• Pilgrimage: Alongwith a child
If a child offers the pilgrimage, should his parent who has taken him to pilgrimage offer a sacrifice on his behalf in the same way as adults do, should he perform all the rituals of pilgrimage.
When a child is taken to pilgrimage, the pilgrimage should be complete. Every duty required in pilgrimage should be complete. Every duty required in pilgrimage should be performed either by the child himself or by his parent accompanying him. If the child is too young to walk, the tawaf counts as that of child and the father should do his own tawaf later. A reward of the pilgrimage is credited to the child and an additional reward credited to the parent. If the pilgrimage is done in the Tamattu' or Qiran method, then a sacrifice on behalf of the child is due in the same way as it is due to the parent himself.
• Pilgrimage: At other's expense
Some government and private institutions and companies sponsor what they call " poor men's pilgrimage." Some of these companies and institutions may pressure their employees to go on such free pilgrimage. Some of these employees may have some other urgent needs, such as serious sickness in the family, the payment of an outstanding debt, the marriage of a daughter, etc. Would it not have been better for the company to help the employee with these needs, instead of sending them on pilgrimage? It is sometimes felt that there is an element of prestige which the company or the institution gains as a result of this exercise. How about helping them offer the Umrah instead of pilgrimage? Does a person who offers pilgrimage in such circumstances fulfill his obligatory pilgrimage, or he will have to offer it again when he is able to undertake the journey on his own resources? If a person who can afford to perform pilgrimage without any financial help from others accepts such an invitation, does it count as the discharge of his obligatory pilgrimage?
As you are all well aware, pilgrimage is a duty incumbent on all Muslims and it must be offered at least once in a lifetime. Therefore, many scholars are of the opinion that once a person is able to make the journey and make the pilgrimage, he must do so without delay. He does not know whether he will live till the following season or not. If he waits he is simply delaying a duty that has become obligatory to him. Furthermore, he may not be able to afford the journey the following year or in a few years time. He would have missed the chance of discharging a very important duty.
As long as one receives his money from a legitimate source, then he can offer the pilgrimage, using that money. It is well known that receiving a gift is a legitimate way of taking money from another person. The Prophet, who was not allowed to take charity from anyone, used to accept gifts. Therefore, there is nothing wrong with accepting a gift which covers the expenses of one's pilgrimage.
It is true that some companies and institutions, as well as governments, invite people to offer the pilgrimage at their own expense. Some companies invite their own employees. They feel that it is a gesture of kindness or appreciation to the employees to be invited to go on pilgrimage. Some of those employees are reluctant to accept such invitation because of reservations of the type mentioned. Therefore, a company may feel that it needs to encourage its employees to accept the invitation. Obviously, no one forces or pressures another into making the journey.
Whether it is better to give the employees money to meet some other needs is a totally irrelevant question. There are numerous methods of earning reward from Allah. We may choose whichever one suits us. Allah says in the Qur'an that no restriction is imposed on people who wish to do an act of kindness. You will find some people providing drinking water to a village or to their neighbors as an act of charity. Others prefer to offer food, while a different group may give cash. We cannot say to the one who provides drinking water that he should have given the cost in cash to poor people. Moreover, one act of kindness should not be considered in opposition to another. Perhaps those employees who have another urgent need may be able to get help from their companies or institutions if they put their cases to them. Do you find it proper to say to a company that it should not invite some people to pilgrimage in order to help them with the marriage of their daughters? The two things cannot be matched together. Nor is it kind nor polite to suggest that these companies sponsor the pilgrimage of their employees as a matter of prestige. How can one testify to that? We are here running into the dangerous grounds of trying to judge the intentions of other people, when we have nothing to go by except our own knowledge which, by necessity, must be defective. It is Allah alone who knows the intentions of the people and rewards them for their actions according to His knowledge. If a company sponsors the pilgrimage of its employees, then we should praise that company as one which looks after its employees and its interests. We give them credit for their action as it appears to us, without trying to attribute it to any ulterior or selfish motives. You suggest that Umrah may be offered instead of pilgrimage in such cases. 'May I ask : in what cases? How do you feel if you invite a person to dinner and he says to you : I will only have a cup of tea or an orange juice. As you realize, the difference between Umrah and pilgrimage is great indeed. Although both are duties of Islam, the effort and expense needed for the one are no match at all to those of the other. Or do you mean that the company should offer Umrah to those of its employees who have other needs and offer them cash to meet such needs? That bring us back to the earlier point of imposing restrictions on kindness. That is not acceptable.
When a person offers the pilgrimage and he or she is an adult, sane Muslim, he or she has discharged the duty of pilgrimage, and any subsequent pilgrimage counts as a voluntary one. Whether he meets the expenses himself or someone else foots the bill is irrelevant. Even if he is very rich and he receives an invitation to offer pilgrimage, which he duly accepts, then his duty of pilgrimage has been discharged. He does not need to do it again.
People in our part of the world describe pilgrimage as an invitation by Allah. That is an appropriate description, since we travel for pilgrimage to visit the Sacred House of Allah. We do not go there unless we are admitted by Him. Sometimes, He invites us and requires us to pay our own expenses. At other times, He facilitates for us the invitation allowing others to pay our expenses. We should not refuse. Indeed, when we accept His kindness we are doing what is appropriate.
The pilgrimage is valid in every sense of the word. Therefore, no repeat is required, unless we wish to voluntarily offer a second or a third pilgrimage.
• Pilgrimage: Conditions making it due
Are there any conditions which make the duty of pilgrimage due?
In order that pilgrimage becomes due, a person must be sane and must have attained puberty. Moreover, he must be able to afford and undertake it. This means that an insane person is not required to do the pilgrimage, nor is it acceptable from him. A child below the age of puberty may do the pilgrimage and his parents or guardian who take him will also be rewarded for that pilgrimage, but pilgrimage in his case is not a duty. Therefore, when he reaches the age of puberty and pilgrimage becomes a duty, he is not considered to have fulfilled it because when he did the pilgrimage he was very young. This is the same like offering Dhuhr prayer before it is due. It would not count as an obligatory prayer, but as a voluntary one. When Dhuhr falls due, the person is required to offer it then.
The ability, according to scholars, is both financial and physical. In the early generations of Islam, scholars used to speak of food and transport and the ability to provide these for oneself during the pilgrimage. Nowadays, there are other expenses involved in undertaking the journey to do the pilgrimage. Therefore, with food we must include what a pilgrim reasonably needs during his stay in the pilgrimage until he returns home, such as a reasonable accommodation, any fee he may have to pay on his journey as in the case of pilgrims who must travel through one or more countries and have to pay fees for their visas. While in the past transport meant a camel, owned or leased, today we may speak of fares of a plane or a boat.
It is a condition of financial ability that the prospective pilgrim should have enough to cover all this in excess of what he and his dependents may need of accommodation, food, etc. If he has incurred some debts, whether to other people or to Allah, as in the case when he may not have paid some zakah which is due, the money he needs for his journey should also be in excess of money required to cover his debts or he should first settle his debts.
If a person does not own enough to cover his expenses during his pilgrimage, but someone else, say a friend or a relative, or any other person or a company, offers to pay his expenses it is not obligatory for him to accept the offer. If we were to say that he must accept, then pilgrimage becomes due from him. It is not the case, because the financial ability must be his own. Nevertheless, if he accepts and undertakes the pilgrimage, he has fulfilled his duty.
It is important to point out that Islam takes everything into consideration. In some cases, accepting such an offer may put the person concerned in a position of moral indebtedness to the one who has offered him that. What Islam is telling him is that if he declines that offer, he incurs no sin and he has not failed to fulfill his duty.
Someone may ask whether he should change his lifestyle in order to meet the expenses of pilgrimage. Well, there can be no rigid rule in this regard. Suppose that a married couple have no children and are unlikely to have any, but the man has a big house or a villa to live in, yet he has not much money of his own. If he sells his house to buy a smaller but perfectly adequate one, he will have the required money, then he should sell it. On the other hand, if a man needs his house for the accommodation of his family, or to use its rent for maintaining his dependents, he need not sell it. If he has something in excess of his needs, he should sell it to meet the expenses of pilgrimage. On the other hand, a person is not required to decrease the level of his stock in his business if that will mean a decrease in his regular income. If he has tools which he needs for his work, he need not sell them. But if he does not particularly need them, then he should sell them.
Debt is another point of consideration. The normal situation is that a debtor need not offer the pilgrimage until he has settled his debts. However, if he has bought a car on installments and his regular income makes him perfectly able to pay each installment on time until he clears the debt, and yet he has enough money to meet the pilgrimage expenses, he should do the pilgrimage.