Some mosques have specially equipped bathrooms for men and women to wash their faces, arms, and feet. The prayer hall will not have pews or seats; people sit on carpets or rugs. There might be a few chairs available for people with disabilities or the elderly. There are different entrances for men and women, who sit on different sides of the prayer hall.
People will stand, bow, prostrate and sit in unison at different points during the prayer. When a Muslim is praying, they will not talk or respond to you until they have completed the prayer.
You can ask questions before or after. Friday prayers tend to be a longer service, as they include a sermon, customarily delivered in two parts.
The sermon is often entirely or partially in Arabic and is followed by prayers. Depending on the mosque, the service will last anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes. The most important thing to remember during your mosque visit is to be fully present. This is how peace is waged—by taking one small step into the unknown. By getting to know someone who looks different, prays differently, or sees the world differently than you do.
This is how we push back against fear, polarization, and mistrust. This is how we make the more beautiful world together. Pick up the phone today and get in touch with your local mosque. Take one small step toward peace. Tagged: Interfaith Muslim Peacemaking. New here? Create an account. Have an account? Sign In. To protect you, we've sent you a confirmation email to make sure it's really you.
Aslan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. Following the terror attack on two New Zealand mosques last week, many Muslim communities across the world gathered as usual for their most important weekly ritual — Friday prayers.
In the past few years, Muslims have been attacked and killed while praying, many times on a Friday. When you are called to congregational Friday prayer, hasten to the remembrance of God and leave off trade. That is better for you, if you but knew. Muslims believe Friday was chosen by God as a dedicated day of worship. In addition to the prayer itself, which is shorter than the usual midday prayers, Friday services include a sermon, usually given by a professional male Muslim clergy member in Muslim majority countries, but in the West, they are also given by a male lay community member.
Muslim men are required to attend Friday prayers as long as they not traveling, while women are given the option to attend, given their traditional role in the household when Islam was established. In some countries, such as India , Pakistan and Tajikistan , women are not usually permitted to pray in mosques whereas in countries like Iran and Kenya, they attend in larger numbers.
In almost all mosques, men and women pray separately. In some places women are behind the men in the same room and in others, women are in a different room or behind a barrier. The Role of the Mosque Mosques reflect the size and needs of individual Muslim communities, as their members all worship together on Fridays.
Historically mosques have been at the center of education and intellectual life. Inscriptions from the Qur'an adorn the interiors and exteriors of mosques, establishing a strong link between scripture and the place of prayer.
Mosque decoration almost never includes human or animal forms, which are seen as potentially idolatrous. Instead, geometric, floral, vegetal, and calligraphic designs adorn mosques, symbolically recalling the promise of Paradise. Mosques around the World Mosques throughout the Islamic world use diverse building materials and reflect different regional traditions and styles. Despite variations in size and design, the special place mosques hold in Muslim communities remains universal.
View of the courtyard. Shah Mosque, Isfahan, Iran, 17th century. The qibla entrance as seen from inside the courtyard. Sheila Canby: Listen to a conversation between Deniz Beyazit and Walter Denny, on the context of the mosque and ritual. Five daily prayers are one of the pillars of Islam. Deniz Beyazit: These five daily prayers are very important for every pious Muslim. You need to clean your body in ritual terms. And so you wash your hands and you wash your feet.
You take the water—you sniff, actually, the water, so you clean every part of the body. And once you're clean, you can enter the sacred space of the mosque.
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