Blog Post 3
For my third blog post, I decided to do a sketch which incorporates the idea of Ayah/Ayat from week 2 readings. Ayat’s literal meaning is “verse or sign”, but it can be used in deciphering the Quran with clues pertaining to the rhythm and hymnic nature of the verses. According to “Approaching the Quran” by M. Sells, the idea behind the Ayah is that God is present everywhere through “sound figure, gender dynamic, implicit metaphors in the Quran”, the experience can be amplified so that the person reading the Quran can feel the full emotions. For example, through an intricate echoes, allusions, resonances across a variety of passages the Quran is able to evoke an experience of bushra which is the bearing of good news, and bring upon the feeling that God is truly everywhere because theoretically God is filling the person with emotions. This idea is also key in laying down symbols and depicting cultural tendencies such as describing God in the form of a gender neutral whereas most faiths portray God as a masculine character. To illustrate the idea of the presence of God everywhere even through implicit metaphors, I sketched two different scenarios where the I drew a Quran that has verses. If you look carefully, you can distinguish the different darker parts of the text where the darker parts show the Arabic word for God. On the other hand, I sketched a person reading the Quran. The person reciting utilizes “Tajwid” which is a set of words for songlike recitation. Through this songlike recitation, I depicted the musical notes from the recitation in the shape of the Arabic word for Allah to again illustrate the omnipresent nature of God.