This year (2014) millions of Muslims are joining pilgrimage to Mecca. Many persons from Bangladesh including a person well known to me as a spiritual guide have already reached Saudi Arabia with the pious purpose. To cite a report from a news media :
These days, the holy city of Mecca is abuzz with activity as many Muslims have followed the Divine Command to perform Hajj. Many have been waiting for years and have made a long journey to Mecca to fulfill their dreams. Hajj is regarded as one of the pillars of Islam and every Muslim, who can physically and financially afford the pilgrimage, must perform it at least once in a lifetime.
Here’s the Grand Mosque, the holiest in Islam. Many pilgrims have already arrived in Mecca for this year’s Hajj and the number will swell to millions as we approach the time of the ritual. Pilgrims, who come to Mecca, are supposed to perform rituals once they reach the holy city. They had entered the state of Ihram before coming to Mecca, which means they are prohibited from a number of acts. The first rite pilgrims have to carry out in Mecca is called Tawaf or circling around the Ka’ba in the Grand Mosque seven times counter-clockwise.
For Hajj pilgrims, the Ka’ba is the centerpiece of their journey. They circle around it, stand before it, and praise God. The Ka’ba, also known as the Sacred House or the House of God, is the Muslims’ Qibla, the direction they face when they pray. And finally, the pilgrims cut part of their hair and nails to finish their minor rituals. They will now wait for several days in Mecca to perform the major Hajj rituals.
Description of the institutional significance of Islam is incomplete without reference to the massive spiritual gathering in Arafat Maidan. In fact Hajj continues to stand out to be the keynote of a strong Islamic institution with universal appeal. The holy Hajj thus performed enables a pious Muslim to become close to Allah. The Almighty loves any pious Muslim who visited the Mecca to join the largest gathering. The Hajj is an expression of ‘solidarity of the Muslims’ and their utter ‘submission’ to the Almighty Allah. The word Hajj means a journey symbolically meaning ‘both strong outer act and inward acts of intention.’
They all then become the guest of Allah. The pilgrims are expected to visit all holy places close to Mecca. The mass of believer’s joining the gathering to purge of all sins are found attired in ‘a special unsewed loose dress called ehram symbolising strong fidelity and modeled behaviour of pious Muslims in traditional manner.
There seems to be a common manifestation of reverence to the five pillars of Islam that act as an axis for spiritual, moral and humanitarian development. ‘Muslims believe in one Allah and follow the way of life laid down for them by the Prophet(SM)’. Such a belief is the manifestation of Tawhid (Divine Unity) as the ‘primal epistemology of Islamic world view.’
The Quranic commandants are followed by the mumins (believers) and practionars. They are devotees clinging to rituals prescribed by the Holy Quran and Hadis praying five times a day and attending weekly and periodic religious congregations, paying Zakat and performing Hajj depending on financial strength. The believers realise that there is a life after death. The sinners will suffer punishment in the Hell for their misdeeds and not for following five pillars and other commandments of Allah (Hajj being one of the five pillars) as the key guidelines of Islam. The good souls will live in peace in Heaven for pious life and merit. The Muslims believe that those who have gone astray from the right path will be severely punished even in grave until the Day of Resurrection.
Hajj is the largest religious gathering like an ocean. It is a special occasion for the Muslims especially to participate in religious discussions, congregation, special prayer and food participation. . Pious Muslims all over the world throng at Saudi Arab staying there for a couple of weeks to observe ritual in wider participation. The Muslims from different countries enjoy sojourn in Saudi Arabia staying there for some time until assembling in the vast plain of Arafat offering Zuhar and Asar prayers together for spiritual benediction and supplicating ‘Most Gracious and Benign Allah’ begging pardon for misdeeds in temporal life.
The ritual like Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca) is observed in the lunar month of Zil Hajj. Hajj is one of the five pillars of Islam. It is enjoined on the solvent Muslim to trek to Saudi Arab for performing Hajj in the ritualistic manner.
After arrival in Mecca the pilgrim, the devotees observe a cluster of rituals as a symbol of ‘lives of Ibrahim and his wife Hajera’ and ‘ the solidarity of Muslims worldwide.’
‘The greater Hajj (al-Hajj al-Akbar) begins on the eighth day of the lunar month of Dhul-Hijjah. If they are not already wearing it upon their arrival, pilgrims put on Ihram clothing and then leave Mecca for the nearby town of Mina where they spend the rest of the day. The Saudi government has put up thousands of large white tents at Mina to provide accommodations for all the pilgrims’
‘On the first day of the Hajj (the 7th day of the 12th month in other words, Dhul-Hijjah), the pilgrims perform their first Tawaf, which involves all of the pilgrims visiting the Ka’ba and walking seven times counter-clockwise around the Ka’ba.
It is said that the Ka’ba premise was created thousands years before the creation of earth. All mosques are spiritually affiliated to the Ka’ba. It became the first prayer house (Sura Bakara, cited in M. Ismail Kutubi).
The pilgrims may also kiss the Black Stone (Al-Hajar Al-Aswad) on each circuit. If kissing the Stone is not possible because of the crowd, they may simply point towards the Stone on each circuit with their right hand. In each complete circuit a pilgrim says “In the name of Allah, Allah is Great, Allah is Great, Allah is Great and praise be to Allah” (Bismillahi Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar wa lillahil hamd) with 7 circuits constituting a complete tawaf. The place where pilgrims walk is known as ‘Mutaaf’. Only the first three shouts are compulsory, but almost all perform it seven times.
The eligibility for performing Hajj is clearly defined in the Islamic guidelines to be followed. “A person intending to perform the holy Hajj should be in a reasonably good health and apparently fit free from all deadly diseases that may act as a handicap for performing the cumbersome pilgrimage. He /she should be free from all sorts of debts-both official and unofficial. Muslims who perform all other Islamic rituals devotedly such as fasting during Ramadan, distribute Zakat money at the rate of two and a half per cent annually from his earned income after meeting all expenses, offer prayers regularly five times a day, can only think to perform the holy Hajj.
In fact the guidelines determining the eligibility for attending pilgrimage to Mecca are ‘cxplicit’,’rigid’ and ‘self-explanatory’. Only people untouched with purposive corruption for making money considered morally well-guided is fit for traveling to Saudi Arab as pilgrims. Persons thriving on ill-gotten money coming through the chain of corruption are unscrupulous; for them holy journey cannot be aspired for.
(The writer is Professor of Public Administration, Chittagong University)
