I
was born Anna Linda Traustadóttir to Icelandic/Danish parents
in Reykjavík, Iceland in 1966 and baptized into the Lutheran
Church. My family moved to Vancouver, Canada and then to New
York City when I was young. I finished high school at 16. In
1988, I got my B.A. from McGill University, Montréal, Canada.
Since then I have been traveling around the world, studying
and working. Denmark has been my base since 1990.
In
1997, while studying Arabic in Cairo, one of my English
girlfriends, a born-again Christian bought me a portable
Bible, with both the Old and New Testaments. I was extremely
pleased because I had decided that I needed to know what the
Bible was and what was in it. And I felt that I could hardly
call myself Christian without consciously studying the Bible.
In
1998, whilst studying at Damascus University, I read the whole
Bible, from cover to cover, taking notes as I went along. Once
I had completed it, I realized that there were too many
inconsistencies, too many things I didn’t agree with. Like
the Old Testament’s portrayal of God and women, not to
mention all the things that Paul wrote in the New Testament.
And when I read about the holy men, the Prophets, like Noah,
Lot, David, etc., I found that I didn’t respect them. I love
and admire Moses (from the Old Testament) and Jesus (from the
New Testament).
Having
already read the Torah, I tried getting a complete Jewish
Talmud, to no avail. I’d always heard that Jews (except for
Reformed) do not recognize someone who converted to Judaism.
Also, many, though not all, Jews are Zionist (those who
support Israel). And I am terribly anti-Zionist and
anti-Israel, and so, by default, pro-Palestinian. I also
wanted a religion that would accept a convert. I dabbled with
Buddhism but decided this was not for me, as Buddhists don’t
believe in God. And I strongly believe in God, always have.
Buddhism is still interesting as an alternative way of life.
My mum and I used to discuss Hinduism and so I was very
interested in it, but there are just too many Hindu gods for
me. Therefore Hinduism was out of the question. That, and the
fact that you cannot convert to Hinduism.
When
I had my son, Andrés Ómar, in October 2001, I was asked
whether he would be baptized, and even then I refused. I felt
that innocent children would surely be welcome in Heaven,
baptized or not. Anyway, how could I introduce him into the
Christian religion when I myself did not call myself a
believing Christian, though I was born and raised as a
Protestant? I didn’t believe in the Trinity, in Mary as the
“mother” of God, in Jesus as the “son” of God, in
Jesus dying to cleanse us of our sins, in Jesus crying out in
Aramaic on the cross: “Eli, Eli, lama sabakh-tha-ni?” I
mean why would Jesus cry out: “My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me?” when Jesus knew he was sent on a mission by
God as a prophet of God?
I
grew up being one of the most anti-Muslim, anti-Islam people
you could ever meet. This is true: I was. I had also been
anti-Arab before moving to Cairo to study Arabic (I thought
Arabic calligraphy was beautiful). I’d grown up in the
States, raised on American movies, which always
portrayed Arabs as fundamentalists, radicals,
women-oppressors, religious fanatics, terrorists, never normal,
average people. The large majority of people who are anti-Arab
have never been to any Arab country. The reality there is very
different.
When
I read the Qur’an, I thought it was beautiful, so scientific, so
compassionate, so feminist! |
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In
1999, I went back to Damascus to work at an embassy. There in
2000, I met an engineer named Mohannad. We married soon after
we met. To be honest when I married Mohannad, I married him
because I loved him, even though he was Muslim. Over
time, I realized I loved him because he was Muslim. A
good Muslim. I had met many Muslims here in Denmark and in the
Middle East, and just like in my life, I’ve met some nice
and not-so-nice Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. I
thought all those Muslims I’d met were representing Islam.
And whenever I asked Muslims questions about Islam, one thing
struck me: Nearly everyone claimed to be an expert in Islam,
even those who gave me, I later found out, false information.
It would have been more prudent just to say: I don’t
know/I’m not sure. Yet I never judged Christianity or any
other religion by its followers. Strangely though, I judged
Islam by every Arab I meet, even though (1) not all Arabs are
Muslim. Some are Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, Druze, Coptic,
Alawite, etc. And (2) most Muslims aren’t Arab. Muslims can
be Indonesian, Indian, Chinese, Macedonian, Malay, Russian,
Thai, African, Bosnian, American, Swedish, etc., and of
course, Arab. I had been raised not to be prejudiced, but I
was. It took me a long time to realize this.
It’s
only after countless hours of discussion, and at times
arguments (!), with my husband that I came to be open-minded
enough to realize that I didn’t have the full picture.
During
Ramadan, November 2002, I asked Mohannad whether he would help
me read the Qur’an in Arabic. He had little time, but I was
determined to read the Qur’an in Arabic with the help of a
good translation. When I read the Qur’an, Islam’s holiest
book, I thought it was beautiful, so scientific, so
compassionate, so feminist! Nearly all the books I’d ever
read about Islam, all written by non-Muslims, showed Islam in
a negative light. Those people who wrote against Islam
sometimes gave partial quotes from the Qur’an, leaving out
the rest of the verse, or they would translate the verses
incorrectly, on purpose or by mistake. I knew enough Arabic to
know that what I was reading was unlike anything I’d ever
read.
I
studied further and realized that the Arabic scientific revolution followed
the arrival of Islam. |
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So
much science, so much knowledge that has been only recently
discovered. I mean the Prophet Mohammad mentions: black holes,
space travel, DNA and genetic science, evolution
(transformation and mutation), geology, oceanography,
embryonic development, aquatic origins of life... WOW! I had
always heard that the Qur’an was basically just a
watered-down version of the Bible, but none of this was in the
Bible! I wondered how someone over 1400 years ago could have
written anything like this! Some of these ideas were only
discovered this century. Then I thought, well, Arab
scientists, astronomers, mathematicians, cartographers were so
advanced for that time, maybe some of them got together and
wrote a book, loosely based on the Torah and the Gospels. But
then I studied it further and realized that the Arabic
scientific revolution followed the arrival of Islam.
Then I read that Muslims believe that the Qur’an was given
to Mohammad through the Angel Gabriel, and is the continuation
of God’s word. Muslims believe that parts of the Torah and
parts of the Gospels, that speak of Jesus’ life, are
inspired by God, or “Allah” as God is called in Arabic.
Not just Muslims, but Christian and Jewish Arabs also call God
“Allah.” Muslims revere Abraham, Solomon, Moses, Jesus,
and Noah, in fact, all of the Biblical Prophets. It is also
mentioned that there are other prophets that came to other
nations to help them become better people. It’s said that
Buddha was one of these prophets, but that he along with
Jesus, never meant for people to believe he was superior to
God, just that he was a messenger of God. They also believe
that the Prophet Mohammad is the last prophet, until Jesus
returns to Earth.
It
says in the Qur’an that Allah can put a veil over our eyes
and a stone over our hearts so that we can neither see nor
feel the message of the Qur’an. Only when Allah is ready for
us to know it, do we understand. On 12 December 2002, I had an
incredible dream that started me thinking and contemplating
religion more deeply. Dreams are very important in Iceland and
dream interpretation is practically a science! I never thought
I needed a religion. Religion fascinated me, but I had
believed I was doing fine just believing in God, taking bits
from different religions until I got my own cocktail:
“Anna’s Mix.”
In
January 2003, I started looking at the Internet, just doing
searches like: “Islam,” “Qur’an,” “Muslim,” etc.
In March, whilst in Reykjavík, I got the opportunity to speak
with one of my best Icelandic girlfriends, a Muslim, and she
recommended a really good English translation (the Abdullah
Yusuf Ali version), to go along with the original Arabic. In
April, I received it and started using it as a supplement.
He
feared that people would think he was forcing me to become Muslim. |
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In
May 2003, my Icelandic Muslim friend returned the visit and
stayed two weeks with us. We started talking about the
Qur’an. I told her that I wanted to translate it into
Icelandic. She told me it was her dream too. We agreed we
would do it together. We used our time together well,
discussing Christianity, Judaism and Islam all day, every day.
She had questioned her Lutheran faith, considered Judaism,
visited Israel (“Occupied Palestine” as far as I am
concerned) twice, and only on her second visit, started to
consider the other side of the Arab-Israeli conflict. She got
interested in Islam. She had earlier gone a similar path as I,
coming to the same conclusions. Back in 1995, when she told me
she’d become Muslim, I behaved badly: I was extremely
negative. Shame on me for being unsupportive!
Now
I found myself seeing myself Muslim. I told my husband about
my revelations, and he questioned me at length. He asked me to
wait with changing my religion. He told me that becoming
Muslim would make my life more difficult, that people who
didn’t know Islam would treat me differently, that at this
time, in the year 2003, and in this world we live in, people
would ridicule me. He said I might lose contact with my family
and my friends if I took on the Muslim faith. He feared that
people that didn’t know me so well or that I hadn’t seen
in a long time, or ever met him, would think he was forcing me
to become Muslim. I told him if that were true, we could not
have got married, for when we married, I was Christian, and
had remained Christian up until then. Also, I argued, people
who have known me at all know I am a strong-minded, true
feminist/humanist, that I am opinionated, but not
narrow-minded, and that no one can control me... My parents
have tried for years to no avail!
When
I read the Qur’an, I feel it in my stomach, deep in my gut, that
this is right for me. |
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I
decided then and there that if friends and family didn’t
want any contact with me because I decided to become Muslim,
so be it! My religion is mine and I am proud of my research
into Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam. It
has taken me years and countless hours of reading and
soul-searching to get to this point. My belief in God is
something I have always taken seriously and I have never been
ashamed to declare this faith, even when others ridicule me
for believing in something they say we cannot see. I argue,
look around you, how can you not believe in a supreme being
that created everything around us. And for those of you that
view Islam as some kind of cult, it isn’t. It’s one of the
biggest religions in the world, if not the largest: One in
four people on this planet is now Muslim, and it’s the
fastest growing religion.
So
finally, on 4 June 2003, I decided to officially become Muslim
so that I could go on Hajj to Mecca. I had been searching for
answers for a long time, since my childhood, and by the
mid-1990’s, I was buying books on different faiths. Deep
inside, I imagined I would find the answers for me. I remember
the first time I heard the “Azan” (the Muslim call for
prayer, when a fellow says “Allahu Akbar” (God is Great)
from a minaret at a mosque). It was a bright, sunny, February
Sunday in Cairo in 1997, so church bells were also ringing,
but when I heard the call for prayer, tears streamed down my
face, without my realizing it. I wasn’t Muslim, but it moved
me. One of my oldest and dearest friends, a Catholic, was in
Beirut a while ago, staying at a hotel and woke up to the call
for prayer at 4.30 during her first night in Lebanon. She
thought it was so moving that she also cried.
When
I read the Qur’an, I feel it in my stomach, deep in my gut,
that this is right for me. The inspirational beauty of the
Qur’an makes me sometimes cry. It’s an all-encompassing
way of life. No other religious book ever moved me to tears.
The
Qur’an is simply put the most complex book I’ve ever read.
The more you read it, the more you both understand and at the
same time, question. The Qur’an is meant to inspire you to
learn more. Every time you read it, you peel off different
layers of understanding. I am not an expert; I never will be.
Even if I read from it every day for the rest of my life, I
will still learn something new. It’s full of mysteries. I
still also supplement my Qur’anic studies with Biblical
studies like the “Gospel of Barnabas,” “The Torah,”
etc.
I’ve
also since got some new Muslim girlfriends over the Internet.
Whilst searching the net, I came across an Icelandic Muslim
site:
