Food Resources and their Transformation - Food Culture and Health in Pre-Modern Islamic Societies - page 198

age” (ajj mabrūr) , he replied, “Offering
food and speaking kindly” ( iām al-aām
wa-īb al-kalām ). The Prophet is quoted as
saying, “The angels do not cease to pray
for blessings on any one of you as long as
his table is laid out, until it is taken up”.
Among the many sayings of pious early
Muslims is one from the Prophet's grand-
son, al-asan (d. 49/669-70): “A man
will have to give an account for every
expenditure he makes for himself, his
parents, and those in his charge, except
what he spends on food for his brothers,
for God is too shy to ask about that.”
Although the Qurān stipulates that God
has determined the life-span of each indi-
vidual, Jafar b. Muammad assures us
that God does not count the time one is
at table with his “brothers,” so one should
prolong such gatherings.
The topic on eating in al-Ghazālī's
(d. 505/1111) encyclopaedic work, Iyā
ulūm al-dīn , “Revival of the religious
sciences”, contains a large number of
adīths and sayings (akhbār) that encour-
age hospitality and provide guidelines for
all aspects of this etiquette: issuing invi-
tations, accepting invitations, the man-
ner of eating and ending the gathering.
It is noteworthy that al-Ghazālī's work,
though ūfī in orientation, devotes far
more space to the virtues of offering food
and the etiquette of offering and receiving
it, than to the virtues of fasting, a prac-
tice often associated with ūfism. Indeed,
al-Ghazālī says that one should not refuse
an invitation to eat because one is fast-
ing, and that one's reward for making a
brother happy by accepting hospitality
will be greater than the reward obtained
by fasting. Typical among the many
adīths he cites are these: “There is no
good in one who does not offer hospital-
ity”; “among the things which expiate sins
and increase in rank are offering food and
praying at night while people are sleep-

ing”. A person should not deliberately
show up at a person's house at meal time,
but if he is offered food and senses that
the host really does want him to eat, he
should stay. If, however, he senses that
the host is offering food out of a sense
of obligation, despite his reluctance, the
visitor should not eat. The host obtains a
spiritual reward through hospitality, and
it became the practice of the early Mus-
lims to be hospitable. Indeed, al-Ghazālī
says, if the owner of the house is absent
but you are sure he would be happy if you
ate, go ahead and eat, for that is the way
of the pious ancestors.
A host should not burden himself by
going into debt in order to offer food to his
guests—although in fact many do exactly
that, so ingrained is the offering of hos-
pitality in cultural mores. A hagiographic
account of Shaykh Amad Riwān of
Egypt (d. 1387/1967) says: “The people
knew no one equal to him in generosity
in his day . . . He gave like one who has no
fear of poverty, from all the wealth, food
or clothing that God gave him”. This
reflects a description of the Prophet him-
self, whose generosity to even the most
rude and demanding nomads prompted
one man to urge his tribesmen to become
Muslims: “For Muammad gives like one
who has no fear of poverty”.
There are stipulations concerning the
type of person to whom hospitality should
be extended. A person should invite only
righteous people to share his food: “Feed-
ing a pious man strengthens him for
obedience, but feeding a depraved man
strengthens him for depravity,” while a
adīth relates that it is wicked to invite
only the rich. Conversely, acceptance of
an invitation should not take into account
the wealth of the host. Al-Ghazālī tells us
that al-asan once greeted some people
who were eating scraps in the road, and
they invited him to join them. He agreed,