The Origins of Jinn: From Evil Spirits to Genie - (Exploring Middle Eastern Folklore)

most of us are familiar with the term genie it's a pretty simple concept you find a magical lamp you rub said lamp and then a weird cryptic spirit comes out and tells you they will grant you three wishes sounds too good to be true and that's because it is most of the time you'll either end up dead or in a worse situation than before modern-day genie can be rather unhelpful and outright strange characters but even they pale in comparison to the original stories and legends the westernized term genie comes from the arabic word jinn ancient spirits and demons who bring a whole new meaning to the phrase be careful what you wish for today's video has been made possible by audible i enjoy reading as much as the next person but most of the time i just want to sit back relax and have someone else immerse me in a story which i imagine is why many of you watch and listen to this channel audible gives me the flexibility to pop in my earphones and listen to whatever i want wherever i am with 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fiction or you can text mythology and fiction to 500 500 so don't miss out download audible today legends of jinn are most commonly associated with islamic myth and stories even older in the arabian peninsula however entities similar to the jinn appear all throughout the world in islamic tradition the term jinn is used as a collective to refer to any group of supernatural creatures it can also be used to refer to a specific creature for example you may have a piece of work about a gin or you may have a group of miscellaneous demons and spirits that are referred to as jinn or jinn communities like demons they can be evil but in some stories jinn are benevolent they are summoned and bound by a sorcerer not too different from the stories of genie before islamic belief a group of middle eastern scholars described the jinn as evil spirits who reside in the desert and unclean places they would disguise themselves to pass us by as animals others believe the jinn were closer to deities and as a result they were worshiped when islam became the religion of choice these deities may have been perceived as having pagan influences and thus they played a much smaller role in everyday life despite once being seen as deities they were never considered immortal or invincible there are notions of armed men being able to kill a jinn they are however mostly just theories as jin could not only shapeshift but also turn invisible so good luck trying to kill something you can't even see jin will also consider the spreaders of disease and mental illness they could possess one's mind and body as we move into scripture the overall stature of the jinn changes in the story of solomon jyn were spirits of nature similar to the previous pagan deities solomon was gifted the power to talk to animals and spirits and thus he was able to reign in the unruly jinn and command them to help build the first temple in ancient jerusalem in the quran itself the jinnah mentioned a grand total of 29 times most of this occurs in the 72nd chapter titled al-jin or the jinn in order to maintain the notion of there being only one true god the jinn shift from deities to lesser spirits who in terms of hierarchy in relation to god are roughly level with humans meaning they are subject to his judgment in death they exist somewhere in between our realm and the spectral realm in one hadith the jinn are divided into three distinct groups jin who fly through the air jin who could take the shape of dogs and snakes and jinn who travel in the same way as humans scholars have interpreted the quran's use of jinn to mean one of two things an entity or being that exists in a plane invisible to humans therefore we can categorize angels and demons as jinn but not every jinn is an angel or demon you then have a description that paints them in a light similar to humans jinn were created from a smokeless fire and inhabited the earth before adam and the first humans they were faster and stronger but they still lived like humans in many ways they still had to eat sleep and drink and when they died they would be sent to heaven or hell depending on their actions they were also divided into separate tribes with each one being created from a different mixture of fire wars between light and dark angelic and demonic gin occurred quite often it even became common to explain violent storms as warring tribes of jinn invisible to the human eye these storms represented the chaos and aftermath of these battles this conflict can also be explained by taking a look at another traditional story which tells us why the jinn may have disappeared the angels were created on wednesday the gin on a thursday and a thousand years later humans on a friday these three races co-existed peacefully until corruption violence and greed overcame the jinn the warnings of god were ignored and he was given no choice but to send the angels to purge the jinn most of them subsequently died and the few gin that did survive were exiled from earth these traditions involving jinns spread across more than just arabia reaching turkey north africa and even the balkans in morocco exorcisms were performed for those who were thought to be possessed by aegin however they couldn't just possess anyone they would target people whom they considered vulnerable often referred to as a tired soul someone who was unhappy mentally unstable or just depressed hence the association with jin and mental illness another widespread belief is that the jinn live underground where they plot and scheme against humanity they surface only to spread illness and cause harm to those who mistreat others this extends to possession and kidnapping children in this case the jinn exists as a moral lesson or reminder so how did we go from jinn to genie the most obvious example being the genie in disney's aladdin who is far from an evil spirit this and many other tales are inspired by the arabic text 1001 nights a collection of middle eastern folk tales from the 8th to the 14th century for many of these tales their source of origin is unknown but there are numerous influences from arabic persian and greek to indian turkish and chinese so it's an amalgamation of cultures from basically everywhere in english it's also commonly referred to as the arabian nights here the jin make an appearance in a number of different stories the most noticeable being aladdin and the wonderful lamp in this story aladdin isn't too different from the disney variation a young mischievous misguided lad who is found in the streets of a chinese city by a sorcerer who claims to be the brother of aladdin's father so his long lost uncle and no before you ask this man is not called jafar he claims to be mustafa the tailor he convinces aladdin and his mother that he only wants to help them but first he needs a favor of course inside of a cave there is the most wonderful oil lamp in all the land if aladdin is able to retrieve it he promises they will never be poor again the cave however is magically booby-trapped and dangerous enough that mustafa himself would never dare to enter but he does give aladdin a magical ring for protection once inside her no one's surprise mustafa double crosses aladdin and leaves him trapped inside the cave in despair of his situation aladdin begins to rub his hands in doing so he accidentally rubs the ring and to his surprise out pops a gin or genie aladdin returns home to his mother with a magical ring a gin and a wonderful lamp his mother decides maybe they should sell the lamp in order to afford food and as she begins wiping it down out pops a second gin much more powerful than the first with help from this jinn aladdin becomes extremely rich and marries the sultan's daughter hearing of aladdin's meteoric rise mustafa makes his return knowing only the lamp could have caused this much good fortune he tricks aladdin's wife into giving him the lamp and his first command or wish is to take the palace and everything inside of it back to his home when aladdin returns he does the only thing he can he summons the first genie from the ring he tells aladdin that he cannot undo the magic of the second gin but he can send him to the palace once there he kills mustafa and returns his palace to its rightful place this isn't how the story ends though mustafa's older brother vows to avenge his death he transforms himself into an elderly woman and owns his way inside of aladdin's palace by convincing his wife he has magical powers the jin in the lamp however sees through this disguise and alerts aladdin of the imposter who is then killed now we get the happy ending where aladdin eventually becomes sultan and lives a happy evil sorcerer-free life when it comes to modern fiction jin and genie have been interpreted in a variety of ways some are indeed lesser gods and others are magical entities summoned through the use of dark magic and witchcraft one trope that is certainly stuck is being granted three wishes when you summon a genie now these wishes have a habit of going sideways and i'm sure fans of the wish master franchise will be more than familiar with a tricky gin the jinn have appeared in stories for thousands of years and it's always interesting to see ideas from different cultures merge together and create new stories whether it's a race of invisible spirits at war entities that live underground and punish humans a boy in his magical lamp or just classic robin williams you can't really go wrong with a story of a gin unless you're the one making the three wishes because in that case i wish you the best of luck as always i've been your host mythology and fiction explained you

Channel: Mythology & Fiction Explained

Views: 413,439

Keywords: Jinn, Genie, Mythology and fiction explained, middle eastern folklore, islamic jinn, the jinn, aladdin, folklore, mythology

Id: WdqgSWNJz0I

Length: 13min 45sec (825 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 02 2020