Answer
In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.
In this fatwa:
There are safe methods for putting off menstruation as a temporary measure, and there is nothing wrong in the Shari`ah in making use of that to put off menses to perform Umrah.
In responding to the question, Sheikh Ahmad Kutty, a Senior Lecturer and Islamic Scholar at the Islamic Institute of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, states:
According to the vast majority of scholars, while menstruating, the woman is not allowed to make tawaf (circumambulation of the Kabah), which is a pillar of Umrah, without which Umrah is not valid.
Therefore, you should wait until you are free of menses and have purified yourself, then you can make Umrah.
If you are already in Makkah and your menstrual period starts before you are able to make your Umrah, you should wait there until it is over, and after having purified yourself you may go to tan`im, which is a place at which you can enter into ihram and enter Makkah with ihram. Otherwise, you may go to Madinah and perform the ziyarah (visitation of the Prophet’s Mosque) while you have your period and come back later to Makkah in ihram.
There are safe methods for putting off menstruation as a temporary measure, and there is nothing wrong in Shari`ah in making use of that.
However, in the case of Hajj (I mean the only Hajj you are able to perform) and you are forced to leave Makkah because of travel arrangements that you cannot change at all, then you’re allowed to make tawaf and your tawaf will be considered valid as an exceptional case. This is the ruling given by Imam ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah bless his soul).
Almighty Allah knows best.
Editor’s note: This fatwa is from Ask the Scholar’s archive and was originally published at an earlier date.