Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/376

 X, who has empowered me to do so (under bargain of a dowry of so many bungkay)." He now pulls the bridegroom's hand as a signal and the latter then immediately repeats after him the following words "I accept her hand (against a dowry of so many bungkay)."

The teungku then recites the fatihah (the first surah of the Qurān) during which all hold their hands before their faces as is customary during prayer. After this comes a general offering up of praise to God, and finally the teungku repeats another prayer generally used in marriages, beginning with the words "Oh Allah! make union between these two, even as thou didst unite the water and the earth" etc. All present express by their "amens" their sympathy in this prayer for blessing, and then the bridegroom thanks them all by a seumbah or respectful obeisance.

The order of proceedings is almost exactly similar when the teungku appears not as the substitute of a wali, but as deputed by taḥkīm by a woman who has no wali and her intended husband. Here the authorization of the teungku by the wali is replaced by the woman's tahkīm; and in the "offer" he adds after the bride's name the words "who has empowered me" or "who has entrusted herself to my charge by taḥkīm," no mention being made of her wali.

The expedient of the tahkīm is very frequently resorted to in Acheh, although almost every ulèëbalangship has its "kali" (qādhī), and in other Mohammedan countries where such is the case, recourse is had to the qādhī or the minor official invested by him with the wali-ship of women who have no wali. The reason is not far to seek. The ulèëbalangships are not indeed very large, but the bad state of the roads and the general insecurity prevailing in Acheh would render it very burdensome to the people to be obliged to go to the residence of the kali for the celebration of every one of the numerous marriages of this description. In Java the facilities are greater, and the pangulu of a division receives all women who are without a wali at the chief centre of the province.

The adat in Acheh is much stricter than in Java in regard to the