Mecca

The Great Mosque and the Ka`ba.

Long before Mohammed the chief sanctuary of Mecca was the Ka`ba, a rude stone building without windows, and having a door 7f t. from the ground. The Ka`ba has been rebuilt more than once since Mohammed purged it of idols and adopted it as the chief sanctuary of Islam, but the old form has been preserved, except in secondary details. It is essentially a pre-Is15.mic temple, adapted to the worship of Islam on the basis of the story that it was built by Abraham and Ishmael by divine revelation as a temple of pure monotheism, and that it was only temporarily perverted to idol worship from the time when 'Amr ibn Lohai introduced the statue of Hobal from Syria till the victory of Islam. The chief object of venera tion is the black stone, which is fixed in the external angle facing Sala in the south-east corner. Its technical name is the black corner, the others being named the Yemen (south-west), Syrian (north-west), and 'Iraq (north-east) corners, from the lands to which they approximately point. The black stone is a small dark mass with an aspect suggesting volcanic or meteoric origin, fixed at such a height that it can be conveniently kissed. The history of this heavenly stone, given by Gabriel to Abraham, does not conceal the fact that it was originally the most venerated of a multitude of idols and sacred stones which stood all round the sanctuary in the time of Mohammed. The Prophet destroyed the idols, but he left the characteristic form of worship—the tawaf, or sevenfold circuit of the sanctuary, the worshipper kissing or touching the objects of his veneration—and besides the black stone he recognized the so-called "southern" stone, the same pre sumably as that which is still touched in the tawaf at the Yemen corner (Muh. in Med., pp. 336, 425). The ceremony of the tawaf and the worship of stone was common to Mecca with other ancient Arabian sanctuaries. It is still the first duty of one who has returned to the city or arrived there as a pilgrim.

Islam associated legends with those spots within the Ka`ba previously sacred to older cults; such are the Multazam, on the east side, between the black and 'Iraq corners, where prayer should be offered; the Maejan ("kneading place") where Abraham is said to have stood to build the Ka`ba, and the Hijr on the north-side which is included in the tawaf, and two slabs of verde antico within it are called the graves of Ishmael and Hagar, and are places of acceptable prayer. Even the golden or gilded mizdb (water-spout) that projects into the Hijr marks a place where prayer is heard, and another such place is the part of the west wall close to the Yemen corner.

The feeling of religious conservatism which has preserved the structural rudeness of the Ka`ba did not prohibit costly surface decoration. In Mohammed's time the outer walls were covered by a veil (or kiswa) of striped Yemen cloth. The caliphs substi tuted a covering of figured brocade, and the Egyptian Government still sends with each pilgrim caravan from Cairo a new kiswa of black brocade, adorned with a broad band embroidered with golden inscriptions from the Koran, as well as a richer curtain for the door. The door of two leaves, with its posts and lintel, is of silver gilt. Ibn Jubair describes the floor and walls as overlaid with richly variegated marbles, and the upper half of the walls as plated with silver, thickly gilt, while the roof was veiled with coloured silk. Modern writers describe the place as windowless, but Ibn Jubair mentions five windows of rich stained glass from `Iraq. Between the three pillars of teak hung 13 silver lamps. A chest in the corner to the left of one entering contained Korans, and at the 'Iraq corner a space was cut off enclosing the stair that leads to the roof. The door to this stair (called the door of

mercy—Bab el-Rahma) was plated with silver by the caliph Motawakkil. Here, in the time of Ibn Jubair, the Maqam or standing stone of Abraham was usually placed for better security, but brought out on great occasions.

The great founder of the mosque in its present form, with its spacious area and deep colonnades, was the caliph Mandi, who spent enormous sums in bringing costly pillars from Egypt and Syria. The work was still incomplete at his death in A.D. 785, and was finished in less sumptuous style by his successor. Subsequent repairs and additions, extending down to Turkish times, have left little of Mandi's work untouched, though a few of the pillars probably date from his days.

After the Ka`ba the principal points of interest in the mosque are the well Zamzam and the Maqam Ibrahim. The former is a deep shaft enclosed in a massive vaulted building paved with marble, and, according to Mohammedan tradition, is the source (corresponding to the Beer-lahai-roi of Gen. xvi. 14) from which Hagar drew water for her son Ishmael. The legend tells that the well was long covered up and rediscovered by 'Abd al-Mottalib, the grandfather of the Prophet. Sacred wells are familiar features of Semitic sanctuaries. The Maqam Ibrahim is also connected with a relic of pre-Islamic tradition, the ancient holy stone which once stood on the Malan, and is said to bear the prints of the patriarch's feet. The legend seems to have arisen from a miscon ception, the Maqam Ibrahim in the Koran meaning the sanctuary itself ; but the stone itself is certainly very ancient.

Safi and Marwa.

In religious importance these two points or "hills," connected by the Mas'a, stand second only to the Ka`ba.

Safa is an elevated platform surmounted by a triple arch, and ap proached by a flight of steps. It lies south-east of the Ka`ba, facing the black corner, and 76 paces from the "Gate of Safa," which is architecturally the chief gate of the mosque. Marwa is a similar platform, formerly covered with a single arch, on the opposite side of the valley. It stands on a spur of the Red moun tain called Jebel Kuaykian. The course between these two sacred points is 493 paces long, and the religious ceremony called the consists in traversing it seven times, beginning and ending at Sala. The lowest part of the course, between the so-called green milestones, is done at a run. This ceremony is part of the omra and is generally said to be performed in memory of Hagar, who ran to and fro between the two eminences, vainly seeking water for her son. The observance, however, is certainly of pre-Islamic origin ; and at one time there were idols on both the so-called hills. (See especially Azraqi, pp. 74, 78.) The Ceremonies and the Pilgrimage.—Before Islam the Kaba was the local sanctuary of the Meccans, where they prayed and did sacrifice, where oaths were administered and hard cases submitted to divine sentence according to the immemorial custom of Semitic shrines. But, besides this, Mecca was already a place of pilgrimage. The custom had already such a hold on the Arabs, that Mohammed could not afford to sacrifice it to an abstract pur ity of religion, and thus the old usages were transplanted into Is lam in the double form of the omra or vow of pilgrimage to Mecca, which can be discharged at any time, and the hajj or pilgrimage at the great annual feast. The latter closes with a visit to the Katba, but its essential ceremonies lie outside Mecca, at the neighbouring shrines where the old Arabs gathered before the Meccan fair.