Location Pattern of Mosques: The Case Study of Nabi Mosque according to Verses, Hadithes and Prophet's Sira

Abstract

One important characteristic of Islamic culture is the subject of art and architecture that has passed a particular and evolutionary process in dealing with neighboring civilizations and cultures with a supplementary and constitutive role. During prophet’s life (PBUH) and Saudi Bedouin, Islamic architecture began its own identity by establishing Prophet’s Mosque in Medina without any special glaze and decoration but full of eternal concepts. This building is considered in different aspects, however, this article only focuses on one aspect which is the locating of the mosque according to the prophetic pattern of Islamic urbanization in an analytic and comparative method (comparing Verses and hadith with the Prophet’s Sira). Although the location of prophet's mosque was affected by geographic environment and Saudi Arabian native culture, it matches with paradigms of Quran and hadith. Furthermore, it was built by divine order and the characteristics such as: dominance of the urban space, centrality, extensibility and retrofitting, independence, invitation, unity and absorbing the majority, universality, material and spiritual prosperity and development, were noticed. This article intends to investigate the locating criteria of mosques on the base of verses and hadith and compare the result with Prophet's Sira.