Why King Abdullah was buried in an unmarked grave

You may have imagined a somewhat lavish burial for King Abdullah, the Saudi king who died Friday at the age of 90.

He was, after all, one of the richest men in the history of the world.

But King Abdullah's burial was nothing out of the ordinary, nor is his unmarked grave, both of which are in accordance with Wahhabi Sunni Islam.

Wahhabism holds that public displays of grief are sinful, akin to idolatry.

Abdullah's body was bathed, according to tradition, shrouded in a simple beige cloth and buried, without a coffin, between two unmarked stones at Riyadh’s Al Oud cemetery. 

After the king's body was laid to rest, it was covered in dirt and stones.

Other heads of state are also buried in unmarked graves at Al Oud, as are many of Abdullah's commoner subjects.

Reuters reports that there is no official mourning period in Saudi Arabia and flags around the kingdom fly at full staff. Despite his apparent popularity at home, there were no spontaneous gatherings on city streets to mark Abdullah's passing.

Tony Street, an expert in Islam from Cambridge University, told Newsweek that when it comes to burial, Wahhabists are “hostile to leaving anything that might become a site for veneration.”

They characterize their belief as “simply a commitment to utter and absolute Tawhid, the affirmation of God’s supremacy,” he added.

In fact, the House of Saud doesn't like to be referred to as Wahhabi because using the label “is awarding exactly the kind of eminence to a Muslim that they try to avoid," Street said.

There are, of course, a few exceptions to the no pomp and circumstance rule surrounding King Abdullah's death.

Before the burial, Reuters reports, afternoon prayers took place before ranks of Muslim leaders, Saudi princes, powerful clerics and billionaire Arab businessmen.

Tens of thousands are expected to pay their condolences in the coming days during a traditional "bayaa" ceremony. 

"It would take a considerable suspension of disbelief to accept that the bayaa is anything like an open process of popular participation, rather than a stage-managed event by the Saud dynasty and the ultra-conservative Wahhabi clerical establishment which provides its religious legitimacy," the BBC reported upon the death of King Fahd in 2005, who preceded Abdullah.

Certainly heads of state from around the world don't attend the average Saudi funeral. 

Obama canceled his trip to the Taj Mahal in India and is headed to Saudi Arabia to pay his respects to the Saudi royal family and King Salman.