distinction between the creation of humans from clay, like pottery, and the
jinn, out of smokelessfire (Q55:14–20).
A smokeless, reductionfire is used for the production of luster, an
iridescent sheen that makes the surface of a pot appear more ethereal than
material. Associated withjinn–supernatural, invisible, and yet material
spirits believed to populate creation–smokelessfire embeds inexplicable
wonder in creation. While the Quran might reference the technique through
its use by potters in pre-Islamic Coptic Egypt, under the Abbasids this
technology was used to make ceramic wares of unstable appearance that
could be understood through an aesthetic vocabulary of wonder (‘ajab)
related to a color (abu kalamun) indicating mutability found naturally in
birds with iridescent feathers, chameleons, or mollusks.^43 Thus the magical
visual qualities of lusterware suggest, through the process of their produc-
tion, the unique nature of divine creation of both human and non-human
beings. Similarly, the frequent practice of making form ambiguous, such as
where an object recalls architecture or an animal, suggests the mutability of
materiality against a backdrop of the absolute divine [seeChapter 2.3]. Some
Sufifestivals involved the construction and destruction of elaborate forms
out of sugar and other temporary materials point to the liminality of matter,
both celebrating material pleasure while emphasizing its ephemerality.^44 The
phenomenon of analogous inkwells and architecture, often underscored by
the use of the same inscriptions, suggests liminality between text and matter,
referencing the material world as that which has been written–a world that
is contained in the Quran, and ultimately provides an analogue of divine
will.^45 Similarly, the common poetic analogue between liquids and solids
suggests a perpetually liminal, atomistic worldview. Functioning by infer-
ence rather than iconography, such signs depend less onfixed significations
than on practices of internalized recognition informed through a subject’s
discursive–spiritual environment.
‘Ajabsuperseded mere wonder. Al-Jurjani defined it as a change in the
soul (nafs) through something the cause of which is unknown and is out of
the ordinary. Echoing Platonic and Aristotelian associations between
wonder and philosophy, Qazvini defined it as“the sense of bewilderment
a person feels because of his inability to understand the cause of a thing.”^46
The definitions offered by North African lexicographer ibn Manzur (1233–
1312) suggest an ambivalence at the heart of wonder: while he associates
(^43) Carboni,2001: 51. (^44) Graves,2018:10–16. (^45) Graves,2018:95–140, 207.
(^46) Berlekamp,2011: 22.
The Materiality of Dreams 195