Paper short abstract:

I draw on Jamilā’s recurring dream to examine her mode of being-in-the-world vis-à-vis the dead other. This talk centers on the Islamic theories on “vision” and “dream”; what Ibn ‘Arabī considered as khayāl (imagination), an occurrence between the real and the phenomenal worlds.

Paper long abstract:

This talk draws on Jamilā’s recurring dream to examine her mode of being-in-the-world vis-à-vis the dead other. Jamilā imagines Safiyya (an elderly neighbor in Aleppo who was killed during an air bombing) through her dreams. Jamilā had just turned eight years old when she and her family fled Aleppo and resettled in Brooklyn. Jamilā, now a 13-year-old girl, dreams of Safiyya centers on an image of an old women in a white burial cloth prominent in Islamic ritual. Jamilā’s dream became a “selfscape” (Hollan 2004) of her moral experiences and emotions towards the dead other, Safiyya. The discussion of dreams centers on the Islamic theories on “vision” and “dream” and also the symbolic meanings of her dreams, partially Sūfī beliefs relevant in Syria. This mode of relationality highlights the idea that ethics entails infinite responsibility to the other. The world of dream becomes a place where Jamilā described herself as someone who has “committed a sin” by “abandoning Safiyya.” This imaginal space can be analyzed through what Islamic philosopher, Ibn ‘Arabī (1165-1240) considered as khayāl (imagination or a mental image), an occurrence that represents something “between the real and the phenomenal worlds, as do our imaginings” (Landau 1957:60). Khayāl provides both a symbol for reality and also for hidden meanings for Jamilā’s dream. Ibn ‘Arabī believed that during dreams imagination is at its most active stage, where khayāl “gets hold of the experiences of daily life, and presents them to the ‘inward eye’ (of the heart)” (Landau 1957:60).