The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 01 (of 10)
General
The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 01 (of 10)
Fairy tales; Tales -- Arab countries
[FN#12] The Arab. singular (whence the French "génie"), fem. Jinniyah;
the Div and Rakshah of old Guebre-land and the "Rakshasa," or "Yaksha,"
of Hinduism. It would be interesting to trace the evident connection,
by no means "accidental," of "Jinn" with the "Genius" who came to the
Romans through the Asiatic Etruscans, and whose name I cannot derive
from "gignomai" or "genitus." He was unknown to the Greeks, who had the
Daimon {Greek Letters}, a family which separated, like the Jinn and the
Genius, into two categories, the good (Agatho-dæmons) and the bad
(Kako-dæmons). We know nothing concerning the status of the Jinn
amongst the pre-Moslemitic or pagan Arabs: the Moslems made him a
supernatural anthropoid being, created of subtile fire (Koran chapts.
xv. 27; lv. 14), not of earth like man, propagating his kind, ruled by
mighty kings, the last being Ján bin Ján, missionarised by Prophets and
subject to death and Judgment. From the same root are "Junún" = madness
(_i.e._, possession or obsession by the Jinn) and "Majnún"=a madman.
According to R. Jeremiah bin Eliazar in Psalm xii. 5, Adam was
excommunicated for one hundred and thirty years, during which he begat
children in his own image (Gen. v. 3) and these were Mazikeen or
Shedeem—Jinns. Further details anent the Jinn will presently occur.
[FN#13] Arab. "Amsár" (cities): in Bul. Edit. "Amtár" (rains), as in
Mac. Edit. So Mr. Payne (I., 5) translates: And when she flashes forth
the lightning of her glance, She maketh eyes to rain, like showers,
with many a tear. I would render it, "She makes whole cities shed
tears," and prefer it for a reason which will generally influence
me—its superior exaggeration and impossibility.
[FN#14] Not "A-frit," pronounced Aye-frit, as our poets have it. This
variety of the Jinn, who, as will be shown, are divided into two races
like mankind, is generally, but not always, a malignant being, hostile
and injurious to mankind (Koran xxvii. 39).
[FN#15] _i.e._, "I conjure thee by Allah;" the formula is technically
called "Inshád."
[FN#16] This introducing the name of Allah into an indecent tale is
essentially Egyptian and Cairene. But see Boccaccio ii. 6, and vii. 9.
[FN#17] So in the Mac. Edit.; in others "ninety." I prefer the greater
number as exaggeration is a part of the humour. In the Hindu "Kathá
Sárit Ságara" (Sea of the Streams of Story), the rings are one hundred
and the catastrophe is more moral, the good youth Yashodhara rejects
the wicked one's advances; she awakes the water-sprite, who is about to
slay him, but the rings are brought as testimony and the improper young
person's nose is duly cut off. (Chap. Ixiii.; p. 80, of the excellent
translation by Prof. C. H. Tawney: for the Bibliotheca Indica:
Calcutta, 1881.) The Kathá, etc., by Somadeva (century xi), is a
poetical version of the prose compendium, the "Vrihat Kathá" (Great
Story) by Gunadhya (cent. vi).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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