The Importance of Performance

While reading the chapter “Celebrating Religion and Nation; The Festivilization of the Qur’an,” I found myself thinking, ‘isn’t this a little sacrilegious?’ Making Qur’anic recitation into a huge competition (into many huge competitions)? As Rasmussen puts it, the “Festivalization” of religion demonstrated in these recitation competitions combines religion and state authority. “Islamic arts…” Rasmussen argues, “are manifested as authentic Indonesian national praxis” (126). This along with state and corporate sponsorship of these recitation competitions had me thinking that this kind of recitation no longer seems very religious. I thought, if this kind of traditionally religious practice is being performed for monetary gain, personal glory, or upward social mobility, it cheapens or erodes the original intent of the practice.

But thinking more specifically in terms of the sensory information we’re focused on in this class, the acts of learning, performing, and perfecting Qur’anic recitation may actually be benefited by the festivialization of recitation. In the descriptions of the competitions I was reminded of participating in the national Poetry Out Loud competitions in high school. Overall, high schoolers competitively reciting poetry and men and women of all age competitively reciting the Qur’an are very different from one another, but they might have some of the same benefits.

I found in this competition that not only did I gain a much better understanding of the poems through memorization and repetition, but I gained a better understanding of and relationship to the poems by performing them for a crowd. Anyone who’s been in a play or participated in this kind of competition understands the feeling of being taken over in some way, and performing your words as if your brain is on autopilot. I’ve found in those moments and in reflecting on those moments, I’ve grown closer to the poem I’m reciting and I wonder if professional Qur’an reciters have the same experience. You can read the Qur’an over and over, and recite it aloud, alone, to yourself, but I’m guessing that standing in front of a crowd and performing for judges creates a relationship between the reciter and the words that can’t be achieved any other way.