A question about mosques

Society Religion & Philosophy
1

Assalam O Alaikum,

I tried researching this issue, but couldn’t find much. So anyway, here it is. I am hoping some of you may have some insight about this.

We have this mosque in our city, which is in prime downtown location. It was actually a club before, but the community bought it more than a decade ago and converted to a mosque. It has prayers five times a day, plus jumma, plus a host of other community activities, including school on Sundays and community iftaars etc. The inside area of the mosque is quite spacious, but since its in down town so parking spaces are just not there. Our community owns the land and the building, so its completely paid off.

Due to the constant problem about lack of parking space and that the community will out grow this mosque, there is a sugegstion to move the mosque to a more spacious land, and the grand plan includes a huge mosque, a complete Islamic school, s full shopping area exclusively for halal meats and other muslim-focused shops, some residential spaces, offices and a complete ranch for slaughtering animals according to halaal methods. Its a good plan, but obviously it costs a lot of money.

The most logical way to do it is to sell the current land, and use the funds to buy the land and build the new place. We have volunteers who have offered temporary space to accomodate the prayers for the transition period.

However, the issue which has been raised is that once a land has been set up as a mosque, it can NOT be used for any other purpose. Meaning, the land which is the current mosque can not be sold to anyone who plans to use it for any commercial reason. Apparently the ruling is only applied if five times prayers are established in a place, and does not apply to temporary halls rented for Jumma prayers or Eid prayers.

I am just trying to get an idea on what is the basis of such a ruling? Is it in Quran, or sunnah or some other scholarly interpretation?

Thanks for reading the issue, and hopefully we can some insights on this issue.

W’salam and Jazak Allah.

2

The following question and answer might help:

Is it permissible to sell a mosque…?

A similar question is answered on the following page (1/3rd of the way down):

http://www.islamonline.net/livefatwa/english/Browse.asp?hGuestID=4NZyF9

The following web page says that:

“… you can not sell a mosque, (unless it is to be sold in order to build a new one on the same spot, or move it somewhere else).”

http://www.contactpakistan.com/Communitylibrary/Islam/Ramadan/retreat.htm

The following page says:

“Hence all the schools, except the Hanbali, concur that it is not permissible to sell a mosque irrespective of what the circumstances may be, even if it lies in ruins or the people of the village or locality where it is located have migrated and the road to it is cut in such a manner that it is certain that not a single person will pray in it. Despite all this, it is Waajib that it remain in the same state without any change…”

It then goes on to say:

“The Hanbali say: If the residents of a village migrate from the locale of the mosque and it stands in a place where no one prays in it, or if it is too small for the number of people praying in it and its extension or building a part of it is also not feasible without selling a part of it, its sale is valid, and if it is not possible to draw any benefit from it except through sale, it may be sold (al-Mughni, vol. 5, “baab al-waqf”).”

http://huquq.com/maghniyah/selling_of_trust.htm

The book referred to in this last quote, al-Mughni, is one of the most authoritative works on jurisprudence in the Hanbali school, authored by Ibn Qudamah. I can probably take a look at it if you want me to check the details of the quote and if it provides any further information.

Having said that, this is the kind of question that you really need to consult someone who has knowledge of Shariah transactions as often you can’t simply lift an answer from a book in circumstances like this. The peculiarities of each individual case needs to be taken into account.

And Allah knows best.

Iqbal

3

Thanks. I read these links. There seems to be no clear guideline, as either way is permitted with some IF's. I guess we'll just have to go with the local fatwa, which stops from selling the mosque, cz the new location is a few miles away, in a less populated area, although the new location is also supposed to be primarily a mosque with a host of other Islamic-related purposes.

4

My personal opinion would be to move the mosque to the more convenient location. Because if it is in congested location, many people won't be able to join prayers. If it is moved, more people will be able to join prayers. Selling and buying would be one time (most likely), while people will be coming to prayer 5 times a day. I don't see any problem with moving unless there is a clear command from Allah swt.