Mosques are at the center of Islamic civilization. As the safe havens of peace and tranquility on earth, mosques are the places where Muslims come together to worship Allah, talk amongst themselves, keep each other informed, and consult on social issues.
Fourteen centuries ago, Allah revealed the Qur’an, the last book of salvation, to mankind through His servant and messenger, Prophet Muhammad (saw). People of all classes, ages, and backgrounds came together under the roof of the same faith, sharing the same feelings and thoughts. The sincere unity of the believers, shaped with the guidance of revelation, created a brand new model of humanity and society. At the center of this social structure are the mosques, each of which is a spiritual candle.
Throughout history, Muslims have built their cities centered on mosques; they have positioned their houses, educational institutions, marketplaces, and common areas of use around the mosques. The fact that the mosque is at the center of life is not only a physical condition but also a civilizational system that includes the worldview. Islamic sciences, Islamic arts, and Islamic architecture were largely manifested in this mosque-centered social life; they developed by blending with different cultures and societies and led to the emergence of magnificent examples of cities, mosques, and madrasas in Mecca, Madinah, Qurtubah (Córdoba), Baghdad, Istanbul, and Samarqand.
The First Mosque on Earth
The mosque is at the center of Islamic civilization, and at the center of all mosques in the world is Masjid al-Haram, described in the Qur’an as “the first mosque on earth”. Allah the Almighty also refers to it as “a blessed sanctuary and a guide for all people” (Ali ‘Imran, 3:96). All the mosques in the world are like its branches. In addition, the Messenger of Allah, while answering questions, said that the first mosque built on earth was Masjid Aal-Haram and the second mosque was Masjid al-Aqsa in al-Quds (Bukhari, “Anbiya”, 40; Muslim, “Masajid”, 1-2).
The Masjid al-Haram is a sanctuary in the city of Mecca, located in today’s Saudi Arabia, which contains the Ka‘bah, an immensely meaningful and sacred structure for Muslims. Wherever Muslims are in the world, they perform prayers by facing towards the Ka‘bah, the Bayt Allah, which means “the house of Allah”. Today, the Ka‘bah is the symbol of Islam and Hajj all over the world with its cube-shaped structure, measuring 10 by 12 meters at its base, and its black cover that has been carefully woven and renewed for centuries.
The Holy Qur’an states that the location of the Ka‘bah was shown to Prophet Ibrahim by Allah, and that he and his son Isma’il raised the foundations of the Ka‘bah (Hajj, 22:26; Baqarah, 2:127). Stones brought from the mountains surrounding Mecca were used in its construction, and the stone that Prophet Ibrahim put under his feet to build the walls during the construction has survived to this day as Maqam Ibrahim. Also located in the Masjid Al-Haram in the eastern corner of the Ka‘bah, Hajar al-Aswad, which means “the black stone”, is considered sacred for Muslims as a stone believed to have been sent down from Heaven. The Zamzam Well, located directly opposite Hajar al-Aswad, about twenty meters away, is also located inside the mosque. Zamzam is the name of the water that was offered to Hajar, the wife of Prophet Ibrahim, by Allah when she was desperate to quench the thirst of her infant son Isma’il.
Muslims Competed for Service
All acts of misbehavior are forbidden in the Masjid Al-Haram, with the Ka‘bah in the middle of its courtyard. Whoever enters it should be safe (Al-i ‘Imran, 3:97). The inviolability and sanctity of this area were also a prevailing belief among the pre-Islamic Arabs. Indeed, the city of Mecca was a religious center even before Islam. People from all over Arabia would come to Mecca for pilgrimage. However, this ancient place of worship was diverted from its original purpose, and the idolatrous traditions and pagan beliefs of the Arabs of Jahiliyyah drove it away from tawhid (monotheism) and its position as the center of tawhid. What was built as a sanctuary for people to connect with their Lord had become a place where people fell into the trap of polytheism (shirk). Although the polytheists tried to forbid Muslims from worshipping in this ancient mosque in the early years of Islam, after the conquest of Mecca in the 8th year of Hijrah, Masjid al-Haram regained its original identity and became the center of monotheism again after being cleansed of idols. In his famous conquest speech, the Prophet (saw) said that the polytheists who took refuge in the Ka‘bah would be safe, preserving the long-standing identity of the mosque.
What did Masjid al-Haram look like at the time of the Messenger of Allah? At the time of the advent of Islam, the Arabs lived a predominantly nomadic life, so architecture was not advanced yet; places of worship and similar structures were built in the simplest forms.
During the time of Prophet Muhammad (saw) and Abu Bakr, the Masjid al-Haram consisted of an empty area around the Ka‘bah. As the number of Muslims increased, this area was insufficient to meet the needs of the community, so ‘Umar expanded the area in the year 638 by demolishing the houses near the mosque, surrounding it with a wall of medium height, and placing torches on these walls for illumination. Nine years after this expansion, ‘Uthman raised the walls of the mosque a little higher, enlarged the area even more, and built a single row of wooden porticoes surrounding the courtyard. In the following years, these activities continued, and the mosque was covered with marble columns and decorated ceilings during the Umayyad, Abbasid, and Ottoman periods. The fact that the Qur’an states that only those who believe in Allah and the Day of Judgment and who perform their prayers properly, pay their zakat, and fear none but Allah shall repair the mosques of Allah (Tawbah, 9:18) has made Muslims throughout history compete with each other in building new mosques and reconstructing existing ones. As a matter of fact, when a portico of the Masjid al-Haram collapsed in 1572, the Ottoman Sultan Selim II commissioned Architect Sinan, the wisest architect in the empire, to completely renovate the mosque, sparing no expense in this endeavor. The Great Architect Sinan dismantled the wooden ceiling of the mosque and replaced it with white-washed domes with gold alams (finials), decorated the interior of the domes, repaired the minarets, and renovated the 19 gates of the Masjid al-Haram, which were subject to constant flooding, by raising the thresholds.
In the following years, Muslims continued to expand and renovate Masjid Al-Haram. Not much of the physical structure of the mosque from that period has survived. The current physical structure of the mosque bears the signature of the Saudis to a great extent. The historical parts that still survive were inherited from the Ottomans who served the holy city for centuries.
The Prophet Muhammad (saw) said of the Masjid al-Haram, “No (religious) journey is to be undertaken except to (pray in) the three mosques” and that the prayers performed here are considered more virtuous than those performed in other mosques (Bukhari, “Fadl al-salah fi masjid Makkah wa’l-Madinah”, 1; Muslim, “Hajj”, 415, 505-513). Both for this reason and because it is a place of Hajj, Masjid al-Haram is one of the places of worship visited by millions of Muslims every year. With its 9 minarets, 99 gates, 190,000 square meters of building area, 61,000 square meters of roof space, and 88,000 square meters of prayer space outside the mosque, Masjid al-Haram has an area of approximately 350,000 square meters, and with the use of the surrounding streets, it is large enough for 1 million people to perform prayers at the same time.
