The Hajj: Pilgrimage to Mecca

2005 Vol. 1: Jan/Feb

Hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, is one of the five pillars of Islam, the duty of every Muslim who is physically and financially able to perform it. In the 19th century B.C., Muslims believe, Abraham—the revered patriarch of Islam, Christianity and Judaism—was instructed by God to build a house of worship in a narrow valley between two barren ridges in a place today called Mecca, on the present site of the Ka’bah, the cubic structure inside the Grand Mosque.