It Would Appear That The Office Is Hereditary; At Least Often
Transmitted From Father To Son.
The number is fixed at five hundred; but
to
[P.345] increase it, an expedient has, according to D'Ohhson, been
adopted, of dividing each number into half, and third, and eighth
shares; and any fractional part may be bestowed upon an individual, who
thus becomes an inferior member of the corps. Many of these Ferrashyn
are in partibus, the title having been given to great foreign hadjys,
dispersed over the whole empire, who think themselves honoured in
possessing it.
Many of these Ferrashyn are, at the same time ciceroni, or Mezowars, and
exercise also, the very lucrative profession of saying prayers for the
absent. Most hadjys of any consequence who pass here, form an
acquaintance with some of these men, their guides over the holy places.
On their return home, they often make it a pious rule to send annually
some money, one or two zecchins, to their ancient cicerone, who is thus
bound in honour to recite some prayers, in the name of the donor, before
the window of the Hedjra. These remittances, wrapped up in small sealed
papers, with the address upon them, are collected in every province or
principal town of Anatolia, or Turkey in Europe, from whence they are
principally sent, and brought to Medina by the Surra writer of
Constantinople, who accompanies the pilgrim caravan, and is at the head
of its financial department. Some of the principal Ferrashyns have
monopolized whole towns and provinces; the natives of those parts, who
pass through Medina, being introduced to them by their countrymen. The
correspondents of others are dispersed over the whole empire. The
profits which they derive from this profession, which resemble those
accruing to Roman Catholic priests for the reading of masses, are very
considerable: I have heard that some of the principal Ferrashyn have
from four to five hundred correspondents dispersed over Turkey, from
each of whom they receive yearly stipends, the smallest of which is one
Venetian zecchin.
The number of Ferrashyn, as well as of Mezowars, is very great. The
duties of their office can be so easily performed, that they are for the
greater part a very idle class. During the time of the Wahabys, however,
their perquisites ceased; and, as few pilgrims then arrived, they were
reduced to great extremities, from which they are now beginning slowly
to recover. They complain, that the long cessation of the yearly
stipends has accustomed so many original correspondents
[p.346] to withhold their gifts, that, although the caravan intercourse
is re-established, little inclination appears to renew them.
The Wahabys are forbidden by their law to visit the tomb of the Prophet,
or to stand before the Hedjra and pray for his intercession in heaven.
As Mohammed is considered by them a mere mortal, his tomb is thought
unworthy of any particular notice. It was as much a strict religious
principle, as a love of plunder, that induced Saoud to carry off the
treasures of the Hedjra, which were thought little adapted in decency
and humility to adorn a grave. The tomb itself he left untouched; and,
for once, gave way to the national feelings of the Arabians, and perhaps
to the compunctions of his own conscience, which could not entirely
divest itself of earlier impressions; he neither removed the brocade
from the tomb, nor the curtain which encloses it. Dreams, it is said,
terrified him, or withheld his sacrilegious hand; and he in like manner
respected that of Fatme: but, on the other hand, he ruined, without
exception, all the buildings of the public burial-ground, where many
great saints repose, and destroyed even the sculptured and ornamented
stones of those tombs, a simple block being thought by him quite
sufficient to cover the remains of the dead.
In prohibiting any visit to the tomb, the Wahabys never entertained the
idea of discontinuing the visit to the mosque. That edifice having been
built by the Prophet, at the remarkable epoch of his flight from Mekka,
which laid the first foundations of Islam, it is considered by them as
the most holy spot upon earth, next to the Beitullah of Mekka. Saoud had
indeed once given orders, that none of these Turkish pilgrims, who still
flocked from Yembo to this tomb, even after the interruption of the
regular pilgrim-caravans, should any more be permitted to enter Medina:
and this he did to prevent what he called their idolatrous praying; a
practice which it was impossible to abolish without excluding them at
once from the mosque; this prohibition Saoud did not think proper to
enforce: he therefore preferred keeping them from the city, under
pretence that their improper behaviour rendered such a proceeding
necessary. He himself, with all his adherents, often paid a devout visit
to the holy mosque; and in the treaty of peace which his son Abdallah,
concluded with
[p.347] Tousoun Pasha in 1815, it is expressly stipulated that the
Wahabys should be permitted to visit the Mesdjed-e'-Neby, or the mosque
of the Prophet, (not his tomb,) without molestation.
Even with the orthodox Moslims, the visit to this tomb and mosque is
merely a meritorious action, which has nothing to do with the
obligations to perform the Hadj, incumbent upon the faithful; but which,
like the visit to the mosque at Jerusalem, and the tomb of Abraham at
Hebron, is thought to be an act highly acceptable to the Deity, and to
expiate many sins, while it entitles the visiter, at the same time, to
the pratronage of the Prophet and the Patriarch in heaven: and it is
said, that he who recites forty prayers in this mosque, will be
delivered from hell-fire and torments after death. As saints, however,
are often more venerated than the Deity himself, who it is well known
accepts of no other offerings than a pure conscience or sincere
repentance, and is therefore not so easily appeased; so the visit to
Medina is nearly as much esteemed as that to the house of God, the
Beitullah at Mekka; and the visiters crowd with more zeal and eagerness
to this shrine, than they do even to the Kaaba.
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