Niujie Mosque

Niujie mosque is an Islamic building of Hui nationality, ranking first among the four mosques in Beijing. The general layout of Niujie mosque has its own characteristics. The temple is on the east side of Niujie. The main hall has to sit West to East. The entrance can only be set at the back of the hall. The gate of the temple is replaced by the moon watching tower. There are three wooden archways in front of the building, with a screen wall across the street to emphasize the entrance.

Niujie Mosque

Niujie mosque is an Islamic building of Hui nationality, ranking first among the four mosques in Beijing. The general layout of Niujie mosque has its own characteristics. The temple is on the east side of Niujie. The main hall has to sit West to East. The entrance can only be set at the back of the hall. The gate of the temple is replaced by the moon watching tower. There are three wooden archways in front of the building, with a screen wall across the street to emphasize the entrance.

Historical evolution

Niujie mosque is the oldest and most magnificent mosque in Beijing. It is also one of the most famous mosques in the world. Now it is a key cultural relic protection unit in China. Niujie worship temple was built in the 14th year of Tonghe in the Liao Dynasty, that is, the second year of Zhidao in the Northern Song Dynasty (996). It was founded by the Arab scholar Nasrudin. In the 10th year of Chenghua in the Ming Dynasty (1474), it was granted the name of "worship Temple" by imperial edict.

Repair of past dynasties

After successive renovations and expansion, the magnificent group of ancient buildings has been formed.

In 960 ad, there was an Arab "Shaihai" (originally meaning "old man" and "elder"). The name of a famous religious scholar in Islam is gewamerdin, who came to Beijing with his son to preach. His son, nasurudin, refused to accept the emperor's offer. He was determined to teach for the mosque, so he asked for the construction of the mosque. In 996 ad, in the 14th year of emperor shengzongtong of Liao Dynasty, Niujie temple was built and began to take shape.

In 1474 A.D., the temple was given the name of "worship Temple". In 1442, a large-scale expansion was carried out. Ming Chenghua ten years (1474), Fengchi granted the name of "worship temple.". In 1696, the temple was restored and expanded according to the style of the Ming Dynasty, gradually forming today's scale. After the founding of the people's Republic of China, the government repaired the temple many times in 1955, 1979 and 1996.

Niujie temple was founded by nasurudin, an Arab scholar who became an official in the Liao Dynasty. After expansion and reconstruction in yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, its overall layout was centralized, rigorous and symmetrical.

The temple covers an area of 6000 square meters, the main buildings are worship hall, moon tower, Xuanli tower, lecture hall, stele Pavilion, pavilion and bath room.

The temple, with its east facing west and its halls, buildings and pavilions arranged on a central axis, is a unique group of ancient Islamic buildings in Chinese style, which combines the two architectural styles of Chinese classical palaces and Arabian mosques.

Main attractions

Niujie mosque is located at 88 Niujie, Xicheng District (Xuanwu District), Beijing, covering an area of about 6000 square meters. It is the largest mosque with the longest history in Beijing. Grand scale, solemn and deep, is the product of the combination of Chinese style ancient palace and Arabic style mosque, is the best of Chinese ancient architecture. The main buildings are worship hall, Xuanli building, Wangyue building, North and South stele Pavilion, big screen wall and so on.

Big screen

Walking into the chapel, you can see a large shadow wall more than 30 meters long. The shadow wall is made of blue bricks and tubular tiles, with a long ridge, stacked jade and waist relief. The design is exquisite. On the right side of the center, there is a well-known stone carving of "four no pictures". The author came here with admiration for his name. The relief on the base of white marble has auspicious clouds and auspicious auspicious auspiciousness on the top and pleasant and peaceful pillow on the bottom. In the middle, the design is a bell hanging on a tree, chess playing under the bell and standing beside the chess. It is vivid and has a long artistic conception. However, there are no figures in the relief, so it is called "Siwu": there are no chess players, no bell players, no admirers, and no incense burners. Asked about the reason, a Muslim friend told the author: when Islam decorates mosques, it often uses plant patterns, geometric patterns and Arabic characters, but it is forbidden to use animal and character patterns.

Moon tower

Around the screen wall, you will arrive at the main entrance of the mosque. The main gate is on the ground floor of Wangyue, with a gold plaque of "datianjun road" hanging on it. The gate is usually closed and only opened on Eid al Fitr and Eid al AdhA. The author walked into the mosque from the convenience door and went to the first courtyard. As soon as you enter the temple, more than 10 meters high Wangyue tower stands in front of you. There is a gold plaque on the blue background of "Niujie worship Temple" hanging on the Wangyue tower. The building is a hexagonal pavilion with double eaves. The top of the pavilion is covered with yellow glazed tiles above and green below. The peacock green sloping ridge is hexagonal and has a golden glazed pottery top. Every year, when Ramadan enters in September of the Yili calendar, the Imam villagers go up to the building to look for the new moon to determine the beginning and end of Ramadan, so it is called wangyuelou.

Chapel

Through the corridor, you enter the second courtyard. The west of the courtyard is the hall of worship, facing Mecca, which is the most important part of the mosque. The main hall has five couplets and three entrances, which can accommodate thousands of people to worship. There is a three-story roof, and there is a vertical half arc shadow wall at the junction of the top of the hall, which becomes a special decoration of the top of the hall. The front is a hexagonal pavilion building, commonly known as kiln hall. The niche on the front of the kiln hall is full of exquisite Arabic and flowers. The arched gate of the hall imitates the Arabian style and falls to the ground in an arc. On the gate ticket of the arched gate, there are the Koran texts with powder and gold, and the words praising the Mukden. The script of the texts is vigorous and powerful. Among them, the ancient Arabian art book style "Kufa style" is rare, and it is valued by Islamic teachers at home and abroad. The pillars are decorated with lotus patterns, all of which are red ground, powder and gold. The ceiling and beams in the hall are painted with "Bo Gu" and "Hua Qi", and various kinds of chandeliers are hung with glass beads and colored glass lampshade. The hall is golden, dazzling, solemn and magnificent, giving people a sense of holiness and solemnity. The floor of the main hall is lined with white felt sheets, waiting for the arrival of Muslims.

Bunker house

Bunk house is in front of the chapel, which is a square pavilion with a double eaves. Bunk house is used to report the time to the church people before worship, so it is also called Xuanli building or wake-up building. Its predecessor is the Zunjing pavilion built in the song and Yuan Dynasties.

North South stele Pavilion

Outside the main hall, there are two North and South stele pavilions. The steles in the pavilions record the historical evolution of the temple, but the handwriting is not clear. Fortunately, the staff of the temple enthusiastically introduced it, so the author has a rough understanding of the thousand year history of the worship Temple: Niujie worship temple was built in the 14th year of Liao Dynasty (AD 996) and was translated by the Arabian Shahai (Shahai, Arabic), which is the name of a religious scholar with high virtue Hoo) Nasrudin. In 1442, a large-scale expansion was carried out. Ming Chenghua ten years (1474), Fengchi granted the name of "worship temple.". In 1696, the temple was restored and expanded according to the style of the Ming Dynasty, gradually forming its present scale. After the founding of new China, the people's Government repaired the temple twice in 1955 and 1979. In 1996, the people's governments of Beijing Municipality and Xuanwu District allocated another 3 million yuan to renovate the ancient temple, making the temple shine again.

North South lecture hall

On both sides of the hall are the north and South lecture halls. There is also a two-story Pavilion in the east of the hall, which is called Xuanli building (also known as bunker building), and is built to call people to worship. There is a counter hall in the east of the building. Now there are ancient porcelain and manuscripts of Arabic scriptures, as well as the classics of various printing plates.

There is a courtyard in the southeast corner of the second entrance courtyard. There are green cypresses in the courtyard. There are two low black brick tombs under the cypresses. The Shaihai tomb at the top of the tomb is the tomb of two elders who came to China to preach and died in the temple at the end of song Dynasty and the beginning of Yuan Dynasty. According to Arabic tombstone records, two Shaihai people, one named Ahmed burtany, from Ghazni (now in Afghanistan), died in the year 679, that is, 1280; the other named Ali imadundin, from Bukhara (belonging to Central Asia), died in the year 682, that is, 1283.

The inscriptions of the two ancient tombs (in Arabic) are well preserved and the handwriting is clear. They are rare cultural relics in China. The inscription praises liangshahai for "devoting all his life to preaching Islam".

Preservation of cultural relics

Niujie temple is one of the treasures of Islamic cultural relics in China. The traditional form of Chinese wood structure is adopted in the construction of the chapel, but the details of the main buildings are decorated with the Arabic style of Islamic architecture. In addition to the buildings in the temple, other important cultural relics are preserved in the temple.

The two Shahai tombs in the temple are the tombs of Islamic elders who came from Arab countries to give lectures in the early Yuan Dynasty. The tombstone is engraved with Arabic characters, vigorous and powerful, with a long history, which is a rare cultural relic in China.

There is a vertical forehead of "imperial edict" preserved in the temple, which is an enlun (hand instruction) issued by the emperor in 1694. The origin is as follows: in the Islamic Ramadan of one year, the Niujie mosque is bright at night, and there is an endless stream of Muslims who come to worship in the temple. For this reason, some people falsely reported to the emperor, and the Hui people gathered and scattered at night, plotting to rebel. The emperor found out that the Muslim people obeyed the Lord's holiness and obeyed the law with no intention of rebellion. Therefore, it was issued that Enron was familiar with all provinces. If the officials and the people were not angry, they would falsely report the Muslim rebellion, and the officials would act first and then act. The Hui people in the world should keep their own halal and not violate their orders. Don't let me down. I love you.

There are also Ming Dynasty ancient porcelain censers, chronicle steles, and manuscripts of the Koran that have been preserved for more than 300 years, as well as Qing Dynasty copper, iron censers, and copper pots, such as one

Chinese PinYin : Niu Jie Li Bai Si