What Do You Know About Al-Aqsa Mosque?

A blessed mosque that was mentioned in the Hadith of our Master Muhammad, peace be upon him, the third after the Two Holy places, and the place where Al-Mi^raj happened to Prophet Muhammad, may Allah Bless him and Grant him peace. For many centuries, it remained a center for teaching sciences and knowledge of Islamic civilization, and a field for major religious ceremonies and sultanate ceremonies.

The Building

The Al-Aqsa Mosque consists of several buildings, and it contains several landmarks of up to two hundred landmarks, including domes, corridors, niches, pulpits, minarets, wells, and other landmarks.

It includes both the Dome of the Rock (the Golden Dome) located at its core, and the Al-Qibli Mosque (the black lead dome) located at its southernmost point towards the Qibla.

The area of the Al-Aqsa Mosque is about 144 dunums (one dunum is a thousand square meters), and it occupies about one-sixth of the area of the Old City, and its shape is polygonal or semi-rectangular, irregular, its western side length is 491 meters, the eastern side is 462 meters, the north is 310 meters, and the southern is 281 meters.

Whoever enters Al-Aqsa and performs the prayer anywhere in it – whether under a tree of its trees, a dome from its domes, or on a terrace from its terraces, or inside the Dome of the Rock, or the Al-Qibli Mosque – a prayer is written for him in Al-Aqsa Mosque, so the matter is the same, and there is no difference in Praying between one place and another in it, the credit is all for it.

It includes seven galleries: a middle portico and three on the east side and the same on the west side. These galleries rise on 53 marble columns and 49 stone masts.

At the top of the mosque is a dome. It also has 11 gates, seven of which are in the north, a door in the east, two in the west, and one in the south.

In the Al-Aqsa Al-Sharif Square there are 25 fresh water wells, eight of which are in the courtyard of the Holy Rock and 17 in the Al-Aqsa courtyard. There is also a pool for ablution. As for the drinking pot, the most important of which is Sabil Qaitbay, which is covered with a magnificent stone dome, and attracted the attention of Arab and foreign travelers who visited the mosque, along with Sabil al-Badiri and Sabil Qasim Pasha.

The Al-Aqsa Mosque has four minarets and many domes and terraces that were intended for people of knowledge, mystics and strangers, and the most famous domes include the Dome of the Chain, the Dome of the Mi^raj, and the Dome of the Prophet.

As for the corridors, the most important of them is the corridor adjacent to the Gate of Honor of the Prophets, and the corridor extending from the Gate of the Chain to the Mughrabi Gate, and there are two sundials to tell the time.

The History

Al-Aqsa Mosque is the second mosque placed on the ground after the Grand Mosque, and the evidence for that is what Al-Bukhari narrated on the authority of Abu Dhar al-Ghafari, may God be pleased with him, who said what means: I said, O Messenger of God, which mosque was placed on the earth first? He said: Masjed Al-haram, I said: then what? He said: “Al-Aqsa Mosque,” I said: How much was there between them? He said, “Forty years, then wherever prayer catches you, pray, and its land is like a mosque for you.”

It is more likely that the first person who built it was our Master Adam, peace be upon him, who demarcated its boundaries after forty years of establishing the rules of the Sacred House by order of God Almighty, without there being a synagogue, church, temple, or temple before them. As the construction and reconstruction operations continued on the Grand Mosque, they followed on the blessed Al-Aqsa, for our Master Ibrahim first lived his life, then his sons Isaac and Jacob, peace be upon them, took over after him, just as our Master Solomon, peace be upon him, renewed his building after that.

In the past, the name of the Al-Aqsa Mosque was called the Noble Sanctuary and its facilities, the most important of which was the Dome of the Rock, which was built by Abd al-Malik bin Marwan in 72 AH (691 AD) with the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and it is one of the most impressive Islamic monuments, and then Caliph Al-Walid bin Abdul Malik completed the construction during his reign, which extended between 86-96 AH.

The construction of the current mosque differs from the construction of the Umayyads, as the mosque was built several times in the wake of earthquakes that it has faced over the past centuries, starting with the earthquake that it was subjected to – the late Umayyad rule – in 130 AH, to the earthquake that occurred during the Fatimid era in 425 AH.

Fires And Excavations

On August 21, 1969, the occupation authorities cut off water from the Haram area and prevented Arab citizens from approaching the Temple Mount squares, at a time when a Jewish extremist tried to burn down the Al-Aqsa Mosque. This fire came within the framework of a series of measures undertaken by the Zionist occupation since 1948 with the aim of erasing the Islamic civilizational identity of the city of Jerusalem.

The fire actually broke out and almost came to the dome of the mosque were it not for the desperation of Muslims and Christians in the firefighting operations that took place despite the nose of the Israeli authorities, but after the fire came on the Saladin minbar and caught fire on the southern roof of the mosque and the roof of three corridors.

The Zionists claimed that the fire was caused by an electrical short circuit, and after Arab engineers proved that it was an act of action, it stated that an Australian young man was responsible for the fire and that it would bring him to trial, and it was not long before it claimed that this young man was an insane and then released him.

Most of the countries of the world condemned this fire, and the Security Council met and issued Resolution No. 271 of 1969 with a majority of 11 votes, and four countries abstained from voting, including the United States of America, which condemned the Zionists and called on it to cancel all measures that would change the status of Jerusalem.

The resolution stated that “the Security Council expresses its sorrow for the severe damage caused by the fire to the Al-Aqsa Mosque on August 21 1969 under the Israeli military occupation, and is aware of the loss suffered by human culture as a result of this damage.”

Closing Al-Aqsa

On July 14, 2017, hundreds of Palestinians performed Friday prayers in the streets of the occupied city of Jerusalem after they were prevented from praying in the Al-Aqsa Mosque due to clashes that led to the killing of three Palestinians and the killing of two Israelis. After the end of the prayer, the worshipers chanted what means, “With our souls and blood we redeem you, O Aqsa,” and “Allahu Akbarr.”

The Israeli occupation authorities have arrested the Mufti of Jerusalem and the Holy Land, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, and closed the doors of Al-Aqsa Mosque until further notice.

The closure of Al-Aqsa Mosque to worshipers on the aforementioned Friday is the first of its kind since the Al-Aqsa Mosque fire in 1969.