Save the Low Pan! Islamic Toilet Etiquette

For centuries and centuries, since the beginning of time, the natural position that people globally adopted for relieving themselves was that of squatting. Indeed, this position is so natural that a child instinctively adopts it when he needs to relieve himself.

It was only around the seventeenth century that Lord John Harington invented the high-pan toilet. Despite the years that have passed since its inception, and its popularity among certain classes of society, more than half the population of the world still squat to relieve themselves.

Squatting has numerous Deeni as well as health benefits. When a person squats, there is no water directly below him – as is the case with the high-pan toilet. As it is well known, the high pan toilet has a tit-for-tat – or rather ‘splish for splash’ attitude. Suffice it to say that a person using the high-pan toilet is at great risk to suffer a splash-back. This not only messes a person’s body with najaasat (impurity) which renders salaah null and void, but is also the cause of one suffering painful punishment in the grave.

Furthermore, when a person uses the high-pan toilet, his thighs and buttocks are in contact with the seat – a seat on which countless people sat before him. Without first washing and cleaning the seat, there is no way for one to know whether the seat is truly hygienic or not.

From a health perspective, doctors have only recently ‘discovered’ the benefits of squatting. In a nutshell, squatting allows a person’s colon to straighten, facilitating easy, effortless movement. On the contrary, when a person is seated on the high-pan, his colon is bent, due to which he has to strain and push in order to relieve himself. This unnecessary straining and pushing harms the colon and leads to fissures (tears in the colon) and other health complications.

Another observation is that people who squat tend to relieve themselves in a much shorter span of time compared to those seated on the high-pan. Because sitting on the high-pan hinders the movement of the bowel, prolonging the toilet session, people have now resorted to reading magazines, novels or even using their phones in the toilet in order to pass the time! The toilet is a place of filth and Shayaateen, and should thus be frequented for as short a duration as possible. However, people are now all too comfortable in the loo and thus unnecessarily spend up to twenty minutes at a time on the pan!

The west, in a misdirected effort to enjoy the benefits of squatting, has invented contraptions such as the ‘squatty potty’ and other similar squat-stools. Although this may assist with the bowel movement, this does not address the ‘splash-back’ dilemma with which all high-pan users are faced.

The solution is much simpler – the low pan toilet. We need to keep the low pan toilet chained to our homes – not flushed out of our lives. If we are able to, let us install these toilets in our homes and teach our children how to use them correctly. Only those who cannot use the low pan at all due to old age or ill health (such as knee problems) should use the high pan – and that too with extreme care.

Uswatul Muslima

Islamic Toilet Etiquette and Q and A

Question: What are the rules and manners to be followed when answering the call of nature?
ANSWER
1. Before entering the toilet, one should say the A’udhu (isti’adha) and Basmala and then recite the prayer “Allahumma innee a’oodhu bika minal khubthi wal khabaa-ith.”

2. When entering the toilet, one should not have in one’s hand anything on which the name of Allahu ta’ala or any verse of the Qur’an al-karim is written. There is no objection if it is in one’s pocket or covered with something. Similarly, when stepping into the toilet, one should not be wearing a pendant with the name of Allah on it. If one has, one should tuck it inside the neck of one’s sweater before entering it.

3. It is permissible to enter the toilet with an amulet if it is covered properly.

4. One should enter the toilet with one’s left foot and exit with one’s right foot.

5. One should recite the prayer “Alhamdu-lil-laa-hil-la-dhi adh-haba ‘a-nil a-dhaa wa ‘a-faa-ni” afer exiting the toilet.

6. One should not talk or sit for a long time or read anything like a newspaper or sing a song or smoke or chew gum in the toilet.

7. After cleaning one’s private parts, one should cover them immediately.

8. One should neither face the Qibla nor turn one’s back toward it while urinating or defecating.

9. One should remove the feces on one’s anus with one’s finger and wash one’s hand. If there are still traces of filth, one should wash them with water.

10. When cleaning the private parts after answering the call of nature, men should wash them from the back to the front. Women should wash them from the front to the back. Thus, the genitals will not be smeared with filth, nor will it cause one to be sexually aroused by the stimulation of fingers.

11. One should dry one’s private parts with a cloth after washing them. If there is not a cloth available, it is permissible to use toilet paper because toilet paper is produced to be used after answering the call of nature. But using other kinds of paper for this purpose is not permissible.

12. One should sprinkle some water over one’s underpants after cleaning one’s private parts. By doing so, when one notices wetness on one’s underpants, one will not feel doubt as to whether it is urine or not. One should assume it to be the sprinkled water and should not fall into baseless misgivings (waswasa).

13. After cleaning their private parts, men should do istibra. Women do not do it. Istibra means not to leave any drops of urine in the urethra. It is done by walking or coughing or lying on the left side.

14. If a man exits the toilet without doing istibra, drops of urine may come out and soil his underwear. Therefore, he should insert a cotton wick as big as a barley seed into his urinary hole, whereby he will prevent urine from oozing out.

15. Istinka means a feeling of being sure and having no doubts that there are no drops of urine left, and one’s heart is at ease about it. A man can make wudu’ after this certitude in his heart.

16. One should not look at one’s private parts or spit into the toilet.

17. One should not urinate while standing unless there is strong necessity for doing so and should not let drops of urine splash onto one’s clothes. To that end, one should keep separate pajamas or tracksuit. It is mustahab to enter the toilet with separate pajamas and with the head covered.

18. One should wash one’s hands after using the toilet.

19. One must not urinate into any water, on a wall of a mosque, in a cemetery, or on a road.

20. Cleaning the private parts with stones and similar materials is an acceptable substitute for cleaning them with water.

Question: Is it better to have separate clothes to wear in the toilet?
ANSWER
Yes, it is better. Wearing separate clothes for the toilet and staying there with your head covered is mustahab. (Se’âdet-i Ebediyye)

Question: I think that a western-style flush toilet is more comfortable to use. Is it permissible to use a western-style toilet instead of a squat one?
ANSWER
If one, when using a sit-down toilet, can clean one’s private parts comfortably and spray from one’s urine does not come back on one’s clothes, there is nothing wrong with using it. However, using a squat toilet has many health benefits:
1. Cleaning filth is easier.
2. Spray from urine is less likely to come back on one’s body and clothes.
3. As one’s colon is emptied completely, the urinary bladder and bowels relax.
4. When one is in the squatting position, fecal matter does not remain in the tube along which it moves and is expelled from the body. Western physicians who studied why urinary tract- and colon-related diseases were uncommon among Muslims found that it was because Muslims did not use sit-down toilets.

Urinary system disorders, especially prostate problems, are very distressing things, which have a negative effect on the happiness of a family. Men must not urinate while standing, and Muslims should choose (between squatting and sitting) the best one for health.

Question: Is it mustahab for both men and women to enter the toilet by covering their heads? Can a woman enter the toilet by covering her head with an underscarf (hijab accessory) instead of a headscarf?
ANSWER
Yes, it is mustahab to enter the toilet with a covered head. A woman’s wearing an underscarf suffices for this purpose.