I have a question about disobedience of Iblis. Did Iblis disobey God out of a free will? What? Did Iblis disobey Allah out of a free will? Free will, yes. Iblis is one of the jinn and… No, you know, the whole issue should be first resolved of jinn. What a jinn is and in what context it is meant there in the place where you have mentioned. Jinn may mean different things. Jinn may mean bacteria, jinn may mean snakes, jinn may mean people living in the mountains. Jinn is a word which also means those ladies of high society which observe purdah, observe veil and live separately from others.
Jinn also may mean big people, the chosen ones and the more powerful ones. There the jinn means those of the… or the chosen ones of the jinn, that is the capitalist in that context. And the Naas, the proletariats, the common man. When the world would be divided among jinns and the Naas, it means the capitalist and the… or the guyaas and the proletariats, let’s call it. So it may mean so many different things. It also may mean somebody who is rebellious in nature, who is fiery in character.
And this is an Arabic idiom, that when some particular trait in somebody is to be pronounced and brought to greater relief, then they say he is born out of that. Qalaqal insaana min ajal. Ajal means hastiness, hurriedness. So is man born out of hurriedness? What do you mean by that? Obviously it means that to be in a hurry, to be in a rush, to be impatient, is a character of man, is deeply ingrained in him, is a second nature to him, things like that. So when in Arabic it is said somebody is born out of something, it may mean physically, but it also may mean that he has got that trait in his nature most prominently.
So when the jinn is used in that context, indicating rebellious nature of a people, then it is always said he is born out of fire. Like qalaqal insaana min ajal, and in comparison to that, man is shown to have been born out of teen, that is humility, humbleness. Fire is the indication or symbol of revolt and destruction. And teen, particularly the one which has wetness in it, that is a symbol of growth and coherence and cohesion.
So this is exactly the opposite, and also humility, humbleness. Those who are rebellious, they are called of fiery nature, even in English and other languages. So Iblis is depicted to have been born out of fire, that is, it may mean that he had a rebellious nature, he would not bow down to authority, and he must have belonged to some unruly tribe, a people who never knew superior authority and how to bow down to others. They took pride, like the pre-Islamic Arabs used to take pride in this very fact, of their Iblisiyat in this way.
They said, we are a people who will be destroyed and killed, but we are not going to bow down to authority. So this is one of the greatest miracles of our Prophet, to have subdued them, you know, with one word. But every Prophet has his own Iblis. That is to say, the most rebellious among his opponents, the one who is most hostile and also symbolizes all that is mentioned in the Holy Quran by the term Iblisiyat. So Iblis is the personification of a Shaitaan at different ages.
Shaitaan can be of many different orders and different status, but Iblis is the very top and the one, that Shaitaan, who opposes a Prophet in his lifetime. So Iblisiyat is a very special manifestation and very intense manifestation of Shaitaniyat, that is Satanism. So in this context, when you read that episode, everything would become very clear to you, that Iblis was the head of the hostile movement against Adam and his authority. Is it to be understood in this way, that God gave Iblis a fiery nature? What? Is it to be understood like this, that Allah gave? Well, everything which we have in the world is given by Allah.
Show me one thing which is not given by Allah. You know, you remind me of a very interesting episode, which happened in Lahore many, many years ago. It was even much before partition. There used to be a half-witted person in Lahore, who was considered to be a holy man. Unfortunately, this is the standard of the present-day Muslims. Whoever is half-witted, he is considered to be a holy man. According to the standards laid down by the Holy Prophet, Sayyidina Muhammad Mustafa, the believer has much greater and brighter intelligence. He sees with the light of Allah.
But anyway, those who are half-witted and semi-idiots and things, they are considered to be the holiest of men. But some among them are holy, in the sense that they have lost all interest in the world. And they behave as if they are idiots, but they are not idiots. Of their own accord, they have abandoned the world and have become devoted entirely to Allah. Some of them also behave like semi-idiots and things. But in reality, they are not.
So I am talking of one of such persons, who was idiotic apparently, but also was a very holy man. He used to live near Masjid Wazir Khan, near Delhi Darwada. So once he was seen in a very jubilant mood. He was just dancing about and laughing, while it was against his character to do that. So somebody asked him, why are you sighing, he was called. Sighing, why are you so happy today? What happened? He said, yes, I have told my God what I had to tell him. So I am very happy now. A lot of burden is off my head now.
So he asked, what have you told your God? Tell me. He said, I have told him that I don’t like your creation. Away with it. Just not interested. So after a few days he was seen again, very downcast, cast fallen, very much dejected and you know, in the blues. So the same man met him and said, why? Sighing, what has happened? He said, answer has come back. So he said, what is the answer? He said, Allah has told me to leave his creation and go to whichever creation he likes.
Whomsoever’s creation he likes, you know. No choice. See, this is free will. In a way it’s free will. But looking at it from a different angle, there is no free will involved. You can’t make a choice, you can’t go anywhere else. Everything is given to you by Allah. And wherever you go to will still belong to him. So this is why some Urdu poets have dwelt on this subject very interestingly. One of the greatest poets of Urdu is called Mir, is known as Mir. He says, You know, you don’t know the meaning but Urdu is your subject. Isn’t it? I mean, I know you are a student of Urdu, but not yet.
You have not reached that standard, I know. It is a beautiful couplet, but it’s very difficult to translate. I’ll give a very rough idea of what it conveys. It says, First of all, you have to understand the Urdu idiom of Black and white. It literally means black and white. So it says, Black and white, which covers both the good sides and the evil sides. So all that there is, by way of destiny, is called black and white. In the matter of affairs, in the affairs, in the decennial affairs we can call it. When you say, It can be translated in the decision making here in this world.
All that belongs to us is that we can cry the night out and drag the day out in misery. That is all the decision that we can take. And we are living a miserable life. The whole night we keep crying until the morning, the dawn appears. And then the day is a laborious day for us. We spend it somehow in misery, so the night begins. So that is all that belongs to us in decision making in this world. It’s a grave allegation, an unjustified allegation against us, that we have a free will. You do whatever you please, and throw the blame upon us.
You see? He was a very pious man too, I mean, he was a great Sufi in a way. Although there was another Meel who was known as a great Sufi poet, but he also had a deep Sufism in him. So it was not an insulting attitude at all. There is a way of expressing things to God and trying to solve the riddle of Taqdeer. So this is it. In a way everything is His, nothing is yours or mine.
May I ask one more question in this connection? When the Quran says that jinn are created of fire, does this apply to all the groups of jinn you have mentioned, bacteria, people? You know, in that particular place, as I have mentioned, in the case of Iblis it is mentioned he was created, he himself admits or confesses that he was created from fire. In other places the jinns are also known, declared by the Holy Quran to dive in water and bring out pearls for Hazrat Salman and Hazrat Dawood. So what sort of fire that was? Which dipped into water and still came out whole.
So obviously Allah does not mean any material fire in that context. So in some places where jinns are mentioned as having been created from fire, there is positive, irrefutable proof from the Holy Quran that material fire is not meant. Must be fiery nature or some other aspect of jinn which has been mentioned there.
In other places, in some places, fire is also mentioned. Literally, the heat of fire. And there, Min Naris Samum is mentioned. And the Holy Quran tells us that before the creation of man, we had created jinn with the fire of Samum. That is a very hot blaze. Samum is hot blaze. So you can say we created jinn from the most fiery hot blaze. And there it seems that it is something literally mentioned. You can’t put other meanings to it than the just material literal meaning as it’s mentioned. So we must explore this region now and try to find out what is meant by jinn here.
Now fortunately, Sayyidina Muhammad Mustafa has already solved this riddle for us in a different place. Although the two are not connected directly, but one can begin to see light and infer from that statement of Muhammad, which would ultimately apply to this situation as well. At one time, he admonished the companions not to use bones for cleaning themselves. If they don’t find water, if they have gone to attend the call of nature, they have to clean their body with water normally according to the Muslim custom.
But if it’s not available, then earth or other articles can be used, dry articles. But Prophet Muhammad prohibited people from using bones. Why? He said because it is the food for jinn. Now we know positively now that the bones are the food of bacteria. And we also understand the significance of this injunction. If bones are used which are infested with bacteria, then there is every possibility of people getting infection in the urinary organs or rectal infection or something. It’s very likely.
So when Prophet Muhammad said don’t use it, it is the food for jinn, what he meant was food for bacteria. And because the Arabic word jinn can be extended to mean this, because literally speaking, originally the jinn means everything hidden. So jaan is used for some snakes who live hidden from the eyes. As I have mentioned, if you consult the Arabic lughat, that is the dictionary, you will find under the word jinn so many possible meanings extending from human beings to other objects. And the spectrum is very wide because everywhere where the word jinn is applied, there is some sense of hiddenness, something concealed, away from others, different from others.
The big people, the leaders, the Arab leaders were also called jinn. And women who keep away segregation from men and so on. And as I said, mountainous people who live in mountains and who do not want to appear before public eye. Like the delegation from the South Yemen which came to Prophet Muhammad and did not want his identity to be disclosed and met him privately at some place. And there Prophet Muhammad met them and after a little dialogue they accepted Islam.
So the Holy Quran mentions them as jinn because they wanted to avoid public notice, public observation, and they met him secretly. But from the tradition itself we have a proof that they were not the type of jinn which are generally believed. Because they left behind the signs which positively denoted that they were ordinary human beings. Because where they cooked, where they built fire, where they rested, in short, where they camped. The ruins which they left behind or the signs which they left behind have been mentioned in the hadith, in the traditions and they speak of a people living, coming, having come and stayed there for a while and did not want to meet him in Medina in public eye.
So this is the word jinn with this widest application. Bacteria also are a part of this word jinn because they live hidden from the public, from human eye. And in that respect they are the first to be called jinn. Because of all other things on which the word jinn applies, we can’t say that they are totally hidden from the public eye. But as far as the naked eye is concerned, bacteria are entirely hidden from public eye. So the most intense meaning of jinn is found in the word bacteria, the very first meaning. And this is exactly what the holy Quran tells us.
That before the life which ultimately developed into human beings, that is creation of Naas, jinn had been created from fire. And a positive scientific proof has been established of exactly this thing. That there are a type of bacteria which are called pyrobacteria. Pyro means fire. And they are called fire bacteria. They are born out of fire. They eat and consume the energy of fire directly. Not through chemical disintegration. Directly from fire.
And they were born directly from the hot blazes before the creation of other types of life. Previously, although the scientists had always, not always but for a long time, known the existence of fire bacteria, but they thought they were not among the oldest. They thought there were two types of bacteria which are the oldest. One which are called eukaryotes and prokaryotes, I think. I don’t remember exactly the names. But the meaning is one with the cells, with the central nucleus. And one without a central nucleus. Prokaryotes and… Huh? Pardon? No, no, no. Pardon?
Prokaryotes and? Yes, eukaryotes. So, they thought they were the oldest form of life. They were the very first creation in the form of a cell. Beyond that, whatever you may believe, there may be organic matter having developed, but the first life was in the form of these two bacteria. And they are not fire bacteria. But recently it has been discovered, only in the past decade, that fire bacteria are at least as old as these two prokaryotes. And when I read this article, you know, I was so happy, because I had always believed that according to the Holy Quran, the bacteria must have been born directly from fire, prior to the phenomenon which ended up into the creation of man.
So these other two bacteria are the ancestors of all other life. And the scientists had believed that the fire bacteria also belonged to the tree of that line of life. Now they have established beyond doubt that they have their independent origin, which is at least as old, if not older. So the Holy Quran declared it 1400 years ago, that before the creation of life which ended in man’s creation, that is what it means, we had created jinn directly from fire, and the blaze of fire. And this is exactly the picture created or envisaged by scientists.
That in the hot blazes of that age, where there was just radiation and blazes from heaven, and there was no oxygen in the atmosphere, life was created, and these type of bacteria were born in those days. So literally this means some types of jinn, not all, have been materially created from fire directly. Does this word fire generally stand for something destructive, when it’s mentioned that jinn is created of fire? When the nature of jinn is described, their destructiveness of the jinn is brought to the limelight.
Where it is not mentioned, other purposes of jinn have been brought to highlight. For instance, in the case where they were subjugated to Hazrat Dawood and Hazrat Suleiman, this nature is not emphasised. Their work, their huge capabilities of physical services, and their aptitude for certain works, that has been limelighted, and the stress is laid there. So as I said, jinn is a very wide word, covering so many things, and it’s the style of the Holy Quran that in the context where the word jinn is used, some indications are thrown for which purpose the word is used.
What is the special quality of the jinn here, in this case? So it’s not difficult to see through that. Do you know that the Danish also tend to believe in jinn? It’s one of the most popular beliefs, isn’t it? Because wherever I go, the jinn come after me. They don’t leave my bed. This question doesn’t leave me. It means that this is a worldwide popular idea, and this is a proof that basically, fundamentally, man is religious. If he doesn’t believe in God, he has to believe in something odd. He can reject the idea of God, considering it to be odd. Yet, willy-nilly, he has to believe in some other odd thing at the same time.
So that his rejection of God is not justified. You know, Europe, Eastern Europe particularly, is so superstitious. It’s unbelievable to imagine Russian communists, scientific socialists, who have rejected the idea of existence of God as hocus-pocus, believing in superstitious things so much that they leave the rest of the world behind, by large margin. You know, the number of witch doctors in Russia today is the greatest after Africa. In the modern world, in the world of today, in the world of the rockets, in Russia, the witch doctors outnumber every area of the country, except certain African countries.
And the superstitions found today, alive and in practice, in Czechoslovakia, are so numerous that they say, the scientists who have worked on it, that if one country is to be named on the top of the list, no doubt it is Czechoslovakia. For superstitions of all kinds. And yet they don’t believe in God. And they reject the idea of God. And believe in inferior things, built on the same type, on the same pattern, you know. So that shows that the claim of the Holy Quran, that when we created you before that, we took a covenant from you.
Each soul had confessed that yes, we have a God. That is to say that it was deeply inbred in every soul, ingrained in every soul, that you must live with the idea of God. If it is not the true God, then you will create a distorted God. A junior type of God, a jinn or dev or something. And you have to believe because it is in you. We witness this nowadays. Even in the countries of our country, they could not do away with God.
