Qualla: Qibla

Qibla: Introduction

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. Somewhere near Mecca in the second year after the migration to Medina, Muhammad was leading prayer when a revelation came down, and in the middle of the ritual he turned. The congregation turned with him. Before that moment, Muslims had faced Jerusalem to pray, aligned with the Jewish practice they had known. After, they faced Mecca, a cube-shaped stone building that they believed had been built by Abraham and Ishmael long before any of them. The site of the switch became known as the Masjid al-Qiblatayn, the Mosque of the Two Qiblas. A billion and a half people now turn, five times a day, to face the same point.

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Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

Qibla: One Direction for Many Things

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Orientalist, Public domain. The qibla is the direction of the Kaaba, and Muslims face it for far more than prayer. Animals are turned toward it for slaughter. The dead are aligned with it when buried. Pilgrims enter the state of ihram facing it. Making a supplication toward it is encouraged. Spitting or rel...

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Image: Orientalist | Public domain

Qibla: A Cube, and a Line of Sight

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. The Kaaba is less than 20 meters wide. From Medina, 338 kilometers away, a deviation of a single degree shifts the imaginary line of sight by 5.9 kilometers, more than the entire city of Mecca across. From Jakarta, some 7,800 kilometers away, a one-degree error throws you 100 kil...

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Image: Public domain

Qibla: Before the Astronomers

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Maqivi, CC0. In the first two centuries of Islam, Muslims used whatever methods they had. When Muhammad was in Medina he faced due south, because Mecca is due south of Medina, and the habit of facing due south spread with the early conquests. In al-Andalus at one end of the Islamic world and ...

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Image: Maqivi | CC0

Qibla: The Astronomers Arrive

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ds02006, Public domain. The mathematical qibla begins in Baghdad in the mid-9th century, when Muslim astronomers, working from translations of Greek and Indian texts, developed exact methods to determine the direction of the great circle passing through any point on Earth and the Kaaba. Habash al-Hasib,...

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Image: Ds02006 | Public domain

Qibla: A City Full of Different Qiblas

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit OpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0. The mismatch between folk qibla, astronomical qibla, and the true qibla produced cities where every mosque pointed a different direction. The Egyptian historian al-Maqrizi, writing in the 15th century, recorded the qiblas of Cairo's mosques: 90 degrees (due east), 117 (winter sun...

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Image: OpenStreetMap contributors | CC BY-SA 2.0

Qibla: To the Space Station

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Angnation, CC BY-SA 3.0. Accurate longitudes arrived with 18th- and 19th-century cartographic surveys. GPS made the modern qibla a button on a phone. When a person stands in San Francisco today, the great circle direction to the Kaaba is 18 degrees 51 minutes east of north, which looks wrong on a Mercato...

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Image: Angnation | CC BY-SA 3.0