The most authentic account of the Prophet’s (Pbuh) pilgrimage in the 10th year of his emigration to Madinah is that reported by his companion, Jabir bin Abdullah (RA). He states that when the Prophet (Pbuh) intended to offer the pilgrimage he made his intention clear to all people, and people started to come to Madinah to join him on his pilgrimage in order to offer the rituals of pilgrimage in the same way as the Prophet (Pbuh) did. Jabir describes that when they started their long journey they formed such a large group that he could not see the end of the people either to his front or to his back or to his left or to his right. Other reports suggest that the number of pilgrims who went to Makkah with the Prophet (Pbuh) was about 1,00,000. This is obviously a rough estimate. No one can give any figure with any measure of accuracy. Many people use the term “Haj-e-Akbar” as denoting a pilgrimage when attendance at Arafat happens to be on a Friday. This is a mistaken notion. The term occurs at the beginning of Surah 9 in the Qur’an, where the Prophet (Pbuh) was instructed to make a declaration to all people in Arabia, using the occasion of pilgrimage in order to ensure that all Arabian tribes, wherever they lived, would hear of it. This particular term may be rendered in English in either of the two forms. “The day of grand pilgrimage” or “the grand day of pilgrimage.” This ambiguity led certain people to associate what they term as “grand pilgrimage” with Friday. They claim that if a person offers the pilgrimage in a year when attendance at Arafat coincides with a Friday, he receives the reward of seven pilgrimages. This is the reason which makes many people exert a special effort to go to pilgrimage when it is certain that the day of Arafat will fall on a Friday. In all this, people are mistaken.