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Tongxin Mosque, the oldest and largest Islamic building in Ningxia
Tongxin County belongs to Wuzhong City, Ningxia. On the high ground in the northwest corner of the old county, there is an Islamic building with the longest history and the largest scale in Ningxia, which has the traditional Chinese classical architectural style——Tongxin Mosque. It has a great influence on the Muslims in southern Ningxia. Historically, it was the center of Islamic academic activities in the area. Many well-known Muslim scholars have studied and preached here. It ranks among the top ten ancient mosques in China.
The temple was first built at the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty. It was built on an abandoned lamasery. The inscription records that it was rebuilt three times during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, the 56th year of Qianlong (1791) and the 33rd year of Guangxu (1907) of the Qing Dynasty. Most early Chinese mosques were built in traditional Chinese architectural styles, and the same is true of the Tongxin Mosque. The overall architecture of the temple is in the classical Chinese palace style, with overhanging beams and cornices, resting hills and ridges, and its shape is quite similar to the Hall of Supreme Harmony in the Forbidden City in Beijing.
The whole temple is divided into inner and outer courtyards, and the outer courtyard is more spacious, where Muslims gather for rituals on major festivals. In front of the temple gate, there is a 9-meter-long and 6-meter-high "Yuezang pine and cypress" brick screen wall, which symbolizes "Allah is omnipotent and immortal, and believers live long and live long." The brick-carved official script couplets on both sides read "All things are born to be part of the master, and all the fans are popular to show the grace of the saints." On the other side of the screen wall is written in Arabic and Chinese: "Concentric Mosque".
Behind the screen wall are three brick coupon gates, with the words "Mosque" written on the middle gate, and the left and right coupon gates are written with "Xinxin" and "Patience" respectively. On the upper part of the coupon gate is a 2-story Bunker Building (Xuanli Building) with four corners and pointed roofs.
Entering from the coupon gate and going up the steps, it is the inner courtyard of the main building, which is opposite to the coupon gate, facing west and east, with a wide view. The worship hall and the imam's house were built on the top. In front of the hall, there are 5 lecture halls in the north and south respectively, forming a triple courtyard layout with the main hall.
worship hall
The Tongxin Mosque is not only a place for Muslim religious activities, but also a cultural relic building with a glorious revolutionary history. On October 20, 1936, when the Red Army of Chinese Workers and Peasants went west, they mobilized the local people to hold a congress of representatives from all walks of life in the temple, and established the first revolutionary regime in the history of the Hui people here - "Hui People's Autonomy in Yuhai County, Shaanxi, Gansu and Ningxia Provinces". "Government" (called Ningxia Province in the Republic of China, and Yuhaibao was the seat of Tongxin County Government), and it is also the first county-level minority autonomous regime in Chinese history.