Deconstructing the American Mosque: Space, Gender, and Aesthetics

Chapter One: AESTHETIC ORIGINS AND END CONDITIONS

Chapter One AESTHETIC ORIGINS AND END CONDITIONS 1. CONCEPTION: Aesthetics and Monotheism In the performance of daily Muslim devotions, the repeated act of communal prostration intrinsically defines an interval of time and, invariably, a sense of space and place. Communal worship is a devotional act, and space and place can be expressed in terms of a referential cognition, which regulates the spatial order of a mosque (masjid).1 While these remarks provide general information about the function of a mosque, theydo not adequately explain the purpose or the meaning of spatial order. Because spatial order is both a system of aesthetics and the making of architectural space and form, an analytical discourse is required to explain the system and the modalities of architectural expression. In a concise essay entitled ‘‘Symbols and Signs in Islamic Architecture,’’ Oleg Grabar raises a crucial question related to the system and the modalities of architectural expression behind the development of Muslim architecture since the eighth century .. He asks: ‘‘What are the sources of the system, the revealed and theologically or pietistically developed statement of faith, or the evolution of visual forms over fourteen hundred years?’’2 Grabar’s question prompts a fresh inquiry concerning the study of Muslim art and architecture, but there is a ‘‘danger that unique cultural experiences can much too easily be transformed into meaningless and obvious generalities .’’3 From the standpoint of hermeneutics, the American mosque is a unique cultural experience. In our attempt to explain its origin and evolution , it is important that we avoid ‘‘meaningless and obvious generalities.’’ But how do we explain what makes each building a unique expression, or what cultural or environmental conditions have led to the genesis of a particular American style? In view of the Qur’anic mention of the term ‘‘masjid ,’’ which also appears in the hadith literature, there are several ways to address this question and the issues raised by Grabar in order to decipher the meaning of spatial order. Since hermeneutics concerns itself with the analysis of structure, language, and the psychology of human response and behavior, all of these aspects are considered in our analysis of the American mosque. The aim of this chapter is to interpret the unique cultural and religious experiences that affect the modalities of architectural expression.4 Robert Mugerauer has argued that hermeneutics offers many types of interpretation , which may provide our inquiry with a valid discourse about spatial order. Hermeneutics aims not so much to develop a new procedure as to clarify how understanding takes place. It appears radical and has shaken traditional approaches mainly because it attempts to show the limitations and even groundlessness of what has been taken for granted . . . because it focuses on what usually is taken as peripheral and critically brings to the foreground what usually is hidden or transformed in temporal divergences.5 In the introduction to this essay, I explained Ibn ‘Arabi’s theory of deconstruction , which may be used to explain various types of aesthetic treatment . For example, importance is attached to elements that may contain hidden meaning or those that may transform symbolic meaning, two types of modalities that can make an edifice appear anomalous to the naked eye. One good example of hidden or transformed meaning is the adaptation of two minarets in American religious edifices—in the Islamic Center of Cleveland and the Islamic Center of Greater Toledo, both in Ohio. This mode of symbolic expression is related to fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Ottoman architecture; in America, it is an aesthetic anomaly. In chapter , we investigate how Ibn ‘Arabi’s theory of subject and object is useful to our analysis of modes of expression and our attempts to explain aesthetic anomalies.6 Our first analysis of the American mosque is connected to the spatial order of the Prophet’s mosque, built at Madinah in the year  .. At the outset, I propose three interpretations of spatial order, analogous to Ibn ‘Arabi’s theory of subject and object. 26 Deconstructing the American Mosque 1.1: Islamic Center of Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio. Photograph ©  by Daud Abdul-Aziz. Courtesy of Daud Abdul-Aziz. 1. The seminal mosque is a spatial paradigm; it is an archetype, which offers a distinct type of spatial order. Architectural convention and subjective meaning have evolved in response to this type of spatial order. In our discourse, this distinction assumes a new idiom: spatial sunnah. 2. Since...