Journal of Researches in Islamic Architecture

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Many scholars believe that social modernity in Iran has been started far earlier than era of Reza Shah Pahlavi with its up-down modernization project and it is argued that there has been an innate social process of modernity gradually developed since Qajar period. So it can be questioned that which one of the two cultural models of Modernity and Tradition has been dominating Qajar artifacts and if there were any clear footsteps of cultural patterns of modernity in spaces of everyday life of ordinary people of that time. Here, this question is inquired from the viewpoint of guest’s spatiality of home. Beginning from this question then domestic examples from first period of introducing of modernity to Iran (since Qajar to starting years of Pahlavi Dynasty) with emphasize on cases of city of Tabriz are studied concentrating on effects of the two cultures of Tradition and Modernity on spatial patterns of hospitality within these houses. The hypothesis of productive effect of dialectic of “self-other” on domestic spaces of modern era is put into critical debate. Three basic patterns of domestic spaces (minimal house, maximal one and collective house) are analyzed from viewpoint of spatial-cultural relations. Each of these three patterns has its special theoretical debate in western discourse of early modernity. For each pattern two example of Qajar houses of Tabriz are selected for analyzing of guest space: Amir-Nezam house and Behnam House are considered as maximalist type, Alavi House and Sehhati house as minimal examples and Rastgar house as semi-community house. So the research method is historical-interpretive based on historical texts, assessments and pictures as well as buildings. The maximal pattern is bourgeois’ that is manifested in Victorian examples. In this pattern all spaces are arranged upon a theatrical scene in which actors are homeowners and audiences are guests. This theatrical model as Goffman argued has been extended to contemporary western house. Introduction of large variety of rooms for various presences of guests can be interpreted as a byproduct of this culture. In comparison, in its Iranian counterpart there is no considerable social distance between the host and the guest in spatial order of a conventional party. Such a view has resulted in unifying of guest receiving space and living space which is placed at the central axis of house. This axial position is a socio-cultural characteristic of guest’s spatiality which is not restricted to maximalist ones. Any separation among people during guest presence would be upon vast family divisions which has no relation to guests. Heavy interior decoration of bourgeois’ internal design is eliminated in many houses of rich men of Qajar as our study shows. Two minimalist patterns of early modernity are arguable: dirty houses of Industrial revolution and what has been called “the minimum dwelling” by modernists. The latter is a product of modernists’ social project which was based on reducing home-living in the favor of social presence. It was an essential step to deny private sphere. The guest’s spatiality here was seen as being with others in out-of-home places. So restaurant and saloons occupied the place of parlors. Searching for Iranian transformation like that model has reverse result. We have shown here that in Qajar small houses of Tabriz, there were no conceptual difference in comparison with maximalist houses while historical documents show no sign of development of out-of-home places for guests. The third pattern is the community houses that were seen as utopias of the project of modernity. From the view point of guests’ spatiality, this pattern is movement towards denying any distance between self and other so the stranger becomes host as well as guest. In utopist text of William Morris (News from Nowhere) such a position is articulated. It has been argued by many writers of western culture that it has been common pattern of medieval society that has been destroyed by bourgeois’ culture. If the utopia were to be realized then strangers should be accepted in common spaces without any exception and if the socialist utopia was going on then maximizing use of common facilities would be seen as an instrument to saving the community so any private guest should make use of common ones instead of host’s ones (the example of socialist Russia housing projects). Khanghah of Daravish in the Islamic word pursues such a pattern with the exception of absence of family i.e. these places where completely masculine spaces. So these could not be extended to dwelling patterns of traditional Iran. In Tabriz of Qajar there were no similar examples to multifamily apartments of socialists’ utopias of early 20th century as well as utopian community ones. The only close examples to utopian patterns of modern guests’ spatiality in Tabriz are rare hotels of late Qajar and a house (Rastgar) with a linear and multi-unit plan that cannot be undoubtedly a Qajar house. It is could be said that social analysis of guests’ spatiality of modernity is heavily based on resolving of dialectic of otherness in western society of 19 century. This study shows that real patterns of modernity for guest’s spatiality at home differs greatly from its counterparts of Qajar Iran and those of Qajar could be interpreted far more persuasively with traditional patterns than those of modernity. So now it is possible to put some query on the hypothesis that tells if there was not obligatory modernization project of Rezashah then there would be an innate Iranian Modernity. Full openness toward strangers embedded at the center of utopian views of intellectuals of modernity and has been at the focal point of modern utopias has no essential meaning in domestic culture of Qajar era of Iran because acceptance of guest as a member of family was so deep in cultural-spatial patterns of those people that modern utopian perspective of fading “otherness” in spatial arrangement of hospitality of home has no new message for that people. So it is conceivable that the theory of innate cultural permutation of Islamic and traditional lifestyle of Iranians without Rezashah’s projects cannot be easily confirmed for social history of Iran.

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Mankind is always interacting with an environment that contains various meanings and layers with each of which the environment behaves differently, and on the other hand, this behavior is effectively reflected back to the environment. In recent decades, experimental environmental psychology has sought to help solve the issues posed to human societies by pursuing two objectives of theoretical understanding of human interactions with the environment and applying this understanding in practice. In pursuit of these objectives, the area of knowledge has succeeded to build theories and achieve practical findings. Nevertheless, applying these achievements in an Islamic society faces theoretical and practical challenges in both "description" and "prescription", which in turn necessitates further investigations about "Islamic Environmental Psychology". The present study aims to present an applied paradigm of environmental psychology in interaction with Islamic thoughts, which can be used to organize "location-behaviors" of contemporary living in order to facilitate the realization of an Islamic lifestyle. In regards, the present study began with the three constituents of "location-behavior" that is, humans, the environment and the mechanisms needed for the human-environmental interaction, and posed three questions: what social, psychological and cultural characteristics of humans, from the Islamic perspective, affect the environment? What are layers of the environment that affect humans under certain circumstances? And finally, what mechanisms are required for a human-environment interaction in Islamic viewpoint? To answer these questions, two frameworks were proposed: The first relies on environmental psychology by accepting the assumption about different layers of the environment (from the objective to the subjective environment) and assesses the effect of sociocultural environment in a comparative study. The second framework relies on the Islamic doctrines and develops a reference framework consisting of both Islamic views and environmental psychology views. Following a survey of the two proposed frameworks, the second one was taken as the reference comprehensive framework in this article. To develop this comprehensive framework, the relation between religious epistemology and experimental science was first discussed. Unlike the modern perspective that sets the religion-science-art trinity against the emotion-intellect-sense one, in respective order, or at most assumes a unity between religion and art by mixing emotion with sense, the Islamic perspective holds that religion rules these three areas, and only one aspect of religion is strongly associated with emotions,which is "faith". In the second step, the Islamic version of environmental psychology debate was analyzed in three areas of the individual-entity system within the framework of the anthropology of religion, the collective-social system within the framework of religion’s attitude toward society, and the body-space system within the framework of religion’s attitude toward the body, not as separate distinctive areas, but as three spatial human-environment experiences. That is to say, the fundamental difference of environmental psychology from an Islamic viewpoint is so vast that it expands from the "bodily area" to the "spiritual aspect" in the individual-entity line, from the "corporeal world" to "incorporeal world (the invisible)" in the body-space line, and from "routine patterns of life" to the debate on the "united ummah as a timeless entity" in the collective-social line. In the final step, a three-layer system was devised to discuss the intended paradigm, which includes collective references to the current state of the society and Islamic texts. The first layer includes identifying "local phenomena" as clear points in Islamic jurisprudence and ethics, whose "position" in religious sources is identifiable in behaviors, rituals, sensory perceptions and spiritual perceptions. In fact, theidentified "local phenomena" have not yet really emerged in environmental psychology within an Islamic framework, and if this layer is the only one concerned, this phenomena can be more or less studied in experimental environmental psychology. For practical purposes, the phenomena can be classified in two areas –"general local behavioral-psychological phenomena", indicating phenomena with no direct relationships with the environment,and may only be affected by it, and "specific local behavioral-psychological phenomena", indicating phenomena with an established bodily-environmental aspect. The second layer, which is the first real step toward an "environmental psychology" within the framework of Islam, seeks to identify the (correlative or causal) "relationship mechanisms" between "general” and “specific” local phenomena in religion that have been identified in the previous layer. Finally, the third layer emerges from linking and creating connected loops of general and specific mechanisms of the second layer and through creating a sub-system, and may have certain concepts and components in common with experimental psychology. According to the results, two approaches are applicable in the development of an Islamic environmental psychology paradigm: a conscious approach and a meta-conscious one. The first approach is informed and based on the rules and regulations of jurisprudence and Islamic orders. In this approach, attempt is made to extract the basic concepts by reference to the original Islamic sources and to understand the Islamic position on man-made environment irrespective of the external determination of the past centuries. The second approach is meta-conscious and normative (relying on values and knowledge), is based on the recommended or prohibited behavioral patterns, provides a system for the regulation of behavior-body relationships, and takes priority over mentalities and even time and place values. Although an axiom of all religious doctrines, this approach has been less emphasized in theorizing, compared to symbolic concepts. Compared to the mainstream "behavioral sciences" as "subjective" perspective on the role of social behavior, this approach proposes a middle perspective in forming architecture and an "objective" perspective, based on the role of the subject and object and the third factor, culture, in relation to the role of architecture in society. The final outcome of the present study, that is the Islamic environmental psychology paradigm, aims at producing theoretical and practical knowledge and addresses four conditions: past conditions, i.e., the quality of life before modernism (the popular culture), present conditions, i.e., the current quality of life, desirable conditions, i.e., the quality of life deserved by humans from the viewpoint of Islam, and possible conditions, i.e., the quality of life that can be handled by humans, in order to create behavioral benchmarks in accordance with Islamic view point. The authors recommend that both conscious and meta-conscious approaches can be used, since the conscious approach is based on jurisprudence and orders and thus acts as a framing shell, prevents distortions to some extent, and is also the doorway to theoretical knowledge and implications. also, the second approach as the meta-conscious one, should ideally create environments that are affected by the recommended behavioral patterns of Islam.

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“Islamic-Iranian Model of Architecture” is the strategic scape proposed for future of architecture of Iran. So guiding higher education courses towards this goal could be seen as their mission. In this respect and among architectural graduation courses the course of “architectural technology” has the potential to take leading place because it is attached directly to institute of technology as progressive force of the world today. But this may be its weakness as well as the technology tends to deny any locality in its nature. In its syllabus the current architectural technology course has been ill-attached to cultural priorities. So most recently a two-credit unit is added to its content called “Wisdom of art and technology in architecture”. It seems that the main mission of this class is to describe the technology from the view point of Islamic Wisdom so that prepare an appropriate theoretical stand for architectural technology students. This article is aimed to draw a conceptual framework for technology within Islamic system of world-view. So at first it is tried to locate religious view amongst context of philosophy of technology. In this respect the four-part categorization of Carl Mitcham is taken as main framework of discussion where technology is seen from four directions: physical products, types of knowledge, forms of procedures and goals. He makes a differentiation between religious technology, craft technology and scientific ones. To make a proper relation between Islamic views and current philosophy of technology another division of Mitcham is also taken into account: humanities views versus engineering ones. Humanities philosophy of technology refers to those attempts of philosophers who try to make descriptive insights to essential qualities of man-made tools so the traditional branch of Hikmat (philosophic work of Muslims) can be interpreted as a kind of engineering philosophy of technology. These philosophic analyses try to make a spectrum of creative force from God to human and describe why all man-made world is related to unity of the world. There is no obvious critical debate among traditional philosophic works of Muslims. Three subdivision here are Mash’a’ philosophy of Farabi and Ibn-e-Sina, Ishraq of Sohravardi and the composite reading of Molla Sadra that their influences on debate of technic are respectively considered in Ehsa-o-loloom (Farabi), FotovvatNames (unknown authors) and Resaleh-Senaeieh (Mirfendereski). The critical stand point of humanities branch could be traced among some current attempts of Islamic intellectuals who are originally affected by western critical views. These works are categorized in three groups: social oriented ones are those who see some weakness in Islamic society relation with new technology but put the blame on Muslims’ social approach not modern technology. The so-called Islamic enlightment throughout 150 recent years pursued this way. Among this group Ali Shariati’s thesis of four human’s prison is studied here. The second approach that could be called new-realism that is affected originally by works of Islamic cleric Allame Tabatabaii and then rational positivism of Poper is mainly known with name of Abdolkarim Soroosh who after a modest criticizing of modern technology without denying its positive effects, puts self-protection and independent will towards non-consumerism society as main tool for damping negative effects of new technology. The third approach is a Heideggerian one merged with intuitive school of Sohravardi and Ibn Arabi. Its proactive leader was seyyed Ahmad Fardid and until now has its own followers. In terms of technology this approach is more Heideggerian than Islamic and sees the rescue from evil force of modern technology unavailable unless a great change occurs in in human ontological world.
All six approach described here have some basic weaknesses for current situation either from descriptive view or from critical perspective especially in terms of architectural technology problems. So a new approach is designated here that looks for a fundamental map of relation of three major players: Islam, Human and Technology. Three keywords are used to reach to a basic platform for the debate: humanized Idealism (Kamal), ethical duty orientation (Taklif) and intellectual religious scrutiny (Ejtehad). The first term (Kamal) makes the main criteria of human change in the natural world and describes why the God (Allah) not only allowed the mankind to make changes in nature but also wanted him to do so. But Kamal is at the same time a restrictive term in Quranic view because it makes dependence among all creatures so that the growth of them is linked to each other.  This semi ethical meaning of Kamal is strengthen by more ethical concept of Taklif. Taklif in Islamic context in contrast to Kantian sample is not an ultra-real one but is a deep real and objective phenomena that draws brilliant lines between various rights and duties of not only humans but also all creatures. Here four basic types of Taklif in Islamic view are used to make the main model of ethical evaluation of technology that are four responsibility of human: responsibility for Allah, for the self, for the others and for the environment. Each of them has its own content in Islamic context and has a specific relation with technology that makes them very appropriate for the aimed model-making. Here otherness of every four is considered priory to unity of the “I” and them. So the responsibility is definable and evaluable. Finally this new approach is summarized in a table that can be used for weighting technological inventions in architecture.This table views every technological changes from to basic point: 1. If the technology is harmful for any of the for basic rights. 2. Whether it is generative for the four human relations or not. All evaluations are linked to the Islamic life style but the models of this text can be seen as independent from Islamic context as well.

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Islamic Architecture is a main course in undergraduate Architectural program of Iran which is essentially a historical as well as theoretical one that makes its applicability so rare in design studios while Islamization has been a main goal of recent architectural policies of Iran. It has been a main concern of scholars in the field of architectural education and in this article some proposed approaches to make theoretical and historical data about architecture applicable for design studio are reviewed.
Two main routes are taken for such an application: 1. Architectural institutional approaches are those plans that try to explore structuralistic components of historical building. For example defining their formal order, spatial arrangement and or analyzing its language of motifs in such a way that could not easily accused to copying from old building; these approaches do not widely enter into cultural debates or religion-based issues unless rare subjects as anti-illustrational view in Islam or bold symbols such as Ka’beh . 2. Ex- Architectural institutional approaches are those that concentrate on the human life of the historical buildings. Behavioral researches and vernacular researches are common studies of this kind. These approaches are somehow based on the hypothesis of continuity of at least a few human characteristics during the history. These approaches suffer from theoretical support as well as social acceptability even between scholars of architecture or humanities.
After a review of role of historical precedents in design studies, various approaches taken towards applicability of the course of Islamic architecture (along with some other historical courses in architectural education program of Iranian schools) for design activities in two recent decades are studied. They are formulized within three main branches: 1. Conceptual continuity: scholars of this vision try to find or construct a context for continuing traditional patterns in current time. For such an application their strategy is to emphasize on symbols instead of architectural pure forms so that they could bond it to social long-life norms. Another strategy of them is to identify timeless combinations of form and idea or architectural concept. Courtyard is one of these concepts which is seen as crystallization of spiritual presence at the heat of the building. Although this approach has not yet been successfully used for the course of Islamic architecture it is routinely used for the other course (theoretical basics of architecture). A main barrier for its applicability for design studio is the lack of aspects that could be continued.
2. principal-based approach refers to those ways that believe in existence of some “abstract” humane basics that are fixed throughout time and space. Although its continuity varies through scholar views. Some as Pirnia define five or seven parameters that are specified to Iran not all Islamic regions. But some others proposed global principals for Islamic architecture. Nader Ardalan or Khalil Pirani are two of such scholars. While these principals have not yet empirically approved at least from users point of view it is a main conflict for their educational apply in design studio. From instructor point of view, they have secondary problem of claims of students. Because an abstract principal could be widely interpreted in such a way that any architectural form would be claimed to be based on such principals. 3. Empiricism refers to comparing physical and practical aspects of buildings detached from their historical context. Climatic characters as well as spatial orders are usual themes of this approach. But it is questionable that if mapping or sketching from buildings are useful ways for understanding life of a building to apply its understandings into new designs. Some schools of architecture encourage their students to use formal patterns of historical buildings for free form inspiration. In this way cultural heritage is considered as a consuming source a low-rated thing. Moral problems of this approach for cultural basics of the society should be taken into account.
The main problem with these approaches as anti-historicism or anti-Islamisism. Here the problem of Islam is taken into account as the main subject of the debate. So a new proposal is offered that can be called as “Islamic Critical View” that criticizes works of architecture from the view of its compatibility with Islamic norms. Main feature of this proposed approach is that it takes stability of moral and values of Islamic Tradition of Holy Prophet and Imam’s as its criteria for evaluating historical changes in architectural form. These changes then are put in critical debate in class sessions without any pre-assumption to consider whether they can be supposed as Islamic solutions or not.  So any historical building is an object that has valuable aspects but not made sacred for its history. Since the measure of criticism is put within Islam itself it is less morally harmful for valued heritage. Here high cultural bases are saved and minor cultural themes are weighed against it.

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Identifying ideal user is a basic function of theoretical debates of urban design.  Here, the situation of the concept of” Ideal user” is enquired in three main categories of social theories used in urban design discourses (i.e. socialistic theories, ecologistic ones and performance-based theories) and it is shown that none of them is of enough relevance to Islamic model of socio-spatial relations and there is critical conflicts for their simbiosis. The negation of middle-scaled groups of cultural society (i.e. the family and neighbourhood) in socialistic theories as well as the anti-idealistic and individualistic assumptions in the ecologistic theories make them unreliable for Islamic aims. The performance based theory in its turn bases its debate on non-honest relation from ethical pont of view and has not proper basics for Islamic view. So a new theory based on Quran and Ahadith is proposed for socio-urban interactions that can be summarized as: In Islamic view the out-of-home environment is a place for relations of the kind of the limited home-like ones that emerges from duties and rights that Islam puts on members of Islamic society. So it can be said that urban space is an expansion of the home inner space. And in this model the society is not seen as a unit composed of individualized persons whose individuality emerges by exiting home; but the community emerges from expansion of family nodes and sharing of borders of fields arranged around such centers and so the urban space is formed - in its turn-  upon nucleous made in developing homes. It is not made from summing up personal spaces and not by connection of them by in-between spaces. Here the definition of urban space as none-residential space or third place in which people look for none-residential relations is cicked out. In other words, in searching for Ideal User for Islamic theory of town design we do not look for “Islamic Fleneur” but we search for a human for whom Islam has made duties to become an ideal person and the responsibility of the urban space is aiding him to depart from existing condition to ideal one.

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The issue of the ultimate goal in Islamic architecture, contrary to contemporary views, is not so vague, and to consider "divinity" as this goal would be less controversial. However, this term can take on very variable meanings, and the main issue of the present study is to refine the variable meanings and reach the correct framework from the perspective of Islam. This paper aims to study the role of nurturing architecture from new angles and make its connection with the spiritual dimension of human life clearer. In search of a new theory for reading the mosque in Islam, this paper first criticizes the aesthetic and epistemological approach to the role of the mosque from the perspective of the traditional text and as an approach that places the body or space of the mosque in the position of the spirituality and points out that it lacks the necessary authenticity from an Islamic point of view. Then, by proposing an "instrumental" approach to the role of the mosque in achieving the spirituality instead of a goal, the issue of the relationship between the concept of the mosque and the philosophical discussion of technology can be raised, which opens a new window to understanding the relationship between Islam and architecture. Therefore, while creating a new possibility to include Islamic principles in the design of the mosque, in terms of preventing religious distortions in the mosque and other religious spaces, it can also lead to a more effective approach. In this study, among the five architectural connections as a means of presence, the background connection of the most compatible situation with the Islamic requirements in the field of the mosque is advanced, the design consequences of which should be examined more carefully in the future.