HAJJ

It is almost that time of the year again. Last year I had the opportunity to perform Hajj, and now, from a distance of 12 months I am able to speak of the experience. 

What I felt performing the rites, the sensation of being in a place so very holy and sanct, the unbelievable realisation that I am where the holy prophet (pbuh) was, the power of Kabba over ones mind and body, the presence of millions of people - all seemed surreal. Yes, that is the very word to sum up my journey to allah, there is none other. For me Hajj was spiritually exhausting and enriching at the same time. Makkah is powerful, magical, a utopia, it is there in time and place, yet unreal in every sense. From the moment I entered the holy city of Islam, I felt it alien, a Star-gate of some sort, a doorway to another world, another realm. When I looked upon the House of God, it unnerved me, I felt something I haven't ever felt before, an out of body sense, as though what is happening before me or what I am seeing is a dream. 

Makkah they say is a jalalli city. It refers to the sheer energy and power of Kabba. I think this is more than true, while you're in Makkah your soul, your senses, your mind, your thoughts, and your emotions are on high alert. You forget everything else in your life and concentrate on your spirit and the connection it has to the city. It is hard to explain in words - the sheer strength, regality, magnificence, and other worldly glamour of that city. You feel as though you have been live -wired to an endless source of energy, your thoughts become enlarged, your body seems to diffuse, and feels like it's floating through air itself. For the first time in my life I had the strongest belief in life after death, for, hajj in itself seemed an after-death experience.

While Makkah is masculine, brave and valorous, which challenges your spirit and drains you, Medina is like a cold drink of water which soothes the thirst of  body and soul. In coming to Medinah you come back to being a new-born, a tabula-rosa, you suddenly feel calm and contented. Your prayers from being desperate and urgent change to a continuous hum of adulations and supplications to God.

God is infinite and eternal. And so are his manifestations. The two cities depict two opposing faces of Allah, one grand the other simple, one awesome the other awe-inspiring, one hard and rough the other soft and tender. In Makkah God is 'Zahir' in Medina he's 'Batin'. In Makkah he is 'Rehman' in Medina he's 'Rahim'. In Makkah God is outside and visible, in Medina he is inside and within.

These contradictions and compositions are the true essence of Hajj, the balance between this life and the after-life, the balance between what we do and what we sow, the balance that God and Mohammed (pbuh) asks from us in all we do.