A Personal Journey of a Gay Muslim – I am fourteen years old and I am reading Surah Maryam during Quran class. We are the twenty or so students in my class, belong to the girls part within the Islamic school is where I go in the wealthy Arab nation that my family moved to.
We’re tripping through Surah Maryam painfully slowly, around ten verses at time. I sit at the back of the class, so that we can finish reading before my turn arrives.
Today, I’m writing a note on my calculator for my closest friend and have been trying for a while to figure out an algorithm using numbers, symbols as well as the scattering of alphabets that appear on our calculators’ keyboards.
Then a person in the first row is able to read the translation in loud voice:
The pains of the birth of a child (of IsaMaryam] drove herto the trunk of the palm tree. She told her, “Oh, I wish I had died before this and was in oblivion, forgotten.” (19:23)
I put down my note, put down my watch I stop trying to figure out what I’ll eat lunch, and stop breathing for a moment. Because this verse is telling me that Maryam is dying.
Maryam in the famous surah we’re studying, is wishing to die. Maryam is the name of a chapter dedicated specifically to her by the Quran, this beloved woman to God as the mother of prophets, portrayed as an example to the world–is declaring that she would like to die.
In this traumatic time of childbirth, and the birth of the prophet Isa who would go to establish the whole religion of Christianity This Maryam is speaking to God and expressing her grievances to God crying in the pain of God that she wishes to be forgotten or being forgotten. That she would like to be dead.
I’m 14 years old. I’d like to die.
There’s been nothing that has triggered this sensation However, that’s not the only part of the problem. My life isn’t a mess. My goal is to be gone. To stop living, and more or less. I’m just trying to end my existence. It’s a constant feeling that wants to go away.
It’s a craving that’s never gone away even in the company of my family, even if I’m joking around in public, or engaging in games, or making others laugh. I don’t want to be doing this thing known as living any longer, and this feeling creates and fills a void within me.
I would like my parents not to have seen me, I would like my friends to never be able to meet me, and I don’t want any of this life I’ve never wanted. I would like to never have ever lived.
I’m not going to tell anyone that I’m bored of being alive, and that my desire is to die as I’m unable to comprehend the feeling for myself I don’t have any words to express this emotion, just vague thoughts about this feeling which isn’t talked about in my family, in my society, or in Islam.
Suicide, as we hear often in sermons on Friday, Islam classes, halaqa reading groups are an act of devils. It’s cowardly and one of the most grave sins, that is punishable by hell, which is a way to get out of the family of Islam This means that there is that there’s no funeral prayers or Muslim burial, no audhubillahi minnash shaytan an arrajeem.
But that’s not the issue I’m struggling with, as I insist to myself. I’m not sure the issue. But it’s actually; the feelings I’m feeling, which I’m avoiding, are completely distinct. I’m just trying to erase myself in retrospect. As Maryam I’m not looking to die, but I’d rather be an era of oblivion, gone. I’d like to go to the grave.
After reading the story of Maryam dying in the desert, I’m looking at my next Quran class. I’m nervous as the time gets closer, and am eager to get walking into the lab for language. My class of 22 girls shrinks to less than half while we make through the school’s structure to the annex located on the opposite part of the campus.
All the girls appear not too rushed as we arrive. They have a long time selecting seating spots, chattering, and finally getting settled, but I’m quick Pen out, notebook out with headphones, and I’m ready to begin the lesson.
I’m jumpy. In a state of hyperawareness of everything and everyone concerned that I’m clear, that anyone can see that I’m awed by the next chapter in Maryam’s story Maryam as I lean into the story so that I don’t be able to miss a single word, that I’m grabbing at every detail I can find about the woman who screams at God and desires to die.
Today is a review class, the Quran teacher informs us to prepare us for our midterm that next week. I’m devastated. I’ll be waiting for a full week to find out what’s to come next as we go over the 30 or so verses we’ve read, then we review the recitation, hard words as well as the English translation to prepare for the upcoming exam.
One of the people sitting in front of me begins reading the opening of the surah and I shrug, and as I fall into my usual listening mode. I push my best friend next to me and request to take her multicolored pens to use to sketch. Someone then is reading the translation of these verses to me:
and mention in the Book the story of Maryam as she retreated from her family and moved to an easterly location.
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She then took, to be in complete isolation of them all, an wall. Then, We gave her Our angel, and he portrayed his self to her in the form of a proportioned man.
She said “Indeed, I seek refuge in the Most Merciful from you, [so leave me], if you should be fearing of Allah.
He told him, “I am only the messenger of your Lord to give you [news of] a pure boy [Isa]. “
She asked, “How can I have a boy while no man has touched me . . .” (19:17-19)
I put my foot down. Stop drawing, stop counting how long until the time of my class is up I forgetting about the chips bag that I carry around in my purse, and stop breathing for a moment and my body is caught in a flash of clarity that pierces through my mind and suspends my thoughts.
My arm suddenly raises on itself and, before I’m aware of taking any choice, I’m speaking with a higher pitch than normal and my breathing apprehensive. “Miss. Miss. Did Maryam say that no man has touched her because she didn’t like men?”
There’s an pause. Two seconds of stunned silence before my classmates burst into screaming titters. Some of them squint. This is akin to one of my famous questions that have ruined the class. And some of my students are upset at me for interrupting their free-from-jail review of the classes they’ve missed and the information they should be aware of for their midterm.
However, I am and so thankful for the twittering. It hides my genuineness. I’m grateful for the earlier jokes, and that I am able to use this as a moment of fun instead of having a genuine need to know the answer. I’m curious whether this is a real thing?
Are there women who are as me, who aren’t a fan of males? Who would confide in the handsome, well-proportioned man angel that appeared before them to get away? Who has never been approached by men? Who doesn’t want to be touch by men?
It is the Quran instructor, who is a sexy Sudanese lady in her 60s that has been nice to me, doesn’t appear to have any insight into my question. Thankfully, she doesn’t skip one beat in her answer.
“No,” she says. “It’s because Maryam had taqwa, she had God consciousness in its highest state of being. It’s because Maryam was pious and loved and feared God.
She knew that the Divine was watching her even if no one else was around, knew that the presence of God was everywhere even if she couldn’t see God. Maryam didn’t want the privacy of her situation to tempt her into doing something with this beautiful man, something God wouldn’t be happy with.
Isn’t that an excellent lesson to learn, girls? Don’t ever forget that God is watching. When you’re around boys, God is always watching. If you’re alone with a boy, God is watching. If it’s just the two of you somewhere, then God is the third. Remember Maryam, girls. Maryam turned to God. She asked the man to go away because she had taqwa.”
But I am sure. I’m not sure.
Maryam has an individual,somehow like me. I’m feeling different the next day following Quran class. Feeling relieved at first, once the embarrassment subsides after I’ve finished pretending that the question was intended, after I’m done receiving high-fives on the way to class from my peers for the joke I made. I’m glad that nobody has noticed and happy to know that I’m not only one with this experience.
After this relief, is elation. There are women just as my self in the Quran. Women who are not interested in males, who were born in a wrong way, who live lives completely beyond their control. Women who rage in the presence of God at no cost, about the desire to die.
It’s so intense the elation that it is able to spill out of my body and over everything. Something is different, it’s like something completely new is possible. I’m not talking but I’m bouncing inside.
What was the way Maryam reside? Who cared for her? Who was the one who loved her? What will I do in the future, how can I build my own life? Who will care for me, and who do I care for? I’m intrigued by these questions And curiosity isn’t synonymous with boredom, as well as a wish to go away.
I’m 14 when I began reading Surah Maryam. This year, I decide to not die. The year I chose to live.
The song is adapted from Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H. Copyright (c) 2023 by Lamya H. Published by Dial Press, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. The rights are reserved. The content of this excerpt is allowed to be reproduced or printed without the written consent of the publisher.
All opinions and views within this piece are solely the author’s personal views.
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