Once the news of the three preachers—Qaher, Maher, and Shaher—had spread across Antrototo, everyone wanted them. Their names reached the farthest corners of the planet. Followers came from every direction, seeking their advice on almost everything in public and private life.
Hardly anyone made a decision without first asking a preacher what was permissible, what was forbidden, what pleased Antar the god and ruler, what displeased him, and what might bring down his anger and punishment. Of course, each preacher interpreted the rules according to his own temperament, beliefs, and preferred approach. As the people liked to say, even worship has its factions.
One group wanted to follow everything that pleased Antar and everything approved by his followers and messengers, such as Noor. The preachers had already told them that their new god and benefactor, Antar, would eventually send more messengers after Noor. Noor was merely the first.
There would be another list of envoys and representatives. Antar would give the preachers the names of those he appointed so that the people could be warned in their places of worship and taught the importance of having intermediaries between themselves and their god.
After all, their god might be ill, exhausted, or busy with the enormous responsibilities of godhood that had suddenly fallen upon him and driven sleep from his eyes—even though his divine eye supposedly stayed awake day and night, never sleeping, never dozing, over his servants.
Still, apparently, even a god could become tired and overwhelmed.
This poor Antarian god, they were told, always needed someone to carry the burden of his enormous divine duties.
Therefore, among Antar's worshipers was a group that preferred strict commitment, taking the sacred book exactly as it had supposedly been revealed. They chose to make things difficult for themselves, to devote enormous effort to worship, even to sacrifice their lives and labor in the struggle to raise the banner of—well, "worship," as they called it—along with humility and supplication before their god Antar.
Naturally, such people would choose the preacher who best matched their worldview.
Just as science had branches and disciplines that all belonged to one larger field, these believers believed that the different schools were merely branches of one grand science: the science of flattering, glorifying, and magnifying the One God, Antar.
The branch best suited to them was the preaching of Qaher, "the Conqueror."
They gathered around him, always asking questions about their standing with Antar—the god-ruler, or ruler-god—and asking to be taught the foundations of worship and religion so they would know what was allowed and what was forbidden.
Qaher, the ever-ready preacher, gave them long lists of prohibited acts, forbidden things, and permitted pleasures, and answered every question they brought him.
A second group hated this approach. They saw it as excessive and severe, as though the tender and merciful god Antar were some cruel creature who had to terrify his servants into worshiping him with everything they possessed, spending their most precious resources and exhausting themselves in his service.
To this second group, such behavior was obvious exaggeration and fanaticism. They considered it a distortion of the image of Antar as the loving, merciful, compassionate god who really wanted nothing more than the happiness of the people he ruled.
Why would such a god demand difficult rituals? Why would he want to deprive them of the pleasures of life?
Maher, the second preacher, told them that the basic rule of things was permission.
In other words: relax.
They did not have to live under an endless mountain of rules. The god was not asking them to suffer unnecessarily. This comforted them enormously. It made the new Antarian religion seem gentle, moderate, and merciful—not so strict that every simple matter became a burden, but not so loose that it collapsed into lawlessness or vulgarity.
So this group naturally turned to Maher, the clever negotiator of religious ideas, who knew how to stitch together their torn beliefs, patch their intellectual holes, and smooth over everything they could not reconcile.
He could serve them bitterness as though it were honey, without their noticing, and sweeten it with the sugar of faith, mercy, tolerance, and the compassion of their god Antar.
They followed him in every small and large matter, looking for the ideal formula that would satisfy Antar and allow them to sleep peacefully, free of worry.
The final group loved ideas of progress, civilization, science, and refinement. These were educated people. They could read and write, they were curious about knowledge, and they loved learning.
But they did not want to lose their religion.
They were afraid that science, culture, and civilization might carry them away into a deep ocean of knowledge and enlightenment until they suddenly found themselves far from the strong rope of faith—the rope that supposedly pulled them out of the depths of rational knowledge and back toward the eternal horizons of belief, its mysterious spirals and its dark labyrinths that only increased faith through confusion.
They adored this strange mixture because it allowed them to preserve the sweetness of their ignorance—or, as they preferred to call it, their faith.
So even when they studied more deeply and descended farther into the oceans of knowledge, they kept searching for the strong rope of faith that would pull them back from the sea of science and rescue them from its blinding light before their hearts became blind and the light of their insight went out.
Shaher, the "wise" preacher, always knew exactly what these people wanted.
He gave them what they dreamed of.
He dedicated his sermons and messages to them. He threw them the ropes of faith, took their hands, and led them toward the path of divine mercy. He pulled them from the vast sea of science by reminding them that every branch of knowledge they encountered was itself the work of Antar, the Antarian god, who had known all of it long before they did.
Their science, he told them, was only a drop in the oceans of his knowledge.
Antar had spoken of those sciences in the sacred law he had supposedly written, and Shaher would open those lessons for his followers during his sermons and instruction.
They loved the arrangement.
They could study without feeling that knowledge might pull them away from faith. Science and faith were presented as twins—identical halves of one whole, each completing the other.
Their god Antar was said to be almost a living mass of knowledge embodied in a divine ruler. He was knowledge made flesh, if such an expression could be used.
Antar loved hearing reports of the three preachers' influence over his believers. He was delighted that they were satisfied with him, obedient to him, and eager to follow him.
Samson and Qandil were no less delighted.
They all drank a toast to their magnificent victory.
And especially after Samson ordered Antar to print copies of the sacred law that Samson and Qandil had written for him, carefully weaving the dramatic plot around his supposed divine status.
The plan was so cleverly constructed that, over time, almost everyone came to believe that a real god named Antar existed—that he was no longer merely the ruler of Antrototo, but the One True God they had somehow failed to recognize until the appointed moment.
Then, when the hour finally came, this hidden god supposedly revealed himself.
To make the strategy more convincing, Antar did exactly what Samson ordered. He printed the portion of the merciful law that had already been written and distributed copies to the believers.
But a sacred law needed a sacred name.
After consulting Samson, Antar called it **The Antorabi Law**—a glorious title, a sacred trademark, a name that sounded ancient enough to have existed before anyone else on the planet.
The preachers did their part perfectly.
They explained to the believing servants that this merciful law was not the end of the revelation. There were more sections to come.
This was only the beginning.
So let them rejoice in it. Let them enjoy its blessings. Let them swim happily through the oceans of faith while remaining eternally loyal to their great god Antar.
Each of the three preachers had his own style, his own methods of persuasion, and his own labyrinth of explanations for questions of religion, worship, and faith.
Each had become an expert—not at repairing these doctrines, of course, but at "interpreting" and explaining them whenever a believer found them difficult to understand.
Qaher was the first star.
His followers called him "Our Master," especially the believers of the first group. Whenever they saw him, they kissed his hand. They sat before him like students before a teacher, or children before their father and benefactor, obedient and ready to follow.
Seated in his chair, Qaher explained and interpreted whatever their minds and logic found difficult or unacceptable. He had an answer for every question and an explanation for every contradiction.
He insisted that he was not patching holes. He was merely dressing the wounds of a wounded heart—and bandaging the crooked, crippled logic that had been injured by doubt.
Yet despite his severity, quick temper, and nervous disposition, Qaher often reproached himself for his outbursts and regretted his anger toward other believers.
Strangely enough, despite his supposed piety, he had a filthy mouth and a sharp temper. But he often regretted losing his temper.
That was why he was rarely found in the middle of the crowd.
He was both solitary and social at once.
He had enough hypocrisy and flattery to appear at celebrations and funerals, cultivating the friendship of Antar's officials, politicians, soldiers, and courtiers so they would give him gifts and favors in return for his constant flattery and proximity to them and, through them, to Antar.
But when he was alone, he enjoyed his solitude.
Whenever he found an opportunity that did not require him to flatter officials or curry favor with powerful men at Antar's court, he chose isolation immediately, as though throwing a heavy stone off his chest.
Maher was different.
His specialty was seduction through gentleness.
He spoke constantly of the kindness, tenderness, and mercy of Antar—mercy greater than a mother's mercy toward her child.
His most attractive message was simplicity: worship should not be burdensome. People should not torture themselves. The god wanted them to be happy and enjoy life on Antrototo.
They should not deprive themselves of life's pleasures.
His evidence was that God was moderate in his demands. Worship was built on balance, tolerance, mercy, and moderation.
He hated the extremism Qaher preferred.
Maher regularly criticized Qaher in front of his followers and told them that Antar was displeased with him.
Maher also loved mixing with the people. He could be found almost everywhere, with or without a reason, using every opportunity to display the tolerance of his message and insist that his intentions were pure.
True religion, he said, was built on moderation, tolerance, and love of humanity. Mixing with people and loving them were fundamental pillars of religious devotion.
This won him countless followers.
It did not matter whether they were noble, educated, or merely part of the crowd. What mattered was that there were many of them, obedient, convinced, and hopeful for the rewards Antar would pour upon them if they worshiped him faithfully.
Qaher and Maher differed in style, but both depended on the same machinery of faith.
Qaher held the weapon of divine anger and punishment before his listeners more often than he offered dreams and promises of reward. He relied heavily on fear, intimidation, and punishment.
He believed that fear of Antar—the god and ruler at the same time—was more important than the softness and tolerance preached by Maher.
Fear, he said, was the foundation of worship: tears shed in terror of God, hope for his forgiveness, willingness to sacrifice everything to satisfy him, and total loyalty to raise his name and power.
Through such sermons he frightened people's hearts. He promised disaster—complete and terrible—for anyone who disbelieved in Antar or whose heart was corrupt.
His words terrified them. His warnings shook them. They rushed toward him seeking, and sometimes begging for, forgiveness and mercy so they could escape the anger and punishment of Antar.
As for the third preacher—well, the third was Shaher.
Shaher danced with progress. He applauded science and trumpeted knowledge, but always on one condition: science had to be tied to faith.
He served science with the flavor of religion and religion with the taste of science—a strange mixture that could taste bitter like poison yet supposedly heal the chests of those infected by unbelief.
He taught them that those who truly feared God were the learned, and that scholars were inheritors of divine messengers and prophets.
This was Shaher's constant message.
He repeated it with absolute certainty into the ears of believers in the third group, the people who loved science and civilization but feared that their magnificent faith might shake beneath their feet in front of the enormous giant of knowledge.
They feared that the mountain of their faith would collapse from the top of its steep peak before the powerful pickaxe of science.
What was a believer to do when confronted by such a scientific giant? It was savage, powerful, armed with sharp claws called honesty, logic, transparency, and evidence. Those claws could tear faith apart and leave it lying helpless on the ground.
The thought alone kept many believers awake.
But Shaher offered the solution.
Here, he told them, was where the mind could finally rest. The burden of thinking could be lifted. The believer's heart could relax under Shaher's powerful preaching.
He raised the sword of science—but not against religion.
He claimed to wield it for the believers, to rescue them from the terrible punishment of their god.
Whenever Shaher raised that strong sword, the believers who loved both science and religion bowed before his answer.
He had the magical, comforting solution—but on one condition: hold fast to the rope of religion. Tie it tightly around your heart so that the cursed thing called thought could never loosen the knot.
In his sermons and spiritual lessons, Shaher described science in the language of faith. Its fragrant aroma supposedly filled their hearts and minds, not merely their senses.
They disappeared into the depths of "scientific faith" and "faith-based science."
He told them that God should not be worshiped through ignorance, in an obvious attempt to persuade them that worship became stronger, better, and more valuable to Antar when it came from scientific knowledge, analysis, and faith all at once.
Scientific ideas were therefore forced beneath the umbrella of faith—even when the principles of that faith were themselves illogical.
The millstone of faith, powerful and vigorous, crushed every scientific idea beneath its teeth, mixed it with religious doctrine, and turned the resulting mess into something soft and sweet—like pudding.
That way, the believer would never lose his faith during the violent clash with the cold iron sword of science.
Through this method, Shaher guaranteed that the third group of believers would never let their ignorance—or, as they preferred to call it, faith—melt away like a piece of ice beneath the burning golden sun of science.
Sometimes he persuaded them that all the scientific achievements they saw around Antrototo—discoveries made by other peoples, in other regions of their vast planet—were nothing more than tools for worshiping Antar.
Even if those scientists did not know the god or believe in him, their science was still secretly serving him.
They were merely arrogant, obstinate unbelievers.
Science, Shaher said, was actually a tool created for one purpose: to lead you toward the god, to help you know him, and to draw closer to him.
That was the true purpose of science.
At other times, Shaher would read pages from Antar's sacred book, **The Antorabi Law**, and explain them as scientific information wrapped, cooked, coated, and preserved inside faith.
Every scientific discovery, he claimed, was already there.
Scientists who searched and discovered new truths were never adding anything to what had been written in the sacred law. It had all been explained in advance.
The book was already filled with science, stacked high with knowledge, and all the skill Shaher needed was to interpret those sacred sciences for the believers.
"Do not be surprised, believers," he would tell them. "You are servants. Therefore you must be loyal and obedient to your god and master. This is not a matter for debate.
"Science is never foreign to faith. The two agree. They resemble one another. They are twins.
"Even if logic and scientific reasoning appear to disagree with both of them, believe the person telling you that they agree. That is merely another deception of the accursed Saman.
"The god is worshiped through knowledge. We understand him when we decipher the scientific mysteries engraved and preserved in the law of the Merciful God, Antar the Great, the Compassionate, the Generous.
"And when you finally understand, you will realize how insignificant you are, human being, beside the genius, knowledge, and civilization of the magnificent Antarian god Antar—the king and god who rules humans and jinn."
The believers who loved science and remained loyal to the god and the religion adored Shaher's sermons.
Why wouldn't they?
He soothed their hearts and calmed their minds so that the two no longer collided at the wall of science and logic.
After listening to him, they felt comfortable: believers and scholars, civilized and faithful all at once.
They could bring together the two things that seemed to be enemies and return home at peace without thinking too hard about either one.
That was precisely what Shaher wanted.
They could hope for the god's reward and mercy and reach him through science. They could worship and pray in the name of science.
His words made them certain.
They repeatedly returned to his sermons because he made them feel safe.
He even expressed his own dissatisfaction with the other two preachers and claimed not to approve of their methods because they ignored the wonders of science and relied too heavily on what earlier generations had said.
To Shaher, science was part of faith and could never be ignored.
That was why the third group loved his words so much.
He understood what they needed, and he gave it to them.
He kept their faith clothed so that science would never strip it naked.
For if that happened, the believers would leave him.
And so the three preachers agreed on one thing above all: they must never agree.
They had to appear different, because that was the plan.
But who knew the plan?
Who understood what was really happening?
Of course: Antar, his magician Samson, and his minister Qandil.
They had explained it all to Antar and convinced him, especially Samson, who had the strongest influence over him.
Antar could not move a step, lift a finger, or form an idea without Samson's permission and planning.
Without Samson, Antar was worth nothing.
Take Samson's magic and deception away from him, and Antar would be like Cinderella after midnight.
Samson had been the one who proposed the whole arrangement, with Qandil encouraging him, and he convinced Antar that the three preachers must clash publicly and insist upon their disagreements.
The purpose was to keep the believing servants trapped in a permanent maze without realizing they were inside one.
That was the real trick.
Each of the three groups had to believe that it alone possessed the truth, that it alone knew the correct way to practice faith, and that everything the other groups believed was nothing but nonsense.
Thus each believer lived inside a maze from which he could never escape.
He would circle it forever until his life ended, always caught between the stick and the carrot—punishment and reward, longing for eternal bliss while terrified of eternal torment.
There was no way out.
The circle around his neck had to remain tightly closed, or disaster would follow and every form of happiness would disappear.
This was the elaborate deception Samson had designed, with Qandil beside him, and which the three preachers executed with impressive precision.
They convinced all the believers that they disagreed with one another, even though in reality they were almost identical.
They were tightly connected. Their interests were aligned. Their goals were the same. They were cooperating to perfect the great trick of faith—the polished magical deception that had worked on every kind of believer.
Soon believers spent day and night memorizing, reading, and even worshiping the sacred book of Antar: **The Antorabi Law**, which had been imposed on every corner of Antrototo.
Each group interpreted the law according to the preacher it had chosen, following his sermons and religious lessons until each became convinced that he alone was walking the true path and following the straight road of genuine faith.
And the game of faith between the believer and the Merciful God kept spinning, endlessly orbiting the same imagined light.
It was like a cat chasing a mouse.
The magic word became the key to the secret and the lifeline that supposedly protected them from every evil.
How could it not?
It covered the nakedness and weaknesses of Antar's invented religion and his claimed divinity.
It was glittering light—gold only on the surface, a thin coating that concealed the cracks beneath.
It stood between the believer and thought, reason, and logic under the excuse of faith and the promise of an imaginary paradise.
Paradise, as the joke went, was simply hell painted red in every shade, with a gold-colored crust.
And the believers, in all their groups and shades, remained in that state.
They began to venerate **The Antorabi Law** beyond all measure. It became more precious to them than their own children, their flesh and blood.
They followed the path laid out for them with extraordinary precision.
This made Antar happier than ever.
He rejoiced. He celebrated. He took enormous pleasure in the success of his plan and the power of Samson's deception.
Samson and Antar laughed together and raised another toast to their victory.
Their laughter filled the vast, imposing palace of Antar until it seemed the very walls might split open from the joy of their triumphant success in the great game of faith and the believers who had fallen into it.
Chapter Nine
The Illusion
Noor's happiness as the messenger had become immense. The new religion and the new god had spread through nearly every region and settlement of Antrototo. This was largely due to the support of the three preachers—Maher, Shaher, and Qaher, despite the differences they claimed among themselves.
Those differences allowed them to tighten their grip, impose their influence over the believers, and raise their standing among the inhabitants of Antrototo. They credited their success to Antar, the new god, whose happiness was no less than theirs. Indeed, his self-satisfaction surpassed even theirs.
Antar had become the official god of Antrototo—or at least the official god recognized by the believers, his devoted servants who accepted him, praised him, and applauded him. Some were hypocrites. Some were deceivers. Others were simply naive believers who accepted the story, believed in him, worshiped him, and surrendered themselves to his new religion.
But as always, every camp, every herd, produces a few dissenters.
There had to be one discordant note in the song—a melody that sounded unlike the familiar tune, a voice singing a different hymn from the one repeated by the growing herd of believers who had become devoted servants of Antar.
This discordant note irritated Antar more than anything.
He had grown accustomed to hearing only the herd's melody. To him, it had become a sacred obligation.
But the strangest thing about the discord was the identity of the person producing it.
The very person singing that unfamiliar song was one of the most devoted followers of Antar and the Antarian religion, one of those believers who supposedly guarded his faith and clung tightly to it.
His name was Aref.
Aref was a young man in his twenties, and he was the only grandson of Nasr.
His grandfather, Nasr, had raised him after the death of his father and mother.
As everyone knew, Nasr worked as a potter—a craftsman who made clay vessels, cups, household tools, and other objects the people of Antrototo depended on in everyday life.
When necessary, people also commissioned Nasr to make statues. They treated some of these figures as sacred objects, weaving stories and myths around them. Some claimed the statues had once been the spirits of evil gods who had been transformed into the shapes Nasr made.
Others believed the statues protected them from divine anger, brought good fortune, or summoned food and rain, because benevolent spirits supposedly inhabited them.
Naturally, these concepts changed somewhat after the rise of the supposed divinity of Antar.
The first messenger, Noor, had worked tremendously hard on the believers. His first efforts had produced only a modest result, but the tiny fruit of that effort gradually grew until it became a flourishing tree—with the help, of course, of the three preachers, Maher, Shaher, and Qaher, who had become the stars of Antarian society on Antrototo.
Yet traces of the past remained lodged in people's minds.
Many believers continued to think of the statues as spiritual intermediaries, as objects carrying a divine breath from the great and only original god, the source from which all the lesser gods supposedly sprang with their sacred spirits hovering over the people.
According to this belief, the spirit of Antar inhabited the statues. People commissioned the statues specifically for that purpose, then prayed through them, asking their spirits to intercede with Antar—to forgive them when they sinned, reward them when they deserved reward, and spare them his anger and displeasure.
At first Antar strongly rejected the idea. He feared that believers might forget him and begin worshiping the clay statues instead.
But Samson convinced him that the practice was actually useful. It supported the story of creation from clay that Samson was spreading through the three preachers—Maher, Shaher, and Qaher.
Samson even ordered Antar to encourage them to continue.
Behind the scenes, Samson secretly created human shapes from clay and other materials. He cast spells over them to make them move like people, or else used his magic to make believers think they were moving.
He placed them in streets and public squares, then made the people see what he wanted them to see.
Through the three preachers, the message was spread that Antar himself had created these figures and breathed his spirit into them, just as he had created all the inhabitants of Antrototo and given them life while they were still in their mothers' wombs.
Humanity, they were told, had originated from sticky clay because of Antar.
Therefore, believers could easily accept that the great god Antar had breathed some of his spirit into these statues. Sometimes Nasr made such figures alongside his household pottery, and the believers imagined that he had given them an Antarian divine breath, turning them into little gods born from Antar himself—little angels acting on his behalf.
Once Samson explained the advantages, Antar not only accepted the idea but became pleased with it.
It supported his supposed godhood and strengthened his announcement that he was a god. It also reinforced the idea among the naive believers who had already begun accepting it.
When Aref was still a child, something happened that would remain with him.
One day, as usual, little Aref sat in front of his grandfather, Nasr, and watched him with wonder and fascination while he worked on a clay statue.
Nasr was an accomplished potter, and he could spend hours shaping the vessels every household in that region of Antrototo needed. But he was especially meticulous when making one of the statues people commissioned from him.
On that particular day, Aref entered the workshop while his grandfather was deeply absorbed in his work. The boy sat in front of him and watched.
The statue had been commissioned by one of the wealthier inhabitants of the planet. It was the figure of a large, tall man with a woman standing beside him, tiny by comparison, as though she were a small piece of his body—as though she had sprung from one of his ribs or from some part of his enormous, powerful frame.
Aref was ten years old at the time.
He often sat beside his grandfather, his eyes speaking the language of wonder, while questions seemed ready to pour from his mouth at any moment.
That day, he watched the strange statue with particular fascination. He followed the movements of his grandfather's hands as they traveled through a sea of wet clay and soft mud, turning and shaping the material through careful curves and measured motions.
Suddenly Aref asked:
"Grandfather, why does the woman look so small and weak beside this man? Aren't both figures supposed to be statues of the same kind, the same size?"
Nasr looked at his grandson uneasily.
His eyes trembled like a clock pendulum swinging from side to side.
The old man himself had not been completely convinced by what was happening. Doubts moved quietly inside him. But he often accused himself of failing to understand the whole matter, or of having weak faith.
At times the words of the three preachers affected him. He was especially drawn to Maher, who preached moderation and balance and insisted that love, tolerance, and avoidance of extremism were among the divine qualities of Antar.
So sometimes Nasr doubted, and sometimes he believed.
The growing fame of the three preachers and the fact that nearly everyone had accepted their claims made matters even more difficult.
Many people had come to believe that Saman the Accursed had never been a righteous man at all, but an evil, resentful creature who hated Antar and wanted to lure people away from him.
According to the new story, Saman had told his old followers that he had died, yet he had remained alive to tempt the believers and lead them away from the god's path because he had hated Antar ever since the day Antar expelled him from his palace and from the paradise of luxury he had enjoyed there as one of Antar's closest servants before the Antarian curse fell upon him.
Nasr's confusion became even worse after he began spending time with Abu al-Hikma.
Abu al-Hikma mixed seriousness with comedy, laughter with tears, truth with fantasy.
Nasr could do little but laugh along with everyone else while hiding his questions inside his chest, leaving their fires to burn beneath his ribs and trying to silence them by every religious explanation he could find.
But what worried Nasr most was his grandson's closeness to Abu al-Hikma and the boy's obvious fascination with his jokes.
Nasr knew Aref asked too many questions and thought too deeply. He feared that the boy might someday begin thinking seriously about the contradictions hidden inside Abu al-Hikma's jokes.
Then he reassured himself: Aref was still young. And everyone regarded Abu al-Hikma as nothing more than a mocker, a fool, or perhaps a harmless eccentric.
That thought calmed him for a while.
Then he would fall silent again, as though waiting for something to happen.
Suddenly Nasr was pulled out of his thoughts by the voice of his grandson.
"Grandfather! Grandfather! Where did you disappear to? I'm talking to you and you're staring into space. Why aren't you answering me? Is there something you're hiding from me?"
Nasr stammered nervously.
"No, no, my son. Nothing at all. I'm simply exhausted from all the work and feel that I need some rest."
Aref looked at him.
"I thought my question was difficult—or perhaps impossible to answer."
Nasr smiled weakly.
"Not at all, troublesome grandson. Your question is perfectly clear. In fact, you answered it yourself without realizing it."
Aref stared at him in astonishment.
"I answered my own question? How?"
Nasr stepped closer to his grandson.
"It happened when you said the woman looked small and weak beside the enormous male statue.
"That is natural, my son. That is simply the nature of woman. No matter how large her body is, she remains physically weak compared with the strength of a man's body.
"She declares that weakness simply by standing quietly beside him. She appears to be a part of him—or part of his powerful body and ribs."
Aref frowned.
"But can't a woman simply be a woman without having to be weak or standing in a way that announces how small her role is and how little status she has?"
Nasr shifted uncomfortably.
"Will you please stop with all these questions? I knew you would exhaust me and argue over every little thing."
"I am sorry, Grandfather, if I've burdened you with my questions. But I have the right to understand."
Nasr sighed deeply.
"Because woman has always been subordinate to man, my son. She obeys him. That is how we were raised, and that is what we have always known in this region of Antrototo.
"A woman is weak and always needs someone to lead her. And since she is, in the old story, originally part of man, it is natural for him to lead and for her to follow.
"She is the weaker side. Her functions are defined, and her role is limited by man."
Aref stared at the statue.
"So that's why you made it like this?"
"Because it represents the first creation. We humans came from dust and sticky clay. The original creation began with a primordial father and mother, and from them all humanity descended.
"Didn't you hear Maher's sermon a few days ago when I took you with me to listen to his religious lesson? Have you forgotten?"
"No, Grandfather. I remember it well.
"But I also remember how confused I was during that lesson. There was one question that kept bothering me. I wanted to ask Maher about it, but I was afraid he might laugh at me or ignore me.
"Maybe he'd think I was too young. Maybe my question would mean nothing to him, and he wouldn't care enough to satisfy my curiosity."
Nasr looked worried.
"What question troubled you, my son? Why did it cause you so much confusion?"
Aref hesitated, then spoke honestly.
"If what Maher—and the other two preachers—keep saying is true, that we were created from dust and sticky clay, then where is that clay?
"A few days ago I cut my finger, and after that sermon I deliberately examined it because I wanted to see that cursed clay for myself.
"But there was no clay anywhere."
He looked genuinely puzzled.
Then Aref walked toward the statue his grandfather was making.
He came closer, staring at it with an expression of uncertainty and suspicion.
He studied the figure and pressed his index finger into the clay body.
"Where is the blood?
"If I came from the same source as this statue, where is its blood?
"If this statue is supposed to represent my creation, where is the clay in my body?
"If this statue represents me, where is the blood?
"If I am descended from it, where is the clay?
"If I am an extension of it, as they claim, and if it is part of the origin and foundation of my creation, where is the connection between us?
"I see the opposite. You and I—and this statue and I—seem to live very far apart from one another."
Nasr swallowed hard.
His throat had suddenly gone dry.
He stammered more than before, as though he were asking himself exactly the same questions.
But he pulled himself together, straightened his back, and tried to compose an answer.
Aref, however, had already planted the question deep inside his grandfather's mind.
The old man would remember it long after the boy stopped asking.
And that question would become one of many seeds of doubt scattered through the family—seeds that neither preaching nor fear could entirely bury.
Later, Abu al-Hikma came to visit.
No one knew exactly what he believed.
Some people considered him a clever, malicious man who deliberately pretended to be ignorant and foolish so he could say whatever he wanted and then have everyone dismiss it as madness.
Others could not decide whether he was serious or joking, whether he believed or disbelieved.
No one knew for certain.
Aref, however, had never felt comfortable with Abu al-Hikma's sharp words. He often sensed that the jokes meant exactly what they seemed to mean, and that behind the laughter lay a denial of the credibility of the great god Antar.
Still, Abu al-Hikma always insisted that he was a believer and that he performed the required rituals.
He simply liked, from time to time, to soften the bitterness of life with sarcastic humor.
One day Aref brought tea to Abu al-Hikma.
He took the cup immediately and thanked him.
"Perfect timing. This tea is exactly what I needed. I have a terrible headache.
"And perhaps your grandfather's illness—and the sadness written across his face—has somehow passed to me and added to the pain in my head."
He glanced toward Nasr, who was lying on the bed, and a mischievous smile appeared behind the faint grind of his teeth.
"I prayed to the great god Antar to cure my headache. But the headache remained stubbornly attached to my head. It refuses to leave.
"Maybe it is resisting the god's command.
"So I thought perhaps a cup of tea would be stronger than my prayer. Surely my stubborn headache won't dare disobey a cup of tea.
"Maybe the headache will feel embarrassed and leave after the first sip.
"What a rebellious, unbelieving, disobedient little creature."
Aref let out a long, sharp breath that escaped between his ribs like the blade of a sword and seemed to burn Abu al-Hikma's face.
"Abu al-Hikma—or Uncle Abu al-Hikma, as I've always called you—you are my grandfather's only close friend and the person closest to him.
"Honestly, I don't understand you anymore. I cannot tell what you're really getting at with your words and contradictions.
"Are you joking? Or are you mixing seriousness with humor because there is something you do not want to say openly?
"You have confused me for a long time.
"I've spent nights thinking about your words. Even as a child, I used to wonder about what you said.
"You know how much I questioned things when I was young—faith, God, the meaning of belief. I often wondered whether your jokes were truly just jokes, as my grandfather always told me, or whether there was something else behind them.
"Something you don't want to tell anyone.
"Something you're afraid to say openly.
"Maybe you pretend to be foolish or crazy so that the foolishness becomes a messenger carrying the words you are too afraid to say yourself.
"But why do you say these things?
"I was a child, and I had an excuse. I was young. I didn't understand what true faith meant.
"But you…"
Abu al-Hikma suddenly sprang to his feet.
He muttered under his breath, almost sadly:
"I wish you'd stayed a child. I wish you had never grown up."
Then he suddenly pretended to become furious.
"I swear I am a believer!" he shouted, his voice loud enough to cut through the ears of everyone nearby.
"I will not accept anyone questioning my faith. What are you saying, my boy? How dare someone like you say this to me?
"No. This is too much. I absolutely refuse to accept such an insult from you.
"I was merely joking with your grandfather to ease some of the pain of his illness, and now you come here and casually throw these insulting words at me?"
Nasr raised himself slightly from the bed and tried to calm him.
"Don't be upset, Abu al-Hikma. Aref is like your own grandson. He did not mean to insult you at all.
"He loves you very much. He loves your jokes and laughs at your contradictions all the time.
"Please don't be angry."
Aref immediately got up, approached Abu al-Hikma, kissed his head, and apologized with genuine regret.
"I'm sorry, Uncle Abu al-Hikma. I never meant to insult you or question your faith. I was only asking questions. Besides, I…"
Abu al-Hikma interrupted him, pretending that his anger had cooled as he sighed.
"I am a true believer. And because I consider you close to me, like your grandfather, I joke with you. That's all."
Aref sighed in relief.
"It's all right. It's all right, Abu al-Hikma, you good and wonderful man. Sometimes I can't help wondering about you.
"Please forgive me. Don't be angry with me."
Abu al-Hikma sighed.
"I forgive you, my boy. Would a grandfather become angry with his grandson?
"I only wanted to test how much you love me and how much you care about pleasing me."
His voice carried the familiar edge of sarcasm.
"Exactly as we, the believing servants, are expected to seek the satisfaction of the great god Antar.
"We know that he tests us during our lives on our glorious planet, Antrototo.
"Of course, this test is not like the little test I just gave you. His test is deeper, wiser, and more divine.
"He wants to see how desperately we work to please him, so that after we die he can choose which of us deserves to remain forever in his bliss—the ones who cared most about earning his favor and avoiding his anger, punishment, and bitter hell.
"And we gladly accept this test. We are satisfied with it.
"We know that he tests us, and we never stop to ask why an all-knowing, all-experienced, all-powerful god would need such a test.
"Perhaps he has doubts, just like we do.
"Perhaps he has fears of his own."
Before Aref could say a word, Abu al-Hikma quickly added in a firm voice:
"Of course, those are merely the whispers of Saman the Accursed. He has crawled into this poor head of mine with his whispers to weaken my faith.
"What a jealous creature he is! He envies the great god and has hated him ever since that famous incident between them, back when he was responsible for everything in Antar's palace and betrayed the trust placed in him.
"What a vile creature."
Aref began to smile, almost relieved by Abu al-Hikma's familiar performance.
But Abu al-Hikma continued, his voice carrying a strong, confident, sarcastic rhythm.
"Still, whenever I think about this great examination and test, I remember an old story my grandfather once told me. I still remember it to this day, and it always makes me smile."
Aref looked at him eagerly.
"What story?"
Abu al-Hikma answered:
"My grandfather told me that when he was young, he knew a man from a remote region of our vast planet, Antrototo.
"The young man had a small orchard filled with many kinds of fruit. He cultivated it and lived from the harvest.
"But a group of troublesome children kept wrecking the place.
"Every night, they would sneak into the orchard in the darkness, or slip in around the quiet hours of early morning, pick his delicious fruit, play with it, tear leaves from the trees, and damage the harvest.
"No matter how much the man shouted at them or warned them, nothing worked. He often chased them with a stick, but they always fooled him.
"They kept returning, picking fruit, playing among the trees, and destroying what he had planted and labored over. As a result, he could not sell the amount he needed from the season's harvest.
"The poor man became desperate. He could not understand how to stop the children or keep them away from his orchard.
"He was a man of limited means, and he had already tried everything—scolding, begging, pleading, speaking gently. Nothing worked.
"Finally, after long suffering and even longer thought, he came up with a clever trick."
Abu al-Hikma paused for effect.
"One day he built a wooden statue from two pieces of wood. It had a fake head and arms stretched outward. He dressed it in human-looking clothes, so that it resembled a person—and, more importantly, looked close enough to the children to frighten them.
"He named it Ammar the Braggart.
"He gave it bulging eyes and sharp claws, fixed to the tips of its fingers. Then he dressed it like an evil sorcerer.
"He hid it in a secret place and positioned himself behind it—or behind one of the huge trees in the orchard—so none of the children would see him.
"When he spotted the children approaching at night, he raised his rough voice and shouted:
"'I am the sorcerer Ammar the Braggart! Anyone who comes near me—or near this place—I will bewitch! I will pour my greatest anger and wrath upon him! I will turn him into a terrifying, hideous monster whom everyone will hate, or I will strike him with a terrible disease from which he will never recover, and he will suffer until he dies!'
"The man performed his trick brilliantly.
"Every night he terrified the children with his frightening words. He also spread a story through one of his close relatives—someone who, naturally, benefited from the fruit of the orchard—that the evil sorcerer was actually his brother.
"The brother had been traveling for years, the story went, and the man had never spoken of him because he feared the sorcerer's evil.
"This supposed sorcerer was said to be vengeful, powerful, arrogant, proud, and merciless—terrible enough to destroy anyone who angered him.
"From that day on, the children stayed away from the orchard.
"They had fallen for the trick and believed the deception.
"The man had wanted to test how frightened they were of him, and how carefully they would avoid angering him, after seeing the wooden statue standing with its arms outstretched among the great trees.
"Soon everyone—young and old—began treating the imaginary sorcerer with caution. They approached him, or rather avoided the orchard, out of fear of his supposed wrath and in hopes of earning his favor, enjoying the good things of his orchard, or receiving his protection.
"He convinced them that anyone who stayed away from the orchard and obeyed his orders would earn the sorcerer's approval and escape his punishment.
"The sorcerer would supposedly send all kinds of good things upon the obedient.
"But anyone who disobeyed and came near the orchard would be doomed.
"With a single finger, the sorcerer Ammar the Braggart could supposedly turn him into an ugly monkey, a spotted snake, or strike him with the most deadly diseases and terrible disasters.
"And so the man achieved his goal.
"What a deceiver. But clever, all the same.
"Through his clever trick, he deceived everyone into believing that he simply wanted to discover who among them was most deserving of his favor and paradise, and who deserved his anger."
Abu al-Hikma sighed as though there were something else waiting at the edge of his tongue.
But suddenly his voice failed him, as though he had suffered a fatal blow or been struck mute.
Aref sat before him, studying every expression on his face, every movement, every shift in his eyes.
To Aref, Abu al-Hikma's face had become an unknown map whose hidden keys he was trying to discover for the first time, using the man's words and the strange story he had just told him as clues.
Eventually Abu al-Hikma prepared to leave.
He asked permission, then walked away with heavy steps, lost in thought.
He left Aref equally lost in thought—and Nasr no less disturbed.
The long silence was finally broken by Nasr's hesitant voice.
"What is wrong, my son? You look distracted and silent.
"You are not unfamiliar with Abu al-Hikma's jokes, contradictions, and stories."
Nasr reached toward Aref's face as though a blind man were testing the first steps of an unfamiliar path.
Then, with tension in his voice, he asked:
"Did Abu al-Hikma's story—or his words—upset you?
"I know you, my son. You…"
Aref interrupted him.
He deliberately gathered confidence into his expression, like a fighter pretending to be strong and fearless while standing before a giant—an ant facing an elephant.
"I don't care about Grandfather Abu al-Hikma's words. He may simply be rambling or making jokes. Perhaps he only wants to amuse you and make your illness easier to bear with stories like that.
"Don't worry about me, Grandfather."
Nasr smiled.
"Bless you, my son."
Aref kissed his grandfather's forehead, then went to his room, hoping to sleep.
But sleep was nowhere near him.
Aref tried to silence the voice that had begun ringing inside his ears.
Before his eyes appeared the ghost of his own childhood self: little Aref, endlessly curious, endlessly astonished, constantly asking questions and exhausting the adults around him.
He tried to push the child away from his imagination, his memory, and his thoughts.
But the child would not leave.
His questions kept returning.
They began gnawing at Aref's mind once again.
The ghost of that questioning child now gnawed at the mind of the grown young man.
A struggle erupted between them.
The adult Aref battled the child he had once been.
Sometimes one seemed to defeat the other. Then the other came back and won.
The struggle grew hotter.
Sleep vanished completely from Aref's eyes.
He became afraid of the voice he was fighting with every strength he had.
More than anything, he feared for his own mind—or rather, for his heart.
He feared for his faith.
The sharp blades of that child's voice were moving closer and closer to him, to the very center of his belief, as if they wanted to cut through it.
Aref entered a whirlpool of doubt and conflict.
He asked himself:
"Was I simply a small, ignorant child who understood nothing?
"Or was what I said back then logical, my thinking still clean because it had not yet been polluted or programmed?
"Which of us will win this fierce battle?
"And when everything is finally over, to whom will victory belong?"