The Afaq Khoja Mausoleum is a

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be considered a type o ...

Xinjiang Xinjiang,; , SASM/GNC romanization, SASM/GNC: Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Sinkiang, officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People' ...

; it is the holiest

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

site in the region. It is located some 5km northeast from the centre of

Kashgar Kashgar () or Kashi ( zh, c=喀什) is a city in the Tarim Basin region of southern Xinjiang, China. It is one of the westernmost cities of China, located near the country's border with Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. For over 2,000 years, Kashgar ...

, in Haohan Village (; ''Ayziret'' in Uyghur), which is also known as Yaghdu., page 75. The shrine is visited by sightseers and has been designated as a tourist attraction by Chinese officials.

History

The '' mazar'' (mausoleum) was initially built in ca. 1640 as the tomb of Muhammad Yūsuf, a Central Asian

Naqshbandi Naqshbandi (Persian: نقشبندیه) is a major Sufi order within Sunni Islam, named after its 14th-century founder, Baha' al-Din Naqshband. Practitioners, known as Naqshbandis, trace their spiritual lineage (silsila) directly to the Prophet ...

Sufi Sufism ( or ) is a mysticism, mystic body of religious practice found within Islam which is characterized by a focus on Islamic Tazkiyah, purification, spirituality, ritualism, and Asceticism#Islam, asceticism. Practitioners of Sufism are r ...

master who had come to the Altishahr region (present-day Southern

) in the early 17th century and possibly was also active in spreading

Sufism Sufism ( or ) is a mysticism, mystic body of religious practice found within Islam which is characterized by a focus on Islamic Tazkiyah, purification, spirituality, ritualism, and Asceticism#Islam, asceticism. Practitioners of Sufism are r ...

China proper China proper, also called Inner China, are terms used primarily in the West in reference to the traditional "core" regions of China centered in the southeast. The term was first used by Westerners during the Manchu people, Manchu-led Qing dyn ...

.Due to scanty and imprecise documentary evidence, the late career of Muhammad Yūsuf and the date of his death remain uncertain. According to

Joseph Fletcher Joseph Francis Fletcher (April 10, 1905 – October 28, 1991) was an American professor who founded the theory of situational ethics in the 1960s. A pioneer in the field of bioethics. Fletcher was a leading academic proponent of the potential b ...

's research, Muhammad Yūsuf had worked among Hui and

Salar people The Salar people are a Turkic peoples, Turkic Ethnic minorities in China, ethnic minority in China who speak Salar language, Salar, a Turkic language of the Oghuz languages, Oghuz sub-branch. They numbered 165,159 people in 2020, according to t ...

in present-day

Gansu Gansu is a provinces of China, province in Northwestern China. Its capital and largest city is Lanzhou, in the southeastern part of the province. The seventh-largest administrative district by area at , Gansu lies between the Tibetan Plateau, Ti ...

and

Qinghai Qinghai is an inland Provinces of China, province in Northwestern China. It is the largest provinces of China, province of China (excluding autonomous regions) by area and has the third smallest population. Its capital and largest city is Xin ...

provinces in the mid-17th century, then returned to Altishahr and died there in 1653, poisoned by his rivals. On the other hand, the dean of Hui studies in China, Ma Tong, thought that Muhammad Yūsuf died in 1622, and all preaching in Qinghai and Gansu was done by his son Afāq Khoja. ( Lipman's source is:

, "The Naqshbandiya in Northwest China", in ) Later, Muhammad Yūsuf's more famous son and successor, Afāq Khoja, was buried there as well in 1694. As believed, the tiled mausoleum contains the tombs of five generations of the Afāqi family, providing resting places for 72 of its members.

Description

The mausoleum is perhaps the finest example of

Islamic architecture Islamic architecture comprises the architectural styles of buildings associated with Islam. It encompasses both Secularity, secular and religious styles from the early history of Islam to the present day. The Muslim world, Islamic world encompasse ...

in Xinjiang. A large dome of 17 m is at the center surrounded by four corner minarets with stripes and arabesque floral patterns. Each of the windows of the minarets are in a different geometric pattern while the tops have turrets with an inverted lotus dome and scalloped edges. The entrance to the mausoleum is a majestic facade and a tiled ''iwan''- niche style typical of Central Asian mosques. The tombs are decorated with blue glazed tiles and draped in colorful silks. Inside the tomb hall is the Casket of Iparhan which supposedly carried her from Beijing. There is a mausoleum, four prayer halls which are supported by wooden beams with muqarnas on the capitals, a lecture hall and a cemetery which is still in use by the Ugyhur population and has distinctive mud and brick tombs. A gateway also has blue glazed tiles and there is a pond in the courtyard for people to cleanse before entering.

Gallery

Chinese tourism

In 2015, officials opened a tourist park named Xiang Fei Garden near the mausoleum. The shrine is visited by pilgrims and sightseers especially China's ethnic-Han majority, and has been designated as a tourist attraction by Chinese officials.

References

{{coord, 39, 29, 26, N, 76, 01, 23, E, display=title Kashgar Mausoleums in China Dargahs Major National Historical and Cultural Sites in Xinjiang 17th-century mosques in China