In The Great Khan’s Tent Episode IX:The Arabian Nights Part VIII

01/04/23 • 46 min

In this episode we continue the story of “The Second Royal Dervish” in the continuation of Night XIII and part of Night XIV. Within this story is a nested tale of “The Story of the Envier and the Envied” which provides a moral tale for those who are envious. Within the story of “The Second Royal Dervish” we encounter, for the first time, an actual confrontation head on with the Jinn, in this case with Jarjaris, where all other previous interactions were feats of intellectual battles. This confrontation showcases that humans can go head-to-head with the Jinn, however, the cost of doing so is great.

Previous Episode

In The Great Khan’s Tent Episode VIII: The Arabian Nights Part VII

In this episode, we continue the story of “The First Royal Dervish” in the continuation of Night XI, Night XII, and part of Night XIII. We also hear part of the story of “The Second Royal Dervish” and encounter the Jinn once again. However, unlike previous episodes this time the Jinn is named, Jarjaris, and given a lineage which links him to Iblis, commonly known as Satan, providing evidence for the Islamic belief that Iblis was allowed to procreate. Jarjaris clearly is placed in the category of those Jinn who are unbelievers. Notice the themes that are present in both these stories and what social issues they are trying to convey, aside from the surface level interpretations.

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In The Great Khan’s Tent Episode X: Special Episode II

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In this series of special episodes, I hope to highlight the historical background for the One Thousand and One Nights, by examining the history of the work, where the text drew its inspiration from, the original manuscripts, translators and translations, and how it found a new iteration in Children's Literature. In this Second special episode, I look into the brief history of oral literature, providing example from Gilgamesh and the Great Flood story, go into a surface level discussion about why my scholarly opinion disregards the monocausal hypothesis, and look into the first two inspirations from the subcontinent, the Jataka and the Panchatantra.