7

I was still a child when I first saw my father beat my mother. Patches of skin were visible through his wispy beard, which meant he hadn’t been with the militants for long. But it took only a few weeks of indoctrination for him to change. Gone was the man who wore Western pants and snuck out to the movies. Gone, too, was the man who allowed his wife to berate him in front of his children.

In his place was a man who stood holding a glass in one hand and my mother’s neck in the other. His face was twisted in rage, and flecks of spit were flying out of his mouth. I don’t remember what he was shouting about or how the argument began. But I remember pressing against my sisters as we looked out from the kitchen, watching the events unfold in the hallway. I remember the sound the glass made as he brought it down on the side of her head, how its violence and its volume surprised me. And I remember the noise my mother made as she fell to the floor, as if all the life were leaving her body through that tiny whimper.

The next day, after my mother returned from the hospital, I saw that the hair above her ear had been shaved, and her skin was swollen and stitched. From that time forward, things changed at home. My parents’ arguments flared more readily, although they often ended just as quickly when my father reminded my mother what would happen if she didn’t back down. Sometimes, though, no matter how loudly and desperately she pleaded, his fingers still reached for her throat.

Perhaps I was too young to see it, or maybe I was blind to the truth, but at the time I never made the connection between my father’s conversion to militant Islam and the increase in violence in our home. I was unaware of the way the group spread their poison, of how they encouraged my father to embrace his power to lead and rule his family the way a “true” Muslim man should. To my mind, the pain and fear he introduced to our house had nothing to do with his faith. It was simply the way things were.

And that is why, the second time I heard a mullah stand up in the daras and teach about jihad, I did not associate it with violence and fear. Though it wasn’t as exciting as the day I gave away my gold jewelry, once again I accepted everything I heard. But now the stakes were even higher. Jihad was not just a matter of how you lived. It was about way more than that. Yes, I thought. This is the way I must die.

†

I could tell from the number of shoes lined up outside the meeting room that the daras was well attended that Friday afternoon. I took up my usual place beside my mother in the screened-off area and listened as a mullah I had never heard before began to preach.

“This world is your examination hall,” he said. “If you pass in this hall, you will have everlasting life. If you pass here, then on the day of judgment you will go to heaven. If you fail, you will go to hell. Every time you face something you think you can’t do, remember this truth. Your actions are being recorded and will be remembered on the day of your death.”

I remembered my dream from years earlier, the one in which an angel dragged me to hell. I knew all about our deeds being recorded and counted for or against us on the day of our death. But the idea of the world as our examination hall was entirely new to me. It stuck in my chest like a fish bone.

“When we die, what awaits us is the pain of the grave.” I knew all about that, too. My mother had often spoken of the way our graves will stretch and pull, crushing and straining us within them. I’d always shivered at the thought.

“But not everybody will face the grave. Those who die for Allah will avoid hell entirely. Anyone who gives their life in jihad will go straight to heaven, straight to paradise. We should all embrace the struggle for that life rather than this one. Brothers and sisters, I tell you that this life is only temporary. Everyone has to die sometime.”

†

At first I’d thought of jihad simply as a struggle against poverty. The tools I used in the fight against injustice were my gifts of jewelry and my lovely white dress, and my devotion to educating children who were too poor to attend school. But I knew this was not enough. I had been sensing this for months.

My unease started soon after I gave away the dress. I was still upset about the whole episode—partly with Allah but mainly with myself—when my mother told me that the next daras would not be held at our house.

“Why not?”

“Auntie Selma has asked that we meet at her house.”

We had been meeting for weekly gatherings in our home for years, and a special bond had grown between the hundred or so people who attended. Having spent so much time learning about the Qur’an together, encouraging each other to become better Muslims, we had become like family. We helped each other when times were hard and celebrated when times were good. Whenever one of our members had something significant to announce, we often relocated the daras to their home.

Auntie Selma was not an aunt by blood or marriage, but she was special to everyone in the neighborhood. Her husband and three sons were good Muslims—always generous, kind, and devout.

“Has one of her sons gotten engaged?”

“Perhaps,” my mother said. “She said she wants all of us to dress up and share a feast.”

When Friday finally came, I was excited and decided not to stage another fashion battle with my mother. I gladly chose a dress I knew she liked. We walked the short distance to Auntie Selma’s house as a family, my father and brother striding ahead, my mother, sisters, and me following respectfully behind.

Auntie Selma directed the women to one room as her eldest son invited the men into another. “Welcome,” she said to the women once we were all inside and the door was closed. She was holding a large photograph of her husband, and suddenly it struck me that months had passed since I’d last seen him.

“My husband has been martyred.” Her voice was strong, and her eyes swept the room as she spoke. “It was his wish that his eldest son should be sent to fight. So next week, I will send him for jihad. You must all pray that he doesn’t become fearful and return home, and that when he goes, he fulfills his father’s wish. Pray that he will become a martyr too.”

The room instantly filled with cries about the greatness of Allah. Auntie Selma stood and smiled as she acknowledged the women’s exclamations. Before long we were eating sweets and fragrant rice and drinking cool sodas. The women were buzzing from conversation to conversation. I sat quietly and watched, knowing that this was a place for mothers, not children.

After we returned home, I tried to speak with my mother about this news, quizzing her about where Auntie Selma’s husband’s jihad had taken place and how he had died. But my mother told me she knew nothing more than what Auntie Selma had said.

Her words did not satisfy my curiosity, and she knew it.

“We might never know how or where he died,” she explained to me later that evening. “But we do know for sure that he is a hero. What he did is an example to us all.”