9 - Dyula Islam: the new orthodoxy

Summary

While I was in Koko, my opinion was solicited several times about the following matter: ought one to pray Allahu Akbar! with arms outstretched or with arms crossed? Proclaiming that I was not a Moslem, and consequently not a competent authority, I adamantly refused to answer. Leaving such a decision to me was, in any case, something of a joke. Yet normally, this was no joking matter, nor was any Dyula in a position to follow my example and remain neutral. The passions aroused in such discussions might seem – as they seemed to me at the time – out of all proportion to the nature of the issue. Actually, far more fundamental matters were at stake, though these were rarely made explicit. I was thus left to witness curiously heated arguments about whether or not crossing arms in prayer was the surest way to eternal damnation. Astonishingly enough, few Dyula in Koko were partisans of crossing arms in the first place; those who invoked the torments of hellfire were preaching largely to the convinced!

In fact, the arm-crossers, known as ‘Wahhabi’ or simply as bras croisés, were critical in a number of crucial ways of the typical Dyula practice of Islam. One question, though it usually went unasked, loomed behind the argument: which group, the ‘Wahhabis’ or the ‘traditionalists’ (for want of a better term), was truly faithful to the original practice of Islam? The Sunni interpretation of the nature of Koranic revelation makes this an explosive question.