Hagar’s story is the one I came upon when I went to Hajj in 1995 and came across Ali Shariarti’s book Hajj. He was an Iranian Sociologist. His work is actually more relevant to the 21st Century for us High Performing LEADERS today as is the work of Allama Iqbal the Spiritual Father of Pakistan.

However I digress

It is timely that I write this as the Hajj is going on right now

Friday 14th June 2024.

Thousands of individuals are circumambulating around the Kaabah right now.

Thousands of individuals across the world are gathered together doing what Hagar did many centuries ago.

Running between Safa and Marwah the two mountains in Mecca now Saudi Arabia.

They do what a Black Egyptian Woman did.

She ran, staggered, walked, crawled seven times in the raging heat of the desert.

She ran in desperation.

Hagar’s story is about WATER and FLOW and MOVEMENT and not quitting even though your husband, or in this case our case…. humanity has abandoned us.

We feel like that sometimes don’t we as Leaders?

Humans seem to be running towards disaster.

Abandoning values that they held dear in exchange for the greed of power and greed of money.

Now for me there is nothing wrong with power, if you use it for the service of humanity and the same is the case with money.

You hold onto it, both power and money will corrupt you.

Because power and money are ENERGY and not one individual or one group of individuals can hold them.

Both need to be circulating

Both need to be flowing

Otherwise they become stagnant and toxic

Like water does.

Hagar’s story most mosques don’t relate.

Because the REAL story of the pilgrimage both the lesser and the bigger is tied to that flow of movement that seven tuns from Safa to Marwah

It is interesting the circling of the Kaabah is done seven times too?

There is also the seven repeated verses of Surah Fatiha

The Opening Song

Surah means Song

Now imagine this

The HOLDING of the Baby Ismail

The DESPERATION

THE HEAT of THE DESERT

Having only God to rely on

Let’s flip it another way

Hagar’s SEARCH for water

By doing that we are relying on ourselves

Doing something for ourselves?

Our survival depends upon it..

She ran seven times….. seven is a number that is the Seven oft repeated verses Surah Fatiha. Seven heavens. There’s so much in her story.

A LACK of everything

Food running out

Water running out

And in the Bible her story when you read it reveals so much about her character.

Some say she was an Egyptian Princess of Royal blood.

I saw that somewhere.

You see
Hagar is inside every one of us.
An Energy pattern waiting to be activated.

I remember running between Safa and Marwah and thinking how did she do it? She didn’t run in the now air conditioned area but in the heat.
I felt that heat  in 1995 in May. Mecca was not as modern as it is now

And Shariarti says something in his book She is buried there with Ismaili underneath the Kaabah.
Not many know that
We circle the Kaabah we also circle where she is buried
Our mother
We circle God’s house but we also circle our Mother and Ismail who is described as The Father of 12 great nations in the Bible
He the baby……being in the desert is left out in the story as it recited in the mosque just the bit that his heel touching the sand led to the gushing

She and he as a baby are left out of the story of the pilgrimage because there are so many layers to that story that are not even explored by the Imams in the mosque.

Because we are seeing sadly so many women and babies being left emotionally by men today.

Practically left.

Literally left.

This is not being talked about.

Hagar’s story shines a light that sometimes even if you are left in the desert that your resourcefulness, your not giving up, your MOVEMENT results in you finding WATER,

Water leads to Life.

Our bodies consist mostly of Water and this shows THRIVING communities

When I was doing the Hajj in 1995 each time I circled the Kaabah I thought of her and God’s sense of humour
Each time I smiled
And then we have the racism of the vast majority of Muslims especially Arabs Today forgetting their Mother.
You forget your mother you forget yourself
You don’t know your mother you don’t know yourself
To know yourself is to know your cherisher and sustainer

I understand now why The Prophet said all he said about the Mother He knew she was buried underneath the Kaabah. The Station of Abraham we pray a prayer there. Do we say Surah Fatiha for Hagar and Ismail as we circle the Kaabah?

When the Bible is studied Sarah and Leah are often talked about. Not Zilpah and Billah that

In Muslim circles Hagar is hardly talked about yet we run seven times from Safa to Marwah during Hajj and Umrah.

The running
The walking
The staggering

She must have done all those in that heat

The movement is the heart of the Hajj and the Umrah

This is our life journey
Because water is life.
Zam Zam just the phonetics of it conveys ABUNDANCE

FLOW

OVERFLOW

Hagar’s story you see is not just for Muslims it is a story for all of humanity giving HOPE.

In the eyes of every woman including my own I see Hagar

I see the potential of creating communities which are about FLOW and ABUNDANCE and RELIANCE on each other not losing hope.

MOVEMENT

I am The Muslim Alchemist

I am all about transformation and transforming the crap into Gold

Alchemy was discovered by the ancient Egyptians

It is the practice of transforming base metals into GOLD

Hagar’s story is an extremely alchemical one where she transformed desperation to FLOW