Security of the Sacred Precinct (amn al-haram)

Safety for whoever enters the Sacred House is among the signs the Qur'an mentions about the House. Muhammad Rashid Rida reads it as a matter the Arab tribes agreed on before Islam, which Islam then affirmed. ¹

Rida presents two objections. The first is the conquest of Mecca by the sword. He answers that it was made lawful for the Prophet ﷺ for an hour of a day, and that he ordered his herald to proclaim that whoever enters his house, or the house of Abu Sufyan, or the Sacred Mosque is safe. He notes that the Prophet answered Sa'd ibn Ubada on that day, saying he had not lied, and that it was a day when God glorified the Ka'ba. The second is what al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf did in hurling mangonels at the Ka'ba. Rida notes that Muhammad Abduh regarded this as an aberration that does not contradict the consensus on respecting the House, and that al-Hajjaj and his soldiers did not believe what they did was lawful, and that politics drove them to it. ¹

Rida reads Abduh's view that safety does not mean that people are naturally unable to seize one who has entered, but that God inspired people to respect the House because they believe it is attributed to Him, and forbade wrongdoing and aggression within it. Rida reports that some exegetes took safety to mean safety from punishment on the Day of Judgement, and that Abduh rejected this, saying it would demolish the whole religion, since safety there belongs to those who hold pure monotheism and do righteous deeds, and entering the House is one of the acts of faith. ²

In a footnote Rida reports that Abduh believed that whoever performed the pilgrimage in his time was throwing himself into destruction because of political hostility, and says that he himself holds the same view. In the same footnote Rida says he wrote it before the Wahhabis took control of the Hijaz and Mecca in 1924, as he puts it, and that he supported their entry and regarded their creed as Sunni. All of this is Rida's view and his statement. ²

The classical and historical reports on the conquest of Mecca and on the conduct of al-Hajjaj have not yet been added, nor has the history of these events from a second source. The date 1924 given in the footnote needs a second source before any use.

Sha'rawi reads «make this land safe» as a request that the security God gave the House last. He holds that the safety of the House is a ruling to be obeyed, not merely a report: whoever obeys God carries it out, and whoever does not is not secured by the House. ^{3 4}