Posted on 04/06/2009 10:03:10 AM PDT by Alex Murphy
Worshippers are worried about the validity of their prayers after some 200 mosques were found to point in the wrong direction, the BBC reported Monday.
The issue came to light after people looking down from high-rises in Mecca noticed that niches in many older mosques were not pointing towards the Kaaba — an ancient building in Mecca's Gran Mosque.
Islamic officials reportedly dismissed the concerns, according to the BBC.
"There are no major errors, but corrections have been made for some old mosques, thanks to modern techniques," Tawfik al-Sudairy, Islamic affairs ministry deputy secretary told the newspaper al-Hayat.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Some 200 mosques in Islam's holiest city, Mecca, point the wrong way for prayers, reports from Saudi Arabia say.All mosques have a niche showing the direction of the most sacred Islamic site, the Kaaba, an ancient cube-like building in Mecca's Grand Mosque.
But people looking down from recently built high-rises in Mecca found the niches in many older mosques were not pointing directly towards the Kaaba.
Some worshippers are said to be anxious about the validity of their prayers.
There have been suggestions that laser beams could be used to make an exact measurement.
Tawfik al-Sudairy, Islamic affairs ministry deputy secretary, downplayed the problem in remarks quoted by the pan-Arab newspaper al-Hayat.
"There are no major errors but corrections have been made for some old mosques, thanks to modern techniques," he said.
"In any case, it does not affect the prayers."
ROTFL ... apparently against the will of duh Prophet to use a flipping compass.
Islam has lost its sense of direction?
Like it ever had one(that was legitimate).
Bwaaaa ha ha ha!
Next they’ll learn that there’s no 72 virgins, and that BACON IS FREAKIN’ DELICIOUS!
Given the mindset over there the answer will probably be to tear down the newly built high rises.
memo to the confused Muzzies: It doesn’t matter.
Let’s see, they say that Allah is the same God Christians worship. If that is so it doesn’t matter which way you face because God is omnipresent. Isn’t the same true for allah? He just lives in the east?
Actually, could the Earth have MOVED a bit? That area is not on a fault line, If memory serves, but -— it is possible that the ground shifted a bit, isn’t it?
Like their prayers have been working for them. I guess Moo ham-od was too busy with the baby girls to worry about details in directon.
“Like their prayers have been working for them...”
I submit that their prayers have been answered. They wanted Obama to win the election, didn’t they?
If I were them I’d leave well enough alone.
(I guess they’ve been praying to the backside of he who will remain nameless.)
Meanwhile the direction signs in Gitmo are 100% correct, you can’t please anybody these days.
Why don’t they just by-pass Mecca and go directly to howling at the moon?
Religions are not, and are not supposed to be, made up of purely rational, logical regulations. They all deal with the supernatural, the invisible, and the spiritual, so it is perfectly legitimate for a religion to be concerned about such matters.
I have long shook my head at how religious Jews demand secular rationalism of chr*stians. The past seven plus years I have seen conservative chr*stians demanding secular rationalism of moslems.
Hilarious!
LOL. I have a good idea. How about they build a mosque in the Bermuda Triangle?
Continental drift?
I understand some of the oldest mosques outside of Mecca origionally pointed toward Jerusalem.
Perhaps it’s just their fannies that point in the wrong direction.
The sad truth is that the majority of existing mosques are based on old (and bad) cartography, and the niche or window that indicates the qibla (the official direction of Mecca) indicates the wrong direction. I'm sure God doesn't mind - after all, the Christians got his birthday wrong, too.
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