بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمنِ الرَّحِيم
قُل أوحِيَ إِلَيَّ أَنَّهُ استَمَعَ نَفَرٌ مِنَ الجِنِّ فَقالوا إِنّا سَمِعنا قُرآنًا عَجَبًا
Say: ‘It has been revealed to me that a team of the jinn listened [to the Quran], and they said: “Indeed we heard a wonderful qurʾān.
EXEGESIS
Ūḥiya is a verb in passive voice that lexically derives from the root waḥy. Some lexicologists maintain that the word waḥy implies to write. However, as Rāghib asserts, the literal meaning of the word waḥy is ‘a swift signal’ that may take place in the form of a speech which is secret or allegorical, or through a sound, bodily gesture, or even by means of writing. Looking into how it takes place, Ṭurayḥī asserts that waḥy denotes a communication that happens in secret such that none other than the recipient of the message is aware of it. Furthermore, a group of grammarians have maintained that any kind of information transmitted to another, openly or secretly, and by whatever means, which is understood clearly by the recipient, can be termed as waḥy.
Based on these assertions of the lexicographers, it can be concluded that waḥy in the Arabic language implies, first and foremost, a communication in which information is transmitted from the giver to the recipient. This communication could happen by means of a sign or gesture, writing, through an envoy, inspiration, or a secret conversation. Moreover, although this communication is swift and concise, it happens in an accurate manner such that the message conveyed is clearly comprehended by the recipient.
The term waḥy has appeared in different connotations in the Quran, and has been used in discussions related to the angels, devils (shayāṭīn), humans, animals, and inanimate objects. The most frequent usage of this word in the Quran, including in the verse under discussion, has been in relation to the communication between God and His prophets. Other than the connection between God and His prophets, the term has appeared in the Quran as also signifying divine inspiration to the angels (8:12), humans (28:7), and inanimate objects (99:4-5); secretive suggestion from Satan (6:112 and 6:121); communication by signs (19:11); and divinely-granted instinct to creatures (16:68).
Istamaʿa is a perfect tense which comes from the root samʿ meaning hearing. The word samʿ is also alternatively used in Arabic to denote the organ of hearing – the ear. Rāghib maintains that the term samʿ signifies the ability to hear. In any case, there is difference in meaning between the nouns samʿ and istimāʿ. While samʿ implies the mere activity of hearing that may and may not be accompanied with attention, istimāʿ means to listen carefully and to pay thorough attention. Hence, the verb istamaʿa means a kind of hearing that begets understanding of what is being said.
However, the word samiʿa has also appeared in the Quran in some occasions meaning to understand and perceive (8:31, 4:46, 2:285, and 28:80), and at times to denote obedience and following (8:21). As such, it could be because of the usage of this word in signifying understanding that some researchers have concluded that samiʿa in the Quran does not imply hearing through the physical organ only, but that it also includes hearing by means of spiritual power as in the case of the jinn in this verse, or as a result of absolute ontological dominion over the creation as is true of God (58:1).
Nafar is a noun that according to lexicographers refers to a group of less than ten people. However, Ālūsī asserts that the term is equally used in the Arabic language to imply a group that has more than ten members. The word nafar has its origin in the root nafr, which lexically means to feel uneasy about something and thus to move away from it. Bearing in mind the meaning of the root nafr, Muṣṭafawī maintains that the idea of setting out uneasily is incorporated in the meaning of the term nafar, like in the case of going out in pursuit of knowledge or for a battle. Kinsfolk are also referred to as nafar since they come out to help their fellow kinsman.
Some grammarians are of the opinion that nafar as well as the word rahṭ denote a group of people that has no female member in it. As a result, some exegetes like Thaʿālabī have been persuaded to believe that the team of jinn who listened to the Quran comprised male members only. Ālūsī does not agree with this view; according to him, the term nafar is neither specifically used for a group of men, nor for human beings only, as it has been used in the Quran to refer to the jinn.
Jinn – genie or jinni in English – is the plural of jānn as well as jinnī which, in Arabic and Quranic terms, refers to a kind of invisible creature made of fire. It derives from the root verb janna meaning to hide, to cover, or to veil. According to Rāghib, it implies invisibility from the senses. Thus, the specific type of creation mentioned has been termed as jinn due to their being hidden from the physical senses. According to Rāghib, the term jinn is also deployed in Arabic to refer to beings who are invisible to mankind, such as the angels and devils. The word jinn has appeared twenty-two times in the Quran. Jinnah is another term that refers to this type of creature, and has been used in the Quran five times (see 11:119 as an example).
Qur’ān is a noun that is said to have derived from the root qarʾ which means to collect or to bring together. Rāghib holds that reading is called qirāʾah because it puts together letters and words and joins them to one another. Based on this, the term qurʾān would mean ‘that which brings together’. Ibn al-Athīr, Zajjāj, and others, maintain that the book revealed to Prophet Muhammad (s) has been named qurʾān due to the fact that it collects different chapters, stories of past nations, divine commands and interdictions, and above all it incorporates within it the message of the previously sent divine scriptures.
According to another opinion, the term qurʾān is related to the perfect root qaraʾa which denotes ‘to read’. Thus, qurʾān would either mean ‘that which is read’ or ‘the reading’, similar to the word kitāb in the Arabic language which is often used to denote that which has been written (maktūb), though as a verbal noun it means to write. Scholars like Ṭabarī, Liḥyānī, and others, have held this view.
Nonetheless, there are other opinions about the etymology of the word qurʾān. According to al-Ashʿarī, it is from the root qarana which means to combine or to connect. Thus, the Quran was so named because it is formed from the combination of chapters, verses, and letters. Al-Farrāʾ believes that it derives from qarāʾin which signifies ‘to resemble’. The Quran has been so called since its verses resemble, as well as confirm, one another. There are also those like al-Shāfiʿī who maintain that the word Quran, just like the Torah or the Evangel, is a proper noun that does not derive from any word and that had not ever been used before in the Arabic language. It should however be noted that based on these three opinions, the word is pronounced qurān, that is, without the hamzah.
Although the different views expressed regarding the etymology of the word qurʾān are justifiable in their own right, the second opinion that believes the term qurʾān to have been derived from qaraʾa seems to be more concrete and suitable than the rest of the views. It thus becomes clear that the word qurʾān, as it appears in the holy book, is heavily intertwined with the notion of reading.
The term qurʾān has appeared in the Quran more than sixty times, and has been used as a proper noun for the Quran in 9:111. However, in the verse under discussion, the term qurʾān implies recitation.
ʿAjab commonly means amazement or astonishment. It is a noun that lexically denotes the disavowal of something due to its being unusual. Muṣṭafawī holds that ʿajab is an emotional state that occurs to a human being when he encounters something that is unusual to the natural course of things. This state, when experienced by man, is called taʿajjub. Some grammarians have suggested that the state of taʿajjub occurs in man as a result of a lack of knowledge about the cause of a given phenomenon. This could be illustrated by the example of a man who digs a well for water but comes upon a treasure trove. This would naturally arouse amazement in the person since it came unexpectedly for him due to him being unaware of the presence of treasure at that particular place; otherwise, had he known the dynamics of how the treasure got there, he would not have been taken by surprise.
The term ʿujb, or excessive self-admiration – which is one of the negative moral traits – has its lexical roots in the word ʿajab. In the verse under discussion, ʿajab signifies a thing that arouses wonder due to its being atypical of its likes.
EXPOSITION
The surah begins by disclosing the story of a group of jinn who happened to listen to the Quran and were fascinated by it. It opens with the imperative Say, thus directing the Holy Prophet to inform the Muslims of the incident as has been received by him through revelation.
The command Say signals to the listener the importance of the message that is being conveyed, and that it requires the listener to be attentive to what is being said.
Bearing in mind that this was the first time the Quran was giving detailed information about these invisible creatures – regarding whom the Arabs held superstitious beliefs – it may have been due to this reason that the description of them directly rested on the revelation, Say: ‘It has been revealed to me …’, since this would dismiss any suspicion that the information provided by the Prophet may have been influenced by such beliefs regarding the jinn as were prevalent during his day and age.
One of the strange allegations against Prophet Muhammad (s) by the infidels in Mecca was that he was a soothsayer, that is, either he had connections with the jinn and devils from whom he used to obtain information, or that he used to speculate regarding the unseen. As such, the phrase: Say: ‘It has been revealed to me …’ denies any such connections or conjecture on the part of the Prophet, and emphasises that the only source of information about the incident and what transpired thereafter is revelation. The Quran strongly rejects this accusation against the Prophet elsewhere by asserting: Nor is it the speech of a soothsayer. Little is the admonition that you take! Gradually sent down from the Lord of all the worlds (69:42-43).
In addition, the sentence Say: ‘It has been revealed to me …’ also bears indication that in the course of this event, the Prophet did not come into any contact with the jinn or have conversation with them, nor was he aware of the fact that they had gathered around him.
This extrapolation corroborates with the occasion of revelation reported for this surah. It has been narrated that one day, the Holy Prophet set out from Mecca together with Zayd ibn Ḥārithah towards the souk of ʿUkāẓ in the city of Taif, for the purpose of inviting its people towards Islam. However, the people of Taif did not show readiness to respond to his call. On their way back to Mecca, they halted at a place called Wādī Majannah. As the Prophet was immersed in the recitation of the verses of the Quran in the middle of the night, a group of jinn happened to pass by the place and hear the Quran. They were attracted by its recitation and thus they went back to their people and informed them about it. As a result, a group from among them came to the Holy Prophet and professed Islam. It was subsequent to this incident that Sūrat al-Jinn was revealed to the Prophet.
However, this in no way implies that the Prophet never had any direct contact with the jinn throughout the period of his mission for the purpose of inviting them towards Islam. Rather, at some occasions the Prophet recited for the jinn verses of the Quran while he was fully aware of their presence. Jābir ibn ʿAbd-Allāh al-Anṣārī says in a report: ‘One day, the Apostle of God (s) came out and recited Sūrat al-Raḥmān for his companions to the end, but none of them uttered a single word. He then said: “I recited this surah for the jinn and they responded more suitably than you. Whenever I repeated the verse, So which of your Lord’s bounties will you both deny? they would say in reply: ‘None of Your bounties – our Lord – do we deny; to You belongs all praise.’”’ Moreover, there are also reports, such as the one mentioned earlier regarding the occasion of revelation of this surah, which show that the jinn used to frequently visit the Prophet in order to learn more about divine precepts.
A similar incident to that which has been mentioned in Sūrat al-Jinn appears in verses 29-32 of Sūrat al-Aḥqāf (46), which is the sixty-sixth chapter in the chronology of revelation. As the events mentioned in these two chapters may seem to be one and the same – as believed by many exegetes – a close scrutiny of them shows that they actually refer to two different incidents. Verse 46:30, They said: ‘O our people! Indeed we have heard a book which has been sent down after Moses …’ suggests that this group of jinn who listened to the Quran believed in Prophet Moses (a) and the Torah, whilst the verses of Sūrat al-Jinn indicate that this particular group of jinn regarding whom the chapter was revealed were polytheists who did not believe in prophethood at all. Hence, the incident of the jinn mentioned in Sūrat al-Aḥqāf seems to have no connection whatsoever with the event mentioned in this surah.
The occasion of revelation reported for Sūrat al-Jinn, by virtue of the mention therein of the Prophet’s journey to the city of Taif, indicates that this incident must have taken place in around the tenth or eleventh year of the prophetic mission, that is, a couple of years prior to the Prophet’s migration to Medina.
On their first encounter with the Quran, the jinn were overwhelmed by the extraordinary nature of the divine message, and thus they characterised it as a wonderful recitation: Indeed we heard a wonderful qurʾān. The content and the beauty of the Quran had such a massive impact on them that they ultimately professed belief in it by only listening to its verses: Hence we have believed in it (verse 2), without asking for further evidence or miracle from the Prophet. This clearly indicates that the style, eloquence, and content of the Quran are by themselves a miracle that is sufficient to prove its veracity. However, in order to comprehend this reality, it is required of the listener to pay due heed and attention to its content, as indicated by the word istamaʿa: a team of the jinn listened (istamaʿa) [to the Quran].
Taking into account the subsequent verses of the surah, the statement Indeed we heard a wonderful qurʾān seems to have been made by this group of jinn as they related the incident to their people, just as the Quran has quoted them in a similar incident in 46:30. Nonetheless, there is also the possibility that they may have whispered this particular sentence to themselves after being wonderstruck by the content and beauty of the Quran, similar to what has appeared in 58:8.
It is worthy of note here that there is no explicit mention in the Quran as to whether or not the jinn can be physically seen by humans. It can, however, be deduced from 21:82, 27:39, and 38:37 that the jinn were visible to Prophet Solomon (a) as they performed certain tasks for him. On the other hand, a cursory look at the Islamic narrations does not leave room for any doubt that, though invisible in nature, the jinn, like the angels, can become perceptible to human eyes.
INSIGHTS FROM HADITH
- Muʿādh Ibn Jabal reports: ‘We were at the door of the house of Imam Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq (a) that a group of people came out of the house who were similar to the zuṭṭ, covered in garments. So we inquired from Abū ʿAbd-Allāh (a) about them, and he said: “These are your brethren from the jinn.”’
Note: This narration substantiates the point mentioned in the Exposition of this verse about the ability of the jinn to become visible to humans.
- Sadīr al-Ṣayrafī reports that Imam al-Bāqir (a) once asked him to get something for him from Medina. As he reached the broad road of al-Rawḥāʾ he came across a man waving at him with his clothes. He thought that the man was thirsty, so he went towards him and offered him a cup of water. He did not take the water and instead handed him a letter whose stamp was still wet. Upon looking at the seal he realised that it was from Abū Jaʿfar, al-Bāqir (a), so he asked the man out of surprise as to when he saw the Imam last, and he replied that it was only a few moments ago. Sadīr opened the letter to find that the Imam had instructed him to accomplish a few other things in Medina. As he turned back to speak to the man, he had already disappeared. When Sadīr met with the Imam, he told him: ‘May I be sacrificed for you! A man delivered your letter to me while the stamp was still wet.’ The Imam answered: ‘O Sadīr! We have attendants among the jinn. When we are in a hurry to do something, we dispatch them.’ According to another report, the Imam replied: ‘We have followers among the jinn just as we have adherents from the humans. When we intend to do something [quicker], we send them.’
REVIEW OF TAFSĪR LITERATURE
There are reports from Ibn Abbas and Ibn Masʿūd cited by the exegetes in their works which provide a somewhat different occasion of revelation for Sūrat al-Jinn.
Ibn Abbas reports that the Messenger of God set out with a group of his companions towards the souk of ʿUkāẓ. Around the same time, the devils (shayāṭīn) were blocked access to the news of the heavens and were attacked by the heavenly flames. As this seemed unusual for them, they suspected that something must have caused it, so they journeyed through the east and the west seeking to know the cause of it. A group of them who journeyed towards Tahāmah came across the Apostle of God and his companions who had halted at Nakhlah for the morning prayer. It was here that they heard the Quran and said: ‘This is what has barred us from listening to the news of the heavens.’ Thereafter, they returned to their people and said: Indeed we heard a wonderful qurʾān, which guides to rectitude. Thus, Sūrat al-Jinn was revealed to the Holy Prophet.
Although some exegetes have considered this report to be more reliable than other reports, Faḍl-Allāh questions the authenticity of the report and points to ambiguities in its content. According to him, the source of this report is unknown as Ibn Abbas did not narrate it from the Prophet himself. Furthermore, it is not clear, in his view, as to how the jinn were able to understand the cause behind the shutdown of the heavenly news by just listening to the Quran. On this basis, he is inclined to believe that such reports are very similar to traditions that have been forged in the name of Ibn Abbas. Rāzī raises yet another inconsistency in the content of the report, as those who were attacked by the heavenly flames were the devils, whilst those who ended up listening to the Quran were the jinn. Although Rāzī thereafter offers two options to resolve the discrepancy in the content of the report, in the absence of clear proof in support of either option, the inconsistency in the report would still remain unresolved. This discrepancy could be settled based on a claim by Qurashī, that there is no difference in the referents of the terms jinn and shayāṭīn in respect of this particular phenomenon in the Quran.
On a different note, according to the report by Ibn Masʿūd, none of the companions of the Prophet accompanied him on the night that he went out to meet with the jinn – commonly known amongst the exegetes as the ‘night of the jinn’. As they could not find the Prophet in Mecca on that particular night, they went searching for him in the valleys outside the city where they eventually saw him coming from the direction of the cave of Ḥirāʾ. When he was asked as to where he had been, the Prophet said in reply: ‘The envoy from the jinn had come to see me, so I went to recite the Quran for them.’
The purport of this report, in addition to the conflicting narrations as to whether or not Ibn Masʿūd accompanied the Holy Prophet on that night, and the different reports about the places to which the jinn belonged and also the surah to which they listened on this night, has led a group of exegetes to conclude that the report by Ibn Masʿūd is referring to a completely different incident to that related to the revelation of Sūrat al-Jinn.
In an endeavour to reconcile between the conflicting reports on the incident, Thaʿālabī holds that the jinn mentioned in Sūrat al-Jinn seem to have come to the Prophet for the first time coincidentally, as they searched for the cause of attack by the heavenly flames, and that was later followed by another delegation from the jinn as it appears from other reports. However, Tabatabai is of the opinion that the reports on the story of this group of jinn mentioned in this surah are too many and extremely disparate to be reconciled based on the verses of the Quran or acceptable circumstantial evidence.
Interestingly, ʿAbd al-Karīm Khaṭīb claims that the event mentioned in Sūrat al-Jinn is closely related historically to the first pledge of ʿAqabah. As a group from among the people of Medina went to meet with the Prophet in the middle of the night outside the city of Mecca, where he recited to them verses from the Quran, it was around the same time that God directed a team from the jinn to go and listen to the Quran, and they eventually believed in it. He holds that the phrase which has been sent down after Moses in 46:30, reveals that this team of jinn was from Medina, as the only divine book that was then known to its people was the Torah revealed to Prophet Moses (a). However, beside the fact that the affiliation of this event with the pledge of ʿAqabah remains unsubstantiated, it is based on the assumption that the events of the jinn mentioned in Sūrat al-Aḥqāf and in this surah are one and the same – a perception that is contrary to what is inferred from the Quran about these two events as discussed earlier in the Exposition of this verse.
Based on what appears from his work al-Taḥrīr wa al-Tanwīr, Ibn ʿĀshūr strangely seems to hold a perception about the jinn that is contrary to what is understood from the verses of the Quran about these beings, and that is at variance with the position of the vast majority of the exegetes regarding these creatures. He considers the world of jinn to be a realm that is free of obligations and beliefs, since he does not see them to be voluntary agents, but as beings who have a fixed disposition of either good or evil. And it is on this basis that no prophet had ever been sent to them with the divine law. However, in the case of the jinn who accepted the call of the Prophet towards Islam, he believes that God unveiled to them the truth out of His grace and hence they accepted it.
[1] Ayn, under w-ḥ-y.
[2] Raghib, under, w-ḥ-y.
[3] Bahrayn, under w-ḥ-ʾ.
[4] Maqayis, cited in Tahqiq, under w-ḥ-y; Lisan, under w-ḥ-y.
[5] Arastah, pp. 62-63.
[6] Lisan, under s-m-ʿ.
[7] Raghib, under s-m-ʿ.
[8] Fayyumi, cited in Tahqiq, under s-m-ʿ; Raghib, under s-m-ʿ.
[9] Raghib, under s-m-ʿ.
[10] Tahqiq, under s-m-ʿ.
[11] Lisan and Bahrayn, under n-f-r.
[12] Alusi, 13/186 and 15/92.
[13] Raghib, under n-f-r.
[14] Tahqiq, under n-f-r.
[15] Qamus, under n-f-r.
[16] Lisan, under n-f-r.
[17] Thaalabi, 5/224.
[18] Alusi, 15/92.
[19] Fayyumi, under janīn. According to a view, jānn are those members from amongst the jinn who have been subjected to transmutation (maskh) (Bahrayn, under j-n-n).
[20] Bahrayn, under j-n-n; Qurtubi, 21/264.
[21] Lisan and Bahrayn, under j-n-n. Such Arabic terms as jinnah (madness), jannah (garden), janīn (the embryo), janān (heart), and junnah (shield) all come from the same root and involve the meaning of being hidden and covered.
[22] Raghib, under j-n-n.
[23] Lisan, Raghib, and Bahrayn, under j-n-n.
[24] Raghib, under j-n-n.
[25] Lisan and Bahrayn under q-r-ʾ; Maqayis cited in Tahqiq, under q-r-ʾ.
[26] Raghib, under q-r-ʾ.
[27] Arastah, p. 44; Tibyan, 8/218.
[28] Razi, 29/428.
[29] Tahqiq, under q-r-ʾ; Kawthar, 5/88; Arastah, p. 44; al-Jurjānī, Āyāt al-Aḥkām, 1/104.
[30] Arastah, pp. 43-44; Kawthar, 5/88.
[31] Mizan, 20/38.
[32] Hans Wehr, under ʿajiba (ʿajab).
[33] Lisan, under ʿ-j-b.
[34] Tahqiq, under ʿ-j-b.
[35] Raghib, under ʿ-j-b.
[36] Mizan, 20/38.
[37] Tibyan, 10/146.
[38] Tantawi, 15/131.
[39] The Arabs in those days used to believe that the jinn rule over this earth, and hence whenever they were to spend a night at a given place they would take refuge with the jinn who rules that place by saying ‘I seek refuge with the master of this valley from the fools of his community’, and thereafter spend the night in peace. They also assumed that the jinn have knowledge of the unseen, and that the fortune tellers predict the future based on the information given to them by the jinn. Some of them even worshipped the jinn and believed in the kinship between them and God, thinking that He has a wife from among the jinn who gives birth for Him to the angels (Qutb, 6/3721).
[40] See Ibn Kathir, 7/405; Tabrisi, 9/253; Nemuneh, 24/478; Qutb, 6/3721; Ibn Ashur, 13/25.
[41] See Alusi, 14/36; Shawkani, 5/119; Qurtubi, 18/71.
[42] Nemuneh, 25/102; Qutb, 6/3273.
[43] Qummi, 2/299-300; Burhan, 5/48; Ahsan al-Hadith, 10/163-164; Safi, 5/18-19; Tafsīr Sharīf Lāhījī, 4/595; Nemuneh, 25/100; Nur, 5/19; Mizan, 18/219-220. This group of the jinn thereafter used to frequently visit the Holy Prophet, so he asked Ali ibn Abī Ṭālib (a) to instruct them on Islamic teachings.
[44] Bihar, 18/79; Manaqib, 1/47; see also Ahsan al-Hadith, 10/165; Zubdah, 6/340; Qutb, 6/3726.
[45] Muhit, 10/293.
[46] Mizan, 20/47.
[47] Mizan, 20/38.
[48] Nemuneh, 21/372.
[49] Tantawi, 15/132.
[50] Qamus, under jinn, point 12. For further explanation on this, see tamaththala under the Exegesis of verse 17 of Sūrat Maryam.
[51] These are dark complexioned people either from India (Lisan, under z-ṭ-ṭ) or Africa (Bahrayn, under z-ṭ-ṭ, and Ayn, under z-ṭ-ṭ).
[52] Nur, 5/431.
[53] A place located between the two cities of Mecca and Medina, about thirty or forty miles from Medina (Nur, 5/432).
[54] Nur, 5/432.
[55] Nur, 5/432.
[56] The heavens did not use to be guarded during the period between Prophet Jesus (a) and Prophet Muhammad (s). It was after the advent of the Holy Prophet that the devils were prevented from listening to the heavenly news and were attacked by the flames (Tabari, 29/65; Muqatil, 4/461; Suyuti, 6/270; Razi, 30/664).
[57] The mention of the souk of ʿUkāẓ as well as the claim that the jinn heard his recitation around the time of the morning prayer makes this report very close to the occasion of revelation mentioned in Exposition. There is also a third narration reported by Ibn Isḥāq which seems to be highly corroborating the report by Qummī (see Ibn Ashur, 29/201; Khatib, 15/1211; Tantawi, 15/129; Qutb, 6/3724). However, the mention of the attack on the devils by the heavenly flames is exclusive to the report by Ibn Abbas.
[58] Samarqandi, 3/503; Ibn Ashur, 29/201; Tibyan, 10/144; Ahsan al-Hadith, 11/370; al-Tafsīr al-Ḥadīth, 3/8-9; Ibn Kathir, 7/266-267; Tantawi, 15/129; Nemuneh, 25/101; Tabari, 29/64; Qurtubi, 20/1-2; Thaalabi, 5/493; Zubdah, 7/205-206; Qutb, 6/3272, 3724; Zamakhshari, 4/311; Tabrisi, 10/554; Nur, 5/430.
[59] Qutb, 6/3273.
[60] Fadlallah, 23/147-148.
[61] Razi, 30/664.
[62] Razi, 30/664-665. Option 1: it is probable that the jinn were together with the devils at the time when the latter came under attack by the flames. Thus the jinn accompanied the devils as they came out in search of the cause of this event. Option 2: it could be that those attacked by the flames were in fact the jinn referred to in this report as shayāṭīn (devils), for anyone who rebels against the obedience of God can be called shayṭān.
[63] Qamus, under jinn.
[64] Nemuneh, 25/101-102; Tantawi, 15/129; Qurtubi, 3-4; Alusi, 13/188; Zubdah, 7/205-206; Qutb, 6/3272; Tabrisi, 10/554.
[65] Muhit, 10/293.
[66] Ahsan al-Hadith, 11/368. The jinn who came to Mecca were from Naṣībayn, a village in Yemen, whilst the group that came to the Prophet at Nakhlah was from Naynawā, and the surah that they listened to there was, according to ʿIkramah, Sūrat al-ʿAlaq, while others hold that it was Sūrat al-Raḥmān.
[67] Ahsan al-Hadith, 11/370.
[68] Thaalabi, 5/224.
[69] Mizan, 18/220.
[70] Khatib, 13/293-295.
[71] Ibn Ashur, 29/202-203.