CHAPTER II.
DEMONOLOGY.
The Muslims, in general, believe in three different species of created intelligent beings: Angels, who are created of light; Genii, who are created of fire; and Men, created of earth. The first species are called Meláïkeh (sing. Melek); the second, Jinn (sing. Jinnee); the third, Ins (sing. Insee). Some hold that the Devils (Sheyṭáns) are of a species distinct from Angels and Jinn; but the more prevailing opinion, and that which rests on the highest authority, is, that they are rebellious Jinn.
"It is believed," says El-Ḳazweenee, "that the Angels are of a simple substance, endowed with life and speech and reason, and that the difference between them and the Jinn and Sheyṭáns is a difference of species. Know," he adds, "that the Angels are sanctified from carnal desire and the disturbance of anger: they disobey not God in what He hath commanded them, but do what they are commanded. Their food is the celebrating of his glory; their drink, the proclaiming of his holiness; their conversation, the commemoration of God, whose name be exalted; their pleasure, his worship; they are created in different forms, and with different powers." Some are described as having the forms of brutes. Four of them are Archangels; Jebraeel or Jibreel (Gabriel), the angel of revelations; Meekaeel or Meekál (Michael), the patron of the Israelites; ´Azraeel, the angel of death; and Isráfeel, the angel of the trumpet, which he is to sound twice, or as some say thrice, at the end of the world—one blast will kill all living creatures (himself included), another, forty years after, (he being raised again for this purpose, with Jebraeel and Meekaeel), will raise the dead. These Archangels are also called Apostolic Angels. They are inferior in dignity to human prophets and apostles, though superior to the rest of the human race: the angelic nature is held to be inferior to the human nature, because all the Angels were commanded to prostrate themselves before Adam. Every believer is attended by two guardian and recording angels, one of whom writes his good actions, the other, his evil actions: or, according to some, the number of these angels is five, or sixty, or a hundred and sixty. There are also two Angels, called Munkir (vulg. Nákir) and Nekeer, who examine all the dead and torture the wicked in their graves.
The species of Jinn is said to have been created some thousands of years before Adam. According to a tradition from the Prophet, this species consists of five orders or classes; namely, Jánn (who are the least powerful of all), Jinn, Sheyṭáns (or Devils), ´Efreets, and Márids. The last, it is added, are the most powerful; and the Jánn are transformed Jinn, like as certain apes and swine were transformed men.[18]—It must, however, be remarked here that the terms Jinn and Jánn are generally used indiscriminately as names of the whole species (including the other orders above mentioned), whether good or bad; and that the former term is the more common; also, that Sheyṭán is commonly used to signify any evil Jinnee. An ´Efreet is a powerful evil Jinnee: a Márid, an evil Jinnee of the most powerful class. The Jinn (but, generally speaking, evil ones) are called by the Persians Deevs; the most powerful evil Jinn, Nárahs (which signifies "males," though they are said to be males and females); the good Jinn, Perees, though this term is commonly applied to females.
In a tradition from the Prophet, it is said, "The Jánn were created of a smokeless fire."[19] El-Jánn is sometimes used as a name of Iblees, as in the following verse of the Ḳur-án:—"And the Jánn [the father of the Jinn; i.e. Iblees] we had created before [i.e. before the creation of Adam] of the fire of the samoom [i.e. of fire without smoke]."[20] Jánn also signifies "a serpent," as in other passages of the Ḳur-án;[21] and is used in the same book as synonymous with Jinn.[22] In the last sense it is generally believed to be used in the tradition quoted in the commencement of this paragraph. There are several apparently contradictory traditions from the Prophet which are reconciled by what has been above stated: in one, it is said that Iblees was the father of all the Jánn and Sheyṭáns,[23] Jánn being here synonymous with Jinn; in another, that Jánn was the father of all the Jinn,[24] Jánn being here used as a name of Iblees.
"It is held," says El-Ḳazweenee, a writer of the thirteenth century, "that the Jinn are aërial animals, with transparent bodies, which can assume various forms. People differ in opinion respecting these beings: some consider the Jinn and Sheyṭáns as unruly men, but these persons are of the Moạtezileh smoke [which is also at variance with the common opinion], and that [all] these kinds of beings are [usually] invisible[25] to men, but that they assume what forms they please, and when their form becomes condensed they are visible."—This last remark illustrates several descriptions of Jinnees in the "Thousand and One Nights," where the form of the monster is at first undefined, or like an enormous pillar, and then gradually assumes a human shape and less gigantic size. It is said that God created the Jánn (or Jinn) two thousand years before Adam (or, according to some writers, much earlier), and that there are believers and infidels, and every sect, among them, as among men.[26] Some say that a prophet, named Yoosuf, was sent to the Jinn; others, that they had only preachers or admonishers; others, again, that seventy apostles were sent, before Moḥammad, to Jinn and men conjointly.[27] It is commonly believed that the preadamite Jinn were governed by forty (or, according to some, seventy-two) kings, to each of whom the Arab writers give the name of Suleymán (Solomon); and that they derive their appellation from the last of these, who was called Jánn Ibn Jánn, and who, some say, built the Pyramids of Egypt. The following account of the preadamite Jinn is given by El-Ḳazweenee.—"It is related in histories that a race of Jinn in ancient times, before the creation of Adam, inhabited the earth and covered it, the land and the sea, and the plains and the mountains; and the favours of God were multiplied upon them, and they had government and prophecy and religion and law. But they transgressed and offended, and opposed their prophets, and made wickedness to abound in the earth; whereupon God, whose name be exalted, sent against them an army of Angels, who took possession of the earth, and drove away the Jinn to the regions of the islands, and made many of them prisoners; and of those who were made prisoners was ´Azázeel [afterwards called Iblees, from his despair]; and a slaughter was made among them. At that time, ´Azázeel was young: he grew up among the Angels [and probably for that reason was called one of them], and became learned in their knowledge, and assumed the government of them; and his days were prolonged until he became their chief; and thus it continued for a long time, until the affair between him and Adam happened, as God, whose name be exalted, hath said, 'When we said unto the Angels, Worship[28] ye Adam, and [all] worshipped except Iblees, [who] was [one] of the Jinn.'"[29]
"Iblees," we are told by another author, "was sent as a governor upon the earth, and judged among the Jinn a thousand years, after which he ascended into heaven, and remained employed in worship until the creation of Adam."[30] The name of Iblees was originally, according to some, ´Azázeel (as before mentioned); and according to others, El-Ḥárith: his patronymic is Aboo-Murrah, or Abu-l-Ghimr.[31] It is disputed whether he was of the Angels or of the Jinn. There are three opinions on this point.—1. That he was of the Angels, from a tradition from Ibn-´Abbás.—2. That he was of the Sheyṭáns (or evil Jinn); as it is said in the Ḳur-án, "except Iblees, [who] was [one] of the Jinn:" this was the opinion of El-Ḥasan El-Baṣree, and is that commonly held.—3. That he was neither of the Angels nor of the Jinn; but created alone, of fire. Ibn-´Abbás founds his opinion on the same text from which El-Ḥasan El-Baṣree derives his: "When we said unto the Angels, Worship ye Adam, and [all] worshipped except Iblees, [who] was [one] of the Jinn" (before quoted): which he explains by saying, that the most noble and honourable among the Angels are called "the Jinn," because they are veiled from the eyes of the other Angels on account of their superiority; and that Iblees was one of these Jinn. He adds that he had the government of the lowest heaven and of the earth, and was called the Ṭáoos (literally, Peacock) of the Angels; and that there was not a spot in the lowest heaven but he had prostrated himself upon it: but when the Jinn rebelled upon the earth, God sent a troop of Angels who drove them to the islands and mountains; and Iblees being elated with pride, and refusing to prostrate himself before Adam, God transformed him into a Sheyṭán. But this reasoning is opposed by other verses, in which Iblees is represented as saying, "Thou hast created me of fire, and hast created him [Adam] of earth."[32] It is therefore argued, "If he were created originally of fire, how was he created of light? for the Angels were [all] created of light."[33] The former verse may be explained by the tradition that Iblees, having been taken captive, was exalted among the Angels; or perhaps there is an ellipsis after the word "Angels;" for it might be inferred that the command given to the Angels was also (and à fortiori) to be obeyed by the Jinn.
According to a tradition, Iblees and all the Sheyṭáns are distinguished from the other Jinn by a longer existence. "The Sheyṭáns," it is added, "are the children of Iblees, and die not but with him, whereas the [other] Jinn die before him;"[34] though they may live many centuries. But this is not altogether accordant with the popular belief: Iblees and many other evil Jinn are to survive mankind, but they are to die before the general resurrection, as also even the Angels, the last of whom will be the Angel of Death, ´Azraeel. Yet not all the evil Jinn are to live thus long: many of them are killed by shooting stars, hurled at them from heaven; wherefore, the Arabs, when they see a shooting star (shiháb), often exclaim, "May God transfix the enemy of the faith!" Many also are killed by other Jinn, and some even by men. The fire of which the Jinnee is created circulates in his veins, in place of blood: therefore, when he receives a mortal wound, this fire, issuing from his veins, generally consumes him to ashes.