The False Prophet

My initial reaction to Mahmoud Fall, the main character in "The False Prophet", is that he is a lazy man who refuses to earn a living by working. The comparison of Fall to cats in the story is an interesting analogy that had not ocurred to me. Cats (in my opinion) give back the least of various types of pets, and instead are simply another mouth to feed. Further into the story as Fall travels "towards the sunset and the country of the Bilals" it became apparent to me that not only is Fall lazy, but as he changes his name to "Aidra" in order to trick people into worshipping him, he is actually a con artist. As the tale continues my opinion of Fall decends even further, if that is possible, as it is revealed that "he profited from his knowledge of the Holy Book", by using a Holy name to trick locals into providing food and shelter for him. Mahmoud Fall is also a racist as shown by the multiple quotes such as "In his view these ebony-skinned men were his inferiors" and "These blacks definitely had a low regard for the value of prayer". Fall's soul and his personality are very similar to the descriptions written in the text about "carcasses of animals which had been picked clean at every stage of decomposition...". Along his journey, Fall has begun as a dishonest person, who is lazy at best, or a worthless carcass. As the story unfolds it is almost as if his soul begins to "decompose" as he spirals downward into complete disregard for his fellow man by deceiving them and robbing them of their hospitality. Finally in the closing of the story Fall begins to go a little mad and hear voices. Almost as if he has a split personality between being a thief and a religious man, Fall is torn between his greed and his false piousness. As the story ends Fall "realized that there is no need to believe in Allah in order to be a thief!" I found this ending to be almost humorous compared to the rest of the story.