HAJJ SHOWS EQUALITY AMONG MEN AND WOMEN
In Islam there are different types of ibadah (worship). The obligatory one is in the form of namaz that every Muslim has to learn salah and offer five times daily, another form is recitation of the Holy Quran, the zakaat, the keeping of roza and the most well-known of all, the Pilgrimage or Hajj. The very last is among the most well-known pillars of Islam and has become a representative congregational prayer of Muslims.
Hajj is the 5th pillar of Islam and it is obligatory upon every Muslim who is physically and financially able to perform this. It is one of the biggest and greatest congregations in the entire world and is performed in the sacred month of Zil-Hajj. Besides being just an obligatory prayer or a type of ibadah (worship), Hajj symbolizes a superior universal message.
One of the most important problems of the world of nowadays is the gender based discrimination and inequality where women are considered as lesser being and men are consider the major being. The ritual and rites of Hajj challenges and rejects this typecast and shows to the whole world that when it comes to performing a spiritual and religious ritual, women are equal to men and the performing the rituals of Hajj carries equal spiritual reward for them as it does for men. In Holy Quran ALLAH Almighty says:
Verse 3:195 of Holy Quran
And their Lord responded to them, "Never will I allow to be lost the work of [any] worker among you, whether male or female; you are of one another. So those who emigrated or were evicted from their homes or were harmed in My cause or fought or were killed - I will surely remove from them their misdeeds, and I will surely admit them to gardens beneath which rivers flow as reward from ALLAH, and ALLAH has with Him the best reward."
From this above ayah it is clear that performing of Hajj carries equal return and reward for women as it carries for men, hence, the stereotype that just men can go for the spiritual rituals and obligations is refused in the ritual of Hajj.
Another feature that brings about the significance of women in Islam with regards to the rituals of Hajj is the reality that it involves a ritual of Saaee. This ritual is in memorial of Hazrat Hajra (RA) who ran between mountains of Safa and Marwa in search of water for her son Hazrat Ismail (AS). This act of Bibi Hajra was so liked by ALLAH Almighty that ALLAH made it an obligatory act for the ritual of Hajj. Hence, this also gives us the lesson that in Islam both women and men are equal when it comes to their present in the court of ALLAH Almighty, particularly in context of spiritual reward.
Cheapumrahpackages.org is one of the authorized Hajj and Umrah travel agent based in UK offers a range of Manchester Hajj 2021 Packages from UK.