Hajj- the largest annual gathering of people in the world takes place from 8^th to 12^th of the last month of the Islamic calendar. It is one of the five pillars of Islam (others being Shahadah (belief or confession of faith), Salat (worship in the form of prayer), Sawm Ramadan (fasting during the month of Ramadan) and Zakat (alms or charitable giving)). Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca, the sacred city of Islam that every Muslim is expected to do once in his lifetime. 

 

                            Rituals that pilgrims perform include walking counter-clockwise seven times around the Ka’bah, the cube-shaped building which acts as the Muslim direction of prayer, run back and forth between the hills Al-Safa and Al Marwah, drink from the Zamzam Well, goes to the plains of Mount Arafat to stand in vigil, and throw stones in a ritual Stoning of the Devil. The pilgrims then shave their heads, perform a ritual of animal sacrifice, and celebrate the three-day global festival of Eid-al-Adha.

                            The mythology dates to the time of Prophet Ibrahim, around 2000BC in the Kingdom of Babylon. Ibrahim’s father was an idolater who made idols of God and Ibrahim’s mind rejected the idea of people bowing and worshiping a lifeless toy. He felt repulsion towards the idols and one day went and broke all idols of the temple. People were furious and questioned Ibrahim, to which he replied, “the biggest of the idol has done it. Ask them if they can speak." "You know well that these idols don't speak!" People said impatiently. "Then how come you worship things that can neither speak nor see, nor even fend for themselves? Have you lost your minds?" People’s mind and senses felt that Ibrahim is telling truth but their pride prevented them from succumbing to him and thus they decided to put him on fire as a punishment. Allah saved Ibrahim from the fire by only burning the chains he was tied to. People were shocked and amazed. But even after that only two people in his town believed in Ibrahim’s ideologies. Leaving his town, Ibrahim traveled to various places around the world to spread the awareness and knowledge of ONE God, Allah.

                                   Over the years, Ibrahim continued with his mission and succeeded but wished if there could be such a place where people would be in peace, and concentrate solely for the worship of Allah. His wish was answered when Allah ordered him to build the Sacred House, the Ka'bah. Both Ibrahim with his son Ismail went on building Ka'bah calling people to obey their Lord.

                             Hajj is therefore, a symbol of solidarity of all Muslims and complete submission to Allah. Today more than 3 million pilgrims arrive in Saudi Arabia to perform Hajj every year, which is a 2824% increase in the last 92 years.

         It is the immense devotion to Allah and enormous faith in his existence that drives millions of Muslims all around the world to do Hajj at least once in their lifetime, if not more.