Houri
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The houris are beings in Islam, described in English translations as "full-breasted companions of equal age [or well-matched]", "lovely eyed", virgins of paradise, denoting humans and jinn who enter Jannah (paradise) after being recreated anew in the hereafter.
The "large breasts" of the houris
Book 78, verse 33 of the Quran says that the houris would be large-breasted. This adjectivation, however, has not been translated into all non-Arabic versions of the Quran.
Several translators—like Hilali-Khan, Arberry, Palmer, Rodwell and Sale—have translated the adjective to refer to "swelling breasts".
Ibn Kathir, in his tafsir, writes that the adjective contained in said verse "means 'round breasts'." He goes on as to state that it is "meant by this that the breasts of these girls will be fully rounded and not sagging, because they will be virgins, equal in age."
Abdullah Yusuf Ali, on the other hand, translates said adjective into English simply as "voluptuous"—which refers to sensual (or physical) attributes, though not necessarily breasts.
As an alternative interpretation, Muhammad Asad has said the following regarding such verse:
- As regards my rendering of kawa’ib as "splendid companions", it is to be remembered that the term ka'b—from which the participle ka’ib is derived—has many meanings, and that one of these meanings is "prominence", "eminence" or "glory" (Lisan al-Arab); thus, the verb ka'ba, when applied to a person, signifies "he made [another person] prominent", "glorious" or "splendid" (ibid.) Based on this tropical meaning of both the verb ka'ba and the noun ka'b, the participle ka'ib has often been used, in popular parlance, to denote "a girl whose breasts are becoming prominent" or "are budding" hence, many commentators see in it an allusion to some sort of youthful "female companions' who would entertain the (presumably male) occupants of paradise ... This interpretation of kawa’ib overlooks the purely derivative origin of the above popular usage—which is based on the tropical connotation of "prominence" inherent in the noun ka'b—and substitutes for this obvious tropism the literal meaning of something that is physically prominent: and this, in my opinion, is utterly unjustified. If we bear in mind that the Qur'anic descriptions of the blessings of paradise are always allegorical, we realize that in the above context the term kawa’ib can have no other meaning than "glorious [or "splendid"] beings".|Muhammad Asad|The Message of The Qur'an
The authoritative Arabic-English Lexicon of Edward William Lane defines the singular of the word kawa`ib as "A girl whose breasts are beginning to swell, or become prominent, or protuberant", related to words meaning knob, breast, bosom, virginity, and so forth.
Alleged "72 virgins"
The idea of 72 virgins in Islam refers to an aspect of paradise. In a Sunni collection by Abu `Isa Muhammad ibn `Isa at-Tirmidhi in his Jami` at-Tirmidhi and also quoted by Ibn Kathir in his Tafsir ibn Kathir of sura 55 it is stated:
- It was mentioned by Daraj Ibn Abi Hatim, that Abu al-Haytham 'Adullah Ibn Wahb narrated from Abu Sa'id al-Khudhri, who heard Muhammad saying, 'The smallest reward for the people of Heaven is an abode where there are eighty thousand servants and seventy-two houri, over which stands a dome decorated with pearls, aquamarine, and ruby, as wide as the distance from al-Jabiyyah to San'a.
However, regarding the above statement Hafiz Salahuddin Yusuf has said: "The narration, which claims that everyone would have seventy-two wives has a weak chain of narrators."
In the same collection of Sunni hadiths, however, the following is judged strong (hasan sahih):
- That the Messenger of Allah said: "There are six things with Allah for the martyr. He is forgiven with the first flow of blood (he suffers), he is shown his place in Paradise, he is protected from punishment in the grave, secured from the greatest terror, the crown of dignity is placed upon his head—and its gems are better than the world and what is in it—he is married to seventy two wives among the Hur the `Iyn ["wide-eyed ones", اثْنَتَيْنِ وَسَبْعِينَ زَوْجَةً مِنَ الْحُورِ الْعِينِ] of Paradise, and he may intercede for seventy of his close relatives."
The Syro-Aramaic Reading of the Koran by the pseudonymous "Christoph Luxenberg" claims that the word is actually just the Syriac word for "white" and refers to white raisins.
See also
- Apsara (Hindu and Buddhist faith)
- Dakini (Tibetan Buddhism)
- Fairy (European folklore)
- Valkyrie (Norse religion)
- Maid of Heaven (Bahá'í faith)
- Nymph (Ancient Greek religion)
- Yakshini (Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain religion)
