Mosques play an important infact vital role in a Muslim’s life
As saying prayers five times a day is obligatory along with it is also ordered by Allah to pray in congregations as it is written in the Quran.
“Establish worship, pay the poor-due and bow your head with those who bow (in worship)”
Our Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) told his followers that saying prayer in congregation is 27 times better and rewarding than saying alone.
It is a Muslims belief that when one performs abulation (i.e. washing up for prayers) well, then goes to mosque, with the sole intention of performing prayer, and has no other objective but prayer then every step that he takes in the way for the mosque is raised to a degree and a sing is effaced until he enters the mosque, he is considered as praying as long as he is waiting for the congregational prayer to start. And the Angels continue supplicating for him saying “O Allah be merciful to him and forgive his sins accept his repentance.” (And the angels continue this supplication for him as long as he is in mosque).
Due to these important and vital factors of saying prayers in congregations, building mosques in every Muslim area became essential and customary. In addition to that, why every big Islamic Emperor or ruler built the most stunning architecture, grandeur and design of their time was because of another strong belief for the wealthy and well to do Muslims that whoever builds a mosque for the sake of Allah, Allah will build the same for him in heaven.
That is how the most beautiful architecture and design came out in Mosques that are present today.
These mosques do play a very essential role in our lives, when a Muslim enters the mosque, its architecture, its designs inspires a Muslim and one feels the Greatness of God and to know that the most beloved places to Allah are the mosques, he feels calm and satisfaction of pleasing by being in His house for the sole purpose of remembering Him thanking Him for all His blessings upon him and repenting for his sins asking for forgiveness.
At the heart of many Islamic civilizations, there has been a faith that supplied both cultural unity and a spiritual ideal. Muslims had put their greatest artistic efforts into the search for a higher spiritual level by building beautiful Mosques that have emerged as the masterpiece in art and architecture on the face of the earth.
As the Muslim population grew it became necessary to have larger mosques where the faithful could gather. Large mosques also communicated the power and practise of Islam of the emperors and people of that time.
As the mosque is the most immediately recognisable and purely Islamic building showing the material symbol of a great religion throughout the world. In principal, it need only provide a place for prayer and submission but the great congregational mosques were evolved by constructing and combining number of standard elements in it like outer walls, courtyard, and place for abulation, prayer hall, minaret and mihrab. Yet within this unity, we find variety. Their architecture took different forms in different times and places. We find three broad types: the Arabs, Iranian and the Ottoman. Each of these types has its own unmistakable style. The Arab hypostyle, the Iranian courtyard with iwans courtyard and the massive Ottoman domes and slender minarets are distinct variations that represent different regional histories.
One of the example of great Islamic architecture is the great mosque of Cordoba in Spain. In 8th century Spain was ruled by Arabs and due to which many Islamic art like metal work, and designs of many buildings are the renaissance of Islamic civilization. Mosque of Cordoba is one of the most original creations of Islamic civilizations.
One of the Historian Stierlin’s overall assessment of this mosque is: “with the Cordoba mosque, Islamic architecture had reached the apex of a system which had previously been illustrated by the Amr mosque in Cairo (Egypt) or the Great mosque of the Aghlabids in Khairowan.
