STUDI MAĠREBINI 21.

1 (2023) 1–15

brill.com/stma

Ǧuḥā/Giufà: a Cunning Fool Bridge of Dialogue

between East and West

Francesca Maria Corrao | Orcid: 0000-0001-5548-037X

Full professor of Arabic Language and Literature, Luiss University,
Rome, Italy
fcorrao@luiss.it

Abstract

Ǧuḥā/Giufà is a foolish rogue whose anecdotes are spread in the Mediterranean

region; this area is characterized by different religious culture and the anecdotes show
that these convey important shared values. Recent studies proved that a good num-
ber of these stories have far Eastern origins demonstrating that human community
has important values to educate to a more harmonious global society. The study gives
some information on the analysis of the hero from Western and Eastern perspectives
and indicates some of the stories of far Eastern origins spread in the Mediterranean.

Keywords

Ǧuḥā – Arab literature – human trickster – Nasreddin Hoca and Giufà – comparative
literature – cunning fool’s anecdotes – Indian Buddhist tales – Mediterranean popular
literature

The purpose of this study is to try to understand the reasons why Ǧuḥā’s anec-
dotes, a famous Arab trickster, are laughed at in different traditions of the
Mediterranean region and elsewhere in the world. I will first compare some
analyses of laughter in the most significant Western and Islamic studies. In a
second step, I will examine some stories that correspond in various traditions
with their different variants.

Published with license by Koninklijke Brill NV | doi:10.1163/2590034X-20230079

© Francesca Maria Corrao, 2023 | ISSN: 0585-4954 (print) 2590-034X (online)
2 Corrao

1 Why Do We Laugh?

What makes us find something humorous even if we belong to different, and

at times conflicting, cultures? Freud believes in his Wit and its Relation to the
Unconscious that the speed with which two irreconcilable orders of things are
connected makes people laugh; he also quotes Aristotle to highlight that sud-
denly recognizing something, which on first impact sounds obscure, gives joy;
and finally, Freud assumes that the public enjoys humor when they are in a
particular disposition of mind to laugh, for to have fun subverting the normal
order of things requires a special timing.1
There is a very long and extensive literature on humor tracing back to
Aristotle’s second volume of the book “Poetics” that deals with comedy and
laughter, until more recent studies.2 On the other shore of the Mediterranean
al-Ǧāḥiẓ (d. 868) introduces his humorous Kitāb al-Buḫalāʾ (The book on
Misers) justifying himself for writing a comic text; he explains that he collects
anecdotes and short stories to amuse his readers while informing them on vari-
ous aspects of knowledge and exposing the mistakes by which misers betray
themselves.3 We find similar reasonings in other classical authors, such as
al-Ǧawzī (d. 1201) in his Aḫbār al-Ḥamqāʾ wa ʾl-Muġaffalīn (Stories of the Fools
and the Simpletons) who states that a fool’s stories cause intelligent people
to give thanks to God that they are not made so; he also believes that these
warn some people on other’s foolishness; finally he claims that humor serves
as natural relaxation and to this purpose it is supported by many sayings of the
Prophet and the early Muslims.4
According to Freud wit utilizes a way of connecting levels of extraneous and
unreconcilable ideas that is carefully avoided in serious thought, it is mani-
fested in the critical power of young people, of the insane, as in that of one
who is inebriated or drugged.5 In the Middle Ages, Islamic society granted
the freedom to say and do what reason prohibits to the jesters, or the fools
who were the “lovers of God”, that is, those poor mendicants associated with
unorthodox mysticism, whose strangeness was justified by their excessive love
for God, which distanced them from the rules of earthly life.6 Humorous jok-
ing makes it possible to associate ideas and words that common sense and

1 Freud 1975: 145–150.

2 Rod 2007.
3 al-Ǧāḥiẓ 1951: 3.
4 al-Ǧawzī 1925: 5–10.
5 Freud 1975: 150–155.
6 Bausani 1958: 139–159.

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Ǧuḥā/Giufà: a Cunning Fool Bridge of Dialogue 3

criticism forbid. Associating incompatible levels and ideas serves to break a

habit, that mechanical process leading to a separation between the gesture
and its original meaning to the point of creating a rigidity denying the imper-
manent nature of life. This break from convention relates to an infraction of
the traditional order of things, as Baudelaire observed in his study on “Essence
of laughter”.7 This type of “absolute” humourism creates an infantile dimension
which subverts rationality and is in contraposition to the morality of work, sac-
rifice and seriousness. Freud, like later Bergson, notes the repressive function
of laughter, which chastises the mechanical aberrations of life.8 Laughter is not
only used to temporarily destroy, which is the expression of the oppressed, and
which reveals the weakness of power that destroys authority. Mikhail Bakhtin
affirms that this type of laughter is represented by the festive rituals of rever-
sal, in his analysis of Gargantua and Pantagruel.9 Piero Camporesi affirms that
the Italian masque of Bertoldo, a comic character like Ǧuḥā/Giufà, reinforces
the cultural value upon which social stability is based.10 For Bakhtin, popular
comic tradition is a comic tradition of laughter, opposed to the seriousness and
the comedy of power. It can be found in the Middle Ages and has been treated
prominently in the Renaissance. But still today in popular comedy in the the-
atre and the cinema we find gestures and jokes which recall a more ancient
tradition. Both Bergson and Freud establish a connection between the origins
of comedy and joyful emotions. In a broad sense, humor is related to the devia-
tion from the ordinary and the conventional, which provides relief from the
psychological and social restrictions imposed on humankind, and the relief is
expressed through smiling or laughter.11 Georges Tamer concludes that in gen-
eral, what we find is the frequent association of laughter with a lower, infan-
tile level, with a playful element in opposition to the serious level of reality.12
The Egyptians Muḥammad Raǧab al-Naǧǧār and ʿ⁠Abbās Maḥmūd al-ʿ⁠Aqqād
agree upon the idea that what generates humor is the exigence to free oneself
from a condition of psychological depression in order to bring about a positive
change through laughter.13

7 Baudelaire 1961: 710–728.

8 Bergson 1983: 20.
9 Bakhtin 1968.
10 Camporesi 1993.
11 Freud 1975: 250; Bergson 1983: 22.
12 Tamer 2009: XI.
13 al-Naǧǧār 1979: 133; al-ʿ⁠Aqqād 1956: 76.

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2 Humor and Laughter in Classical Islamic Culture

The famous Arab polygraph al-Ǧāḥiẓ emphasizes, like Freud and Bergson,
that smiling is a child’s first beautiful expression and makes the blood richer
with joy and strength.14 In Arab literature, humor falls into the category of
fun (hazl) or pleasant entertainment.15 This category is opposed to serious,
didactic-sententious literature. In the Qurʾān the term hazl is defined as the
following:

Behold this is the Word That distinguishes Good from Evil ( faṣl)
It is not a thing for amusement (hazl). (LXXXVI: 33-14)

The revelation of divine truth separates good from evil and guides man towards
the noblest purpose of his spiritual life, which is not mere entertainment but a
stimulus to engage in the most daring undertakings. Therefore, hazl is opposed
to the high enterprise of the spirit, to the seriousness of divine discourse.
Literally, the opposite term faṣl, expresses the clear separation between good
and evil, contrasting good with everything that is “indistinct”, primitive, or not
ordered according to divine law.
Earthly life is repeatedly defined as “lahw, laʿb” (vanity, a game) as opposed
to “true life” in the world beyond (Qur., VI: 32; XXIX, 64; XLVII, 36; LVII, 20), and
with the truth and seriousness of divine creation (Qur., XXI: 16; XIV, 19). The
spiritual life is clearly placed above vanity and play (Qur., LXII, 11), but in the
praxis of worldly life both are allowed.
Fun is legitimate, as is laughter, if it serves to dissolve the tensions of the
existential horizon, to lighten the heavy seriousness of everyday life; but on
condition that the amusement falls within the sphere of the permissible, and
the infractions of laughter are temporary and moderate. From this perspec-
tive it is legitimate to laugh at the digressions of a fool, as well as at those of
a miser, because they are marginal types whose temporary violations confirm
the validity of the rule, and indeed become useful to remove the fear of viola-
tion which is buried by laughter (whoever laughs at the violation lowers its
value). Games, even the erotic ones, sports and family entertainment are law-
ful if they do not violate the Qurʾānic precepts.
The Prophet affirms that among the things most dear to him are women,
perfume, and prayer; another of his sayings affirms that only three worldly
vanities are legitimate: the sexual relationship (with one’s legitimate wife), the

14 al-Ǧāḥiẓ 1951: 9.
15 Kilito 1985.

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training of horses, and to play with one’s family.16 What has been said high-
lights the contrast existing between a behavior faithful to the Qurʾānic dicta-
tion and therefore considered high/safe, and by extension true/serious, against
all that is transgressive, and therefore low/profane, and false/illicit.17
When satire is understood in the sense of mockery, transgression, or moral
corruption, it could be condemned because it is associated with the customs
of the pagans, the enemies, the violators of the law of God. The severe divine
warning goes to those who mocked the pious Muslims, to the iniquitous trans-
gressors “allies of the devil”, to the libertines and adulterers who persisted in
living in the illicit, violating the laws of the Muslim community (Qurʾān IV: 24,
38; XXIV: 2–3; LXXV: 5, 20). Furthermore, the sacred text does not ignore irony,
even if this is limited to the description of the unfaithful and hypocrites or of
some embarrassed attitudes of Moses before God.18
The infringements of clowns, jesters, farce actors and puppets, are admis-
sible, but on condition that they take place within the limits of time and place
of the show. Laughing is allowed because it releases the tension engendered
by the fear aroused by the desire for violation. Laughter has a universal value:
it serves to bury fear and at the same time removes the fascination of viola-
tion, but above all laughing reaffirms adherence to the sacred law. Reading
the Qurʾānic verses, Islam marked a clear dividing line between the high/
rational culture of the new religious community and the low/irrational nature
of pre-Islamic life. This distinction would remain in the following centuries,
to delimit the boundaries between “lawful” behavior corresponding to the
Qurʾānic dictation, and “illicit” behavior, that is contaminated by foreign and
antagonistic cultures. The contrast is not always so schematic, although severe
Islamic monotheism lends itself to restrictive interpretations.
Over the centuries, seriousness continues to be associated with moral cor-
rectness and both are often opposed to the facetious and illicit. However, the
supporters of the usefulness of transgression for a playful purpose had never
failed; among these was al-Ǧāḥiẓ, who argued that to better instruct it was
essential to alternate the weight of serious speech with the lightness of frivo-
lous narration, since telling stories between the serious and the facetious guard
the wise from the folly of others.19
The Imām al-Ġazāli (d. 1111) had a different opinion and imposed a limit
on frivolous narratives: fantastic stories, albeit with an edifying purpose, were

16 Rosenthal 2011: 2–6.

17 Corrao 1996: 13.
18 Mustansir 1991: 179–193.
19 al-Ǧāḥiẓ 1951: 3.

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unacceptable. It would therefore seem that while for the frivolous there could
have been a margin of tolerance, the same could not be for the “false”;20 the
latter term had a negative value also for the historian Ibn al-Aṯīr (d. 1234) who
used it to liquidate the credibility of pre-Islamic legends, the events of the
Persian kings as well as those of the pharaohs, because they referred to a poly-
theistic culture and, therefore, were not substantially different from the lies
of the pagans against which the prophet had warned. It is interesting to note
that Ibn al-Aṯīr in reporting the stories of the Persian kings, he made fun of
their claim to have divine origins. The historian also denounced their claim to
symbolically bury the old year by celebrating the feast of Nawrūz. He feared
the devastating effects that such influences could have on the popular level for
the Islamic faith, to the point of declaring that he omitted other legends from
his collection because he considered them harmful.21
The quṣṣāṣ, the storytellers, spread traditional Arabic narrative, pre-Islamic
legends, and foreign anecdotes, including the anecdotes of Ǧuḥā. This pro-
duction is heir to a rich oral tradition widespread among the people who fre-
quented the town squares, but also known to the humorists of the Umayyad
and Abbasid courts. Ibn al-Nadīm (d. 990) in the Fihrist, classified it under
different headings, samar (nocturnal literature), adab makšūf (literature with-
out veil, coarse), amṯāl (proverbs), ḫurāfāt (legends), aḫbār ġarība (strange
stories).22 The spread of stories and legends with foreign content, even if not
transgressive with respect to the Qurʾānic dictation was opposed by orthodoxy,
but in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society, such as the medieval Islamic
one, it was difficult to prevent Muslims from having contact with people of the
other communities or forbid them to attend the sacred or secular feasts of the
sister religions.
The clear separation between the serious and the facetious, and the out-
right condemnation of the non-Islamic cultural heritage, led the authors of
humorous collections to justify their choice and to historicize the protagonists
of the narratives. Moreover, always in al-Ǧāḥiẓ’s writings we find that the intro-
duction of a well-known person or character is an important device that gives
credibility and more emphasis to what is being told.23 Worth noticing that our
oldest direct reference to Ǧuḥā is found in the Kitāb al-qawl fī ʾl-biġāl (The

20 al-Ġazāli 1884: I, 31.

21 Ibn al-Aṯīr 1929: I, 15–43.
22 Ibn al-Nadīm 1871: 345.
23 al-Ǧāḥiẓ 1959: 9.

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Ǧuḥā/Giufà: a Cunning Fool Bridge of Dialogue 7

Book of Sayings on the Mules),24 and that later authors would associate Ǧuḥā
with famous figures such as Abū Muslim and the caliph al-Mahdī.25

3 The muǧūn, Literature and Ǧ uḥā’s Anecdotes

The typical themes of Arab comic literature, muǧūn, like those of universal
laughter, concern mating, birth, growth, excessive eating, and drinking, in
short, everything related to physiological needs. The rules of the comic cor-
respond in all cultures, and medieval laughter was characterized by the
transgression and lowering of values considered “sacred” and “inviolable”. Pro-
ceeding by overturning is the norm, the contents vary with the diversification
of historical contexts. The characteristics of Arab comic production, as of all
Mediterranean cultures, can be summarized in the spirit of ḥumq (fool), which
is typical of those who make a mistake in using the necessary means or meth-
ods to achieve an end.
To undertake a historical reconstruction of the most important comic texts
and Islamic humorists, raises some difficulties, since the earliest material
belonged to the oral tradition and was only later recorded in anthologies of
proverbs and anecdotes. Ǧuḥā is among the most legendary fool mentioned
in the Fihrist.26 The fame of his humorous anecdotes has survived for centu-
ries, Abū ʾl-Faḍl al-Maydānī (d. 1124) reports that his kunya was Abū ʾl-Ġuṣn,
and Ibn al-Ǧawzī affirms that stories going under his name are not by him but
are attributed to him out of malice and that he was an intelligent person.27
Ibn Šākir al-Kutbī in his ʿUyūn al-Ta‌ʾrīḫ (The sources of History) confirms this
opinion and affirms that the alleged date of Ǧuḥā’s death is 160 h. (776 a.C.),
(al-Kutbī ms. 1497: 373–374). The fullest information is available under the
voice “Ǧuḥā” in al-Murtaḍā al-Zabīdī’s Tāǧal-ʿ⁠Arūs min Ǧawāhir al-Qāmūs (The
Bride’s Crown from the Pearls of Dictionary); there are mentioned two other
names, one being al-Daǧīn b. Ḥāriṯ Ābū ʾl-Ġuṣn, and the other ʿ⁠Abd Allāh Ǧuḥā.
There is also written that his mother was a servant of Anas b. Mālik’s mother,
and most of the stories of which Ǧuḥā is the hero are ill-founded and that the
people were asking God to allow them to profit from his blessing.28

24 al-Ǧāḥiẓ 1955: 36.

25 al-Naǧǧār 1979: 36–38; Ibn al-Ǧawzī 1925: 27.
26 Ibn al-Nadīm 1871: 155.
27 Ibn al-Ǧawzī 1925: 25.
28 al-Zabīdī 2011, s.v. “Ǧuḥā”.

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Ǧuḥā’s anecdotes are still widely spread in oral and written tradition and are
known in both East and West.29 The character, according to Hasan al-Shamy –
behaves as a human trickster in an ambiguous way, assuming opposite quali-
ties: he is cunning and foolish, he acts cowardly and boldly, he is a liar and
naive and so on.30 ʿ⁠Abd al-Ḥamīd Yūnus suggests that the anecdotes of the
fool, due to the ambivalent nature of his transitional and transformational
character, adapted to different cultural contexts.31 As Stith Thompson points
out they are affected by the nature of the land where they are current, by the
linguistics and social contacts of its people, and by the lapse of the years and
their accompanying historic changes.32

4 Ǧ uḥā’s Anecdotes around the World

The anecdotes of the wise fool Ǧuḥā are to be found in the collections of
Arabic proverbs and tales; in addition to the Thousand and One Nights, we
find traces in the Indian Panchatantra and in Boccaccio’s Decameron, to name
only the most famous.33 In the Mediterranean the stories of Ǧuḥā the cun-
ning fool spread through the centuries with slight variations in the name of
the figure and small adaptations to the local culture. In Turkey his name is
Nasreddin Hoca, in Tunis Djha, and in Sicily Giufà. These stories remained
alive for centuries thanks to the oral tradition. But in Italy more recently, sev-
eral writers including Luigi Pirandello, Italo Calvino, and Leonardo Sciascia set
about remodeling anecdotes to adapt them to our own times; we might also
mention Filippo De Franco’s Le storie di Giufà raccontate al popolo siciliano and
Gesualdo Bufalino’s L’uomo invaso.34 Numerous important authors in the Arab
and in the Turkish literature invented for the Ǧuḥā figure stories with a begin-
ning and an end, arranging the anecdotes in such a way as to feature in the
various stages of his life. Thus, in Sicilian narrative as in Turkish folklore Giufà
is born, grows up and dies.35
In Sicily, Giufà stories attracted the attention of ethnologists such as
Giuseppe Pitrè, Laura Gonzenbach and Sebastiano Lo Nigro, and more
recently Marina Di Leo, who published in their collections some anecdotes

29 Makkī 1970: 70–90.

30 al-Shamy 1982: 219–227.
31 Yūnus 1969: 3–8.
32 Thompson 1977: 13.
33 Marzolph - van Leeuven 2004: I, 241.
34 Corrao 2001: 140–141.
35 Corrao 2017: 129–141.

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Ǧuḥā/Giufà: a Cunning Fool Bridge of Dialogue 9

of the cunning fool. Over the last two centuries both in the Arab world and in
Turkey, scholars interested in the figure Ǧuḥā/Nasreddin Hoca, set out to prove
the existence of a specific personage in their own national popular literature.36
In Turkey, moreover, Nasreddin Hoca has had workshops dedicated to him in
which particular emphasis was placed on the mystic interpretation of certain
anecdotes, and in particular the tales dwelt upon by Mawlana Ǧalāl al-Dīn
al-Rumī (d. 1273).
In the early 1980s I approached the figure, starting from an anthropologi-
cal viewpoint; the behavior of Ǧuḥā/Giufà has many points in common with
the host of tricksters studied by Levy Strauss. The closest definition of this
type of figure was formulated by a scholar from Palermo, Silvana Miceli, who
brings his function into sharper focus.37 The foolish rascal violates – albeit only
temporarily – any order for the sake of reasserting his own validity; he breaches
conventions to destroy, but at the same time to reaffirm, a set of over-rigid
rules. Historically speaking, in the transition from paganism to the monothe-
istic religions – and Christianity in particular – the function of the trickster
is associated with that of the little devil since he calls God’s great work into
question. As also Mikhail Bakhtin pointed out, these carnivalesque demons
overturn the natural order, its rules, and roles, but only for a limited period.38
From the perspective of the Arab critics, al-Naǧǧār asserts that the figure of
the cunning fool serves as a “safety valve”, helping to get through those criti-
cal moments in history when no direct criticism of the system is admitted.39
In particular, the stories of the Arabic Ǧuḥā range over various topics, by no
means limited to social-political criticism. In the earliest collections, in any
case, the main function of the anecdotes is to warn the wise against having
anything to do with the foolish, lest they be tricked. In my first work on the
subject, I traced the birth of the character to the Mediterranean area. In the
course of time, however, reading the collections of Indian fables, I found that
certain anecdotes circulated in an area well beyond the Mediterranean of
King Solomon and Marcolf.40
An episode of the Arabic Ǧuḥā’s anecdotes appears in the Panchatantra,
but more stories are in the other Indian collection The Ocean of the Streams of
Story, by the Brāhman Somadeva (11th century), where I found many episodes
involving fools brought together in one section. Often the fool is a Brāhman,

36 Corrao 2001: 140–141.

37 Miceli 1984.
38 Bakhtin 1968.
39 al-Naǧǧār 1979: 80–82.
40 Croce - Banchieri 1973.

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or a servant, and the stories are recounted for pedagogic ends.41 Comparing
the Indian and Arabic collections, a significant difference emerges. The Indian
tales present a negative image of the woman as mean, cunning and treacher-
ous, while the Arabic tales show her to be crafty – she hoodwinks the fool and
denies him food – but she is not simply treacherous. In the Sicilian stories we
find only the mother of Giufà, who again is crafty, but who uses her craft to pro-
tect herself and her child from the latter’s foolishness. It is only in the recent
novel by Di Franco that Giufà has a wife, although he behaves like a young
fool (Corrao 2005, II: 1192–1198). In the Indian stories the fool is always a loser,
to be wary of; he is a weak man who succumbs to the powerful and cunning.
In the Arabic and Islamic world Ǧuḥā gets into difficulties when he is by the
side of his wife or before institutional authorities. In both the Sicilian and the
Arabic tales, the fool shows his cunning even in the most disastrous cases and
succeeds in turning to his favor situations that only boded ill, exploiting now
his cunning, now his decency. Significant effects are produced by negative/
positive opposition, hence the delight provoked by this character is based on
this value. In this sense, the cunning fool is the perfect model of the mythi-
cal character in that the real hero of the myth is that one who assumes and
resolves the opposition. There is no mythical hero who is not strong and weak
at the same time, as is the case of Achilles, a demi-god but one whose heel
reveals his human weakness. A hero can be beautiful and ugly at the same
time, like Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto (d. 1530), who was handsome
but cross-eyed and had lost his brain, or stupid and intelligent, as in the case
of Ǧuḥā/Giufà, the cunning fool. These contradictory qualities have their ori-
gin in the fundamental opposition nature/culture, and from there the need to
overcome the dichotomy which for primitive people lay between the human
and the animal world. Tales and myths had among their functions that of over-
coming this dichotomy with their half-human (animal), half-god heroes. Today
all these mysteries have lost their force, their symbols no longer interest our
psyche. Neither the animal world nor the plant world nor the miracle of the
spheres, but the human being is now the crucial mystery.
In the Indian collections, as in the Thousand and One Nights, certain char-
acters are possessed by devils.42 This feature no longer finds any place in the
Sicilian stories of Giufà, where, however, the idea persists that people who do

41 The Panchatantra is a celebrated 6th-century collection of stories that includes tales of

the earliest oral tradition; it was compiled by a Brāhman to teach the art of government
to the young heirs to the throne. In particular, the story tells of a husband who learns that
his wife is betraying him and decides to denounce her, but she comes up with a new trick,
turns the situation round, and publicly accuses him of betraying her. Corrao 2010.
42 Corrao 2010.

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Ǧuḥā/Giufà: a Cunning Fool Bridge of Dialogue 11

bad deeds are turned into animals. This is a trick, too, but the fool believes in
this nonsense. The story goes that he makes his way to the market to sell an
ass; two thieves make away with it, and one of the villains takes the place of
the animal. He then explains to Ǧuḥā that as he had ill-treated his mother, she
turned him into an ass; now, however, having atoned for his bad ways, he had
recovered human guise. The two celebrate the event; then Ǧuḥā goes to market
to buy an ass and recognizes his own, but he does not buy it, explaining that
he wants to punish him for his bad behavior, because of which he had been
turned back into an ass.43
In this Arabic version the focus comes more on the uprightness of the fool
than on the transformation and subsequent redemption which, after all, never
actually took place since the whole thing was a trick. In the Indian version, on
the other hand, the transformation does come about, the “animal-man” weeps
and moves to pity someone who promptly saves him. Moreover, the transfor-
mation is often brought about by evil characters. In this evolution of the story,
we can trace the transition from polytheist to monotheist religion – from the
idea of salvation made possible through the merit of others to the idea that
the individual must mend his ways and then hope in divine grace. The idea of
“magic” punishment inherited from the previous culture remains, but it is less
important, serving to warn children not to behave badly towards their moth-
ers. It is, by the way, worth recalling that the theme of transformation of man
into animal has survived in Western literature up to recent times: suffice it to
mention, for example, Kafka’s Metamorphosis. Another interesting aspect of
the tales of the fool is the transformation from a condition of unawareness
to one of wisdom. In the Indian tradition many of the tales involve Brāhman
faithful or Buddhist monks, while Sufis feature in the Turkish Muslim tradi-
tion. Before examining some of the tales a preliminary point needs to be made.
There exists a sacred Buddhist text entitled The Wise Man and the Fool which
offers no account of any fool but explains how a common mortal can progress
from the condition of foolishness to wisdom if he takes to the way of Buddhist
practice. This sacred text was translated from Sanskrit to Mongolian and found
circulation in Central Asia before the spread of Islam. We also know that after
the conversion certain important Buddhist principles persist in the thought of
various mystic confraternities among the Uygurs. The research of the Turkish
scholar Emel Esin draws a parallel between Uygur Buddhism and Turkish
Bektashiyya. He points out the correspondence of certain terms, the common
concept of the microcosm represented by the individual and the macrocosm
corresponding to the spirit of the cosmic universe, the dharma. Furthermore,

43 Corrao 2001: 65–66.

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Esin observes that the Buddhist symbol of Mount Sumeru is represented by

the conical hat of the Bektashi Dervishes; it symbolizes the point of contact
between the earth and the universe.44
All this goes to show that the stories of Giufà can be approached in a dif-
ferent light, not at the level of fool-wise man contradistinction, nor as clash
between the contradictory categories of nature vs. culture, but in terms of
transformation through a continuous process of growth and spiritual ripening.
One interpretation does not exclude the other, but, rather, they comple-
ment one another and point to two different perspectives, one seeing harmo-
nization in emancipation from a lower to a higher condition, while the other,
a dualist view interprets the contradistinction at the level of dichotomy, where
one prevails over the other. The former sees the law of birth and death that
permeates the universe in a flux of constant transformation, while the latter
accounts for the universe as the work of a God who creates and a demiurge that
destroys to validate the work and reconstruct it. Finally, in the Islamic reading
the fool Ǧuḥā/Nasreddin ignores earthly laws to approach God in contempla-
tive ecstasy, and some tales can be reread in this light. The Ǧuḥā anecdotes
that usually provoke laughter can at times leave one somewhat perplexed,
which is not particularly conducive to interpretation in anthropological terms.
I am thinking, for example, of “the call to prayer”, to name an anecdote that
we find in both the Turkish and the Arabic traditions.45 In this anecdote the
fool, instead of entering the mosque on the call to prayer, runs in the opposite
direction and seeks faith elsewhere in the world. Thus, metaphorically, we are
apprised of the need for a spiritual approach, and not to follow the teachings to
the letter in the place where religious practice is codified by men.
At a first reading of this anecdote, we are moved to laughter at the naivety
of the protagonist but rereading it at a deeper level we are led beyond the
immediate meaning to cast our eyes further than the customary frames of ref-
erence. However, the action of Ǧuḥā is not destructive; indeed, it leads one to
go beyond the formal performance of rituality and seek out its spiritual sense.
On the other hand, the Sicilian stories of little demons lead to the extreme
of contradistinction; for Giufà there is no middle way: he takes his revenge on
the unjust bishop and brings about his death; the same fate befalls the priest
who exploits him, and the “Morning-singer” who annoys him.46 In the Arabic

44 Corrao 2010: 159–161.

45 Some stories of Nasreddin Hoca are mentioned in Aarne 1961. The Index includes some
of the Turkish anecdotes collected by Wesselski 1925. See also Marzolph 2005; Corrao
2001: 123.
46 Al-Maydānī 1925: 396; al-Naǧǧār 1979: 58. The Sicilian version is in Pitrè 1978: 360–361. An
account on this story and an oral version from Tunisian folklore is in Corrao 2019: 215–222.

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Ǧuḥā/Giufà: a Cunning Fool Bridge of Dialogue 13

tales, too, we find anecdotes telling of injustices suffered by Giufà or some

other character, which Ǧuḥā remedies, at times with cunning, at other times
with wisdom. Also following this line are the Sicilian Giufà tales such as “The
betting” and “Giufà and justice” admitted.47 In the latter recurs a motive that
also appears in a Buddhist tale; the fool tricked by the judge punishes him with
a blow on the head because he has not done him justice. Once again, in this
story emerges the old Buddhist interpretation in showing that the law of cause
and effect strikes beyond our capacity to understand it.
If he acts in accordance with his heart, whether wittingly or not, Ǧuḥā/Giufà
finds help within himself or receives helps from others to solve problems; by
the same token, if he or others act badly, they eventually pay the consequences.

5 Conclusion

Ǧuḥā the cunning fool with his comic behavior makes people laugh because
he fulfills different functions, but these different functions all lead to a single
conclusion: human beings share similar ethical values and laugh at the same
contradictions. The oppositions that Ǧuḥā/Nasreddin/Giufà show in the anec-
dotes are not part of an external dimension: he is fool and wiseman at the same
time. Every human being, as each one of us feels like a fool at times and at
other times cunning or wise, and we laugh when for a moment we realize that
we can shift from one life condition to another in a very short lapse of time.
We laugh when the fool shows us that opposite conditions are within our-
selves; laughter is the relief we perceive when suddenly, we see the possibility
to transform our inner condition from foolishness to cunningness or wisdom.
As a Buddhist tales narrates, it depends on our life condition if we perceive
the Ganges River as dirty water or a beautiful river or a purifying sight for our
spirit. Life and death live within us, and we perceive this when we become
aware that we destroy the ideas we have created in the short space of a second.
The perception we have in that single moment is that we can change, and that
it depends on us, it gives us hope and relief and makes us laugh. From religious
texts to psychoanalysis and philosophy everything leads us to the one convic-
tion that the smile of hope is the life that makes us win out over the fear of
death. The anecdotes of the fool remind us how simple can be to make our
lives better together.

This story inspired the Sicilian writer Leonardo Sciascia (1973), who wrote a short story
entitled “Ǧuḥā” in his collection Il mare color del vino (The wine-colored sea).
47 al-Naǧǧār 1979: 183, 126–127.

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14 Corrao

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