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Muslims Mark Hajj Season with Pilgrimage to Mecca
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http://enews.voanews.com/t?ctl=1069E51:3919ACA Every Muslim
financially able to do so is obliged under Koran to make  pilgrimage
to Mecca during Hajj at least once in lifetime The annual season of
Hajj is now under way. Every Muslim who is financially able to do so
is obliged under the Koran, the holy Muslim scripture, to make the
pilgrimage to Mecca during Hajj at least once in his or her lifetime.
The season culminates on the "Id-Al Adha," the festival of sacrifice,
which this year falls on Tuesday, January 11 and continues until
January 14. The arduous annual Hajj pilgrimage takes place this year
against the background of the continuing war in Iraq and the
increasing militancy on the part of the Islamic extremist groups
against broader interests of the West and of particularly, the United
States.

Call to Prayer: "God is most great, god is most great," the muezzin
says in calling the faithful to prayer, "I bear witness to the oneness
of god, I bear witness to the oneness of god."

At the muezzin's call, Muslims turn toward Mecca and prostrate
themselves before God in humility to say their daily prayer.

It was in Mecca around the year 570 that Muhammad, the prophet of
Islam, was born. When he was 40, he began to guide his people and
teach them the oneness of God. By doing so, the Islamic faith teaches,
Muhammad completed a tradition begun by Adam and followed by a
succession of prophets, including Abraham, Moses, Jesus, in order that
humanity may live in peace and in covenant with God.

Soon after Muhammad started his teachings, he asked his fellow
clansmen from the elite tribe of Quraysh, to abandon their practices
of worshiping idols and ponder the intricacies of creation that, he
reasoned, could come from one God only. But faced with defiance and
persecution, Muhammad fled Mecca, his birthplace, with a handful of
his followers and journeyed to Medina, then an oasis 320 kilometers
north of Mecca. The flight, or Hegira, of the prophet of Islam in the
year 622 marks the beginning of Muslim calendar and an era profoundly
transforming the course of human history.

Muhammad thrived in Medina. Eight years after he fled Mecca, he
returned in triumph to witness the removal of the idols from Ka'ba,
the House of God. Muslim tradition has it that Abraham, the Patriarch,
built Ka'ba as the House of God. Located in one corner of Ka'ba is the
"black stone," or Hajar-Al-Aswad, which Muslims believe was given by
God to Abraham as a reward for his faithfulness. The stone represents
the covenant between God and humans.

The Great Patriarch, in a test of his faith and rectitude, was ordered
by God to sacrifice his son, Ismael. However, God, satisfied that
Abraham had passed the test of faith, offered a ram to be sacrificed
in place of his son at the last minute. The festival of sacrifice
commemorates these events.

Abraham, writes Bruce Feiler, a New York Times best selling author,
"remains a defining figure for half the world's believers. Muslims
invoke him in their daily prayers, as do Jews. He appears repeatedly
in the Christian liturgy. The most mesmerizing story of Abraham's
life-his offering a son to God-plays a pivotal role in the holiest
week of the Christian year, at Easter. The story is also recited at
the start of the holiest fortnight in Judaism, on Rosh Hashanah."

For over 13 centuries Muslims the world over have looked forward to
the day when they would be able to set foot in Mecca, a barren valley
surrounded by harsh hills in today's Saudi Arabia.

Pilgrims to Mecca start their spiritual journey stripped of the
trappings of class, power and status. Men wear the "Ihram," a
two-piece seamless cloth cover. Women pilgrims wear a head to toe
white garment that reveals only their faces and hands. The pilgrims
then head toward Ka'ba chanting the "Talbiyah," a prayer to Allah.

The pilgrims chant, "here we come o Allah, no partner have you.
Blessings are yours, the kingdom, too."

After reaching Ka'ba, the pilgrims begin their Tawaf, a ritual in
which they walk seven times counterclockwise around Ka'ba, as the
American writer Herman Melville put it, "to circumambulate the city of
a dreamy Sabbath afternoon."

Then they make the "Sa'ay," the trip between the hills of Safa and
Marwa, seven times. A trip to Minah takes place on the eighth day of
the Hajj. The following morning the pilgrims make a trip to the plain
of Arafat. Here Muslims perform the "standing" rituals, praying from
noon until sunset near the site of Muhammad's farewell address. At
night, the pilgrims retreat to a place called "Muzdalifah." Then they
return to Minah for three days, where they cast stones at the three
pillars representing the Satan, signifying his rejection and what he
stands for.