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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Iraq
Index
Originally political, the differences between Sunni and Shia
interpretations rapidly took on theological and metaphysical
overtones. In principle a Sunni approaches God directly; there is
no clerical hierarchy. Some duly appointed religious figures,
however, exert considerable social and political power. Imams
usually are men of importance in their communities but they need
not have any formal training; among the beduins, for example, any
tribal member may lead communal prayers. Committees of socially
prominent worshipers usually run the major mosque-owned land and
gifts. In Iraq, as in many other Arab countries, the
administration of waqfs (religious endowments) has come
under the influence of the state. Qadis (judges) and imams are
appointed by the government.
The Muslim year has two religious festivals--Id al Adha, a
sacrificial festival on the tenth of Dhu al Hijjah, the twelfth
month; and Id al Fitr, the festival of breaking the fast, which
celebrates the end of Ramadan on the first of Shawwal, the tenth
month. To Sunnis these are the most important festivals of the
year. Each lasts three or four days, during which people put on
their best clothes, visit, congratulate, and bestow gifts on each
other. In addition, cemeteries are visited. Id al Fitr is
celebrated more joyfully, as it marks the end of the hardships of
Ramadan. Celebrations also take place, though less extensively,
on the Prophet's birthday, which falls on the twelfth of Rabi al
Awwal, the third month, and on the first of Muharram, the
beginning of the new year.
With regard to legal matters, Sunni Islam has four orthodox
schools that give different weight in legal opinions to
prescriptions in the Quran, the hadith or sayings of the Prophet
Muhammad, the consensus of legal scholars, analogy (to similar
situations at the time of the Prophet), and reason or opinion.
Named for their founders, the Hanafi school of Imam Abu Hanifa,
born in Kufa, Iraq about A.D.700, is the major school of Iraqi
Sunni Arabs. It makes considerable use of reason or opinion in
legal decisions. The dominant school for Iraqi Sunni Kurds is
that of Imam Abu Abd Allah Muhammad Shafii of the Quraysh tribe
of the Prophet, born in A.D.767 and brought up in Mecca. He later
taught in both Baghdad and Cairo and followed a somewhat eclectic
legal path, laying down the rules for analogy that were later
adopted by other legal schools. The other two legal schools in
Islam, the Maliki and the Hanbali, lack a significant number of
adherents in Iraq.
Data as of May 1988
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