Visualizing the Sacred, Monetizing Affect: The Subordination of Qur’anic Authority within Platform Economies

Abstract

The presence of the Qur’an on social media is often assumed to extend the reach of divine revelation; however, this study suggests otherwise. Through a qualitative case study of the TikTok account @sahabatquranofficial, this article analyzes how platform infrastructure intervenes in the sacred text through three intertwined processes: the standardization of meaning, affective engineering, and capital conversion. Data—including ten videos of Qur’anic recitations, commercial content, and account statistics—were analyzed using Bourdieu’s framework of commodification and Srnicek’s theory of the platform economy. The findings reveal that the diverse content of the verses is reduced to a single, aesthetically produced register of “serenity,” which is then detached from the text and converted into economic value through layered monetization. In this configuration, sacredness is maintained as symbolic capital—valued precisely because it is exchangeable—while religious authority is not merely fragmented but systematically subordinated to the logic of the affective platform economy. Criteria for legitimacy shift from interpretive competence to the measurability of platform metrics.