Naming – In this book, as Nawaz becomes nine months pregnant, she must choose a name for her child. One name stood out to her, and that was Maysa, however, her mother did not think it was a “Muslim name”. She believes that when naming a child, their name should have relevance to some type of Islamic history. For example, Nawaz’s mother named her after a woman named Zarqa al-Yamama. She was a legendary Arab woman who could see great distances and was able to warn her tribe of approaching danger. Although her mother later learns that her daughter’s name meant “blue eyes” in Arabic and not “brave woman". This shows that Muslim’s tend to associate Arabic or Arabized names to be so called “Muslim names”. Even without knowing what these names mean,
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In Laughing all the way to the Mosque, Zarqa Nawaz mentions that while growing up she used to hear stories of the jinn and how they have the power to possess you, and in fact many Muslims today go through the same experience. Both novels describe how humans are made “from clay” and how the jinn are made “from fire”. They also share the fact that the jinn have free will just like humans. In Laughing all the way to the Mosque, Nawaz is terrified to go to the outhouse all by herself at night and one can see why though Ingrid Mattson’s descriptions, “jinn have powers of movement and transformation far beyond those of humans, who can easily be deceived by them because of this fact” (165). The Quran also recognizes the possibility that the jinn have the power of possession, enforcing Nawaz beliefs. Both books also mention that the last few surahs of the Quran help protect you from harm. In Laughing all the way to the Mosque, Nawaz asks her husband if he recited the last three chapter of the Quran to his “possessed” patients to help and cure them, and in The story of the Qur’an, Ingrid Mattson describes how it is a Sunnah to read the last two surah’s of the Quran, “collectively known as ‘The Two Protections’, should be regularly recited for protection from all harm” (166). Ingrid Mattson also describes how people just like Nawaz’s husband do not believe in possession, “others adopt metaphorical readings of the Qur’an’s description of jinn and view passion as a form of mental illness”
In Laughing all the way to the Mosque, Zarqa Nawaz mentions that while growing up she used to hear stories of the jinn and how they have the power to possess you, and in fact many Muslims today go through the same experience. Both novels describe how humans are made “from clay” and how the jinn are made “from fire”. They also share the fact that the jinn have free will just like humans. In Laughing all the way to the Mosque, Nawaz is terrified to go to the outhouse all by herself at night and one can see why though Ingrid Mattson’s descriptions, “jinn have powers of movement and transformation far beyond those of humans, who can easily be deceived by them because of this fact” (165). The Quran also recognizes the possibility that the jinn have the power of possession, enforcing Nawaz beliefs. Both books also mention that the last few surahs of the Quran help protect you from harm. In Laughing all the way to the Mosque, Nawaz asks her husband if he recited the last three chapter of the Quran to his “possessed” patients to help and cure them, and in The story of the Qur’an, Ingrid Mattson describes how it is a Sunnah to read the last two surah’s of the Quran, “collectively known as ‘The Two Protections’, should be regularly recited for protection from all harm” (166). Ingrid Mattson also describes how people just like Nawaz’s husband do not believe in possession, “others adopt metaphorical readings of the Qur’an’s description of jinn and view passion as a form of mental illness”