The seulaweuet (Achehnese, from the Arabic ṣalawāt, “blessings” or “psalms of praise”) was the repetition of formulas of praise in honour of the Prophet in the Achehnese religious gatherings. It was the Achehnese equivalent of the universal Mohammedan practice of ṣalawāt — the blessings invoked on the Prophet that form so conspicuous a part of the liturgy of Islam — and was used especially at the consecration of the kanduri laot or annual feast of the fishermen, where it took its place beside the liatavi or recitation in chorus of portions of the Quran.
Use at the kanduri laot
The principal reference to the seulaweuet in The Achehnese occurs in Snouck Hurgronje’s account of the pukat-fishing communities of the Achehnese coast. The kanduri laot was the annual feast of the pawangs of each lho’ or “bay,” held to invoke God’s blessing on the labours of its fishermen, and corresponding, for the sea, to the kanduri blang held for the planters. Before the company proceeded to attack the good cheer which was spread on the shore of the lho’ that gave the feast, the feast was consecrated by dikr (the repetition of the divine name), by the repetition of psalms of praise (seulaweuet) in honour of the Prophet, or by liatavi — the recitation in chorus of portions of the Quran by the teungkus and leubes present. The seulaweuet was thus one of three forms of consecration, interchangeable with the dikr and the liatavi, by which the kanduri laot was made a religious act.
The form of the recitation
The seulaweuet, like the ratebs with which it was allied, was a chanted repetition of formulas of praise. Its Arabic original, the ṣalawāt, is the plural of ṣalāh, and in its Achehnese form the term denotes the formulas of blessing invoked on the Prophet, of which the commonest is the ṣallā llāhu ʿalayhi wa-sallam (“May God bless him and grant him peace”) that follows every mention of the Prophet’s name. In the seulaweuet, these formulas were drawn out into a chanted sequence, performed by the teungkus and leubes present, and constituting one of the regular forms of Achehnese communal devotion.
Place in Achehnese religious life
The seulaweuet belonged to that body of optional devotions by which the Achehnese supplemented the prescribed prayers of the law. Like the ratebs and the tahlil, it was a liturgical exercise that could be inserted into a variety of occasions — a kanduri, a feast, a night-watch — to give them a religious character. Its use at the kanduri laot was particularly natural, since the kanduri was an act of thanksgiving for the labours of the sea, and the Prophet, in Achehnese as in general Mohammedan piety, was the chief intercessor between the worshipper and God. The seulaweuet thus consecrated the feast by invoking, in chanted form, the blessing of God on the Prophet, and through the Prophet on the company that had assembled in his name.
See Also
Source
The Achehnese, Vol. I, by Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje, translated by A.W.S. O’Sullivan, indexed by R.J. Wilkinson. Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1906.