Mosques
Mosques: Religious and Cultural Significance
“Mosque” in Arabic is masjid, which means “place of prostration.” Worshipers of Allah practice five daily prayers, which involve kneeling and touching the forehead to the ground in “prostration.” In this sense, masjid can be anywhere that one kneels in time of prayer, whether it be in private devotion at home, or in a remote location, or inside a mosque.
Major mosques in cities were commonly known as jami’ (congregational mosques). A neighborhood mosque built next to a tomb was known as a masjid. Muslim worshipers pray towards the Ka’bah in Mecca, which is always the back wall, the giblah wall, of the mosque. On the inside of the giblah wall, there is a niche called the mihrab, with a dome in front of it. To the right of the mihrab is the minbar, a raised structure similar to a pulpit from where the sermon is given.
Mosques became centers for community gatherings, political meetings, discussions of faith, providing for the poor. They also functioned highly as centers for learning, in law and the sciences. They represented the collective body of the Islamic faith, remembering Allah, and are unified in architectural and artistic style.
The Great Mosque of Cordoba
The Great Mosque of Cordoba was built by Abd al-Rahman I on the site of an earlier Visigothic temple, which was also the site of a former Roman temple. Construction was completed in 786. One aspect of this mosque that is most striking is its huge expanse of columns supporting arcades that are painted alternating red and white. This color pattern is closely associated with the famous earlier Umayyad mosques, such as the Great Mosque of Damascus, and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem.
