Читать книгу A Dictionary of Islam. Being a cyclopedia of the doctrines, rites, ceremonies, and customs, together with the technical and theological terms, of the Muhammadan religion онлайн

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The Wahhābīs, the Puritans of Islām, regard the circumambulation of the Prophet’s tomb as superstitious (as shirk, or associating something with God, in fact), but how can they justify the foolish ceremonies of the ḥajj? If reverence for the Prophet’s tomb is shirk, what are the runnings at aṣ-Ṣafā and al-Marwah, the stonings of the pillars, and the kissings of the black stone? No Muslim has ever yet attempted to give a spiritual explanation of the ceremonies of the Makkan pilgrimage, for in attempting to do so he would be charged with the heresy of shirk!

Mr. W.S. Blunt in his Future of Islām, has given some interesting statistics regarding the pilgrimage to Makkah in the year 1880, which he obtained during a residence at Cairo, Damascus, and Jiddah. The figures, he says, are taken principally from an official record kept for some years past at Jiddah, and checked as far as European subjects are concerned, by reference to the consular agents residing there.