Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque and Shaikh Lecture

The entrance to Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque

The outside of Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque.
When the Mosque is full this entire court is
filled with people praying. 

The third day of orientation started with an early trip to The Grand Mosque of Sultan Qaboos, which was built from 1996 to 2001. It is the largest mosque in Oman and among the biggest in the Middle East. We were given a tour of almost the entire mosque starting with the gardens and ending with the library. The main prayer room could hold thousands of people in and of itself, but when the entire mosque is filled with people there can be up to 7,000 people praying inside. The architecture was beautiful and exotic with imported carpets from Iran, and bright colors and texts from the Koran all across the walls.  While outside there were vast fields of shiny stone for people who did not get a place inside to pray and the library was as modern as any, with a vast amount of books, mostly in Arabic, for those who want to study Islam in a quiet environment. Perhaps one of the most amazing things about this huge piece of architecture is that the Sultan paid for the whole thing out of his own pocket.

The great hall of Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque

      At around 11 o’clock the group had to leave the mosque because a prayer time was coming up and we would not be aloud inside while Muslims were trying to pray. We went back to the World Learning Center, where we would eventually attend class, to get a few minutes to eat and get some time in with our beloved internet. We then attended a lecture from a Muslim Shaikh and this was a very interesting experience. Being that I am not a religious person, from a solely historical standpoint it was a great lesson on the history of Islam in Oman. However, what I found most fascinating was the respect he had for other religions, mainly Christianity and Judaism, while still remaining devout to his own.