A Shi'ite Pilgrimage to Mecca, 1885-1886

A Shi'ite Pilgrimage to Mecca, 1885-1886

Author: Mirzâ Mohammed Hosayn Farâhâni

Publisher: University of Texas Press

Published: 2015-01-28

Total Pages: 445

ISBN-13: 0292716516

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Western accounts of the Hajj, the ritual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, are rare, since access to Mecca is forbidden to non-Muslims. In the Muslim world, however, pilgrimage literature is a well-established genre, dating back to the earliest centuries of the Islamic era. A Shiʿite Pilgrimage to Mecca is taken from the original nineteenth-century Persian manuscript of the Safarnâmeh of Mirzâ Moḥammad Ḥosayn Farâhâni, a well-educated, keenly observant, Iranian Shiʿite gentleman. This memoir holds a wealth of social and economic information about Czarist Russia, the Ottoman Empire, Egypt, Northern Iran, and Arabia. The author is a meticulous observer, recording details of distances, currencies, accommodations, modes of travel, and so on. He records the experiences encountered by pilgrims of his day: physical hardships, disease, generosity and compassion, banditry, hospitality, comradeship, and exaltation. And, without prejudice, he discusses the tensions between the Shiʿites and the Sunnites in the holy places—tensions that still exist and have erupted in bloody clashes during recent pilgrimages. A Shiʿite Pilgrimage to Mecca will appeal to a wide audience of general readers, Middle Eastern scholars, anthropologists, and historians.


One Thousand Roads to Mecca

One Thousand Roads to Mecca

Author: Michael Wolfe

Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic

Published: 2015-09-29

Total Pages: 701

ISBN-13: 0802192203

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“Wolfe does an exemplary job of detailing the ceremonies performed at Mecca and the reasons behind them . . . Highly recommended.” —Library Journal, starred review This updated and expanded edition of One Thousand Roads to Mecca collects significant works by observant travel writers from the East and West over the last ten centuries—including two new contemporary narratives—creating a comprehensive, multifaceted literary portrait of the enduring tradition. Since its inception in the seventh century, the pilgrimage to Mecca has been the central theme in a large body of Islamic travel literature. Beginning with the European Renaissance, it has also been the subject for a handful of adventurous writers from the West who, through conversion or connivance, managed to slip inside the walls of a city forbidden to non-Muslims. These very different literary traditions form distinct impressions of a spirited conversation in which Mecca is the common destination and Islam the common subject of inquiry. Along with an introduction by Reza Aslan, featured writers include Ibn Battuta, J. L. Burckhardt, Sir Richard Burton, the Begum of Bhopal, John F. Keane, Winifred Stegar, Muhammad Asad, Lady Evelyn Cobbald, Jalal Al-e Ahmad, and Malcolm X. One Thousand Roads to Mecca is a historically, geographically, and ethnically diverse collection of travel writing that adds substantially to the literature of Islam and the West. “Serves as an excellent introduction to a religion, people, culture, and philosophy.” —Santa Cruz Sentinel


Imperial Mecca

Imperial Mecca

Author: Michael Christopher Low

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2020-10-06

Total Pages: 599

ISBN-13: 0231549091

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With the advent of the steamship, repeated outbreaks of cholera marked oceanic pilgrimages to Mecca as a dangerous form of travel and a vehicle for the globalization of epidemic diseases. European, especially British Indian, officials also feared that lengthy sojourns in Arabia might expose their Muslim subjects to radicalizing influences from anticolonial dissidents and pan-Islamic activists. European colonial empires’ newfound ability to set the terms of hajj travel not only affected the lives of millions of pilgrims but also dramatically challenged the Ottoman Empire, the world’s only remaining Muslim imperial power. Michael Christopher Low analyzes the late Ottoman hajj and Hijaz region as transimperial spaces, reshaped by the competing forces of Istanbul’s project of frontier modernization and the extraterritorial reach of British India’s steamship empire in the Indian Ocean and Red Sea. Imperial Mecca recasts Ottoman Arabia as a distant, unstable semiautonomous frontier that Istanbul struggled to modernize and defend against the onslaught of colonial steamship mobility. As it turned out, steamships carried not just pilgrims, passports, and microbes, but the specter of legal imperialism and colonial intervention. Over the course of roughly a half century from the 1850s through World War I, British India’s fear of the hajj as a vector of anticolonial subversion gradually gave way to an increasingly sophisticated administrative, legal, and medical protectorate over the steamship hajj, threatening to eclipse the Ottoman state and Caliphate’s prized legitimizing claim as protector of Islam’s most holy places. Drawing on a wide range of Ottoman and British archival sources, this book sheds new light on the transimperial and global histories traversed along the pilgrimage to Mecca.


The Mecca Bible ; Treasured History of Ancient Arabia

The Mecca Bible ; Treasured History of Ancient Arabia

Author: Muhammad Mustafa Mansur MD

Publisher: Muhammad Mansur

Published: 2023-11-23

Total Pages: 465

ISBN-13:

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The Mecca Bible is the culmination of 38 years of research, yielding the following major findings: The Holy Land promised to Abraham was not Palestine but the Mecca region of Arabia. The Israelites were originally from ancient West Arabia, with a significant population still present during the emergence of Islam, forming an important part of Saudi Arabia's population today. The original Old Testament was written in the old Arabic of the 2nd millennium BCE. Two distinct eras emerge from this research: The Israelite Era: According to this research, the Garden of Eden was situated in the lush green mountains of West Arabia during the Savannah period following the last Ice Age. The four rivers mentioned in the Old Testament are identified as four valleys in this region. Noah's clan resided near Tayef to the North. The boat of Noah is said to have landed in the mountain area of Al Arid in East Arabia, leading to the repopulation of Arabia after the Deluge. The homeland of the first Semitic Gubarah/Hebrews was the Riyadh region, from where Abraham's clan migrated to Dawasir valley and then to the Mecca region. Jacob and his children left for Misr (modern-day Ethiopia) from Idhim, south of Mecca. The Exodus under Moses is said to have occurred from Axum, with the Red Sea crossing at Bab el Mandeb, leading to a 40-year wandering in the Tihama region of Asir in Saudi Arabia. Joshua is credited with leading the conquest of the Holy Land of Mecca, and King David established a kingdom with U’ra es-Salam/Mecca as its capital. King Solomon is believed to have built the Temple to encompass the Kaaba in the location of the holy mosque of Mecca. Following Solomon, the kingdom was divided, with Samaria/A’sfan in the north and U’ra es-Salam/Mecca in the south falling to the Assyrians and Chaldeans, respectively. The Jewish Era: After Babylon fell to Cyrus the Great, the Israelites gradually returned to U’ra es-Salam/Mecca, albeit facing opposition from surrounding tribes. The Achaemenid Empire guaranteed religious freedom to its subjects. Alexander the Great's conquest in 332 BCE did not extend to Arabia, allowing Arabs to regain their independence. Believers faced pressure from heathen Arab tribes, leading to a choice between abandoning their monotheistic beliefs or leaving. While some integrated with local beliefs, a minority moved to Greek-dominated lands. In Alexandria, the Hebrew Old Testament was translated to Greek, and a Hashemite Meccan dynasty led Jews in Palestine. Under pro-Greek influence, the community started to disconnect from West Arabia. Scriptures were translated from Greek to Aramaic, defining Canaan as Palestine, Syria as Aram, and Misr as Egypt. The gentile Edomites/Adnanites emigrated from Arabia, favored by Romans for their lack of allegiance to the Greeks. King Herod built the Jerusalem Temple, which existed during Jesus Christ's time and was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70. The 2nd century witnessed the deportation of Jews from Palestine. Identity of Original Scriptures: In Palestine, liturgy was conducted in Aramaic, with Hebrew largely forgotten. In the 5th century AD, efforts to read square Aramaic texts began in Galilee and Babylonia, which were previously copied from old Aramaic texts commissioned by Ezra. This research posits that the texts must be reread in the 28-letter format and in the context of their place of origin, ancient West Arabia. When interpreted as such, geographic and historical contradictions can be resolved. Y-DNA Haplogroup Studies: Recent Y-DNA genetic studies support these findings, with high compatibility found between the Y-DNA of the Cohen family and royalty members from Jordan, Morocco, and the Shareefs of Mecca. Most of the population in KSA belongs to the J1 haplogroup family. Ashkenazi Jews are believed to have central Asian and East European origins, while Sephardim Jews have North African origins.


Creativity and Conservatism: An Investigation into the Formation of Saudi Female Artistic Identity

Creativity and Conservatism: An Investigation into the Formation of Saudi Female Artistic Identity

Author: Fatemah Abdullah Alqahtani

Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers

Published: 2024-07-31

Total Pages: 126

ISBN-13: 994875025X

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This book investigates the formation of Saudi female artistic identity within the context of religious and social values and customs. It proposes a theory about the uniqueness of this identity in terms of how Saudi female artists push the boundaries of creativity in a conservative culture. The book explores the influence of two main factors: Islamic doctrines and sociocultural norms. It examines how these factors relate to the temporal and spatial limitations placed on artists. From a faith-based perspective, it analyses the ambivalent relationship between some Muslim scholars’ thoughts and the concept of creativity, and how this ambivalence can be overcome. The book also examines the intellectual and cultural factors that have shaped Saudis’ collective mindset about the arts, incorporating significant events in Saudi history and their impact on artistic practice. If you have questions about what factors shape female Saudi artistic identity or how these artists are challenging norms of representation, this book helps uncover the answers.