The Steamship Hajj: How Empire, Fear and Greed Took on Religion | Episode 17

In 1880, the SS Jeddah was steaming across the Indian Ocean when her captain abandoned ship. He told his rescuers the 1,000 passengers had mutinied and that the ship had sunk. But this was a lie and the case became a cause celebre of British disregard – because the Jeddah’s passengers weren’t any ordinary passengers. They were Indonesian and Malaysian pilgrims – Muslims on their way to Mecca to perform the Hajj.

Join Oswin and Carla and the great writer on religion, Peter Stanford, as we try to understand the mechanics, the money-making and the magic of pilgrimage.

It’s a tale of technology, of power, of disease and migration. It truly is a tale of our times.