Hatif () is a voice that can be heard without one's discovering the body that made it.

Al-Jahiz Abū ʿUthman ʿAmr ibn Baḥr al-Kinānī al-Baṣrī ( ar, أبو عثمان عمرو بن بحر الكناني البصري), commonly known as al-Jāḥiẓ ( ar, links=no, الجاحظ, ''The Bug Eyed'', born 776 – died December 868/Jan ...

wrote that the

Bedouin The Bedouin, Beduin, or Bedu (; , singular ) are nomadic Arab tribes who have historically inhabited the desert regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, the Levant, and Mesopotamia. The Bedouin originated in the Syrian Desert and A ...

believed that important messages could be transmitted without a visible medium. The receiver would hear the message in realtime without seeing the speaker.

Al-Masudi Al-Mas'udi ( ar, أَبُو ٱلْحَسَن عَلِيّ ٱبْن ٱلْحُسَيْن ٱبْن عَلِيّ ٱلْمَسْعُودِيّ, '; –956) was an Arab historian, geographer and traveler. He is sometimes referred to as the "Herodotus ...

focused on the psychological backgrounds of this phenomenon, and explained the ''hatif'' as a

hallucination A hallucination is a perception in the absence of an external stimulus that has the qualities of a real perception. Hallucinations are vivid, substantial, and are perceived to be located in external objective space. Hallucination is a combinatio ...

caused by loneliness. However, according to al-Jahiz, belief in ''hatif'' was so widespread among the Bedouin, they were perplexed if people doubted their existence. Such ''hatif'' was also attributed to jinn by pre-Islamic Arabs. This way, they talk to humans or avenge murder on a fellow jinn by driving the murderer insane. ''Hatif'' doesn't necessrily come from humans or jinn, but also from ghosts, dwelling near graves to remind humans of their mortality or announce their death.Werner Diem, Marco Schöller ''The Living and the Dead in Islam: Epitaphs as texts'' Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, 2004 p. 158 In modern Arabic, the term ''hatif'' is also used for a

telephon The Reis telephone was an invention named after Philipp Reis of a telephone-like device he constructed. Reis's first successful work is dated to October 1861. History In 1861, Philipp Reis succeeded in creating a device that captured sound, co ...

, due to invisible communication.

References

Arabian legendary creatures Jinn Ghosts {{Folklore-stub

See also

References