Pilgrimage

A pilgrimage is a journey or search of great moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith. Many religions attach spiritual importance to particular places: the place of birth or death of founders or saints, or to the place of their "calling" or spiritual awakening, or of their connection (visual or verbal) with the divine, or to locations where miracles were performed or witnessed, or locations where a deity is said to live or be "housed," or any site that is seen to have special spiritual powers. Such sites may be commemorated with shrines or temples that devotees are encouraged to visit for their own spiritual benefit: to be healed or have questions answered or to achieve some other spiritual benefit. A person who makes such a journey is called a pilgrim. In America, the term pilgrim is typically associated with an early colonial protestant sect known for their strict rules of discipline.

The Holy Land acts as a focal point for the pilgrimages of the Abrahamic religions such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

In the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, the visitation of certain ancient cult-centers was repressed in the 7th century BCE, when worship was restricted to the YHWH at the Temple in Jerusalem. In Syria, the shrine of Astarte at the headwater spring of the river Adonis survived until it was destroyed by order of Emperor Constantine in the 4th century.

In mainland Greece, a stream of individuals made their way to Delphi or the oracle of Zeus at Dodona, and once every four years, at the period of the Olympic games, the temple of Zeus at Olympia formed the goal of swarms of pilgrims from every part of the Hellenic world. When Alexander the Great reached Egypt, he put his whole vast enterprise on hold, while he made his way with a small band deep into the Libyan desert, to consult the oracle of Ammun. During the imperium of his Ptolemaic heirs, the shrine of Isis at Philae received many votive inscriptions from Greeks on behalf of their kindred far away at home.

As a common human experience, pilgrimage has been proposed as a new Jungian archetype by Wallace Clift and Jean Dalby Clift.

Pilgrimage centres

Antiquity

Many ancient religions had sacred sites, temples, oracles and sacred groves to which pilgrimages were made.

Karnak, Egypt.

Thebes, Egypt.

Kurukshetra, India.

Delphi, Greece. Oracle.

Dodona, Epirus, Greece. Oracle.

Ephesus, Temple of Artemis (Diana), Turkey.

Baalbek Lebanon.

Jerusalem, Israel.

Bahá'í Faith

Bahá'u'lláh decreed pilgrimage to two places in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas: the House of Bahá'u'lláh in Baghdad, Iraq, and the House of the Báb in Shiraz, Iran. Later, `Abdu'l-Bahá designated the Shrine of Bahá'u'lláh at Bahji, Israel as a site of pilgrimage.

Bahá'í pilgrimage consists of visiting the holy places in Haifa, Acre, and Bahjí at the Bahá'í World Centre in northwest Israel, and Bahá'ís can apply to join an organized nine-day pilgrimage where they are taken to visit the various holy sites, or attend a shorter three-day pilgrimage. Hindus are encouraged to undertake pilgrimages during their lifetime. Most Hindus visit sites within their region or locale.

Kumbh Mela is the largest pilgrimage recorded in history. Kumbh Mela is also credited with the largest gathering of humans in the entire world.

Those who can afford to go may journey to more popularly known and visited sites, such as those in the following list.

The last four sites in the list together comprise the Chardham, or four holy pilgrimage destinations. It was traditionally believed that one who undertakes a pilgrimage to all four sites will attain moksha, the release from samsara (cycle of rebirths), at the time of death. The holy places of pilgrimage for the Shaktism sect of Hinduism are the Shakti peethas (Temples of Shakti).

Islam

Pilgrims circumambulating the Kaaba during the Hajj]] , Mecca, Saudi Arabia]]

The pilgrimage to Mecca (the Hajj) is one of the Five Pillars of Islam. It should be attempted at least once in the lifetime of all able-bodied Muslims who can afford to do so. It is the most important of all Muslim pilgrimages, and is the largest pilgrimage for Muslims.

Another important place for Muslims is the city of Madinah, the second holiest place in Islam, in Saudi Arabia, where Muhammad rests in Al-Masjid al-Nabawi (the Mosque of the Prophet).

The ihram (white robes of pilgrimage) is meant to show equality of all pilgrims in the eyes of God: that there is no difference between a prince and a pauper. Ihram is also symbolic for holy virtue and pardon from all past sins.

While wearing the ihram in Mecca, a pilgrim may not shave, clip their nails, wear perfume, swear or quarrel, hunt, kill any creature, uproot or damage plants, cover the head for men or the face and hands for women, marry, wear shoes over the ankles, perform any dishonest acts or carry weapons. If they do their pilgrimage is uncompleted.

Judaism

is all that remains of the Western wall of the Temple in Jerusalem.]] The Temple in Jerusalem was the center of the Jewish religion, until its destruction in 70 CE, and all adult men who were able were required to visit and offer sacrifices (korbanot), particularly during Passover, Shavuot and Sukkot.

Following the destruction of the Second Temple and the onset of the diaspora, the centrality of pilgrimage to Jerusalem in Judaism was discontinued. In its place came prayers and rituals hoping for a return to Zion and the accompanying restoration of regular pilgrimages.

Until recent centuries, pilgrimage had been a fairly difficult and arduous adventure. But now, Jews from many countries make periodic pilgrimages to the holy sites of their religion.

The western retaining wall of the original temple, known as the Wailing Wall, or Western Wall remains in the Old City of Jerusalem and this has been the most sacred site for religious Jews. Pilgrimage to this area was off-limits from 1948 to 1967, when East Jerusalem was controlled by Jordan.

There are numerous lesser Jewish pilgrimage sites, mainly tombs of tzadikim, throughout the Land of Israel and all over the world, including: Hebron; Bethlehem; Mt. Meron; Netivot; Uman, Ukraine; Silistra, Bulgaria; Damanhur, Egypt; and many others.

Sikhism

pilgrim at Harmandir Sahib (the Golden Temple) in Amritsar]] The Sikh religion does not place great importance on pilgrimage. Guru Nanak Dev was asked "Should I go and bathe at pilgrimage places?" and replied: "God's name is the real pilgrimage place which consists of contemplation of the word of God, and the cultivation of inner knowledge."

Eventually, however, Amritsar and Harmandir Saheb (the Golden Temple) became the centre of the Sikh faith, and if a Sikh goes on pilgrimage it is usually to this place considered the spiritual and cultural centre of Sikhs rather than a pilgrimage.

Zoroastrianism

The Zoroastrians take pilgrimage trips in India to the eight Atash Behrams in India and one in Yazd.

Secular pilgrimage

In modern usage, the terms pilgrim and pilgrimage have developed in sense to include sites of secular importance. For example, fans of Elvis Presley may choose to visit his home, Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee. Visits to war memorials such as the Vietnam Veterans Memorial are often seen as pilgrimages. Similarly one may refer to a cultural center such as Venice as a "tourist Mecca".

Paris Commune

The Père Lachaise Cemetery, where the defenders of the Paris Commune made their last stand and many of them were afterwards summarily executed, is the focus of annual pilgrimages by parties and organizations of the French Left.

Communism

In a number of Communist countries, secular pilgrimages were established as an "antidote" to religious pilgrimages, the most famous of which are:

USSR: Mausoleum of Lenin in Red Square, Moscow

PRC: Mausoleum of Mao Zedong in Tiananmen Square, Beijing

Germany: Birthplace of Karl Marx, Trier

Fascism

The mausoleum of Italian Dictator Benito Mussolini in Predappio, Italy serves as a pilgrimage site for Italian Neo-Fascists. In post-World War II Germany, considerable efforts were made to prevent Hitler's bunker in Berlin from becoming a similar place of pilgrimage for Neo-Nazis.

See also

Burial places of founders of world religions

HCPT – The Pilgrimage Trust

Junrei

List of shrines

Monastery

Pardon (ceremony)

Pilgrimage of Trust

Romeria

Sacred travel

World Youth Day

Notes

Further reading

al-Naqar, Umar. 1972. The Pilgrimage Tradition in West Africa. Khartoum: Khartoum University Press. [includes a map 'African Pilgrimage Routes to Mecca, ca. 1300-1900']

Coleman, Simon and John Elsner (1995), Pilgrimage: Past and Present in the World Religions. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Coleman, Simon & John Eade (eds) (2005), Reframing Pilgrimage. Cultures in Motion. London: Routledge.

Davidson, Linda Kay and David M. Gitlitz (2002), Pilgrimage: From the Ganges to Graceland: An Encyclopedia. Santa Barbara, Ca.: ABC-CLIO.

Gitlitz, David M. and Linda Kay Davidson (2006). Pilgrimage and the Jews. Westport, CT: Praeger.

Jackowski, Antoni. 1998. Pielgrzymowanie [Pilgrimage]. Wroclaw: Wydawnictwo Dolnoslaskie.

Kerschbaum & Gattinger, Via Francigena - DVD- Documentation, of a modern pilgrimage to Rome, ISBN 3200005009, Verlag EUROVIA, Vienna 2005

Margry, Peter Jan (ed.) (2008), Shrines and Pilgrimage in the Modern World. New Itineraries into the Sacred. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

Sumption, Jonathan. 2002. Pilgrimage: An Image of Mediaeval Religion. London: Faber and Faber Ltd.

Wolfe, Michael (ed.). 1997. One Thousands Roads to Mecca. New York: Grove Press.

Zarnecki, George (1985), The Monastic World: The Contributions of The Orders. pp. 36–66, in Evans, Joan (ed.). 1985. The Flowering of the Middle Ages. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd.