Genie

Genie is the English term for the Arabic جن (jinn). In pre-Islamic Arabian mythology and in Islam, a jinni (also "djinni" or "djini") is a member of the jinn (or "djinn"), a race of creatures. The word "jinn" literally means anything which has the connotation of concealment, invisibility, seclusion and remoteness.

Etymology and definitions

Genie is the usual English translation of the Arabic term jinni, but it is not an Anglicized form of the Arabic word, as is commonly thought. The English word comes from French génie, which meant a spirit of any kind, which in turn came from Latin genius, which meant a sort of tutelary or guardian spirit thought to be assigned to each person at birth (see genius). The Latin word predates the Arabic word jinni, and the two terms have not been shown to be related. The first recorded use of the word in English was in 1655 as geny, with the Latin meaning. The French translators of the Arabian Nights later used the word génie as a translation of jinni because it was similar to the Arabic word both in sound and in meaning; this meaning was also picked up in English and has since become dominant.

Amongst archeologists dealing with ancient Middle Eastern cultures, any mythological spirit lesser than a god is often referred to as a "genie", especially when describing stone reliefs or other forms of art. This practice draws on the original meaning of the term genie for simply a spirit of any sort.

Jinn in pre-Islamic mythology

For the ancient Semites, jinn were spirits of vanished ancient peoples who acted during the night and disappeared with the first light of dawn; they could make themselves invisible or change shape into animals at will; these spirits were commonly believed to be responsible for diseases and for the manias of some lunatics. Types of jinn include the ghul (night shade, which can change shape), the sila (which cannot change shape) and the ifrit.

The Arabs believed that the jinn were spirits of fire, although sometimes they associated them with succubi, demons in the forms of beautiful women, who visited men by night to copulate with them until they were exhausted, drawing energy from this encounter just as a vampire is supposedly sustained by his victim's blood.

Jinn in Islam

Muslims believe that jinn are real beings. The jinn are said to be creatures with free will, made of smokeless fire by God (the literal translation being "subtle fire", i.e. a fire which does not give itself away through smoke), much in the same way humans were made of a metaphorical clay. In the Qur'an, jinn are frequently mentioned and Sura 72 of the Qur'an named Al-Jinn is entirely about them. Another Sura (Al- Naas) mentions the Jinn in the last verse. In fact, the Prophet Muhammad was said to have been sent as a prophet to both "humanity and the jinn."

The jinn have communities much like human societies: they eat, marry, die, etc. They are invisible to humans, but they can see humans. Sometimes they accidentally or deliberately come into view or into contact with humans.

Jinn are beings much like humans, possessing the ability to be good and bad. They have the power to transform into other animals and humans, and they are known to prefer the form of a snake. It is also known that they eat bones and their animals eat droppings, that is why it is forbidden to perform Istinja (washing) with those items. Jinns also have the power to possess humans, have much greater strength than them, and live much longer lives. In fact, according to some hadith, the great-grandson of Iblis, or the Devil (who was born before mankind), converted to Islam during the time of Muhammad, so he must have been thousands of years old. According to the majority of Islamic scholars, clear evidence exists in the Qur'an that the Devil was not an angel (as thought by Christians), but a jinn, citing the Quranic verse "And when We said to the angels:'Prostrate yourselves unto Adam.' So they prostrated themselves except Iblis (The Devil). He was one of the jinn..." Surat Al-Kahf, 18:50. According to Islam, angels are different physical beings, and unlike the fiery nature of jinn, they are beings of goodness and cannot choose to disobey God, nor do they possess the ability to do evil. Evil Ifrit (pronounced AYE-FRIT) in the The Book of One Thousand and One Nights are called "the seed of Iblis".

In Islam-associated mythology, the jinn were said to be controllable by magically binding them to objects, as Suleiman (Solomon) most famously did; the Spirit of the Lamp in the story of Aladdin was such a jinni, bound to an oil lamp. Ways of summoning jinn were told in The Thousand and One Nights: by writing the name of God in Hebraic characters on a knife (whether the Hebrew name for God, Yaweh, or the Arabic Allah is used is not specified), and drawing a diagram (possibly a pentagram) and strange symbols and incantations around it.

It is said that one could kill a jinn with the Inwa, a manner of throwing the stone of a fruit so hard so it could, in fact, kill something. The jinn's power of possession was also addressed in the Nights. It is said that by taking seven hairs out of the tail of a cat that was all black except for a white spot on the end of its tail, and then burning the hairs in a small closed room with the possessed—filling their nose with the scent—this would release them from the spell of the jinn inside them.

In the Qur'an, Solomon (Arabic: Suleiman) had members of his army belonging to the race of jinn. Solomon had the ability to communicate with all creatures, which allowed him to communicate with the jinn as well.

Evil beings from among the jinn are roughly equivalent to the demons of Christian lore. In mythology, jinn have the ability to possess human beings, both in the sense that they persuade humans to perform actions, and like the Christian perception of demonic possession.

Genies in Western culture

In Western fiction, after the Aladdin tale in the Western version of The Book of One Thousand and One Nights, genies live in small oil lamps and grant three wishes to the person who rubbed the lamp to release the genie while more mischievous ones take advantage of poorly worded wishes (including in one episode of The X-Files). Alternately, they may grant a single wish per day.

Many stories about genies tend to follow the same vein as the famous short story The Monkey's Paw by W.W. Jacobs, with the overriding theme of "be careful what you wish for"; in these stories, wishes can have disastrous, horrific and sometimes fatal consequences. Often, the genie causes harm to the loved ones or innocent people surrounding the wisher, making others pay for its master's greed or ignorance.

Until 2005, the Djinn was one of many mythical creatures to be used as a Brownie patrol. When the Girl Guides of Canada updated the Brownie program in 2005, they decided that Djinns were an improper use of an Islamic cultural icon and made the decision to remove Djinns from the program.

Jinn in Popular Culture

Awareness about the origins of the genie myth, and the use of the original spelling djinn has become more common. Usually, the term djinn is used by authors who wish to convey a more serious interpretation of the mythical creature, rather than the comical genies the Western public has become used to such as Robin Williams' character in Aladdin.

Examples include:

Mr. Beaver in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe conjectures that the White Witch Jadis was not human (as was her claim), but was in fact half giantess and half Jinn, a descendant of Lilith, Adam's "first wife."
The horror film Wishmaster features a hateful and evil djinni as its villain. The series has spawned four sequels.
The "Djinn in charge of All Deserts" gives the lazy camel his hump in the story How the Camel Got His Hump from Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories.
In the roleplaying game In Nomine by Steve Jackson Games, a band of demons in Hell's service are called Djinn.
In the collectible card game The Gathering there are more than two dozen djinn-related cards, mostly larger-than-usual creatures with a drawback, and a dozen ifrit/efreet cards.
Several references to djinn occur in the final short story, entitled "Ramadan," of Neil Gaiman's sixth The Sandman collection, Fables and Reflections.
In the Dragon Ball manga, Majin Buu is described as a djinn.
In the Bartimaeus Trilogy books by Jonathan Stroud, a djinni is a section of five major demons, also including afrits (a form of Ifrit) as a creature of fire, marids, foliots, and imps. The trilogy focuses on a five-thousand year-old djinni named Bartimaeus and his unwilling alliance with a teenage boy.
In the series of books named Weather Warden, the Djinn are heavily used and mentioned. The Wardens who control fire, weather and earth capture the Djinn in bottles. The two most powerful Djinn in the world are used in these series of books.
Declare, a novel by Tim Powers deals extensively with Djinn, set in the context of the cold war espionage community.
In the videogame, Golden Sun, players encounter Djinn as small benevolent creatures who use their powers to aid the protagonists in battle. There are four types of Djinn that correspond to an element each and the appearance of the Djinn of one element is identical.
In another video game, Shadow of Destiny, the player is called upon by a Djinn referred to as Homunculus, who is bound to the famous alchemic artifact the Philosopher's Stone.
In the popular book series Children of the Lamp, John and Phillipa Gaunt discover that they are members of the djinn tribe Marid.
In the young adult's book Castle in the Air by Diana Wynne Jones, the sequel to Howl's Moving Castle, there is a genie in a bottle and a pair of Djinn.
In the video game Primal the Djinn are a fiery race of demons inhabiting a volcanic land called Volca and are allies to the evil Abbadon. The main charater Jen can also assume the form of a Djinn as one of her four demon transformations.
In the animated series Martin Mystery, episodes called "Curse of the Djini" and "Return of the Djini" featured an evil djinn trapped in a skull that could read peoples' mind's and make them say their wishes. If the djinn died then the wishes would be undone.

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References

al-Ashqar, Dr. Umar Sulaiman (1998). The World of the Jinn and Devils. Boulder, CO: Al-Basheer Company for Publications and Translations.
Barnhart, Robert K. The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology. 1995.
"Genie". The Oxford English Dictionary. Second edition, 1989.

External links

Satan is a jinn
Sura Al-Jinn from the Qur'an
True Scientific Explanation of Jinn
Jinn Possession: Between Facts and Illusions online Fatwa from islamonline.net
The World of Jinn and Its Secrets online Fatwa from islamonline.net
A Jinn Paralyses Me At Night -- though such symptoms are now compatible with a recently discovered condition known as Sleep Paralysis.
All about possession and exorcisms
What are Jinns and Spirits ?
Jinn and Forms of Jinn
Macula's (Jinn)

Islamic mythology | Legendary creatures | Arabian mythology | Arabic words

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