جبل ورفاعة وقاسم، وهم المصلحون الذين جاؤوا للأخذ بيد أهل الحارة وتبصيرهم بحقوقهم فى وقف الجبلاوى، ينطقون دائما باسمه ويعلنون أنهم مكلفون من قِبَله، وهو ما يعنى أنهم هم رسل الله: موسى وعيسى ومحمد عليهم الصلاة والسلام، جاؤوا يدعون إليه ويعملون على التمكين للمبادئ والقيم التى يريد سبحانه من أهل الحارة (أى البشر) التمسك بها والكفاح من أجلها ... إلخ، مما لا ينطبق منه شىء على الدين، ولا يصدق إلا على المولى جل وعلا مع الأخذ فى الاعتبار بأننا هنا بصدد رواية رمزية كما هو مفهوم.
وإضافة إلى من ذَكَرْنا ممن قاموا بتفسير الرواية التفسيرَ الذى نرى بكل قوة أنه هو التفسير الصحيح نسوق هنا بعض ما كُتِب عنها باللغة الإنجليزية والفرنسية: فمن ذلك مثلا ما جاء تحت عنوان " Children of Gebelawi" فى الموسوعة الخاصة بموقع " NationMaster.com". وهذا نصه:
The story recreates the history of the monotheistic Abrahamic religions, allegorised against the setting of an imaginary Cairene alley. The first four sections retell, in succession, the stories of Adam (and his sons), Moses, Jesus and Muhammad; the protagonist of the book's fifth section (who, significantly, comes after the Prophet of Islam) symbolises modern science. Monotheism … is the belief in a single, universal, all-encompassing deity.
وفى الزاوية الخاصة بتعريف الكتب فى موقع " www.alibris.com" نقرأ تحت عنوان " Children of Gebelawi " الكلمة التالية عن الرواية: " An allegorical novel about the Cairo alley that often appears in Mahfouz's work, but which is inhabited this time by Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed".
وثَمَّ خبرٌ بتاريخ Wednesday, August 30, 2006 at 12:13 PM عن وفاة الكاتب الكبير منشور فى موقع " stevejanke.com" تحت عنوان " Nobel Prize winner Naguib Mahfouz passes away"، ننقل منه ما يلى:
Children of Gebelaawi (Awlad haratina) is Naguib Mahfouz's most controversial work. Set on the edge of real Cairo, it relates in a simple, parable-like language the history of an isolated alley (harah) through several generations. The hero of each generation struggles to restore the rights of the alley's poor and oppressed inhabitants to the estate (waqf) set up by their ancestor, the powerful and enigmatic Gebelaawi. In order to accomplish this mission, he must battle the tyrants who control the estate and their thugs or "strongmen'' (futuwah), sadistic protection-racketeers with colorful gangster-like names such as Guzzler, Bruiser, etc.
On closer examination, we see that Children of Gebelaawi is an allegorical tale. The heroes of the first four episodes relive the lives of the prophets Adam, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, and the protagonist of the fifth represents modern man who relies on science and technology to destroy the alley's oppressors.
أما الفقرات التالية فعبارة عن كلمة لقارئ لندنى يدعى: Ralph Blumenau كتبها فى موقع " www.amazon.com" تعليقا على الرواية قال فيها:
This novel about a community in some desert village is written with the simplicity of language that one associates with old myths, and underlying the story are indeed echoes, sometimes close and sometimes rather distorted, of ancient myths. God is allegorized as Gabalawi, the remote and mostly unseen owner of the estate of which the Children of the Alley are supposed to be his heirs. The central character in each of the five stories is up against the selfish and oppressive overseers who dominate the estate and its inhabitants with the help of their retinue of gangsters. The first of the stories evokes that of the expulsion from the Garden of Eden and the story of Cain and Abel; the second that of Moses and Pharaoh; the third that of
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