Prohibition of Making Graves into Mosques

This is a message from the listener Ahmad Baghdadi, an Egyptian resident in Jeddah, who says: There is a mosque in our country that contains a shrine. Is prayer permissible in this mosque or not? We do not know whether the mosque was built first or the shrine. I request your guidance regarding prayer in this mosque, noting that many people come from their countries to visit this shrine, slaughter animals for it, and place money inside it. Please advise us, may Allah reward you.
Answer: Mosques that contain graves are not to be prayed in, and it is obligatory to dig up the graves and move them to the known cemeteries, so that no grave remains in them, whether the grave of a close friend of Allah or anyone else, whether one called a close friend of Allah or otherwise. Rather, it is obligatory to dig them up and move them to the public cemeteries. It is not permissible to slaughter for graves or offer money to them, nor to offer vows to them. Rather, this is major shirk (associating partners with Allah). Therefore, it is obligatory to dig up the graves in the mosques and transfer their remains to the public cemeteries in a separate pit, each grave in a separate pit like the other graves. As for the mosques, it is not permissible to establish graves in them, because the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) prohibited this and warned against it, and he censured the Jews and the Christians for their doing of it. It is established from him (peace and blessings be upon him) that he said: agreed upon by al-Bukhari and Muslim. And he (peace and blessings be upon him) said, when Umm Salama and Umm Habiba informed him of a church containing images, and that it was such and such: So it was reported that those who build mosques over graves are among the worst of creation. And he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: So he (peace and blessings be upon him) prohibited making graves into mosques.
It is known that whoever prays at a grave has made it a mosque, and whoever builds over it to pray in it has made it a mosque. Therefore, it is obligatory to remove graves from the mosques and not to place graves in them, in obedience to the command of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), and out of fear of the curse that came from our Lord (Glorified and Exalted is He) for those who build over graves. He said: So it is known by this that it is not permissible to make them mosques, but rather they must be separate, and the mosques must be separate. So the graves are in one side, distinct, and no mosques are built over them, and the mosques are far from the graves, with no graves in them, but rather they are free from that. If a grave is found in a mosque, one does not pray in it out of fear of this curse, and out of fear of the means to shirk; because if one prays in the mosque, Satan may make it attractive to him to call upon the dead, or seek aid from the dead, or pray for the dead, or prostrate to the dead, and thus major shirk (associating partners with Allah) occurs.
And because this is from the practice of the Jews and the Christians, it is obligatory that we differ from them and distance ourselves from their path and their bad practice.
But if it is known that the mosque was built over the grave, it is obligatory to demolish the mosque, if the graves were the original structure and then it was built over them, it is obligatory to demolish the mosque. But if it is not known, then the graves are dug up and moved to the cemeteries, and the mosque remains and is prayed in; because the original state is the existence of mosques before graves. Yes.
The presenter: May Allah reward you.