The Darkness is Not Death: Toward A Christian-Muslim Comparative Theological Study of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

             The darkness is not death.           For Daniel in the lion's den,             For Jonah in the whale,           Out of the abyss came life.For Mary and John, for our Friend Himself,       In their final sufferings and sleep,         For Khidr in his spirit's quest,             Came life.¹

There is a fifth-century Christian tradition about seven (or eight) young men who, during the Decian Roman persecutions, flee for safety to a cave in the mountains outside Ephesus. They fall asleep and awaken centuries later amazed to find Christian surroundings, and in the ecclesial context of the day their appearance is understood as a miracle that testifies to the reality of bodily resurrection. One of the reasons the legend is still so fascinating, even if it is marginal in the Christian world today, is that we find a version of it in sura 18 of the Qur'ān, the revelatory message of Islam. Nearly twenty ayat, or verses, are dedicated to the story, and sura 18 is entitled al-kahf, or The Cave, for the Sleepers are referred to there as the Companions of the cave (ashāb al-kahf). The tradition of the Sleepers has received significant, although by no means abundant, scholarly attention in the last century, with research tending to concentrate upon several areas of focus; namely the sources and historicity of the tradition,² the proliferation and interpretation of the tradition in the Christian context,³ the proliferation and interpretation of the tradition in the Islamic context,⁴ and the spiritual and theological significance of the shared Christian-Muslim veneration of the Sleepers.⁵ The most important voice to work within the last area (that is, the significance of the Sleepers as a tradition shared by Christians and Muslims) is the French Catholic scholar of Islam, Louis Massignon (1883–1962), who saw in the common veneration of the Sleepers an opportunity to highlight Christians' and Muslims' shared hope in the justice of God and in the resurrection of the believer.⁶ This article, although indebted to the more historical and philological studies, continues in the vein of Massignon's research. It complements interpretations that emphasize the practical-spiritual value of his work, as primarily manifested in his establishment in 1954 of an annual joint Muslim-Christian pilgrimage to the chapel of the Seven Sleepers at Vieux-Marché near Plouaret in Brittany, by breaking open the theological possibilities of Massignon's interreligious reading of the Seven Sleepers tradition.⁷ It does so by clearing the way for an engagement with Massignon's work from within the emerging horizon of comparative theology. The article proceeds in three sections. First, I introduce the legend in its Christian and Islamic forms, including some thematic analysis according to the commentarial traditions in each religion. I include a note on the uniqueness of the Islamic form and its relationship to the Christian form. Second, I highlight the most salient points of Massignon's understanding of the Seven Sleepers apropos of his interreligious reading. Finally, I conclude by sketching the basic framework for future reflections on the Seven Sleepers in the light of comparative theology.

THE SEVEN SLEEPERS OF EPHESUS ACCORDING TO THE CHRISTIAN SOURCES

In 1953 Ernest Honigmann wrote a foundational paper in the history of scholarship on the Seven Sleepers.⁸ He established the historical, geographical, political, and religious context in which the tradition arose and was disseminated. He also provided a summary of the narrative, which, because of its pithiness, deserves full quotation:

The Emperor Decius (249–51) comes to Ephesus to revive there the worship of idols and enforce his laws against the Christians. Seven young men who live in the imperial palace–their names are given in many variants–refuse to sacrifice before the idols. The emperor brings them to trial but, being about to leave Ephesus, he grants them a short time for reflection until his expected return. They leave the city and hide in a cave in a neighboring mountain, the name of which is also given in many different variants, where...