by Jean Sasson
Take the evidence from four witnesses amongst you
Against them; and if they testify
Confine them [the guilty women] to houses until
Death do claim them.’ ”
I looked at Nura and then, one by one, at my other sisters. My gaze rested on Tahani’s stricken face. All hope was lost for her friend Sameera.
Sara, usually quiet and restrained, now spoke. “No one can help her. The Prophet, himself, ordered this method of punishment.”
Anger flamed out of my body as I retorted, “Sameera was not guilty of lewdness—there are not four witnesses to any crime of Hudud (crimes against God)! She merely fell in love with a Westerner! These men of ours have determined it is permissible for them to mate with a foreign woman, a woman of another religion, but no, we women are forbidden! It is insane! This law—and its interpretation—is made by men, for men!”
Nura tried to calm me, but I was prepared to fight to the last desperate inch this unnatural tyranny now focused on one whom we all loved, Sameera.
The day before, Sameera had been sentenced by the men of her family and of her religion to be confined to a room of darkness until she was claimed by death. Sameera was twenty-two. Death would come slowly to one so young and strong of limb.
Her crime? While in school in London, she had met and fallen in love with one not of our faith. From our first age of understanding, we Saudi women are taught that it is a sin for any Muslim woman to bind herself to a non-Muslim: The religion of her children cannot be guaranteed if her husband is Christian or Jewish. Since the last word in the Middle Eastern family rests with the husband, the children might well be brought up as Christian or Jewish; the wife and mother would have no say.
Every Muslim is taught that Islam is the final message from Allah to mankind, and, therefore, it is the faith superior to all others. Muslims are not allowed to bring themselves knowingly under the patronage of non-Muslims, nor should they ever allow such a relationship to develop. Yet many Saudi men do marry women of other faiths without repercussions. Only Saudi women pay the supreme price for their association with a nonbeliever. Our religious scholars say the union of Muslim men with women of other faiths is permissible, for the children are raised in the superior Muslim faith of their father.
Just thinking about the unfairness of it all made me scream out in rage. My sisters and I understood that from this moment, the stepping-stones of Sameera’s life, one by one, would lead to a great tragedy. And we, her friends from childhood, were helpless in our desires to rescue her.
Sameera had been Tahani’s dearest friend since the age of eight. She was an only child; her mother had fallen ill with ovarian cancer and, although cured, she was told there would be no other children. Surprisingly, Sameera’s father had not divorced his now barren wife, which would have been customary for the majority of Saudi men.
My sisters and I had all known women stricken with serious illnesses, only to be thrust aside by their husbands. The social stigma of divorce is severe, and the financial and emotional trauma overwhelming for women. If the children of a divorced woman are not suckling, they too can be taken from her. If divorced women are fortunate, they will have loving parents to welcome them home, or an elder son who will give them shelter. Without a supportive family, they are doomed, for no single or divorced woman can live alone in my land. There are government-sponsored homes built specifically to accommodate such women, but life is bleak and each moment is cruel. Those few divorced women who have an opportunity to remarry are lucky enough either to be a great beauty or to have a great fortune. As with everything else in Saudi society, the failure of the marriage and the blame for divorce rests with the woman.
Sameera’s mother had been one of the fortunate. Her husband loved her truly and did not think of casting her aside at her time of greatest need. He did not even take a second wife to provide him with sons. Sameera’s father is a man considered strange in our society.
Sameera and Tahani were the best of friends. And, since Sara and I were closest to Tahani in age, we were playmates of Sameera too. All three of us were envious of Sameera in many ways, for her father bestowed great passion on his only child. He, unlike most Saudi men of his generation, was of a modern mind and promised his daughter that she would be free of the antiquated customs forced upon the females of our land.
Sameera had felt our pain at the obvious failings in our father. In every crisis she had stood firm with the passion of our cause. My eyes stung as I recalled Sameera’s tears at Sara’s wedding. She had clung to my neck, moaning that Sara would die in the harness of servitude! And now she, Sameera, was locked in the darkest of prisons where even servants were forbidden to speak as they pushed her meals through a special slot at the base of the only door. She was never to hear another human voice. Her total world would be only the sound of her own breathing.
The thought was unbearable. I turned to Sara and suggested that Kareem and Asad might lend some assistance. Tahani looked up in expectation. Sara shook her head slowly, no. Asad had already made inquiries; neither the uncle nor Sameera’s former husband would lift the harsh sentence of darkness with silence until death. This was a matter between the family and their God.
The year of my wedding, Sameera had already charted her future with great care. Since an early age, she had had the odd idea to become an engineer. No woman in Saudi Arabia had such a degree, for we are directed to careers considered appropriate for females: pediatricians, teachers, or social workers for women and children.
In addition, Saudi female students are forbidden contact with male teachers, so Sameera’s father had hired his daughter a tutor from London. After years of concentration and effort studying at home, Sameera had been accepted to a technical school in London. Her father, in great pride of his beautiful and clever child, accompanied his wife and daughter to London.
Sameera’s father and mother settled Sameera in a private dwelling. Two Indian female servants and an Egyptian secretary were employed to live with their daughter. They bade their child farewell and returned to Riyadh. Of course, no one had a thought that they would never see each other again. The months passed, and as we expected, Sameera excelled in school.
During her fourth month in London, Sameera met Larry, an exchange student from California. Opposites attract, as they say, for Larry was tall, muscular and blond, a California free spirit, while Sameera was exotic, slim, and mired in the confusions created by our oppressive men.
She wrote Tahani that love had made her heart heavy, for she knew she was forbidden to marry a Christian. Larry was a Catholic who would never agree to convert to the Muslim faith, a procedure that would help their situation.
Within the month, Tahani received a second, more desperate letter; Sameera and Larry could not survive apart. She was going to live with him while in London, and later, she would escape to the States where they would marry. Then, Sameera said, her parents could purchase a home near their daughter in the States. She was certain that their close family relationship would not suffer. But she would be forced to forfeit her Saudi nationality. We would never see her again in our country, for she understood that she could not return to our land after such a scandalous event as marriage to a nonbeliever.
Tragically, Sameera’s parents never learned of their daughter’s dilemma, for both of them and their driver were killed instantly when a water tanker crashed into the side of their car as it crossed a busy street in Riyadh.
In the Arab world, when the head of the family (always a male) dies, the eldest brother takes control of the affairs of the surviving family members. Upon Sameera’s father’s death, his eldest brother was now her guardian.
Never have two men of the same family borne so little resemblance to each other. Where Sameera’s father was permissive and loving, his brother was stern and unbending. A man of the deepest faith, he had often expressed his profound displeasure at the independence of his brother’s daughter. Scandalized, he had not spoken to Sameera’s
father since the day Sameera enrolled in the school in London.
Scornful of the education of girls, he thought it best that females be married at a tender age to a man of years and wisdom. He had recently wed a thirteen-year-old child. She had begun her menses a few months back and was the daughter of a man such as himself. Sameera’s uncle was the father of four daughters and three sons; his daughters had been safely wed at the first sign of puberty. They received little schooling other than the female arts of cooking and sewing, although they had ample instruction in reading skills so that they could recite the Koran.
The day following her parents’ deaths, Sameera received a second shock. A communication of command arrived from her uncle, who was now the head of her family: “Return to Riyadh on the earliest flight. Bring all that belongs to you.”
Her fear of the brutal realism of life under the care of her uncle caused Sameera to gather her courage and plunge irrationally into a headlong course of unknowns. In what proved to be a fatal mistake for her, Sameera and Larry fled together to California. The blatant disobedience of this female child burned into the heart of Sameera’s new guardian. At that time, he had no knowledge of Sameera’s foreign lover. He had no understanding of the wayward girl, for he had no experience with unyielding females.
By the end of the month, with no information of Sameera’s whereabouts, the uncle imagined his niece dead, her body decaying in a heathen land. His hunt for her intensified without results, until finally, at the insistence of his eldest son, he relented and employed the services of a private agency to trace the path of his brother’s only child.
Early one morning, Sameera’s tyrannical uncle, roaring with rage, arrived at Tahani’s villa, clutching the agency’s report. He demanded that my sister, Sameera’s confidante, reveal the location of his “ungodly niece and her infidel lover!”
Eyes wide as she described the scene, Tahani marveled at his anger. He banged his head against the walls of her home; he cried to Allah for assistance in slaying his niece; with fierce denunciations, he promised revenge upon the heathen lover. He cursed the day his brother’s child was born. He prayed aloud for God to heap calamities upon his faithless niece. He declared that she had ruined the honor of the family for generations to come.
Tahani, overwhelmed by his shouting and violence, fled from her home to the offices of her husband, Habbib. When they returned to their palace, Sameera’s uncle had since departed, but not without a dire warning to the servants that the one who sheltered his niece would feel his wrath. To soothe Tahani’s fears, Habbib sought out the uncle and calmed his angry malice. He assured him that his niece was not in contact with our family.
Isolated as she was in another country, Sameera was unaware that her uncle, in a ceaseless effort to locate his niece, now confiscated all family members’ mail. By promise of great punishment should any contact with his niece escape his attention, he intimidated the family. The girl would eventually long for contact with those of her blood; when the “one of great sin”, as he deemed Sameera, weakened, she would not slip past his vigilant eye. He needed only to wait.
Meanwhile, in California, Larry grew uncertain of his love, and Sameera thrashed about as one lost. Her lover’s new indifference bit deeply into her heart; she called Tahani in great fear and uncertainty as to her future course. What should she do? She had few funds and fewer friends in her new land. Without marriage to Larry, she would not be allowed to remain in America. Habbib, while allowing Tahani the freedom of her friendship with Sameera, refused his wife’s request to wire money.
With only a few thousand dollars left in her bank account, Sameera, in an act of desperation, called her dearest auntie, the youngest sister of her father. The auntie, in dread of her brother’s power, dutifully reported the call of her niece. Notified of his niece’s difficulties, the uncle carefully planned for her capture and return to his influence.
Sameera was lured to Cairo with the promise of peaceful reentry into the family she had fled. Money was wired for her return trip. Sameera telephoned Tahani and tearfully confided that she had little choice. Larry’s love had dissolved, and he had no inclination to assist her financially. She had not yet acquired her degree and could not earn a salary. She had no money. She had placed telephone calls to the Saudi embassies in Washington and London. The embassy staffs were unsympathetic. After she had explained her situation, she was curtly told she would have to return to her family. Escape from reality was impossible; she must return to Saudi Arabia.
Sameera told Tahani she was fearfully hopeful that her aunties were speaking the truth, for they had given their oath that their brother had softened and had agreed for her to continue her educational courses in London. Perhaps, after all, her uncle would treat the only child of his brother with kindness. Tahani, certain that the wrath of the uncle had not diminished, was unable to voice her caution, for she saw clearly the futility of Sameera’s position.
Sameera was met at the Cairo airport by two aunties and two male cousins. They quieted her apprehensions with talk of her return to London, once she had repaired her isolation from her family. Happily, Sameera concluded that all would be well. Sameera returned to Riyadh.
When Sameera’s expected telephone call did not come, Tahani fell into the deepest depression. She finally called Sameera’s relatives, only to be informed that the child had a small fever and did not feel well enough to speak to her friends. Tahani was assured that Sameera would contact her the moment her health improved.
The second week of her return, one of Sameera’s aunties answered Tahani’s plea with the news that a marriage had been arranged, and that Sameera wished for Tahani to cease her contacts, for her future husband did not look favorably upon his wife’s girlhood friends.
Sameera finally managed to contact Tahani. Her hopes had been dashed from the moment she saw her uncle, she said. He had been waiting for their meeting, his fury building, until it had peaked at the sight of his “Godless” niece.
Since the night of her return, Sameera had been confined to her room, awaiting the verdict of her uncle. No member of her family dared raise a voice of protest at her mistreatment. She whispered to Tahani that she had been informed that a suitable marriage had been arranged; she would be wed within the month. Sameera was terrorized at the thought, for her relationship with Larry had been one of deep love; she was no longer a virgin.
We were able to discover few details of the wedding, for no one outside Sameera’s family was invited. We knew for certain that it was not a union of joy. We learned that the groom was in his mid-fifties and that Sameera was the third wife.
Much later, Habbib was enlightened of the family gossip by one of Sameera’s male cousins. He said that on her wedding night Sameera had fought the husband with such strength and determination, he had barely survived the taking of what was his. The husband, we were told, was short and fat and not overly muscular. Evidently, blood had been lost, but it was that of the husband; in the fierce battle, he had had little time to verify his wife’s virginity.
When Tahani questioned Sameera’s auntie, who now regretted her role in entrapping her niece, she was told that in the beginning, the husband had been fond of the tigress he had wed. Her insults and brave defense had done little to deter his resolve to conquer her with force. But, as time passed, he wearied of Sameera’s violent gestures of disdain and grew to regret the one he had taken under his roof.
Sameera had bragged to her auntie that, in her distress, she had grown bold and shouted into her husband’s round face that she could not love one such as he. She, Sameera, had known the caresses of a real man, a man of strength. She scorned her husband’s expertise as a lover and compared him cruelly to her tall, handsome American.
Without ceremony, the husband divorced Sameera and deposited her at her uncle’s door. He angrily told the uncle that the family had no honor and had knowingly wed him to one who was no longer pure. In great detail, he spoke of Sameera’s “shame” at coming to the marria
ge bed with memories of another in her mind.
In a bottomless black rage, the uncle sought guidance through the pages of the Koran; he soon found verses that cemented his decision to shut away the one who had shamed his family name. The former husband, still smarting from the insults on his manhood, furthered the decision by vowing to announce to all who would listen the lack of honor in the home of Sameera’s uncle, unless serious punishment were meted out to the girl.
Habbib delivered the sad news to Tahani that Sameera had been sentenced to “the woman’s room,” a particularly cruel punishment. A special room on the top floor of her uncle’s villa had been prepared for her. A windowless padded cell had been completed for the purpose of imprisoning Sameera. The windows were obstructed with cement blocks. Insulation had been installed so that the cries of the one imprisoned could not be heard. A special door had been hung, with a bottom panel adjusted to serve as entry for food. A hole in the floor had been built for the disposal of body wastes.
Curious foreign workmen were informed that a member of the family had suffered brain injuries from an accident; it was feared that this person might harm herself or perhaps others of the family. My sisters and I had gathered to console Tahani, who was suffering tremendous grief at the incarceration of one close to her heart. Each of us was in pain, for Sameera was one of us, a Saudi woman with no recourse against injustice.
While I plotted endless schemes of rescue, my older sisters saw the situation more clearly. They had heard stories about other such women, and knew that there was no hope of extricating Sameera from the isolation of her fading life.
For many nights sleep deserted me; I was consumed by emotions of despair and helplessness. I too had heard rumors of other condemned women in my country receiving the punishment of the woman’s room, but I had never had a picture in my mind of the reality of the drawn and anguished howl of someone I had known, a woman who had embodied the life and hope of our land, a woman now living in utter blackness, without sight or sound to sustain her life.
