Al-Jāḥiẓ on the senses: Sensory moderation and Muslim synesthesia

Abstract

The celebrated Iraqi littérateur, al-Jāḥiẓ (d. 255 AH/869 CE), devotes a long section of his opus magnum, The Book of the Living, to the topic of “sensation among the various classes of living things.” His observations about the wondrous qualities of the human and animal sensorium are also found elsewhere in The Book of Living and in other of his works. This article traces al-Jāḥiẓ’s sensory theory in its epistemological and ethical dimensions, by pulling together key passages on the five senses from al-Jāḥiẓ’s oeuvre. The article argues that al-Jāḥiẓ develops a characteristic sensory style that is marked not so much by his desire to elevate sight above hearing, or human rationalism over animal sensualism, but rather by his erudite conoisseurship of the natural world and by his deep and measured appreciation of the phenomenon of synesthesia. Given al-Jāḥiẓ’s exalted status in Arabic literary history, his moderate sensory style constitutes an important paradigm on which later thinkers active in the Islamic world could build.