Page 166 - UAE Truncal States
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The Islamic Basis of Society

        chorus of both rows responds, singing, chanting and exclaiming, the
        drums accompany the human voices; the enthusiasm of the per­
        formers and the rhythm of the music may leave the beholder
        spellbound.
          In another ceremony, which is traditional for the same time in this
        area, men gathered in a majlis lake turns reading aloud the
        description of the birth of IheProphel Muhammad written in the 18th
        century by ’Abdul Rahim al Barzanji. The reading culminates in a
        prayer and exclamations, at which moment everybody, including the
        women who have gathered behind the curtain wall to listen, rises to
        their feet.
        Burials
        Simplicity and absence of pomp and ceremony also marked the
        traditions for burial of the dead. The deceased was buried as soon as
        possible, and certainly before sunset of the day he died. His body was
        taken to the graveyard, which was recognisable only by the many
        stones pointing up out of the ground, marking the head and foot of
        each grave. Relatives and friends carried the body, which was
        wrapped in a white cloth, to the grave, accompanied by only the male
         mourners. Near the grave they would line up for a prayer, which in
         the absence of a qadi ormutawwa' could be led by any respected man
         in the group, and after the body was lowered into the grave it was
         filled again with stones and sand and the head and footstone were
         placed upright. After another prayer the mourners would disperse.
        The wife and close female relatives might relieve their grief with a
         few spontaneous wailing shouts, but otherwise the family accepted
         the death of one of its members composedly as the very will of God,
         being confident that the deceased would remain in the hands of God.
         Pilgrimage (Hajj)
         The pilgrimage to Mecca at least once during a lifetime is one of the
         five obligations which a Muslim should endeavour to fulfil. But for
         people living in the eastern parts of the Peninsula the hajj was an
         extremely arduous and long journey, and on account of this not many
         people undertook it in the days before motorisation.39 There were
         various routes to Mecca: one could take a boat to Aden and then
         another boat from there to Jiddah; or else one went by boat to Basra
         and joined the Iraqi pilgrim caravan travelling on foot or by hired
         camel all the way across Arabia. Towards the end of Shaikh Zayid
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