In Photos: The Hajj
More than 1.75 million worshippers from 168 countries arrived in Saudi Arabia for the five-day ritual, a once-in-a-lifetime duty for every able-bodied Muslim who can afford it.
As Malcolm X once put it: “During the past eleven days here in the Muslim world, I have eaten from the same plate, drunk from the same glass and slept in the same bed (or on the same rug) – while praying to the same God with fellow Muslims, whose eyes were the bluest of the blue, whose hair was the blondest of blond, and whose skin was the whitest of white. And in the words and in the actions and in the deeds of the ‘white' Muslims, I felt the same sincerity that I felt among the black African Muslims of Nigeria, Sudan and Ghana. We are truly all the same-brothers.”
Pilgrims began gathering on Mount Arafat on Thursday for the highlight of the Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia dedicated to prayers and reflection.