Title: Forty Days and Forty Nights in Yemen: A Journey to Tarim, the City of Light
Author: Ethar El-Katatney
Number of Pages: 168
Publisher: Ta-Ha Publishers
Year: 2010 Language: English
Life in our world today has become so intense and busy that we sometimes feel like we need a 'disconnect and recharge' button. Tarim was that place for me where spirituality is in the air and where I felt my soul could breathe. A place where I could connect with my Creator, learn more about myself and return to the world rejuvenated. |
With these very words, Ethar El-Katatney introduces her debut book, Forty Days and Forty Nights in Yemen: A Journey to Tarim, the City of Light. In this book, she meticulously and frankly writes her diary in a small town called "Tarim" in Hadhramaut Valley of Eastern Yemen. She went there in summer 2008 to attend a 40-day intensive Islamic summer course on three aspects: knowledge, spiritual wayfaring, and Da`wah.
The author had first written her diaries in Tarim, Yemen, in a blog that was then published by the London-based publishing house in early 2010.
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| Yemeni village. |
What the Book Describes
Tarim is known to be the "Daughter of Medina," as it has long been considered a beacon of Islamic knowledge and distinguished for introducing numerous Islamic scholars (perhaps the most famous of them these days is Al-Habib Ali Al-Jifri, who wrote the foreword to the book).
People go there from all over the world to learn about Islam. Approximately, one in three Tarimis are descendants of Prophet Muhammad (Peace and Blessings of Allah be upon him), making it the city with the highest concentration of them anywhere in the world.
The Islamic Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (ISESCO) chose it as the Capital of Islamic Culture 2010.
It is said that when you are in Tarim, you feel like you have travelled back in time to the days of Prophet Muhammad. And while reading the book, you will grasp this feeling. It is a desertic, primitive, and small town in which streets are unpaved and dusty; the houses are made of mud bricks, with no television, no fridges, no mirrors, no internet, and no mobile signal reception. Just a serene, tranquil place dedicated to Allah.
Throughout the 40-day diary, the author interestingly describes the details of her experience, starting from her arrival in Sanaa Airport and seeing people chewing Qat all around her, till she goes back to her home in Egypt.
She depicts the places she came through, the "blistering" heat, the food she ate, the Yemini hospitality, and even the girls' talk with her colleagues. She shares her impressions and reflections as well. Caught up in El-Katatney's Sufi experience, the pages turn themselves.
The book also sheds light on the woman scholars in Tarim, who are mostly the wives or the mothers of other male scholars. The author says that they — though not famous — are very knowledgeable and interesting that some of them may surpass men. She felt lucky being a girl, because only females can take the advantage of interacting with them. All through describing the classes, El-Katatney mentions some Prophetic hadiths and Qur'anic verses. Moreover, in the end of every day of the 40 days, she puts one or more quotes from her scholars.
Among these amazing quotes, the one that has touched many of the book's readers says,
| All Muslims know three hadiths: "Acts are by intentions," "Ask your heart," and "Religion is making things easy," which they use to justify their actions. They do bad deeds but say that their intentions are good. They make their own decisions regarding questions they have, not realizing that you should 'ask your heart' only if you find that scholars are equally divided over the issue. They ignore things they should do because they say they are too hard. |
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The Audience
In the book signing, the author said for the first time that she wrote this book for the non-Muslims in the West as well as the Arabs and Muslims.
Aiming at non-Muslims in the West, she tries to show them what is behind the stereotype of the Niqab and the beard and to give a portrait of a place where real Islam has penetrated the hearts of the people and how it is truly a way of life.
El-Katatney also aims at the Arab and Muslim public, in order to show Muslims that there are levels of inner faith, ethical values, and behavior that are way more to life than Prayer and Hijab.
The book is printed on lustrous paper and includes plentiful photographs taken by the author that give a pictorial documentary of the visit and make the reader way more engaged in the experience. And here, we are exclusively showing some of these pictures.
Editor's Note: Check more information about the book on www.amazon.co.uk
