Muslim Traditions: Purity and Health
BY: DANIEL HECKER
The numerous purification precepts in both the Koran and Tradition touching both bodily cleanliness and mental and spiritual hygiene, insist that a Muslim be found in state of purity, especially before and during the performance of religious ceremonies such as prayer, fasting or pilgrimage.
Muhammad’s dictum, “A strong believer is preferable to a weak one” reflects his emphasis on bodily, mental and spiritual health, and most of his prescriptions deal with more than one of these aspects.
Purity through Hygiene: The Fly in the Soup
Muhammad was already well aware in the 7th century that flies can be carriers of contagious diseases, and in consequence warned his followers about them. He believed however that the danger of contagion could be averted by paying attention to a fly’s wings.
Muhammad claimed a fly’s two wings contained both poison and the antidote. One wing bears the antidote against the poison borne by the other. This explains the saying traditionally attributed to Muhammad: “If a fly falls into somebody’s soup, he must put the whole fly into the soup and then remove it. One wing contains disease, the other healing.”
Blessing through Hygiene
Bodily cleanliness was so important for Muhammad that he assured his community that Allah’s blessing could be obtained by certain forms of hygiene. He is quoted as saying: “If a morsel happens to fall on your hand on its way from your plate to your mouth, you must first clean the morsel and then eat it. It must not be left over for the devil. When a person has eaten enough, they should lick the fingers used in eating, for one doesn’t know which part of the dish contains Allah’s blessing.”
In other words the blessing may be located in the food already consumed or in the part which drops on the ground or sticks to one’s fingers.
Other parts of the Tradition expand this rule. Food remains are to be removed not only from the fingers but also the hand, and with the tongue or fingers also from the dish. The Tradition states: “Whenever Allah’s prophet sat at a meal, he licked his fingers clean… He also enjoined us Muslims to clean the dish.” (the Arabic word qas’a refers to dish containing food for ten people).
Muhammad rejected the use of other means than the tongue for cleaning one’s fingers: “The fingers may not be wiped with a cloth but must be licked clean.”
Obligatory Hygiene
Muhammad said that he always washed after sexual intercourse and ordered his followers to do likewise and then perform the ritual ablution in preparation for prayer. His companion and later second Caliph ’Umar Ibn al-Khattab threatened those who did not wash after intercourse with severe punishment.
Menstruation is regarded as impurity in Islam and Sure 2:222 forbids intercourse during a woman’s period. There is however a tradition imputed to Muhammad’s favourite wife Aisha that he did have relations with her at such times.
Bodily health
Muhammad is said to have named various remedies reputed to cure any disease.
The black seed
This is a kind of spice in frequent use in the Muslim world and popularly known in several Arabic countries as “blessing seed” (in Arabic: habbatu l-baraka) due to the belief in its miraculous healing properties. Muhammad is said to claim it could cure any illness but death.
„al-Hijama“
This procedure refers to letting blood by means of a surface incision on a part of the body using a sharp instrument such as a knife. In Muhammad’s time it was in use as a remedy in the Arabian peninsula. He is said to have treated himself in this fashion at the ages of 17, 19 and 21 and recommended it as an effective remedy for any illness: “A Muslim treated by 'al-Hijama’ at the age of 17, 19 or 21 will be healed of any disease.”
Sexual Purity: Consanguinity though breast-feeding
The Tradition refers to the danger of sexual temptation which is present when a man and a woman are left together alone in a room. Muhammad is reputed to have affirmed: “Whenever a man and a woman are alone, the devil makes up the threesome.”
Weaning creates a consanguineous relation, so a male child weaned by a wet nurse is regarded as her son and may not therefore later take her to wife, because it would constitute an incestuous relation. It also implies such a man and his former wet nurse may be alone in a room together. Therefore, tradition even tells us about consanguineous relations between adults created through breast-feeding. The provisions apply also to the auntnephew relation: the man may not marry the sister of his former wet nurse since she has become his aunt through the consanguinity created by weaning.
