Whyusingjinnevenforpermittedthingsisnotallowed—Abdulrahmanal-Faqihandthethreekindsofjinn-users

Abdulrahman al-Faqih’s answer

Sheikh Abdulrahman al-Faqih states his position plainly, and adds that he personally heard Sheikh Ibn Bāz deny that it is allowed.

“

What we hold as our religion before Allah is that it is not permitted to use the jinn in any of these matters.

His central argument is the Prophet’s ﷺ own practice. The Prophet was in the most desperate need of scouts, of anyone who could help him in war and uncover the enemies’ secrets. Yet he never used a single Muslim jinnī for it. He sent Hudhayfah to spy on the enemy camp on that freezing night of the Trench: where were the jinn then? If the motive and the need existed in the Prophet’s time, and the possibility existed, and he still did not use them, that proves that using them after him is not legislated.

There is a second argument. The Prophet ﷺ said of the shayṭān who lunged at him in prayer: “Were it not for the supplication of my brother Sulaymān, I would have tied him to the pillar” (Bukhari and Muslim). He held back out of respect for Sulaymān’s du‘ā:

قَالَ رَبِّ ٱغْفِرْ لِى وَهَبْ لِى مُلْكًۭا لَّا يَنۢبَغِى لِأَحَدٍۢ مِّنۢ بَعْدِىٓ ۖ إِنَّكَ أَنتَ ٱلْوَهَّابُ

Qāla rabbi-ghfir lī wa-hab lī mulkan lā yanbaghī li-aḥadin min baʿdī innaka anta-l-wahhāb

"He said: My Lord, forgive me and grant me a kingdom such as will not belong to anyone after me. Indeed, You are the Bestower." — Sūrah Ṣād 38:35

Command over the jinn was Sulaymān’s exclusive kingdom. Whoever uses the jinn, even in permitted matters, has trespassed on the du‘ā of Sulaymān.

The essay: no jinn serves for free

A student of knowledge on the Multaqa Ahl al-Hadith forum develops the point. Allah gave the jinn extraordinary powers exceeding those of mankind, which is why no human being gets their service without giving them something in return. Even among people, a brother rarely serves his brother except for some interest; and there is more good in people than in jinn.

He quotes Ibn Taymiyyah (Majmū‘ al-Fatāwā 19/41): people of misguidance and innovation, who have asceticism and devotion but not upon the lawful way, sometimes receive “unveilings” and produce effects; they take themselves off to the haunts of the devils — places where prayer is forbidden, because the devils descend on them there and address them as they address the soothsayers, just as they used to enter the idols and speak to the idol-worshippers and help them with certain wants, as they help the sorcerers and the worshippers of the sun, moon and stars. Devils they call “the spiritualities of the planets” may descend on such people and fulfil some of their needs (killing an enemy or making him ill, luring someone they desire, or fetching money), but the harm this brings them is greater than the benefit, and may be many times greater. And many who use the jinn this way claim Sulaymān did the same, which is the slander the devils wrote into the books of sihr and kufr they buried beneath his throne. Two groups went astray over it: those who defamed Sulaymān because of it, and those who said “if it were not lawful Sulaymān would not have done it” and so followed sorcery.

Note, says the essayist, two things in Ibn Taymiyyah’s words: he says the devils address these people “as they address the soothsayers”: the very description of those who question the jinn and seek their help today — and he calls the second group’s practice a species of sihr.

Three kinds of people who use jinn

Three kinds of people who use jinnEach is set out in full below.

• Those who never askedThe jinn came to them and offered.
• Those who ask the jinnForbidden at least by sadd al-dharā’i‘.
• Those who compel the jinn by forceIt ended with Sulaymān.

1. Those who never asked: the jinn came to them and offered. These are the very people Ibn Taymiyyah’s warning describes.
2. Those who ask the jinn. They incur everything the first kind incurs, plus this: asking created beings is in origin restricted: Ibn Taymiyyah writes that “asking the creation is in principle forbidden, but was permitted for necessity” (Majmū‘ 1/181). The evidence includes the famous counsel to Ibn ‘Abbās:

إِذَا سَأَلْتَ فَاسْأَلِ اللَّهَ وَإِذَا اسْتَعَنْتَ فَاسْتَعِنْ بِاللَّهِ

"When you ask, ask Allah; and when you seek help, seek help from Allah." — Tirmidhi 2516, graded sahih; also Ahmad 2669

And the pledge of ‘Awf ibn Mālik’s small group, to whom the Prophet ﷺ added quietly, “…and do not ask people for anything”. Afterwards, if one of those men dropped his whip while riding, he would not even ask someone to hand it up to him (Muslim 1043). If asking a capable, present human is discouraged like this, then asking the jinn is forbidden at the very least by sadd al-dharā’i‘, the Sharī‘ah’s blocking of every road that leads to shirk. Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhāb devoted a chapter of Kitāb al-Tawhīd to this: “How the Chosen One ﷺ guarded the precinct of tawhīd and blocked every path leading to shirk.”

3. Those who compel the jinn by force: commanding them from above, as a superior commands a subordinate, the way Sulaymān did. There is no point discussing this kind: it ended with Sulaymān. Only this kind escapes Ibn Taymiyyah’s rule that “every asker, in hope or fear, is a worshipper of the one asked” (Majmū‘ 10/239).

It is in this light, the essay concludes, that one must read the sentence transmitted by al-Sa‘dī in Tarīq al-Wusūl (p. 134): “Humans’ use of jinn is like humans’ use of humans — some use them in harām, some in permitted things, some in obedience to Allah and His Messenger.” That single sentence is the mainstay of most who have fallen into this practice or given fatwa for it, and it does not carry the weight they place on it.