The Jinn: The Most Misunderstood Supervillain in Islam
I can talk. I’ve long been possessed by one
“Jinn dhore geche”
Growing up in Bangladesh, this was the phrase I heard my mother say the most when explaining away my aberrant behaviour. Spiked my hair up with coconut oil and walking around pretending I was a punk? Jinn dhore geche. Stole the giant stick the neighbour used to beat his cows with? Jinn dhore geche. Lacing the maulavi’s tea with castor oil in revenge for him caning me senselessly for mispronouncing my “gh” during Qur’an recitals? Jinn dhore geche.
It means I’ve been possessed by the Jinn. The Jinn is the Muslim kid’s bogeyman. With ankles and wrists twisted backwards, they live in the dark, awaiting Shaytan’s permission to jump inside and occupy the body and soul of naughty boys and girls.
To this day, for my family and the thousand relatives beyond them, I continue to serve as a cautionary tale to strengthen their belief in Jinn possessions, the heads of any impressionable children immediately dunked in bubbling cauldrons of holy Zamzam water at the mention of my name.
Jinns aren’t as bloodcurdling as they’re made out to be. They’re flesh and blood, feel pain and joy just like us, but are destined to remain unseen, feared. You have to feel sorry for them really. They were here first. For two thousand years before Adam’s apple was a twinkle in Hawwa’s eyes, (that’s Eve to you and me), they ruled the earth. But they screwed it up, so the Big Al sent an army of angels to beat the crap out of them and oust them all into the underworld, to dwell for all eternity in the dirtiest, dankest recesses of the earth, like inside dustbins and toilets. Which is why Muslims are advised to praise the lord before taking a leak, in case a Jinn shoots up the pipe hole. (Although seeing as the Big Al’s replacement for the twisted firestarting Jinns—namely humans—have gone on to wreak so much more havoc on this planet, it must make the religious wonder whether we’d all been possessed by Jinns a long, long time ago.)
The idea worked just fine for my folks, who seemed content to blame their shortcomings as parents on goblins. As a result, I’ve always been drawn to Jinns because, unlike the goody-two-wings angels, they’ve always possessed free will. They are famous for being Truthers who know the unseen and understand more about the world than Man ever can. So you have to wonder why, when put to the test – failure to comply meaning losing their place on Earth – they simply said, ‘No, fuck that.’ Nor can you help but feel some kind of admiration for their supreme dark overlord, Iblis.
“And remember, when we said to the angels, ‘bow before Adam’, they all did so. But not Iblis the Jinn, who rebelled against the command of his Lord.”
Surah Al-Kahf, 18:50
Iblis was a hardcore rebel Jinn who could take human form and spent most of his time on Earth urging the disbelievers of the world to unite and take over. Stupid really, considering the Big Al was very much in the game back then and promptly sent in the angel Jibreel to terminate him. But you have to hand it to Iblis. Even as he was being condemned to eternal hell, he dared barter with Big Al, and talk about negotiation skills! While all other Jinns were cursed with mortality, he got to stay on Earth until the Day of Resurrection, with his very own throne in the sea, from where, to this day, he sits plotting the destruction of mankind.
According to the Holy Q, there are three types of Jinns to choose from:
Ones that are like the wind, with wings.
Ones that resemble snakes or black dogs.
Ones that travel, rest for a bit, then travel again.
That’s all that’s said anywhere about this third variety of Jinn. Loaf about and have adventures. Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve found my brand.
‘I like that they’re made of fire,’ a girl I was dating once said, both of us requisitely stoned to have such a conversation.
‘That’s been said about me too,’ I winked.
‘Wouldn’t it be funny if when they said Jinns, what they actually meant was genes? Our bodies are like vessels, right? Things that store genes to pass on from one generation to the next one. So maybe we’re all just made up of Jinns and they’ve been using us all this time, and we’re nothing more than a bunch of carriers.’
‘Jinnatics!’ I quipped, proud of myself.
‘I want to see one,’ she sat up and clapped. ‘Where’s the best place to look for them?’
I nearly said toilet, but the idea of a wasted blowjob in the bogs didn’t seem like the height of chivalry, so instead I told her they sometimes lived in trees.
‘Think there might be one in that tree?’
I regretted passing up the toilet option. But she’d already leapt up it like Huckleberry Finn on speed and was stood perched on its highest nook, expecting to fly.
I’m shit at climbing trees, so I had to pretend I was much more wasted than I was to justify my shoe slipping and constant loss of grip on the way up. I slid, gurned, grappled, lost my composure, regained it, and then somehow made it nearly to where she now lay scanning the branches for Jinns. I tiptoed precariously on the branch below her, hoping a redeeming quip would come to me should I fall and splatter.
‘Come lie with me,’ she said in a dulcet tone laced with what sounded a lot like romance. It gave me just the boost I needed to hoist myself up to her level, elbowing her boob and head-butting her chin, ending with our bodies obscenely entwined. For a long while we just lay there, breathing in each other’s scent, feeling dizzy on the swaying branch yet safe under slices of sky like mosaic shards framed by jagged leaves.
‘Maybe Jinns are like a metaphor for the demons we carry inside us,’ she whispered.
It’s the last thing I remember her saying before I fell off my tree and knocked myself out. And no, I didn’t get laid that night.
I often recall those words. When I’m battling addiction, depression, or psychotic rage. I remind myself the demon Jinn inside me is Type 3: simply resting inside me a while.
I know how to deal with my Jinn. I tell him I feel his pain, of being an outcast in a land that was once his, forever maligned and in the shadows of a lesser being. That I understand he’s only giving me a taste of the hell he’s going through.
And so, I fill myself with peace. The kind he’s doomed to never be able to experience. So off he fucks, knowing full well he can’t defeat a man who will not fight but only show him kindness. Because if there’s one thing Islam can assure us, is that we were born pure, having already beaten the Jinns to be the rightful owners of our souls.
Although, there’s no harm in scanning the trees or checking the toilet to be sure there isn’t one waiting to suck you in…
اﺍلسحرﺭاﺍلذﺫھﮪﮬﻫبي
سفﻑوﻭ نُیﻳلازﺯ نلجوﻭمﻡ
منﻥ اﺍلفضاءاﺍلﮭﻬائلﻝ
إﺇلى وﻭاﺍدﺩيﻱ اﺍلجنﻥ
حانﻥ اﺍلوﻭقتﺕ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwimy2I3fas