Islamic burial
The Islamic or Muslim burial consists of a coffin-free religious burial , which is oriented towards Mecca to Allah: “The angel of death who is entrusted with you will take you away. Then you will be brought back to your Lord ” ( sura 32 , 11).
In Islam there are precise rules for terminal care . The prayers, the ritual washing of the corpse and the funeral are laid down in the process.
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Accompany the dying
The believers who stand around the death camp of a Muslim or a Muslim woman constantly pray the Creed of Faith ( Shahada ) of Islam and Sura 36 in Arabic . In verse 12 it says there: "See, we make them (the dead) alive and we write down what they did before, and we have enumerated their traces and all things in a clear example."
Unceasingly the dying, even the dead will be the Shahadah whispered with a gentle, audible voice as a salutary Viaticum in the ear. Mohammed is said to have called this sura himself the heart of the Koran. For the devout Muslim , death is not only the natural end, but also the climax of life. The dying Muslim is about to return to Allah in order to give an account of his faith in front of him about his life.
Dealing with the deceased
Immediately after death occurs, the dead man's eyes are closed. With the exception of one man with a deceased person or one woman with a deceased person, those present leave the death room in order to immediately inform all relatives, friends, neighbors and acquaintances of the death orally or in writing. The remaining person lays the body on their back and extends their arms and legs. The face of the deceased must point towards Mecca . The feet are turned towards the holy city as well, as if he were about to sit up in the direction of prayer. This prayer posture is also important for the tomb later. The dead Muslim is evidently understood as a prayer before Allah.
The ritual cleansing of the corpse
The ritual cleansing - also called ablution - is an obligatory rite for all Muslims, which takes place in the death room or in a room in the mosque that is intended for it. It must be performed by an adult Muslim. For women, this rite should be performed by a woman, for men by a man. The following order of precedence is to be observed when selecting the person to perform the ablution: the person desired by the deceased, then the parents, followed by the grandparents. The spouses are also allowed to wash the partner. The washing sequence follows a fixed sequence, after which the dead person is wrapped in sheets: three for a man, five for a woman, and one for a child.
The multiple ritual cleansing of the corpse takes place as before the daily compulsory prayer : First the hands of the deceased are washed up to the wrist, the mouth is rinsed, the nostrils cleaned, the face washed, then the hands up to the elbows and the head from the hair up to the neck, continuing to wash the whole body starting with the right side. The pubic area is covered with a cloth from the navel to the knees and washed underneath the cloth. This is done several times with fresh water without soap. After the second washing, musk , camphor or rose water can be added to the new water so that the whole body smells good. The cloths and towels are only intended for one dead person. The washing and the ritual cleansing of the body have to be done in an uneven number of times. The dead should be able to stand before Allah without any spots or flaws. An old rule points to the historical origin of faith: If there is no water for the believer when preparing for his compulsory prayer - for example in the desert - he takes sand instead. This also applies to the ritual cleansing of the deceased.
The anointing of the body
The anointing of the dead can be done with camphor oil on seven selected parts of the body, which always touch the ground when performing the daily compulsory prayer five times: on the forehead, on both palms of the hands, on both knees, on both big toes. The Shiites also add their noses. The Sunnis, on the other hand, anoint the whole body of the dead.
The clothing of the deceased
Then the dead person is dressed in his funeral robe if it is already prepared in the closet. Or he is wrapped without clothes in a white cotton cloth, which is tied over the head and below the feet with strips of fabric of the same color. The shroud may not be made of silk or have gold embroidery. Only the outlines of the body can be seen under the cloth. In death before Allah all are equal.
The funeral robe itself consists of a head covering that completely covers the head up to the neck, of a shirt-like outer clothing and a shorts-like lower part or, in the case of a woman, of tubular trousers (pantalon) . If the Muslim has taken part in a pilgrimage to Mecca, his pilgrimage robe is put on him. Martyrs killed fighting unbelievers as persecuted by the faith are cleansed by their own blood. They are generally buried in the clothes they were wearing at the moment of their death. The various denominations of Islam regulate the question of the ritual cleansing of miscarriages, premature births and stillbirths, infant deaths and those who have been injured in traffic and industrial accidents. In the case of small children, ritual cleansing can also be dispensed with.
The funeral prayer
The funeral prayer can be said at any time, except when the sun rises or sets. This happens after the completion of the preparation of the deceased for Allah. For the Shiites, the beneficiary or a representative is obliged to do so. According to Sunni tradition, this may have been determined by the deceased during his lifetime. The funeral prayer can also be taken over by the sheikh of the neighborhood.
Whoever performs the funeral prayer stands on the right side at the head of the bier and first announces his intention . The different denominations of Islam know different wording. The men of the mourning suite stand in the direction of Mecca and perform these prayers in a standing position, in contrast to the five compulsory daily prayers. The Shiite prayer for the dead reads: “Allah is the greatest. I testify that there is no other god than Allah and that Muhammad is Allah's Prophet. - Allah is the greatest. God bless Mohammed and his family. - Allah is the greatest. God forgive the sins of believing men and women. - Allah is the greatest. God forgive these deceased sins (if the deceased is a child, it is said: God forgive the sins of his parents) - Allah is the greatest. "
The funeral procession
The dead person on the stretcher in his shroud can still be covered with a fine carpet. The stretcher is carried on the shoulders or just with the hands at knee level. In Islam it is a duty for a man to join the funeral procession and even to carry the dead a few steps with him. The funeral procession with the Imam goes ahead, followed by the dead man. The Shahada is repeated aloud over and over again.
Today, with the long distances between the apartments and the cemeteries, the stretcher is placed on a specially designed car. The participants then follow in the car or on the motorcycle.
The service and the funeral
The dead should be buried within a day. Today, hygienic reasons are usually given for this. The original sense of this hurry is that the angel of death guides the soul to heaven after death so that it can experience a kind of intermediate judgment there and then return to the body in the grave. If death occurs in the evening or at night, the burial should take place the following morning. In Muslim countries, the deceased is taken to the mosque or laid out in front of the mosque after donning the funeral robe. The incense mixes with the musk scent or with the scent of camphor or rose oil by burning incense sticks. Sometimes a valuable blanket is placed over the dead, but it is not placed in the grave.
Then the Imam, the Islamic clergyman, speaks verse 111 four times from Sura 17. This is the beginning of the daily compulsory prayer. The usual bows are omitted, those present remain standing. This sura recalls Muhammad's night journey from the Kaaba to Jerusalem, his journey into heaven. The recitation is interrupted by the personal prayer O God forgive him, be gracious to him or O God forgive her and be gracious to her. The funeral prayer does not contain a request for forgiveness of sins for small children who are not yet considered responsible for their actions. After a short funeral service, the imam accompanies the four men who usually shoulder the deceased on a stretcher and those who accompany him to the grave. When a woman is buried, only men attend her funeral. A public lamentation for the death of women is not permitted according to Sharia, Islamic law.
The Muslim cemetery
By renouncing a pronounced cult of the dead, the Islamic cemeteries are extremely simple. They are often outside of the inhabited places in otherwise unusable wasteland. In Germany, the municipalities have assigned parts of the cemetery to the Muslim communities or made land available for their own cemeteries, as the Muslim communities generally lack corporate status and therefore cannot be cemetery owners .
Because the row graves are often not visited six weeks after the burial of the deceased, the graves remain unplanted. Often the graves look neglected. Death tore all ties between the married couple. Men and women can definitely lie next to each other. Smaller row graves are provided for children. For the Shiites, the grave must not rise higher than the surrounding ground. The Sunnis claim the vaulting of the tomb to distinguish them from the graves of the infidels. For them, the grave may even be adorned with a marble stone on which the name of the deceased, the date of death and a verse from the Koran are written.
In Islam, the dead enjoy an eternal right to rest .
The burial of the Muslim
When they arrive at the grave, the dead are placed on the stretcher by the men, lifted into the grave and laid down there on the right in the direction of prayer to Mecca. The one who goes down into the grave to bed the deceased must be barefoot and bareheaded. He has to unbutton his clothes and has to say: “In the name of Allah. According to the religion of the Prophet Allah, God, may his grave be wide for him. Grant that this dead man be united with his prophet, God, if he was a benefactor, increase his charity; if he has acted badly, forgive him, have mercy on him and let him have his sins behind. ” The grave is about one and a half meters deep with a niche at the head end. It can be the custom to untie the dead man's head and whisper the Shahadah in his ear again. In Germany, the coffin requirement has now been abolished in most federal states. For the Muslim, the coffin is of course used to recover a dead person and to transport a dead Muslim, as well as to bring his corpse home, but not for burial.
The only short burial ceremony consists of incessant recitation of the Koran: the 112th sura is uttered 41 times : "He is Allah, one and only, the eternal God, he does not procreate and is not conceived, and no one is like him." The Imam stands during the funeral service for a man at the head end, for a woman at the foot of the corpse. The Shahada, Surah 1 and a greeting of peace are spoken. Unfired clay slabs are sometimes placed over the ones placed in the grave, closing the gaps between them. A niche is created in the grave on the side facing Mecca. While the mourners cast the earth into the grave, they speak sura 20 , 55: "We created you from it (earth) and we will let you return to it and from it we will raise you another time." Above the filled grave Later, only a stone at the head end and at the foot end on the accumulation of earth mark the position of the deceased.
See also
Individual evidence
- ^ Islamic burial rites
- ↑ "After death, the angels hung the book around the deceased's neck." Thomas Lemmen: Basis Wissen Islam , Gütersloher Verlagshaus, Gütersloh 200, p. 38f.
- ↑ Funeral rules in the Islamic Bund of the Islamic World, accessed on February 3, 2014
literature
- The Koran . Translated from the Arabic by Max Henning. Introduction and remarks by Annemarie Schimmel . Philipp Reclam Jun., Stuttgart 1960.
- Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje : Islam . In: Alfred Berthold, Edvard Lehmann: Textbook of the history of religion . Founded by Chantepie De La Saussaye. Volume 1, published by JCB Mohr (Paul Siebeck), Tübingen 1925, p. 724ff.
- Thomas Lemmen : Basic knowledge of Islam. Gütersloher Verlagshaus, Gütersloh 2000, ISBN 3-579-00654-1 .
- Astrid Eisingerich: Death as a return to God, the source of all life - dying, death and mourning in Islam . In: Birgit Heller (ed.): All contemplation is death. Interreligious approaches to dying, death and mourning. Lambertus Verlag, Freiburg 2003, ISBN 3-7841-1410-5 , pp. 118-144.
- Klaus Dirschauer : Islamic burial. Salat al-Janazah - the passage ritual . In: Friedhofskultur 101. Vol. 7/2011, pp. 17-20.
- What everyone should know about Islam . On behalf of the Office of the United Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany (VELKD) and the Church Office of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) ed. v. Martin Affolderbach u. Inken Wöhlbrand. Complete overar. New edition, Gütersloher Verlagshaus, Gütersloh 2011, ISBN 978-3-579-06559-5 .
- Klaus Dirschauer : The Islamic burial and the customs of his mourning. In: Buried with words: Designing and creating funeral speeches. Donat Verlag, Bremen 2012, ISBN 978-3-943425-08-6 , pp. 101-112.