Djinn of the Shrine

In this week’s episode host Rabia Chaudry is joined by Professor Ali Olomi, a historian and Mid East scholar, djinn and folklore expert, and host of the podcast "Head On History". You can find and follow Ali, and his djinn threads, on Twitter, at the handle @aaolomi.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to The Hidden Gin, a production of I Heart
Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Hi, and

(00:30):
welcome to this very special bonus series of The Hidden Gin.
The interviews. In these episodes, you'll hear me talk to
people from all walks of life who have had GIN experiences,
are drawn to the stories of Gin, and draw lessons
from these stories. You'll hear from artists, scholars, writers, journalists,
and Gin exorcists, and even from me as I discuss

(00:53):
how and why this series came about in a very
personal conversation with my husband. Thanks for listening and enjoy.
All right, so let's just start at the top then, um,
can you can you please introduce yourself? Tell us a
little bit about who you are and what you do. Sure.

(01:14):
My name is Ali ALONEI I am an assistant professor
of history at Penn State Abington working on medieval Islam
in the modern global Middle East. I specialized in Muslim politics,
Islamic esoterrorism, and folklore. Wow, so I discovered you. I

(01:35):
don't know how I discovered you. I don't know if
I searched for the word gin on Twitter. I don't
know how I encountered your Twitter account, but it is
a has been a gold mine, and that's been to
treat to follow you online. Do you do you have
a special affinity for the Gin? Like what's going on here?
I mean, I love the Gin and I think that

(01:57):
they're a fascinating sort of creature that doesn't often get
talked about outside of sort of Muslim circles. Uh. And
so while you say Jin and Muslims, I mediica. Oh yeah,
and exactly what you're talking about. Most people don't who
want Muslims. And so I've always had this connection, and well,
why don't I share a little bit about the Gin
and talk about it. I had already been doing it

(02:17):
in my classrooms for a long time. Whenever top history
of Islam, there's always several weeks kind of dedicated to
like esoterrorism, cultural aspect, sharing Gin stories. Its awesome opportunity
for Middle Eastern students and South Asian students and the
African students to share their own experiences. And then I
was like, going, what I could just open this up

(02:40):
a little bit more and talk about it more publicly,
and so I did. I started using Twitter as a
way of sharing aspects of Islamic esoterrorism, astrology, folklore, but
then also the gym as well. Can I see what
you cut your own? Like? Ethnic and cultural background is sure? Yeah,
I come from an ad again background, going and raised

(03:01):
in the United States by families all again. So let
me start. I'm gonna ask you a real personal question now,
have you before we get into all the questions about Jin,
have you ever had a personal encounter with Jin in
your own life? Well, my family has had a pretty
interesting experiences with Jin there. It's not uncommon to talk
about various sort of encounters Um, some very kind of

(03:25):
famous ones, usually around the funeral. My great grandfather was
known to speak to gin Um and I. I've had
me not kind of interesting, weird and eerie encounters out there,
whether they're Jin or not. You know, it's people a
good side. But one kind of interesting moment was I
came home for school. I was reather to be on
I think maybe early high school, late middle school, and

(03:47):
I walked in and there was just this cat in
my house. The doors of the lock, the words flocks.
Had no idea how this cat got in and completely
had made itself at home, just very well acts. When
I walked in it doesn't startled, just kind of looked
up from where it was napping, as if you're interrupting
my nap um in a very sort of regal manner.

(04:09):
And as is customary for anyone who's grown up in
a Muslim background, you kind of know that maybe that
could be a gym, and so this sort of protocol
around it, you don't you don't try not to send it.
You're trying not to be rude. So I simply said,
thanks for visiting, but it's time for you to go, uh,
and kind of opened the door, and it got up

(04:29):
and walked right out, every kind of interesting in eerie
encounter and and kind of like maybe it was just
a really funky cat or maybe it was something else,
who knows. Wow, So you, at a pretty young age
like knew the protocol to like ask to leave your home.
Oh oh totally why, I mean, I grew up my

(04:52):
my fascination with folklore was really fostered by by my
my family. My grandmother would tell me stories growing up.
In those stories always in evolved kind of some elements
of instructions and elements of teaching, so like you know,
you know, you knew how to you know what prayers
to say. I had to course see you know, you
knew if you were scared at night what you would do. Uh,

(05:13):
if you encountered the sort of new Minnesota the gym,
you kind of had some ideas because you have been
familiar with the stories you we were growing up, UM
and by about middle school of high school, you kind
of figured out if I'd need a gym, just don't
piss it off. Well, did you ever have any any
of the weird encounters you have? Have any of them

(05:34):
ever been frightening? Uh? There was one slightly fright I
wouldn't say it was like frightening the sense that I
was scared for my life. But it was one of
those like what what is even happening here? It was
actually an Afghanistan? And so I visited Afghanistan once I
graduated high school. UM, and in one of the ruins

(05:54):
there was a blind kid. This was a sort of
historical flight that had slightly been turned into a shrine.
People would go there and they would lock locks, like
little key locks that they would say prayers and they
would lock it. And that's a way to lock your
prayer or light candles. Kind of a folk practice that

(06:15):
isn't considered part of Orthodox Islam, but was part of
the course sort of popular practices found there. And one
of the kids there, and I don't know if the
kid was part of the shrine or custodian of some sort.
He was a blind kid. And I had my camera
with me at the time, and he was with his

(06:37):
I think grandfather, our great grandfather, and he was also blind.
And they knew I had camera, Like I didn't know
how they knew because I had to leave the camera here.
It wasn't clinking, it wasn't clanking, um. And there was
something very kind of surreal and slightly otherworldly about both

(06:58):
of them, um, and the way they had this like
they could see me even though like I'm under present,
sure they can't see me. These two are blinding. They
shouldn't be able to. Are you they were blind? I
guess it's yeah. I mean that's the real question. They
could easily as not. But they weren't wearing sunglasses or

(07:21):
any type of covering. And their eyes were white, um,
and slightly damaged. So maybe they had side Maybe you know,
my young teenage mind was slightly imaginating or or making
it more than it there was. But this, this particular
trine was known for dealing with the blind. There was

(07:42):
a small spring next to it where people would kind
of wash their faces and their hands, and it was
meant reputed to kind of cure warts and acne and blindness.
There were kind of the things associated with this. So
the Custodians were generally believed to be blind themselves. Know,
maybe they were running some great, you know, scam or

(08:04):
or you know, I was imagining it, but it was
a very unnerving, not frightening, but very unnerving kind of experience.
They were. It was they were far more sure and
confident and authoritied than I had expected, and they seemed
to kind of see right through me, which was a
very weird experience. Do you think they could have been gin?
Is that what you're like? Suspicions? Yeah, the suspicion was

(08:28):
they were they could possibly have been non not exactly human,
because later when I asked my uncle's so, who were
those people by the door, and was like, which people? So, uh,
you know, the two the kids and the grandfather, And
he didn't see that, So maybe he wasn't paying attention,

(08:49):
or or maybe he was doing his own thing, and
maybe I imagined it um. But that was for me,
that only was the experience itself kind of unnerving. They're
kind of the personality, if you will, for the vibe
to use the millennia the word right, the vibe that
they were giving um, but also the afterwards of it,

(09:10):
which was I experienced if a my uncle didn't and
and he was like, yeah, I didn't see anyone there.
Oh that's crazy. Well so let me I know that
was very interesting. Did you put your camera down and
then walk into the shrine or what did you do?
I did. I did put the camera down. There was
no arguing. I mean I went in there as was
sort of like amateur want to be historian at the time.

(09:30):
I want to take pictures and I want to bring
them back. But there was like, yeah, I'm not arguing
with these people. I'm not. I'm not they this is
they're in charge. I'm not. I'm the visitors. I'll put
my camera down. Did make a fuss, went in, Uh,
saw a couple of the candles, didn't lightened the well,
put any locks, but I kind of walked around. It's
really hot, uh and and kind of dimly lit, mostly

(09:52):
just candles. And then when I walked back out and
did a small donation but thank you, and took my
camera with me. But then I asked my uncle once
we got back to the car. He was just, again,
I don't know who you're talking about. And they were
sitting right in front too. Um. It wasn't like they
were in an alcove where they were off kind of hidden.
They were very much right there. Um. And so the

(10:15):
experience was surreal. And then later as I started to
kind of gelve more academically into the gym, that became
a very common theme amongst them as sort of guardians
of shrines and places in nature, um, where they would
kind of perch and sometimes appear as people were, as animals,
et cetera. So who knews what that experience was. It
could have been the heat, It could have been an

(10:35):
overthrought imagination, but it was it was. It was unnerving.
It was probably the most unnerving encounter I'd had something otherworldly. Wow.
So let me, um, I want to talk about like
they so from from the research times one and I have,
there's so much I mean, like it's there's so many

(10:56):
rabbit holes. Oh my gosh, it's been this is like
more complicated than like solving a wrongful conviction. It's it's
like one whole after another after another. There's just such
a I mean, there's centuries and centuries and centuries of
you know, resource materials. Crazy. But one of the things
I'm trying to figure out is this that you know,
I I am getting a little bit confused about how

(11:19):
like gin are categorized. And I've seen it in so
many different ways. Beforest of all, there seems to be
like there's a clear um, there's clear evidence for the
fact that people believed in the existence of Gin before Islam,
right like they were worshiped by the pre Islamic Arabs.
There's connections to like Assyrian and Babylonian and all kinds

(11:41):
of stuff. Um, But like how they're categorized is a
little bit confusing to me. And I'll give you an example.
I've read one place where there are like basically four categories.
Like the categories would be so the ones who live
among us, there's the one that attached themselves to children,
and then it seems there's all these categories of really

(12:01):
scary ones. So it's like the fret the marred them. No,
I don't understand all those separate categories. Are they all
under one category of like the bad ones? Or how
do how a would I to understand these? You're you're
absolutely right here, and you're completely fair to be confused.

(12:22):
Everybody is confused, and that's because the categorizations overlap and
they're contradictory and vary from author to author. Uh. Sort
of classically, the general referred to in sort of types
that there are those that fly, there are those that
are amongst us, and those that takes sort of humans
animal shape. That's one way of categorization. And then you'll

(12:44):
find a more sort of atomized categorization, which they had names.
There's the afreet than the rid, the gene, the whole uh.
And then they're even further types of sort of categorization,
some that are very kind of local um and all
of them are you know, from an academic perspective, they're

(13:05):
all right. That's just because people are going there dealing
with something that is intangible. They're dealing with either sort
of a literary experience that they're writing about the gin
in the world of fiction and literature, or they're dealing
with it in a sort of religious cosmological sense, or
they're dealing with it in a vocal or sense, in

(13:27):
which it's the oral stories that are told. And so
as a result, there's a great deal of diversity or
approaches towards classifications, and all of them are useful in
their own ways. UM. I've discussed some of the classifications
and kind of the threads that I've done, but even
then it's just a sort of limited approach. There's so

(13:47):
many different ways. UM. And there was a period of
time and particularly during the medieval era about the nineth
century to the thirteenth century, in which Muslim writers were
really just trying to classify the whole world. They were
writing about various animals in different places in the world,
even people. They were classifying people, and so the gym
were kind of caught up in this moment of sort

(14:10):
of compilation, this moment of encyclopedia writing. UH. And and
sort of part of this attempt to systematize the world
will understand at least the world in a sort of
orderly fashioned UH. And there's a debate, you know, some
some authors talk about the freet is not separate from
the movie, and the two are actually the same, uh,

(14:30):
and others are a little bit more like, no, no,
there's a difference between these. So there is a great
deal of sort of slippage in the categories, and they're
not as fixed um as we might think, And many
Gin kind of overlap with one another. Someone will say, oh,
it's in the freet now that you will say, oh,
that work is actually on the rid, and then we'll say, oh,
it's both. So there is a lot of overlap. I

(14:52):
feel better knowing that because I thought this is really
so complicated that I cannot come something that is that
there are aren't somewhere. You're feeling exactly the way all
of us feelings were come. That's exactly how it is. Okay, okay, good.
One of the things, you know, I was talking to
a friend of mine, um who about you know, just

(15:13):
Gin experiences and stuff, and he made his comment he said,
you know, I don't know. I mean, he comes from
a South South Asian background as well, and he's like,
I don't know. He's like, you know, it just seems
like the GIN kind of skipped over North America and Europe,
like they're all why are they all like why are
they all concentrated back like where we come from. I

(15:33):
don't know. Clearly you are very skeptical. But you know, now,
of course there's also the idea that a lot of
those kind of supernatural experiences that people do experience in
in in the West might you could attribute to Gin.
We we think everything is gin, but are there places
that you're gonna find It seems like they're parts of

(15:54):
the world, like places like in Morocco or Omana. So
there's just certain places where it just seems like it's
they're like they're just populate those places. Yes, certainly, I
mean there's there's kind of two different approaches. One is
the approached the general universal and that because they're a
hidden race alongside humans, that they that wherever you find humans,

(16:15):
so too where you kind of find Gin. And some
would argue that the sort of folklore parallels that we
find our evidence of that. Now, academics would simply say
that these are people who are encountering similar you know,
luminous experiences, are supernatural experiences and trying to make it legible.
But it is quite striking that, for example, far off

(16:37):
places in northern Europe refer to concepts like elves and
dwarves and trolls that have a lot of similarities to
some of the stories about the gin. Um. Similarly that
the concept of the sheet and sort of Celtic world,
a sort of hidden race, are fairy very similar to

(16:57):
the Gin, but it's also simultaneously true. They seem to
congregate in certain places and in some places have reputations
of being uniquely haunted by jin Oman as you rightly
pointed out as one of those right very famously kind
of asas the most Gin haunted place in the worlds Um,

(17:19):
but so too we find South Asia, India has especially
Islam has ribed in India and Bacon the kind of
language of the Gin is very popular that indead it
is uniquely haunted. Afghanistan another place that's considered uniquely haunted.
Islands and the Indian Ocean are also considered to be

(17:40):
kind of places that are unique to the Gin. And
I think some of this has revolved around the type
of lore that gets told that's really kind of strong
storytelling cultures. That's where we have more stories coming out
of those places. But also because of their histories and
locations themselves, jin are then said to believe, you know,

(18:01):
the belief is that sure, they live amongst us, but
they're uniquely kind of associated with ruins, and they're associated
with sort of ancient places. Uh. And so in the
kind of popular Muslim imagination, places like Oman and South
Asian and Afghanistan and these islands often are tied to
like all these with ancient civilizations. So these are places
with a lot of ruins or oh there these is

(18:23):
a lot of these natural, untouched formations. Therefore, of course
these places have to have their GIN to have these
kind of two parallel traditions that are looking side by side.
But one GIN is really universally can find them anywhere.
And Muslims make legible kind of supernatural experiences in vic
to the gen Uflo abduction, well that's a gen haunting

(18:44):
class of gen um as well. Circle yeah, crop circles
gen So there's all like everything is made legible within
that idea of the gym. And then there's other parallel tradition.
It's more like well of concentrations and them out in
the world. And so maybe you're not going to find
a lot of them in North America, but if you

(19:06):
go to Oman, you're going to find a lot of them.
Can I ask you though, if and I'm sure you
have in all your years of like studying this examined, Like,
you know, Gin stories from different parts of the world.
Are there kind of common themes you see here? And
are there sometimes like real divergences like in stories let's
say you hear from like let's say Bosnia versus in

(19:27):
a kneese ower. You know, can you can you talk
a little bit about that. Yeah, there are very common
themes amongst amongst Gin stories and you can see them, uh,
kind of globally. And that's that's an example of the
way in which as Islam spread, so to the stories
of the Gin spread with them. And so those themes

(19:47):
are found everywhere. The idea of a headed race, that
they're kind of mischievous, that they're associated with the night,
that they're linked to animals, those are all very common.
No matter where you go, from north of North Africa
all the way to Indonesia, those are very common. But
then they're also kind of regional variations. So for example,

(20:08):
in North Africa you'll find more kind of symbiotic relationships
with the Gin, in which the Gin, as troublesome as
they can be, can be invited in for a sort
of consensual possession, that is possession that is actively sought out,
and these are found in certain sort of Sufi circles.

(20:28):
The Busines, for example, will engage in this type of
activity in which the gin will actually possess certain saints
or sages or mystics and then kind of work miracles
and offerings and sort of do oracular activities. That's very
uniquely North Africa, and you find it in Morocco, you
find it some other places. Sudan is another place you

(20:50):
find it. You're not going to find that, for example,
in Lebanon, you're not going to find that insula. You're
not going to find that intact area where the gen
are far more kind of problematic. They're kind of a pain,
and you live alongside them, but you don't want them
to possess you. That's a bad experience, it's a it's
an invasive experience. And then contrast, I would say Indonesia

(21:11):
and Malaysia, where the gin have a much sort of
clear shamanic component to them. They're associated more actively with
healing and medicine and practices that are very clearly part
of local and pre Islamic folk belief. So there there's
this is one of the reasons why I find the

(21:32):
Gin so fascinating is that it's simultaneously shows us the
way that Islam spread and is localized, but also shows
us the way in which various pre Islamic practices are preserved.
Whether it's a cult of possession or it's a shamanic
healing tradition, those things end up getting incorporated in the
sort of folk Islamic practices, and the Gin are front

(21:54):
and center in that. And how people approach the Gin,
how they see the Gin, their relations and hip to
the Gin, really tells us these kind of unique and
diverse traditions, and most of it is pre Islamic that
just kind of endures or reimagined within a sort of
Islamic cosmology. Can I ask you, have you come across

(22:17):
any kind of like narratives or belief let's say amongst
the first people in North America, um that might coincide
or overlap or somehow connected Gin traditions a certain degree.
A lot of the kind of land spirits and major

(22:38):
spirits found within the first people in First Nations traditions
have some similarity to the Gin, particularly if we if
we were to look at them in a sort of
in their pre Islamic form as these sort of intermediary
entity between the sort of celestial world and human world,

(22:58):
particularly if we see them as nature spirits, uh and
not just sort of infernal, then yes, there's a lot
of sort of there's a lot of commonality. I wouldn't
say they map out exactly, uh, and there's some very
clear differences, but I would say that they're mostly you
can find similar traditions almost globally. Um. For example, when

(23:20):
I was talking about, um, the house gym that that
exists in leaving offerings of milk, that's found in Slavic countries,
that's found in Russia, that's found in northern Europe. Uh,
this idea of a house spirit or house help that
you can work with, and you find similar amongst even

(23:42):
in South America. There are some good traditions amongst the
indigenous populations in Brazil of a certain type of fiery
serpentine land spirits. And they sound when you discussed them,
when you're kind of dissect that they sound very much
like gin. So there are a lot of kind of
overlap and and there are a lot of kind of

(24:04):
parallel traditions that uh, someone can look at and go, oh, yeah,
that sounds gin like to me, this sounds like it
could be a gin um. And you know, there's a
variety of different explanations for one thing, that again, people
wherever they are encountering nature the world. The other in
similar fashions. When you when you said people leaving milk out,

(24:29):
the first thing I thought of was Santa Claus. Maybe. Yeah,
I have no idea that's any connection, right right, it's
a you know that that that whole Santa Clause narrative.
As much as it's commercialized and you know, kind of
a made up almost a certain extent, uh, you know,
corporate holiday, it has much older folklore roots. The idea

(24:49):
of leaving out some type of offering, and it was
always either sweets or milk m to goodly spirits of
some sort or to appease spirits. Sound home almost globally.
Oh my god, maybe sand Across the original was that
he's a gin as crazy. We'll be right back after
the short break. I want to ask you about something

(25:12):
I thought. It's interesting I and it just seems like
a very common experience, and of course it could be
attributed to two different things rather than gin. But my
own husband has had this experience and I know a
number of men who have said they've had this experience where, um,
it sounds like sleep paralysis. They wake up, they're paralyzed.

(25:33):
They sense or see or feel this presence on top
of them, either pinning them down, holding them around the
throat and things. And it seems like if a female,
like for some reason, the sense is that this is
a female entity. Can you talk a little bit about that,
Like what is I don't know if it's just me,
if like I just happen to know like four or

(25:53):
five people who have similar experiences. But it seems like
is that the sleep straight up sleep paralysis or what
do you think? Well, it's interesting is that the experience
of sleep paralysis, uh, you know in psychology is almost
uh universally found within gin lore. And one it tells

(26:14):
off that you know, ancient people are trying to make
sense of whatever their experience fundamentally is, um, and that
we've been experiencing sleep replixes sent time immemorial. Um. I
mean we can go all the way back to the
Mesopotamian and the language about the litlit to these kind
of female spirits that cause nightly emissions that cause paralysis. Um,

(26:37):
you know, they they've been that story and that narrative
has been in folklore for ages. The gin also are
associated with it, and the gin um have this kind
of connection with the night terrors that waking up that
in that in that state of trying up just nightmares,
but true night terrors and sleep paralysis. Uh. And it

(26:57):
is often associated with female female gin and there is
a sort of kind of gendered analysis that could be
done there. Why is it a female? But there it's
interesting because the gin that are said to cause those
sort of night terrors out heroize one kind of famous
a gen that does that. Haraja is another very famous
gin that's associated with a sleep paralysis um that they

(27:22):
are female and they're simultaneous considered as terrifying and seductive.
They have kind of this bose quality to them um.
And then other instances they are they're not even gendered.
They're simply seen a sort of shadowy figures, which is
another very common way that the gin are described. If
they're not described in sort of very explicitly monstrous or

(27:42):
animal like terms, they're just described as shadows. Uh. And
so so for a lot of people that sleep paralysis experience,
which involved the inability to move in the scene. You know,
this kind of visitation by the shadowy figure is seen
as a gin phenomenon. And there's some really interesting and
cool that's being done by anthropologists and psychologists who are

(28:04):
kind of exploring the intersection there between mental health between
you know, something very natural, but the narrative, sort of
ethnographic narrative. And also people tell about well, I had
this experience and then I recited that I don't see
and it lifted off of me. I was able just
to move again. There's some really kind of interesting work

(28:26):
that's just starting to be done on the in that arena,
but very comment so um, I'd have to look up
the names that there's a couple of people, uh that
I've come across whose works are really really good and
they're based mostly from the correct me in West African
ethnographic work. Oh no, no, I think it's East African. Yeah,

(28:49):
I'm it's East African ethnographic work and it involved a
mixture of mental health analysis combined with ethnographic looks and
the the article and I can find it intended to
be interested um interviewing women healers who deals specifically with

(29:09):
night terrors and how how they deal with those night
terrors and the kind of medicine, the natural remedies that
they prescribe. Um. And it's a really really interesting kind
of work, and it is growing. Uh and and there's
a lot of kind of exploration of the components of health,
mental health, psychology, and you know, religion and esotery or

(29:32):
folk religion will say, uh and and I think the
gin and night terror is right dead in the center
of that. Yeah, I mean it is. I mean, you know,
I'm sure we've all experienced this where you have, especially
with older folks, but back home, there are times when
you know that somebody clearly has mental health issues or
they need some kind of psychological or psychiatric diagnosis and assistance,

(29:54):
but the family and says, no, it's a gin, it's
a gin possession or you know, and for that reason,
you know, there are people who don't get maybe the
help that they need. Um yea. And so it's I mean,
that's that has to be really difficult, like as a
line to try to I mean, I guess where I
have fallen on that when I have encountered that personally,

(30:16):
what the people I know is for me to say, okay,
it's like totally do the Gin exorcism, but also like
just try both, like do everything at the same time,
Like why does why why take your chances? Um? But
I don't know if that's just if it's a shame reaction,
like we would prefer to think of our loved one
as being possessed then being mentally ill. I'm not quite sure. Yeah,

(30:40):
I think I think the discourse of Shane plays it
plays a big rule there um as well. I think, um,
there's a there's certainly some sort of language about well,
this isn't normative behavior, therefore it must be attributed to
something expernal um. And so I think that there is

(31:01):
there's a sort of space there where Shane plays a
big role. Uh, that there's a way of kind of
you know, deflecting, Okay, this is this person isn't ill,
this person is just dealing with the gin. Yes, we
resolve that everything can go back to normal. Um. And
so I think that the there's definitely something there. And
but there's also really great work being done by mental

(31:23):
health professionals in the Muslim community to help kind of
push back on the stigmas of mean mental health and
and kind of give people the language, the vocal they
need to address, you know, their experiences. Um you mentioned, uh,
you know, the gender issue. I mean, do we know
for sure from or what do we from? What we know?

(31:45):
Do we know for sure that gin are like human
beings like you know, have kind of you know, specific
like male feme. Could there not be three or four
or fire or other kinds of genders that we don't
know about in the gen world, Well, the gin are
are just arrived as shape shifters, and so a male
Jin are also female gin and female general also male gym. More,

(32:06):
we are told that they have families and they have children,
and they obviously copulate, and they obviously uh you know, reproduce.
But they're they're accurately description non binary, and they really
kind of shift all over the place. There's very famous
examples and even within the written lore itself of Jin

(32:27):
being referred to sometimes as males, sometimes like females. Sometimes
it's just we don't know. Um. I mean May Moon
is a very famous Jennings of Jin king associated with Saturday.
But in North Africa he's Maimuna. He's a female Gin.
Now some go, well that's his that's his sister, and
ithers gonna know that's him. He's both he simultaneously and

(32:48):
Jim King and a Jin queen uh. And you know,
it depends on which day you get him. Uh. And
so they kind of fallen and there's much more nebulous abstract.
While they're very clearly certain gendered anxieties about the GIN,
and you can certainly see the sort of projections of
male authors in particular on the GIN on the whole,

(33:11):
Lure is actually for more nebulous and for more kind
of diverse, that Gin do shape shift, that GIN do
have kind of multiple genders there. And then there's even
Lure that's that's even you know, sort of weird ablis
the you know, Islamic concept of the devil is said
to have both genitals. So there's this kind of fascinating

(33:33):
discussion about gender that's being happened with the GIN, and
they exist kind of in this really nebulous state. So
I think it's pretty accurate to say that that in
the kind of contemporary terms, they're they're non binary. There
aren't as fixed in in gender as we might imagine
them degree or even in terms of sexuality. They're kind

(33:54):
of their own thing um, reflecting a sort of diverse experience,
but they they have been known to fall in love
with humans, to pursue sexual involvement with human beings. UM.
I have one friend who you know, according to her

(34:15):
and I, she is incredibly competent and smart and reliable
and trustworthy, and I have no reason not to believe her.
Four years apparently was just some a gin was obsessed
with her and just followed her from place to place
to place, and she had some terrifying experiences, um, and
made it very difficult for I mean, I don't know

(34:37):
if it made she thinks it made it difficult for
her to get married. She eventually get married and I
think was rid of the gin. But that was the
first time I had heard of anything like that. UM.
But I noticed, I think when you did an am
a on your Twitter, there's some one of the women
who responded said something about, you know what happens of
the gin follows you around, Like how do you get

(34:59):
rid of that? So it just it seems like those
stories are not so uncommon, that yeah, gin can fall
for you and get obsessed with you and totally I
mean one of the main kind of ways that they interact,
and they did a threat on on the kind of
interaction with humans. Is the most popular one is the dissertation. Right,
they just kind of show up, uh, And then that's

(35:20):
kind of you know, in the sort of lure as
well as in the kind of interviews that you have
with people, though it's just mostly an act of curiosity,
that kind of showing up and they're kind of looking around.
Possession is another one that you'll find, but just as
equally common as as love. Now there's some of those
are complicated by stories of abduction, and it talks about
that the gin falls in love with a person and

(35:42):
therefore they're abducted into the gin would uh that that
there's language around that, but there's also instances of them
just kind of stalking. So that becomes a very kind
of common motif amongst certain groups, that the gin will
fall in love and they become obsessed with the person,
and then they'll just kind of follow follow that person

(36:04):
around throughout their lives. This can be described by people
as an intrusive experience, as one that is disruptive and destructive,
often explaining this is why I can't get married because
as a gym that's been following around as you as
your friends said, that's actually not uncommon. We do hear
that quite a bit. Um. In other instances, it's not

(36:25):
always disruptive. Sometimes it can be positive. For example, kind
of the oldest case of this is a woman that
we have from from a narration that indicates that Um
male Jim had fallen in love with her, I mean
followed her around, and in turn for his affection, he
taught her medicine, he gave her skill certain skills. So

(36:50):
it's a kind of complicated relationship that can be disruptive,
it can be intrusive, uh, and that other instances it
can be more positively, for example, in Indonesia Malaysia, those
relationships can be seen a sort of more positive light.
But if a jingles in love with you, that's a
way of developing a sort of hidden skill, gaining a
secret knowledge that you might be inclined towards, certainly shamanic

(37:12):
healing practices. UM. It's similarly, even the abduction stories can
sometimes be told in a formal positive light when individual
indicating that, oh, you know, her son had been taken
by a female jin, but he was happily married and
had kids off in the gin world, So there's there's
a sort of the stories. They're very but it is

(37:35):
a common experience. It's idea, but I wouldn't say like
everybody's had, but it's certainly more common than people might think.
The idea but jin falling in love and then you know,
following around that is a common story, folklore, narration, and
for some people a very real experience for them. I
did notice that you commented on a tweet by this

(37:55):
gentleman I think he calls himself Dawa Man or something
where this like a clear clip of him giving a
talk saying, you know, sisters don't go outside looking beautiful
because um, yeah, your reaction was kind of like, you know,
but but in essence, wasn't he kind of right then?
I mean, like in that sense or what did you find?
What was off putting about that for you? So the

(38:17):
issue is that there's always going to be within folklore
components of it that regulate behavior, that regulate people's actions,
And that's old, It's always existed. There's no denial of
the fact um that that that idea of all you
need to cover yourself up with the gin are going
to fall in love with you, That that's not unique

(38:38):
to him. My You know, his history has always been
quite repugnant and familiar with in British Muslim circle. Um.
But setting that aside, that that is an old mare
and that's an old concept, it's not a new concept, um.
And we've had people who made mention of it, other
people who have disputed, who pushed back on it. Uh.

(39:00):
I think that that particular approach is problematic for a
variety of different reasons. First, because I think that what
the Gin offer are kind of a variety of different
things that I mentioned this is that first, there's an
academic approach of the Gin. It's a really great way
of understanding of the way in which Islam has spread
and with which Islam has localized. For people who are

(39:23):
more mystically inclined, or who are more inclined towards spirituality,
the GIN offer an opportunity to explore the complexities of
human of the human psyche, but also to experience the
numerals that force that is not us out there, so
to speak. And for the faithful, it's a way of
understanding the sort of complex cosmology, it's very beautiful cosmology

(39:44):
that is at the heart of Islam. Um. All of that,
I think is great and beautiful aspect of the gin.
But I think once we start falling into the category
of sort of fear mongering or or regulating behavior, then
I think it can be a problem. Uh. And there's
no doubt that a great deal of gin lore can

(40:05):
be a trip can be seen as a sort of
superstitious or fear oriented or designed to regulate behaviors. Don't
do this and don't do that. Um. And I recognize them,
and there's there. They're worthwhile, uh, you know, exploring and examining.
I'm just not very comfortable with the sort of prescriptive
component of this. Hey, women, you should do this because

(40:26):
the gen are going to do that. That is always,
to me sounds far more predatory than anything else, and
it is almost always by some guy who's telling women
how to live their lives. And it's that The issue
for me is that there is a sort of prendation
on fear and using that fear, exploiting that feeling to

(40:48):
regulate women's bodies that I think should be resisted, you know.
And I'm also guessing if if a ginn wants to
see what he looks like, what you look like, he
can I mean, he doesn't have to wait for you
to step onto the street. You're right. So one of
the things that that that's even within the sort of
logics of the lower itself, it doesn't quite make sense
the people who who have said it. And again this

(41:10):
is not unique to Della man development. This has been going,
you know, thousands, hundreds of years. We've had medieval writers
say with all sorts of people. But it doesn't quite
fit within its own logics because the gin lived within
your house as well, So are you going to are
you going to be veiled in your own home? They're
gonna see you. The idea that if you have to

(41:30):
walk out veiled constantly really is to constantly on guard
that the Gin might accidentally see you doesn't quite fit
because one, they live within your house too, They're invisible,
Therefore they're going to see you at some point or another.
And three were told that they have various abilities and powers.
And one that's so if there's an entity that has
all these abilities and powers and perhaps can almost practically

(41:53):
read the human mind, um, I doubt that. You know,
they're not waiting for a glimpse of your head job
to fly off the side. Yeah, they're they're they're not
waiting for ankle glimpses or yet. Okay, speaking of the
gin that live in your house, there's one category of
gin and then I'm kind of fascinated with that. I
guess I don't quite understand where they fall on the

(42:14):
spectrum of um innocuous too, maybe problematic. And that is
the gin that they say that that the tradition is
that every person is assigned one gin, Like there's one gin?
Can you talk a little bit about that whole story,
like what why do they exist? And another places I've
read that maybe it's not a gin, maybe it's some

(42:35):
kind of a double id get, Like it's a little
confusing to me. Yeah. Yeah, So there's Amazon or the
Koeen as it's known in Arabic is that it's known
as the attending gym. The gym is associated with an individual.
They're born with it and may they have it throughout
their life. On the whole, there's generally seen, I think

(42:55):
within traditional Orthodox Aslamic approaches as a tempting force. That
they're sort of force that is aimed attempting individuals are
the associated with doubt, they're associated with anxiety, they're associated
kind of with as as a force that that that
that gets us to stumble all and counteracted by uh,

(43:17):
you know, for the angels that are meant the guard
in the people that keep them from doing us. And
there's this idea that they's a sort of balanced there
between this gin and the angels around us, with us
with heavily leaning towards the angelic sub But when you
go down to the sort of folklore component that is

(43:38):
outside the actual orthodoxy, what people are saying, what ordinary
people believe, that's where it gets a little bit complicated.
The Korean sometimes is seeing not just as a gin,
but has a dopple ganger as a sort of shadows
sells to a certain extenter of a shadow that follows
us throughout life, and in that instance it's also seen
as a bit disruptive. But there are other lower components

(44:00):
to it, generally associated with esoterism, in which the gin
is seen as a sort of alchemical process. That is
that you'll goal in life is to take this gin
that begins at birth as a sort of untamed gin
and tamed them to become an ally and once you've

(44:20):
done that, you've reached a sort of spiritual potential. rEFInd
this within certain is esoteric circles. And then this is
taken even further and some occult practices in which the
Korean is seeing not just as an attending gin, but
as a familiar spirit in which you can work with
in order to achieve certain magical effect, its creation of

(44:41):
talismans or whatnot. So there's a sort of diverse, complicated
approach to the Korean, but traditionally it is seen within
the sort of orthodox approach within Islam as attempting force,
as a as a force that exists in your life
to tempt you, as a force that exists in your life,
as a sort of negative side to you or sort

(45:03):
of dark shadow to you. You know. It almost um
it brings to mind that image of like the person
with a double on one shoulder and needs all the
other shoulder. I guess it's like connected to that, Yeah, yeah,
very much so. Whereas in the Islamic tradition, the idea
that you have multiple angels, uh, you know, working on
your side with one Korean that is that is not

(45:26):
you know, but definitely that sort of the idea of
the devil and angel right there. So when the person dies,
does that jin die yes. So the idea is that
generally the gin is associated with that person's life. Once
that person dies, the Korean dies as well. But again
it gets messy and complicated and sometimes contradictory. There are

(45:49):
stories of how the Korean continues on after because Jin
has such long lifespan, so there is some debate from
the whole most most kind of narrations indicate that the
gin also dies, that it is intimately tied to the
human life, and so too is its strength, age, etcetera.
The more pious a person is, the weaker the Krena is.

(46:09):
That doesn't have much of an influence, it's just kind
of a shadow that exists there. The more you know,
rebellious a person is, and the stronger the Korena is.
So it is kind of intimately tied to our personal
lives or experiences or destinies, whatever you want to call it.
I saw a tweet that I think you're responding to somebody.

(46:30):
Somebody asked like, how how can they died? Can they
be killed? And you said, well, it seems like Jin
mostly died by accident. Can you talk a little bit
about that. Yeah, So the ginns are this is kind
of one of the again one of the kind of
interesting components of how kind of um you know, contradictory
some of the information sometimes can be, but also speaks
of a kind of vast diversion creative stories that are

(46:51):
told on one end, which told that the Gin are ancient,
that they live thousands and thousands of years, that they
are immensely strong and mensely powerful, and the very few
things can kind of hurt them, classically salt iron things
like that. Um. But on the other instance, we have
all sorts of stories to talk about. You know, someone

(47:12):
spat their seed into a hole and it accidentally killed
the gin, or they sat rock into a cavern has
accidentally killed the gin. So for whatever reason, it seems
like they're constantly getting killed accidentally, and that leads to
all sorts of problems. That's when the Gin are offended, uh,
and then they they wreak their their vengeance upon that person,

(47:36):
but through possession, abduction, et cetera. The other common way
in which that they're killed is an animal form, so
the stories of hunting. But the gin took on a
snake form and go on the head that snake, and
then the cousin gin shows up and you killed my cousin.
So that's the other sort of aspect to it, is
that either they're killed accidentally or they're killed an animal form.

(47:57):
Those are the kind of two common ways that we
hear about their gaps, other than that they're supposed to
be and thensally strong, long lives, so they're very supposed
to be very difficult to kill. But apparently when you're
not intending to, you can kill a GM. So let
me see this. Um, you mentioned how in in something

(48:19):
like a North African tradition, there's like a tradition of
like actually inviting a summoning like possession. I've read something
about like a gin cannot enter your home until you
invite it? Am I thinking about a vampire? Maybe? I am? Actually,
but let me do this. Have you ever, like what
do you know about the summoning like gin? Like? Have
you are they? Is it different in different cultures how

(48:41):
it's done? Is there like kind of an orthodox way
to do it? I know it's I know it's considered prohibited,
it's not considered permissible, right yeah, yeah, yeah, the gin
there's a variety of different way There is sort of
a textual tradition that's found, Uh, this is would be
I guess the best way to approach it would be

(49:02):
or call it would be ceremonial. So there's a sort
of approach into which the gin can be summoned, and
it generally involves a certain formula, knowing the gin the name,
having some type of purification ritual that's done beforehand, lots
of incense, smoke. One author talks about how you have
to burn a special type of incense uh, and then

(49:26):
you can use that and the gin will kind of
appear through the smoke there. Uh. And that that's sounding
sort of magical operations of what not within these medieval texts.
That's one approach, and that seems to be the kind
of common method found within I would say literary circles
and sort of scholarly circles. That that's one way to

(49:49):
do it. But there is a great deal of variation locally, uh,
And so there are more sort of possession oriented ways
rather than summoning a gin, the gin can be invoked
that is brought inside a person uh. And then through
the possession speak to people, engage with people, give you know,

(50:09):
foretell the future, things like that, and that's found more
commonly in North Africa. There's bizarre rituals in Egypt which
involved dancing and possession. Found from Egypt to Sadan, there
are the Buffer rituals and Morocco West Africa that involved
actually getting possessed uh. And then this very elaborate sort

(50:32):
of ceremony that is done um. And then there are
a slightly more kind of shamanic for lack of a
better word, approaches that we find in Indonesia and Malaysia,
and which is a sort of symbiotic relationship. The gin
are and revoked through a sort of pack making deal UH.
Gin is found or located through a particular you know,

(50:57):
natural ceremony, going out to a tree, going to a cave, etcetera.
And a relationship is built like an actual pact is
signed between the individual, the healer and and the gin,
and then that gen warps with that healer. So there's
some great deal of sort of variety and how they're invoked,
but there is a core sort of operation, if you will,

(51:20):
written roughly around the medieval era. It's still used by
some people in which gin can be summoned, gin can
be brought to manifest themselves. And then there are others
that say you can't necessarily manifest it, but you can
certainly invoke the power, since you'll find gin also make
their appearance in sort of talisman making, the creation of

(51:41):
sort of magical objects of some sort. All of this
falls well without or outside Orthodox Slam and is considered
deeply prohibited by black kind of orthodox religious scholars, but
as a common feature of popular Islam not always falls
into the black magic. I was gonna say, yeah, you know,

(52:03):
some people call black magic, of some practitioners themselves wouldn't
call it that. For example, the practices in Indonesia are
seen as healing oriented, but orthodoxis Mom would definitely look
at it. All of this as a form of a
form of black magic. Uh, definitely outside what is considered
permissible within Islam um. And but but there's a great

(52:24):
episode of folk level and popular level. There's a great
dealer kind of you know, flexibility there. Uh. And some
people quite overtly invoked from malicious books is but other
people see it as as a sort of healing practice.
And so in some ways it has some parallels with
We could look at sort of the folk healing practices

(52:44):
of the Mediterranean, granny magic, kitchen magic, or the sort
of shamanic practice that we find and wed on North
America and South America. What can I ask you? What,
what is like the power dynamic there? Who is the
who is a charge? And that in those relationships? Is
it I've read that you know? And and also like

(53:06):
you know in the story of the creation of Adam
of course that that man is superior, but go gener powerful.
So what's the power dynamic here? Yeah? So, um, humans
are considered superior in Islamic cosmology. Um, but the Gin
are clearly very powerful in their own sort of way.

(53:27):
So Orthodox Islam will generally a sort of Orthodox scholarly
tradition would indicate that any type of relationship between gin
and humans is a sort of corruption, that the Gin
is corrupting the human beings. So even if a person
thinks that they're got this powerful relationship or the upper
hand of the Gin, the gin is is subverse that

(53:47):
they're doing some things of which is why a lot
of these folk practice that involved direct relationships with the
Gin are seen as not permissible within Orthodox as law.
Within the sort of folk and popular expression, it's generally
a far more symbiotic relationship in which the Gin and
the human are scene as in partnership for some particular function,

(54:10):
whether it is to heal people or to give oracular advice,
or to foretell the future or whatnot. It's seems far
more symbiotic than what orthodox is Slam would it be.
So there is there's some great there's divergence there in
terms of the pallodynamics, and I have to wonder that
you can ask, I have to wonder what is the
gin getting out of this? I mean, like, you know,

(54:31):
if they're telling the future for a human being, or
they're helping heal, helping somebody heal others, what's the gin
getting at well. Traditionally it said that if the gener
involved in methical relationship, it's because they are getting something
generally there in love with that person, or there's an
ancestral line there, or that they're building a relationship right

(54:53):
they're working together, there's some type of something that they're
getting out of it. Again, classically, in sort of an
orthodox interpretation would see that as what they're getting out
of it is the ability to just mass with people.
So there so the argument there is one of the
reasons why you shouldn't be engaged in these nonpredictable acts

(55:14):
or non permitted acts is because that no matter what
you think you're getting out of it, in reality you're
kind of being screwed over about by the Gin. But
for people who whoo, who are engaging these kinna foke
with popular practices, the gin and humans have a relationship
in which they live side by side in the day
is mutually beneficial. One of the mutual kind of mutually

(55:37):
beneficial aspects of it is offerings. So for example, and
many of these these kind of popular practices that we
will find, if you're working with the Gin, you're generally
giving them something back. Milk, candle, Hannah is a common
offering that is given to the Gin. Various kind of
things that they get in return, like gifts, um, and

(55:57):
then in turn they bestow their own it's whatever those are.
Have you um. Have you ever witnessed an exorcism? I
have um once. It was an interesting experience. There's a
very it was. It was a formal exorcism, not like
a uh sort of emergency, oh someone's been possessed. This

(56:21):
was in a ceremonial sort of context, and it was
part of a sort of like if you're still or whatnot,
you come to this place there's an open air shrine
in Morocco. Uh. And what you'll do is been the
mystic or or the saint or the healer or whatnot

(56:43):
will then perform a sort of a ritual of sorts
in which you will invoke the gin that is hiding
within you. There's an element of performance. Music is played,
songs or song uh, certain incenses or burn and this
kind of ritual action that it was very kind of
stylized to a certain extent, which is different from sort

(57:05):
of other experiences of exorcisms, which are much more kind
of focused on intervention of some sort of some sort
uh and they're really kind of intense. This was a
much more sort of formulaic, stylized approach, almost by the numbers,
like people with people kind of line up who feel
like they have something going wrong in their lives, they

(57:27):
can't get married, they can't whatnot. And then they take
their turn coming up to this person and they performed
this exorcism and cleansing. And it involved a bundle of
herbs that would be rushed and kind of slapped on
this person. Uh. The person would be the limbs would
be tied by some type of cloth uh and then

(57:47):
various forms of waters were sprinkled, and the waters looked
like they had some type of herbs and then some
some something other than it wasn't just water. Prayers are recited,
songs were recited, music was aid, uh, and then the
person was unbound from the cloth and like, oh you're
free now. Some of them, some of the people that

(58:07):
came forward had very like a sort of intense reactions.
They would struggle against the clock, they would fight, they
would screen, they show out and others and very sort
of benign non reaction to what was going on. Um.
But it was a very stylized experience that I saw.
But I did I did see this um as part
of this kind of world travel that I did trying

(58:28):
to look for gin lore. I've not I've noticed in
actually including that that little clip from Dala Guy that
he also says that in the UK seems to be
full of young young brothers who are like performing extra
some of them on YouTube. In fact, um it's uh so,
I mean, I don't do know anybody who does that

(58:52):
like here out here in your area and on the
East coast, because I'd love to see that there are
people that do extra so ism in the United States.
I'm not sure how open they'd be to being filmed
or or talked to, but they do exist more often
not it's word of mouth and or through a mask.

(59:13):
Somebody knows somebody who does this sort of work. Uh.
There are specialists of some sort that they see themselves
as kind of some sort of spiritual figure. They are
either in a mom or shape or on the law
or something. They are almost most exclusively male in in

(59:34):
these circles. Um. And and they do perform at one
particular form of exorcism that was done in the United States.
But I saw um was involved in chains, chains that
or all that I heard, I didn't actually see this one.
The change were being thrown over a person in order
to trap the gin, and they repeatedly throwing the change

(59:56):
over and over and the person would step out of it.
So they do exist. Um. They seem to congregate in
New York or Virginia and northern California. They're probably everywhere, um,
but those are the kind of the places the people
that I've spoken to the big general will come from
those kind of three areas. But I think any kind
of population of Muslims probably has a few exorcists or

(01:00:19):
exerci who end up who end up having to do
it because nobody else is going to do it. You
who end up doing that type of stuff. There's a
lot of it's also a business there component of there's
a financial exchange. Some of them can be quite exploitative,
but they do this and they I think they're a
little bit more open up in the UK, a little
bit more underground. I hope you enjoyed that conversation as

(01:00:44):
much as I did. Now there are as many people
in the world with gin stories as there are gin
so if you have one you'd like to share, make
sure to email it to me at the Hidden Gin
at gmail dot com. That's the Hidden Gin th h
I D d N d J I n N at
gmail dot com. And until next time, remember we are

(01:01:08):
not alone. The Hidden Gin is a production of I
Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Mankey. The
podcast is written and hosted by Robbiah Chaudry and produced

(01:01:30):
by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with executive producers Aaron Mankey,
Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. Our theme song was created
by Patrick Quartets. For more podcasts from i heart Radio,
Visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
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