Visiting shrines an everlasting tradition

Rasha Mehyar and Yomna Kamel Middle East Times staff


Early every Friday morning, Nadia, who lives in a poor district of Helwan, goes to visit the shrines of Sayyeda Zeinab and Sayyeda Aisha. There she performs the Friday prayers and asks these two women saints to intercede on her behalf.

Like Nadia, many lower income women go to visit the shrines of female Muslim figures scattered across the country. Despite the fact that the practice is frowned upon by strict religious orthodoxy, women continue to believe in this long standing tradition.

"My mother always used to bring me and my sisters to visit the shrines. In addition, visiting the shrine and praying in front of the tombs is very comforting to the soul," Nadia explained.

Despite the fact that many of these shrines are for women known to have lived during the Prophet's era, the tradition remains controversial among theologians.

Shrines dedicated to these women have been visited for centuries. However, different schools of thought in Islam have radically divergent attitudes towards the practice. On one hand, the conservative Wahhabis of Saudi Arabia prohibit visits to shrines altogether, while the Ismailis (a Shiite sect found in Egypt, east Africa, and India) encourage pilgrimages and tend to decorate their shrines with gold and marble.

Cairo's most popular shrines for women are those of Sayyeda Zeinab, Sayyeda Aisha and Sayyeda Nafisa near Coptic Cairo. These women were known to be very close to the Prophet and had a great deal of influence on the development of Islamic thought.

Sayyeda Aisha, for instance, was the Prophet's most beloved wife. She was well respected and asked for advice from the caliphs long after the Prophet's death.

Sayyeda Zeinab, on the other hand, was one of the Prophet's daughters and reportedly he took special care of her.

Because these women were so close to the Prophet and full of faith and purity, it is commonly believed that God would not turn down their requests. As a result, many come to their shrines and ask for these holy women's intercession on their behalf.

"I see women visiting the shrines, praying there, giving money and food to the poor. People think that by doing so, God will give them his blessing," said Soad Ibrahim, a physiotherapist who has lived in the neighborhood of Sayyeda Zeinab for more than 20 years.

According to Ibrahim, these people are illiterate and did not learn Islam properly.

"I see people leaving food, papers with their requests and even gold by the tomb. With this they hope that they have done a good deed, and that God will answer their requests."

Such a scornful attitude by more educated Egyptians towards this tradition is quite common. In fact, for centuries representatives of orthodox Islam, such as the Azhar sheikhs, have been trying to discourage these visits.

"Visiting shrines is not an Islamic ritual. There is nothing in the Holy Quran or the Sunna that encourages people to visit shrines to get blessing. The people buried there were human beings and we can be as good as they were," Soad Saleh, professor of Jurisprudence at Al Azhar University said.

Since the enshrined saints are good examples for Muslims to follow and they were special people, people's visits to their shrines should only be for the purpose of praying for them. However, leaving money (nozoor), jewelry or paper with their wishes is not acceptable at all in Islam, Saleh explained.

However, those who go to shrines do not think that what they are doing is wrong or against Islam. Saleh thinks it is the role of the religious people to make people aware of the fact that such practices are not Islamic.

"Since I was brought up on the tradition of going to shrines, I do not think it is wrong. Several times I requested some wishes from Al Sayyeda Aisha and my wishes came true, so I keep on coming back," Nadia said.

Despite the weight of official disapproval, these visits continue as women go to ask for help in their daily lives. Requests to the saints vary from asking for forgiveness to personal wishes.

"I know women who cannot have a baby, [so they] visit the shrines, leave gold bracelets and necklaces and ask Sayyeda Aisha to help them," said Madiha Al Safty, a sociologist at the American University in Cairo.

Safty also explains that the tradition of visiting shrines is not limited to just the poor and needy, but cuts through all economic classes.

"I have seen very rich people visit these shrines. Some of whom are belly dancers and actresses," she said.

One of the problematic details of these shrines is that no one is actually positive that these figures are really buried there. The head of Hussein is supposedly buried in the Sayyedna Hussein mosque in Cairo, but some say it is in Damascus or even Iraq.

While Nadia is visiting the shrines of these holy women in Cairo, elsewhere in the region there are many women performing the same rituals and visiting tombs supposedly of the same women, but in Syria and Iraq.