MEG C A 675 shouts of Labbeyka (a word of obscure origin and meaning) ; he enters the great mosque, performs the tawaf and the sa y * with circumstances and prayers which it is unnecessary to detail, and then has his head shaved and resumes his common dress. This ceremony is now gene rail y combined with the hajj, or is performed by every stranger or traveller when he enters Mecca, and the ihram (which involves the acts of abstinence already referred to) is assumed at a considerable distance from the city. But it is also proper during one s residence in the holy city to perform at least one omra from Tan im in connexion with a visit to the mosque of Aisha there. The absurd triviality of these rites is ill concealed by the legends of the sa y of Hagar and of the tawaf being first performed by Adam in imitation of the circuit of the angels about the throne of God ; but in truth the meaning of their ceremonies seems to have been almost a blank to the Arabs before Islam, whose religion had become a mere formal tradition. We do not even know to what deity the worship expressed in the tawaf was properly addressed. There is a tradition that the Ka ba was a temple of Saturn (Shahrastani, p. 431); perhaps the most distinctive feature of the shrine may be sought in the sacred doves which still enjoy the protection of the sanctuary. These recall the sacred doves of Ascalon (Philo, vi. 200 of Kichter s cd.), and suggest Venus-worship as at least one element (comp. Herod., i. 131 ; iii. 8 ; Ephr. Syr., Op. Syr., ii. 457). To the ordinary pilgrim the omra has become so much an episode of the hajj that it is often described as a mere visit to the mosque of Aisha ; a better conception of its original significance is got from the Meccan feast of the seventh month (Rajab) graphically described by Ibn Jubair from his observations in 1184 A.D. Rajab was one of the ancient sacred months, and the feast, which extended through the whole month, and was a joyful season of hospitality and thanks giving, no doubt represents the ancient feasts of Mecca more exactly than the ceremonies of the hajj, in which old usage has been overlaid by traditions and glosses of Islam. The omra was per formed by crowds from day to day, especially at new and full moon. 2 The new moon celebration was nocturnal; the road to Tan im, the Mas a, and the mosque were brilliantly illuminated ; and the appear ing of the moon was greeted with noisy music. A genuine old Arab market was held, for the wild Bedouins of the Yemen mountains came in thousands to barter their cattle and fruits for clothing, and deemed that to absent themselves would bring drought and cattle plague in their homes. Though ignorant of the legal ritual and prayers, they performed the tawaf with enthusiasm, throwing them selves against the Ka ba and clinging to its curtains as a child clings to its mother. They also made a point of entering the Ka ba. The 29th of the month was the feast day of the Meccan women, when they and their little ones had the Ka ba to themselves without the presence even of the Sheybis. The central and essential ceremonies of the hajj or greater pil grimage are those of the day of Arafa,, the 9th of the "pilgrimage month " (Dhu l Hijja), the last of the Arab year ; and every Moslem who is his own master, and can command the necessary means, is bound to join in these once in his life. By them the pilgrim be comes as pure from sin as when he was born, and gains for the rest of his life the honourable title of hajj. Neglect of other parts of the pilgrim ceremonial may be compensated by offerings, but to miss the "stand" (wokuf) at Arafa is to miss the pilgrimage. Arafa or Arafat is a space artificially limited, round a small isolated hill called the Hill of Mercy, a little way outside the holy territory, on the road from Mecca to Taif. One leaving Mecca after midday can easily reach the place on foot the same evening. The road is first northwards along the Mecca valley and then turns eastward. It leads through the straggling village of Mina,occupying a long narrow valley (W. Mina), two to three hours from Mecca, and thence by the mosque of Muzdalifa over a narrow pass opening out into the plain of Arafa, which is an expansion of the great W. Na man, through which the Taif road descends from Mount Kara. The lofty and rugged mountains of the Ilodheyl tower over the plain on the north side and overshadow the little Hill of Mercy, which is one of those bosses of weathered granite so common in the Hijaz. Arafa, as we have already seen, lay quite near Dhu l-Majaz, where, according to Arabian tradition, a great fair was held from the 1st to the 8th of the pilgrimage month ; and the ceremonies from which the hajj was derived were originally an appendix to this fair. Now on the contrary the pilgrim is expected to follow as closely as may be the movements of the Prophet at his " farewell pilgrimage " in the year 10 of the Flight (632 A.D.). He therefore leaves Mecca in pilgrim garb on the 8th of Dhu l Hijja, called the day of tarwvya (an ob scure and pre-Islamic name), and strictly speaking should spend the night at Mind. It is now, however, customary to go right on and encamp at once at Arafa. The night should be spent in devotion, but the coffee booths do a lively trade, and songs are as common as prayers. Next forenoon the pilgrim is free to move about, and towards midday he may if he please hear a sermon. In the after- i The latter perhaps was no part of the ancient omra ; see Snouck-Hurgronje. Het Mekkaamche Feest, 1880, p. 115 sq.
- The 27th was also a great day, but this day was in commemoration of the
rebuilding of the Ka ba by Ibn Zubeyr. noon the essential ceremony begins ; it consists simply in " stand ing " on Arafa shouting Labbeyka and reciting prayers and texts till sunset. After the sun is down the vast assemblage breaks up, and a rush (technically ifdda, daf, nafr) is made in the utmost confusion to Muzdalifa, where the night prayer is said and the night spent. Before sunrise next morning (the 10th) a second "stand" like that on Arafa is made for a short time by torchlight round the mosque of Muzdalifa, but before the sun is fairly up all must be in motion in the second ifdda towards Mina. The day thus commenced is the " day of sacrifice," and has four ceremonies (1) to pelt with seven stones a cairn (jamrat el akaba) at the eastern end of W. Mina, (2) to slay a victim at Mina and hold a sacrificial meal, part of the flesh being also dried and so preserved, or given to the poor/ (3) to be shaved and so terminate the ihram, (4) to make the third ifdda, i.e., go to Mecca arid perform the tawaf and sa y (omrat el-ifdda), returning thereafter to Mina. The sacrifice and visit to Mecca niay, however, be delayed till the llth, 12th, or 13th. These are the days of Mina, a fair and a joyous feast, with no special ceremony except that each day the pilgrim is expected to throw seven stones, at the jamrat cl akaba, and also at each of two similar cairns in the valley. The stones are thrown in the name of Allah, and are gene rally thought to be directed at the devil. This is, however, a custom older than Islam, and a tradition in Azraki, p. 412, represents, it as an act of worship to idols at Mina. As the stones are thrown on the days of the fair, it is not unlikely that they have something to do with the old Arab mode of closing a sale by the -purchaser throwing a stone (Birrim, p. 328). 4 The pilgrims leave Mina on the 12th or 13th, and the hajj is then over. The colourless character of these ceremonies is plainly due to the fact that they are nothing more than expurgated heathen rites. In Islam proper they have no raison d etre ; the legends about Adam and Eve on Arafa, about Abraham s sacrifice of the ram at Thabir by Mina, imitated in the sacrifices of the pilgrimage, are mere clumsy afterthoughts, as appears from their variations and only partial acceptance. It is not so easy to get at the nature of the original rites, which Islam was careful to suppress. But old usages were not quickly eradicated, and we find mention of practices con demned by the orthodox, or forming no part of the Moslem ritual, which may be regarded as traces of an older ceremonial. Such are nocturnal illuminations at Mina (Ibn Batiita, i. 396), Arafa, and Muzdalifa (Ibn Jubair, p. 179), and tawafs performed by the ignorant at holy spots at Arafa not recognized by law (Snouck-Hurgronje, p. 149 sq.). We know that the rites at Muzdalifa were originally connected with a holy hill bearing the name of the god Kuzah (the Edomite Koze) whose bow is the rainbow, and there is reason to think that the if Adas from Arafa and Kuzah, which were not made as -now after sunset and before sunrise, but when the sun rested on the tops of the mountains, were ceremonies of farewell and salutation to the sun-god. The statistics of the pilgrimage cannot be given with certainty and vary much from year to year. The quarantine office keeps a record of arrivals by sea at Jiddah (30,271 for the year 1878 A.D., or 1295 A. u.) ; but to these must be added the great overland cara vans from Cairo, Damascus, and Irak, the pilgrims who reach Medina from Yanbu and go on to Mecca, and those from all parts of the peninsula. Burckhardt in 1814 estimated the crowd at Arafa at 70,000, Burton in 1853 at 50,000, Abel el-Razzak in 1858 at 60,000. This great assemblage is always a dangerous centre of infection, and the days of Mina especially, spent under circumstances originally adapted only for a Bedouin fair, with no provisions for proper cleanliness, and with the air full of the smell of putrefying ofl al and flesh drying in the sun, produce much sickness. Literature. Besides the Arabic geographers and cosmographers, many of whom have been already cited, we have Ibn Abd Rabbih s description of the mosque, early in the 10th century ( Ikd Farid, Cairo edition, iii. 362 sq.), but above all the admirable record of Ibn Jubair (1184 A.D.), by far the best account extant of Mecca and the pilgrimage. It has been much pillaged by Ibn Batiita. The Arabic his torians are largely occupied with fabulous matter as to Mecca before Islam ; for these legends the reader may refer to C. de Perceval s Essai. How little con fidence can be placed in the pre-Islamic history appears very clearly from the distorted accounts of Abraha s excursion agxinst the Ilijjiz, which fell but a few years before the birth of the Prophet, and is the first event in Meccan history which has confirmation from other sources. See Nb ldeke s version of Jabari, p. 204 sq. For the period of the Prophet Ibn Hisharn and Witkidf are valuable sources in topography as well as history. Of the special histories and descriptions of Mecca published by Wiistenfeld (Chroniken der Stadt Mekka, 3 vols., 1807-59, with an abstract in German 1861), the most valuable is that of Aziakf. It lias passed through the hands of several editors, but the oldest part goes back to the begin ning of the 9th Christian century. Kutb el-Dfn s history (vol. iii. of the Chroniken) goes down with the additions of his nephew to 1592 A.D. Of European descriptions of Mecca from personal observation the best is Burck- hardt s Travels in Arabia (cited above from the 8vo cd., 1829). The Travels of Aly Bey (Badia), London, 1816, describe a visit in 1807; Burton s Pilgrimage (3d ed., 1879) often supplements Burckhardt; Von Maltzan s Wallfahrt nach Mekka, 1865, is lively but very slight. Abd cl-Razzitk s report to the Government of India on the pilgrimage of 1858 is specially directed to sanitary questions. For the pilgrimage see particularly Snouck-Hurgronje, Het Mekkaamche Feest, Leydon, 1880. (W. R. S.) 3 The sacrifice is not indispensable except for those who can afford it and are combining the .hajj with the omra. < On the similar pelting of the supposed graves of AbiiLahab and his wife (Ibn Jubair, p. 110) and of Abu RightO at Mughammas, see Noldeke s translation of
Tabarf, p. 208.