However, it is not the expansion or collapse of Islam that I want to address directly in this post. Rather it is the method used by Islam to spread a comprehensive culture, a complete and unified way of living wherever it has been established. The purpose for this investigation is to see what, if anything, Christians might learn from the strategy of Islam. Christianity and Islam are competing visions for the world. That is, they both have a global vision. In the first six centuries after Christ the successful spread of Christianity was unrivaled. The birth and spread of Islam from the seventh century on changed the geo-religious map significantly. How did they do it? And what happened to Christianity's global vision. Where is the so-called Christian culture? Where is the unified Christian global vision? Perhaps the best way to answer those questions is by looking at Islam as a mirror of Christianity (see my blog Mirror, Mirror on the Wall). In this way we will see that Islam has done a better job at executing its strategy for the nation of Islam than Christians have for the kingdom of God.
So over the next several days and weeks I will be writing a series of articles that look at the comprehensive Islamic strategy for a unified global culture. In part one, today, we will be looking at Islam's control of the landscape.
Control of the Landscape
When one travels in North Africa or the Middle East there is one image that can't be ignored--mosques and minarets. These are the dominant Islamic images. Islam knows that in order to dominate the religious culture they must control the landscape. This, of course, was understood by earlier Christians. Steeples and bell towers once dominated the landscape in what are now considered Muslim countries. Churches that once dotted the cityscape have now been relegated to obscure places or done away with altogether.
The idea of control of the landscape as a means of creating a unified Christian culture is something that is lost on most Christians here in the West (especially here in America). The Western mind is pragmatic. Therefore, Christians in the West want buildings that are practical, multipurpose, functional, and non-desrcript. On the surface there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with this approach. It may even have much to commend. For one thing it's more affordable. Some have even argued that it is better stewardship. Others approach it from a more theological point of view--The church is not a building, they say. Often Jesus' dialogue with the Samaritan women in John 4 is used as a basis to justify this approach. Worship, said Jesus, is in Spirit and truth. Advocates of the more practical approach to church architecture use this as their proof text to support the thesis that buildings and physical space don't really matter.
The reality, however, is that the dominant ideas embraced by a culture will ultimately determine what the landscape or cityscape look like, and this goes a long way in shaping the overall culture. In the secular West the skyscrapers erected by banks, insurance companies, and corporate headquarters have become the new cathedrals of out time. Human beings will always build temples to their gods. Those temples will reveal something of the nature of the god or gods they worship. In that way they speak volumes. In addition, someone, or some religion is going to control the landscape. That religion, whether secular, Jewish, Islamic, or Christian is going to be the dominant force in shaping the culture. As the landscape goes, so goes the culture.
The question for us is what religious buildings are going to dominate the Western cityscape in the future. Is it going to be the mosque or the church, the minaret or the steeple. You may not think it matters all that much, but history shows that it matters a great deal. Furthermore, the change of the landscape and cityscape will also show us to what extent Christianity will be successful in it's mission especially in the North Africa and the Middle East in the same way that the mosque and the minaret demonstrate the success of Islam over the centuries.
This is something that Islam has know from the very beginning. It has been part of their strategy all along. The Islamic conquerers have always known that if you control the landscape and cityscape you control hearts and minds of the people. Architecture is a means of inculturation. It is part of what it means to build a unified culture. In this regard, Islam is presently doing far better than it's rival Christianity.
If christianity is going to be a cultural force it must control the cityscape. If it is going to defeat Islam then Mosque's must be turned into churches and minarets into steeples.
*For further reading see Philip Jenkins, The Lost History of Christianity, pp. 214ff. I have profited much and borrowed liberally from Jenkins' ideas.
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Glad you are doing this series. In terms of the pervasive Western belief that the aesthetics of a cathedral, or place of worship, don't matter, I believe they are denying explicitly the fact that the sense of sight is the sense that we are most susceptible to. There are physiological responses to what we see, our body reacts and cognitive associations are made because of this one, very powerful sense. I realize that the sense of smell also creates extremely powerful associations, but even those associations cause us to remember visually the things they are associated with. But, more to your point, the pragmatism that has guided the austere architecture of modern churches seems to suggest that Christians are more than willing to abdicate associating beauty with worship of the Almighty; where there should be a building that stands out among the masses, which is representative of what is conducted by the hearts and minds on the inside, there is a bloc that is easily habituated and ignored. One thing that struck me while in Jordan was the fact that the rounded, soft angles of the mosques and minarets sat in stark contrast to the monotony of rectangular residences, or functionally designed places of business. Mosques dotted the landscape and were palpable to the eye. There was never a question of where to worship and who to worship, even if they mosque was old or not maintained well, the associations were still prevalent and consistent among them all. There is something to be said for that, instead of receding into the background in the hope that you would become "relevant". A holy institution that is relegated to arguing about styles of architecture (and ultimately "dumbing it down") for relevancy's sake needs to revisit the issue altogether. Architecture has always been one of those cogs in the wheel of the Humanities that reflects the paradigms of the culture. What does it say about our paradigms when, by design, something as unique as a church can go completely unnoticed in a city or subdivision? When one asks the question "where should we go to church?" The answer is no longer "look for the steeple" but, "look for the little tin sign on the side of the road." Or, for more "successful" churches, "look for the billboard". Pathetic.
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