THE MIRROR Thursday, June 12, 1997, page 3
Click here to see the photograph of the tomato [384K JPEG file].
PILGRIMS were last
night flocking to see a
message from God - in a
TOMATO.
Schoolgirl Shaista Javed, 14
sliced open the fruit to make a salad
for her gran and found the holy
words spelt out by its pips and
veins.
On one half was written: "There is
no God but Allah," and on the other:
"Mohammed is the messenger."
A holy man verified that the
words came from sacred Moslem
book the Koran. Now gran Niamat
Bibi's modest terraced house has
now become a mecca for pilgrims.
More than 100 Moslems have
flocked to her home to see the
amazing tomato in her fridge.
Shaista said yesterday: "I cut the
tomato in half and saw what looked
like Arabic lettering. I iust couldn't
believe it.
"It looked like the word for God, I
recognised it from the Koran.
"Then when I looked closer I
could see it was a whole phrase, a
very important one saying, 'There
is no God but Allah'."
She cried out and Niamat rushed
into the kitchen. They looked
closely and found more writing.
Niamat said:"I saw the second
holy phrase and I just couldn't
believe what I was seeing. There
were some letters missing and it
was hard to decipher but the
message was clear."
News of the discovery spread fast.
Niamat said: "At first there were just
a few friends, neighbours and
relatives, but as news spread they
were. coming from far and wide.
Even people from different towns
have made the journey.
"They knock on the door and I
take them through to the kitchen
and open the fridge door for them to
have a look. What has happened is
amazing."
A spokesman at the local mosque
said: "We don't consider it a miracle
but it is certainly a blessing."
Niamat says the tomato will stay
at her home in Huddersfield, West
Yorks, until it can be preserved.
In March last year another family
from the town found 'Praise Allah'
written inside an aubergine.
And a rock from Ben Nevis which
has been engraved with 'Allah' by
the wind and rain is kept in a
mosque in Burnley, Lancs.
Two years ago, Hindus across the
UK besieged temples when statues
of elephant-headed god Ganesh
'drank' offerings of milk through
its trunk.
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