Mecca pilgrims snap selfies as Eid al-Adha ends

As they fulfill a sacred requirement of Islam, some pilgrims to Mecca share the moment by tweeting a selfie to their family and friends.

|
Khalid Mohammed/AP
Muslim pilgrims move around the Kaaba, the black cube at center, inside the Grand Mosque, a day before Muslim's annual pilgrimage, known as the Hajj, in the Muslim holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014.

It's one of the biggest trends taking over the social media world, and now during the annual Muslim hajj pilgrimage, visitors to the holy sites can't resist the urge to take a selfie.

Between calls for forgiveness from God, the word "selfie" echoes through the white marble halls inside the Grand Mosque in Mecca where pilgrims walk around the Kaaba, the black-clad cube towards which the world's 1.6 billion Muslims face to pray,

"I'm taking a selfie with Kaaba behind me to post on my Facebook so my family and friends can see me. That's the way we communicate these days – no need to call," said Mehmet Dawoud, a Turkish student.

To many, selfies are just another way to preserve the memory of being in a holy site and also share the experience in the trendiest of ways with loved ones.

"Selfies are just a way to make the memory last in the coolest possible way. Hajj is always seen as something very serious and for older people. Selfies make it cool again," said Amir Marouf, a 30 year old Egyptian architect.

However, to some Saudi clerics who strictly follow the ultra-conservative Wahhabi school of Sunni Islam, selfies are a misuse of time when pilgrims should concentrate on praying.

Inside the Grand Mosque you occasionally hear a cleric urging selfie takers: "Focus! Prayer is more important."

Other Saudi clerics view the phenomenon as harmless and say it does not contradict any of Islam's principles.

"There's no harm in these photos. People just want to have fun and remember being in the holy sites," said Sheik Abdallah bin Ali basfar, a local religious lecturer in Mena.

(Editing by William Maclean and Mark Potter)

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Mecca pilgrims snap selfies as Eid al-Adha ends
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Latest-News-Wires/2014/1004/Mecca-pilgrims-snap-selfies-as-Eid-al-Adha-ends
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe