In newspaper reports over the past few years the Muslim “trace of prostration”, currently popularly known in Arabic as a zabība, has drawn significant attention. The history of the application of the word zabība to the brown mark on the forehead is uncertain. It is frequently connected to the common meaning of the word “raisin”, as though the mark resembles that dried fruit in some form; this explanation has the feel of a folk etymology without any particular linguistic value. Lane's Lexicon cites a range of Arabic dictionaries that support a meaning of the word to be “a small purulent swelling or pustule, that comes forth upon the hand”Footnote ¹ which clearly could lie in the background of this modern usage. The formation of such a prayer mark is said to be a particularly male Egyptian habit today, although it is certainly observable in other countries, and it has been known throughout the Muslim world in previous centuries as will become clear below. Notably, Lane does not appear to remark upon its prevalence in Cairo of the 1830s,Footnote ² suggesting that its rise to prominence in contemporary Egypt is relatively recent. Elsewhere in the Islamic world different names for the mark are found; a popular term is miḥrāb that is used in Urdu and Punjabi, likely as both a reminder of the place of prayer as well as its representation on private prayer rugs.Footnote ³ In contemporary Egypt the zabība has been remarked to be the symbolic equivalent for a male to the female ḥijāb, acting as an external marker of identity and membership related to expressions of piety (a tendency also noted to manifest itself in the emergence of popular pious utterancesFootnote ⁴). Modern attention to the mark often arises in a context of polemic, especially connected most recently with pseudo-scientific investigations of the impact on one's mental health of banging one's head repeatedly (in this context the mark tends to be called a “prayer bump”). This motif has been well analysed by Gabriele MarranciFootnote ⁵ in an insightful blog posting; it does not require any further consideration here.

The idea that there are distinguishing physical marks of pious Muslims, which this notion of the trace of prostration evokes, is certainly worthy of further investigation. Not a great deal of attention has been paid to the phenomenon in scholarly literature, it would seem.Footnote ⁶ It is also evident that this focus on distinguishing attributes on the forehead is certainly not limited to the Islamic context as a glance at other religious traditions will show, nor is it limited to a mark resulting from prayer. This article will explore some of the ideas related to the forehead for a Muslim, including both the trace of prostration and the presence of the forelock, while incorporating some brief references to practices in other religions that, as we shall see, may have some relevance to understanding the background to this attention to the forehead. Of course, it must be recognized at the outset that it is doubtful that popular religious practice can be traced to normative scriptural sources in any substantive way; the interest in a study such as this must reside in the appreciation of the variety and range of symbols that religions employ to convey their moral and ethical codes within their cultural contexts rather than in the search for origins and contexts.

The Quran makes reference to the “trace of prostration” in the midst of one long segment found at the end of sūra 48, al-fatḥ, in verse 29. The passage begins by declaring that Muḥammad is the messenger of God and goes on to describe his followers as remaining strong when standing up to the unbelievers and as being compassionate with each other. It then continues by stipulating that these followers of Muḥammad are those who may be seen performing the bowing (rakʿa) and prostration (sajda), the components of ṣalāt. These people may be recognized, the Quran suggests, by the fact that “their mark is on their faces, the trace of prostration”Footnote ⁷ (sīmāhum fī wujūhihim min athar al-sujūd). These members of the faithful community are frequently specified in the exegetical tradition as Muḥammad's companions,Footnote ⁸ following a common historicizing tendency that may be observed in most classical Muslim exegesis.Footnote ⁹

The noun sīmā (“mark”) is used five additional times in the Quran. In Q. 2:273 the mark is the characteristic of those who receive charity genuinely: “[Alms are] for the poor who are restrained in the way of God, and are unable to journey in the land; the ignorant man supposes them rich because of their abstinence, but you shall know them by their sīmā – they do not beg of men importunately”. Here, the mark serves to distinguish the pious from the ignorant. Q. 7:46 and 48 use the word in reference to a mark which distinguishes those who deserve the rewards of paradise and those who are in hell. “Between them [the people of hell and the people of paradise] is a veil and on the heights are men knowing each group by their sīmā, who shall call to the inhabitants of paradise, ‘Peace be upon you’… The dwellers on the heights shall call to certain men they know by their sīmā, ‘Your amassing has not availed you, neither your waxing proud’ ”. Here the mark is not restricted to the pious but also marks the evildoers. In Q. 47:30 the mark is again characteristic of evildoers, understood, it would seem, as something separate from the behaviour they manifest in their speech: “Did We will, We would show them to you so that you would know them by their sīmā; but you shall certainly know them in their twisting of their speech”. Finally, Q. 55:41 presents the mark as the characteristic of those condemned for their sins (mujrimūn): “The sinners shall be known by their sīmā and they shall be seized by their forelocks and their feet [and then thrown into hell]”. This passage draws our attention to the idea that a sīmā is not reserved for the pious alone, but it also conveys a general reference to the forehead as a way of distinguishing people.

The word sīmā may be connected to other grammatical forms generally understood to be derived from the root s-w-m in a basic sense of “having distinguishing marks” as in Q. 3:125 (musawwimūn, “those having marks”) and 3:14, 11:83 and 51:34 (musawwama, “marked”). The use in Q. 3:14 is in connection with horses, so the basic sense is likely a distinguishing mark in the sense of being branded.Footnote ¹⁰ However, the origin of the word sīmā posed some difficulties for classical lexicographers who were uncertain whether they should derive this word from the root w-s-m with a transposition of the wāw or from s-w/y-m.Footnote ¹¹ This became muddled because of the usage in Q. 68:16, “We will brand him on the nose” (sa-nasimuhu ʿalā l-khurṭūm), and in 15:75 “In that are signs for those who distinguish”, in which the term mutawassimūn is used. In both of these passages the words providing those senses of branding and distinguishing are understood to be derived from the root w-s-m. It is possible that these verbal uses are denominative formations from the noun sīmā, thus creating the multiple possible paths for derivation and word formation. Arthur JeffreyFootnote ¹² suggested that the word sīmā itself entered Arabic from the Greek sēma, a sign, mark or token (especially one understood to descend from heaven), via Syriac; the blending of this particular word with meanings derived from the same root letters with a different history may have produced the uncertainty we find in the Arab lexicographers. It is also worthy of note that the word is subject to some variant spellings in the Quran, further indication of the uncertainty surrounding the word; sīmā could also be spelled sīmāʾ or sīmiyāʾ, and occasionally these other spellings were tied to specific meanings.Footnote ¹³ The difficulties connected to verbal stems at question here have been extensively studied by Tilman SeidenstickerFootnote ¹⁴ and an attempt at a resolution of these issues, if such is even feasible, need not detain us further here.

To return to the first Quranic passage, it will be observed that in Q. 48:29 the distinguishing mark of the follower of Muḥammad is specified to be the “trace of prostration”; none of the other passages make this direct link of the mark to prayer as such.Footnote ¹⁵ The use of athar, “trace”, here is also the only time that word is directly linked to prayer; the more common usage relates to the traces left by walking, either the path or the footprint itself, conveying a definite physical sense.

The exegetical tradition displays a good deal of variation in how to interpret sīmā, in Q. 48:29 and elsewhere, in light of its association with the trace of prostration. It would be fair to say that the dominant tendency is to understand it in ways other than seeing it as a reference to a physical blemish on the skin. Interpretive options include the idea that this is the mark that will only become apparent on the day of resurrection as marking the believers. It is also thought of simply as the “glow” that emanates from someone who is faithful in their praying as well as an indication of the believer's general disposition. As well, it is sometimes taken as the look on someone's face that results from staying up all night in prayer. It could also be the trace of dirt left on the face after bowing in prayer. However, it is also explicitly deemed to be like the callus (thafina) on the knee of a camel that is the result of prostration; this is sometimes illustrated through the mention of the Shīʿī Imām Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn (d. 94/713) and ʿAlī ibn ʿAbdallāh ibn ʿAbbās (d. 117/736), both of whom are known as Dhū l-thafināt because of their piety (as are several other figures of the distant past).Footnote ¹⁶

Such variety in interpretation is not limited to the instance of the use of sīmā in Q. 48:29 but also extends to the other passages in which the word is used; the meaning of the word in these other instances often incorporates the usage in Q. 48:29 with its focus on the mark being the result of prayer. For example, in the treatment of Q 2:273, the mark is interpreted as the behaviour of “humility and humbleness”, or as the “sign of poverty” being seen in tattered clothes, or as not making demands when begging, picking up on the Quranic phrase “not begging from people demandingly” (or, as some have it, not begging as such at all), or as a physical characteristic that is the result of repeated praying or praying all night, including being tired.Footnote ¹⁷ Thus, while various options were held out for what the exact nature of the sīmā might be – clearly an ambiguity that was brought about by the fact that both the righteous and the evildoers are “marked” in some way or another – the idea that a physical prayer mark is meant does have a long history within Islamic culture and its modern resurgence picks up on a firm tradition of understanding the trace of prostration as a mark of the pious person.

It is quite apparent that religions in general employ certain distinguishing body markings as indicators of distinction, membership and piety.Footnote ¹⁸ The forehead garners particular attention in many of the world's religions as the place for those displays. In India the marker known as the tilak (and its related, specifically female version, the dot known as the bindi) provides an indication of group affiliation (depending on the number and colour of the lines); it adorns the forehead of religious devotees and is present in ritual observances and on special occasions as well. It is not necessarily limited to the forehead, but that area certainly gains the most attention. In the Bible perhaps the most vivid use of the forehead is in Revelation 14:1, in which John reports that he saw in his vision a group of 144,000 people “who had his [the Lamb the Redeemer's] name and the name of his Father written on their foreheads”.Footnote ¹⁹ In general, the forehead is a place for symbols of dedication and allegiance, as is shown in its centrality for Aaron's seal as a mark of devotion to God in Exodus 28:36–8. The Revelation of John also speaks of the forehead as the place of a marker of evil; the Beast, the evil counterpart of the Lamb in the visions, causes everyone “to be branded with a mark on his right hand or forehead” in Revelation 13:16, the significance of which is provided in 14:9 (and see 20:4) in which an angel cries out: “Whoever worships the beast and its image and receives its mark on his forehead or hand, he shall drink the wine of God's wrath, poured undiluted into the cup of his vengeance”. The whore of Babylon has a name written on her forehead according to Revelation 17:5. It is clear that the forehead is the place for distinguishing marks, but they are not by any means always portrayed as positive indicators.

Later tradition develops the symbolism of the forehead in a number of ways. In Christian iconography a bump on the forehead between the eyes appears to be a marker of spirituality; such is prominent in certain representations in mosaic of the Byzantine and Eastern church traditions of Christ Pantocrator, as seen for example in Haghia Sophia.Footnote ²⁰ Such a mark is generally interpreted as an indication of spiritual wisdom and piety.Footnote ²¹ It would not be stretching the connections by also considering the smearing of ash on the forehead within the Catholic tradition as a mark of penitence and mortality, a tradition that arose perhaps in the eighth century and in association with ritual observations of Lent leading up to Easter.Footnote ²²

The practice of wearing tĕfīllīn that originated in late-Second Temple Judaism derives from the dictates of Deuteronomy 6:8 and 11:18 (“You shall bind them [the laws] as a sign (ōt) on the hand and wear them as a phylactery (ṭoṭafōt Footnote ²³) on the forehead”).Footnote ²⁴ The tĕfīllīn as ritually powerful objects – whether understood as protective amulets, piety reminders, symbols of (male) Jewish community membership or representations of divine presence – have been extensively studied by Yehudah Cohn;Footnote ²⁵ the connection of the forehead to the container of four pieces of parchment with centrally important biblical passages inscribed on them (Exodus 13:1–10; 13:11–16; Deuteronomy 6:4–9; 11:13–21) conveys symbolic value on many levels.

To return to the Islamic context, this significance of the forehead as a place for the marking of membership and of piety in religious contexts, and specifically in the Quran, demands further consideration in light of the content of the rest of the passage regarding the mark as the trace of prostration found in Q. 48:29. After mentioning the sīmā, the verse goes on to say, “That is their likeness in the Torah and their likeness in the Gospel is like a seed that sends forth its shoot then makes its strong. It then becomes thick and stands on its own stem, amazing the sowers, so that it enrages the disbelievers thereby”. Could there be some connection between the mark that is the trace of prostration and something mentioned in the Torah and/or the Gospel? The syntax of this passage proved challenging for classical exegetes and modern translators alike. Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 606/1209) has an extensive discussions of the intricacies of the grammar here, exploring many options.Footnote ²⁶ Fundamentally, the problem revolves around what the referent is of the “that” with which the statement starts. The closest element is the “trace of prostration” marking the believers that is seemingly likened to something in the Torah. However, is the same “likeness” of the trace also to be found in the Gospel, or should one insert a break after the mention of the Torah and see a new parable (“likeness”) conveyed by the meaning of the parable of the seed? Of course, the connection also depends upon what one understands sīmā to refer to in the first place: if that word conveys the sense of the general disposition of the pious person in prayer, then such could be (and often is) seen as a generic reference to the qualities of the believers, extolled in both the Torah and the Gospel. Such, certainly, is the way much of the exegetical tradition has understood the passage.

However, another understanding that has arisen, perhaps for the first time in the writings of Richard Bell,Footnote ²⁷ was to see this “likeness” in a very literal way such that it is a reference to the Jewish tĕfīllīn, thus picturing the Muslim trace of prostration as “like” that legacy. The physical sense of the Muslim mark on the forehead is thus reinforced by the literal Jewish interpretation of the biblical command manifested in the tĕfīllīn, once that connection is made. This is hardly a compelling reading of the Quranic verse, given its syntactical complexity, but, at the same time, it is evocative in the overall context of the marks on the forehead as signifying ideas related to piety and membership. It would, however, be hazardous to suggest a direct connection here, given the single reference and the absence of any tangible historical and cultural evidence.

Another extended Quranic passage that includes reference to the mark known as the sīmā also invokes the forehead but in a different way. A conjunction of the distinguishing mark and the forelock (nāṣiya) is to be found in Q. 55:41 (as cited above) that presents a mark as the characteristic of those condemned for their sins (mujrimūn). Those who are distinguished by a mark “will be seized by their forelocks and their feet” and thrown into hell. Mentioned three additional times in the Quran, the forelock widens the range of images employed related to distinguishing marks on the forehead. One instance is in Q. 11:56 in which the image resonates most strongly with that of a horse's mane, being the forelock by which it is led: “Truly, I have put my trust in God, my Lord and your Lord; there is no creature that crawls, but He takes it by the forelock (bināṣiyatihā). Surely my Lord is on a straight path.” It is striking that there is no association here between being led in this way and one's status as an unbeliever (or believer). Next, Q. 96:13–18 embeds the forelock (mentioned twice) in a story of an opponent of God's message, traditionally held to be Abū Jahl: “If he cries lies and turns away, does he not realize that God sees? No indeed; surely We shall seize him by the forelock (bil-nāṣiya), a lying (kadhiba), sinful (khāṭiʾa) forelock. So let him call on his concourse! We shall call on the guards of hell.” The passage continues in verse 19 to emphasize the remedy: “Bow thyself, and draw nigh”. The tie-in here to prayer is apparent.

The word “forelock” in these passages is often taken to mean a physical lock of hair that is on the forehead. In explaining the word in Q. 96:15, “We shall seize him by the forelock”, al-Ālūsī (d. 1270/1854), for example, provides the following comment: “The forelock is the hair on the forehead that one lets grow specifically … It is specified here because the accursed one [Abū Jahl] attached great importance to it by combing and perfuming it, and being seized by it is the greatest humiliation for an Arab.”Footnote ²⁸ The idea that the forelock is declared to be kadhiba, “lying”, and khāṭiʾa, “in error”, might, of course, suggest a metaphorical usage of the word so that it simply means having power over someone, as might be implied more clearly by Q. 11:56.Footnote ²⁹ In that passage the forelock symbolizes the person as a whole (and is thus functioning as a synecdoche).

The forelock is a powerful and widespread symbol, well known in the Islamic context. Cutting off the forelock occurs in early Arabic poetry to signify “indebtedness for one's life having been spared”.Footnote ³⁰ The presence of the forelock also becomes a factor related to covering one's hair, especially by women; such is seen to be one function of the ḥijāb. Ibn Kathīr (d. 774 /1373) makes the connection in dealing with Q. 24:31 in which the instruction is given to Muslim women that they should “cast their veils (khumur) over their bosoms”. He suggests that the reason the khimār should be worn this way is to distinguish Muslim women from the women of the jāhiliyya who did not do that; rather, they would walk past men with their chests uncovered and with their necks, locks of their hair (dhawāʾib shaʿrihā) and earrings revealed. This interpretation supports an understanding that displaying wisps of hair – reasonably understood to be otherwise called forelocks – is a non-Islamic (i.e. jāhilī) practice.Footnote ³¹ Thus, a context is provided for the sense of the forelock as “lying and in error” in a spiritual (jāhilī) sense without excluding the literal sense of the forelock as something real, grown on a person's head. This contrasts with a modern interpretation, surprisingly widespread, that seeks to define nāṣiya in a fully symbolic mode (thus being something that could not be literally “seized”), reflective of contemporary “scientific” values. This is found in much popular Muslim discourse today that relates the forelock to the “prefrontal cortex” of the brain. Typical is the following:

Like the forehead in general, the forelock has ancient significance and is a symbol that conveys multiple values. In ancient times creating the forelock involved shaving (or simply gathering hair) in order to create a tuft of hair on the crown of the head that could then be braided and worn as a ponytail.Footnote ³³ In Greek and Roman iconography, a forelock especially appears to be a special marker. It has a Hellenistic background within iconography associated with the god Sarapis of the Ptolemies, for example. Aristotle is often portrayed with forelocks, indicating his wisdom. The forelock is also associated in the turn-of-the-eras' Fables of Phaedrus with Opportunity,Footnote ³⁴ who is bald except for a long forelock; as a Renaissance emblem it also becomes applied in a similar manner to Time, leading to the idiom “Grab Time by the forelock” when an opportunity arises.Footnote ³⁵ The forelock certainly moved into Christian iconography, not limited to Jesus but also found on John the Baptist.Footnote ³⁶ In some Christian paintings the forelock appears to become a simple “mark” of spirituality on the forehead, just like the sīmā of the Quran. That likely led to the idea that touching one's forehead when meeting someone (like tipping the hat) is an act of deference and respect, although in current British English that appears to have acquired a negative sense of showing too much deference.Footnote ³⁷ That such outward marks of traditional piety and respect constitute a polemical topos is also apparent from Jesus's words in Matthew 6:1–6 and 23:5 and its reappearance today can only be seen as unexceptional.Footnote ³⁸

It is in Judaism again that the forelock particularly draws our attention because of a (not undisputed) Mishnaic prohibition of the forelock as it is the marker of the pagan. Marcus Jastrow understood the meaning of the disputed term belōrīt in Mishna ʿAvōda Zara 1:3 as referring to “plait or locks, esp. the long hair worn by the Roman and Greek youths of the upper classes and offered to the gods on arriving at puberty”,Footnote ³⁹ thus what is often understood as a forelock. In this interpretation, the Mishna repudiates the Jewish wearing of the forelock on the grounds of it being a custom of idolaters, although there is a significant difference of opinion among scholars regarding precisely what the word belōrīt refers to.Footnote ⁴⁰ Additionally, according to some interpretations, this is part of the context for understanding the use of the tĕfīllīn, which it is said, must touch the skin; on the head, a forelock could interfere with such.Footnote ⁴¹ Of course, here we see the key conjunction of the marker on the forehead as an indication of membership and piety contrasted with the forelock, the marker of paganism and impiety.Footnote ⁴²

On the evidence of the trace of prostration and the forelock, it is apparent that the vocabulary of the Quran shares in a common universe of images. Understanding the mark on the forehead as a positive symbol of piety and membership has a long heritage in Islam and has found its support in a reading of the Quran. Likewise, the image of the forelock as one with negative associations of identification resonates with the Quran. Both characteristics find their parallels particularly in Judaism, but to suggest paths of transmission between religions in this web of images and symbols related to the forehead would be unwise. There simply is insufficient evidence by which one could establish such a genealogy. Certainly the commonality of the symbols is striking, but an appeal either to biblical or Arab cultural contexts alone will not suffice to provide an “explanation” for the Quran. The passage of time, with all its historical interactions in social, cultural, economic, political and religious contexts, must be allowed to play its part in the development of the meaning of these symbols. The prevalence of the trace of prostration in today's Egypt in particular emphasizes the fact that popular religious practices have their own particular dynamic that cannot be traced directly either to scripture or to well-established expressions of piety.