The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India, Volume 1

5. Marriage

The census returns of 1911 show that three-fourths of Muhammadan boys now remain unmarried till the age of 20; while of girls 31 per cent are unmarried between 15 and 20, but only 13 per cent above that age. The age of marriage of boys may therefore be taken at 18 to 25 or later, and that of girls at 10 to 20. The age of marriage both of girls and boys is probably getting later, especially among the better classes.

Marriage is prohibited to the ordinary near relatives, but not between first cousins. A man cannot marry his foster-mother or foster-sister, unless the foster-brother and sister were nursed by the same woman at intervals widely separated. A man may not marry his wife’s sister during his wife’s lifetime unless she has been divorced. A Muhammadan cannot marry a polytheist, but he may marry a Jewess or a Christian. No specific religious ceremony is appointed, nor are any rites essential for the contraction of a valid marriage. If both persons are legally competent, and contract marriage with each other in the presence of two male or one male and two female witnesses, it is sufficient. And the Shiah law even dispenses with witnesses. As a rule the Kāzi performs the ceremony, and reads four chapters of the Korān with the profession of belief, the bridegroom repeating them after him. The parties then express their mutual consent, and the Kāzi, raising his hands, says, “The great God grant that mutual love may reign between this couple as it existed between Adam and Eve, Abraham and Sarah, Joseph and Zuleika, Moses and Zipporah, His Highness Muhammad and Ayesha, and His Highness Ali and Fātimah.”³⁰⁵ A dowry or meher must be paid to the wife, which under the law must not be less than ten silver dirhams or drachmas; but it is customary to fix it at Rs. 17, the dowry of Fātimah, the Prophet’s favourite daughter, or at Rs. 750, that of the Prophet’s wife, Ayesha.³⁰⁶ The wedding is, however, usually accompanied by feasts and celebrations not less elaborate or costly than those of the Hindus. Several Hindu ceremonies are also included, such as the anointing of the bride and bridegroom with oil and turmeric, and setting out earthen vessels, which are meant to afford a dwelling-place for the spirits of ancestors, at least among the lower classes.³⁰⁷ Another essential rite is the rubbing of the hands and feet of the bridegroom with mehndi or red henna. The marriage is usually arranged and a ceremony of betrothal held at least a year before it actually takes place.

Carrying the horse-shoe at the Muharram festival

6. Polygamy, divorce and widow-remarriage

A husband can divorce his wife at pleasure by merely repeating the prescribed sentences. A wife can obtain divorce from her husband for impotence, madness, leprosy or non-payment of the dowry. A woman who is divorced can claim her dowry if it has not been paid. Polygamy is permitted among Muhammadans to the number of four wives, but it is very rare in the Central Provinces. Owing to the fact that members of the immigrant trading castes leave their wives at home in Gujarāt, the number of married women returned at the census was substantially less than that of married men. A feeling in favour of the legal prohibition of polygamy is growing up among educated Muhammadans, and many of them sign a contract at marriage not to take a second wife during the lifetime of the first. There is no prohibition on the remarriage of widows in Muhammadan law, but the Hindu rule on the subject has had considerable influence, and some Muhammadans of good position object to the marriage of widows in their family. The custom of the seclusion of women also, as Mr. Marten points out, operates as a bar to a widow finding a husband for herself.

7. Devices for procuring children, and beliefs about them

Women who desire children resort to the shrines of saints, who are supposed to be able to induce fertility. “Blochmann notes that the tomb of Saint Salīm-i-Chishti at Fatehpur-Sikri, in whose house the Emperor Jahāngīr was born, is up to the present day visited by childless Hindu and Musalmān women. A tree in the compound of the saint Shāih Alam of Ahmedābād yields a peculiar acorn-like fruit, which is sought after far and wide by those desiring children; the woman is believed to conceive from the moment of eating the fruit. If the birth of a child follows the eating of the acorn, the man and woman who took it from the tree should for a certain number of years come at every anniversary of the saint and nourish the tree with a supply of milk. In addition to this, jasmine and rose-bushes at the shrines of certain saints are supposed to possess issue-giving properties. To draw virtue from the saint’s jasmine the woman who yearns for a child bathes and purifies herself and goes to the shrine, and seats herself under or near the jasmine bush with her skirt spread out. As many flowers as fall into her lap, so many children will she have. In some localities if after the birth of one child no other son is born, or being born does not live, it is supposed that the first-born child is possessed by a malignant spirit who destroys the young lives of the new-born brothers and sisters. So at the mother’s next confinement sugar and sesame-seed are passed seven or nine times over the new-born infant from head to foot, and the elder boy or girl is given them to eat. The sugar represents the life of the young one given to the spirit who possesses the first-born. A child born with teeth already visible is believed to exercise a very malignant influence over its parents, and to render the early death of one of them almost certain.”³⁰⁸

8. Pregnancy rites

In the seventh or ninth month of pregnancy a fertility rite is performed as among the Hindus. The woman is dressed in new clothes, and her lap is filled with fruit and vegetables by her friends. In some localities a large number of pots are obtained, and a little water is placed in each of them by a fertile married woman who has never lost a child. Prayers are repeated over the pots in the names of the male and female ancestors of the family, and especially of the women who have died in childbirth. This appears to be a propitiation of the spirits of ancestors.³⁰⁹

9. Childbirth and naming children

A woman goes to her parents’ home after the last pregnancy rite and stays there till her confinement is over. The rites performed by the midwife at birth resemble those of the Hindus. When the child is born the azān or summons to prayer is uttered aloud in his right ear, and the takbīr or Muhammadan creed in his left. The child is named on the sixth or seventh day. Sometimes the name of an ancestor is given, or the initial letter is selected from the Korān at a venture and a name beginning with that letter is chosen. Some common names are those of the hundred titles of God combined with the prefix abd or servant. Such are Abdul Azīz, servant of the all-honoured; Ghani, the everlasting; Karīm, the gracious; Rahīm, the pitiful; Rahmān, the merciful; Razzāk, the bread-giver; Sattār, the concealer; and so on, with the prefix Abdul, or servant of, in each case. Similarly Abdullah, or servant of God, was the name of Muhammad’s father, and is a very favourite one. Other names end with Baksh or ‘given by,’ as Haidar Baksh, given by the lion (Ali); these are similar to the Hindu names ending in Prasād. The prefix Ghulām, or slave of, is also used, as Ghulām Hussain, slave of Hussain; and names of Hebrew patriarchs mentioned in the Korān are not uncommon, as Ayūb Job, Hārūn Aaron, Ishāq Isaac, Mūsa Moses, Yakūb Jacob, Yūsaf Joseph, and so on.³¹⁰

10. The Ukīka sacrifice

After childbirth the mother must not pray or fast, touch the Korān or enter a mosque for forty days; on the expiry of this period she is bathed and dressed in good clothes, and her relatives bring presents for the child. Some people do not let her oil or comb her hair during these days. The custom would seem to be a relic of the period of impurity of women after childbirth. On the fortieth day the child is placed in a cradle for the first time. In some localities a rite called Ukīka is performed after the birth of a child. It consists of a sacrifice in the name of the child of two he-goats for a boy and one for a girl. The goats must be above a year old, and without spot or blemish. The meat must be separated from the bones so that not a bone is broken, and the bones, skin, feet and head are afterwards buried in the earth. When the flesh is served the following prayer is said by the father: “O, Almighty God, I offer in the stead of my own offspring life for life, blood for blood, head for head, bone for bone, hair for hair, and skin for skin. In the name of God do I sacrifice this he-goat.” This is apparently a relic of the substitution of a goat for Ishmael when Abraham was offering him as a sacrifice. The Muhammadans say that it was Ishmael instead of Isaac who was thus offered, and they think that Ishmael or Ismail was the ancestor of all the Arabs.³¹¹

11. Shaving the hair and ear-piercing

Either on the same day as the Ukīka sacrifice or soon afterwards the child’s hair is shaved for the first time. By the rich the hair is weighed against silver and this sum is distributed to beggars. It is then tied up in a piece of cloth and either buried or thrown into a river, or sometimes set afloat on a little toy raft in the name of a saint. Occasionally tufts of hair or even the whole head may be left unshaven in the name of a saint, and after one or more years the child is taken to the saint’s tomb and the hair shaved there; or if this cannot be done it is cut off at home in the name of the saint.³¹²

When a girl is one or two years old the lobes of her ears are bored. By degrees other holes are bored along the edge of the ear and even in the centre, till by the time she has attained the age of two or three years she has thirteen holes in the right ear and twelve in the left. Little silver rings and various kinds of earrings are inserted and worn in the holes. But the practice of boring so many holes has now been abandoned by the better-class Muhammadans.

Tāzia or tombs of Hussain at the Muharram festival

12. Birthdays

The child’s birthday is known as sāl-girah and is celebrated by a feast. A knot is tied in a red thread and annually thereafter a fresh knot to mark his age, and prayers are offered in the child’s name to the patriarch Noah, who is believed to have lived to five hundred or a thousand years, and hence to have the power of conferring longevity on the child. When a child is four years, four months and four days old the ceremony of Bismillah or taking the name of God is held, which is obligatory on all Muhammadans. Friends are invited, and the child is dressed in a flowered robe (sahra) and repeats the first chapters of the Korān after his or her tutor.³¹³

13. Circumcision, and maturity of girls

A boy is usually circumcised at the age of six or seven, but among some classes of Shiahs and the Arabs the operation is performed a few days after birth. The barber operates and the child is usually given a little bhāng or other opiate. Some Muhammadans leave circumcision till an age bordering on puberty, and then perform it with a pomp and ceremony almost equalling those of a marriage. When a girl arrives at the age of puberty she is secluded for seven days, and for this period eats only butter, bread and sugar, all fish, flesh, salt and acid food being prohibited. In the evening she is bathed, warm water is poured on her head, and among the lower classes an entertainment is given to friends.³¹⁴

14. Funeral rites

The same word janāzah is used for the corpse, the bier and the funeral. When a man is at the point of death a chapter of the Korān, telling of the happiness awaiting the true believer in the future life, is read, and some money or sherbet is dropped into his mouth. After death the body is carefully washed and wrapped in three or five cloths for a male or female respectively. Some camphor or other sweet-smelling stuff is placed on the bier. Women do not usually attend funerals, and the friends and relatives of the deceased walk behind the bier. There is a tradition among some Muhammadans that no one should precede the corpse, as the angels go before. To carry a bier is considered a very meritorious act, and four of the relations, relieving each other in turn, bear it on their shoulders. Muhammadans carry their dead quickly to the place of interment, for Muhammad is stated to have said that it is good to carry the dead quickly to the grave, so as to cause the righteous person to attain the sooner to bliss; and, on the other hand, in the case of a bad man it is well to put wickedness away from one’s shoulders. Funerals should always be attended on foot, for it is said that Muhammad once rebuked people who were following a bier on horseback, saying, “Have you no shame, since God’s angels go on foot and you go upon the backs of quadrupeds?” It is a highly meritorious act to attend a funeral whether it be that of a Muslim, a Jew or a Christian. The funeral service is not recited in the cemetery, this being too polluted a place for so sacred an office, but either in a mosque or in some open space close to the dwelling of the deceased person or to the graveyard. The nearest relative is the proper person to recite the service, but it is usually said by the family priest or the village Kāzi. The grave sometimes has a recess at the side, in which the body is laid to prevent the earth falling upon it, or planks may be laid over the body slantwise or supported on bricks for the same purpose. Coffins are only used by the rich. When the body has been placed in the grave each person takes up a clod of earth and pronouncing over it a verse of the Korān, ‘From earth we made you, to earth we return you and out of earth we shall raise you on the resurrection day,’ places it gently in the grave over the corpse.³¹⁵ The building of stone or brick tombs and writing verses of the Korān on them is prohibited by the Traditions, but large masonry tombs are common in all Muhammadan countries and very frequently they bear inscriptions. On the third day a feast is given in the morning and after it trays of flowers with a vessel containing scented oil are handed round and the guests pick flowers and dip them into the oil. They then proceed to the grave, where the oil and flowers are placed. Maulvis are employed to read the whole of the Korān over the grave, which they accomplish by dividing it into sections and reading them at the same time. Rich people sometimes have the whole Koran read several times over in this manner. A sheet of white or red cloth is spread over the grave, green being usually reserved for Fakīrs or saints. On the evening of the ninth day another feast is given, to which friends and neighbours, and religious and ordinary beggars are invited, and a portion is sent to the Fakīr or mendicant in charge of the burying-ground. Some people will not eat any food from this feast in their houses but take it outside.³¹⁶ On the morning of the tenth day they go again to the grave and repeat the offering of flowers and scented oil as before. Other feasts are given on the fortieth day, and at the expiration of four, six and nine months, and one year from the date of the death, and the rich sometimes spend large sums on them. None of these observances are prescribed by the Korān but have either been retained from pre-Islamic times or adopted in imitation of the Hindus. For forty days all furniture is removed from the rooms and the whole family sleep on the bare ground. Sometimes a cup of water and a wheaten cake are placed nightly for forty days on the spot where the deceased died, and a similar provision is sent to the mosque. When a man dies his mother and widow break their glass bangles. The mother can get new ones, but the widow does not wear glass bangles or a nose-ring again unless she takes a second husband. For four months and ten days the widow is strictly secluded and does not leave the house. Prayers for ancestors are offered annually at the Shab-i-Bārat or Bakr-Id festival.³¹⁷ The property of a deceased Muhammadan is applicable in the first place to the payment of his funeral expenses; secondly, to the discharge of his debts; and thirdly, to the payment of legacies up to one-third of the residue. If the legacies exceed this amount they are proportionately reduced. The remainder of the property is distributed by a complicated system of shares to those of the deceased’s relatives who rank as sharers and residuaries, legacies to any of them in excess of the amount of their shares being void. The consequence of this law is that most Muhammadans die intestate.³¹⁸

15. Muhammadan sects. Shiah and Sunni

Of the two main sects of Islam, ninety-four per cent of the Muhammadans in the Central Province were returned as being Sunnis in 1911 and three per cent as Shiahs, while the remainder gave no sect. Only the Cutchi, Bohra and Khoja immigrants from Gujarāt are Shiahs and practically all other Muhammadans are Sunnis. With the exception of Persia, Oudh and part of Gujarāt, the inhabitants of which are Shiahs, the Sunni sect is generally prevalent in the Muhammadan world. The main difference between the Sunnis and Shiahs is that the latter think that according to the Korān the Caliphate or spiritual headship of the Muhammadans had to descend in the Prophet’s family and therefore necessarily devolved on the Lady Fātimah, the only one of his children who survived him, and on her husband Ali the fourth Caliph. They therefore reject the first three Caliphs after Muhammad, that is Abu Bakr, Omar and Othman. After Ali they also hold that the Caliphate descended in his family to his two sons Hasan and Hussain, and the descendants of Hussain. Consequently they reject all the subsequent Caliphs of the Muhammadan world, as Hussain and his children did not occupy this position. They say that there are only twelve Caliphs, or Imāms, as they now prefer to call them, and that the twelfth has never really died and will return again as the Messiah of whom Muhammad spoke, at the end of the world. He is known as the Mahdi, and the well-known pretender of the Soudan, as well as others elsewhere, have claimed to be this twelfth or unrevealed Imām. Other sects of the Shiahs, as the Zaidiyah and Ismailia, make a difference in the succession of the Imāmate among Hussain’s descendants. The central incident of the Shiah faith is the slaughter of Hussain, the son of Ali, with his family, on the plain of Karbala in Persia by the sons of Yazīd, the second Caliph of the Umaiyad dynasty of Damascus, on the 10th day of the month Muharram, in the 61st year of the Hijra or A.D. 680. The martyrdom of Hussain and his family at Karbala is celebrated annually for the first ten days of the month of Muharram by the Shiahs. Properly the Sunnis should take no part in this, and should observe only the tenth day of Muharram as that on which Adam and Eve and heaven and hell were created. But in the Central Provinces the Sunnis participate in all the Muharram celebrations, which now have rather the character of a festival than of a season of mourning. The Shiahs also reject the four great schools of tradition of the Sunnis, and have separate traditional authorities of their own. They count the month to begin from the full moon instead of the new moon, pray three instead of five times a day, and in praying hold their hands open by their sides instead of folding them below the breast. The word Shiah means a follower, and Sunni one proceeding on the sunnah, the path or way, a term applied to the traditions of the Prophet. The two words have thus almost the same signification. Except when otherwise stated, the information in this article relates to the Sunnis.

Famous Tāzia at Khandwa

16. Leading religious observances. Prayer

The five standard observances of the Muhammadan religion are the Kalima, or creed; Sula, or the five daily prayers; Roza, or the thirty-day fast of Ramazān; Zakāb, the legal alms; and Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, which should be performed once in a lifetime. The Kalima, or creed, consists simply in the sentence, ‘There is but one God and Muhammad is His prophet,’ which is frequently on the lips of Muhammadans. The five periods for prayer are Fajr ki namāz, in the morning before sunrise; Zohar, or the midday prayer, after the sun has begun to decline; Asur, or the afternoon prayer, about four; Maghrib, or the evening prayer, immediately after sunset; and Aysha, or the evening prayer, after the night has closed in. These prayers are repeated in Arabic, and before saying them the face, hands and feet should be washed, and, correctly speaking, the teeth should also be cleaned. At the times of prayer the Azān or call to prayer is repeated from the mosque by the muezzan or crier in the following terms: “God is great, God is great, God is great, God is great! I bear witness that there is no God but God! (twice). I bear witness that Muhammad is the Apostle of God! (twice). Come to prayers! Come to prayers! Come to salvation! Come to salvation! God is great! There is no other God but God.” In the early morning the following sentence is added, ‘Prayers are better than sleep.’³¹⁹