Ṣafā
Ṣafā is one of the two well-known hills located within al-Masjid al-Ḥarām in Makkah, the other being Marwah. The two hills hold great religious and historical significance in Islam and are closely associated with the rites of ḥajj and ʿumrah. The ritual of saʿy—walking between Ṣafā and Marwah—is performed in commemoration of the struggle of Hājar, the wife of Prophet Ibrāhīm (RA), who searched for water for her son Ismāʿīl (RA). The Qurʾān explicitly refers to the sacred status of the two hills in Qurʾān 2:158, describing them as among the symbols of Allah.
In sīrah literature, Ṣafā is especially remembered as the location where Prophet Muḥammad ﷺ publicly proclaimed his mission to the Quraysh during the early Makkan period. After receiving the command to warn his nearest relatives, the Prophet ﷺ ascended Mount Ṣafā and called the clans of Quraysh, inviting them to believe in Allah and warning them of divine accountability. This event marked one of the earliest public declarations of Islam and intensified the opposition of Quraysh against the Prophet ﷺ. According to the sīrah reports, Abū Lahab responded with hostility, leading to the revelation of Sūrat al-Masad (Qurʾān 111).
Ṣafā also occupies an important place in Islamic ritual practice through the rite of saʿy. During ḥajj and ʿumrah, Muslims begin the ritual at Ṣafā and proceed repeatedly between Ṣafā and Marwah (q.v.) in remembrance of Hājar’s perseverance and trust in Allah. The Prophet ﷺ himself performed saʿy during his pilgrimages and instructed Muslims regarding its rites and significance. Consequently, Ṣafā became permanently associated with devotion, remembrance, and submission to Allah.
Classical Muslim scholars regarded Ṣafā as one of the visible symbols (shaʿāʾir) of Islam and an enduring reminder of the spiritual legacy of Ibrāhīm (RA) and his family. sīrah and ḥadīth sources frequently mention Ṣafā in relation to the Prophet’s public preaching, pilgrimage practices, and the sacred geography of Makkah.
In Islamic historical and devotional tradition, Ṣafā represents both the beginnings of the Prophet’s public mission and the continuity of Abrahamic worship within Islam. Its association with revelation, daʿwah, and pilgrimage gives it a lasting place in the religious consciousness of Muslims throughout the world.
## References
1 Top of FormAl-Qurʾān, 2:158. 2 Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, ḥadīth nos. 3364–3365. 3 Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, ḥadīth nos. 1277–1278. 4 Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad ibn Jarīr al-Ṭabarī, Tārīkh al-Ṭabarī, trans. Syed Muḥammad Ibrāhīm and Ḥabīb al-Raḥmān Ṣiddīqī (Karachi: Nafīs Academy, 1990), 1: 183. 5 Ṣafī al-Raḥmān Mubārakpūrī, al-Raḥīq al-Makhtūm (Urdu) (Lahore: Maktabah al-Salafiyyah, 1995), 614. 6 Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq ibn Yasār and Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Hishām, Sīrat Ibn Hishām, Urdu trans. Syed Yāsīn ʿAlī Ḥusnī Niẓāmī (Lahore: Idārah Islāmiyāt, 1994),2:386. 7 Abū ʿUbayd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Saʿd al-Baṣrī, Ṭabaqāt Ibn Saʿd, trans. ʿAbdullāh al-ʿAmadī (Karachi: Dār al-Ishāʿat, 2003), 1:56-58.7 Muḥammad ibn Abī Bakr ibn Ayyūb Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyyah, Zād al-Maʿād, trans. Rais Aḥmad Jaʿfarī (Karachi: Nafīs Academy, 1990),1- 2: 511- 42.8 F. E. Peters, The Hajj: The Muslim Pilgrimage to Mecca and the Holy Places (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994). 9 Ziauddin Sardar and Zafar Abbas Malik, Mecca: The Sacred City (London: Bloomsbury, 2014). Michael Wolfe, “The Hajj: Pilgrimage to the House of God,” Saudi Aramco World 52, no. 3 (2001): 2–13.