Is it Love or Fear?

During my discussion topic, I brought up the place of women and how men treat them. The way women are treated throughout the book, is very different than today. Men are in power of the women, and all women must obey their husband at anytime no matter what the situation is. After this we began to discuss the relationship between the children and the fathers and how the children must obey their fathers, no matter if they disagree with the situation or not. When discussing his daughter marriage negotiations Ahmad denies the request and doesn't allow his daughter to marry. The emotions and reaction of his daughter, Aisha, really stuck out to me. In paragraph below the the narrator describes her feelings.

Although she was hurt, angry, and resentful, these emotions could not touch her father. They fell back impotently like a wild animal stopped by its trainer, whom it loves and fears. Aisha was not able to attack her father, not even in the depths of her heart. She continued in her love and devotion for him. She felt sincerely dutiful to him, as though he were a god whose decree could only be received with submission, love, and loyalty. (160-161)

Here we are able to see how much Aisha respects her father even though she strongly disagreed with her father decision of not letting her marry the officer, who she truly fell for. But, we still don't know whether or not she really respects her father, or does she just fear her father. Is it love or fear?

Obviously we can see from this paragraph that Aisha feelings are deeply hurt and that she is heart broken. Aisha is able to look past this pain and hate towards her father, and forgive him. To me she fears her father more than she loves her father. The author uses the metaphor a wild animal. He says, “They fell back impotently like a wild animal stopped by its trainer, whom it loves and fears” (160-161). They meaning emotions were lifted from her and she was able to look past that time. But, in order to tame a wild animal who must put fear in the animals heart in order for the animal to obey you. By taking over the animals, you take control of their life; therefore, to me its more fear than love. An animal knows if he goes against the owner's rule, it would be punish so it is scared to do otherwise.

Aisha is afraid to stand up against her father, because she knows there is no way around it and that she would get punished if she does so. She has been put under his command and rule. Her father has taken over her mind and life; therefore, she lets him control what she does. She has become a tamed “animal”. We have seen how the children are being controlled by Ahmad, but now the narrator is referring to the daughter as an “wild animal”.

At the end of this paragraph, the narrator describes Aisha feeling toward Ahmad by saying, “She felt sincerely dutiful to him, as though he were a god whose decree could only be received with submission, love, and loyalty” (161). The narrator says she looks to her father as a God, which to me is beyond extreme. He also says that the actions he does are done out of love and loyalty. This shows that the family held their father and wouldn't do anything to disobey him.

In the bible it says “fear God”. God is the only person we shall fear, because he can instantly change ones life. The family refer to him as God because he has the power to choose what they do in life and who they marry. By referring to their father as God, shows they fear him more than they love him. Yes, it is natural that we all love our parents because they are the ones who gave us life. But in Aisha case, it seems that she has overlook the love towards her father and has replaced it with fear. The family doesn't really have much love for their father, but are to afraid to against his orders.

Does Ahmad want his family to fear him, or is he just looking out for the best interest for his family?
Does he really love his family, or is he in love more with the power and control he has over them?

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Worshipper Blinded by Love and Fear

The family adores Ahmad in a very extreme way. I feel like everyone in the family blindly follows his lead, even when he is wrong. No one dares to speak against him because the fear incited by his power is intimidating. Even more than the intimidation, the affection they feel for Ahmad makes the family look at him as something close to a god. We really get a sense of this affection, loyalty and fear for Ahmad when the author describes the feelings Aisha had when her father decided that she wouldn’t get married before Khadija, thus denying Aisha from the opportunity of marrying the officer she had fallen for. The author writes:

Although she was hurt, angry, and resentful, these emotions could not touch her father. They fell back impotently like a wild animal stopped by its trainer, whom it loves and fears. Aisha was not able to attack her father, not even in the depths of her heart. She continued in her love and devotion for him. She felt sincerely dutiful to him, as though he were a god whose decree could only be received with submission, love and loyalty. (160-161)

Here we see that the love and fear she felt towards her father was much too strong to allow Aisha to let any of the negative emotions be against her father come out.

The words the author uses to convey the feelings Aisha against her father are powerful; the author uses hurt, angry and resentful, which are all very strong emotions. Here we start to see the pain her father has made her go through by not allowing her to marry. We understand through those words what’s going on in her heart.

When the author says, “these emotions could not touch her father” (161), one can interpret that she couldn’t allow her father to see how she felt or that she wouldn’t allow herself to feel those emotions against her father. After reading the next two sentence that say that her emotions “fell back impotently like a wild animal stopped by its trainer, whom it loves and fears,” and that “Aisha was not able to attack her father, not even in the depths of her hear,” I came to the conclusion that despite the strong emotions she felt she wouldn’t allow her self to turn those emotions against her father. The fear and the love she had wouldn’t even let her think of feeling the hurt, anger, and resentment against her father even in the secrecy of her heart. Her conscious wouldn’t let her feel that way about her father. Not even the other strong emotions she felt could erase the deep love and great fear her father incited in her.

Then the author closes the passage by telling us that Aisha obeyed her father “as though he were a god whose decree could only be received with submission, love and loyalty” (161). This last sentence proves my last point that Aisha, and even the rest of the family saw Ahmad as a god. They obey him without question because they love and fear him.

The author uses Kamal to show as another example of someone who sees Ahmad as a god. When having a conversation with his mother, Kamal asked if his father feared god, and then commented that he couldn’t “imagine [his] father being afraid of anything” (67). Here we see how high Kamal holds his father as to think he doesn’t even fear god.

The fear and love caused by Ahmad’s character make his family hold him in a very high esteem almost as high as God’s. As I wrote about this topic I began to wonder several things. For example, does Ahmad mean to cause these feelings and their result? Is it his vanity that leads him to want to be like a god, or does he behave how he does unconsciously or with another intention? Does the family see how close to god they see him? How contradicting is for the family, specially the Amina, to hold Ahmad as high as they do and yet believe God has control over everything?