Honoring Our Ancestors
Altars, places to honor our ancestors along with displays of that which we experience as sacred, were never part of my upbringing. I didn’t start having an altar until well into my adulthood. A central part of my home altar is my connection to the ancestors. My ancestors include family and friends who died and some becoming ancestors too soon on their life path.
Our connection to those who lived before us can be deep and profound if we invite their memories into our lives. Not only their memories, but what they worked for and how
they lived.
Those of us who hold identities that have been the target of oppression know that our ancestors faced hardships we may never fully understand intellectually, but we carry the memory in our bodies.
As a woman born in Egypt and raised a strict Muslim in the United States, I have had to face challenges that include anti-immigrant sentiments when I was a child from those here in the United States, and in Egypt I was faced with misogyny and strict rules of conduct because of my family’s interpretation of the faith. I often felt stifled as a child and teenager, rules imposed on me did not apply to my male cousins of the same age. I was angry at the unfairness of it and I finally left the faith in my early twenties.
I connect most closely with my female ancestors, especially my two grandmothers. I knew my maternal grandmother, Labiba (her first name) and I adored her. She was feisty, gregarious and honest to a fault. I am grateful that I remember my maternal grandparents. My grandfather Abdelgawed (his first name), was more of a quiet introvert, who was kind and generous. I have a picture of both my grandparents on my altar.
My paternal grandmother is my namesake, Aisha. By all accounts she was the life of the party, a vivacious, generous and welcoming soul. She died when I was young and I don’t have any memories of her. I was born in Egypt and spent my first year of life living with her in Alexandria.
There is a picture of me as an infant on her lap and it is the only picture I know of with the two of us together.
I will never know what my grandmothers had to endure as Muslim females who were mandated into behaving a certain way in order not to be ostracized. They made the best of their circumstances, that I do know given how generous of spirit they were and how I heard stories of their antics.
My grandmothers are the reason I am alive, they suggested to my parents that they marry each other. They were friends and loved to laugh with each other, host parties and socialize.
I think of them often with the knowledge that I am living the life they didn’t know was possible for a female. I am independent, a faith leader and working for liberation of all. I am my ancestors’ wildest dreams.
- In an Ancient Forest - October 17, 2024
- Leaning Into a Generosity of Spirit - June 4, 2024
- Embracing Pluralism - March 11, 2024
