Its glazed tiles were made in Turkey, and its Arabic inscription tells of the Night Journey of Muhammad as described in the Qur'an surah Inside the shrine, an arched wall called the octagonal arcade or inner octagon follows the exterior shape. An open space between this and the central circle forms the inner ambulatory around the Rock, carpeted in lush red. The area between the inner octagon and outer octogan exterior wall forms a smaller, outer ambulatory, carpeted in green.
The two ambulatories recall the ritual circular movement of pilgrims around the Ka'ba in Mecca. The cupola , the interior of the great golden dome, features elaborate floral decorations in red and gold, as well as various inscriptions.
The main inscription in the cupola commemorates Saladin, who sponsored extenstive restoration work on the building. The mosaics of the interior feature both realistic and stylized representations of vegetation and related themes Muslim law forbids the representation of living beings in art.
The mosaics evoke an exotic garden, perhaps the gardens of Paradise. Rich jewelry is also depicted in abundance, including breastplates, necklaces, and a Persian crown with features gathered at the base. The caliph Omar had conquered Persia in , and the mosaics symbolize the Persian crowns he sent to hang in Mecca.
The founding inscription is a monumental meter long line of Kufic script running along the top of both sides of the octagonal arcade inside the Dome of the Rock. On the outer side of the arcade, the inscription quotes Quranic verses glorifying God.
On the eastern side, an inscription gives credit for the building's construction to the Abbasid caliph al-Mamun in the year 72 AH AD. However, al-Mamun reigned from AD, so the inscription clearly represents an Abbasid effort to claim credit for the achievement of the previous dynasty.
Much of the inscription on the inner side of the octagonal arcade exhorts Christians to depart from error of the Trinity and recognize the truth of Islam:.
The columns supporting the inner octagon and the center circle are of different sizes; they were recycled from previous structures. The crosses on some show them to have been taken from churches. There is an internal, Islamic explanation; there is an explanation that relates the building to non-Muslim monuments and functions; and there is what may be called an accidental level, at which the mosaic decoration is simply meant to be beautiful just as the Herodian platform of the Haram may have been chosen simply because it was a large empty space.
The third document in our possession, the inscription, will provide us with a possible solution. The major one, meters in length, is found above the arches of the inner octagonal arcade, on both sides. With the exception of one place where the later caliph al-Ma'mun substituted his name for that of Abd al-Malik, this inscription is throughout contemporary with the building.
The other two inscriptions are on copper plaques on the eastern and northern gates. They, too, have been tampered with by the Abbasid prince, but it has been shown that they should be considered as Umayyad. Verse 3 goes as follows: "And say: praise be to God, Who has not taken unto Himself a son, and Who has no partner in Sovereignty, nor has He any protector on account of weakness.
First They are followed by 4. Believe therefore in God and his apostles, and say not 'Three. God is only one God. Far be it from His glory that He should have a son. His is whatever is in the heavens, and whatever is on the earth. And God is a sufficient Guardian.
The Messiah does not disdain being a servant of God, nor do the Angels who are near Him. And all who disdain His service and are filled with pride, God will gather them all to Himself.
This is Jesus, the son of Mary; this is a statement of the truth concerning which they doubt. It beseems not God to beget a son. Glory be to Him. When he decrees a thing, He only says to it 'Be,' and it is. And verily God is my Lord and your Lord; adore Him then. This is the right way. The true religion with God is Islam; and they to whom the Scriptures had been given differed not until after the knowledge had come to them, and through mutual jealousy.
But, as for him who shall not believe in the signs of God, God will be prompt to reckon with him. The inscription on the north gate is more important since it contains two significant passages. First, 9. But, while it is true that it has become perfectly commonplace, its monumental usage is rarer and this is the first known occurrence of it.
Second, the inscription contains an abridged form of 2. And we make no distinction between any of them and unto Him we have surrendered". The main inscription ends with an exhortation, mingled with the threat of divine punishment, pointing to Islam as the final revelation and directed to the Christians and the Jews "O ye people of the Book". Just as the Dome of the Rock is a monument without immediate parallel in Islamic architecture, so is its inscription unique. Moreoever, it must be realized that even those quotations which later became commonplace were used here, if not for the first time, at a time when they had not yet become standard.
Through them the inscription has a double implication. On the one hand, it has a missionary character; it is an invitation, a rather impatient one, to "submit" to the new and final faith, which accepts Christ and the Hebrew prophets among its forerunners. At the same time it is an assertion of the superiority and strength of the new faith and of the state based on it. One day Muqaddasi asked his uncle why al-Walid spent so much money on the building of the mowque of Damascus.
The uncle answered:. Verily al-Walid was right, and he was prompted to a worthy work. For he beheld Syria to be a country that had long been occupied by the Christians, and he noted there the beautiful churches still belonging to them, so enchantingly fair, and so renowned for their splendor, as are the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and the Churches of Lydda and Edessa.
So he sought to build for the Muslims a mosque that thouls be unique and a wonder to the world. And in like manner is it not evident that Abd al-Malik, seeing the greatness of the martyrium [qubbah] of the Holy Sepulchre and its magnificence was moved lest it should dazzle the minds of the Muslims and nence erected above the Rock the Dome which is now seen there.
And it is a well-known fact that eastern Christianity had always liked to use the emotional impact of music and the visual arts to convert "barbarians. In most cases the "highlight" of the "guided tours" to which they submitted was a visit either to a church where a definite impact was made by the religious representations or to a court reception with similar results.
In the pious accounts of later times the Muslim always leaves impressed but unpersuaded by the pageantry displayed. One may wonder, however, whether such was always the case and whether the later stories should be considered, at least in part, as moral stories intended to ward off defection. That the danger of defections existed is clearly implied in Muqaddasi's story. From a Muslim point of view, therefore, the Dome of the Rock was an answer to the attraction of Christianity, and its inscription provided the faithful with arguments to be used against Christian positions.
It is of considerable importance to recall, finally, that at the very same time the neighboring basilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem was being redecorated by Christians. The new decoration consisted of symbols of the Church's councils, both ecumenical and regional, and including those councils which condemned the monophysite heresy and asserted the trinitarian dogma of Christianity.
The coincidence is certainly not fortuitous. First, the building of a sanctuary on Mount Moriah must have been understandable - and understood - in terms of the body of beliefs which had been associated with that ancient holy spot, since Islam was not meant as a totally new faith but as the continuation and final statement of the faith of the People of the Book. In other words, the Dome of the Rock must have had a significance in relation to Jewish and Christian beliefs.
Second, the first major Muslim piece of architecture had to be meaningful to the follower of the new faith. As we have seen, these themes recur in the analysis of the three types of evidence provided by the building itself.
Its location can be explained as an attempt to emphasize an event of the life of Abraham either in order to point to the Muslim character of a personage equally holy to Christians and Jews or in order to strengthen the sacredness of Palestine against Mekkan claims. The royal symbols in the mosaics could be understood as simply votive or an expression of the defeat of the Byzantine and Persian empires by the Muslims.
Finally, the inscriptions are at the same time a statement of Muslim unitarianism and a proclamation to Christians and Jews, especially the former, of the final truth of Islam.
The inscription forcefully asserts the power and strength of the new faith and of the state based on it. It exemplifies the Umayyad leadership's realization of its own position with respect to the traditional heir of the Roman empire. In what was in the seventh century the Christian city par excellence Abd al-Malik wanted to affirm the superiority and the victory of Islam.
This affirmation, to which was joined a missionary invitation to accept the new faith, was expressed in the inscriptions, in the Byzantine and Persian crowns and jewels hanging around the sacred Rock, and most immediately in the appropriation of the ancient site of Mount Moriah.
Thereby the Christian prophecy was voided and the Jewish mount rehabilitated. But it was no longer a Jewish sanctuary; it was a sanctuary dedicated to the victorious faith. Thus the building of the Dome of the Rock implies what might be called a prise de possession, on the part of Abd al-Malik, of a hallowed area. The Prophet Muhammad, founder of Islam, is traditionally believed to have ascended into heaven from the site. In Jewish tradition, it is here that Abraham, the progenitor and first patriarch of the Hebrew people, is said to have prepared to sacrifice his son Isaac.
This occurs:. The Noble Rock is therefore the Place of Ascension into the heavens! Scholars explain that this is the reason the Prophet saw ascended from Jerusalem rather than Makkah. As mentioned before, the Blessed Masjid Al-Aqsa is the second-oldest House of Allah on Earth, and has thus been a sacred site since the earliest days of humankind. However, the Dome of the Rock Masjid is still in its original structure - and in this sense, it is the longest-standing Masjid in the world!
It is located on a plateau which is four metres higher than the rest of the Blessed Masjid Al-Aqsa sanctuary. Because this is the site of the Noble Rock, it is believed to be the exact place where the Prophet saw ascended into the heavens. The Dome of the Rock Masjid is octagonal, capped at the centre by the famous golden Dome, approximately 20 metres in diameter. It is topped by a full moon decoration which is aligned so that, if you could look through it, you would be looking towards Makkah.
The Dome of the Rock Masjid contains the original mihrab — the oldest mihrab preserved in the Islamic world! It also has seven mihrabs close to the northern entrance, representing the seven days of the week.
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