Rebuilding the Kaaba

Part oneA weak and damaged Kaaba

By c. 605 CE, the Kaaba was in poor condition. It was a low stone building with no roof, and Makkah's valley sometimes flooded. The walls had cracked, and the Quraysh feared that the building could collapse. They decided to rebuild it. The Prophet ﷺ was then about thirty-five, five years before the first revelation.

They felt uneasy about the task. Everyone remembered what had happened to Abraha's army, and nobody wanted to be the first to strike the old walls. At last al-Walid ibn al-Mughirah, an elder of the Quraysh, said a prayer that they meant no harm and wanted only to improve the House, and began to pull down a section. The others waited a night to see whether any harm would come to him. When none did, they joined in. Each clan was given a stretch of wall to take down and rebuild. The Prophet ﷺ worked too, and carried stones with his uncle al-Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him).

Muhammad ﷺ worked alongside the men, carrying stones on his shoulders with his uncle al-Abbas. Al-Abbas told him to take off his waist-wrap and fold it over his shoulder as a pad, as the other men were doing. When he did, he fell to the ground, his eyes turned to the sky, and he called for his waist-wrap and tied it back on. Jabir ibn Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him), who reported it, said he was never seen uncovered after that day. Even before prophethood, he was protected from what was shameful.

They faced practical problems. The Quraysh built their houses of mud and clay and had little experience with large stone. They also needed timber for a roof. By chance, a ship had been wrecked on the Red Sea coast at Jeddah. The Quraysh bought its timber, and a Roman builder named Baqum, who was living in Makkah, offered his skills.

They also made a rule that only honest earnings could pay for the work. No money gained by usury or theft would be accepted, because the Kaaba was the House of Allah. Funds ran short anyway. They had to build the walls a little smaller than before, and left a section on one side, known as the Hijr, outside the walls. They raised the door above the ground, so that they could control who went in, and they roughly doubled the height of the walls.

Years later, the Prophet ﷺ mentioned this to his wife Aishah (may Allah be pleased with her). He said that he would have restored the Kaaba to its original shape, had his people not so recently left the old ways.

From the hadith

Narrated `Aisha:

I asked the Prophet (ﷺ) whether the round wall (near Ka`ba) was part of the Ka`ba. The Prophet (ﷺ) replied in the affirmative. I further said, "What is wrong with them, why have they not included it in the building of the Ka`ba?" He said, "Don't you see that your people (Quraish) ran short of money (so they could not include it inside the building of Ka`ba)?" I asked, "What about its gate? Why is it so high?" He replied, "Your people did this so as to admit into it whomever they liked and prevent whomever they liked. Were your people not close to the Pre-Islamic Period of ignorance (i.e. they have recently embraced Islam) and were I not afraid that they would dislike it, surely I would have included the (area of the) wall inside the building of the Ka`ba and I would have lowered its gate to the level of the ground."

Part twoThe Black Stone

When the walls were built and the time came to set the Black Stone back in its corner, a crisis began. The Black Stone is a dark stone set in the eastern corner of the Kaaba, and it marks where pilgrims begin their circling of the House.

Setting it in place was a great honour, and every clan wanted it. The arguments grew so heated that two clans brought a bowl of blood, dipped their hands in it and swore to fight to the death rather than give way. For several days the town was on the edge of bloodshed. Then Abu Umayyah ibn al-Mughirah, the oldest of the Quraysh, made a suggestion. They should accept as judge the first man to enter the gate of the mosque the next morning.

The first man through was Muhammad ﷺ. When they saw him, they said, with relief, that it was al-Amin, and they would accept his judgement.

He listened to them, then asked for a cloak and spread it on the ground. He lifted the Black Stone with his own hands and set it in the middle of the cloth. Then he asked the elders of each clan to take hold of an edge and lift together. They carried it to the corner. There, the Prophet ﷺ took the stone and placed it in its position with his own hands.

Nobody had lost any honour, and nobody had been left out. The clans went home satisfied. What could have been a bloody feud in the sacred town ended in cooperation, because they trusted the man they knew as al-Amin. Five years later, the same man would come to them with a message they did not want to hear.

Nobody had lost any honour, and nobody had been left out.

More on How to Muslim

• guide.howtomuslim.orgHow to perform UmrahThe Kaaba today, and how to visit it step by step.

WatchLectures for this chapter

Lecture Towards EternityO Messenger, Ep. 1: Life of Prophet Muhammad (opens on YouTube)

Lecture Islamic GuidanceGreen Stone Under The Ka'bah (Seerah of Muhammad, part 19) (opens on YouTube)

The mapWhere it happened

• The Kaaba
• the Black Stone
• the Hijr
• the mosque gate
• Jeddah

This map is a simple sketch to help you picture where events took place. Positions, distances and borders are approximate, so please use it for reference only, not as an accurate map.

SourcesSources for this chapter