Zilhan, Nimrod's Daughter

4. 02. 2017 20:05:01
Sitting on a carpet near the catapult columns we were amazed more than ever, more than with any other legend or tale Mom told us with her sweet voice full of love.

In my native town Farqin (Silvan in Turkish) my Mom's name was Zilhan (Zeliha in Turkish). It was not a common name in Kurdistan where we were living. Farqin once upon a time used to be the capital of Kurdish Merwani Kingdom and about 100 BC it had been the capital of Kingdom of Armenia.

For us Mom's name sounded like out of some fairy tale, a name of some mysterious princess. But not only for us, also for people around. Our childhood friends were asking curiously why our Mom's name was Zilhan. After dinner we used to sit around her and she used to tell us a tale or a legend we asked for. She used to tell a story with her sweet voice full of love stroking the closest child's hair with her gentle fingers. When she finished storytelling I asked her once why her name was Zilhan. We always called her just Mom, daye in Kurdish, with love and respect. Instead of explanation she sang a song, smiling lovingly. She promissed to explain but we had to go with her to visit the City of our Prophets. This made us curious even more but when we were asking impatiently when we would go to see the mysterious City she just kissed us and hugged so we were growing more and more curious. Finally she probably gew tired of our questions so she arranged the long promissed trip. It was in April when it was not so hot and the whole Kurdistan was covered in lush green, dotted with colourful flowers and streams were brimming with water from melted mountain snow. We took an old WWII Jeep Willys and with our driver we set off for a trip to the City of Prophets.

It was the time of a State directed economics in Turkey. It was just impossible to decide and go to buy a car, actually life was even worse than in a Communist country. Dad was clever and had his friends so he was able to get an old Willys probably a third or fourth car in our town. We went with a driver as Dad could not drive and probably even did not want to. Our Willys was hardly enough big for us, four kids, and Mom.

The journey in our Willys took us the whole day driving bumpy countryside roads. We were jumping over the Moon with joy, enjoying wind blowing around us. Before we got on the road to the City of Prophets we had had to pass the unofficial capital of Kurdistan, Amed (Dyarbakir in Turkish). The Dyarbakir people were watching us, we looked at them and the City's charming buildings, palaces and churches. One gate led us into the town and we left it through the opposite gate. We were amazed seeing the whole city built inside a forteress wall. We went on along a narrow country road climbing upon a mountain. There were just big black stones around us... We thoroughly enjoyed our journey but Mom was sitting on the front seat and she was turned back to watch us all the time. She was nervous about everything and above all that we were too much excited about every discovery and jumping high and shouting.. She must have been worried for our safety but she did not want to spoil the trip. If a rare tractor or a truck once in a long while appeared our driver always went to the edge of the road and let them pass. We were jumping high in our Willys, waved and greeted the people in the passing vehicle, they answered blowing their car horn and we were overexcited, glad they answered to our greetings.

When we came to the top of the mountain we stopped to have lunch next to the holy stream spring. It was cold on the mountain top however all of us left the car and run where Mum said the holy stream spring would be. There were huge black boulders everywhere around us and we were slipping over the boulders before comming to the source of all that roar we could hear from afar. We even did not have to ask Mom if we went in the right direction. It was the Karacadag mountain, a former volcano leaving all those black stones around us and letting a huge river bursting out of its rocks ( just when I grew up I realized that it was just a stream but then it seemed to be as wide as a huge river to me). Mom spread a carpet near the river and put all those picnic meals she had prepared with Aunt a day before. We were jumping around the river but even if we loved playing in the water this cold river was discouraging us. Mom was calming us with her sweet voice saying it was a holy river as much as the Tigris River. She told us that the Lord created four streams to bring water to our Paradise and this used to be one of these streams. It used to be a much bigger river then but huge fire burst out of the mountain, such a big fire that some of the water was thown around the slope as much as all those stones we saw all the way from Amed Town. The stones were a memory of a huge explosion when the fire just burst out of the ground and since than the river has became smaller and smaller. Once again we were sitting on a carpet around our Mom and were amazed listening another of her fascinating stories. Our Uncle, the driver, was just nodding in approval of Mom ́s stories and waved to us from our car.

We filled all our vessels with the Blessed River's water and we went on our journey to the City of Prophets. Everywhere around us there were herds of sheep and goats grazing among endless black stones. We never had seen so many of them together and when our driver blew the car horn and the panicked animals were running away we were watching these huge lots of animals moving to all sides. We waved their shepherds, they waved to us. Once or twice Mom asked the car to stop. She left our jeep and approached the shepherds giving therm homemade sweets and the Holy River water. When she was leaving she bowed deeply, nearly touching the ground, put her right hand on her heart and then she touched her mouth and forhead. Finally she raised her hand towards the heaven and said "May the Lord bless you, my brothers", then they said "amin ya RAB" together and the shepherds answered the same way. They bowed slightly, touched their heart, mouth and forhead with their right hand and raised it as high to the heaven as thery could and said "May the Lord open the whole road, Amen."

We were watching our Mom and we were proud to see her giving sweets to unknown shepherds, to see her freely talking to them and we were feeling them belonging among out friends.

As the evening was falling we were approaching the City of Prophets. Our poor Mum was all the time turned back to face us and she was telling us how poor the shepherds were. They had to take their flocks early in the morning, just at the sunrise, among all those black boulders to look for some green grass, how all of them were sitting in the blazing heat around the noon, how their sheep and goats are tired of all that heat so they even cannot walk anymore and also their shepherd cannot find a shady spot to hide. Even today I can remember all of her talk.

Mom started to tell us stories about the City of the Prophets being the City of the Eden from the Bible which the Lord was protecting Himself. There would be lakes full of fish there that sometimes there would be more fish than water but they could not be touched by people. It would be the place where Adam and Eve's descendants would live.

Mom amazed us again. We definitly knew about Adam and Eve from her evening tales as much as Noah and his Arch and how he landed on a high mountain after the flood covered with snow and ice by the Lord so as no human foot could touch it. We also knew about Eden but we heard about the City for the first time and we could not wait to be there so we kept asking Uncle - our driver, when we would come there.

Finally we come to the City of Prophets. At first we could see just trees full of pomeranginates, olives and pistacchio trees around us and high mountains around the City in a half-moon shape. We were so eager to see lakes full of fish. However, being so late we went to Mom's relatives who greeted us and hugged us and where we would stay. They were bringing everything available and they were quite surprised to learn we managed to come there in just one day. They brought ayran with finely cut rose leaves floating in it and we got Mother Sarah's bread, the tastiest bread we had ever tried.

The adults were talking all the night long about the Prophets, Adam and Eve, Noah and Abraham and about the evil Nimrod. Just Nimrod was an evil person, everybody else were so nice, so holy and I was suddenly scarred of the idea that such a villain could live here, in the City of the Prophets.

Next morning we asked Mom about the story of her name as much as we came mainly to know it. She caressed as as always and she said this day she would explain and show.

We left for the mountains with our hosts. The road went really uphill and the trip was quite tiring so we were making lots of stops, always being given cold water and sweets by out Aunt before we reached the top of the mountain. There were two huge columns towering high, as tall as minarets that Turks were erecting in our town.

On the top of the mountain we sat on the carpet given to us by our Aunt and Mom with her sweet voice finally started to tell us the story about her name, the story for which we had come such a long way through the strange countryside.

From the top of the mountain she pointed her finger down towards the landscape.there was a vast plain as far as we could see. Mom said it had been the Paradise where the Lord sent Adam first and when he saw he was alone in the Paradise he created Eve for Adam not to be sad and lonely.

She asked if we remembered Noah and we answered immediately we did. He build the Arch and took all animals inside to save them from the Flood. The Mom aked us if we could see the Arch. As Noah trusted the Lord and he did everything he had been ordered and so he not only saved him but also all the animals. Noah's great-great-grandson was called Nimrod. That Nimrod took Adam's fur coat taken by Noah into the Arch and so preserved. So Nimrod took that fur coat and with that he became so powerful that he even stopped obey the Lord. He gave his name to two mountains. One of them was quite far, a week long trip on a horseback near the Adiyaman town the other one was near the Van Lake and it was just 3-4 day trip. The first mountain was the place to spend a part of winter and the second one, near the Van Lake was to spend a part of summer as it never is too much hot there. The top of the mountain is filled with the Van Lake that never gets frozen, even in winter. It is huge and it stays always warm so a bath in the lake cures all kinds of diseases. Nimrod also built a great City of Babylon far away across a desert because he wanted to be equal to the Lord. Finally the Devil ruled him and he started to create lots of minor gods. One night the Devil told him in his dream that a boy would be born next year in the town of Ruha who when he gew up would kill him. On the next morning Nimrod ordered his guards to kill all boys born in that year so a massive killing begun. But his officer Ahad's wife, Nuna, was also pregnant. They did not know if a boy or a girl would be born so they kept her pregnancy in a secret. Finally a boy was born. They secretly took him into the mountains above the Ruha town and left him in a mountain cavern. The baby was hungry and finally a doe heard his hungry cries. Eventhough she knew it was a baby of a dangerous human species she came close and despite of being afraid of humans she fed the baby. One day the desperate parents could not overcome their feelings anymore and they went to the mountains to find the baby's bones to bury them. How surprised they were when they found the baby-boy full of life and merrilly playing with animals. They realized that one of gods was feeding him so they left him in the cavern and returned just much later when the King's order was forgotten to take the boy back with them and called him Abraham.

The boy grew up into a strong, brave and proud man who fought his father and also Nimrod breaking their idols and gods they celebrated in stones. He shouted that they were betraying the only Lord.

Nimrod was very angry and he ordered to put Abraham into a prison. Nimrod's daguhter Zilhan was Abraham's best friend, they were like a brother and a sister to each other and she was the only one who believed him that there was just one Lord. When she learned that Abraham was imprisoned she went to see her father and fell on her knees begging to release him if not for anything else just to please her. But Nimrod was a cruel man and he considered himself being equal to gods. He did not release Abraham and sent his daughter to their summer palace, at the other end of the city, where the mountains are around Ruha. As sad as Zilhan was she went everyday to one rock where she cried bitterly being afraid that Abraham might be killed. Her tears made a stream and eventually a lake appeared and flowers from every corner of the world were growing on its shores, as much as trees full of pomeranginates, figs, apricots, peachs and other fruit.

Nimrod ordered two tall columns to be built on the Ruha mountain to make a catapult and sentenced Abraham to be thrown by the catapult but not onto the ground, to throw him into a fire. So Nimrod forbade everyone to cook their food on firewood and to heat their houses and he ordered to bring all that wood from all his kingdom under the mountain to make a fire worse than the fire of Hell itself. Wood filled the whole valley and the mound was eventually nearly as high as the mountain. Then the king ordered to load the catapult and to throw Abraham into the blazing fire. But the Lord turned the fire into water and the still unburnt pieces of wood became fish. The Lord made Abraham fall not into the water but onto soft grass of the garden watered with Zilhan's tears. In that moment both lakes joined with a narrow canal.

So this was how Mom finally told us what her name meant, so rare and so beautifull. Sitting on a carpet near the catapult columns we were amazed more than ever, more than with any other legend or tale Mom told us with her sweet voice full of love.

Those lakes have been there since then and nobody can touch fish living there. Sometimes there are more fish than water there, thanks to beautiful Zilhan's tears.

............................................................................................

On a carpet next to a catapult columns high above the city we were bewitched with listening to a story that was nothing like other tales or legends Mother told us with her sweet voice, full of passion and love.

.......................................................

Český překlad je zde : http://uzunoglu.blog.idnes.cz/blog.aspx?c=580475

Autor: Yekta Uzunoglu | sobota 4.2.2017 20:05 | karma článku: 12.16 | přečteno: 306x

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MUDr. Yekta Uzunoglu (kurdským jménem Yekta Geylanî, * 10. května 1953 Silvan, Turecko) je kurdský lékař a podnikatel s arménskými kořeny (mezi jeho předky byli turečtí Arméni, oběti Arménské genocidy na konci první světové války).[zdroj?] Mimo svých profesí se celoživotně angažuje jako kurdský aktivista (upozorňování na potlačování kurdské menšiny v Turecku, Íránu a Iráku), spisovatel a překladatel: Je například autorem překladů částí Bible a děl Karla Čapka do kurdštiny, a naopak kurdské poezie i prózy do češtiny a němčiny. V roce 2006 obdržel cenu Františka Kriegla.Od roku 1996 německé občanství.

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