Tilaka

In Hinduism, the tilaka (Sanskrit: तिलक) is a mark worn usually on the forehead, sometimes other parts of the body such as neck, hand or chest. Tilaka may be worn daily or for rites of passage or special religious occasions only, depending on regional customs.

A Tilaka ceremony in progress to welcome the groom at a Hindu wedding

Quotes

• The fatwa volumes display almost a paranoia about the tilak. Mufti Kifayatullah’s general position is that it is the mark of kufr, but he relents to the extent that he makes the outcome depend on intention and circumstance. Hindus and Muslims are in a procession together; supporters of the cause put chandan tilaks on the participants, including some Muslims: are the Muslims guilty of kufr?, he is asked. Is their nikah with their wives terminated? ... To put chandan and marks on the forehead is the special national and religious characteristic of the Hindus, he says. It was obligatory for those Muslims, he rules, to abstain from this. But, he adds with his usual moderation in regard to specific transgressors, because we do not know whether the chandan was put on those Muslims with their willing approval, one cannot decree that those on whom chandan was put are apostates or kafirs or that their nikah has become void. However, he concludes, they should do taubah and abstain from such actions in the future.
  • About rulings of the Shariat and ulema on the tilak. Arun Shourie - The World of Fatwas Or The Sharia in Action (2012, Harper Collins)

• The Barelvis are predictably much more stern. ... the Barelvis taunted Mufti Kifayatullah, Maulana Abdul Bari of Firangi Mahal and the Deobandis in general on the ground, among others, that by involving Muslims into a campaign in which ... kafirs put tilak and chandan on the foreheads of the believers—these ulema (though Ahmad Riza Khan would never use such a respectable expression for them) had deliberately ensnared Muslims in kufr. Tilak, the Fatawa-i-Rizvia declares, is a way of worshipping Mahadev and is kufr. And, it declares with great emphasis, to acquiesce in kufr even for a second is as much kufr as it is to consent to kufr for a hundred years. By wiping off the tilak the kufr which has taken place is not erased: you must embrace Islam again, you must do nikah again; the reason for this is that a person who having bowed to Mahadev raises his head is in the same position as a person who lies prostrate before Mahadev all day long. [...] To put marks on the forehead—as is done by well-wishers and organizers at such processions—is permanently haram; in fact, there is the apprehension of kufr in doing so. One who does such things becomes a fasiq, a sinner, and must do taubah. [...]Maulana Ahmad Riza Khan predictably is not satisfied with reciprocity. He does not countenance consideration being shown even formally for the religious sentiments of the non-believers—active dissociation, hostile spurning are enjoined, that is his tenor. When a procession bearing idols is brought to or passes their house and the persons thank the processionists, when they allow the processionists to put a tilak mark on them, when they join the Hindus in shouting ‘jai’ to the false god—all of them and all those who joined such a procession are close to kufr, declares the Fatawa-i-Rizvia. More specifically, those who had the tilak put on them, those who joined Hindus in saying that ‘jai’ have become kafirs, it declares. Their women are out of their nikah. Those who did not do these things but joined the procession have come close to kufr. The places of worship of the kafirs, it declares, are places of the Devil. To join in the prayers of kafirs, to go to their places of worship is kufr. And to think lightly of kufr is also kufr. ... To allow tilak to be put is definitely kufr, the Maulana (Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi) reiterates, and against Islam. The zunnar is after all a thread which remains covered under clothes, he points out. But this tilak is a mark, and a mark on the face, and in the face on the forehead—from where it proclaims at all times, ‘We are kafirs.’ Quoting authorities, the Maulana declares, the difference between Hindu and Muslim is the difference between kufr and Islam. And that, the Maulana declares, cannot be erased till the Muslim remains Muslim, and the kafir, kafir...
  • About rulings of the Shariat and ulema on the tilak. Arun Shourie - The World of Fatwas Or The Sharia in Action (2012, Harper Collins)