These burial-places of holy men are frequently located in almost inaccessible spots on mountains. Yet bed-ridden sufferers are hauled up to the precipitous sides in order that they may be benefited by contact with the holy place, as may be seen in the illustration.
The frontier hills are often bare enough of fields or habitations, but one cannot go far without coming across some zyarat, or holy shrine, where the faithful worship and make their vows. It is very frequently situated on some mountain-top or inaccessible cliff, reminding one of the “high places” of the Israelites. Round the grave are some stunted trees of tamarisk or ber (Zisyphus jujuba). On the branches of these are hung innumerable bits of rag and pieces of coloured cloth, because every votary who makes a petition at the shrine is bound to tie a piece of cloth on as the outward symbol of his vow. In the accompanying photograph is seen a famous shrine on the Suliman Range. Despite its inaccessibility, hundreds of pilgrims visit this yearly, and sick people are carried up in their beds, with the hope that the blessing of the saint may cure them. Sick people are often carried on beds, either strapped on camels or on the shoulders of their friends, for considerably more than a hundred miles to one or other of these zyarats. In some cases it may reasonably be supposed that the change from a stuffy, unventilated dark room to the open air, and the stimulus of change of climate and scenery, has its share in the cure which often undoubtedly results.
Another feature of these shrines is that their sanctity is so universally acknowledged that articles of personal property may be safely left by the owners for long periods of time in perfect confidence of finding them untouched on their return. This is the more remarkable, remembering that these tribes are thieves by profession, and scarcely look upon brigandage as a reprehensible act. The inhabitants of a mountain village may be migrating to the plains for the winter months, and they will leave their beds, pots and pans, and other household furniture, under the trees of some neighbouring shrine, and they will almost invariably find them on their return, some months later, exactly as they left them. One distinct advantage of these shrines is that it is a sin to cut wood from any of the trees surrounding them. Thus it comes about that the shrines are the only green spots among the hills which the improvident vandalism of the tribes has denuded of all their trees and shrubs.
Graves have a special sanctity in the eyes of the Afghans, more even than in the case of other Muhammadans, and you will generally see an Afghan, when passing by a graveyard, dismount from his horse and, turning towards some more prominent tomb, which denotes the burial-place of some holy man, hold up his hands in the attitude of Muhammadan prayer, and invoke the blessing of the holy man on his journey, and then stroke his beard, as is usually done by the Muhammadans at the conclusion of their prayers. There are few graveyards which do not boast some such holy man or faqir in their midst; in fact, as often as not, the chance burial of some such holy man in an out-of-the-way part determines the site of a cemetery, because all those in the country round desire to have their graves near his, in the belief that at the Resurrection Day his sanctity will atone for any of their shortcomings, and insure for them an unquestionable entry into bliss. The graves always lie north and south, and after digging down to a depth determined by the character of the soil, a niche is hollowed out at one side, usually the western, and the corpse is laid in the niche, with its face turned towards Mecca. Some bricks or stones are then laid along the edge of the niche, so that when the earth is thrown in none of it may fall on the corpse, which is enveloped in a winding-sheet only, coffins being never used. The origin of the word “coffin” is possibly from the Arabic word kafn, which denotes the winding-sheet usually used by Muhammadans.[1]
Great marvels are related about the graves of these holy men, among the commonest being the belief that they go on increasing in length of their own accord, the increase of length being a sign of the acceptance of the prayers of the deceased by the Almighty. Near the mission house in Peshawur was one such grave, which went on lengthening at the rate of one foot a year. When it had reached the length of twenty-seven feet it was seriously encroaching on the public highway, and it was only after the promulgation of an official order from the district authorities that the further growth of the holy man should cease that the grave ceased to expand. This shrine is still famous in the country round as “the Nine-Yard Shrine,” which numbers of devotees visit every year, in the expectation of obtaining some material benefit.
A Group of Lepers at a Zyarat or Shrine in Hazara
The use of charms or amulets is practically universal. The children of the rich may be seen with strings of charms fastened up in little ornamented silver caskets hung round their neck, while even the poorest labourer will not be without a charm sewn up in a bit of leather, which he fastens round his arm or his neck. These charms are most usually verses out of the Quran, transcribed by some Mullah of repute and blessed by him; others are cabalistic sentences or words, while some are mere bits of paper or rag which have been blessed by a holy man. On more than one occasion I have found my prescriptions made up into charms, the patient believing that this would be more efficacious than drinking the hospital medicines; in fact, one patient assured me that he had never suffered from rheumatism, to which he had previously been subject, after he had tied round his arm a prescription in which I had ordered him some salicylate of soda, although he had never touched the drug. In one instance I found that a man who had been given some grey powders, with directions how to use them, had instead fastened them up, paper and all, into a little packet, which he had sewn up in leather and fastened round his neck, with, he told me, very beneficial result. From this it can be readily understood that Mullahs and faqirs who pretend to have the power of making charms for all known diseases, and sell them to the people at large, are often able to enrich themselves far more rapidly than a doctor who confines himself to the ordinary methods of treatment.
Once, when I was in camp, I came across a mountebank who was making quite a large fortune in this way. He had travelled over a large part of South-Western Asia, but did not stop long in any one place, as no doubt his takings would soon begin to wear off after the first days of novelty. One of his performances was to walk through fire, professedly by the power of the Muhammadan Kalimah. A trench was dug in the ground, and filled with charcoal and wood, which was set alight. After the fire had somewhat died down, the still glowing embers were beaten down with sticks, and then the faqir, reciting the Kalimah with great zest, proceeded to deliberately walk across, after which he invited the more daring among the faithful to follow his example, assuring them that if they recited the creed in the same way and with sincerity, they would suffer no harm. Some went through the ordeal and showed no signs of having suffered from it; others came out with blistered and sore feet. These unfortunates were jeered at by the others as being no true Muhammadans, owing to which they had forfeited the immunity conferred upon them by the recitation of the creed. One young Sikh student, calling out the Sikh battle-cry, ventured on the ordeal, and came out apparently none the worse. The Muhammadans looked upon this as an insult to their religion, because Muhammadans oftener than not heard that cry when the Sikhs had been engaged in mortal combat with them, and this action of the young Sikh appeared to them to be a challenge as to whether the Muhammadan or the Sikh cry had the greater magic power. However, some of the more responsible persons present checked the more hot-headed ones, and the affair passed off with a little scoffing. Every morning and afternoon the faqir prepared for the reception of the patients, who were collected in great numbers on hearing of his fame. Each applicant had to give 5 pice to the assistant as his fee. He was then sent before the faqir, who remained seated on a mat. The faqir asked him one or two questions as to the nature of the illness, wrote out the necessary charm, and passed on to the next. Three or four hundred people were often seen at one sitting. This would give about 50 rupees (£3. 6s. 8d.) as a day’s takings. Some days would, no doubt, be occupied in travelling, and others less fruitful; but his equipment and his method of travelling showed that it was a very profitable business. He was stopping in the rest-house, and invited me to dinner, which was served in English fashion. He entertained me with stories of his travels, and made no secret of the fact that he took advantage of the credulity of the people to run a good business. When dinner was nearly over an assistant came in to say that there were many people outside clamouring for charms. With an apology to me for the interruption, he took a piece of paper, tore it up into squares, quickly wrote off the required number, and gave them to the assistant to go on with. In some cases, especially those suffering from rheumatism or old injuries or sprains, he used rubbings and manipulations, much as a so-called bone-setter does, and these, no doubt, helped the charm to do its work.
The medical and surgical treatment of the faqirs is extremely crude. Sometimes Jogis and herbalists from India travel about the country and practise a certain amount of yunani, or Hippocratic medicine; but the native doctors of Afghanistan have extremely little knowledge of medicine. The two stock treatments of Afghanistan are those known as dzan and dam. Dzan is a treatment habitually used in cases of fever, whether acute or chronic, and in a variety of chronic complaints, which they do not attempt to diagnose. It consists in stripping the patient to the skin and placing him on a bed. A sheep or a goat is then killed and rapidly skinned. The patient is then wrapped up in the skin, with the raw surface next him and the wool outside. He is then covered up with a number of quilts. When successful, this treatment acts by producing a profuse perspiration, and when it is removed—on the second day in the summer and the third day in the winter—the patient is sometimes found to be free from fever, though very worn and weak from the profuse sweating. If the first application is not successful, it may be repeated several times. In a case of severe injury to one of the limbs, the same treatment is often applied locally. In the case of a fractured thigh, for instance, the sheepskin is tied on, a rough splint applied externally, and often left for a week or more. Where there has been an open wound, and the patient has been brought several days’ journey through the heat down to our hospital in Bannu, you can usually anticipate the character of the case by seeing the men who have carried the bed in carefully winding their pagaris round their noses and mouths before proceeding to unbandage it for your inspection, and when it is at last opened all except the doctor and his assistant try to get as far away as possible. A surgeon can scarcely be confronted with a more complete antithesis to his modern ideas of aseptic surgery than a case like this, and many and prolonged applications of antiseptics and deodorants are required before the wound begins to assume a healthy aspect, even if inflammation and gangrene have not rendered amputation a necessity. In the case of a small wound, the whole or a part of the skin of a fowl is used in the same way, the flesh of the slaughtered animal being always a part of the fee of the doctor.