THE FIVE ACTS (Fitra)

There are nine ahAdIs (495-503) on five acts natural to man and proper to Islam: circumcision, shaving the pubes, cutting the nails, plucking the hair under the armpits, and clipping the moustache.

About the moustache and the beard, the Prophet said: �Act against the polytheists, trim closely the moustache and grow beard� (500).  The next hadIs substitutes the word �fire-worshippers� for �polytheists.� The translator provides the rationale for this injunction: �Islam created a new brotherhood on the basis of belief and good conduct. . . . For the identification of faces, the Muslims have been ordered to trim the moustache and wear the beard, so that they may be distinguished from the non-Muslims who grow a moustache and shave beard� (note 471).

author : ram swarup