In his book on the etiquette of listening, the eleventh-century scholar Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī develops a scenario which includes the context, the performer, and the listener who all contribute to turn listening into a transformative experience by which the soul of the listener is moved, his or her inner qualities are revealed, and his or her transactions with the Divine are set in motion. This paper explores in what way these elaborations are relevant for contemporary performers of religious chanting in Arab Sunni communities in the Eastern Levant. It understands chanting in Muslim religious practice as “sensational forms” (Birgit Meyer) that serve religious mediation. These sensational forms are both authorised and contested, and al-Ghazālī’s ideas constitute an eminent reference for many practitioners. The paper captures al-Ghazālī’s elaborations in two aspects: first, his conditioned licence of listening to music and singing as a way to engage with the Divine and earn religious merits. Second, an understanding of music’s materiality that is not necessarily bound to sonic properties but becomes evident in the effect music has on listeners. Taking the concept of sorrow (ḥuzn) as an example, I show how al-Ghazālī’s understanding of mediating sorrow, rooted in the appropriation of ancient Greek music philosophy, has given way to a broader understanding of how to convey and evoke sorrow among contemporary performers.
Zusammenfassung
Wichtiges Element schiitischer Identität ist die Erinnerung an den Tod des Prophetenenkels Husein, nach schiitischer Auffassung rechtmäßiger Führer der islamischen Gemeinde, der 680 n. Chr. von Truppen des amtierenden Kalifen Yazid umgebracht wurde. Die Erinnerungsrituale sind hinsichtlich Typologie und Erscheinungsform höchst unterschiedlich; im Zentrum des Interesses standen bisher die Aufführung als Passionsspiel und Formen der Selbstgeißelung. Klagen und Weinen wurden als Hauptcharakteristikum schiitischer Identität ausgemacht. Hier stehen Techniken und Ästhetik der Trauersitzungen (majalis) in verschiedenen urbanen Milieus in Beirut im Zentrum. Die Aufführungen folgen einer vorgegebenen Struktur und sind gleichzeitig inhaltlich und musikalisch flexibel. Klagen und Weinen sind Teil des Rituals und weniger Ausdrucksform einer Mentalität.
The Muslim theologian Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 1111) is one of the most often cited authors when it comes to "music and Islam." His “Book on the Etiquette of Listening and Ecstasy” (*Kitāb Ādāb as-samāʿ wa-l-wajd*), translated into English more than a hundred years ago, is widely circulated among Muslims in the East and West, in Arabic and English, in print and on the internet. This paper re-examines the text against the background of Arab musical theory of the time when it was written, and analyses selected technical terms that allude to concepts rooted in Late Antique musical philosophy and become also tangible in the Qurʾān. al-Ghazālī recognises both aesthetic pleasure and the transformative power of sounds and gives guidance how to channel the hearing perception into a salvific experience.
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