Bibliotheca Polyglotta

pilgrimage to Mecca (the so-called ‘minor hadj’ which, unlike the hadj proper, need not be performed at a particular time of the year and whose performance involves fewer ceremonies) – WehrCowan1979.

Wellhausen1897 translates the word simply as ‘cult’, in which case it would be from the vb. ↗ʕamara in the sense of ‘to make prosper, cultivate’. It may however have to do, more directly, with the ‘omer’ (Hbr ʕōmär), a central element in the Jewish Pessach rituals. Originally, the ʕumraẗ, like the Pessach, was a spring festival on which a lamb (from the current year) was sacrificed. There was intense exchange between the religions of Arabia of late antiquity, of which many similarities between Judaism, Christianity, pre-Islamic Arabian “paganism”, and Islam give ample evidence.

▪ …

▪ If belonging to ʕam˅ra, cf. ↗s.v..
▪ Connected to Hbr ʕōmär ‘heap/sheaf of grain; cupfull of barley, sacrificed during Pesach’? Cf. "Discussion" below.

▪ Traditionally explained as belonging to a vb. ^†‘to visit’. If this, or what Wellhausen (1897: 78) says, namely that ʕumraẗ means nothing else than »Cultus«, then it is clearly akin to ↗ʕam˅ra in the sense of ‘to cultivate’.
▪ BDB1906 (s.v. ʕMR-3) mentions ʕamara ‘to live long’ and ʕamara ‘to worship’ in the same lemma.
▪ Given that the ʕumraẗ goes back to pre-Islamic times¹ and evidently is related to the Jewish Pessach² (cf. Ar ↗fiṣḥ) in which the ‘omer’ rituals play an important role, we should also not exclude a relation between Ar ʕumraẗ and Hbr ʕōmär ‘(a measure)’ (which in turn is probably akin to Ar ʕamura ‘to be full’ and/or perhaps to Ar ġamura ‘to be abundant (of water), surpass, overtop’, ↗ĠMR).

1. Cf., e.g., art. “ʿUmra” (R. Paret-[E. Chaumont] in EI². 2. Cf., e.g., art. “ʿUmra” (R. Paret-[E. Chaumont] in EI², and Neuwirth2010: 103-4, both with further references.

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► ĭʕtamara, vb. VIII, to visit (s.o., s.th.); to perform the ↗ʕumraẗ : denom. from the latter.

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