Muslims have been told they must pray five times a day, avoid ice-cream, oil-based soaps, insect sprays and ball-point pens, and forgo the temptation to be tattooed. But the list highlights confusion over conflicting directives on Islamic matters. The ban on tattoos was announced by Abdul Hamid Zainal Abidin, director-general of the Malaysian Islamic Development Department, at the same time as he advised Muslims to ignore a letter circulating as an authoritative document, which listed a range of consumer items supposedly containing banned ingredients. He assured Muslims there were no haram, or forbidden, ingredients such as pork fat, pig bones and alcohol, in the ice-cream, soaps, sprays and pens. But he warned youths not to be caught up in the craze for tattoos showing naked women and religious verses. And skipping the subuh, or dawn prayer, would result in a sentence of 30 years in hell, said to be equivalent to 60,000 years on earth.
