Authors if you’re interested: https://cas-cz.academia.edu/OndrejBeranek
https://kbv.ff.cuni.cz/en/people/academic-staff/pavel-tupek
The practice of visiting graves certainly did not emerge only with the rise of Islam: pre-Islamic Arabs were also familiar with the cult of the dead, which suggests that ziyāra was most likely an ancient practice. However, describing the pre-Islamic Bedouin society in general, not to mention its funerary practices in particular, has never been an easy task. Th e classical literature (be it in the cuneiform, Greek or Latin) provides us with only very limited textual evidence about life in Arabia. The first Western scholar to attempt to describe the old Arabian religion was Edward Pococke.
In an essay titled ‘On the Veneration of the Dead in Paganism and Islam’, Goldziher deals specifi cally with the practice of building various objects above graves,5 spending one’s time there or seeking asylum there while being prosecuted, sacrifi cing people, animals6 or locks of hair7 at the graves of esteemed fi gures, or wailing in an exaggerated manner. He concludes that the religious establishment’s eff orts to eradicate these pre-Islamic habits failed and many of the practices continued to survive at that time. Th e cult of the dead was coupled with the cult of ancestors, with only a minor distinction between the two: the former focused on the memory of more recent generations, whereas the latter looked for objects of veneration in the distant past. Some Arab tribes maintained traditions related to ancestral graves even in later periods. Th e Qurʾan mentions ans.āb (5:90, alt. nus.ub, 5:3, 70:43) as a cult object for the pagan Arabs. Th is term refers to upright stones that were honoured by pagan Arabs as part of a cult, and were erected in particular at the graves of venerated heroes.
With the emergence of Islam, the building of ans.āb, their veneration and sacrifi ce by them were forbidden, as is evident from the Qurʾanic verse: ‘O you who have believed, indeed, intoxicants, gambling, stone altars (ans.āb), and divining arrows are but defi lement from the work of Satan, so avoid it that you may be successful’ (5:90). Similar instructions also appear in early Islamic poetry, as in this verse from al-Aʿsha panegyric on Muhammad: ‘Do not sacrifi ce to the raised nus.ub – do not pray to the high places, worship God alone.’10 Wailing for the dead (niyāh. a), a tradition among female relatives for their deceased loved ones, but also practised by professionals, also belongs in the same category of reprehensible acts. In place of the widespread cult of the dead, with all its accompanying practices, the early Islamic ulama tried to establish a ritualised funerary prayer (s.alāt al-janāza). In the Hijaz, he witnessed a Bedouin funeral and reported that after it, the women ‘tore the garments on their bosoms, scratched their faces and scattered dust over themselves’ and that ‘the sister or daughter sometimes cut either all of their hair, or at least one lock, which they hung or laid on the grave’.11 Musil also confi rmed the habit of sacrifi cing a camel in commemoration of the dead, spilling the blood of the sacrifi ced animal, erecting stones on the graves of the dead12 and ascribing a special signifi cance to locks of hair from the forehead.
- Th e largest amount of evidence about the survival of ancient funerary and mourning rituals in modern times comes, however, from North Africa.14 Of all the pre-Islamic customs that were connected with graves and burials, women’s wailing for the dead proved to have the strongest roots: they would express their grief (known as ndīb in North Africa) by groaning loudly, scratching their faces and cutting their hair. Professional wailers (h. azzāna) operated both in the urban centres and in the countryside.15 Th e women’s habit of gathering at cemeteries was also observed throughout the centuries. Louis Massignon (1883–1962), a renowned French scholar of Islam, stated in his study of Cairo’s cemeteries that their main function was to serve as a gathering place for women during Friday prayers, while the men attended mosques.
- The Time of Muhammad:
