3

I live in Indonesia where 90% of our population is Muslim. Every mosque in my locality uses high volume loudspeakers during every prayer. All of the mosques make a loud prayer sound, and it seems like they are competing with each other to make loud noise, but their sound is not clear.

My question is: Are these loudspeakers mandatory for every mosque? Or only in Indonesia do they do this?

Improve this question
2
  • 2
    Technology is used to make our lives better. Negotiate with the concerned people not to race, but maintain enough volume as deemed necessary. Loudspeakers are used almost all over the world.
    – servant-of-Wiser
    Commented Jan 11, 2016 at 18:15
  • 3
    If you mean the speakers outside the mosque, some countries use it only when performing Athan(Call to prayer), then they switch to only the inside speakers when praying.
    – onlyforthis
    Commented Jan 14, 2016 at 6:29

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
3

Loudspeakers can't be mandatory since they didn't exist in the time of the Prophet(p.b.u.h) in 600-700 CE. The Islamic traditional method of relaying the voice of the Imam to a large group of people is to have a human repeater.

A little bit of trivia here is that when loudspeakers were initially introduced some scholars considered their use as impermissible since they technically used mechanical sound instead of human sound ... which according to some was the basis of the initial Ijmah to use Azan instead of horns or bells like the Jews and Christians. Similar objections were made for the use of speakers during Salah.

In some Muslim countries loud-speakers are only used for the Athan (call to prayer), and during actual prayer the sound system is converted to a smaller amplifier that limits the sound to the building.

You can have your government representatives pass laws to regulate this.

Improve this answer
2

Loud speakers are used for convenience. Take a note,

  • Without them the Imam had to put in a lot of effort to make his voice reach the last qatar of the mosque.

  • For large congregational prayers Mukabbir (a person from the muktadi assigned to repeat the takbeers)can be assigned from the muktadi. But the problem is, not all the people who are attending the prayers are well educated on the masail of this act. So there is a potential chance of huge mishap if the mukabbir fails to do his duty accordingly.

There may be some other reasons also. For this convenience and inconvenience stated above, all the localities who are able to afford a loud speaker use them in mosques all over the world to ease the flow of takbeers.

But using loud speakers are not mandatory. People use them for convenience.

Everyone should act responsibly and show tolerance and respect.

  • The members of the locality should eagerly join congregational prayers. If anyone attends the prayers with takbeer-e-ula then how will he feel disturbed? (because he is already in the mosque!)

  • In average it takes no more than 34 minutes on average in a whole day to complete the congregational prayers. Among them only 6 raka'ats throughout the whole day have loud reciting. If we accept that inconvenience then it would be a very remarkable example of communal harmony.

Also those who are using the loud speakers should be sensible. I've heard this in multiple occasions from multiple scholars that, "The use of loud speakers should be limited for adhan and congregational prayers." Different prominent scholars strongly condemn the misuse of loud speakers. For any gathering or bayan, the sound must be confined within the gathering. To use loud speakers throughout the streets is not welcomed at all.

In case we have any such issue in our locality, we should ask any elder or acceptable Ulama to look into the matter.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .