Every rite you will perform traces back to one journey.

Every page in this section explains a rite: what it is, when it happens, how not to get it wrong. This one explains where the rites come from.

In the tenth year after the Hijrah, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ announced that he would perform Hajj. He had not performed it since the command was revealed, and the news spread across Arabia: people came to Madinah in their thousands, and joined along the road in their thousands more, each of them wanting one thing — to travel with him, and to do what he did.

What follows is drawn above all from the account of Jabir ibn Abdillah رضي الله عنه, recorded in Sahih Muslim — the longest and most complete description of the journey, told by a man who was in it.

Leaving Madinah

He set out in the last days of Dhul-Qa’dah, praying Dhuhr in Madinah in full, four rakat, and Asr shortened to two rakat at Dhul-Hulayfah, the miqat of Madinah a few miles outside the city. The shortening of the prayer that your group will practice on the Mashair days begins here, on the first afternoon of the journey.

At Dhul-Hulayfah, Asma bint Umays gave birth to Muhammad ibn Abi Bakr. She sent to ask what she should do, and was told: bathe, tie a cloth as a pad, and enter Ihram. Even childbirth did not stop her from entering Ihram. Remember that if you are tempted to think your own circumstances make you the exception.

When his camel, al-Qaswa, stood up straight with him on the high ground of al-Bayda, he ﷺ called out the words that two million people will call out the year you go:

Labbayka Allahumma labbayk. Labbayka la sharika laka labbayk. Innal-hamda wan-ni’mata laka wal-mulk. La sharika lak.

Jabir describes the road ahead of him and behind him and to either side filled with people as far as he could see — and, he said, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ was among us, the Qur’an was descending upon him, and whatever he did, we did.

Makkah — Tawaf, and Sa’i

He entered Makkah and went straight to the Ka’bah. He touched the corner of the Black Stone, then walked briskly (this is raml, which the men in your group will do) for three circuits, and at a normal pace for four. Behind Maqam Ibrahim he recited “and take the Station of Ibrahim as a place of prayer” and prayed two short rakat, then returned to the Stone.

Then out to Safa. Approaching it he recited “Indeed Safa and Marwah are among the signs of Allah” and said: I begin with what Allah began with. On Safa he faced the Ka’bah, declared the oneness and greatness of Allah, and made du’a. He walked the length, ran where the valley floor dipped — the stretch the green lights mark today — and finished the seventh length on Marwah.

Seven circuits, then seven lengths. When you perform them, you are not performing an approximation of something lost. You are doing the thing itself, in the same places, in the same order, at the same count.

The 8th — to Mina

Those who had not brought a sacrificial animal were told to count the Tawaf and Sa’i they had done as an Umrah, and to leave Ihram — the origin of Tamattu’, the form nearly every pilgrim traveling today performs. He himself had brought the hady, so he remained in his Ihram.

On the morning of the 8th the whole congregation moved to Mina, and he prayed Dhuhr, Asr, Maghrib, Isha and Fajr there — five prayers, each in its time, shortened and not combined. Then he waited for sunrise.

The 9th — Arafah

After sunrise he moved to Arafah, and a plain tent of camel hair was pitched for him at Namirah. Just after midday, when the sun had passed its highest point, he mounted al-Qaswa and spoke, in the valley, to the largest gathering he would ever address.

The lines reported from the sermon belong to everyone who stands there after him:

• Your blood and your wealth are sacred to one another — as sacred as that day, in that month, in that city.
• Every unsettled blood-debt (a claim of revenge for a killing) and every claim to interest from the pre-Islamic era was placed under his feet — abolished — beginning with those of his own family.
• Fear Allah concerning women, he said, and he named the duties owed in both directions.
• I have left among you that which, if you hold to it, you will never go astray: the Book of Allah.
• Then: You will be asked about me — what will you say? They said: we bear witness that you conveyed the message, fulfilled the trust, and counseled the ummah. He raised his finger toward the sky and lowered it toward the people three times: O Allah, bear witness. O Allah, bear witness. O Allah, bear witness.

He prayed Dhuhr and Asr joined, with one adhan and two iqamahs, and then rode on to the mawqif, the place of standing, where he brought al-Qaswa to rest with the rocks before her and turned to face the qiblah. He stayed there in du’a until the sun set completely. That is the whole rite. There is no ceremony at Arafah beyond a human being, standing, asking. This afternoon is the reason the du’a page tells you to arrive with your list already written.

The night — Muzdalifah

He rode out with Usamah ibn Zayd behind him, the crowd so thick that he pulled the reins until the camel’s head nearly touched the saddle, and he said: O people — calmness, calmness. Calm in the crowd is not a polite request added by modern organizers; it is his own instruction, given on the road you will travel.

At Muzdalifah he prayed Maghrib and Isha joined, then slept until Fajr — and Jabir’s detail here is the one to keep: he slept. The night your package describes as “open ground, limited facilities” is a night the Messenger of Allah ﷺ spent asleep on the same ground. In the morning he stood in du’a at al-Mash’ar al-Haram, the place in Muzdalifah named in the Qur’an, until the sky was fully bright, and moved before the sun rose.

The 10th — the great day

Through the valley of Muhassir he quickened his pace. At Jamrat al-Aqabah he threw seven pebbles, saying Allahu akbar with each one — pebbles the size of a date stone. His own example is why throwing large rocks is wrong.

Then the sacrifice: sixty-three camels with his own hand — one, it is said, for each year of his life — and the rest of the hundred by Ali رضي الله عنه. Then his head was shaved, and he prayed for mercy three times upon those who shave and once upon those who shorten. Then to Makkah for Tawaf al-Ifadah, and Zamzam, where his relatives were drawing water, and he drank standing from the bucket they gave him.

Rami, sacrifice, hair, Tawaf — the exact sequence printed on your group’s schedule for the 10th. And when people came to him that day saying they had done one part before another, he answered, again and again: do it, and there is no harm. When your scholar reassures you on the busiest day of Hajj that the order can vary, that reassurance comes from him ﷺ.

The days of Tashriq, and the farewell

He remained in Mina through the days of Tashriq, stoning the three Jamarat each day once the sun had passed its highest point, from Dhuhr onward, and standing after the first and the middle Jamrah to make long du’a. He told the people:

Take your rites from me — for perhaps I shall not perform Hajj after this year.

He did not. Roughly three months after returning to Madinah, he ﷺ passed away. The Farewell Pilgrimage was exactly that, and the people who stood at Arafah that year understood afterward what they had witnessed. The verse this day I have perfected your religion for you was revealed at Arafah: the religion was complete, and its Prophet was taking his leave.

His last act in Makkah was Tawaf of the Ka’bah.

Why this changes how the rites feel

Read The Rites, One by One after this page and something shifts. Raml stops being a rule about walking pace: it is how he walked. The pebble size stops being a regulation: it is what he threw. Sleeping at Muzdalifah stops being a hardship clause in your package and becomes his night. None of the sequence is arbitrary, and none of it is anonymous — every step was first taken by him, and Hajj is designed so that you follow it.