Shops beneath a Mosque

Question

A mosque is being built. May shops be made below it and the mosque above, or not? What is meant by the saying that the mosque extends from beneath the earth (taht al-thara) to above the Pleiades (fawq al-thurayya)?

Answer

It means that all of it remains the right of Allah and the right of the servant (human right) is cut off from it, so that no one can claim ownership of it. Shops may be built around the mosque, along its perimeter; but it should not be that the whole lower floor is shops and only the upper floor is the mosque, with prayer going on above while below Muslims and non-Muslims,…

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

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