Klasztor jako przykład planowania akustycznego na tle filozofii i teologii ciszy
Monastery as an Example of Acoustic Design

Summary/Abstract: In my paper I am analyzing the acoustic design of space in cloistered monaster¬ies of the Roman Catholic Church. I am showing the phenomenon of building monastic establishments far from the urban tissue in the context of the polyva¬lent concept of silence which Christian theology applies. In order to present the existential value of silence I am referring to figures of authority in the fields of philosophy (Plato, S. Kierkegaard, L. Wittgenstein), religion (Gnostic mythology, Meister Eckhart) and aesthetics (R. M. Schafer, J. Cage). Following different attempts to define the term “asceticism”, I am inter¬preting “acoustic asceticism” not as an attempt at sound annihilation but rather as a thoughtful ordering of the existing sonic environment. I am elaborating on various examples of acoustic restrictions in the form of vows of silence in hermit orders. I am presenting my analyses against the background of religious studies, which always see a moment of danger in the structure of the sacred. The sacred always requires a borderland between the sacred and the profane. The monks’ preoccupation with keeping silence is an example of that borderland at the acoustic level.

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