By Angharad Riddoch
Hajj 2023 has taken place in Mecca this week with 2.5 million pilgrims from all over the world. Hajj is the fifth pillar of Islam, a once-in-a-lifetime duty, but for the younger generation of Muslims in the UK, booking costs, environmental impact and shortage of tickets make Hajj almost unattainable. The Religion Media Centre held a media briefing on the significance of Hajj and concerns as it grows in size and becomes out of reach for many British Muslims.
Pilgrims observe many rituals in Hajj and can walk up to 30 miles in the process. Dressed in white, they walk seven times round the Kaaba, a stone cube “the house of Allah”, built by Abraham and his son Ishmael, that sits at the centre of the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca. This is Islam’s holiest site and the place Muslims turn towards in prayer.
They also camp on an open plain in Mina, pray for forgiveness at Mount Arafat where the Prophet Muhammad gave his final sermon, and throw stones at three pillars in Mina, a symbolic stoning of Satan. At the heart, Hajj is a profoundly spiritual moment, with prayers for forgiveness and supplication before Allah.
One of the key challenges of Hajj this year for Muslims in the west, is the system of quotas imposed by the Saudi authorities, allowing each nation one pilgrim per 1,000 Muslims. For Britain, this has reduced the number of tickets to 3,600, a figure not seen since the early 1980s. It is considerably lower than the average in recent times, when as many as 30,000 British Muslims made the pilgrimage in one year.
Sean McLoughlin, professor of the anthropology of Islam at Leeds University, said this was heartbreaking for generations of British Muslims who had been brought up with an expectation they could attend. “It’s going to really change how people experience and think about Hajj in the UK. They won’t be able to discharge what feels like a religious duty and that that could lead to some anxieties,” he said.
Another challenge is the expense. The average cost to British Muslims of a visit to Hajj is about £10,000.
Mohammad Shoaib, formerly a producer at Islam TV, said the lowest package this year was about £6,500 — compared with last year where it was nearer £4,000. Prices “were astronomical” since the new online ticketing system was introduced, he said. In the past, £10,000 would have bought a luxury package, but now that was the average standard cost.
“There are many people who are not going to be able to afford this, especially those who are from what we call the ‘rent generation’ — those who aren’t even able to put down a deposit for a home, let alone put down thousands of pounds, maybe even tens of thousands of pounds for an experience of Hajj,” he added.
This is now the second year that the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah in Saudi Arabia has managed Hajj packages and the online ticketing system has been criticised as chaotic.
In 2022, the Saudi Ministry of Hajj announced a last-minute decision that would mean all those wanting to make the journey must apply through the official Nusuk Hajj platform. This restricted those applying from 57 western countries to a draw for the first time.
Other worrying technical difficulties have continued to be a problem this year.
Saman Javed, reporter with Hyphen Online, has been talking to British Muslims who have had to navigate the system. She told the briefing that some of those people were not able to select packages as the app kept crashing, or pages weren’t loading.
“One of the ladies I spoke to, received confirmation and then a deadline to send her payment across. She sent some of that money — she parted with just under £6,000. Later she was told that her booking didn’t exist.”
Ms Javed said some of those people were “heartbroken” by the whole experience, especially after the pandemic had prevented most people from attending in 2020 and 2021.
She also found that many had struggled with the Saudi-based customer service. “People weren’t really getting any answers. So there was a lot of confusion … I think there was also concern about how this would impact older Muslims who maybe aren’t as tech-savvy.”
Others had also taken a different route to try to avoid this system. The economic crisis and political unrest in Pakistan meant the quota there was not being filled. This gave British pilgrims the chance for a place if they applied for a Pakistani ID and passport. That was a slightly cheaper way, but not significantly so.
Professor McLoughlin said the ticketing system was the “third age” of Hajj attendance for Muslims in western countries. The first age was independent travel; the second, package travel organised by local agents; and third the Saudi in-house online travel agency.
He said it should be seen in the context of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud’s wide-ranging plan known as Vision 2030, to overhaul the kingdom’s economy. The expansion and diversification included building on historic traditions in religious tourism, including the opening of Umrah, a pilgrimage that can be completed at any time. The expansion is linked to “a great trust” in technology in Saudi Arabia.
But Professor McLoughlin said he would be interested to hear what the authorities said about how this growth in ambition equated with managing climate change, as the Saudis’ goal is to acquire half of energy supplies from renewable resources by 2030.
The impact of climate change has been an increasing worry for those making the pilgrimage. Shahin Ashraf, head of global advocacy for Islamic Relief, was worried about the rising temperatures people face despite the pilgrimage moving 11 days earlier each year. She said one in 1,000 pilgrims die at the Hajj each year and 71 per cent of those deaths are due to extreme heat.
“What you’ll find is that even though the temperature goes up to 113 degrees Fahrenheit [45 Celsius], this doesn’t fully capture the heat experienced by the pilgrim. What happens is — we call it the ‘penguin effect’ — when crowds retain the heat, it exacerbates the already sweltering temperatures,” she said. “What [the authorities] try to do well is talk about dehydration, heat, stroke, exhaustion. Approximately 32,000 health workers and numerous ambulances are always on standby for this.”
She said climate change would increase temperatures to extremely dangerous levels and there had to be considerable measures in place to combat this, not just reducing greenhouses gases but aggressive adaptation. The concerns extend to air travel, the air conditioning system, the number of ritual animal sacrifices, the amount of waste and sanitation.
The extra cost of these measures and the risk from extremely high temperatures was a major concern for the next generation of young Muslims who are concerned about the environmental impact of their journey and their stay in Mecca.
Ms Ashraf said: “I believe the next group, maybe in about five to 10 years, will really think about not just the increasing cost, not just increasing challenge, but their own carbon footprint”.
But there is also an impact on older people. She suggested that the expected global warming may result in an age limit for pilgrims, with people at risk from heart complications and heat exhaustion, prevented from attending.
The rising cost of living in the UK means many people will not be able to save for this spiritual journey any time soon — or even in the window of opportunity before their age means they become too susceptible to the dangers of the warming climate at Mecca. Could this start to change Islamic thought on Hajj?
Saman Javed found one striking discovery when reporting on the new booking system. One interviewee told her they would not go to Hajj if it were not a religious obligation.
“I think it’s quite upsetting when it’s supposed to be such a special and sacred time for people. And then they’re having such a negative experience. That’s making them [think again] whether they should be going.”
That, she believed, was a minority view.
“Despite all the challenges Muslims faced this year, I think the overarching belief is that, ‘When it’s my time, and when I’m supposed to go, and when Allah wants me to go, that’s when it will go’.”
Looking back on his experience of Hajj in 2004, Sohail Hanif, chief executive of the National Zakat Foundation, said it was a moment when he was fundamentally transformed. He felt a deepening of faith and certainty that has lasted since that time. “It becomes a very unique journey and moment in a person’s life,” he said.
Mr Hanif believes that despite UK pilgrims’ travel problems, access to Hajj over time has been “very good” when taking into account the global view.
“We’re quite a privileged community because of the history of very good access to the sacred lands — and that’s something for us to appreciate and be grateful for,” he added.
“The global experience for the whole last century has been one of applying, waiting, seeing if you will get the opportunity … So I think it’s part of our history as British Muslims and I think it will continue being a very strong and positive part of our story, because we have such a strong tie to the Holy Land.”
View the Hajj briefing on our YouTube channel here
