Fatima was thinking of running away, she wondered if there was any chance of making a new start somewhere else. The rest of the women in her community had a series of names for her, it had started as “The Black Widow” after her first two husbands had died, but since the last three they’d opted for “Homewrecker” and “Slut.” She got tired of sharing her story, telling people why, trying to justify her existence, it was just all judgment. The white women weren’t any better. Some of them were openly hostile, calling her “Paki” and “Bin Laden” mocking her hijab, others were polite, but clearly uncomfortable and just didn’t understand her. Fatima was lonely.
Sure she had Mike at home, another reason the community hated her, in fact she’d moved in with him as an act of defiance to her parents and uncles who disapproved heartily. Not only was he a kufr but they were living together without being married, though obviously marrying a kufr was out of the question. Mike had been the final straw with her family, she was an apostate and now an outcast. The truth was that Fatima would prefer to marry Mike, at least she wouldn’t feel quite so guilty then, but Mike wasn’t interested in that. Mike was now the only person who ever spoke to Fatima, and even then it was usually to say “fuck off from in front of the telly” or “go fetch me a beer” she didn’t even know why he kept her around, or why she stayed, except that she had nowhere else to go.
But now she was thinking of going. Standing in the railway station she glanced up at the departures board. She had no plan, no money, she just needed to get away. Maybe she’d just get on the first train and see how far she could get before she got thrown off for not having a ticket.
She wandered into the shop on the concourse. She had no money but she was parched. Maybe she could steal a bottle of water without getting caught.
She was just trying to pluck up the courage to pop one under her coat when a voice behind her said “Excuse me, can you pass me a bottle of water please?”
Turning round she saw a Jewish man smiling at her. She knew he was Jewish from his yarmulke. He must have known she was Muslim from her hijab. Well this was a turn up for the books, fancy the only person to speak nicely to her this week being a Jew.
“I bet he’d be more scathing if he knew I was shacked up with Mike” she thought.
Bravely she looked him in the eye and raised her eyebrow
“Are you talking to me?”
“Yes I am” smiled the man
“You can see I’m Muslim right?”
“Yes I can see that”
“And you’re Jewish? and you’re asking me to pass you a bottle of water?”
That’s when the man said something really strange
“If you knew the gift of Allah and who it is that asks you for a bottle of water, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
“What a weirdo” she thought. But at least he seemed like a nice weirdo, she took a chance
“Well Sir, I have no money, even to buy this crappy bottled water, so if you’ve any water you can give me I’d be grateful”
He responded rather cryptically
“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Fatima laughed, clearly this guy was a kook, but there was something about him. Mad men normally made her feel unsafe, scared, with their unpredictability, but there was nothing like that with this guy. He felt safe, he seemed to exude a remarkable peace.
“Okay buddy, well perhaps you can give me some of this living water so I will never be thirsty again” she chuckled.
“Okay he said, go get your husband and come back here and I’ll give it to both of you”
“Oh how presumptuous”, she thought “that he would see a Muslim woman and assume I’m someone’s chattel”
“Sir, I have no husband”
“That’s right” replied the man “You’ve had five husbands and the man you live with now isn’t your husband”
How the heck did he know that?
And yet, he said it so gently, compassionately. There was no hint of judgmentalism, no suggestion she was doing something she shouldn’t be. He didn’t call her a “slapper” or a “whore”, he didn’t ask why she was shacked up with a kufr, he just seemed to accept her.
He smiled again. He looked back into her eyes as though he knew her, really knew her, and yet still loved her. Mike never looked at her like that. None of them had. None of them had ever really known her. How could this stranger…. He talked of Allah, perhaps he was from Allah.
“Okay, I guess you’re a prophet” she dared to whisper, such a thought, there had been no prophets since Muhammed (PBUH) “So what do you think of what’s going on in Israel right now? About how your people won’t let us worship Allah there in peace?”
“Woman” he replied “It doesn’t matter where you worship Allah, a time is coming when everyone will worship Allah truthfully, whoever they are. That is what Allah seeks, truthfulness and authentic worship: Allah just wants you to be you, you’re great. Let me tell you something I haven’t told anyone yet.”
He leaned in close “I am He, Fatima. I am here with you.”
For a moment time seemed to stop. Fatima looked the man in the eyes and felt like she saw the whole universe reflected back, she felt, in that moment as though she were cradled in the hand of the creator of everything, like a ladybird gently held in the hand of a rapt child before it would spread it’s wings and take flight. Fatima felt as though she could spread her wings and take flight at any moment.
Then the moment was shattered by a shout “Josh, we got you fish n chips, is that okay?”
Fatima smiled and headed home to pack a bag and make a proper plan. She had never felt so seen.
The ‘Jesus in Jeans’ series, reimagines what stories from the life of Jesus might look like if they happened today. This series doesn’t make any claims to be the gospel, to be the bible, or to be brilliantly sound theology (I’m a storyteller, not a theologian) Rather, it aims to help the reader think about the context of the story, what might have been going on in the lives of people Jesus touched, and to bring stories from a culture that can seem alien to us into the modern world to make them a bit more tangible to us.
If you’re a Christian, I hope these can give a fresh perspective to familiar stories, and if you’re not, please, read on, don’t dismiss them as not for you. Stories teach us, entertain us and connect us, we don’t have to share the faith the stories have grown out of to enjoy them, and I hope, that by setting these stories in the world we all inhabit they can be given a fresh relevance to those who may consider the originals a bit dry and dusty.
