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Mecca is a city of surprises. The landscape may be bleak, but everything changes once you’re within the city. The extraordinarily rich texture of the Muslim world unfolds all around you, from the sleek magnificence of the Masjid al-Haram (the Sacred Mosque) to the liveliness of the market-traders.

Ten years ago, when I first visited Saudi Arabia for an Umrah, or minor Hajj, swiftly followed a few months later by the full Hajj, I remember being enthralled by the amazing diversity of my fellow pilgrims: their storied faces redolent of history, romance and drama.

There were dignified-looking Persian clerics, ebullient Hausa traders, deeply tanned Tajiks and tens of thousands of Bangladeshi villagers. Regal Sudanese rubbed shoulders with Baluch and Pathan tribesmen, haughty-looking Cairo housewives, Levantine shopkeepers, Javanese and the occasional European or American. There was a moment when I felt as if the entire world was alongside me as I circumambulated the Kaaba.

Even back then, the city was undergoing tremendous change as increased prosperity in the Muslim world fueled the number of pilgrims. Roads and tunnels were being blasted into existence, buildings were being torn down or hastily constructed — a mishmash of styles that left me wondering what the originals looked like.

All of this came back to me as I walked around the British Museum’s very elegant exhibition entitled Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam (open until mid-April). For anyone interested in understanding the Hajj, the exquisitely curated show (in partnership with Saudi Arabia’s King Abdulaziz Public Library) is a superb eye-opener.

The Hajj is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, something every Muslim must do at least once in his or her lifetime if possible. For many Muslims, it is one of the most important events in their lives, a journey to save and sacrifice for. In November, it’s estimated that more than three million Muslims converged on Mecca for the five-day ritual, one of the largest annual human assemblies in the world.

The British Museum’s exhibition is thorough and thought-provoking. Located inside the Museum’s iconic Atrium, the Hajj exhibition focuses on all aspects of the pilgrimage through the ages.

The displays ranged from the Hajj’s origins and rituals, down to the long (and often perilous) routes that pilgrims trekked.

There were magnificent tapestries from India, Chinese vases for holding zamzam water and Central Asian candlesticks. As the most populous Muslim nation in the world, Indonesia was mentioned many times — ranging from Hajj permits issued during the Dutch colonial period to Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje’s atmospheric sepia-tinted photographs of East Indies pilgrims from the 1880s.

Despite all this diversity, there remains an underlying unity, an inexplicable oneness of sorts. Of course, the ihram (white pilgrims’ robes) and the starkness of the landscape reinforces a sense of purity and simplicity of purpose.

But then again, maybe it was the look in their eyes, the faith and determination that united them all, whether they were from Mali, Azerbaijan or China and despite their very different backgrounds. Or was it the length and difficulty of their respective journeys that had brought them to Mecca?

Having had my fill, I wandered out of the Atrium and to the Asia exhibits. Faith was also on display here, but of every different kind: sculptures of the Buddha stood next to carvings from Hindu temples. And yet for some reason, I, a Muslim from Southeast Asia, felt at ease and indeed enjoyed viewing these artifacts just as much as those in the Hajj exhibit. They were part of my heritage, too.

It struck me as I left that perhaps that is the secret of Islam’s greatness: namely, its ability to adapt wherever it goes, but also to unite more than a billion people in shared belief.

I also found it profound that the Hajj and Islam — a faith of complete submission to Allah — should be so celebrated in a museum, the product of the humanistic Enlightenment that was inspired by the exact opposite sentiment.

Another thought struck me: that the majority of the visitors to the exhibition were clearly non-Muslim. It occurred to me that it would be highly unlikely for a similar exhibition on, say, Easter to be held in a museum in a majority-Muslim city such as Cairo, Karachi or even Jakarta despite the shared Abrahamic origins of Islam and Christianity.

Could it also be, then, that this turning away from Islam’s tradition of openness, of closing hearts and minds by far too many Muslims, is the source of many of our current problems?

Karim Raslan is a columnist who divides his time between Malaysia and Indonesia.