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A tomb-shrine in Tarsus built in memory of the Companion Bilal al-Habashi, the first muezzin of the Prophet. It is not his grave; his grave is in Damascus.
His full name is Abu Abd Allah Bilal ibn Rabah al-Habashi. He was born a slave of Abyssinian origin some forty years before the Hijra (c. 581). He embraced Islam through Abu Bakr and was one of the first seven people in Mecca to declare their Islam openly. He became famous as the first to call the adhan, which the Prophet had taught, at his command, in the year 1 (622) or 2 (623) of the Hijra, and he served as the muezzin of the Messenger of God throughout his life.
When Umar became caliph he left Medina and took part in the conquest of many cities and districts of Syria; it is related that in Syria, at the caliph's request, he called the adhan once and moved his listeners to tears. In the year 20 (641), in his sixties, he died in Damascus (or in Aleppo or Darayya) and was buried in the cemetery of Bab al-Saghir.
His Tomb and Complex — The entry TARSUS lists among the important historic monuments of the city the tomb that the Mamluks had built in memory of Bilal al-Habashi. The entry gives no information on the building's date, its architecture, or any mosque or endowment attached to it. The entry records that Tarsus entered the lands of Islam in the reign of Caliph Umar in the year 16 (637), that it was conquered in 761 (1360) by Sayf al-Din Begtemür al-Khwarazmi, the Mamluk governor of Aleppo, and that it passed definitively under Ottoman rule in 923 (1517).
Differing Scholarly Views
The source entries rest on the sira-hadith tradition and on city history; the atlas records the following points only as far as the source goes and takes no side.
The basis of the shrine — The TDV entry does not give the basis of the Tarsus shrine. The entry TARSUS speaks only of a tomb the Mamluks had built in memory of Bilal al-Habashi; it relates no report that Bilal was in Tarsus or called the adhan there. The entry BİLÂL-i HABEŞÎ does not mention Tarsus at all; it says that Bilal took part in the conquest of many cities of Syria but does not list them. The atlas does not go beyond the source on why the building is attributed to Bilal al-Habashi.
Location of the grave — The entry BİLÂL-i HABEŞÎ gives three names for the place of his death: Damascus, Aleppo or Darayya; as his burial place it names only the Bab al-Saghir cemetery in Damascus. The atlas's grave record for Bilal al-Habashi is in Damascus; the building in Tarsus is a memorial, not a grave.
Sources
- TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (DİA) · vol. 40, pp. 111-114, entry “Tarsus”
- TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (DİA) · vol. 6, pp. 152-153, entry “Bilâl-i Habeşî”
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