The Anger of Iblis

Gustave Dorè. “Milton Paradise Lost” (1866)

Lately I happen to walk for hours, without a precise destination, near the central station, not only for a physical need not to lose my fast step, but also to clear my mind.

What sometimes gets out of hand is my empathy. Let me explain.

I have always been very sensitive, one could say empathically hyper-sensitive, with the ability to absorb the emotions of those who stand in front of me and talk to me.

Nothing strange so far. However, sometimes it happens to become a sponge capable of absorbing the pains of everyone I meet.

Walking through the streets of the station, under the arcades, I could not avoid the weight of the pains of the people I passed through.

I know it seems pointless. But that's what I feel.

I walked with my head down and my soul collected like a sieve all the pains and miseries of others, without wanting to.

It's not pleasant at all, and it takes me some time to get rid of it.

 

It certainly doesn't help the time we are all going through.

It's difficult to see the light in the night that weighs on us, and even what we read and the news that follow do not help to make our minds more stable and lighter.

 

The news on the 2021-23 pandemic plan, an informal draft released by the Ministry of Health that also addresses the issue of ethical aspects related to the pandemic threat, is just a few days away.

Healthcare professionals are “always obliged, even during the crisis, to provide the best, most appropriate, reasonably possible care. However, when scarcity makes resources insufficient compared to needs, principles of ethics can allow scarce resources to be allocated in order to provide necessary treatments preferentially to those patients who are most likely to benefit ”.

 

An ethical question that is not easy to put into practice.

And that got me thinking. So, walking.

Obviously, with the scarcity of places in intensive care, choices have to be made: it is better to give precedence to those who are, perhaps, younger and more likely to survive than those who are more serious and elderly.

Salvation becomes a “biological factor”, would say Umberto Galimberti, who was among the authors I read the most during my degree thesis.

The human being reduced to “body”. Then it crossed my mind: but is this criterion of choice so certain? And if the less serious illness man is saved, who is actually a psychopath who will kill his family as soon as he returns home, and let die the old and serious illness artist who has in the drawer, still unfinished, one of the greatest poems in world literature?

The ethical question is for doctors but does not affect those who are sick in the least.

The ethical question of who is chosen to save or let die is completely set aside. Who are these people that are drawn from the medicine sickle?

The thunderous theme of Good and Evil can be read in filigree.

 

It was with this in mind that, while walking, the story of Iblis came to mind. Or the origin of evil, one might say.

One of the most poignant stories when reading the Qur'an and studying Islam.

I state, with great vigor, that I am absolutely not a sage, an ustadz.

I am just a very curious person. That he can't take for granted without first reading and trying to understand.

I specify this because I know that writing about religious topics is very dangerous, it can heat people's minds and suggest wrong things about me.

In these days when I have asked a lot of my Muslim friends on the topic, I have often felt fear and even nervousness.

It is not my intention to rewrite what has been taken for granted for millennia, but I think there are no limits in what one thinks and writes. With respect.

It's not that if I write about Hinduism I become a Hindu, nor if I write about Iblis or Satan I become a follower of evil.

I am very curious and hungry for stories, other cultures and ways of thinking and living the faith. This has been my enrichment over the years, and always will be.

I observe.

 

Above all, I don't think there is anything in our existence that can be defined in a radical way or black or white.

Photography has taught me this. The light meter teaches this.

Therefore the story of Iblis has always fascinated me, among all the stories told in the Koran.

Maybe not everyone is aware of it; and in any case one cannot disregard what one knows as a Christian from what is Islamic matter.

The root is the same but the differences are many.

First of all, there is no iconography in Islam, so we know what is said, but it does not have a definite form as in the Christian tradition. It is no small matter when we want to understand what image to give to what we read.

“Iblis and other jinn”. 14^th century manuscript Kitab al-Bulhan”

It will not be easy to disentangle yourself in this dense vegetation of lineages and types. Nor would I like to dwell too hard on the theoretical aspects.

It must be said immediately that in Islam there are three categories with different origins:

The angels, created by the light,

The jinn, created by smokeless fire,

Human beings, created from the earth.

Belief in angels is the second of the Six Pillars of the Islamic Faith.

That human beings were created from the earth is a common belief in monotheistic religions.

Jinn are what interests me, because they are related to Iblis.

A surah is dedicated to them, number 72, “Aljinn”.

 

This is how Gebriele Mendel describes them, in the commentary on his beautiful translation of the Koran into Italian:

“The jinns are spirits, sprites, demons. In any culture, for any religion, in any time and place, a large part of humanity has believed in the existence of spirits, be they benign or evil. One of the oldest religions, Zoroastrianism, attributes their creation to Ahriman, the lord of Evil. […] Then there were also the jinn of deserts, uninhabited places, ruins, ancient battlefields, gallows and starry nights. For Islam they were created of smokeless fire. Of course they are known primarily in folklore tales, especially where they abound in magic. [...] The fact remains that the last two suras of the Koran are pronounced precisely to safeguard oneself from the wickedness of the evil jinn. However, not to be confused with the demons, the Shayatin.”

 

There are several interpretations of Iblis. The main one wants him to have been a jinn. Others think he was an angel.

In Islamic tradition, Iblis is often identified with ash-Shaitan (“the devil”), often known by the epithet ar-Rajīm (Arabic: ٱلرَّجِيْم, literally “the accursed”). However, while Shaitan is used exclusively for an evil force, Iblis himself has a more ambivalent role in Islamic traditions, but this we will see later.

The term Iblīs (Arabic: إِبْلِيس) may have been derived from the Arabic verbal root bls ب-ل-س (with the broad meaning of “remain in pain”) or بَلَسَ (balasa, “despaired”). Also, the name is related to talbis which means confusion. Another possibility is that it derives from the ancient Greek διάβολος (diábolos), via a Syriac intermediary, which is also the source of the English word “devil”: diábolos means “to divide”.

 

Iblis is mentioned eleven times in the Qur'an, nine of which are related to his disobedience. And here comes the story of him.

He is told in the seventh sura “Al A'Raf” (The Heights – or The Wall with Elevations) from verses 11 to 27 and in the sura “Ta Ha”, number 72, from verses 116 to 121.

That is when God created Adam, ordering all angels to bow down before the new creation. Each of them obeyed by bowing, only Iblis refused, arguing that because he himself was created from fire he was superior to humans, created from clay mud, and that he would never bow down before Adam.

As punishment for his pride, God banished Iblis from heaven and condemned him to hell. It was then that Iblis asked as a last wish to have an extension from hell until the Day of Judgment, so that he could mislead as many human beings as possible with his cunning, and God consented, cursing him.

Story we all know, because it is in every teologic narrative.

Even if there is no lack of  “gender” confusion – one might say – between Iblis and Satan. As happens in much Western literature that sang this story, which has its peak of fame and beauty in John Milton's epic poem “Paradise Lost” of 1667, which makes Satan the rebellious hero who fights for his own principles offended by God, changing from the angel Lucifer (who is “the one who brings the Light”) to Satan and finally to a serpent.

 

Gustave Dorè. “Milton Paradise Lost” (1866)

Before these events unfolded, Iblis was not bad at all, on the contrary.

In some Islamic scholastic traditions Iblis, before he was expelled from heaven, was known as Azazil, that is, as an archangel, the leader and teacher of other angels and one of the keepers of heaven, indeed he was the closest to the Throne of God who gave authority over the lower heavens and the earth.

Iblis is also considered to be the leader of those angels who fought the earthly jinns – leading the army of him to push the jinn to the edge of the world, Mount Qaf.

On the other hand, Iblis is commonly considered one of the jinn, who lived on earth during the battle of the angels, by which he was taken prisoner, with other jinn, and taken to heaven. Since, unlike the others, Iblis was pious, the angels were impressed by his nobility and he was allowed to join the company of angels and raised to their rank. However, although he had the outward appearance of an angel, he essentially remained a jinn, so he was still in possession of his power to choose when the angels and Iblis were ordered to bow down before Adam. Iblis, abusing his free-will, disobeyed God's command.

 

What develops from this story is really difficult to summarize, like unraveling in a mangrove forest.

Because the lineage of evil is constantly changing shape in the Koran, and despite Iblis and Satan alternating in verses, they are not a single subject as in other religious traditions.

Just as in the aforementioned “Ta Ha” sura, in verse 116 Iblis refuses to prostrate himself before Adam but in verse 120 it is already Satan who whispers in Adam's ear tempting him towards the tree of immortality.

It was not at all easy for me to understand the ramifications.

Iblis is seen as the one who disobeyed, generating groups divided into jinn and Satan, the latter also considered by many as sifat (“divine attribute, quality”), or “evil behavior”. While jinn can also be Muslim and good, only those who follow Satan are the most evil, they are hundreds of millions, each with a specific name and task, from those who disturb women or those who pray, to those who protect the hell.

Also in this case the root of the name helps to understand what is meant: shayatin means demons which is the plural of shaytan, demon – the Evil One – of Hebrew origin, but which also has the root for istashata which means to burn, go on a rampage; this ambiguity linked to the grammar of the name makes understanding, on the one hand more complicated but on the other even more graspable (if you keep a look at the Arabic version), because in the singular it is Satan and in the plural without article – shayatin al'ins – designates both demons and human beings who act diabolically.

So Satan is the evil force that corrupts men while Iblis retains his elusive and ambivalent role of jinn and disobeyed one.

 

In the Sufi school readings there are more comprehensive interpretations of this story than Iblis. It goes without saying that no one has ever justified it, much less exalted it as in much romantic literature in the West.

But it is true that the Sufists have always considered Muhammed (SWS) and Iblis as the two true monotheists, and in his refusal to bow before Adam his total devotion to God, the One and Only Beloved, preferring the punishment of hell as a sign extreme of unrequited love, rather than posturing in front of someone other than God.

        “In the unity of affection it was only my heart with Him,
        my heart was the nest of the phoenix of love.
        ...
        On my way by stealth He laid a trap full of deceit,
        and among those gears was Adam the grain of the bait.
        He wanted to send me a sign of great rejection:
        He did what he wanted, an Adam of mud and pretext.
        I was teacher of the angels in heaven, and in heaven
        eternal hope of eternal thing I harbored.
        A thousand and thousand years I have lived in the obedience of Him,
        and in fidelity a thousand and a thousand coffers I have filled Him with.
        ...
        Adam is earth, and I light, the pure Light of Him.
        I thought I was the only one, another was the only one: Him.
        The saints have reproached me for my not prostrating myself:
        that act, if done by me, would have separated me from Him.”

So poetically wrote in “The Crying of Lucifer” Hakim Abul-Majd Majdūd ibn Ādam Sanā'ī Ghaznavi, more commonly known as Sanai, Persian poet from Ghazni born in 1080 and died between 1131 and 1141.

Of the many stories and versions that I have found this poem is one of the most beautiful to try to understand the origin of this terrible story.

In another famous narrative, told by Mansur al-Hallaj, Ruzbihan Baqli and Abū Ḥāmid Ghazzali, Moses and Iblis meet on the slopes of Sinai, and Moses asks Iblis why he refused God's order. Iblis replied that the command it was actually a test. Then Moses replied that in this way he was punished by transforming himself from angel to devil and then Iblis replied that his form was only temporary and his love of him towards God remained the same.

Not all Sufists agree with this reading, Rumi – who is certainly among the most famous – condemns without hesitation the arrogance of Iblis, as one of the greatest sinners.

But this idea of the order of God as a test reflects a concern raised by many Western theologians: if God gives good things to those who obey him, someone might obey God only to obtain them and not out of sincere love for God. Farid ad-Din Attar, another famous Persian poet of the late 12th and early 13th centuries, described this concern with an analogy:

“If you distinguish between a gem and a stone received from the King, you are not a man of the path! If you’re pleased with the gem and disappointed by a stone, you have no interest, then, in the King.” (Nurbakhsh, 39)

 

Farid ad-Din Attar used this analogy to depict God’s test of Iblis’s love: Iblis had to choose between remaining true to God (the King) while suffering the curse of disobedience (the stone) and rejecting God by worshiping Adam while receiving the rewards of obedience (the gem).

In this sense the – monotheistic – faith of Iblis is unshakable and incorruptible before God himself: O Lord, I do not adore you for the sake of mercy; there is no condition for my devotion. I will accept whatever you decide for me. Even the curse and hell.

These seem to be the words of Iblis, in this reading certainly not linked to the orthodoxy of the Islamic interpretation, but rather centered on the emotional substratum of Iblis.

He remains for everyone and forever the one who disobeyed God.

Many read in Iblis the instrument of God's wrath, who uses it as a punishment against the human race that have already disobeyed with the newly created Adam; and that, at the conclusion of the Day of Judgment, he will be able to return to be among His angels more loved than Him.

 

“Iblis and other jinn”. 14^th century manuscript Kitab al-Bulhan”

I don't know if this is true. As I said at the beginning everyone has to write about what he knows. What I wanted here was to reflect on the ambiguity of what we call good and evil.

To refer, one last time, to the etymology, the same word Jinn, the race of Iblis, has a broad nuance which is in its radical J-N-N which evokes the idea of darkness, of veil and hidden thing.

As Mendel explains well:

“The first form verb, janna, means to veil, hide, protect; of the second form, jannana: to make mad, to anger. [...] But from the same radical comes Jannat, Paradise. The passive participle (majnun, taken from demons) means crazy, while janin is the embryo, the fetus.” 

Words are always a key to understanding.

An analogy comes to mind. That of a class, in which among all the students there is one of the most talented, with a dazzling admiration from his teacher. Year after year, with votes getting higher and higher, with the knowledge that fills his heart and intellect as well as the pride of being the favorite, the one who stands out in the whole class who craves the same love from the top teacher. Then one day that same teacher opens the door and lets in a new student, younger, clumsy, never seen before, without the culture and devotion of the favorite student.

And he realizes that all the love that the teacher previously gave to him is now only for the new unknown student. Indeed, the same teacher orders the whole class to love him and bow to him.

I challenge any of you, but only if you are extremely sincere, not to feel anger and disappointment. Feeling all the love and admiration within you rot in an instant and become hate.

No more delusions of love corrode the heart and blind the intellect.

If this rebellion of ours is seen only as pride and presumption and not as wounded love then we might as well leave the class.

 

This is simply a reflection on how elusive the definition of what we call good and evil is. Too easy to point at someone, blame them without trying to understand that, after all, these feelings are also ours, every day.

Certainly there will be those who, like a snake biting its own tail, will jump up and say in a loud voice that Iblis was an angel, certainly not a simple human being, and precisely because he was the beloved he had to obey. And who, again, will say that feeling of pride, presumption, disobedience, are precisely the work of Iblis here on earth, among us.

Almost to put the blame on him again.

 

I don't feel like blaming people that fast. I am too aware of how human being is like jinn: madness and heaven.

The dark areas of the soul can never be eradicated.

And maybe that's what makes us human.

Iblis is closer to us than angels. His madness of love for the one God condemned him to spend his entire existence immersed in our cowardice, hypocrisy, wickedness.

 

This is what I sometimes feel when walking alone, in the crowd of unknown people. Their pains, sadness, shadows. And I absorb them like a sponge. Everything that does not even remotely enter into the choice made in hospitals, about who to save, who to give priority to.

We are just bodies, biological envelopes.

 

Was it really a test for Iblis?

I stand here and wonder if there is still love in God for His beloved angel.

 

If we all still have a chance.

 

• The Thinking Path 
• An Ancient Love Story 

 

“The Koran”, translation and critical apparatus by Gabriele Mendel (UTET, 2006)
“Poets of Islam” (Sellerio Editore, 2004)
“The Mystics of Islam – Anthology of Sufism” by Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch (Guanda, 1991)

 

Italian version