Zaabalawi

“‘Who is Zaabalawi?’ He had looked at me hesitantly as though doubting my ability to understand the answer. However, he had replied, ‘May his blessing descend upon you, he’s a true saint of God, a remover of worries and troubles. Were it not for him I would have died miserably—’” 

Zaabalawi’s identity is a recurring question in the text. Here, the narrator’s father hesitates before he answers, likely because Zaabalawi is not a physical man but rather the personification of spiritual awakening. By providing a more specific answer—that Zaabalawi is a healer—the father has already begun to obscure Zaabalawi’s full significance, and we enter a world of illusion as our narrator’s sense of the world becomes unreliable.

“The days passed and brought with them many illnesses, for each one of which I was able, without too much trouble and at a cost I could afford, to find a cure, until I became afflicted with that illness for which no one possesses a remedy.”

Nostalgia is an important theme in the story, here evidenced by the narrator reflecting on the many illnesses that came with the passage of time. Such a statement suggests that the natural world itself has become colder and less tolerant. The narrator’s encounters bear this out; many of the people the narrator meets disregard him or greet him with outright hostility. However, the narrator’s worldview is paradoxical; in an earlier flashback, his father suggests that Zaabalawi saved him from a similarly obscure disease, refuting the idea that the world has changed at all. Through the lens of nostalgia, the narrator can only glimpse a world of jaded illusion.

“While I found that a large number of them had never even heard of Zaabalawi, some, though recalling nostalgically the pleasant times they had spent with him, were ignorant of his present whereabouts, while others openly made fun of him, labeled him a charlatan, and advised me to put myself in the hands of a doctor—as though I had not already done so.” 

The collective citizens of Cairo are an important presence in “Zaabalawi.” Many of the people the narrator meets are men of industry, including a lawyer, a book peddler, and a city official. Their opinions of Zaabalawi reflect a population that has turned its back on kindness for cynicism and materialism.

“‘At least,’ he said, giving me a smile that revealed his gold teeth, ‘he is still alive. The devil of it is, though, he has no fixed abode. You might well bump into him as you go out of here, on the other hand you might spend days and months in fruitless searching.’”

When the narrator seeks the help of the district magistrate, he has already met with various shopkeepers who suggest Zaabalawi could be a myth, or worse, a fraud. The magistrate can say firmly that Zaabalawi is alive, and also describes a man not as blinded by cynicism and materialism as the others the narrator meets. Ironically, the magistrate himself is wearing gold in his teeth, but his advice sets the narrator back on the path towards spirituality.

“Look carefully in the cafés, the places where the dervishes perform their rites, the mosques and the prayer rooms and the Green Gate, for he may well be concealed among the beggars and be indistinguishable from them.” 

The local magistrate gives the narrator a map of the district, urging the narrator to be scientific in his search. He then describes Zaabalawi’s elusiveness, taking special care to warn the narrator of Zaabalawi’s likeness to a beggar; this is significant, since it draws a contrast between Zaabalawi and the modern world’s materialism. The magistrate also alludes to a Sufist invocation of the godhead through Hadhra—literally, “presence” in Arabic. Hadhra is praise and supplication to God, especially through music and poetry.

“Old Hassanein was squatting on a sheepskin rug in front of a board propped against the wall; in the middle of it he had inscribed the word ‘Allah’ in silver lettering. He was engrossed in embellishing the letters with prodigious care.” 

Eventually, the narrator finds the calligrapher Hassanein. As the narrator approaches, he stands quietly for a time and watches the calligrapher, who is in a subservient position (squatting) and doing careful penitent work (inscribing the name “Allah” in silver). The calligrapher’s artistry and piety are sure signs that the narrator is getting closer to Zaabalawi.

“‘He was so constantly with me,’ said the man, ‘that I felt him to be a part of everything I drew. But where is he today?’ ‘Perhaps he is still alive?’ ‘He’s alive, without a doubt. […] He had impeccable taste, and it was due to him that I made my most beautiful drawings.’” 

The calligrapher admits that he knows Zaabalawi but not his current whereabouts. He confides that when Zaabalawi visited regularly, he provided him with artistic inspiration and seemed to live in his best work; art, in other words, is one of the ways humans can experience the divine. The calligrapher’s stories, however, all exist in the past, suggesting that not only Zaabalawi’s visits but also the artist’s best work have already gone by.

“‘Do those who need him suffer as I do?’ ‘Such suffering is part of the cure!’” 

Sheikh Gad has little to add to the narrator’s understanding of Zaabalawi. He is like the calligrapher in that he has felt the presence of Zaabalawi but does not know if he will return. However, Gad reveals an important detail about the narrator’s suffering, previously stated to be incurable. By suggesting that suffering the disease is the first step toward receiving its cure, Gad affirms that the narrator is suffering from his own spiritual unconsciousness. Becoming aware of this is a prerequisite for finding Zaabalawi—that is, spiritual enlightenment.

 “Without removing his hands from his ears he indicated the bottle. ‘When engaged in a drinking bout like this, I do not allow any conversation between myself and another unless, like me, he is drunk, otherwise all propriety is lost and mutual comprehension is rendered impossible.’” 

At Negma Bar, Hagg Wanas serves as the narrator’s final guide on his journey for enlightenment. Ironically, Wanas’s penchant for unabashed public drinking makes the man seem to be the least spiritual of the narrator’s psychopomps. Sufism, however, associates alcohol with altered and transcendent consciousness. Wanas embodies this abandonment of the self in pursuit of enlightenment.

“I dreamed that I was in an immense garden surrounded on all sides by luxuriant trees, and the sky was nothing but stars seen between the entwined branches, all enfolded in an atmosphere like that of sunset or a sky overcast with cloud. [...] There was an extraordinary sense of harmony between me and my inner self, and between the two of us and the world, everything being in its rightful place, without discord or distortion. In the whole world there was no single reason for speech or movement, for the universe moved in a rapture of ecstasy. [...] When I opened my eyes, consciousness struck at me like a policeman’s fist.”

The narrator’s drunken dream serves as the completion of his spiritual quest, which mirrors Muhammad’s Mi’raj. Here, the boon our hero receives is not material, but rather the ecstatic experience of Sufi mysticism, which entails becoming drunk with ecstasy—a loss of self in a sea of expanded consciousness. However, when the narrator returns to the ordinary world, he is immediately greeted with the its materialism, bureaucracies, and hopelessness—all summarized in the metaphor of a policeman’s fist.

“‘My head’s wet,’ I protested. ‘Yes, my friend tried to rouse you,’ he answered quietly. ‘Somebody saw me in this state?’ ‘Don’t worry, he is a good man. Have you not heard of Sheikh Zaabalawi?’”

When the narrator wakes from his dream, he finds that he has been roused by Zaabalawi, who doused his head with water. The surprising turn is both ironic and symbolic. The narrator has been searching for Zaabalawi throughout the story, but only finds him when he becomes unconscious. This suggests that Zaabalawi only exists as a metaphor rather than as a physical entity.

“I was about to run off in pursuit but found I was more exhausted than I had imagined. Collapsed over the table, I cried out in despair, ‘My sole reason for coming to you was to meet him! Help me to catch up with him or send someone after him.’” 

After missing Zaabalawi’s visit, the narrator is overcome with despair. His outburst is representative of his narrative arc; he has grown from the meek and polite citizen he was at the lawyer’s office to a truly desperate person. The passage also carries a note of irony, because the narrator has already received what he needed most from Zaabalawi—to be lulled into spiritual bliss.

“He was sitting on this chair beside you the whole time. He was playing with a string of jasmine petals he had around his neck, a gift from one of his admirers, then, taking pity on you, he began to sprinkle some water on your head to bring you around.”

Wanas describes Zaabalawi’s decision to wake the narrator from his dream as an affectionate act. The imagery of the jasmine petals is deeply significant in Islamic tradition. “Jasmine” translates to a “gift from God” in Farsi, and the flower’s pale petals have come to symbolize purity. This allusion is central to the text. Although Zaabalawi eludes the narrator, the presence of jasmine petals in the narrator’s dream suggests that the true boon was the temporary attainment of divinity—“a gift from God.”