Mumford on religious buildings;

'Though the mass of inhabitants might be poorly fed and overworked, no expense was spared to create temples and palaces whose sheer bulk and upward thrust would dominate the rest of the city. The heavy walls of hard baked clay or solid stone would give to the ephemeral offices of state the assurance of stability and security, of unrelenting power and unshakable authority. What we now call 'monumental architecture' is first of all the expression of power, and that power exhibits itself in the assemblage of costly building materials and of all the resources of art, aswell as in a command of all manner of sacred adjuncts, great lions and bulls and eagles, with whose mighty virtues the head of state identifies his own frailer abilities. The purpose of this art was to produce respectful terror.'

Mumford- quoted in Vale's Architecture, Power and National Identity.

Consider the Ka'ba. A center, wait, THE center of religious focus in Islam, the second largest religion in the world. It is the very heart of the Muslim World, where every Muslim in the World, let alone within range of the building itself, faces towards to pray. Considering the very important social and political role of buildings (eg mosques) in Islam, we can safely assume the design of the first place of worship is um...well, very important.

And what is it exactly? The sole building that God Himself told Abraham and his son Ismael to build, was grandly doned, the 'ka'ba'. Meaning? the Cube. (uh...I've tried really hard to find an important building with more docile a name, I really have...if you guys know one, let me know yeah) Nothing fancy, flashy, or even- complicated. It was simply named as it was (physically- shape wise and all). A cube.

The funny thing is, I didn't even know that was what kaba meant until 2 years ago...and I would bet money on the fact that a lot of people are just as ignorant of the meaning of the word as me...not cuz you people are as thick as me :3 just cuz you've grown up with the word and accepted it for what it is. (...I mean, how many of us ever bothered questioning what Allah actually meant for example? That it was actually a compound of the words Al- and Lah in Arabic which was the name of the Head God the Pilgrim Arabs used to worship at the time, which is why the generic term for God in Arabic is Lah- or 'the' Lah ie Al-Lah etc etc etc raaaaaantover)

So here's an interesting thought. This Mumford dude reckons right, that every centre of political, religious and social movement needs a building to congrigate and control the masses. Basically, architecture of a doctrine is the intergral point of communication between the state and its followers. The look, location, even the size of the building is a physical embodiment of the values the capitol wishes to uphold, and how they want the followers to see these values.

SIZE
e.g. churches.
look:Big, boastful, and egocentric.
logic:the bigger you are- the scarier you are- the more likely people are to actually listen to you

KABA: heighest wall = 14m (original height) Which makes you wonder...why is the Ka'ba so awefully small?

SYMBOLISM
e.g. crosses, government buildings....
look: shields baring lions, bulls, unicorns, eagles
logic: symbols of power, grandeur; physical embodiment of values recognisable by common people

KABA: brick foundation. Black cloth. Text from the Quran scrawled along the bottom (added after it was originally built).

SHAPE
e.g. palaces
look: huge. huuuuuuge. gold. lots of it. pretty statues. tonnes of scary eyes oogling down at you from massive heights. dont move, their watchin ya. from scary knucks and crannies you cant even hope to figure out. cuz once you come inside such a vast building, u cant even hope to know all the ins and outs of it- thats the point u see, with all this gold and all these powerful people inside these powerful buildings, the building has to keep an eye out for its 'followers'

KABA? its a cube. its about the size of a house. wait, looks like one too. Why you gotta come inside? Surround it from all four sides, see that it looks pretty much the same on each side after you've circled it 7 times during the pilgrimage. Say a couple of prayers. Leave. No statues, no pretty decor- no need to complicate an already complex relationship (ie your personal understanding of God, Self and Religon); lets keep it simple eh


So if a building so elementry to a religion is meant to embody and define our relationship with this particular belief; ie God- what does the simplicity and inherent humbleness of teh Ka'ba suggest about a Muslim's relationship with Allah?


Is it one of respectful terror?

And why is the architecture of the Kaba so simple- 'cube'ic- cutting circles around a square...can it be the actual movement of the worshippers contributes towards the symbolism rather than the building itself? the building is nothing without the followers- so its not a one way relationship- but it is what u make it sorta thing...(insert own theories here)

The Kaba's aesthetic is very abstract and formal. Basically, its functionalist design.

'Functionalism can mean almost anything but in the context of the modern movement it means that design comes from the solution of practical problems...'beauty' derived from fitness of its purpose.'

Allsop. The Architect and his Ego

In short. The Ka'ba is the only pretty modernist building I know. Cuz there was no ego on the architects behalf to make it all ugly and complicated. It doesn't need to be big. It doesn't need to be bold. It doesn't even need to be 'different'. It just needs- to let us do our thing. That is all.