“Money?” the mullah continued. “Power? Property? Status? Family? What do any of these things profit a man who has sold his dignity? A man can lose his fortune. He can fall from power. His home destroyed by natural disaster, his position ruined in the blink of an eye, and his family taken from him. But if he has his dignity, he loses nothing. If he has his dignity, he is in a state of grace. For dignity is given to us by God and can be taken from us only if we give it of our own free will.”
The mullah opened his aba, put his hand in the chest pocket, and took out a document. “A man came to see me holding this piece of paper in his hand. He said to me, ‘Haj-Agha, the authorities gave me this deed to land and said I could cultivate it and feed my family. But it’s not enough land and I don’t have the means to farm it.’”
He looked at the document with mock awe.
“It is an impressive piece of paper. It bears a very official stamp from a high office. But it is a piece of paper. Can this man live on it? Can he shelter his family with it? Can he eat it?”
The congregation let out a collective laugh.
“He asked me: ‘Haj-Agha, what can I do? Where do I go? I am one man with no means. What can I do against such corruption?’” The mullah felt his eyes well up.
He began again. “Imam Hussein.”
Sobbing broke out among the congregation.
“Imam Hussein stood on the plains of Karbala surrounded by an army ten thousand strong. He turned to his followers and covered his face and said, ‘We are all going to die here. Those who want to leave, do it now.’”
The mullah sighed. “And all but seventy-two left. He stood with his family of seventy-two, mostly women and children, surrounded by an army, ten thousand strong. His family dying of thirst in the camps where they cowered, his own infant son, mouth bleeding from sores, his wife, weeping and begging for water. All he had to do to save them, his own flesh and blood, was to sell his dignity, his dignity for his life and theirs. But instead, my brothers and sisters—he chose to die.”
The mullah’s eyes were red, his throat dry. He began to weep and held the tail of his aba to his face as he wept and the believers all wept with him.
As he approached the house, his earlier triumph faded, replaced by the resentment he felt for his younger brother. The mullah had spent his whole life living under the judge’s shadow. The mullah was as short and round as the judge was tall and slender. He wobbled when he walked, due to his bowed legs, while the judge strode effortlessly. His voice was loud and fiery compared to his brother’s soft deep baritone, and he offended family members with his speeches. His brother seldom spoke, and when he did, it was to utter a few words of observation or ask a question. Everyone preferred the judge and the mullah knew it.
He entered the vestibule, taking off his sandals at the door. As soon as Ghamar and Bibi-Khanoom saw him in the kitchen doorway, they adjusted their chadors. Out of propriety, he looked away before greeting them. Bibi-Khanoom ushered him into the living room in the southern wing. “Haj-Agha,” she said—using his honorific title, as she always did—“I am so sorry to have missed this morning. There was so much to do here. I couldn’t get away.”
Ghamar chimed in. “Haj-Agha, I would have come. I was dressed and ready to go, but I live with turtles so it is a miracle that we even made it here.” She threw an accusatory glare at her husband and daughter. They both looked down at their hands.
The judge bent down and kissed the mullah on both cheeks and led him to where he was sitting. He poured him a glass of tea, which the mullah accepted, and offered him fruit, which he declined. The mullah took out his worry beads. Mohammad and the judge picked up their own. For a few minutes, the only sound in the room was that of beads flicking.
Nasreen felt uncomfortable in the mullah’s presence. She was conscious of her uncovered hair and excused herself from the room, despite her mother’s gaze. On the deck at the southern entrance of the house, she paced back and forth—pretending to sun herself while stealing a look down the orchard path.
Ghamar narrowed her eyes. Nasreen was looking for Madjid, she suspected. Over the past year, her daughter had become worried about her appearance, even with her family. There was also the eyebrow plucking, the makeup, and the floral dresses Nasreen had started to wear for the visits to the orchard.
Ghamar turned her attention back to her husband. “Mohammad-Agha, cut up some fruit for Haj-Agha.”
“He doesn’t want any.”
“That’s no reason to be rude.” With some effort, she bent down and picked up an orange, two Persian cucumbers, and an apple from the bowl. She placed them on a plate and took it over to her husband with one of the paring knives. “Now cut those up nicely for Haj-Agha.”
The mullah watched all of this devoid of any expression. “Thank you, Ghamar-jan. Some fruit would be nice.”
Ghamar raised an eyebrow to her husband, who slumped over the fruit, peeling away. She dusted off her hands as she headed back into the kitchen.
The mullah shook his head and said, “You let a woman talk to you like that?”
Mohammad gave him a smile. “She’s not a woman, Haj-Agha. She’s a prison guard.”
The mullah chuckled, then looked out the window at the orchard. “Spring has come early this year.”
The judge nodded. “Yes, unseasonably early.”
“Summer will be long and hot. You will have to keep the grounds hydrated and the fruit pickers will have to come before the summer solstice.”
“Yes.”
“I’m afraid it’s not so easy for the peasants. They can’t afford to irrigate, let alone hire pickers.”
On his knees, Mohammad slid the plate of sectioned fruit in front of the two brothers. The mullah stared at the neatly laid out pieces. He did not take one. “This business of land appropriation is a great injustice. Not to mention the disrespect for our way of life. We are not godless Communists.”
“The issue of land appropriation is a very legitimate concern.”
“The people are angry at the preferential treatment for those close to government officials. The poor have gotten the worst of it. As usual.”
“There are also those in the religious establishment who are not pleased that their family land has been taken from them.”
The mullah stared at his brother with contempt. The most vocal opposition to land appropriation was the clerics whose family lands the government had seized. But that was a side issue to the mullah. His concern was for the poor who were affected, and therefore this concern was righteous and indisputable. “This is a matter of government corruption.”
“I think it is a complicated matter,” said the judge. “There are many factors that—”
“Indecision complicates matters that injustice clarifies.”
The judge flicked his worry beads in silence. He was fully aware of the unethical practices of government officials but he was equally weary of activist clergy who usurped real issues to further their personal crusades.
For months he had struggled to formulate some deeper understanding of the land issue. Whenever he thought he had come to a conclusion, he found a counterargument. And these arguments and counterarguments raced through his mind, leading him to believe that there was no right side when it came to an individual’s struggle for power.
His brother cut short all discussion with a proclamation of faith.
Faith, to the judge, was a surrender of control, not an exercise of it. What he saw in his brother was not faith but certitude, the same certitude he had witnessed at the bench, year after year—men and women,