Answering Ibrahim's Call

You have seen the photos. A white circle of cloth around a black cube. A plain of tents that runs to the horizon. Three million people walking the same direction at the same hour.

All of it answers a call made four thousand years ago.

Four thousand years ago, an old man stood in a desert valley and was told to call. There was no city. There were no roads. His wife and an infant son were the only other humans for hundreds of miles around him. Allah told him to climb to the place we now call the Maqam and to summon every soul who would ever walk this earth to come and answer.

He did. Ibrahim AS (عَلَيْهِ السَّلَام) called.

The call did not travel on his voice. It travelled on the One who had asked for it.

Call all people to the pilgrimage. They will come to you on foot and on every lean camel from every distant path. (Qur'an 22:27)

Ibn Kathir, in his commentary on this verse, records the moment as Ibrahim AS asking how his voice would reach. Allah told him: you call, I will make it reach. Every Hajji who has ever stepped into ihram is answering the call Ibrahim AS made in that valley. Labbayk Allahumma labbayk. Here I am, O Allah, here I am. The word Allahumma makes it clear who the answer is for. Ibrahim AS was the messenger. The One being addressed is Allah.

A delegation, not a holiday

From the outside, Hajj can look like religious tourism. Three million people. Crowds. Photos. A bit like the Eiffel Tower at peak hour but with prayer.

It is not that. It is something else.

A wafd is a delegation. It is the group a king receives with honour. They come with status. They are seated. They speak. They ask. They are given.

That is the rank Allah gave every Hajji who answered the call. Not tourists. Not visitors. A delegation.

For the people who have the means and never go, the Prophet ﷺ also warned us. In a hadith qudsi, Allah Himself says that the servant whose body has been given health and whose provision has been made ample, if five years pass without him coming to His House, is mahroom, deprived (Sahih Ibn Hibban 3703, graded sahih by al-Albani in Silsila al-Sahiha 1541).

It is not a threat. It is a description. When the call goes out and the means are there and the answer never comes, something goes missing that cannot be bought back later.

What Hajj is, in one paragraph

Hajj is one of the five pillars. It is fard once in a lifetime on every Muslim who has the means and the health (Qur'an 3:97). It is not a tour. It is a set of rites in a set of places on a set of days. The hujjaj enter ihram on the 8th of Dhul Hijjah and travel from Makkah to Mina. On the 9th they stand on the plain of Arafah from Dhuhr to Maghrib. The Prophet ﷺ said whoever misses Arafah misses Hajj. On the 10th they sacrifice, shave, perform tawaf al-ifadah, and remove their ihram. The 11th to the 13th are spent in Mina with the stoning of the pillars. The bones of the rite are simple. The heart-work inside them is what makes it Hajj.

What each rite is for

Tawaf

Seven times around the Kaabah. We are not worshipping a building. The Kaabah has no power. It is a direction. A Qibla. The orientation of the heart toward Allah.

When you do tawaf, you are saying with your feet what most of us only say with our tongues. Allah is at the centre. Not money. Not career. Not the mortgage. Not the kids' grades. Not the next holiday. Allah.

Sa'i

After tawaf, the hujjaj walk seven times between the small hills of Safa and Marwa. They are reenacting the search of Hajar AS, mother of Ismail AS (عَلَيْهِ السَّلَام), for water for her infant son (Sahih al-Bukhari 3364).

Ibrahim AS had left them in the valley on Allah's command and walked away. Hajar asked: has Allah commanded this? He said yes. She said: then He will not let us perish.

She did not sit down and wait. She ran. Up Safa. Down. Up Marwa. Down. Seven times. Then Allah sent Jibril. Zamzam burst from the earth at the feet of her infant son.

Sa'i is the answer to a question every Muslim asks at some point. Is tawakkul the same as sitting still? No. Tawakkul means you trust Allah and you still move your feet. The result belongs to Him. The effort belongs to you.

Ihram

Two pieces of unstitched white cloth. The CEO and the cleaner wear the same thing. The king from Saudi Arabia and the labourer from Bangladesh walk the same circuit around the same House. No labels. No logos. No business class.

The Prophet ﷺ said in his Farewell Sermon that no Arab is better than a non-Arab, no white person is better than a black person, no one is better than anyone else except by taqwa (recorded by Ahmad in the Musnad, graded sahih by al-Albani in Silsila al-Sahiha 2700).

Hajj is the moment that line stops being a quote on a poster and becomes the actual experience of three million people for five days. The grave will also be two pieces of cloth. Hajj is a rehearsal for the meeting with Allah.

The three forbidden things

This is one of the most important sentences in the Qur'an about Hajj.

Whoever has obligated Hajj on himself, there is no rafath, no fusuq and no jidal in the Hajj. (Qur'an 2:197)

Three Arabic words. Each one matters.

Rafath. No intimacy with the spouse. No flirting. No lewd talk. The body is given to Allah for these days.

Fusuq. No sin. No disobedience. No lying. No backbiting. No swearing. No cutting in queues at the bus. The smaller habits show whether the heart actually shifted.

Jidal. No arguing. No fighting. Not with the group leader. Not with the bus driver. Not with the family member testing your patience in the heat. Swallow it. Walk away.

A clean slate. Newborn. That is what an accepted Hajj does.

The Prophet ﷺ also said:

Umrah to Umrah expiates the sins between them. And Hajj Mabrur has no reward except Paradise. (Sahih al-Bukhari 1773)

Hajj Mabrur means an accepted Hajj. Not a completed one. An accepted one. Ibn Hajar in Fath al-Bari says one of the signs of acceptance is the person comes back more humble, more devoted and more generous than they were before they left. If they come back the same, that is a question worth asking. If they come back worse, that is a serious question.

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The days made for the hearts that stay home

That is what the people on the plane are doing. Now we come to us.

The first ten days of Dhul Hijjah are not just for the hujjaj. Allah Himself marked them. Not us. Allah.

Read that again slowly. There is no act of worship more beloved to Allah in any other ten days of the year than the act you do in these ten. A fast on the 9th. A sadaqah on the 5th. A tahajjud on the 3rd. A salah at the masjid on the 7th. Each one weighs more than it would in any other month.

These ten days are what Ibrahim's call left for those who cannot travel. The hujjaj fly. The rest of us still get the season.

The verse that tells you what these days are for

That is so. And whoever honours the symbols of Allah, it is certainly out of the piety of the heart. (Qur'an 22:32)

Two words to slow down on.

Sha'aa'ir. The visible signs of devotion to Allah. The outward markers of faith. The fast. The takbeer. The qurbani. The standing at Arafah. The salah you pray every day. All of them are sha'aa'ir.

Taqwa. The inward weight your heart gives to the outward act. God-consciousness. The reason you do the thing, not just the thing itself.

Then Allah closes the verse. That weight-giving is taqwa. Not in your hands. In your heart.

This is the answer to a question a non-Muslim friend will sometimes ask. Why does Islam need rituals? Why all the rules and the prayers and the fasts and the slaughter? Why not just be a good person inside?

The inside needs the outside to have a shape. The outside needs the inside to have weight. Islam asks for both. The act is the body. The taqwa is the soul of the act. The first ten days of Dhul Hijjah are when both are at full volume.

Allah looks at the heart

He said this and pointed to his own chest.

These ten days are a ten-day exam for the heart. The body shows up to the fast. The body shows up to the takbeer. The body shows up to the sadaqah. The heart decides if it counts.

This is also what separates the hujjaj who come back changed from the hujjaj who come back the same. The body completed Hajj. Only one of them let the heart follow.

The Prophet ﷺ also said:

These ten days are the time to inspect that piece of flesh. Has it gone hard with the noise of dunya? Soften it. With Qur'an. With dua. With tears. With giving when no one is watching.

Arafah

The 9th of Dhul Hijjah is Arafah. The day the Hajj turns on. Three million people standing on the same plain from Dhuhr to Maghrib.

Sins of an entire lifetime can be wiped on that one afternoon. That is why people come back from Hajj crying and saying they feel newborn.

For those of us not at Hajj, the Prophet ﷺ told us to fast on Arafah. The fast expiates the sins of the year before it and the year after it (Sahih Muslim 1162). The hujjaj stand. We fast. The mercy reaches both.

Eid al-Adha. The knife and the heart

The 10th of Dhul Hijjah is Eid al-Adha. The day Ibrahim AS was told to sacrifice his son and the day Allah held his hand back and sent a ram from the heavens. The day the Muslim world slaughters an animal in remembrance of that mercy.

This is the part a non-Muslim friend has probably asked you about. Why kill an animal? What does Allah want with blood?

Allah Himself answered.

Neither their meat nor their blood reaches Allah. Rather, it is your piety that reaches Him. (Qur'an 22:37)

The meat does not reach Allah. The blood does not reach Allah. Allah has no need for either. What reaches Him is the taqwa. The willingness. The remembrance. The fact that a Muslim family in Pakenham, on the same day as a Muslim family in Lagos and a Muslim family in Jakarta and a Muslim family in Karachi, is saying with one act: Allah is more than what we own. Even the most expensive thing on the table is Yours, not ours.

The meat goes to the poor, the family and the neighbour. A third, a third and a third. The taqwa stays with you.

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Five ways to answer the call from where you are

The first ten days are coming. Here is what to do.

1. Fast on the 9th of Dhul Hijjah. Arafah. It expiates the year before and the year after (Sahih Muslim 1162). For those not at Hajj, this is the day your heart stands on the plain.
2. Say the takbeer out loud. Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar, la ilaha illa Allah, Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar wa lillahi al-hamd. After every fard salah from Fajr of the 9th to Asr of the 13th. Ibn Umar RA and Abu Hurairah RA used to walk the markets of Madinah saying it. The people would say it with them. Let your home have that sound. (Recorded by al-Bukhari in the Sahih, chapter on the takbeer in the first ten days of Dhul Hijjah.)
3. Give sadaqah every day. Every good deed in these days is amplified. A small amount counts more than it would in any other month. Arrange your qurbani before the 10th. If you intend to sacrifice, the Prophet ﷺ said do not cut hair or nails from the 1st of Dhul Hijjah until after the sacrifice (Sahih Muslim 1977c).
4. Make tawbah. Sit. Ask. Cry. Bring out what is buried between you and Allah. These days were made for return.
5. Plan your Hajj. If you have health and wealth, do not be among the mahroom. Keep doing Hajj and Umrah. The Prophet ﷺ said they remove poverty and sins the way a furnace removes rust from iron (Sunan al-Tirmidhi 810, graded hasan sahih). That furnace never stops.

A note for the sisters. A woman performs Hajj with a mahram. When a man told the Prophet ﷺ his wife had set out for Hajj while he was enlisted for battle, the Prophet ﷺ told him: go back and perform Hajj with her (Sahih al-Bukhari 1862). Even battle stepped aside for Hajj with a wife. The call is that big.

And if you know someone leaving for Hajj this year, do three things this week. Find them, a cousin, a neighbour, the brother three rows back at the masjid. Send them Surah Al-Baqarah 2:197, the three forbidden things, the best sentence you can put in their pocket as they board. Ask them to make dua for you on Arafah. Their dua is sadaqah. Yours back is too.

A closing dua

O Allah, allow us to reach the ten days of Dhul Hijjah in health and wellbeing. Grant us success in fasting, in dhikr, in sadaqah and in tawbah within them. O Allah, accept the Hajj of the hujjaj. Make their affairs easy. Return them safe and rewarded. O Allah, grant us the Hajj of Your sacred House and the visit to the grave of Your Prophet ﷺ.

Ibrahim AS called four thousand years ago. The hujjaj are answering with their feet. The rest of us answer with our hearts. Both answers are heard.

The meat does not reach Allah. The blood does not reach Allah. The body does not always reach Allah either. The taqwa does. The taqwa stays.

Labbayk Allahumma labbayk. Even from a kitchen in Pakenham.

For the season's wider arc through Dhul Hijjah, follow the cluster forward through the month.