Dome of the Rock • مسجد قبة الصخرة

Caliph 'Abd al-Malik bin Marwan (688 CE - 703 CE) had the مسجد قبة الصخرة Dome of the Rock built in 692 . It had no precedent in Islamic architecture's short history of simple and utilitarian buildings. If anything, the Dome was not functional, it was not even a mosque, but it was commemorative, a monument, a shrine to the Rock and to محمد Muhammad's mission.

Today, the Rock is associated with محمد Muhammad's Night Journey from Mecca to Jerusalem, and from the Rock to Heaven, where he conversed with earlier prophets and God gave him the Islamic doctrine. However, this tradition was only present from the early 8th CENT CE onwards. Its function when built is debated, and discussed below.

Little is known about Islamic perception of Jerusalem and the Dome in the pre-Crusades era. There is an especial paucity under the Umayyad kings, as no Islamic historical sources have been found from the Umayyad era. The earliest Islamic historical sources are from the Abbasid kings, whose mentions of Umayyads are limited to bombastic criticism, failing to mention good, pious acts like al-Malik's building of the Dome.

Thus it has remained a mystery as to the Dome's exact function, and its temporal context in Jerusalem. However, scholar Oleg Grabar posited an accepted theory about the role of the Dome in this era.

Grabar saw the Dome as an injection of Islamic presence into the Holy City. Religiously, its Biblical connotations (see below, comparisons with the Solomonic Temple) and Christian-Byzantine forms implied Islam's continuity with Judaism and Christianity. Politically, al-Malik drew upon classic Levantine and even Iranian motifs to reflect the Umayyads' fresh conquest of the region.

Yet its role would change. In the 8th CENT CE, tradition trumped confusion over where محمد Muhammad ascended to heaven. It grew accepted that the Rock was the site, giving the Dome an additional, still widely adored, significance.

From the 8th CENT CE until the Crusades, the preachings of Abu Bakr al-Wasiti (? - 1019 ) are one of the only sources; his analysis is below. Muslim awareness of Jerusalem was transformed yet again with the Crusades in the 12th CENT CE. Ayyubid king Saladin propagandized about the Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock, exalting their great sanctity to instigate Muslims to join his fight to reclaim them from the Crusaders who had taken Jerusalem.

This congealed and heightened Muslim piety toward the city and its Islamic monuments.

al-Wasiti and the Dome of the Rock

al-Wasiti's brief account of the Dome of the Rock reveals that the traditions regarding Mount Moriah, the site of the Dome and the Temple, were rooted in the Old Testament (except for محمد Muhammad's Night Journey, attested in القرآن‎ the Quran).

Jerusalem's holiness to Islam was primarily Judaic, a heritage to which Islam laid claim. Indeed, Jerusalem's sanctity was likely transmitted by محمد Muhammad's Companions, who were themselves rooted in Judaism and Christianity. al-Wasiti's account reveals essentially three Islamic pre-Crusade traditions about Mount Moriah, the site of the Dome and the Temple.

Further, the Rock itself had several roles,

However, Jerusalem was the sacred spot of David and Solomon, God-sent messengers and God-supported kings. These early associations explain why Jerusalem, not a major urban center nor political capital, was given such priority by the Umayyads. It is also clearer why the king Mu'awiya would choose Jerusalem as where to proclaim himself king.

Dome of the Rock, the Solomonic Temple and the Chuch of the Holy Sepulchre

Across from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was the Temple Mount (Eastern Hill), reflecting the inseparability of Judaism from Christianity. Yet the Temple Mount was left barren under Christian rule, revealing the animosity the latter exerted against the former. The Dome of the Rock responded both to Judaism and to Christianity: it was built atop the Temple Mount, and the site became associated in Muslim thought with the Abrahamic sacrifice; and it was built across from the Church, as Abd al-Malik, seeing the greatness of the qubba of the Holy Sepulchre and its magnificence, was moved lest it should dazzle the minds of Muslims and hence erected the Dome of the Rock (from Al-Muqaddasi).

Priscilla Soucek saw Solomonic precedence in the Dome of the Rock's ornamentation. Solomon's Temple was praised by Islamic sources for its decorations, and it is unsurprising that those same motifs found their way into the outer octagon of the Dome of the Rock. However, Soucek concluded that these associations had more to do with Mount Moriah, the Rock and the holiness of the site; it was not a resuscitation of the memory of Solomon's Temple itself.

Dome of the Rock Inscriptions