Hajj has grappled with public health and safety risks such as crowd crushes and infectious diseases in the past. It’s now facing an emerging risk: climate extremes.
Palestinians gather at the area where aid was distributed in Gaza City on Feb. 19, 2024.
Karam Hassan/Anadolu via Getty Images
Ramadan encourages acts of charity. This also poses a question for many Muslims as they consider what more could be done to feed the hungriest in the world, many of whom are in Gaza.
A view of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and its Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem’s Old City.
Ahmad Gharabli/AFP via Getty Images
The Al-Aqsa mosque, a flashpoint in Hamas’ recent assault against Israel, hosts daily prayers and Friday gatherings. It lies adjacent to important Jewish and Christian religious locales.
Howard University students assemble for a graduation ceremony in 2016.
Jose Luis Magana for the Associated Press
While it’s widely believed that Howard University came to be known as “The Mecca” in the 1960s, new evidence shows the nickname is more than half a century older than that.
American Muslim women on pilgrimage at the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina in 2023.
Iqbal Akhtar
A religion scholar argues that the communal nature of Islamic pilgrimage helps worshippers go through a physically demanding schedule and creates camaraderie that continues beyond the pilgrimage.
The celebrated South African architect Sumayya Vally is the artistic director of the exhibition.
A view of the Kaaba at the Grand Mosque during the hajj pilgrimage in the Muslim holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia on July 6, 2022.
AP Photo/Amr Nabil
The start of the hajj is reigniting debates around its commercialization, but pilgrimages are also a time for seeking business opportunities, writes a scholar of Islam.
A late 19th-early 20th century painting by Abbas Al-Musavi depicting the Battle of Karbala, which occurred in 680.
Gift of K. Thomas Elghanayan in honor of Nourollah Elghanayan, Photo: Brooklyn Museum
The Islamic New Year marks the first day of Muharram, a sacred month of prayer and annual reflection.
Muslims pray at the Mihrab, a niche in a wall indicating the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca, at the Foundation Stone, located under the Dome of the Rock in the Al- Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem’s Old City.
Thomas Coex/AFP via Getty Images
Ken Chitwood, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
The Masjid al-Aqsa of Jerusalem is linked in the Quran to the story of the night journey of Prophet Muhammad from Mecca to Jerusalem and has deep religious meaning for Muslims across the world.
Muslim worshippers perform the evening Tarawih prayer during the fasting month of Ramadan around the Kaaba in the Grand Mosque complex in the holy city of Mecca, on April 13, 2021.
AFP via Getty Images
Muslims throughout the world will celebrate the holiday of Eid al-Adha, or Festival of Sacrifice, beginning at sundown on July 30, but the coronavirus has changed many things.
Muslim pilgrims circle round the Kaaba in Mecca in 2019. The numbers will be dramatically reduced in 2020.
EPA
Saudi Arabia has temporarily suspended pilgrimage to its holy sites. Many Muslims travel to these holy sites round the year for a pilgrimage known as Umrah. Here is what it means to their faith.
This year’s hajj has attracted controversy, with growing calls for a boycott.
Shutterstock
Millions of Muslims will convene in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, on Aug. 9. The annual five-day pilgrimage, known as the hajj, is required of all Muslims who can physically and financially make the journey.
Women pray at a mosque during the first day of the holy fasting month of Ramadan on May 6 in Bali, Indonesia.
AP Photo/Firdia Lisnawati
Senior Research Fellow, Muslim Philanthropy Initiative at IUPUI and Journalist-fellow, Religion and Civic Culture Center, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Associate Professor in Islamic Studies, Director of The Centre for Islamic Studies and Civilisation and Executive Member of Public and Contextual Theology, Charles Sturt University