This article is about the mythological creature. For the American air-to-air nuclear missile, see AIR-2 Genie. For the Internet service provider, see GEnie. For the feral child see Genie (feral child). For Canadian film award, see Genie Award.

Genie is the English term for the Arabic "jinni | جن". 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 translation of the original Arabic term jinn, but it is not an Anglicization, as commonly thought. It was first used in English as geny to mean a guardian spirit, with the first recorded use in 1655. The word came from the French genie, which in turn came from the original Latin word genius, for a spirit. The Latin word predates the Arabic word jinn, and the two terms have not been shown to be related. The extension of meaning to the powerful spirit in Islam appeared in 1748 by French translators using the French term genie. The definition referring to the powerful Arabian mythological spirit 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

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, much in the same way humans were made of clay. In the Qur'an, the jinn are frequently mentioned and Surat 72 of the Qur'an named Al-Jinn is entirely about them. 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

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 sufi story of Aladdin was such a jinni, bound to an oil lamp.

In the Qur'an, Suleiman had members of his army belonging to the race of jinn. Suleiman had the ability to communicate with all creatures, thus he could 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.

Jinn in the Occult

In sorcery books Jinn are classified into four races after the classical elements, Earth, Air, Fire (Ifrit) and Water (Marid) and presumed to live in them. They are collected in tribes, usually seven, each with a king. Each king controls his tribe and is controlled by an Angel. The Angel's name is torture to the jinn king as well as his specific tribe.

Unlike white and evil witches, Jinn have free will; yet, they could be compelled to perform both good and evil acts. In contrast a demon would only hurt creatures, and an angel would only have benevolent intentions. Knowing what to ask a spirit to perform is key, as asking a spirit to perform a chore that runs counter to its natural tendencies could possibly anger the spirit into retaliating against the sorcerer.

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.

See also: Aladdin (1992 film), Castle in the Air, I Dream of Jeannie, Charmed

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.
• 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 Magic: The Gathering there are and .
• 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 Bartimaeus Trilogy, a djinni is a section of five major deamons, also including Afrits (a form of Ifirt) as a creature of fire, and Marids, and Imps.
• As well in the Bartimaeus trilogy, instead of having djinni as creatures of the elements, the author (Jonathon Stroud) classifies them in a ranking system according to their power or strength. Below I will list the djinni as he portrays them from weakest to most powerful.

1. imp 2. foliot 3. djinni 4.afrit 5. maridhe hints of things that are beyond the power of a marid as being possible but they do not come up in the books.

• The fantasy-novelists Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman have written a trilogy of fantasy books called Rose of the Prophet, which is set in an Arabic-style fantasy world with djinns and efreets.
• The Weather Warden series by Rachel Caine also prominently features Djinn characters in an modern-day fantasy setting.

See also

• Aladdin
• Ifrit
• Marid

Compare

• Wight

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.

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