Saudi Arabia`s King Abdullah buried in ordinary people’s cemetery

The Saudi Arabian king who boasted 17 billion U.S. dollars in total personal asset had a rather humble death. Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, who died on Friday, was clad in simple shroud made of yellow textile, as he was buried even without a coffin at a cemetery where common people are buried. There was no tombstone.

The Saudi royal family held a simple funeral ceremony on Friday before burying the late king’s body at El-Ud public cemetery in the capital city of Riyadh. The ceremony is a facility that is open to ordinary people as well. The funeral process and method were both ordinary and there was nothing special. After the body was buried, no burial mound was formed and the tomb covered with a thin layer of gravels.

Saudi Arabia`s King Abdullah`s funeral was humble in compliance with Wahhabism. The Sunni Islamic fundamentalism, which was established by Sunni leader Muhammad Bin Abdul Wahhab (1703-1792), emphasizes a strictly disciplined life like the puritanism of Christianity. Saudi Arabia’s first king, Abdel-Aziz bin Abdel-Rahman Ibn Saud, also founded the country based on Wahhabism in 1932.

Dr. Tony Street, an expert on Islam and a professor of Cambridge University in Britain, told an interview with the Newsweek magazine that Wahhabism, the spiritual framework of the Saudi Kingdom, is "hostile to leaving anything that might become a site for veneration,” adding that all previous kings, including King Abdullah, were buried in a cemetery for ordinary people and Saudi Arabia does not designate a period of mourning even the king passes away.

Meanwhile, world leaders are visiting Saudi Arabia en masse to pay respects to the late king Abdullah. U.S. President Barack Obama, who is visiting India, will cancel his tour to Taj Mahal, and hurriedly head to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday. Prince Charles Philip Arthur George of Britain, Crown Prince Naruhito of Japan, and King Felipe VI of Spain also plan to visit the Middle East country. For Korea, an eight-member delegation led by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education Hwang Woo-yea will stay in Saudi Arabia for two days from Sunday to pay respects to the late king.