Mystical systems
Hajj
Direct answer
Hajj: The hajj is the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, performed over five or six days in the last month of the Islamic year and required once in a lifetime of every adult who is able.
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At a glance
- Also called
- pilgrimage to mecca, hadj
- Found in
- Mystical Systems
- Related
- Pilgrimage, Ramadan, Kumbh Mela, Camino de Santiago
The hajj is the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, performed over five or six days in the last month of the Islamic year and required once in a lifetime of every adult who is able.
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What is the hajj?
The hajj is the fifth pillar of Islam. It takes place from the eighth to the twelfth or thirteenth of the month of Dhu al-Hijjah, and because the Islamic calendar is lunar it moves through the seasons, coming about eleven days earlier each solar year. Pilgrims enter a consecrated state called ihram, the men in two seamless white cloths, which erases signs of rank and nation.
The rites retrace acts of Abraham, Hagar and Ishmael as Islam tells them. Pilgrims circle the Kaaba seven times, walk seven times between the hills of Safa and Marwa, and travel to the plain of Arafat to stand in prayer from noon to sunset, the heart of the pilgrimage. They gather pebbles at Muzdalifah, cast them at three pillars at Mina, and offer an animal sacrifice, which Muslims everywhere share as the feast of Eid al-Adha. A final circling of the Kaaba closes the rites.
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What sets Hajj apart
The hajj is pilgrimage as a timetable. A person may walk the Camino in any month; the hajj happens on five named days, and the standing at Arafat on the ninth cannot be made up if missed. Everyone does the same thing at the same hour in the same dress, which is the point: the two white cloths are also the shroud a pilgrim may be buried in. The rites are almost wordless and are made of movement, circling, hurrying, standing, throwing.
- Standing: the fifth of the five pillars of Islam
- Dates: the 8th to the 12th or 13th of Dhu al-Hijjah
- Dress: ihram: for men, two unsewn white cloths
- Essential rite: the standing at Arafat on the 9th
- Scripture: Qur'an 2:196 to 203 and 22:26 to 30
- Closing feast: Eid al-Adha, the feast of the sacrifice
Often mistaken for something else: Umrah is the lesser pilgrimage, made at any time and completed in a few hours within Mecca; the hajj is bound to its dates and takes the pilgrim out to Arafat and Mina.
The story behind Hajj
Muslims hold that the pilgrimage goes back to Abraham, and it was kept at the Kaaba in Mecca before the time of Muhammad. The Qur'an set it in order as worship of the one God, and Muhammad led the pilgrimage in 632, the year of his death, setting the pattern followed since. For centuries pilgrims came by camel caravan from Cairo, Damascus and Baghdad and by sea, journeys of months. Steamships, railways and then aircraft raised the numbers from tens of thousands to between two and three million. Crowding and heat have caused deadly disasters, among them a crush at Mina in 2015.
Why Hajj matters
Hajj is the largest yearly pilgrimage tied to a fixed date and place, and the one occasion on which Muslims of every land perform the same acts together.
How to read Hajj
Muslims save and plan for it over years; governments allot places by national quota; the lesser pilgrimage, umrah, may be made at any time of year.
Hajj in practice: an example
A pilgrim returning from Mecca is greeted with the title hajji, and often marks the journey as the dividing line of a life.
Where readings of Hajj go wrong
Entry to Mecca is limited to Muslims, and the pilgrimage requires an official permit. Heat and crowds make it physically demanding.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Mystical Systems
- Aliases
- the hajj, hajj pilgrimage, pilgrimage to mecca, hajj meaning, hajj rituals, hadj
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
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Common questions
What is the hajj?
It is the pilgrimage to Mecca that Islam requires once in a lifetime of every adult Muslim who has the health and the means. It is held each year on fixed days of the twelfth lunar month.
Why do pilgrims walk around the Kaaba?
The Kaaba is the cubic building Muslims hold to be the house of God built by Abraham and Ishmael, and the point they face in prayer. Walking round it seven times, counter-clockwise, is an act of worship called tawaf.
