The Pilgrimage: Happiness Pure and Simple. When the pilgrimage season approaches, people from all corners of the world begin to arrive in their thousands. They undertake this long and arduous trip for the sole purpose of earning God’s forgiveness and His pleasure. The pilgrimage journey includes certain rituals and actions which may appear, if taken in isolation, to be devoid of a logical purpose. Taken as a whole, and in the context of the relationship between man and his Lord, the noble purpose of this unique experience begins to unfold. Its profound effect on the lives of those who undertake to do it can then be fully appreciated. The purpose is to make clear to man that his best course, throughout his life journey, is to submit himself to God by following his commandments and implementing His rules, which have been made clear to us through His messenger. During the pilgrimage the sense of submission is present in everyone’s mind. The benefit is also very clear. All pilgrims say that their pilgrimage days are undoubtedly the happiest of their lives. When you ask for the reasons behind this fact, the answers you receive are bound to be ‘sincerity’, ‘purity of action’, ‘honesty of purpose’, ‘feeling close to God’, ‘taking part in a grand act of worship’, and so on. All these answers point to one fact. That is, when people are conscious of their submission to God, their happiness is at its climax. Hence, if they sustain this consciousness throughout their lives, their happiness is endless. This is a truism which the advocates of Islam endeavor to put across to all people. They try to show that a Muslim who is aware of his relationship with God is always happy, no matter what difficulties he or she encounters. When we examine the actions a pilgrim does, we realize that every step is taken in the name of God, every action is done for His sake. No other cause would drive that multitude of people to do so enthusiastically what pilgrims do to fulfil this sacred duty. This very fact imparts a different color to all our actions during the pilgrimage. We begin to have a new sense; the sense of a love relationship with God and of total harmony with the world around us. This love relationship teaches us how to conduct our lives so that everything we do should first be considered from the point of view of whether it will please God or displease Him. The harmony with the world around us is the immediate prize we receive for our submission to God. All other creatures submit themselves to God. They do so by their very nature. Of all God’s creation, man alone can rebel and violate God’s laws. When he does that, he is out of tune with the rest of creation. But when he is aware of the fact that he should utilize his freedom of choice in order to make a willing and conscious submission to God, the result is that he lives in harmony with the world at large. No conflict; no clash; no ‘conquest of nature’. All join together in a sublime purpose: to build a happy human life. When that is realized, man’s happiness is infinite. In the pilgrimage we have a sample of such happiness. From the moment we reach the point of meeqat on our journey to Makkah to perform the pilgrimage, we feel that we are in a world which is totally different from that we have known. It is a world characterized by a perfect desire on our part to do everything that God requires of us to demonstrate our submission to Him. Nothing in the world takes priority over our determination to earn God’s pleasure. Nothing is of greater importance than earning the full reward of the pilgrimage. Some people, particularly those who are not familiar with the philosophy of Islam, may raise questions about the relation of action and reward which is central to Islam. What we have to understand is that God does not benefit by our actions so as to pay us a reward for them. It is we who benefit by them. Our benefit does not come only in the form of reward from God for our good actions, but also we are better people for doing these good actions. This applies to acts of worship, honest and straightforward dealings with our fellow human beings, as well as acts of kindness and compassion that we are willing to do without expectation of any returns from other people. This is indeed the purpose of all Islamic worship: to make of us better people; to help us to attain a standard of humanity which cannot be achieved through any other means. Every Muslim reaps this reward in proportion to his dedication to serve God and work for His cause. The more we are dedicated, the more purity we show in our fulfilment of the requirement of Islamic worship, the greater is our awareness of the soundness of our approach to what we have to contend with in our lives. The pilgrimage requires total devotion and pure dedication to God’s cause. The sense of complete submission to God’s will is always in our minds. Considerations of class, position, wealth, social status, family, and race are all reduced to an infinitesimal value. They count for nothing. Only our relation with God is alive, important and paramount. It points out to us the road to happiness in this life as well as in the life to come. At every juncture in the pilgrimage, our sense of submission to God is alive within us. Hence, we feel close to Him. In this closeness to the Supreme Being lies man’s true happiness. ________________________________________________________________________ BT Yahoo! 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