Veiled Mysteries of Egypt and the Religion of Islam by Simon Henry Leeder

Author:Simon Henry Leeder [Leeder, Simon Henry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Geschichte
Publisher: Jazzybee Verlag
Published: 2017-10-26T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER II

“Beats there a heart within that breast of thine, Then compass reverently the sacred shrine: For the essential Kaaba is the heart, And no proud pile of perishable art.”

Jalaluddin Rumi, Lines on the Pilgrimage to Mecca.

IT has been seen that the Mahmal does in some degree eclipse the Holy Carpet. During the night following the celebration at the Citadel all the hangings are taken down. The next morning there is a great procession, when the Holy Carpet is taken from the Citadel to the mosque of Hosein. Last year (1911) the procession was on 7th October. On this occasion, too, it is the Mahmal, or its special banners, which the people chiefly attempt to caress, although they lose no opportunity of rubbing their right hands over the Holy Carpet, and of lifting their children to do so.

For the purpose of this procession, the different lengths of the Kaaba covering are stretched over wooden frames, which, being carried by a number of men, look rather like a succession of giants' biers, covered with black palls. The separate lengths of the Kaaba band are also placed lengthways on frames; and these frames, gleaming with gold, and the gorgeously coloured and embroidered cover for Ibrahim's tomb, set on the back of a beautiful camel, like a palanquin, and then the rich old gold of the Mahmal itself, redeem the procession from a sombreness ill according with an occasion of rejoicing.

For nothing could give more pleasure to the Cairo crowd than this procession of the setting out on the Pilgrimage does; to them, if it has a sobering note at all, it is that it means farewell to some relative starting on a journey, which still has many perils. But the Egyptian is a child of to-day, whose sustenance is hope. Like a child, he has no yesterdays and no to-morrows. At all times his faith tells him “God's in His heaven, all's right with the world.” And the Pilgrimage is, after all, one of the sure paths to Paradise.

And, for the happy moment, here are waving banners, in the warm sunshine, and holy sheikhs of all the different guilds of the mosques, and the bands—one of them of Scottish bagpipes—playing with blissful iteration the one tune that contains every note of music, always in a minor key, that has any value to the native folk.

The whole of the Cairo garrison of Egyptian troops, including all the artillery, footmen, and cavalry, with a special honorary guard of the Mahmal, take part in the ceremonies connected with it. The Ameer Al-Mahmal, who is appointed annually by the Khedive, takes the lead, and is followed by the military pashas.

After the camel, on which the Mahmal has now been fixed, has carried it in its annual rotations of the square of the Citadel, it is led up to the stand where the Khedive—or in his absence the Prime Minister—accompanied by the high functionaries of the State, the ministers, the great ulemas, and the notable men of Egypt, await it.

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