Whatmassis—andwhyithappens

Mass is the Arabic word for the "touch" of the jinn — the range of harm, from a passing interference to full possession, that a devil can inflict on a human being by Allah's permission. This page sets out the proof that it is real, and the reasons the scholars and practitioners give for why it happens to a particular person.

The proof from the Quran

The early commentators read the verse literally. Qatadah said: it is the derangement with which the shayṭān deranges a person — madness. Aḍ-Ḍaḥḥāk said: whoever dies consuming ribā will be raised on the Day of Resurrection staggering like one whom the shayṭān has struck with mass. At-Tabari explained "yatakhabbaṭuhu-sh-shayṭānu mina-l-mass" as: he deranges him by his touch, and from this the Arabs say of a man that he is mamsūs — "touched".

The language itself carries the concept. Lamam — a touch of madness from the jinn — appears in pre-Islamic poetry (al-A'sha describes a she-camel as if "struck by a touch from the visiting jinn"), and Anas ibn Malik said that urinating in the wash-place was disliked "for fear of lamam". The author of aṣ-Ṣiḥāḥ records: lamam is a fringe of madness, and one says "so-and-so has been struck by a lammah of the jinn — that is, a mass."

The scholars' position

"There is none among the imams of the Muslims who denies the entry of the jinnī into the body of the one afflicted with sar' (seizures/possession) and others. Whoever denies that, and claims that the sharia declares it false, has lied about the sharia. There is nothing in the evidences of the revelation that negates it." — Ibn Taymiyyah

The source then presses the point from experience: how can something witnessed and tangible be denied? The shayṭān speaks on the tongue of the possessed in a language the patient does not know, in an accent and voice not his own; it tells of things the patient himself has no knowledge of; the patient feels it moving through his body, and it can disturb his mind and make his limbs behave in ways completely out of character. The source goes as far as to say that whoever denies this while claiming a proof above the Book of Allah and the words of His Messenger has disbelieved in what was revealed to Muhammad ﷺ, and resembles the people of innovation and philosophy. That is the source's position stated in its own strong terms; the settled point for the reader is simpler — the mainstream scholars of Islam affirm that possession is real.

Why it happens: six causes

1. Revenge — the jinn believes you harmed it

The most common cause practitioners describe. A jinnī, hurt by a human — almost always unknowingly — retaliates by attaching itself to him. The classical examples of unintended harm:

• Pouring hot water down drains or in bathrooms without saying bismillāh.
• Urinating into holes, cracks or insect nests (dwellings of the jinn).
• Hurting animals such as dogs and cats.
• Killing house snakes without first giving warning.
• Screaming, weeping, singing — or reciting Quran — in the toilet.
• Jumping or falling from a height without saying bismillāh, landing on a jinnī asleep or unaware.
• Throwing a stone into a well or open ground without saying bismillāh.
• Reading books of sorcery and summoning the jinn.
• Spraying insecticide without saying bismillāh.

The remedy running through the whole list is one word: bismillāh. The jinn take notice when the name of Allah is said, and move aside.

On house snakes, the Prophet ﷺ said: "These houses have their dwellers (of the jinn). If you see one of them (a snake), give it warning three times; if it departs, [leave it]; otherwise kill it, for it is a disbeliever." — Muslim 2236 (with the wording of the tahrīj narrations). As for how the warning is given, Imam Malik said it is enough to say: "I adjure you by Allah and the Last Day — do not appear to us and do not harm us." Ibn Habib relates a fuller form invoking the covenant taken by Sulayman ibn Dawud. The point is a formal notice: leave this house, or be treated as a harmful devil.

2. Indirect revenge

If the shayṭān cannot reach the person who harmed it — often because that person keeps the daily adhkār — it may, by Allah's permission, attach itself instead to someone dear to him: a spouse, a child, a close relative. The harm is aimed at the protected person through the unprotected one.

3. Oppression of the heedless

Sometimes there is no grievance at all — only opportunity. A person far from the remembrance of Allah is simply an easy target for a wicked jinnī:

4. 'Ishq — infatuation

Many cases of possession are driven by a jinnī's infatuation with a human. The person need not be beautiful by human measures. This cause has its own full article — the "lover jinn" — in the deeper reading section.

5. Sihr — magic

When a sorcerer casts sihr on a victim, a servant-jinn is attached to the bewitched person to carry the harm. The possession rides in on the spell.

6. 'Ayn — the evil eye

The practitioners describe the shayṭān slipping into the body of the person struck by the eye along with the breath (the envious glance) of the one who cast it.

Ibn Taymiyyah's summary

Ibn Taymiyyah reduced the causes of possession to three. Sometimes the jinnī desires the person and possesses him for its own pleasure — and this, he says, is the gentlest kind. Sometimes the human has harmed the jinn — urinated on them, poured hot water on them, killed one of them — and this is the severest kind: he notes that the jinn in such cases often go as far as killing the one they possess. And sometimes it is plain mischief and oppression, like the idle cruelty found among humans. However frightening that reads, remember the frame of everything on this site: no devil acts except by Allah's permission, and the door out — remembrance, ruqyah, and turning to Allah — is never closed.