Friday, December 16, 2022

Fady Joudah

 Fady Joudah

from 

A Spider, an Arab, and a Muslim Walk into a Cave

The prophet and his closest disciple, Abu Bakr, were hiding in a cave in Jabal Thawr before heading north to Medina. When Mecca’s rulers sent their best trackers to follow the two men to the exact spot where they hid, one of the “invisible soldiers” who God enlisted to aid his messenger was a spider. As the bounty hunters approached the cave, the spider wove a web obstructing the entrance. The bounty hunters paused: surely, they thought, too little time had elapsed for a spider to have spun such intricate work. They turned back to Mecca empty handed. And schoolchildren today learn about the holy spider and her miraculous, protective web.


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Natasha Trethewey

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