Question:
I bought a ring on Ebay from Turkey that has some numbers in Arabic. No one can tell me what it means as it is a 3 x 3 set of squares. I have written them in English below:
492
357
816
The seller listed it as an Islamic ring but cannot tell me the meaning as he doesn’t know and speaks very little English. I am assuming that it is a Taweez/Ruqiyya written in numerals and some on the internet refer to it as Buduh given to Imam Ghazali. Your help is very much appreciated as to what is the use of this. Thank you.
Answer:
This is a very widespread, basic wafq muthallath or three-per-side graph (plural: awfaq) with the same numerical value (in this case, 15) whichever of the eight combinations of the three directions you add up the numbers (horizontal, vertical and diagonal) that is drawn up and worn as medicine, among other uses, for:
– postpartum pain (placed under her two feet)
– infants and toddlers (worn around the neck or thereabout)
– milk-bearing (written in saffron and washed then drunk by the mother)
– milk-bearing for livestock (placed in the milking bucket)
– deliverance from jail (worn on one’s front, back, right and left sides, and underfoot).
And Allah knows best.
Hajj Gibril Haddad
