- Mut'ah of Hajj
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"Mut'ah of Hajj" or "hajj al-tamattu" (joy of Hajj), involves relaxation of the ihram between the Umrah and Hajj, including the dress code and other prohibitions.
Contents
History
When planning a pilgrimage, one is expected to announce his intention to do so at the start of the journey. If one would start a pilgrimage with only the intention of doing a minor one, and after starting it he would decide that he also intends to do the major one, he needs to go a certain distance away from Mecca, and then start a new pilgrimage, intending to do the greater one.
Muhammad had decreed that Umrah and Hajj can be combined, ie: starting a pilgrimage with the intention of participating in both events.
However, Umar decided to ban this practice during his era as Sunni Caliph during a public announcement in which he forbade Mut'ah. This led to complaints from some of the citizens, as described in the hadith of the four advices to Umar.
The prohibition of this practice has since been voided, and the combination of both Umrah and Hajj in the same month is permitted by both Shi'a and Sunnis.
Overview
There exists two form of pilgrimage, the "minor pilgrimage "(Arabic Umrah) and the "major pilgrimage" (Arabic Hajj). The major one contains more rules, and is obligatory upon all Muslims (if they can afford it financially, but if they can not afford it financially it is not obligatory) to perform once per life. While doing a pilgrimage, whether minor or major, the Muslim needs to adher to some very strict dress codes that also includes some other rules (Arabic: Ihram).
In pre-Islamic Arabia, if one would go to the minor pilgrimage a short period before the major one would commence, he was forbidden to go out of the dress code if he intended to follow it up with a Major pilgrimage.
This rule was abrogated by Muhammad, who said it was permissible to leave the state of Ihram if one intended to attend Hajj. and this relaxation became known as "joy" (Arabic: Mut'ah) or more distinctly, the "joy of pilgrimage", Mut'ah of Hajj or in Arabic :Hajj al-Tamattu. This is not mentioned in the Qur'an, rather it is a part of the Sunnah.
History
This relaxation was a big change for the pre Islamic days of Arabia, but Muhammad decreed the prohibitions of relaxation between the Umra and Hajj as void[1] during the Farewell Pilgrimage. At that point Umar, the future second rightly guided Caliph, asked:
- "Are we supposed to go to our wives and then go to the Kaaba"?[citation needed]
Following Muhammad's decree, some people chose to cast off their Ihram after the Umrah
See also
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