Arctic Tern

Migrants following the light

Whenever someone makes an argument for the superiority of humanity over other species on the basis of our intellect, I can’t help but chuckle. Of course, we are more intelligent when it comes to doing ‘human things’, such as speaking a human language and making calculations with abstract numbers. But how many of us are able to safely find our way to the other side of the world, and then, without any tools for navigation, find our way back to the exact spot from which we left?

The majority of birds worldwide are migratory, which means they inhabit at least two different habitats and migrate between them following seasonal changes. Some of them move from the top of a mountain to a valley. Some of them move a few hundred miles. And some of them migrate across entire continents, only to later return to the same bush from which they left.

The Arctic Tern undertakes the most impressive migration of all birds and in fact of all animals. Every year it flies over 50,000 miles, from the Arctic to the Antarctic and back again. Like many other birds, it leaves in search of light when darkness starts to settle in.

The North Pole is a mystical place to be in the summer: the sun never sets, and due to the fact that 24 time zones collide at the Pole, it is simultaneously 24 different times, as well as no time at all. That’s the home of the Arctic Tern: a space beyond time filled with light upon light. Sounds like paradise to me. But unlike paradise, this space of timeless light does not last for eternity. As the months progress in the Northern Hemisphere, and autumn kisses summer goodbye, darkness creeps into the Arctic. And with winter luring, soon it will be transformed into a space of timeless darkness where the sun never rises. Longing back for light upon light, the Arctic Tern chases the sun on a journey that literally takes it to the other side of the world. It takes this little white bird about three months to complete this monumental journey. And then, after about three months of respite in the light upon light of the Antarctic, it will have to do it all over again. This means that for six months out of the year, and in fact for half of its lifetime, the Arctic Tern is a traveler, dependent on the mercy and hospitality of a habitat that is not its own.

Hospitality is a core principle and practice in the faith of many Muslims worldwide. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, emphasized the importance of caring for one’s guests as an Islamic obligation. Hospitality is one of the first associations I had as a non-Muslim child with the religion of Islam. I was ten years old when I traveled with my parents and my brother to Tunisia. On one of our first days there, we went on a beautiful hike along a river in a wide valley. As we were hiking, two men appeared in the distance. Slowly, the men came closer, until a delightful song of “Welcome, welcome! Welcome to Tunisia,” greeted our ears. In hindsight, I’m not surprised the men had so easily identified us as tourists. It must have been the combination of our bright blond hair, sunburned freckled skin with a white hue of sunblock, and mountain-proof hiking boots that gave us away. The language barrier left us with only a few words in common, which we happily repeated to create a conversation with little content, but great warmth. One of the men had a necklace of wooden beads in his hand, which he presented to my mother as a gift. Impressed by their kindness and hospitality, she gratefully accepted. I fell in love with the necklace as soon as I saw it. Luckily for me, my mother felt it suited me better, and she handed it over to me after we said our goodbyes to the kind strangers. Ever since that holiday, the necklace decorated my bedside lamp, reminding me every night of the ideal of hospitality and generosity the two kind strangers had portrayed.

When people hear I have converted to Islam, they often assume such a ‘radical transition’ must have been paired with some dramatic changes in my life. But as dramatic as my life’s journey, or the journey of the Arctic Tern, may seem to an outsider, we were both just following the light. Becoming a Muslim did not radically change my life, because I was raised with many values that were Islamic, even if they were not labeled as such: compassion, justice, equality, gratitude, discipline, and hospitality, just to mention a few. Sure, there were some things that changed as I became Muslim. I stopped drinking alcohol and started praying 5 times a day in a specific direction. I started fasting and have become much more familiar with the Qur’an. But in many ways, becoming a Muslim felt more like acknowledging, deepening, and strengthening my connection with the good that was already there, as opposed to radically breaking with what was before. Becoming a Muslim felt like coming home, similar to how I imagine the Arctic Tern feels when it reaches the light upon light of the Antarctic, even when to outsiders it seems like it couldn’t be further away from the place it called its home before, the Arctic. Its home is the light, and so it follows the light wherever it leads it.

In Surah Al-Baqarah, ‘The Cow’, the second chapter of the Qur’an, God says: “God is the Guardian of those who have faith. He brings them out of darkness into the light” (Qur’an 2:257). The same God that guides human beings from darkness into the light also guides the birds that are migrating to brighter days, such as the Arctic Tern. The migratory instincts of birds are, for the most part, still a mystery to us. But we know that a decrease in exposure to daylight as summer shifts to autumn, or put differently, an increase in darkness, works as a migratory trigger. Similarly, many people’s spiritual journeys are triggered by the realization that they have become inhabitants of the dark. Or at the very least by a longing for more light. For light upon light.

When I was about 19 years old, my journey led me to the waters of Islam. After fasting my first Ramadan and noticing its profound effect on me, I became thirsty for any kind of knowledge related to the Islamic tradition. At some point, I was reading about Islamic meditative practices, which include the repetition of names of God or devotional phrases with the help of prayer beads. “I would like to give that a try,” I thought as I lifted my eyes up from the computer screen I had been reading on. My gaze landed on the necklace that was given to me by the two kind Tunisian men. For the first time, I had the knowledge to recognize the necklace for what it was. It struck me like lightning. They’re prayer beads! The men had given my mother a tasbih, a string of wooden prayer beads used by Muslims. The beads had been patiently waiting by my bedside for over nine years for the day that I would be ready to use them. For the day that my tongue would give words to the silent praises they had proclaimed by my bedside, ever since I was ten years old.

I always wondered if migratory birds know where they’re going. If they know the destiny of their journey, or if they simply follow their instincts day by day. Maybe the answer doesn’t matter. Because Whoever guides all beings in this life, Arctic Terns and myself included, certainly knows their destiny. And maybe that knowledge is enough to set out into the unknown every day with a sense of trust that we will end up where we need to be. That we will end up at home.