In the 16th century, Azhar students noticed that their colleagues from Yemen drink a strong smell dark beverage with a bitter taste. The Yamani students were used to do this before exams and prayers. Soon, coffee spread inside Al-Azhar, and most of the students drank it.
As usual, sheikhs started to interfere in all aspects of our life. One of them called Ahmed Abdul-Haq al-Sunbati forbade drinking coffee in any form assuring that everything that works to influence the mind is haraam. His fatwa was supported by many sheikhs and were discussed even in religious speeches and led to the destruction of several coffee shops.
In 1572, the scholars in Cairo issued a final fatwa that officially considers coffee as evil and haram and permitted destroying coffee shops and shutting them down. Such fatwa was a reason for great losses for coffee merchants. Supporters of the fatwa strictly applied it and persecuted coffee merchants till they killed one of them. the merchants gathered and decided to punish the murderers of their friend and offered black coffee in his funeral without adding sugar.
The rioters came to the Ottoman Sultan who expelled the fanatic jurist who issued the controversial fatwa and replaced him with a less fanatic one who permitted coffee drinking and the custom of offering sour coffee in funerals lived till today.
