Mosque, Arabic masjid or jāmiʿ, any house or open area of prayer in Islam . The Arabic word masjid means “a place of prostration” to God, and the same word is used in Persian, Urdu, and Turkish. Two main types of mosques can be distinguished: the masjid jāmiʿ, or “collective mosque,” a large state-controlled mosque that is the centre of community worship and the site of Friday prayer services; and smaller mosques operated privately by various groups within society. A Muslim Place Of Worship The first mosques were modeled on the place of worship of the Prophet Muhammad—the courtyard of his house at Medina—and were simply plots of ground marked out as sacred. Though the mosque as such has undergone many architectural changes, the building remains essentially an open space, generally roofed over, containing a miḥrāb and a minbar, with a minaret sometimes attached to it. The miḥrāb, a semicircular niche reserved for the imām to lead the prayer, points to the giblah, i.e., the dire...