yers, and if there is no menial
servant keeps the mosque clean. He sometimes has a little school in the
courtyard in which he teaches children the Koran. He also sells charms,
consisting of verses of the Koran written on paper, to be tied round
the arm or hung on the neck. These have the effect of curing disease
and keeping off evil spirits or the evil eye. Sometimes there is a
mosque servant who also acts as sexton of the local cemetery. The funds
of the mosque and any endowment attached to it are in charge of some
respectable resident, who is known as Mutawalli or churchwarden. The
principal religious officer is the Maulvi, who corresponds to the
Hindu Guru or preceptor. These men are frequently intelligent and
well-educated. They are also doctors of law, as all Muhammadan law
is based on the Koran and Traditions and the deductions drawn from
them by the great commentators. The Maulvi thus acts as a teacher of
religious doctrine and also of law. He is not permanently attached
to a mosque, but travels about during the open season, visiting
his disciples in villages, teaching and preaching to them, and also
treating the sick. If he knows the whole of the Koran by heart he
has the title of Hafiz, and is much honoured, as it is thought that
a man who has earned the title of Hafiz frees twenty generations of
his ancestors and descendants from the fires of hell. Such a man is
much in request during the month of Ramazan, when the leader of the
long night prayers is expected to recite nightly one of the thirty
sections of the Koran, so as to complete them within the month. [327]

25. The Kazi.

The Kazi was under Muhammadan rule the civil and criminal judge,
having jurisdiction over a definite local area, and he also acted as
a registrar of deeds. Now he only leads the public prayers at the Id
festivals and keeps registers of marriages and divorces. He does not
usually attend marriages himself unless he receives a special fee, but
pays a deputy or _naib_ to do so. [328] The Kazi is still, however,
as a rule the leading member of the local Muhammadan community,
the office being sometimes elective and sometimes hereditary.

26. General features of Islam.

In proclaiming one unseen God as the sole supernatural being, Muhammad
adopted the religion of the Jews of Arabia, with whose sacred books
he was clearly familiar. He looked on the Jewish prophets as his
predecessors, he himself being the last and greatest. The