Phenomenology of Religious Tourist's Experiences (Case Study: Harsin City)

This study is an attempt to have a phenomenological reflection on experiences of people who travel to Harsin city as a pilgrim in order to pay a visit to the sacred grave of Ememzade Mehdi and Emamzade Bagher. These visitors believe that their travel can be categorized under the name of religious tourism, that is a tourism in which gaining and approaching the sacred is the ultimate goal of participants.
In this research, relying on the concepts and literature of religious tourism, especially the theory of aspects of religiosity, we have tried to interpret the sense-making aspects, justifying devise and practical consequences of travels oriented to pilgrim sacred graves. To do so, we have used a phenomenological approach. Through using this, we tried to apprehend deeply the subjective meanings and intentions people make when countering the sacred place. Here, we see an articulation of tourism and pilgrimage, not just a travel or recreation, but a religious experience by way of tourism.
As researchers, we attended at these two sacred graves in Harsin and observed directly the rituals, rules, mores and customs which direct the behaviors and experiences of pilgrims. We have also used deep individual interview to understand profoundly their ways of being in these places. The samples are chosen through theoretical/purposeful sampling. We interviewed with 20 people about their experiences and the ways they used to encounter with the sacred place.
Discussion and The findings show that, from the viewpoint of visitors, pilgrimage, in practical aspect, means to participate in some individualistic and communal rituals; in epistemological aspect, it renders to increasing in religious knowledge; in faith aspect, it provides the way for reaching intercessor and to gain worldly profits and other-worldly rewards; in spiritual aspect, it provides for them a sense of emancipation and consolation; and finally in the field of consequences, it creates a kind of moral responsibility and social belonging. So, religious tourism has multidimensional aspects and cannot be reduced to a non-distinctive reality.
To understand the subjective and mental conditions that religious tourists experience, it is necessary to attend the space or inter the world of participants objectively and subjectively. The religious sacred place of Emamzade persuade individuals to go beyond their everyday life and ordinary experiences. They feel a kind of spiritual alteration. Pilgrimage is not a tourism just like other kinds of tourism, but it is a mysterious symbolic space which attracts an influence the tourists’ mental and physical conditions. The main point here is that going to Emamzade is nowadays done in the form of tourism as a modern phenomenon.