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Science, Superstition, and the Supernatural in Iran

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Science, Superstition, and the Supernatural in Iran Fantasies of Reason: Science, Superstition, and the Supernatural in Iran The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Mohammadi Doostdar, Alireza. 2012. Fantasies of Reason: Science, Superstition, and the Supernatural in Iran. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:9282603 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA © 2012 – Alireza Mohammadi Doostdar All rights reserved. Dissertation Advisor: Professor Steve Caton Alireza Mohammadi Doostdar Fantasies of Reason: Science, Superstition, and the Supernatural in Iran Abstract This dissertation examines uncertainties about the supernatural among members of the urban middle class in Tehran, Iran. In particular, I attend to the ways in which the category of the supernatural (mavara) has become, for some people, an object of potential scientific (‘elmi) inquiry that must be distinguished from approaches usually ascribed to the rural, the uneducated, and the poor, often deemed as either superstitions (khorafat) or parochically religious (dini). By examining a range of encounters with the supernatural – such as attempts to explain communications with the souls of the dead, make sense of spirit possession, and differentiate real magic from charlatanism – I highlight the varied modalities through which perspectives and forms of reasoning imagined to be rational and scientific are brought to bear on matters that are understood to lie, at least partially, within the purview of religious knowledge. I situate such supernatural encounters against a backdrop of state disciplinary and coercive measures, thereby illuminating important shifts in Iran’s politico-religious landscape in the past two decades, such as the waning of the religious authority of the Shi‘i ulama among certain sections of society. This declining authority does not necessarily imply a weakened interest in Islam (although this is sometimes the case). Rather, it has opened up a space for reception and deliberation of a multiplicity of sources of religious knowledge, both Islamic and non-Islamic. These include forms of Western-imported spirituality and occultism that have been entering Iran for over a iii century, with their most recent wave consisting of translated texts of New Age spirituality, self- help success literature, and popular psychology that have gained popularity since the end of the war with Iraq. The metaphysical models on offer through these spiritual systems are usually promoted and understood as scientific rather than religious. That is, rather than being seen as contradicting Islamic notions, these formulations are often viewed as parallel to them. By attending to such notions and their everyday manifestations, my project brings into focus various hybrid forms of religious-scientific knowledge, experience, and discourse that have largely been ignored in the study of modern Muslim societies. iv Table of Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................................... vii Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Occult Circuits ........................................................................................................................................ 11 Occult Economies, Uncertain States, and Partial Connections ............................................................... 20 Different Orientations: Mavara and Ghayb ............................................................................................ 26 Doubt, Belief, and Anthropology ............................................................................................................ 35 The Chapters ........................................................................................................................................... 42 Chapter 1 – An Uncertain Reason ................................................................................................ 46 Gullible Victims ...................................................................................................................................... 47 Strange Hesitations ................................................................................................................................. 59 Performing Rationality ............................................................................................................................ 70 Toying with the Rammal? ....................................................................................................................... 78 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................................. 87 Chapter 2 – The Fantastic ............................................................................................................. 90 Iterations ................................................................................................................................................. 96 Crossing the Line .................................................................................................................................. 101 A Career in Witchcraft .......................................................................................................................... 116 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 128 Chapter 3 – Fluid Engagements .................................................................................................. 130 Post-War Alternative Spiritualities ....................................................................................................... 136 Two Glowing Angels and a Tree-Lined Hill ........................................................................................ 146 The Lock of Reason .............................................................................................................................. 156 Bearing Witness .................................................................................................................................... 164 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 183 Chapter 4 – The Scientific Imaginary ......................................................................................... 185 Hybrids of Science and Spirit ............................................................................................................... 193 Experimental Spirit Science .................................................................................................................. 195 The Spiritist Legacy .............................................................................................................................. 204 Islam and Modern Science .................................................................................................................... 214 v Plausible Fictions .................................................................................................................................. 218 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 220 Chapter 5 - Proof of the Eye ....................................................................................................... 223 The New Mystics and their Hagiographies ........................................................................................... 232 The Eye of Insight ................................................................................................................................. 243 Oh Concealer of Faults ......................................................................................................................... 250 The Eye Internalized ............................................................................................................................. 256 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 268 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 272 References ................................................................................................................................... 275 vi Acknowledgements Many centuries ago, the great Sa‘di of Shiraz admonished his readers that “Clouds, wind, moon, sun, and spheres are at work, so that you may obtain a loaf of bread and eat not in ignorance.” If our daily bread depends on such a propitious confluence of cosmic activity, so too, no doubt, must the writing of a dissertation. It is in this spirit that I extend my deepest gratitude to a fraction of this vast theatre, the human individuals
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