Salmiya

When recently having read German Orientalist Tilman Nagel’s voluminous opus maximum on life and legend of the prophet of Islam , I became once more interested in the different versions of Muhammad’s ascension to heaven and his night journey to Jerusalem which had already been combined in the earliest surviving text on his life, Ibn Ishaq’s (d. 761) Sirat Rasul Allah (“Life of the Messenger of God)”, edited by one of his students, Ibn Hisham (d. 830 CE). Largely powerless, his preaching oppressed, his followers brutally persecuted, Muhammad had tried, just 18 months before emigrating to the city of Yathrib, to reassert himself by telling strange stories about night journeys. According to the Kitab al-Tarikh wa al-Maghazi by another biographer, Al-Waqidi (d. 822), the prophet ascended to heaven on Ramadan 17 (621 CE) when having a nap at the Ka’aba in Makkah. A ladder ( mi’raj ) was put up by the two angels Jibril (Gabriel) and Mikhael (Michael) between the Zamzam well...

I was sitting in an airplane of Saudi Arabian Airline. It had turned out to be extremely difficult for me, the infidel, to get the visa for the, at least for foreigners, isolated country of Islam. Countless times I had to go to the Saudi Arabian consulate in Jabriah. I spent endless hours there and was usually treated in an unusual rude and impolite way. “The organizers will inform us if you are welcome!” I was told. “Come next week!” The organizers were the Saudi Arabian Association for Dental Research who had just started another attempt of organizing an annual meeting of the country’s dentists. Having lived and worked for a couple of years in Kuwait, I became more than curious to see whether they were interested in my research, too. Our Dean and my friend and colleague from Jordan wanted to accompany me. She also wanted to go to Makkah for Umrah , the lesser pilgrimage, but that was immediately declined by the authorities at the consulate. No way. Dhu al-Hijjah was coming soon, and...

I was somewhat hesitant to post this photo which shows Lady Evelyn Zainab Cobbold. She is featured in a wonderful article in the new issue of Saudi Aramco World . Lady Zainab was the first Scottish Muslim woman who conducted the pilgrimage to Islam's holy city in 1933, at the age of 66 or so. It is in a way touching to read about her life, that she always felt to be a Muslim (so, she never converted), and about her spiritual exaltation when eventually being part of the crowds of the faithful in Makkah. I have got some impressions of spritual mass phenomena when having visited certain holy shrines in Iran, for example the Hazrat-e Masumeh in Qom and the holy shrine of Emam Reza in Mashhad . I experienced a stark feeling of being a complete outsider, and deep inside I felt a kind of regret (but I certainly would not embrace Islam). Being not religious does not mean that I won't be susceptible for deep spiritual thoughts and experiences. It is a pity (but in a way understandable)...