A written record of two ‘supernatural' events in my life
At the time of writing, I am investigating the claim that Jesus of Nazareth, seen as Christians as the Son of God, was resurrected. I have been reading Dr. Bart Ehrman, as well as Dr. Michael Licona, and watching their debates. They can agree that Jesus was crucified based upon historical evidence independent of the Gospels. They can agree that his disciples claimed to see some kind of visions of him. They just disagree how to explain this based upon historical data and methods.
One of the contentions bought up is the timing of the New Testament books. For some twenty years after the event is too late, for others it seems reasonable considering eye witnesses to the life and death of Jesus were still around.
It has made me think of two ‘supernatural’ events that had occurred in my life which I have yet to document in writing. I put ‘supernatural’ in quote because there could be other ways of explaining them. However, at the time a supernatural explanation their occurrence fitted a worldview I had at the time.
The first occurred during my time in Taliban-governed Afghanistan in 1999, if I remember correctly. The exacts dates can be found in court records, I hope. I was with Abu Musab al-Suri’s contingency during the Taliban offensive in Charikar. An abandoned military compound of sort had been captured. We spent the night in one of the huts. At dawn, booms were heard. At first we thought that the Taliban were advanced but it quickly became clear that Masood’s forces were making a counterattack. There was panic around us as Taliban soldiers scrambled into the back of Toyota pick-up trucks to head back to Kabul. We left our belonging behind.
In the back of Abu Musab’s truck, there were around six men whilst the front were filled. Aside myself, there were two other British citizens. One born to a Pakistani Muslim family, the other a convert of black or mixed race heritage from northern England according to his accent. There may have been two other Arabs, one Swedish-Algerian (I believe) called Muʿtaz billah, if I remember correctly. And there was an Egyptian whom we knew as Abu Abd-Allah, who had lived in the UK and also fought in Bosnia. He was sitting on a barrel.
There was firing from the plantation at the roadsides. We could not see them. I could hear the bullets whizz beside my ears and feel the hairs prick up on them. Then amongst the noise of the speeding trucks, the panic, the gunfire, there was a sudden silence and a bright flash of light. Then the next moment Abu Abd-Allah’s body falls on top of me. He had been shot in the head. I remember feeling the warm blood on my face as it covered my glasses. The blood also soaked through the jacket I was wearing at the time that I had purchased in London, and my green shalwar qamees. Almost all it was died with his blood. The moment his body fell onto me I smelt a sudden burst of fragrance. I remember looking at the British Pakistani almost as if to say, ‘Did you experience what I experienced?’ Eventually, we arrived at a point of safety nearer to Kabul. The body was taken. Some days later, we would visit the grave.
The second ‘supernatural’ event occurred in Damascus in September 2001. I had gone there as part of my BA Arabic. I was staying at the flat of a former local resident Mobeen Muneef. A few years later he would also be part of the news when he was killed on the Iraq-Syria border having spent time in a US military prison.
Mobeen would claim there were jinn in his flat. The flat did have an uncomfortable atmosphere. I remember feeling watched when taking a shower. One night when sleeping on the floor of his bedroom while he slept on the bed, I found myself stood up screaming. I came to the realisation I was screaming after I had bolted up. I remember my throat feeling hoarse. The last thing I could recall before that happened was seeing a some kind of being of white light bending over me. Mobeen himself was also woken frightened by my screaming. Another person told me years later in the UK that he had heard from Mobeen that he saw me bending over myself.
July that year prior to coming to Damascus, I had been in Afghanistan with the purpose of interviewing individuals for Azzam Publications. I was accompanied by the same British Pakistani from 1998 and a British Palestinian.
Incomplete: Sunday 30th November