Sheikh Saad bin Nasser Al Shathri, a senior Saudi cleric, has called on Muslims worldwide to support an ongoing project to expand the Grand Mosque in Mecca as work continues.
Saudi clerics such as Shathri, a Riyadh-based professor in Islamic law and frequent speaker to official television programmes, have backed the project by King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, who carries the official title Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, of Mecca and Medina, saying it will bring "long term benefit to the holy city of Mecca and to Muslims around the world".
"We ask God the almighty to reward King Abdullah for undertaking this project. King Abdullah holds a special place in my heart due to his many achievements which have benefited Muslims as a whole and for which Muslims in the east and west are thankful," Shathri, who travels frequently to the UK and elsewhere in the Islamic world to lecture, said.
The project, which is larger than all previous renovations to the Grand Mosque combined, will expand facilities at the mosque to accommodate 1.2m worshippers, almost double its present capacity and equip the surrounding city with infrastructure to cope with the new influx.
However, the works will not be completed by the time of the pilgrimage to Mecca, or Hajj, later this month. As a result and in appreciation of the works being carried out, Shathri has called on believers to postpone their pilgrimages, or visits to the holy city during the Hajj period, in order to ease congestion in the city and allow the construction works to be completed.
Hajj is an act all Muslims are obliged to perform once in their lifetimes, if they are physically able. The annual Hajj pilgrimage is one of the largest single gatherings on the planet.
Given the importance of the Hajj pilgrimage to Muslims, Shathri, who is one of the founders of an online religious learning resource called Knowledge International University, explained that some may find postponing their pilgrimage difficult. Shathri emphasised to the Guardian that "at times it is appropriate to refrain from performing certain acts of obedience, in order to avoid the hardships of others. In these circumstances, if Muslims choose not to travel to the Grand Mosque with the benefit of other Muslims in mind, they will be rewarded in the same way as if they had performed the pilgrimage".
Shathri also points out that "co-operating with the expansion of the Grand Mosque is consistent with sharia principles because building mosques is regarded as one of the greatest acts of piety and the best of all mosques is the Grand Mosque".