The Incongruity-Resolution Strategy in Mystical Dialogues

The Incongruity-Resolution (IR) model, traditionally rooted in humor studies, has not been extensively applied to the analysis of mystical texts. This study aims to present an expanded model for examining the incongruity-resolution strategy in mystical dialogues and to demonstrate its adaptability to non-humorous and complex educational-mystical contexts. For this purpose, one hundred selected dialogues from Attar’s works were qualitatively analyzed and classified into six patterns based on the type of incongruity (frame-based and verbal) and the resolution mechanisms (frame-based, verbal, or inferential). The findings reveal that in mystical dialogues, incongruity not only triggers cognitive tension, but also serves an educational purpose by destabilizing conventional cognitive frames and guiding readers towards moral and spiritual growth. Unlike humor, which favors a quick and linear resolution, Sufi dialogues employ an open-ended, multi-layered resolution, fostering a recursive interpretive process aligned with the cognitive and spiritual objectives of Sufi teachings. While cognitive effort in humor resolution results in amusement and pleasure, mystical dialogues transform this pleasure into spiritual insight or enlightenment. The results suggest that the IR model offers a valuable framework for understanding the dynamic cognitive processes underlying mystical dialogues but requires refinement to account for the multilayered and occasionally unresolved nature of incongruities in these texts.