مسجد مكة المكرمة

Mecca Masjid in Irbid takes its name from the holiest city in Islam, the sanctuary of Makkah al Mukarramah, and by carrying that name the mosque places itself in spiritual orientation toward the Ka'ba that every worshipper faces five times a day. Naming a neighbourhood mosque after Mecca is a gesture of love and longing, a way of bringing a small echo of the Sacred House into a northern Jordanian town that lies some fifteen hundred kilometres away across desert and sea.

Irbid is one of the oldest continuously inhabited places in the Levant, known in antiquity as Arbila and settled since the Bronze Age. Islam reached the city early, through the armies that passed through the Hauran plain after the decisive battle of Yarmouk in the year 636, fought only a short distance to the north under the command of Khalid ibn al Walid, may God be pleased with him. The surrounding countryside, dotted with olive groves and wheat fields, has supported Muslim village life ever since, and the city today is a thriving university town thanks to Yarmouk University and the Jordan University of Science and Technology, whose students fill its cafés and bookshops.

The mosque itself belongs to the plain, dignified Jordanian style. A square prayer hall of pale limestone, a single ribbed dome, one tall minaret with a conical green cap and a tiled courtyard shaded by cypress trees make up its visible form. Inside, the mihrab is finished in warm stone with verses of surah al Baqarah carved around it, and a modest chandelier hangs above hand loomed carpets in deep red.

The rhythm of worship here follows the gentle tempo of the northern highlands. Fajr draws older men in kufiyyeh and young students from nearby dormitories, Jumu'ah fills every row, and during Ramadan tables of mansaf, lentil soup and sweet qatayef appear along the courtyard for communal iftar. On the mornings of the two Eids the takbir rises from the minaret and neighbours greet one another with embraces before walking together to family homes spread across the olive covered hills around Irbid.