Islam’s Ruling on Circumambulation and Ending Hums Customs

They continued in this way until Allah Most High sent Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. When He perfected the religion for him and prescribed the rites of pilgrimage, He revealed: “Then depart from where the people depart, and ask Allah’s forgiveness. Allah is All-Forgiving, Most Merciful” (Qur’an 2:199). “The people” here means the Arabs. Thus Allah restored them to the pilgrimage practice of standing at ‘Arafah and departing from it. Regarding what the Hums had forbidden people to wear and eat at the House—when they circumambulated naked and barred food brought from outside the Sanctuary—Allah revealed: “O children of Adam, take your adornment at every place of worship; eat and drink, but do not be excessive, for He does not love the excessive. Say: Who has forbidden the adornment of Allah which He has brought forth for His servants, and the good things of provision? Say: They are for those who believe in the worldly life, exclusively theirs on the Day of Resurrection. Thus We explain the signs for people who know” (Qur’an 7:31–32). Through Islam, Allah set aside the Hums practices and what Quraysh had invented and imposed on others. Ibn Ishaq said: Abdullah ibn Abi Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn ‘Amr ibn Hazm narrated to me… The report continues beyond the printed page.

[1] One account of the discarded garments concerns Fakhitah, Umm Hakim ibn Hizam. She entered the Ka‘bah pregnant with Hakim ibn Hizam; labor came upon her and she could not leave, so she gave birth inside. She wrapped herself and the newborn in pieces of aqit and discarded her clothing, which became cast-offs no one could approach. Al-mithbar, with a fathah, means the place where a child is born. [2] Another copy reads “as though she”; [3] harim means something inviolable, not to be touched or used. [4] The adornment in the verse refers to clothing and not circumambulating naked. The instruction to eat and drink alludes to the Hums prohibition on bringing food into the Sanctuary. [5] Recension A reads “from”; other copies read “on.”