This makes clear the weakness of Abū Muhammad al-Maqdisī’s argument, for the Prophet’s visits—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—to the Mosque of Qubā’ did not involve undertaking a journey, and travelling there does not become obligatory through a vow. His claim that the Prophet’s words—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—“No journeys are to be undertaken” should be understood as merely denying that such travel is recommended admits of two responses.

The first is that this amounts to an acknowledgement on his part that such travel is neither a righteous deed, nor a means of drawing near to Allah, nor an act of obedience, nor a good deed. Thus, anyone who believes that travelling to visit the graves of the prophets and the righteous is a means of drawing near to Allah, an act of worship and an act of obedience has contradicted the consensus. If he travels because he believes it to be an act of obedience, that is forbidden by the consensus of the Muslims. The prohibition thus arises on these grounds. It is well known that no one travels to these graves except for this purpose. If, however, we suppose that a man travels to them for a permissible purpose, that is permissible and does not fall within the matter under discussion.

The second response is that this hadith conveys a prohibition, and a prohibition entails unlawfulness. As for the hadiths mentioned by the questioner concerning visiting the Prophet’s grave—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—they are all weak by agreement of the hadith scholars; indeed, they are fabricated.

None of the compilers of the authoritative Sunan collections included any of them, nor did any of the imams cite any of them as evidence. Indeed, Mālik, the imam of the people of the Prophet’s city, who are the most knowledgeable concerning the ruling on this matter, disapproved of a man saying:

“I visited the grave of the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace.”