Word: meccas
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...roads to Mecca were jammed with lengthy processions of vehicles: flashy American cars, Japanese tricycle vans, barefoot pedestrians. As travelers reached the checking post marking the border of the city, they stopped and waited for a guard to inspect their passports for religious identification before he opened the road to them. Only Moslems were allowed to enter Mecca, since they alone came for the religious reasons which justify entering a city that has been closed to non-Moslems for almost 1300 years. En route to the city, the rhythmic prayer of the pilgrims fills...
Some come across the Red Sea from North Africa and Egypt to the Port of Suez, where they crowd on boats going to the Port of Jedda and then take buses to Mecca. Many come from Turkey, Iran and Syria in packed buses across desert roads. Thousands fly from East Asia: India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. And Moslems from America come over on chartered flights scheduled specially for the pilgrimage...
...this state, every pilgrim enters Mecca as an equal; all are humble before God. The King of Saudi Arabia, the President of Egypt, the Sultan of Omman, the Shah of Iran, all are indistinguishable from their subjects, dressed in the same two-sheet simple dress. Worldly conventions are discarded, distinctions eliminated, racial disparities unrecognized. One is freed from one's bondage to both oneself and others, affirming a direct commitment to the One and Only Being, admitting Him as the sole dispenser of one's fate. Coming to pay tribute to the Creator, the pilgrim is no longer a subject...
Driven by persecution from Mecca after he had started preaching the new religion, the Prophet Mohammed wept as he left his home and fled to Medina. He had been born and raised there among his tribe and often had shepherded his uncle's flock on its mountains. And in one of those lonely mountains was the cave where he had received the very first revelation announcing the deliverance of a new and final message...
...Mecca of today bears little resemblance to that of the seventh century. It is a rather small town embedded in a range of harsh volcanic mountains. Modern tall buildings dwarf older houses, and the markets wind along narrow streets and alleys. In the heart of the city lies the huge star-shaped Haram Mosque, and in the middle of its courtyard stands the Ka'ba, the holiest shrine of Islam. Given the honorific title of "House of God" by God Himself in the Koran, the Ka'ba has thus been venerated by Moslems. It is a simple four-walled structure...