Hajj

S1, E4: “The Hajj is the iconic pilgrimage on Earth,” says host Bruce Feiler, as millions of pilgrims gather in the valleys outside the city of Mecca in today’s Saudi Arabia to take part in the annual five-day pilgrimage every Muslim hopes to complete at least once. Since non-Muslims aren’t permitted in Mecca, Bruce’s surrogate is Anisa Mehdi, a veteran reporter of the Hajj, with whom Bruce will Skype at regular intervals. Anisa joins a group of Muslim pilgrims from Boston who begin their journey in Medina, the second of Islam’s holy cities. As the pilgrims visit sites in Medina associated with the life of the Prophet Muhammad, Bruce enlists the help of a historian and an eminent American Muslim scholar to explore the origins of the religion and its iconic pilgrimage. In 622CE Muhammad fled his birthplace of Mecca after persecution by its pagan rulers who objected to him preaching a new monotheism. Muhammad and a small group of followers settled in Medina. Within ten years Islam was the dominant religion of Arabia and Muhammad returned to Mecca in triumph to clear idols from the holy sites and teach his followers the different stages of the Hajj pilgrimage. The Boston pilgrims follow Muhammad’s path from Medina to Mecca, beginning their Hajj by circling the Ka’aba, the ancient shrine at the center of Mecca’s Great Mosque. Muslims believe the Ka’aba was first built by Abraham, patriarch of Islam, Judaism and Christianity. Stripping themselves of worldly possessions for the duration of the Hajj, the pilgrims enact the rituals laid out by Muhammad, experiencing exhaustion, injury and elation as they seek forgiveness and inner peace. They leave with a new sense of connection to humanity, and to the one-and-a-half billion people that make up the worldwide community of Muslims.