Qingjing Temple

Quanzhou Qingjing temple is the earliest Islamic building in China and one of the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units announced by the State Council. The earliest and oldest Islamic temple with Arabic architectural style in China. Located in the middle of Tumen street, Licheng District, it is a national key cultural relics protection unit.

Qingjing Temple

Qingjing temple, originally known as Shengyou temple, also known as aisuhab Grand Mosque, is located in Tumen street, Quanzhou City, Fujian Province. It is the oldest existing Islamic Temple founded by Arab Muslims in China. It was first built in 1009 A.D., the second year of dazhongxiangfu in the Northern Song Dynasty, with the year of 400 A.D.

Qingjing temple, covering an area of 2184 square meters, is a stone structure building, which imitates the architectural form of Islamic chapel in Damascus, Syria. It has the characteristics of large dispersion and small concentration in the functional space of Islamic mosque. The main remaining buildings are gatehouse, worship hall, Mingshan hall, etc.

In 1961, Qingjing temple was listed as one of the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units by the State Council,

In the 1990s, it was listed as the only Islamic mosque among the "top ten famous temples in China". Together with Xianhe temple in Yangzhou, Huaisheng temple in Guangzhou and Fenghuang temple in Hangzhou, it is one of the important historical sites of Quanzhou's overseas exchanges.

Evolution of construction

Qingjing temple was first built in 1009, the second year of Dazhong Xiangfu in the Northern Song Dynasty. The year of Qingjing temple is 400 years of the Huili calendar. It was originally named "Temple of holy friends".

By the third year of the Yuan Dynasty (1310, 710 years of Islamic calendar), the temple was rebuilt by ahama, a Jerusalem native, who "built a high hanging dome, widened the corridor, rebuilt the temple door and renovated the windows."

Yuan zhizhengjian (1341-1368) temple is broken, Li people Jin Ali reconstruction.

In the second year of Zhengde in the Ming Dynasty (1507), Wu Jian rebuilt the stele of "Ji" from Yuan Dynasty to Zhengde period, which was "old stele, decayed for a long time without any sign", so he rebuilt it and erected the stele of "Qingjing Temple".

In the first year of Longqing (1567), the wooden pagoda was damaged. The magistrate Wan Qing ordered the abbot Xia Dongsheng and the teacher Su YangZheng to build five floors of the pagoda.

In the 35th year of Wanli (1607), Quanzhou earthquake caused houses to tilt and the corner of the building to collapse. The main buildings, such as the temple gate and the temple of heaven, still maintain their original scale.

In the 30th year of Wanli (1609), Jiang Zhili, the then magistrate, and Li Shiwen, the magistrate, donated their salaries and renovated them, making Lin riyao, the abbot of the school. When the temple tower was rebuilt, it was changed to seven stories, which is the so-called "seven Level Transit". And according to the Taoist Taiji, Liangyi, Sixiang, Bagua, Qianyuan, Jiutian, etc. to design the reconstruction of the chapel hall. In order to avoid the collapse of external walls or adjacent buildings during the earthquake and the collapse of adjacent buildings in a row, we should add corridors and leave alleys between buildings, and remove large stoves used to slaughter cattle to prevent fire.

In the 26th year of the reign of Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty (1687), "Fengfeng in Quanzhou, the pagoda of the worship Temple" (Kangxi annals), has never been restored.

In 1712, Chen Yougong, the local commander in chief of tingyanshao, Fujian Province, and Chen Meilai, the guerrilla of the left army Association of Fujian Province, came to Quanzhou to witness the decline of Islam in Quanzhou. "That is to say, to extend the division to admonish the disciples of our sect, to learn the classics and to interpret the seal script," to revitalize the Qingjing temple in tonghuai street, to run a school in the temple, to learn Arabic, to read the Koran, and to interpret the Koran 》。

In 1952, the gate building was renovated to solve the water leakage and remove the banyan trees.

In 1957, the mottled black brick wall was changed into granite wall.

In 1961, it was listed as one of the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units by the State Council.

In 1983, 12 Hui people living in the temple were moved out to repair the Mingshan hall and build a new small exhibition hall.

In 1997, Mingshan hall was rebuilt and two new arch gates of Qingjing ancient bridge were built.

In 2002, the western wall was rebuilt.

In 2008, the Sultan of Oman made a full donation to build a new chapel in the east of the temple.

Overall pattern

Qingjing temple covers an area of 2184 square meters, with its gate facing south. The main building is composed of three parts: Gate Tower, Temple of heaven and Mingshan hall. It is similar to Damascus style in Syria, and is modeled on the form of Islamic temple in medieval Arab region.

As the orientation of the main building Chapel of the general mosque must face Mecca, the holy land, and Mecca is located in the west of China, the layout of Qingjing temple is the same as most mosques in China, and the whole is east-west. Although there is no clear internal layout, there are also "primary and secondary" in the architectural distribution. For example, after years of reconstruction and expansion, the main hall of worship in Qingjing temple, Fengtian temple, is still in the front of the whole group and close to the entrance of Qingjing temple. And those auxiliary or secondary space, such as the temple personnel housing and water room, are built in the more secret rear area.

In addition to the flexible distribution and obvious primary and secondary, Qingjing temple also reflects the characteristics of Islamic mosque in function space. With the expansion and reconstruction of the past dynasties, the courtyard pattern gradually appeared: there was no clear axis relationship on the whole, but the temple gate tower, Mingshan hall and the new worship hall formed three single axes respectively. That is to say, the distribution of individual buildings seems to be relatively scattered and disordered, but some of them have their own perfect system. For example, the interior of Mingshan hall and the new worship hall include the necessary space for Islamic religious activities, such as worship, bathing and assistance.

Main buildings

a gatehouse

The appearance of the gate building has the traditional Arab Islamic architectural form. The gate faces south, and the entrance is concave. It is 12.3 meters high, 6.60 meters wide, and 3.80 meters wide. It is built with diabase slates and is divided into outer, middle and inner parts. In addition to the brick dome of the third, the first and the second are both round domes and arches made of bluestone, with a similar stone structure pattern to the "caisson" of ancient Chinese architecture. The first pointed arch is connected with the outer layer in the middle of the gate dome, and an exquisitely carved diabase lotus is hung upside down. Taking the lotus as the center, it is built into a radial shape, extending from the upper end along each side of the outer layer, which is like a spider web arched cover. It means that Islam advocates holiness and purity, and the gate tower is decorated with Arabic relief stone carvings.

The structure in the middle diabase pointed arch is carved into a semi dome shape with granite. On the wall of the dome, there are 87 small pointed arches, which are like a honeycomb. Along with the eight huge pointed arch wall doors and niches built on the East and west walls of the gatehouse, as well as the four pointed arch gates which make up the gatehouse and are divided into three floors, the whole gate lattice has 99 large and small pointed arches, symbolizing the 99 names of praising Allah. The inner floor of the gatehouse is a stone square, and the East and west walls are decorated with a huge pointed arch niche. The upper part is a round dome made of green bricks, chalky and without any decoration, symbolizing infinite space.

The two rows of Arabic stone carvings on the back wall of the gate tower record the founding time, renovation time and the earliest name of Qingjing temple.

Lunar Observatory

The top of the gate tower is the platform, and the front half is the "lunar Observatory", which is the place where imams (imams, imams) and villagers stand on the platform before and at the end of Ramadan to watch the rising new moon and decide the date of fast and the beginning of fast. On the platform, walls are built around it. In the middle of the south wall, a pointed arch niche is built inside and outside. In the middle of the north wall, there are two stone inscriptions with Chinese characters "Yue" and "Tai" inlaid on the left and right walls. Due to the influence of traditional Chinese culture, the platform also adopts the cultural structure and cultural meaning of Chinese architecture. 24 "Hui" shaped buttresses are built on the East, West and North walls around the platform, which are shaped like battlements (originally 24 pointed arched windows), symbolizing the seasons of the four seasons in the Chinese lunar calendar. At the four corners of the platform, there are four unique, delicate and exquisite Arabian style minarets, which have become characteristic buildings integrating Chinese and Western cultures.

On the platform, there used to be an arched dome pavilion with Islamic characteristics, called "moon watching Pavilion", for imam, Imam and other villagers to take a rest when they step on the stage to watch the moon. The pavilions and towers on the moon watching platform were destroyed by the Quanzhou earthquake in 1607. In 1609, the prefects Jiang Zhili and Li Shiwen donated money to help them. Xia riyu, the head of Qingjing temple, and Lin riyao, a member of Qingjing temple, were restored. Later, they were destroyed again in the early Qing Dynasty because of the long-term storm, lightning, especially the earthquake.

South wall

The south wall is 23 meters in length, 6 meters in height and 1.02 meters in thickness. Eight large rectangular stone windows are built side by side at the height of 1.82 meters. The windows are 2.85 meters in height and 1.80 meters in width, and people can see the inside. A long row of relief stone carvings of the Arabic Koran are embedded on the top lintels of the windows facing the outer wall of the street.

Worship the temple of heaven

The main hall of worship associated with the gate tower is also called the temple of heaven, and the Arabic name is "Masjid", which is the place to worship Allah. It is a place of Muslim worship, covering an area of about 600 square meters. The lintel is carved with the Arabic Koran.

On the west wall, there are six small niches and four rectangular doors from south to north. Between the niches, there are large rectangular doors with a height of 2.95 meters and a width of 1.60-1.65 meters

Chinese PinYin : Qing Jing Si