Chapter VII: Secrets of Pilgrimage
make its pilgrimage for seven years. The Anti Christ will appear and Jesus Christ will come down and will kill Anti Christ. Then the Resurrection will come near. There is in Hadis: Before its lifting, the Ka'ba will be circumbulated always. The Ka'ba was twice destroyed and it will belifted up at the third time. The Prophet said: God says: When I will wish to destroy the world, I will begin it first with My house and will destroy it first. Then immediately after it the world will be destroyed.
EXCELLENCE OF HABITATION AT MECCA
The God fearing men disliked to live at Mecca for three reasons. (1) Fear of being equal to Ka'ba, as to be equal from the point of honour is harmful. When the pilgrims finished pilgrimage, Hazrat Omar assembled them and said: O inhabitants of Yemen, go to Yemen, O inhabitants of Iraq, go to Iraq. He said: I fear lest the people inhabit too much in the Ka'ba.
(2) Eagerness for visiting it again owing to separation, as. God made the Ka'ba as a refuge of the people and a safe place. (3) Not to live at Mecca for fear of sins and guilts is better than honouring the place. Hazrat Ibn Masud said: There is no such city except Mecca Wherein the people will be punished for niyyat before actions. Then he read this verse: If a man wishes therein to do .
excessive oppression, he will be given grievous punishment.
This is only for the Ka'ba. Hazrat Ibn Abbas said: To store up food stuffs at Mecca is said to be excessive oppression within the precincts of the Ka'ba. He said: To commit seventy sins at Ruqia is better to me than to commit a sin at Mecca. Ruqia is a place between Mecca and Tayef. Some people feared so much that they even responded not to their calls of nature in the sacred enclosure. It is better to live at Mecca if anybody does not commit any sin. When the Prophet returned to Mecca, he turned his face towards the Ka'ba and said: 'You are the best place to me among the places of God and you are the dearest city to me among the cities of God. Had I not been ejected from you, I would never come out of it?' Why should it not be, as look towards the Ka'ba is worship and if a good deed is done there, it brings abundant rewards.
EXCELLENCE OF MEDINAH
There is no such better place as Medinah after Mecca. The rewards increase much if a good deed is done at Medina. The
192 SECRETS OF PILGRIMAGE Vol-I