Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 November 1897 — Moslems Shun Water. [ARTICLE]

Moslems Shun Water.

At the hour of 12, noon, the Mohammedans can be seen in large numbers at the Begoda dyamia or mosque in Sarajevo, in Bosnia, says the Chicago Record, all sizes, ages and conditions, mingling freely. All go to one side of the inclosing wall, take off their sandals and wash their hands and feet, the majority wiping them off on their voluminous trousers, others simply permitting the air to dry them. It must be understood, however, that the washing of hands and feet in no sense Implies cleanliness. As for the rest of the body, well, Mohammed never said anything about washing or cleaning that, and so what’s the use? There Is one feature about this uncleanliness that is particularly disagreeable. Thetr law forbids the killing of any living being except for food, and this, of course, applies to the case of insects. After the abhrtlon has been performed they again step Into the opanken and go up the steps to the house of prayer, leaving their footwear on the platform and going barefooted upon the prayer rug or carpet, as the case may be. They kneel on both knees, lower their heads twenty or thirty times to the floor and offer their prayer to Allah. In about fifteen toinutes all Is concluded and they go to their places of business again. This ceremony is gone through with five times a day. Each time the call is intoned from the top of the mosque, and sometimes in a beautiful voice. The most impressive of all these calls, however, is that for evening prayer, when, with each verse, the singer, or muezzin, as he is called, hangs a colored lamp out of an arch in his tower. The view of Sarajevo at night, with sixteen lamps hung from the steeple of every dyamia, is of surpassing beauty. Sarajevo also boasts of a very luxurious Turkish bathhouse, but this is patronized almost exclusively by the Europeans and the better class of Mohammedans.