# A Story from Jerusalem explained — Short Fiction

> Chapter companion for Short Fiction by Selma Lagerlöf.

## What happens

In the El Aksa mosque, the old fortune-teller Mesullam broods over a humiliation after being barred from seeing a visiting monarch. A stranger arrives and recounts two vivid dreams—one of seeing Christ's mosaic revealed in the Hagia Sophia, another of passing through the sealed Golden Gate led by Christ—seeking interpretation. Mesullam, suspicious and bitter, dismisses the dreams as mere dreams, only to realize too late that he has twice let fortune slip away.

## Themes in this chapter

### Deception and Truth

Mesullam suspects the stranger of mocking him, while the stranger's dreams reveal hidden truths beneath surfaces—the Christian mosaics under paint and the opening of the sealed gate.

### Nature and the Supernatural

The stranger's trance-like vision in the mosque and his dream of passing through the walled-up Golden Gate blur the line between reality and the supernatural.

## Character check-ins

### Old Mesullam

A soothsayer and dream-interpreter sitting in El Aksa, grieving over a humiliation and refusing to engage with the stranger's visions.

### Jesus

Appears in the stranger's dream as the figure who opens the Golden Gate and as the revealed Christ in the Hagia Sophia vision.

## Key lines

> I could not help but close my eyes as I stood leaning against a pillar. Soon sleep, or rather insensibility, overcame me. Probably it did not last more than a minute, but during this interval I was entirely removed from reality.

The stranger briefly lost consciousness while in the mosque, entering a dreamlike state.

_Describes the onset of the vision in the Hagia Sophia._

> It was Christ , soothsayer, Christ once again.

The stranger identifies the figure who opened the Golden Gate as Christ.

_Key revelation in the second dream._

> Allah, Allah! Twice on the same day Fortune has passed by me without my having captured her. What hath thy servant done to displease thee?

Mesullam laments that he missed two opportunities to gain fortune and renown.

_Mesullam's final realization of his error._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/short_fiction_50_se/chapters/a-story-from-jerusalem
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/short_fiction_50_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/short_fiction_50_se/chapters