Reclaiming Collective Repentance: What Can We Learn from Lost "Disaster Prayers"? (original) (raw)

n December 26, 2003, a powerful earthquake struck southeastern Iran, killing more than forty-one thousand people, injuring sixteen thousand, leaving seventy thousand homeless, and destroying more than 60 percent of all structures in the city of Bam. The ancient quarter of Arge-Bam, including a two-thousand-year-old citadel, built entirely of mud bricks, clay, straw, and trunks of palm trees, was also severely damaged. Bam was founded during the Sassanian period (224-637 C.E.) and its attractions to visitors, in addition to the citadel, were a Zoroastrian fire temple and other remains of the time when the city was a commercial center on the famous Silk Road. The day after the devastation, local people told reporters that on Friday, December 26, a light quake awakened them at 4:00 a.m. Some got frightened enough to go to the street, but they soon returned to their beds. Then at 5:27 a.m. an earthquake that registered 6.6 on the Richter scale caused the collapse of roofs and ceilings, ...