Mecca is the city where the Prophet Muhammad was born in 570. Considered the last of the prophets of Islam, Muhammad is attributed the guidelines of this centennial rite.
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Mecca, in Saudi Arabia, is considered the main holy city of the Muslim world. Currently, the pilgrimage, also known as the Hajj, summons more than two million faithful of Islam to spend six days dedicated to spirituality.
Every Muslim adult must at least once in his life make this pilgrimage that is established as one of the five pillars proposed by Islam, among which are also the profession of faith, daily prayer, almsgiving, and fasting. in the month of Ramadan.
For the faithful of this monotheistic religion, the parameters of the Hajj were established by Muhammad, the last of his prophets, who was in charge of updating the knowledge imparted by Abraham, considered the patriarch of Islam and whose existence dates from 1813 to 1638 BC.
State of purity and days of prayers to the god Allah
The first of these guidelines is to enter the purity and sacred state known as 'Ihram'. In this way the pilgrimage can begin.
The opening day includes a journey of 8 kilometers from Mecca to Mina, a desert place where the bearers of the faith dedicate a whole day in prayers that remember Allah, the name by which Muslims call their God.
A 14.4-kilometer journey continues towards Mount Arafat or the mountain of mercy, a historical scene for Muslims, as it was there that the Prophet Muhammad sentenced his last sermon.
Remembrances of Abraham, the patriarch of Islam
Another of the days is known as the ‘Great Day of the Pilgrimage’. Muslims travel from Muzdalifah to Mina, to perform one of the most dangerous rites. The devotees throw seven stones against three columns called Jamarat.
It is a symbolic act in which an attack is made against the devil, who according to Islamic traditions sought to tempt the prophet Abraham to bend his will and not sacrifice his son as Allah had requested.
Consequently, the following rite is the sacrifice of animals, in order to recall the passage from the Koran, a holy book of Muslims, which tells of when Allah intervened so that instead of killing his son, he would sacrifice an animal.
The Kaba in the Holy Mosque, a sacred scene for Muslims
Finally, the pilgrims continue their way to Mecca and enter the holy mosque, Másyd al Haram. There they revolve seven times around the Kaba, a cubic structure that symbolizes the axis of the unification of Muslims.
In 930, a Shiite movement known as the Carmatians brought a relic known as the black stone to this place. A sacred stone that would have been white at first, but which turned black after absorbing the sins of the thousands of pilgrims who have kissed it.
The wife of Aga Khan III of Pakistan is considered the first woman to kiss this stone in 1954, a ritual that for centuries was intended only for men.
At the end of the pilgrimage, Muslim men shave their heads and women cut off some locks. For a true believer in Islam it is a way to close the pilgrimage and show that sins have been cleansed.