ziyārah

ziyārah, (Arabic: “visit”), in Islām, a visit to the tomb of the Prophet Muḥammad in the mosque at Medina, Saudi Arabia; also a visit to the tomb of a saint or a holy person. The legitimacy of these latter visits has been questioned by many Muslim religious authorities, particularly by the Wahhābīyah, who consider ziyārah a bidʿah (innovation) that should be condemned by all true believers. The Wahhābīyah maintain, in fact, that such visits to the tombs of saints and the invocation of the names of saints in times of trouble is a form of polytheism, for God alone can grant salvation to a troubled person.

Such objections notwithstanding, Muslims continue to make such visits in the hope of obtaining cures or the blessings of the saint. Because saints generally have the reputation for curing a specific disease, visits correspond to personal needs. Thus during some ziyārahs animals are slaughtered as sacrifices and fed to the poor in the name of the visited saint, especially Aḥmad al-Badawī and as-Sayyidah Zaynab in Egypt, ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī in Tunisia, and ʿAbd as-Salām al-Asmar in Libya. Almost every Arab town has its own saint, whose tomb is visited by the local inhabitants.