Corona changes the way Muslims are buried in America

A report published by the British "Middle East Eye" site refers to the specific instructions in Islam to deal with the burial ceremonies, but some procedures in the United States have undergone a fundamental change to help prevent the spread of the Corona virus.

The writer Omar Farouk - in his report on the site - says that families in some societies participate in prayer and the memory of honoring the dead, and that death in the Islamic community is a massive cry for the whole society, where attending funerals is a collective duty.

Muslims also go to the mosques to perform the funeral prayer, then they move to the family of the deceased to offer condolences. But as the Corona virus continues to claim more lives, prominent Muslim scholars and imams in the United States have issued new guidelines on how to perform the funeral service of people who died as a result of the epidemic.

The writer mentioned the volunteer imam, David Nesimi, who lives in the outskirts of northern Virginia, who explains to families how to perform funerals better during an epidemic.

The writer adds that when a person dies in Islamic society, he is washed with water and prays for him at the funeral prayer before burial, and is supposed to be buried within 24 hours, wrapped in a shroud. However, some of these measures were not possible in the United States in the midst of the epidemic.

New fatwas and instructions
The author stated that it is not permissible to wash people who died due to this epidemic, for fear of spreading the virus. And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention attributed that the body of a person who died from the Coruna virus should not be touched due to fears of catching the infection.

And since some states and regions in the country have stopped washing the dead, Muslims have resorted to another Islamic method, which is tayammum, by cleaning the dead with sand or dust, where a bag is used to cover the body to be able to do tayammum procedures above it.

For his part, Dean of Academic Affairs at the Moroccan Institute of Texas, Yasser Qazi, said, "It is necessary to continue the procedures of washing the dead completely, with the necessity of using personal protective equipment, and if there is a real threat to the health of the people dealing with the body, it is possible to do tayammum."

Patience, pain and flexibility
The writer mentioned that the federal government also advised that public gatherings should not exceed ten people, forcing many Muslim Americans to reduce the funeral service. Nasimi also stated that the cemetery staff allowed no more than four people to attend the burial.

Nasimi added that while the restrictions caused distress for families, Islamic law was flexible, and had rules governing situations such as epidemics and disasters. According to the four main doctrines of the Sunnis, the funeral prayer does not require a certain number of people present, and it can also be conducted anywhere.

The North American Council of Jurisprudence allowed funeral ceremonies to be broadcast on the Internet, allowing people to attend the funeral, and the possibility of performing an absentee prayer if the deceased was present in another country.

Fears of cremation
The writer stated that the UK recently issued an amendment to its Corona Virus Prevention Bill, which obligates cremation if the death rate continues to rise due to illness, but cremation is forbidden in Islam, which requires their burial.

In a related context, Abu Issa Neamatullah (Imam based in Manchester) said that Muslims should be prepared to accept the changes if the situation worsens.