Rushdie Haunted by his unholy Ghosts — Page 102
102 Mohamed Arshad Ahmedi with sharpened stakes at the bottom. When the Jahilians saw this foul piece of unsports-manlike hole-digging their sense of chivalry and honour obliged them to behave as if the ditch had not been dug, and to ride their horses at it, full-tilt. . . . trust an immigrant not to play the game. ’ (p. 365). SA L M A N FA R SI It is worth mentioning here who Salman Farsi really was as this may help explain why he too became a target of Rushdie’s poisoned pen. Salman Farsi was born of Persian Zoroastrian parents in the village of Jayy near Isfahan. After converting to Christianity he travelled to Syria whilst still young. There he became a companion of a saintly bishop who, on his deathbed, advised Salman to go to the Bishop of Mosul, who was old but was the best man he knew. Salman set off for the north of Iraq, a journey which was to be the beginning of a series of attachments to early Christian sages until the last of these sages, also on his deathbed, told Salman that the time of the appearance of a prophet was now at hand: ‘He will be sent with the religion of Abraham and will come forth in Arabia where he will emigrate from his home to a place between two lava tracts, a country of palms. His signs are manifest: he will eat of a gift but not if given as alms; and between his shoulders is the seal of the prophecy. ’ Salman made up his mind to find this prophet and paid a party of merchants of the Kalb tribe to take him with them to Arabia. However upon reaching Wadi al-Qura near the Gulf of Aqabah at the north of the Red Sea, they sold him as a slave to a Jew. The sight of palms in Wadi al-Qura made him wonder whether this could be the township he was seeking, but he had his doubts. The Jew sold him to a cousin of his of the Bani Quraiza tribe in Medina. Salman’s new owner had another cousin who lived in Quba, and on arrival of the Prophet this Jew of Quba set off for Medina with the news. Salman was working at the top of a tree while his slave master was sitting under its shade. When Salman heard the Jew from Quba