A Dictionary of Islam Being a cyclopedia of the...

“There were four houses of unburnt bricks, the apartments being of palm-branches; and five houses made of palm-branches built up with mud and without any separate apartments. Each was three Arabian yards in length. Some say that they had leather curtains for the doors. One could reach the roof with the hand. The house of Hâritha was next to that of Mahomet. Now, whenever Mahomet took to himself a new wife, he added another house to the row, and Hâritha was obliged successively to remove his house and build on the space beyond. At last this was repeated so often, that the Prophet said to those about him, ‘Verily, it shameth me to turn Hâritha over and over again out of his house.’ ”

The houses of the rural poor in all parts of Islām, in Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Arabia, Persia, Afg͟hānistān, and India, are usually built either of mud or of unburnt bricks. In mountainous parts of Afg͟hānistān they are built of stones (collected from the beds of rivers) and mud. They are generally one storey high, and of one apartment in which the cattle are also housed. The roofs are flat and are formed of mud and straw laid upon branches of trees and rafters. The windows are small apertures, high up in the walls, and sometimes grated with wood. There are no chimneys, but in the centre of the roof there is an opening to emit the smoke, the fire being lighted on the ground in the centre of the room. In front of the house there is an inclosure, either of thorns or a mud wall, which secures privacy to the dwelling. A separate building, called in Asia a ḥujrah, or guest chamber, is provided for male visitors or guests; this chamber being common property of the section of the village, except in the case of chiefs or wealthy land-owners, who keep ḥujrahs of their own. In towns the houses of the inferior kind do not differ much from those in the villages, except that there is sometimes an upper storey. In some parts of Afg͟hānistān and Persia, it becomes necessary for each householder to protect his dwelling, in which case a watch tower, of mud, is erected close to the house.

The injunctions of Muḥammad regarding the seclusion of women have very greatly influenced the plan and arrangement of Muḥammadan dwelling-houses of the better class throughout the world, all respectable houses being so constructed as to seclude the female apartments from public view. In cities such as Cairo, Damascus, Delhi, Peshawur, and Cabul, the prevailing plan of dwelling-houses is an entrance through a blank wall, whose mean appearance is usually relieved by a handsome door-way and a few latticed windows. A respectable house usually consists of two courts, the first being that used by the male visitors and guests, and the inner court is the ḥarīm or zanānah reserved for the female members of the family. Facing the outer court will be an upper chamber, or bālā k͟hānah as it is called in Persian, the ὑπερῷον or upper room of the New Testament, in which there will be a dīwān, or raised seat or sofa, upon which the inmates can sit, eat, or sleep. This is the usual reception room. In Asia, this bālā k͟hānah seems to take the place of the more elaborate qāʿah described by Mr. Lane in his Modern Egyptians, vol. i. p. 39, which is either on the ground or upper floor. Within the first enclosure will be the stables for horses and cattle, and in its centre a raised dais as seats for servants and attendants. It should be noticed that there are no special bed-rooms in Eastern houses. Male visitors and friends will sleep in the verandahs of the outer court, or on the dīwān in the upper court.

The ḥarīm or women’s apartments in the inner court is entered by a small door. It is a quadrangle with verandahs on each of the four sides, formed by a row of pillars, the apertures of which are usually closed by sliding shutters. The back of the rooms being without windows, the only air being admitted from the front of the dwelling-place. The apartments are divided into long rooms, usually four, the extreme corners having small closets purposely built as store-rooms. On festive occasions these verandah rooms will be spread with handsome carpets, carpets and pillows being almost the only furniture of an Eastern dwelling, chairs being a modern invention. The roofs of these rooms are flat, and as the top is fenced in with a barrier some four feet high, the female members of the household sleep on the top of the house in the hot weather. [HARIM.]

In no point do Oriental habits differ more from European than in the use of the roof. Its flat surface, in fine weather the usual place of resort, is made useful for various household purposes, as drying corn, hanging up linen, and drying fruit.

In the centre of the inner court or ḥarīm, there is usually a well, so that the female domestics are not obliged to leave the seclusion of the ḥarīm for water-carrying. In a large court, of a wealthy person, there is usually a raised dais of either stone or wood, on which carpets are spread, and on which the ladies sit or recline. In the better class of dwellings, there are numerous courtyards, and special ones are devoted to winter and summer uses. In Peshawur, most respectable houses have an underground room, called a taḥ k͟hānah, where the inmates in the hot weather sleep at mid-day. These rooms are exceedingly cool and pleasant on hot sultry days.

We have only attempted to describe, briefly, the ordinary dwelling-houses of Muḥammadans, which are common to all parts of the Eastern world; but in large wealthy cities, such as Damascus, Cairo, Delhi, and Lucknow, there are very handsome houses, which would require a longer description than our space admits of. For Mrs. Meer Ali’s account of a Muḥammadan ḥarīm or zanānah, see HARIM.

HOUSES, Permission to enter. Arabic istiʾẕān (استئذان). To enter suddenly or abruptly into any person’s house or apartments, is reckoned a great incivility in the East, and the law on this subject is very distinctly laid down in both the Qurʾān and the Traditions.

The traditionists record numerous injunctions of Muḥammad on the subject. A man asked the Prophet, “Must I ask leave to go in to see my mother?” He said, “Yes.” Then the man said, “But I stay in the same house with her!” The Prophet said: “But you must ask permission even if you stay in the same house.” Then the man said, “But I wait upon her!” The Prophet said: “What! would you like to see her naked? You must ask permission.”

HU, HUWA (هو). The personal pronoun of the third person, singular, masculine, HE, i.e. God, or He is. It occurs in the Qurʾān in this sense, e.g. Sūrah iii. 1, الاه لا اله الا هو Allāhu lā ilāha illā Huwa, “God, there is no god but HE,” which sentence is called the nafy wa is̤bāt (or that which is rejected), “there is no god,” and that which is affirmed, “but He.” The word is often used by Ṣūfī mystics in this form: يا هو يا هو يا من لا يعلم ما هو الا هو yā hū, yā hū, yā man lā yaʿlamu mā hū illā hū, “O He (who is), O He (who is), O He whom no one knows what He Himself is but Himself.” Some commentators have supposed the word Hū to stand for the exalted name of God, the Ismu ʾl-aʿz̤am, which Muslim doctors say is only known to God. [JEHOVAH, ISMU ʾL-AʿZAM.]

HUBAL or HOBAL (هبل). The great image which stood over the well or hollow within the Kaʿbah. In the cavity beneath were preserved the offerings and other treasures of the temple. (At̤-T̤abarī, p. 6, quoted by Muir.) The idol was destroyed by Muḥammad at his final conquest of Makkah, A.H. 8, A.D. 630. “Mounted on (his camel) Al Caswa, he proceeded to the Káabah, reverently saluted with his staff the sacred stone and made the seven circuits of the temple. Then pointing with the staff one by one to the numerous idols placed around, he commanded that they should be hewn down. The great image of Hobal, reared as the tutelary deity of Mecca, in front of the Káabah, shared the common fate. ‘Truth hath come,’ exclaimed Mahomet, in words of the Corân, as it fell with a crash to the ground, ‘and falsehood hath vanished; for falsehood is evanescent.’ ” (Sūrah xvii. 83). See Muir, Life of Mahomet, new ed. p. 422. It is remarkable that there is no distinct allusion to the idol in the whole of the Qurʾān.

HŪD (هود). A prophet said to have been sent to the tribe of ʿĀd. Al-Baiẓāwī says he was, according to some, the son of ʿAbdu ʾllāh, the son of Rabāḥ, the son of K͟halūd, the son of ʿĀd, the son of ʿAuṣ, the son of Iram, the son of Sām, son of Noah, or, according to others, Hūd was the son of Shālaḥ, son of Arfak͟hshad, son of Sām, son of Noah. D’Herbelot thinks he must be the Heber of the Bible (Judges iv. 1.)

“And to ʿĀd we sent their brother Hūd. ‘O my people, said he, worship God: ye have no other God than Him: will ye not then fear Him?’ Said the unbelieving chiefs among his people, ‘We certainly perceive that thou art unsound of mind, and verily we deem thee an impostor.’ He replied, ‘O my people! there is no unsoundness of mind in me, but I am an apostle from the Lord of the worlds. The messages of my Lord do I announce to you, and I am your faithful counsellor. Marvel ye that a warning hath come to you from your Lord through one of yourselves that He may warn you? But remember when He made you the successors of the people of Noah, and increased you in tallness of stature. Remember then the favours of God; happily it shall be well with you.’ They said, ‘Art thou come to us in order that we may worship one God only, and desert what our fathers worshipped? Then bring that upon us with which thou threatenest us, if thou be a man of truth.’ He replied, ‘Vengeance and wrath shall suddenly light on you from your Lord. Do ye dispute with me about names that you and your fathers have given those idols, and for which God hath sent you down no warranty? Wait ye then, and I too will wait with you.’ And We delivered him and those who were on his side by our mercy, and we cut off to the last man those who had treated our signs as lies and who were not believers.”

“And unto ʿĀd We sent their brother Hūd. He said, ‘O my people, worship God. Ye have no God beside Him. Lo, ye are only devisers of a lie, O my people! I ask of you no recompense for this; verily my recompense is with Him only who hath made me. Will ye not then understand? And O my people! ask pardon of your Lord; then turn unto Him with penitence! He will send down the heavens upon you with copious rains. And with strength in addition to your strength will He increase you; but turn not back with deeds of evil.’ They replied, ‘O Hūd, thou hast not brought us proofs of thy mission, and we are not the persons to abandon our gods at thy word, and we believe thee not. We can only say that some of our gods have smitten thee with evil.’ He said, ‘Now take I God to witness, and do ye also witness, that I am innocent of that which ye associate (in worship with God) beside himself. Conspire then against me altogether and delay me not; Lo, I trust in God, my Lord and yours. No moving creature is there which He holdeth not by its forelock. Right, truly, is the way in which my Lord goeth. So if ye turn back, then I have already declared to you that wherewith I was sent to you, and my Lord will put another people in your place, nor shall ye at all injure Him; verily, my Lord keepeth watch over all things.’ And when our doom came to be inflicted, We rescued Hūd and those who had like faith with him, by our special mercy; and We rescued them from the rigorous chastisement.

And these men of ʿĀd gainsaid the signs of their Lord, and rebelled against His messengers and followed the bidding of every proud contumacious person; followed therefore were they in this world by a curse; and in the day of the Resurrection it shall be said to them, ‘Did not, verily, the people of ʿĀd disbelieve their Lord?’ Was it not said, ‘Away with ʿĀd, the people of Hūd?’ ”

“The people of ʿĀd treated the Sent Ones as liars. When their brother Hūd said to them, ‘Will ye not fear God? I truly am your apostle, worthy of all credit; fear God then and obey me. I ask of you no reward for this, for my reward is of the Lord of the worlds alone. Build ye a landmark on every height, in pastime? And raise ye structures to be your lasting abodes? And when ye put forth your power, do ye put it forth with harshness? Fear ye God, then, and obey me; and fear ye Him who hath plenteously bestowed on you, ye well know what? Plenteously bestowed on you flocks and children, and gardens and fountains. Indeed, I fear for you the punishment of a great day.’ They said, ‘It is the same to us whether thou warn or warn us not; verily this is but a creation [tale] of the ancients, and we are not they who shall be punished.’ So they charged him with imposture and We destroyed them. Verily in this was a sign: yet most of them believed not.”

AL-ḤUDAIBIYAH (الحديبية). Al-Ḥudaibiyah, a well on an open space on the verge of the Ḥaram or sacred territory, which encircles Makkah. Celebrated as the scene of a truce between Muḥammad and the Quraish known as the truce of al-Ḥudaibiyah, when the Prophet agreed not to enter Makkah that year, but to defer his visit until the next, when they should not enter it with any weapons save those of the traveller, namely, to each a sheathed sword. (Muir, from Kātibu ʾl-Wāqidī.)

The treaty is referred to in the Qurʾān as “a victory,” in the XLVIIIth Sūrah, 1st verse: “We have given thee an obvious victory.” A chapter which is said to have been revealed on this occasion and to have foretold the final taking of Makkah, which happened two years afterwards. (See al-Baiẓāwī, in loco.)

ḤUJJATU ʾL-ḤAQQI ʿALA ʾL-K͟HALQ (حجة الحق على الخلق). Lit. “The demonstration of truth upon the creature.” A term used by the Ṣūfī mystics for the Insānu ʾl-kāmil, or the “perfect man,” as Adam was when he proceeded from the hand of his Maker, and when he became a demonstration of God’s wisdom and power before the angels of heaven. As is stated in the Qurʾān, Sūrah ii. 29: “Thy Lord said I am about to place a vicegerent (k͟halīfah) in the earth.” (ʿAbdu ʾr-Razzāq’s Dict. of Ṣūfī Terms.)

ḤUJRAH (حجرة). The “chamber” in which Muḥammad died and was buried, which was originally the apartment allotted to ʿĀyishah, the Prophet’s favourite wife. It is situated behind the Masjidu ʾn-Nabī, or Prophet’s mosque, at al-Madīnah, and is an irregular square of fifty-five feet, separated from the mosque by a passage of about 26 feet. Inside the Ḥujrah are supposed to be the three tombs of Muḥammad, Abū Bakr, and ʿUmar, facing the south, surrounded by stone walls, without any aperture, or, as others say, by strong planking. Whatever this material may be, it is hung outside with a curtain, somewhat like a four-post bed. The outer railing is separated by a darker passage from the inner, and is of iron filagree, painted green and gold. This fence, which connects the columns, forbids passage to all men. It has four gates, the Bābu ʾl-Muwājihah (the Front Gate), the Bābu Fāt̤imah (the Gate of Fāt̤imah), the Bābu ʾsh-Shām (the Syrian Gate), and the Bābu ʾt-Taubah (the Gate of Repentance). The Syrian Gate is the only one which is not kept closed, and is the passage which admits the officers in charge of the place. On the southern side of the fence there are three small windows about a foot square, which are said to be about three cubits from the head of the Prophet’s tomb. Above the Ḥujrah is the green dome, surmounted by a large gilt crescent, springing from a series of globes.