Muhammad Hasan and Stig Toft Madsen

The Blood of the Mourners

Shia Muslims in Norway, Denmark and Sweden have recently started Muharram processions. These processions have a long history, but new elements are being added in surprising ways.
Read here what flagellation has to do with blood transfusions!

The Muslim fascination with blood takes several forms. According to the Koran, God bade Abraham to sacrifice his son Ismail – rather than his other son, Isac, as in the Jewish and Christian tradition – but was allowed to substitute Ismail with a ram. Since then, Muslim families strive to sacrifice an animal – either a ram or goat or a cow or a camel - once every year on the occasion of the pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj) at the end of the lunar Islamic year. For the meat to be halal and fit for human consumption, the animal is slaughtered by cutting the veins and bleeding it to death.

Human blood connected with the martyrdom

A different tradition connects human blood with the martyrdom of Imam Husain. Imam Husain is the third Imam of the Shia line within Islam. Shortly after the death of the Prophet, the Muslim ummah was divided on the issue of succession. Whereas Sunni Muslims consider that the Prophet Muhammad was rightly succeeded by the khalifs Abu Bakr, Umar and Osman, the Shia Muslims consider that the imamat or authority of the Prophet fell on his son-in-law Ali, the husband of Muhammad's daughter Fatima.

From Ali, the line of succession among the Shias went to Ali's elder son Hasan. Hasan was poisoned by Amir Muawia, the governor of Damascus and father of Yazid. Hasan was succeeded by his younger brother Husain. Subsequently, Yazid demanded that Husain swear loyalty to him, but Husain refused to obey a tyrant and left Medina for Mecca and Iraq.
In 61 AH on the tenth day in the month of Muharram, the army of the Yazid intercepted Husain, his family and his army (most of which fled before the battle) at Karbala in Iraq. In the ensuing battle Husain was defeated and killed with his 72 close companions. Sunni Islam, thereby, got the opportunity to expand and consolidate its power, whereas Shias had to confront the Umayad and the Abassid dynasties ruling the Muslim world from Damascus and Baghdad.

Image as sufferers and victims

Except in a few places such as Cairo under the Fatamids and Persia under the Safavids and later from 1500 AD onwards, Shias were left to play second fiddle. At times, Shias were even persecuted by Sunnis. Therefore, Shias down through history have cultivated an image of themselves as sufferers and victims.
Every year on the tenth day in the month of Muharram, Shia clergy recounts the martyrdom of Husain at the battle of Karbala. The Shia community commemorates the event by street processions in which the enthusiastic mourners, or azadars, work themselves into frenzy by shouting the names of the martyrs ”Yaa Husain, Yaa Hasan”. In many places, the mourners also flog themselves on their back. In Iran, mourners often use an instrument (zanjir) consisting of a bunch of steel chains held together with a handle to flog themselves.

In Pakistan the zanjirs are often fitted with steel razors sharpened on both sides, or with small knives. Alternatively, some Muslims tie weights to hooks and suspend them from their breast. The wounds that the flagellants inflict on themselves often heal quickly, but some receive medical treatment, if necessary.

New Political Economy of Blood

The Iranian revolution in 1979 has fostered extremism among Muslims in many places, but in some respects the Iranian revolution has fostered reform and moderation instead. Thus, the present Iranian spiritual leader Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khaminai has issued a statement that the practice of drawing blood by flogging during Muharram is not an Islamic principle (usool), but a practice without roots in the scriptures. Further, some Iranian and Pakistani religious leaders have argued that since the Shias are not so downtrodden nowadays, they no longer need to express their identity through self-flagellation. Instead, the devout Muslim should use the occasion of Muharram to donate his blood to help the sick in the name of Imam Husain. Blood is a scarce good and should not be wasted.

In other words, elements within the religious establishment in Iran and Pakistan have reinterpreted one of the central practices among Shia Muslims in utilitarian and humane directions. Donating blood benefits others and impose less of a penance upon oneself. As in the case of Abraham’s s sacrifice of a ram instead of Ismail, here, too, a more severe from of penance is substituted by a less demanding, but scripturally valid, sacrificial gift. At the same time the “new political economy of blood” is an attempt by the clergy and members of the educated classes to modify and purify the religious practices of the masses in a direction which the clergy considers orthodox.

Welcomed by Shia Muslims in Pakistan

The innovation has not always been welcomed by the Shia Muslims in Pakistan. Some of those who used to flog themselves argued that the ulema or learned people had never shown any opposition to flogging before. Moreover, they may not buy into the argument that the ritual should reflect the historical status of the Shias. They may rather want ot express their grief over Husain’s martyrdom in a traditional manner.
In Pakistan, the first group to adopt the new idea were often Shia students in universities, colleges and schools organized in the Imamiya Students Organization (ISO). Together with the Imamiya Organization (IO) of Pakistan, the ISO established the Imamiya Blood Transfusion Services. Collaborating with the Husaini Blood Bank, a medical NGO, these organizations managed to start blood donation camps on the 9th and 10th day of Muharram, and to deposit blood in various blood banks in public and private hospitals.

After the blood is deposited, patients only have to pay for the screening of the blood. Poor patients may not have to pay at all. Both men and women may donate blood, and the blood is offered to all patients, irrespective of religious affiliation. This non-commercial venture started in Karachi, but it has spread to many other parts of Pakistan. It has not, however, replaced the traditional Muharram processions, which are still very popular.

MUHAMMAD HASAN & STIG TOFT MADSEN

Monsun 3/03 (Webb-bilaga till SYDASIEN)
Sidan skapad 29 september 2003

Tillbaka till Monsun 3/03