Les potions d’amour dans la sémiosphère marocaine

Abstract

In Arab-Muslim esoteric literature, love potions occupy a prominent place; they are often introduced or described under the form of recipes to be prepared and served as a dish or drink diverted from their primary function, to feed or invite, for another function, to attract the loved one, to rekindle the flame of the one already loved or to neutralize a potential rival considered an enemy. Their complexity comes from the fact that they rely on apparent or hidden nourishment, but also on antithetical texts, the Koran and esoteric thought, renowned for their supernatural power. The Koran fought magic, but most recipes bring together surahs with invocations from Jewish Kabbalah for example. How to bring together in the same recipe, two opposing texts and at the cost of what hermeneutic distortions is the question that this raises. The other questions that these potions raise are related to the nature of the correlations that they establish between the ingredients and the aim to attract or neutralize a person. The plan followed in this study is as flow : After explaining the position of the Qur’an towards esoteric thought and highlighting its ambivalence, we will move on to the analysis of the recipes by focusing on their ingredients, on the importance of the figure of the enemy, the correlations they make and the bodies they postulate. We will choose as a case study two famous manuals from the popular library entitled: The Great Magic, by its author al-Husseini and the second entitled The Ancient Alliance by its author Al-Būnī.