Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/97

 men sleep and in which meetings are occasionally held for the discussion of matters of public interest.

When Islam established itself as the rule of life in Acheh, this resting-place for men became also a house of prayer or chapel for the gampōng, such as are to be found in Java under the appellations langgar, balé or tajug. There are however few gampōngs in which religious zeal is strong enough to cause the assemblage of a considerable number in the meunasah for the five obligatory daily prayers.

All are at work or employed in their own affairs, and whoever wishes to perform the appointed prayers (seumayang) does so at home or wherever he may chance to be at the time. The most that is done at the meunasah is to beat at sunset the great drum (tambu) made of a hollowed tree-trunk with buffalo-leather stretched over one end. This is beaten to announce the time for the mugréb prayer which in all Mohammedan countries is more strictly observed than the other four and is generally begun punctually at sunset, its appointed time. The day's work is then as a rule finished and the young men assemble at that hour in the meunasah in any case, albeit not for the purpose of performing the seumayang.

If the heads of the village are not particularly zealous and devout, and the young men are not impelled to the performance of this duty by shame or through fear of some religious teacher, it not unfrequently happens that few or none of those present perform the seumayang.

It is only in the fasting month that prayers are offered up with regularity, at least in the evenings; but as we shall see in a later chapter the proceedings at these are of such a nature that really pious people avoid the neighbourhood of the meunasah as much as possible.

In some gampōngs, however, the meunasah responds better to the religious purposes for which it is intended. Not only are the obligatory religious exercises held there by a congregation of men under the leadership of a teungku, but they sometimes also while away the evenings or nights with non-obligatory acts of devotion. Prominent