Hebron
Shaykh Ali al-Bakka was a Sufi scholar who settled in Hebron and became known as al-Bakka, the one who wept often, for his humility and devotion. He and his…
Shaykh Ali al-Bakka was a Sufi scholar who settled in Hebron and became known as al-Bakka, the one who wept often, for his humility and devotion. He and his wife, Fatima al-Ja'bari of a leading Hebron family, are buried at the mosque that grew from his zawiya. The Mamluk governor Husam al-Din Turuntay built the mosque over the graves in 1282, in the reign of Sultan Qalawun, and the minaret was added in the early fourteenth century by the amir Sayf al-Din Salar. The minaret, a hexagonal shaft on a rectangular base with an arched passage into the courtyard, is the original Mamluk part of the mosque, and the rest was rebuilt in the 1970s. The mosque gives its name to the Shaykh Ali al-Bakka quarter in the north-west of Hebron's old city.