ʿIrq so that it might stand as an unmistakable marker of the miqāt, enabling everyone who passes that point and intends ḥajj or ʿumrah to enter iḥrām there. Because the absence of a mosque at the site has caused some pilgrims from outside the district to overshoot the miqāt before donning iḥrām—there being nothing to draw their attention to it—and in view of the importance of the matter and the urgent need to make this miqāt plain, the Council resolved to assign His Eminence Shaykh ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Bassām, Shaykh ʿAbd Allah ibn Sulaymān al-Manīʿ (both Council members), and Shaykh ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Muḥammad al-ʿAbd al-Munʿim, Secretary-General of the Commission, to visit the designated miqāt, carefully determine its limits, and specify what is required in terms of a mosque and its ancillary facilities. They carried out the assignment and prepared the requisite report.
During the Council’s forty-first session, held in Ṭāʾif from 18/3/1414 AH to 29/3/1414 AH, the matter was tabled and the Council examined the report submitted by the shaykhs, which reads:
“Praise belongs to Allah, and may blessings and peace be upon the Messenger of Allah, upon his family and Companions, and upon all who follow his guidance. To proceed:
Since the miqāt of Dhāt ʿIrq was entered on the agenda of the fortieth session of the Council of Senior Scholars, convened in Riyadh beginning on 10/11/1413 AH, the Council—as recorded in the first minutes of that session—resolved to charge the two esteemed Council members, Shaykh ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Bassām and Shaykh ʿAbd Allah ibn Sulaymān al-Manīʿ, together with the Secretary-General of the Commission, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Muḥammad al-ʿAbd al-Munʿim, with visiting the miqāt of Dhāt ʿIrq and compiling a report on it that would include a description of the site and a statement of its boundaries, to be presented to the Council in its forty-first session.
In compliance with the Council’s directive, the committee entrusted with the task set out on Saturday, 12/2/1414 AH, for the miqāt of Dhāt ʿIrq. On the outward journey they took the road that runs parallel to Wadi al-ʿAqīq, heading northward from ʿAshīrah toward the town of