Most Muslims are not Arab
Around 1.9 billion people are Muslim, roughly a quarter of the world. Only about one in five of them is Arab. The country with the largest Muslim population is Indonesia, followed by Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, and there are large Muslim communities across Africa, Central Asia, Europe and the Americas.
Muslims believe in one God — ALLAH is simply the Arabic word for God, and Arabic-speaking Christians use it too — and that the PROPHET MUHAMMAD, born in MECCA around 570, was the last of a line of prophets that includes Abraham, Moses and Jesus. In 622 he and his followers moved to MEDINA, and the Islamic calendar counts its years from that journey.
The Five Pillars
Islam describes five duties at the heart of Muslim life. The first is the declaration of faith, that there is no god but God and Muhammad is his messenger. SALAH is PRAYER five times a day, facing Mecca. ZAKAT is giving a fixed share of savings, usually two and a half per cent, to people in need.
SAWM is FASTING from dawn to sunset during the month of RAMADAN, and EID marks its end — our Ramadan page covers the month itself. HAJJ is the PILGRIMAGE to Mecca, which every adult Muslim who is able and can afford it should make at least once. Around two million people take part each year, circling the KAABA, the cube-shaped building at the centre of the Grand Mosque.
The Quran is meant to be heard
Muslims believe the QURAN was revealed to Muhammad by the angel Gabriel over about twenty-three years, in Arabic. The word Quran means recitation, and it is recited aloud in prayer and learned by heart; a person who has memorised all of it, more than 6,000 verses, is called a hafiz, and many start as children. Translations exist in most languages, but they are treated as explanations of the meaning, and the Arabic remains the Quran itself. It has 114 chapters, called surahs, and after the short opening chapter they are arranged roughly from longest to shortest rather than in the order they were revealed, so a reader meets the longest passages first.
HALAL means permitted, and covers much more than food, though it is most often heard in that sense — meat prepared in a particular way, and no pork or alcohol.
How a mosque works
A MOSQUE has no altar and no seats. Worshippers stand in rows on carpets, and in the wall facing Mecca is a curved niche, the MIHRAB, showing everyone which way to pray. The IMAM leads the prayer from the front. The tower of a MINARET was traditionally where the call to prayer was made, five times a day.
Mosques are not decorated with pictures of people or animals. Instead they use geometric patterns, plant designs and calligraphy — verses of the Quran written in flowing Arabic script, which became one of the great art forms of the Islamic world. The CRESCENT moon and star often seen on domes and flags is a later symbol, linked especially with the Ottoman Empire, rather than one from the religion's beginnings.