I was praying four raka'as and on the second or third one, when I went down to prostrate myself on the floor and say Allahu Akbar, my hands were taken in someone else's hands as soon as they touched the floor. It was an old friend of mine from high school, and she was kneeling in front of me, holding my hands in hers and facing toward me. Then after I had touched my forehead to the ground, she bent down and touched her forehead to the back of mine. I could feel her hair on my neck.
I have been mildly disconcerted by the dream. I don't know how to read its mixture of religious ritual and sensual, though not sexual, embrace. I worry it's somewhat blasphemous. But my instinct tells me it's not. There was just so much love, and safety, and warmth in that strange embrace, a sense of contact both human and divine.
Maybe I should consider that the richest worship of God also happens when we have each other to hold and to love.
