Amazing Miracle: Quranic verses have appeared on the body of a 9 months old baby from the Russian Republic of Dagestan
Thu Oct 22, 2009 12:58pm IST
By Amie Ferris-Rotman - Reuters
http://larawbar.com/detail.php?id=13856&date=2009-10-24&author=خاکسير
http://in.reuters.com/articlePrint?articleId=INTRE59L0ZC20091022
KIZLYAR, Russia (Reuters) - A "miracle" baby has brought a kind of mystical hope to people in Russia's mostly Muslim southern fringe who are increasingly desperate in the face of Islamist violence.
From hunchbacked grandmas to schoolboys, hundreds of pilgrims lined up this week in blazing sunshine to get a glimpse of 9-month-old baby Ali Yakubov, on whose body they say verses from the Koran appear and fade every few days.
Pinkish in color and several centimeters high, the Koranic verse "Be thankful or grateful to Allah" was printed on the infant's right leg in clearly legible Arabic script this week, religious leaders said. Visiting foreign journalists later saw a single letter after the rest had vanished.
"The fact that this miracle happened here is a signal to us to take the lead and help our brothers and sisters find peace," said Sagid Murtazaliyev, head of the Kizlyar region about 150 km (95 miles) north of Makhachkala, the sprawling Dagestani capital on the Caspian Sea.
"We must not forget there is a war going on here," he told Muslim leaders who had invited the press to witness what they unequivocally claim is a sign from God.
Islam in Russia is widely believed to have originated in ethnically rich Dagestan, where 3 million people speak over 30 languages and whose ancient walled city of Derbent claims to be Russia's oldest city.
A spate of recent suicide bombs and armed attacks on police and security services in Dagestan, Ingushetia and neighboring Chechnya, where Russia has fought two separatist wars, has shattered a few years of relative calm in the North Caucasus.
Local leaders have told President Dmitry Medvedev they are struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency pervading all spheres of society in the north Caucasus -- a region named after the Caucasus mountains that divide Russia from strategically important Georgia and Azerbaijan, where oil and gas pipelines flow to the West.
Up to 2,000 pilgrims from Russia's 20 million Muslim population come daily to see the docile, blue-eyed baby, whose pink brick house has become a shrine.
Vladimir Zakharov, deputy director of the Caucasus Research Centre at the Moscow State University of International Relations, said he was not in a position to judge the veracity of the claims, but that it was clear they were born out of desperation.
"Islam and fear of terrorism now totally dominate the North Caucasus, and they are perhaps using this to escape from a certain reality," he told Reuters by telephone.
POLICED SHRINE
Green satin flags mark the way to the baby's modest family home in Kizlyar, a small town of lime-colored mosques, cornfields and dirt roads whose dust bellows into the sky.
Dagestan's omnipresent armed police patrol the house while imams change photos of Yakubov's arms and legs covered in Arabic script from previous episodes to both jubilation and wails from the bustling crowd.
They say the fact Yakubov's 27-year-old father Shamil works in the police force -- a regular target by militants -- is proof of divine intervention.
Makhachkala's influential mayor Sayid Amirov, who has survived around a dozen attacks on his life since the mid-1990s, interpreted the recent buzz around the baby as a warning.
"What happened here is indeed a miracle, but this should also be a message to not take religion too far," he told reporters.
Authorities say Islamist extremism is as responsible for the growing violence as widespread poverty, and experts add the insurgency is also recruiting foreign al Qaeda militants who seek an Islamic state in the north Caucasus.
Holding up his right foot where a single Arabic letter remained from the latest episode, Yakubov's 26-year-old mother Madina said she had no doubt the verses -- which first appeared two weeks after birth -- were connected to extremism.
"Allah is great and he sent me my miracle child to keep our people safe," she told Reuters, adjusting her tight purple hijab which crowns a multi-colored kaftan.
Though divine "miracles" are common in Christianity -- such as weeping icons and stigmata, bleeding wounds in the hands and feet similar to those of Christ -- Islam rarely has them.
Outside her home, pilgrims prayed and gave thanks to Allah.
Supermarket attendant Madina Nikolayeva traveled from Ukraine to see the baby. Behind her, Akhmed Khadzhy had been waiting all day in the queue.
"Allah is watching over Dagestan," said the pensioner from Khasavyurt near the Chechen border, where clashes with security forces had killed three militants the night before.
(Reporting by Amie Ferris-Rotman; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)
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Tatoooooooooooooo
animatoregypt 1 month ago
@saudilai101 wasn't insulting any religion. I said he didn't follow god's word, regardless of the religion he follows. That was BECAUSE he is hating on our religion and god doesn't teach that. You misunderstood me. Sorry about that.
unamestorm 3 months ago
@wale1969 you seem to like talking about rape...was your mother raped when you were born...you sure talk like the son of a thousand fathers.
amjadami 3 months ago
@unamestorm don't insult their religion.. it is a sin.. let it be cause Allah told us to be patient. insulting them would not lead them to the right path...
saudilai101 3 months ago
@wale1969 no? he told Muhammad to spread the word. He doesn't rely on people, in fact he doesn't need us. He created us and through free will, we get away from allah, therefore deserved to be punished. However, he tells a regular human being to spread the word as a test to see if humanity would follow. Obviously, you didn't. You're ridiculous. In fact, allah says it's HARAM to kill a man for no good reason.
unamestorm 3 months ago
@unamestorm Allah has always rely on you muslims to help carry out his threat on unbelievers and those who oppose his child rapist prophet Mohammad. Allah beg you muslims in sura 9:29 to "fight and kill those who believe not in Allah and his messenger...." and awarding medals, Allah says in sura 4:95 "not equal are those believers who sit at home and receive no hurts, and those who strive and fight in the cause of Allah...Allah hath granted a grade higher to those who fight and kill....
wale1969 3 months ago
@wale1969 and how is that proof that allah can't fight for himself? That is just a sign that the religion of Islam is the true religion. Allah doesn't need us, and if you keep up your attitude and hate towards allah, you will be the one roasting in hell.
unamestorm 3 months ago
Child abuse and another lie in the name of Islam.
SidHenderson 4 months ago
@Rucandor123 have you now accepted the fact that Allah can not fight for himself here on earth and upon heaven above? the only thing you can now reckon with is Hell, since obviously Allah and Mohammed are roasting in Hell Fire.
Mohammed only fooled you bastard muslims to further his grip on idiots like you, for ill-gotten wealth, womanising around and having sex with 9yrs old girls, raping female war captives and killing those who stood in his ways.
wale1969 4 months ago
@wale1969
your so going to hell
not that you don't believe in allah but you just can't shut up about sayng stuff to other religions
Rucandor123 4 months ago