THAYAMMUM : Do we rub soil or dust to clean ourselves for Salat ?

warner

Does the Qur?an tell us to clean ourselves for prayer, by rubbing dust or soil on our faces and hands, if water is not available?

Would this exercise really help in cleaning or will it make us dirtier? While rubbing dust or soil is certainly not the proper way to clean it can be unhygienic too. Does this act make sense ? And if one is sweating, usually the case in hot places with scarcity of water, will probably need more water to get rid of all that grime later. Even when it does not seem like a rational or meaningful way to clean, we still do this without questioning and without taking a better look at what the Qur?an really says.

If you look at any TRANSLATION of the Quran the verses 443 and 5 6 mention the dust / soil/ earth based cleaning or what is commonly known as Thayammum and it is how people have come to understand this word and these verses for centuries.

In fact this cleaning ritual using soil is quite detailed among Sunnis and Shias and I am giving 4 clauses below, which are directly related to the discussion, out of a total 49 rules and regulations related to thayammum from a Fatwa website. (the following link is for anyone interested to take a look, and I must warn you, its got one very important fatwa at the end, not to jump off a moving train to get at water )

http//reliablefatwas.com/rules-concerning-tayammum/

The method of making tayammum is as follows Both palms should be placed on pure ground and the entire face must be wiped with them. Place the palms on the ground for a second time and wipe each hand upto and including the elbows. The areas under the bangles, bracelets, etc. should be thoroughly rubbed. If, according to the person, even a place equal to a nail is left out, tayammum will not be complete.
After placing the palms on the ground, they should be dusted so that no dirt goes on the face and hands thereby making them unsightly.
Tayammum is also permissible with things other than soil if they also have the same qualities, eg. sand, lime-stone, lime, sulphurate of arsenic, antimony (surmah), brick dust, etc. Those things which do not have the qualities of soil cannot be used for tayammum, eg. gold, silver, tin, wheat, wood, clothing, corn, etc. However, if dust or sand has fallen on these things, tayammum on them will be permissible.
Matter which neither burns in fire nor melts, possesses the qualities of earth and tayammum with it will be permissible. Tayammum is not permissible on that which burns and turns into ash or melts. In the same way, tayammum with ash is not ?.

Lets take a look at the traditional translation of the verses

Al Quran 4 43
..and find no water, then seek clean/good earth/ soil and wipe over your faces and your hands . Indeed, Allah is ever Pardoning and Forgiving

Al Quran 56
??..and do not find water, then seek clean/good earth/soil and wipe over your faces and hands with it. Allah does not intend to make difficulty for you, but He intends to purify you and complete His favor upon you that you may be grateful.

To determine what the Quran really says lets examine the main three words (from the above verses which has lend meaning to this concept) by using essentially the Quran as the guide to bring out the meaning. While I will use Lanes Lexicon for further understanding and clarification of these words, you are welcome to check against any other lexicon and dictionary also. But it is important to remember all these lexicons and dictionaries were written almost a 1000 years after the Quran was revealed and prone to corruption and infiltration and influenced by outside sources such as Hadith and will include variations of natural development of a language as a vocabulary of a people.

The three words in discussion and their common translations below

Thayamm?m the act of wiping faces and hands with dust/soil if water is not available
Saaeedan Dust / soil / earth
Thayyaban Clean/ whole some/ good

Interestingly when we look at the use of these words and the roots in the Quran and also in the Lexcion there certainly is a gap between the translation and understanding reached all these years and the actual meanings which comes out. Its important to remember the Quran will not contradict, and if a meaning does not fit in or illogical it is highly doubtful if the meaning is correct.

When we analyse a root of a word in its use in the Quran we can arrive at a common root meaning, And meanings of cognates and associated words of a certain root develop from this initial meaning and also importantly it will retain qualities associated with the root meaning majority of the time.

Lets examine these three words critically starting from Saa eedan

SaAAeedan

The Quran uses words Thurab, Ard, Theen to describe Dust , Soil, Earth, Clay and these words occur in many verses. Use of Saaidan in these two verses is an anomaly since it is not used for dust or soil elsewhere with clarity. When we look at the repetition and the usage of the root Sad Ayn Dal in the Quran there is hardly a connection to the above meanings. Even in Lanes dust or soil is not among the meanings given, apart for the use in these 2 verses.

Lets check the what would be the most plausible and logical translation which retains uniformity in every use of the related root repetition in the Quran.

3510 ...good words ascend to Him & He lifts up the righteous deed...
7217 ...He will cause him to undergo a suffering of ascending / elevated severity
188 And, surely, we will reduce what is on it to vapour!
1840 ...so it becomes but vaporized/ evaporated
7417 On him I shall impose a torment of ascending severity .
3153 When you vanished/disappeared not paying attention...
6125 ...as one who is ascending/ climbing towards the sky...

As shown above - ascending, vapour/ vaporize, evaporate, vanish ? would be the more logical meanings with "vapour" being the exact translation for the word "Saaeedan". Also in Lanes this is established since Sublimate is one of the meanings given while related meaning ascending being there too. The usage in the Quran and also by the definitions below the meaning becomes obvious, and interestingly the inherent qualities of the root word ( vapour) is reflected in the related words, for instance ?ascend? and ?vaporize/ evaporate? in 188 , which is ?turning to gaseous state? possibly the typical doomsday scenario of whats on earth being vaporized/ turning it into a gaseous state and not about turning the earth to soil or dust.
When we look at all the verses with cognates from this root the best meaning seems to be ?vapour? in 443 and 56 and ?soil /dust? should can be clearly ruled out.

The following definitions of Vapour, Sublimate, Evaporate, Vaporize shows how clearly the Quran brings out the meaning of this word in its usage in the above verses.

Vapour is from Latin vapor for steam.

Vaporize or Vaporise

(General Physics) to change or cause to change into vapour or into the gaseous state
to evaporate or disappear or cause to evaporate or disappear, esp suddenly
(General Physics) to destroy or be destroyed by being turned into a gas as a result of extreme heat (for example, generated by a nuclear explosion)
Collins English Dictionary

Evaporate

(Chemistry) to change or cause to change from a liquid or solid state to a vapour. Compare boil
(Chemistry) to lose or cause to lose liquid by vaporization, leaving a more concentrated residue
to disappear or cause to disappear; fade away or cause to fade away all her doubts evaporated.
(Chemistry) (tr) to deposit (a film, metal, etc) by vaporization of a liquid or solid and the subsequent condensation of its vapour
Collins English Dictionary

Sublime/Sublimate definition
From Latin elevate , uplift

Chemistry To cause (a solid or gas) to change state without becoming a liquid.
The American Heritage? Dictionary of the English Language

Thayyaban

Thayeb is used in the Quran to describe good. No disputes here. But good is subjective. A good soil is a fertile soil, good for growing plants, for agriculture but definitely not good for consuming, it cannot be termed as ?wholesome soil? as some translators would like us to have. If they show wholesome soil, we can show them how to end world?s hunger. It maybe possible to find clean soil but its highly doubtful if this ?good soil? or ?good dust? is good enough to rub on your face to clean. There can be so many things in soil which can not be seen by the eye. Household dust is mostly produced by dust mites digesting human dead skin hair etc. and this dust can cause allergies, asthma and wheezing. Therefore the dust in the above Fatwa does not pass the ?Good? test. Soil in most situations can not be hygienic, with germs and other pollution that it can contain, unless you are going to rub Dead Sea Mud or similar. Simply soil can not be categorised as good for this purpose.

Its important to note here thyyaban is used to describe food many times in the Quran.

Unlike dust, ?vapor? can be termed as good especially if it is produced while cooking food.

Thayammum

For centuries we have come to understand this word to mean ? rubbing face and hand with soil/dust when water is not available for cleaning for Salat?. When we read this word in 443 and 56 this is what we have been taught as its meaning and how people have come to understand it and follow it. The word is not listed in Lanes under its seemingly mistaken root of Ya Miim Miim. Yamm is used for water bodies/ waves and has no connection to thayammum. Lanes does not expand on this root either. Since rubbing yourself with soil is a unique activity this could have been Al thayammum in that context if people understood in such a way when it was mentioned.

The same word thayamm?m is used in the Quran 2267, being the only other place where this word is used in the Quran apart from 443 and 5;6 , but every translator translated it as ?aim, purpose, choice? . How is it possible ? There are many words used for aim/purpose/choice and Thayamm?m is not one of them. This clearly shows, there is definite confusion about the meaning of this word.

Al Quran 2 267
( I have left the word thayamm?m untranslated since aim/ purpose is certainly not its meaning and to see if we can use this verse to bring out the meaning of the word)

O you who believe! Give of the good things which you have earned, and from that which We have produced for you from the earth, and do not THAYAMM?M something bad from it in order to give/ sell, when you yourselves would not take it except with closed eyes. And know that Allah is Free of all wants, and worthy of all praise.

The verse is saying to give of the good things you have earned and to give from what God has produced from the earth, and it can be assumed something like?..?not to prepare/produce/cook food which is bad? to give. And if you were given such bad food you will not take it except with closed eyes??This is very important advice in the context that so much bad things which are not fit for human consumption are prepared and cooked and sold to people. The Minhu ( of it) in the verse 2267 after Al Khabitha ( the bad) shows thayammamu refers to what is ?produced from the earth?.

Since 2267 has the only repetition of this word apart from 443 and 56 , with the word or root offering no direct meaning, we have to arrive at the most seemingly logical meaning that will fit in the verse without contradiction. And surely this is more plausible than the traditional one.

With the above clarified meanings of these words thayamm?m shaaidan tayyiban we can presume this to mean to use vapour water from the preparation of food or something of that nature for rubbing face and hands when we run out of water to purify for salat.

Clearly as the verse says at the end ?God does not want to put us in to difficulty?. The difficulty of finding water when its not available and certainly not to make ourselves more dirty and unkempt by rubbing dust on us.

Wakas

peace,

I found your above work to be very poor. A brief review

Quote "While rubbing dust or soil is certainly not the proper way to clean it can be unhygienic too. Does this act make sense ? And if one is sweating, usually the case in hot places with scarcity of water, will probably need more water to get rid of all that grime later. Even when it does not seem like a rational or meaningful way to clean, we still do this without questioning and without taking a better look at what the Qur?an really says."

Unevidenced statements and assumptions.

Here is something you/anyone can try put some tomato ketchup or mustard or such like on your hands then go outside and find some clean soil and rub your hands with it .
Question do you have less ketchup/mustard on your hands? The answer is yes.
(the above works even better with sand, or natron)

Thus, if your hands did have bodily fluids on them, they would almost certainly have less by using clean soil.

Thus, your underlying premise is flawed.

Quote "...Even in Lanes dust or soil is not among the meanings given..."
Lane clearly states ground/earth, with and without dust/soil

http//i58.tinypic.com/14dd8cg.jpg

Misleading/incorrect translations of 188 and 1840 in order to support your view, see
http//corpus.quran.com/qurandictionary.jsp?q=SEd

We will then make what is on it (earth) barren soil/ground/dust

"Yet, perhaps my Lord will give me better than your garden, and send upon it a reckoning from the sky, so it (garden) becomes barren soil/ground/earth/dust."

Where is evaporate/vaporize in Lanes? It's meaning of "sublimate" is indicated as a medical textbook term, and the others state melting, not into a gas.
Quote "...in 443 and 56 and ?soil /dust? should can be clearly ruled out."
Unwarranted conclusion based on the evidence.
If "good water vapour" is what is meant, this implies there is bad water vapour - please expand with some examples suitable to the time.
Quote "With the above clarified meanings of these words thayamm?m shaaidan tayyiban we can presume this to mean to use vapour water from the preparation of food or something of that nature for rubbing face and hands when we run out of water to purify for salat."

So one has water to cook but not wash hands?
Hold one's hands and face over the water vapour thus potentially allowing whatever germs or bodily fluids one has to drip onto food or vessels, or burn one's face?
Or are you suggesting the water vapour be collected first then used? But will this contradict your concluding line "?God does not want to put us in to difficulty?"?

These days people have access to great Quran study tools (e.g. see www.studyquran.org) , thus can verify what people write about The Quran much more easily. The above took me little time.

Farabi

Just wanted to comment.

If the ground was dirty, it will not fall into thoyiban category. For example, watered soil like on the farm, is not on thoyiban category because it will stick to your skin and the smell is not good. So for the verse it self it was clear that we need to use our mind to determine what will fall into thoyiban category.

I think sweep our face with our cloth is enough if the soil arround us not really clean. When I was kid I was taugh that sweep into the wall is clean enough so our face or skin dirt is transferred to the wall.

No longer a Sunna-rejecter

When I was kid I was taugh that sweep into the wall is clean enough so our face or skin dirt is transferred to the wall.

I hope you dont still believe this confused

Wakas

I hope you dont still believe this confused

To be fair, I think rubbing your face/hands against a clay/mud/brick wall would reduce the dirt/pathogens/etc.

cleanfox5982

THAYAMMUM what.? N? Rubing soil or dust or clean clay , this is la about "changing the meaning of the Words from it's contextes "

See this

http//free-minds.org/forum/index.php?topic=9607038.0

warner

Peace Farabi and Alkitab , Thanks for your comments.

Peace Wakas

Initially I thought I wouldn?t respond to your rant since you are too hasty with the Quran and you don?t seem to know even simple things, a 10 year old would know and what these kids do in the science lab. But for the benefit of others who did not understand fully the reasoning in the first post, let me explain further and present more evidence to the fact that the Quran does not require us to rub dust on our faces.

Where you come from, or anywhere for that matter do people clean themselves with soil or earth?. I don?t understand why you would put tomato ketchup and mustard on your face and then try to clean using soil and also encourage others to do the same. I hope no one here is buying your cleaning tips. If that?s not the case free minds would be one dirty place. Didn't understand what bodily fluids are you talking about? ( don?t know what is natron you mentioned either)

Hygiene , Toxins , Microorganism and contaminants

Do you honestly think cleaning with soil is the proper and the hygienic way of cleaning ? In your confusion you are asking me to bring evidence to invalidate that cleaning with soil is unhygienic. I think that argument was settled 150 years ago by the likes of Louis Pasteur and the use of microscopes.

It was mentioned earlier too that dust is a by-product i.e. faeces produced by dust mites, creatures too tiny to be seen with our naked eye , by consuming and digesting human and animal skin hair etc. Can this dust be used, with Lanes inclusion, for this cleaning as thayyaban ? How would earlier people could have known about the origin of house hold dust ?

As Farabi stated, take agricultural soil for instance, beside the wetness, the toxic chemical fertilisers, fungicides, pesticides, germicides, chemical sprays against weed are all part of the soil and even organic fertilisers etc is made out of waste / trash including sewage, and part of the soil. Does this qualify as thaiyaban ?

Most of you know about blindness caused by ring worms etc introduced to the soil from dog and cat urine and these parasites cannot be seen by the naked eye. And lot of toxins and chemicals are disposed on the seemingly safe soil around us polluting the soil, for instance in many places in the world still CFL bulbs are disposed unsafely even smashed in their own backyards with the resultant mercury poisoning . Now, how do you determine if its thayyaban /good for rubbing on your face for salat or to clean tomato ketchup off your face.

Good and bad vapour ? You can extract water vapour from a dead animal , raw sewage and many other things . Now is this good or bad ? If we flush the toilet without the seat down , we introduce water vapour into the toilet with a splash. This is not good too. ( Ladies are right every time they tell men to put that seat down)

Understanding Quran solely through Lexcions or the Quran explains itself

We can?t base arguments on the premise that it?s in Lanes lexicon therefore it is correct or to the contrary. We must apply time and effort with the Quran to correctly understand it.

We must understand these Lexicons were compiled at least 1000 years after the Messenger and a lexicon is a compilation of words and phrases both written and oral, in the vocabulary of a people of a certain language, at the time of compiling. And languages undergo change and in 1000 years they undergo massive change. Accepting Hadith written 200 years after the Messenger, as a source, to explain and interpret the Quran is bad enough and using a Lexicon written 1200 years after the Quran to do the same is worse. And to accept that the vocabulary of a people remained unchanged without corruption for 1200 years is, extreme foolishness.

In terms of a word in the Quran , there is no guarantee a Lexicon will give the exact meaning every time and there are times when only the remnants of the meaning exist and some situations, the meaning is completely lost. Fortunately with Saaeedan the remnants of the meaning survived. This is not a criticism of Lanes or any other lexicon or dictionary for that matter, it is coming to terms with the real contents of such books and the unwise course of using them alone, to understand the Quran, discarding the built in dictionary and the logic in the Quran.

Dictionaries and lexicons are important tools in understanding the Arabic language and the Quran. But the Quran can be and should be used as its own dictionary to interpret and understand. Almost every time, within the Quran the words and roots are used in such a way to bring out the exact core meaning , with repetitions. This is the principle of, some parts of the Quran explain the other parts. It?s a wonder in itself, for anyone who like to study the Quran in detail and deeply. Are we to believe that God sent a book without explanations built in, but at the sole mercy of relying on books written 150years or 1200 years later ?
Further, lexicon will give the traditional meaning of a Quranic word without inquiry. Take the Kaaba entry under root Kaaf-Ayn-Ba, all meanings developed to associate the word to the cubic structure in Mecca will be included in the entry and also words later developed in relation to that. Often true meaning will all but lost in a 1000 year period due to competition from distorted opinion.

Incidentally Thayamm?m is not listed under its root ( of course the wrongly identified root) and thayamm?m is not even listed in Lanes where it should be and only in other places as an excuse to list to cover the tradition.

Saaeedan and Lanes Lexicon

As far as Saaeedan is concerned, Lanes deals with the traditional meaning, and focus on high land and low land. We know that the high and low land concept come from stories of low land being used as toilets in relation to thayamm?m. In the shifting changing landscape and terrains of the desert, someone?s toilet yesterday is your high ground today. Basically someone should possess a highly developed sense of smell or taste for being able to tell the difference of thayyaban with this situation.

Like I explained before, the confusion Lanes has is clear, with definitions ranging from dust and soil and a countless other things. Following are the meanings from Lanes for Saaeedan. ( Please note the dust/ land/ soil etc based meanings shown below are not among the main meanings offered in Lanes, therefore are not in the first few entries there. That itself is a question for its accuracy on this word)

Even land or ground, without any trees ( so for starters its not soil and originating from as mentioned from the wrongly understood Quran verse Kur IV 46 and V 9)
Desert
Surface of the earth
Whether it be dust or earth or otherwise ( That was very helpful)
High, or elevated, land or ground or high, or elevated , land or ground , above such as is low, or depressed or even land or ground ( now this is totally clear)
Surface of the earth
Earth or ground ( so far it has been very helpful)
Or good earth or land or earth or land , not mixed with sand nor with salt soil ( are we there quiet yet ? )
Or dust, or earth, such as is pure, upon the surface of the ground
Or only earth containing dust; not applied to a coarse , nor to a fine, nor to a coarse , although it be mixed with dust ( aren?t we through with the confusion or can we add few more)
Wide or an ample place
A road
A man Should strike his hands upon the surface of the earth , and not care whether there be in that place dust or not. ( And now we take Quran directly from Lanes)
shahran (I thought it was Saeedan)

Yes , now its quite clear with what we are going to rub our faces with .

The aim of the lexicon writer, is not explaining the Quran, but to record every possible word which could be found among a peoples vocabulary. Here we can see how this word and the wrong traditional understanding has expanded into every grain of ?dust? on earth.

We should understand how Arabic words are developed from a root, and how the core meaning and the qualities of the root is reflected in the associated words.

I have listed the use of Saaeedan and its root in the Quran in the earlier post, please check to see how compatible that is to the actual meaning offered.

Now shall we bring the real Saaeedan in Lanes ?

Lets go through the rest of the words and definitions (in fact the main definitions 1, 2, 3 , and other) in Lanes for Saaeedan.

Ascend cloud, increased, upwards (Hot air, vapour, rises up, its the inherent quality and soil, dust settles down. When something turns into gaseous or vapour it goes up, simply hot air goes up along with the vapour. That?s why we see clouds floating suspended in the sky and not parked in our backyards.

2 -3 He sublimated it often occurring in medical books, and used in this sense in the present day. And signifies the act of liquefying, melting or dissolving.
But lets ask why the word ?sublimate? is here. And what has sublimate got to do with dust or soil or earth or land ?

Your argument, that it is a disqualification due to being mentioned in earlier medical books is truly laughable. This clearly shows you have no idea what a lexicon is or how a language develops. Words retain its original form and meaning in old medical books and such, than in common peoples day to day vocabulary, which undergo drastic changes. This is a simple fact.

Breath, sigh, sighing , breathing emitted upwards ( the moisture/vapour we see in the breath when exhaling on a cold day or condensation - breathing into a mirror)

A certain tree from which pitch is melted forth (Again extracting liquid from solid)

A place of ascent, a station , a post of honour ( Again associated to sublimate exalted purified = high, prominent)

Also beverage, or wine, and vinegar, prepared with pains , by means of fire, or well boiled, until it becomes altered in flavour and colour ( this is distilling or evaporation both related to vapour)

The above words and definitions ascend, lift, elevate, sublimate, breathe, ?distil?, prominent, high in Lanes, is consistent with vapour and its related meanings, and these are the same and similar meanings for vapour and its associated qualities, even in English to date. What are all these words sitting in the pages for the meaning of saaeedan. Certainly not by mistake.

English Dictionaries

Also would like to remind, as shown in the earlier post, the use of vapour, vanish, evaporate , ascend in different verses of the Quran is consistent for verses with Sh Ha Dal root. While dust, soil, earth , land is not consistent in these verses and or consistent with one another. Besides the Quran has other words to describe dust, soil, earth and land.

The definitions of vapour, sublimate, and evaporate from the English Dictionaries in the earlier post, shows how a main word and its associated qualities develop, and build related words and this is more so with the root based Arabic language. Words originate and go through a natural process of development and in languages such Arabic and Aramaic this can be noticed quite clearly.

Wakas was concerned about burning himself while trying to collect water vapour while cooking or boiling. Lets look at the meaning of thayamm and avoid getting hurt.

First, there are numerous ways you can collect water vapour/ moisture without boiling the water and burning yourself.

Even after you take out of the stove and put a lid on top of the heated food the moisture will gather ( condensate) on the bottom of the lid.

Vegetables etc can be cooked without water , releasing the moisture. Every food does not have to be boiled to be cooked.

Its not only boiling which releases vapour. You can reduce or put out , the flame and then condensate the air safely , without burning yourself.

Concept of water vapour is taught possibly in grade 3 - 4 and the kids tie a polythene bag, or a bottle etc to a branch with some leaves in a tree and collect moisture/ condensation. This is a good way of collecting water in a survival situation. Also there are other ways of collecting water from thin air from moisture by condensation and that is out of this discussion.

The water released in cooking, even if there is so much of a scarcity, is still a by-product and a waste , you can still cook your food and have some amount of water to rub on your face.

Thayamm?m

We can remove the water/ moisture content in food without boiling or even heating it. Even ancient people have been using this technique to remove moisture from food to preserve it, through vacuum evaporation . Vacuum pump is an ancient invention and vacuum evaporation is used in food preservation and in vine making. Wait a minute , now why did Lanes include wine and vinegar making in Shaheedan ? Wine making involves removing the moisture in the grapes, without heating or boiling. Lanes didn?t miss distillation either. Evaporated water in high temperatures or highly distilled water contains no life. Quran188 and 1840 mentions life less vapour.

Vacuum drying for food preservation makes the moisture/ water in the food to evaporate without much heat. This is fast, and also does not damage the quality of the food as heated drying.
Guess the ancients have been doing the same thing with coffee too. Distilling is not only important for purifying water its been used in wine distilling and vinegar making for centuries. Vacuum distilling is a similar process without having to boil or heat at higher levels. Also vacuum evaporation methods are also used in making perfumes and extracting aroma from flowers etc. Hope now it is clear the reason for old medical books to carry the word Shaeedan/sublimate.

With the above on methods of food preservation we can safely assume that the Quran 2267 is referring to food preservation and the Quran warns us ? to refrain from producing lower quality food , which can not last long and therefore you will be buying at a lower price, if you are at the other end of the bargain?. Therefore Thayamm?m is the sublimation process of drawing out moisture out of food for the purpose of preservation, while the waste product water vapour being advised to be used for rubbing on the face and hands for Salat.

Quran Vs. Traditional Understanding

Just as Hadithists say the most foolish things for people to follow, on the basis that God commanded, including rubbing our face with soil, its pathetic that we are stubbornly holding onto this hadith based interpretation, when the evidence to the contrary is overwhelming.

Its almost impossible to do Quran research without dictionaries, lexicons, root and word search tools, detailed grammar etc. But all of these tools will be useless without consistent effort and careful study, starting from root level analysis to the comprehension of the full picture.

Thanks.