There is a chapter in the Avesta of the Parsees, containing injunctions as to the paring of the nails of the hands and feet.
FIVE FOUNDATIONS OF ISLĀM. (1) Shahādah, or bearing witness that there is no deity but God; (2) Ṣalāt, or the observance of the five stated periods of prayer; (3) Zakāt, giving the legal alms once a year; (4) Ṣaum, fasting during the whole of the month of Ramaẓān; (5) Ḥajj, the pilgrimage to Makkah once in a life-time. They are also called the five foundations of practice, as distinguished from the six foundations of faith. [[ISLAM], [IMAN].]
FIVE KEYS OF SECRET KNOWLEDGE, which are with God alone, are said to be found in the last verse of the Sūrah Luqmān ([XXXIst, 34]) of the Qurʾān: “God! with Him is (1) the Knowledge of the Hour; (2) and He sendeth down rain; (3) and He knoweth what is in the wombs; (4) but no soul knoweth what shall be on the morrow; (5) neither knoweth any soul in what land he shall die. Verily God is knowing and is informed of all.”
FIVE SENSES, The. Arabic al-ḥawāssu ʾl-k͟hamsah (الحواسّ الخمسة). According to Muḥammadan writers, there are five external (z̤āhirī) senses, and five internal (bāt̤inī) senses. The former being those five faculties known amongst European writers as seeing (baṣirah), hearing (sāmiʿah), smelling (shāmmah), taste (ẕāʾiqah), touch (lāmisah). The latter: common sense (ḥiss-i-mushtarak), the imaginative faculty (qūwat-i-k͟hayāl), the thinking faculty (qūwat-i-mutaṣarrifah), the instinctive faculty (qūwat-i-wāhimah), the retentive faculty (qūwat-i-ḥāfiz̤ah).
FOOD. Arabic t̤aʿām (طعام), pl. at̤ʿimah. The injunctions contained in the Qurʾān ([Sūrah ii. 167]) respecting food are as follows: “O ye who believe! eat of the good things with which we have supplied you, and give God thanks if ye are His worshippers. Only that which dieth of itself, and blood, and swine’s flesh, and that over which any other name than that of God hath been invoked, hath God forbidden you. But he who shall partake of them by constraint, without desire, or of necessity, then no sin shall be upon him. Verily God is forgiving and merciful.” [Sūrah v. 92].: “O Believers! wine (k͟hamr) and games of chance, and statues, and divining-arrows are only an abomination of Satan’s work! Avoid them that ye may prosper.”
The other injunctions concerning food are found in the Traditions and sayings of Muḥammad.
No animal, except fish and locusts, is lawful food unless it be slaughtered according to the Muḥammadan law, namely, by drawing the knife across the throat and cutting the wind-pipe, the carotid arteries, and the gullet, repeating at the same time the words “Biʾsmi ʾllāhi, Allāhu akbar,” i.e. “In the name of God, God is great.” A clean animal, so slaughtered, becomes lawful food for Muslims, whether slaughtered by Jews, Christians, or Muḥammadans, but animals slaughtered by either an idolater, or an apostate from Islām, is not lawful.
Ẕabḥ, or the slaying of animals, is of two kinds. Ik͟htiyārī, or of choice, and Iẓt̤irārī, or of necessity. The former being the slaughtering of animals in the name of God, the latter being the slaughter effected by a wound, as in shooting birds or animals, in which case the words Biʾsmi ʾllāhi, Allāhu akbar must be said at the time of the discharge of the arrow from the bow or the shot from the gun.
According to the Hidāyah, all quadrupeds that seize their prey with their teeth, and all birds which seize it with their talons are unlawful, because the Prophet has prohibited mankind from eating them. Hyenas, foxes, elephants, weasels, pelicans, kites, carrion crows, ravens, crocodiles, otters, asses, mules, wasps, and in general all insects, are forbidden. But there is some doubt as to the lawfulness of horses’ flesh. Fishes dying of themselves are also forbidden.
The prohibition of wine in the Qurʾān under the word k͟hamr is held to exclude all things which have an intoxicating tendency, such as opium, chars, bhang, and tobacco.