Metaverse pilgrimages to Mecca will not be considered as “real Hajj”, Turkey’s Directorate of Religious Affairs Diyanet has declared. The ruling follows a month-long deliberation between scholars, who concluded that while virtual reality visits to the Muslim holy city are allowed, they do not fulfil a Muslim’s obligation of making the Hajj pilgrimage – considered one of the Five Pillars of Islam. “This [Hajj on the metaverse] cannot happen,” Remzi Bircan, the director of Diyanet’s Department of Hajj and Umrah Services said earlier this month, according to Hurriyet Daily News. “Believers can pa…

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