As an illustration of the nature and intensity of that perennial warfare on earth, and the nature of its outcomes, a companion Abu Hurayrah narrated that the Prophet said:

A strong devil from the jinns called ‘Ifrit came to me yesterday suddenly, so as to spoil my prayer, but Allah enabled me to overpower him, and so I caught him and intended to tie him to one of the pillars of the mosque so that all of you might see him, but I remembered the invocation of my brother (Prophet) Sulayman: ‘And grant me a kingdom such as shall not belong to any other after me,’ (38:35), so I let him go cursed. (Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith No. 634)

It is noteworthy that the Prophet was in a state of prayer facing the qiblah when the incident occurred. Hence, the main focus of the devil’s attempts to unsettle the Prophet’s concentration must have been the Prophet’s front site.

On the Day of Judgment ,when all masks will fall, everything will become clear and the matters pertaining to the terrestrial life will be conclusively and justly decided.

Satan, too, will then have to admit the truth, outlining to those who followed him why and where things went wrong. To this effect God says in the Quran:

And Satan will say when the matter is decided: ‘It was Allah Who gave you a promise of Truth: I too promised, but I failed in my promise to you. I had no authority over you except to call you, but you listened to me; then reproach not me, but reproach your own souls. I cannot listen to your cries, nor can you listen to mine. I reject your former act in associating me with Allah. For wrong-doers there must be a grievous Chastisement.” (14:22).

Due to the central importance of Al-Masjid al-Haram in the lives of believers, the meaning of it as the qiblah to be faced from anywhere in the world, is readily apparent.

As far as the significance of the downward or the ground side of believers’ existence is concerned – as a symbol and direction of prostration (sajdah) — it could be, and God knows best, that the same has been symbolically suggested by the continuous emphasis on the foundations of the Ka’bah, the Sacred Mosque that existed since its inception only for the sake of accommodating and facilitating the needs of people.

Raising the Ka’bah on its holy foundations might have also indicated the intellectual and spiritual growth of believers and their rising through a range of degrees and stations. That the Ka’bah was built roofless could likewise be interpreted in the spirit that there are neither limits nor obstacles in believing men’s and women’s continuous progression towards spiritual perfection.

This close correlation between the Ka’bah (Al-Masjid al-Haram), as a means, and the case of the spiritual progression and fruition of believers, as an end, was clearly demonstrated by Prophet Muhammad who, when once circumambulated the Ka’bah, affirmed the immensity of its reputation, character and honor by saying to it:

How wonderful you are and how wonderful your fragrance is! How great you are and how great your honor is!

But then he added, demonstrating thereby the truest transcendental purpose of al-Masjid al-Haram:

By Him in Whose hands Muhammad’s soul is, indeed the honor of the believer is greater with God than your honor: his property, his blood and that only good (positive) is assumed about him.

Accordingly, as stressed earlier, Al-Masjid al-Haram or the Ka’bah is not about stones, timber and other building materials of which it might have been composed. The matter was always spiritual, rather than physical, in the sense that the form of the Ka’bah, and later its Al-Masjid al-Haram, followed, facilitated and promoted its primordial humankind-oriented function with all of its dimensions: corporeal, intellectual and spiritual.

Al-Masjid al-Haram was always about its site in particular and the site of Makkah’s haram in general, its direction, safety and incalculable blessings (barakah).

Moreover, it was about the place of annual Hajj, the symbol of unfaltering obedience to God and His injunctions, and about the sign as well as source of strength for warding off Satan and his advances.

It is not surprising therefore that one of the key Hajj rituals is ramy al-jamarat, which involves stoning the three pillars that represent Satan. The ritual is conducted in the locality of Mina, just east of Makkah, for three or four consecutive days, starting with ‘Eid al-Adha or the Feast of the Sacrifice.

It is recounted in the books of history that when the angel Jibril taught Ibrahim the rites of Hajj, subsequent to his construction of the Ka’bah, Satan appeared to him three times, seeking to disturb and demoralize him. At each of the appearances, Jibril asked Ibrahim to pelt or stone Satan. So Ibrahim threw seven stones for each appearance at him. After Satan had been stoned for the third time, he finally, defeated, withdrew from Ibrahim.

That particular Hajj ritual has been prescribed to commemorate Ibrahim’s victory over Satan and to remind every pilgrim that he or she has a similar battle of his or her own. The battle, of course, is primarily about Satan. But, in addition, it is also about repudiating and casting aside one’s low desires and wishes through which Satan tends to penetrate and dominate one’s self.

While every believing person intends to initiate and keep up sound relationships with physically and spiritually the safest Al-Masjid al-Haram sanctuary and its direction, creating then from his personality a safe haven for all forms of goodness and virtue, Satan, on the other hand, craves and plots to severe such relationships, isolate and make a person directionless and lost, and then embark on crafting of his being a sanctuary for himself and all forms of felony and vice.

Read Part 1 – Part 2.