Speaker 1: You're listening to an Airwave Media podcast.
Speaker 2: Hey there, Blake, how are you doing?
Speaker 3: I'm cold, Ben, because I don't have a Monster Talk
Speaker 3: T shirt.
Speaker 2: You know, you know what would be really cool, Blake,
Speaker 2: would be if there was a Talk T shirt. Yes,
Speaker 2: that's just That's just what I was thinking. Why why
Speaker 2: don't we have somebody designed a T shirt?
Speaker 1: Blake?
Speaker 3: But Ben, who could we ask?
Speaker 1: Hmm?
Speaker 2: I don't know. Let me think, don don Hey, I
Speaker 2: have an idea, Blake. Why don't we hold a contest
Speaker 2: and we'll have our listeners, many of whom are very
Speaker 2: creative and frankly much better artists and are smarter than
Speaker 2: we are, and ask them to submit some designs for
Speaker 2: our super cool, awesome Monster Talk T shirt.
Speaker 3: I like this idea, but how can we properly incentivize
Speaker 3: our listeners to participate?
Speaker 2: That's a great question, Blake. Let me think, Hey, I
Speaker 2: know me. We could offer prizes for first, second, and
Speaker 2: third place designs, and of course, the grand prize, the
Speaker 2: best one, will be put on a Monster Talk T shirt.
Speaker 2: What do you think of that, Blake?
Speaker 3: I think we should use the losers too.
Speaker 2: I think that I think that's great idea. Well, why
Speaker 2: don't we do this? Why don't we have an official
Speaker 2: monster Talk T shirt contest challenge Thingy will have like
Speaker 2: the deadline be the end of the year.
Speaker 4: The twenty twelve Monster Dog T Shirt Contest Thingy. Submit
Speaker 4: your designs to contest at monsterdog dot org. Deadline for
Speaker 4: inch Fury December thirty first, twenty eleven. Winners to be
Speaker 4: selected in January.
Speaker 3: Chances are they're not what you think they are. All
Speaker 3: your life, you've been shown images of genies as powerful
Speaker 3: magical entities which have, through one method or another, been
Speaker 3: trapped in a lamp or a ring, and are forced
Speaker 3: to do the bidding of anyone who possesses such items.
Speaker 3: But those so called genies have about as much to
Speaker 3: do with traditional Gin of Arabic folklore as Casper the
Speaker 3: friendly ghost has to do with the Shining. Here's the
Speaker 3: most important difference between the genie from pop culture and
Speaker 3: the creatures called gin. Many people all over the world
Speaker 3: believe that gin are real, often malevolent creatures, which are
Speaker 3: responsible for hauntings and possession. They fit the cultural niche
Speaker 3: that ghosts and demons fill in Western culture, and are
Speaker 3: generally not at all the sort of creature you'd want
Speaker 3: to let out of a bottle or encounter in a
Speaker 3: desolate valley or an abandoned home. And while they inspired
Speaker 3: I Dream of Genie and Disney's Aladdin, they also fuel
Speaker 3: the writings of HP Lovecraft and Robert E.
Speaker 4: Howard.
Speaker 3: So sit back and prepare to uncork a bottle of
Speaker 3: gin on this episode of Monster Talk. It's actually quite
Speaker 3: unlike anything we've ever seen before. A giant, very creature
Speaker 3: Part eight, part of mat.
Speaker 4: In Luckness, a twenty four a mile long bottomless lake
Speaker 4: in the Highlands of Scotland. It's a creature known as
Speaker 4: the Luckness Monster. Monster tal.
Speaker 3: Welcome to Monster Talk, the science show about monsters. I'm
Speaker 3: Blake Smith, and together with Ben Radford, we're going to
Speaker 3: chat with author Robert Lebling about his new book, Legends
Speaker 3: of the Fire Spirits. It's a very comprehensive book about
Speaker 3: the folklore surrounding creatures known as jin. Of course, Ben
Speaker 3: and I are skeptics, and Lebling's book presents the legends,
Speaker 3: folklore and modern anecdotes from a neutral stance. He's living
Speaker 3: in Saudi Arabia in a culture where these entities are
Speaker 3: not only believed by the public, but also endorsed by
Speaker 3: the Koran and by Islam. Listeners to Monstertog will recognize
Speaker 3: that I have an affinity for tales of the paranormal
Speaker 3: and the supernatural, and so do my co hosts. If
Speaker 3: you're into that sort of thing, I think you'll find
Speaker 3: Lebling's book a fascinating read. We don't have him on
Speaker 3: to debate the existence of these entities, but to talk
Speaker 3: about the legends. Some of the tales of gen will
Speaker 3: describe phenomena similar to a haunting, others to possession, yet
Speaker 3: others to fairy tales and folk tales, and even alien
Speaker 3: abduction stories. All of these classes of phenomena are familiar
Speaker 3: to skeptical paranormal enthusiasts, but it's fascinating to hear these
Speaker 3: same kinds of experiences atributed to an entirely different entity.
Speaker 3: I find that interesting as a skeptic and as an
Speaker 3: enthusiast of anthropology and psychology. I suspect you will too
Speaker 3: if you give his book a read. Let's get to
Speaker 3: our interview with Robert Leveling.
Speaker 4: Right now more obstrutal.
Speaker 3: What led you to become interested in GEN?
Speaker 1: I suppose my interest in the Middle East probably led
Speaker 1: to that. I'm interested in anthropology and did some study
Speaker 1: in college and started to hear stories over here in
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region, and I
Speaker 1: became interested in finding out what was behind the stories.
Speaker 1: So I did started to research into it, and I've
Speaker 1: got access to a very good library of old material
Speaker 1: and new material, and from there I decided I start
Speaker 1: my own Yahoo group and start chatting with people about it,
Speaker 1: and before you know it, the Gin Group was born,
Speaker 1: and from that I started collecting material. Over the years.
Speaker 1: It's been still it goes back to the nineteen nineties,
Speaker 1: because I've been here since ninety four in Saudi Arabia
Speaker 1: and it's now it's just one of those things that
Speaker 1: it's kind of hard to shake. So I've been you know.
Speaker 1: I decided eventually the material I collected was worth putting
Speaker 1: into a book, and after working on it through a
Speaker 1: number of iterations with my editor at ib Taurus, we
Speaker 1: finally found something that we thought would work, a narrative history,
Speaker 1: and so that's where we are. We've told what we
Speaker 1: think is the origins and the and the scope of
Speaker 1: the Gin phenomenon around the world world, primarily in the
Speaker 1: Muslim and Arabic speaking world. But I don't know. There's more.
Speaker 1: I've collected so much material over the years about other
Speaker 1: supernatural phenomena, spirit creatures and the like, that may spin
Speaker 1: those into another book at another time, drawing and discussing
Speaker 1: the parallels between the genie or the Gin phenomenon and
Speaker 1: those of other countries, for example, a Celtic tradition the
Speaker 1: elves and fairies and so forth, Yeah, and so forth.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, you know, I've read your book,
Speaker 2: of course, Legends of the Fire Spirits, and I have
Speaker 2: to say I really enjoyed it. It just it had
Speaker 2: such good, rich historical context, in anthropological context. It was
Speaker 2: fascinating to me to read an account of Gin that
Speaker 2: was in depth and scholarly, because a lot of the
Speaker 2: stuff that I'd read about because you know, this is
Speaker 2: one of my just and so much of with just
Speaker 2: sort of superficial, you know, mentions in passing. And I
Speaker 2: was struck by the research that that went into it. Now,
Speaker 2: can you talk a little bit about that research.
Speaker 1: Well, I started collecting stories and and talking to people
Speaker 1: in Saudi Arabia, particularly about what how they perceived the Gin.
Speaker 1: It's a question of perception clearly, and and of of explanation.
Speaker 1: How do you explain phenomena that that are puzzling and
Speaker 1: perhaps don't fit into your into the normal experiences of
Speaker 1: your life. The people of the Middle East and the
Speaker 1: greater Islamic world believe firmly that gin are real creatures.
Speaker 1: They are this this comes primarily from from the the
Speaker 1: passages in the Quran, the Holy Book of Islam, that
Speaker 1: that verify the existence of genies for Muslims. And you know,
Speaker 1: for us in the West, it's kind of it's an
Speaker 1: alien concept, but there were things about it that really
Speaker 1: it seems similar to phenomena that I was seeing in
Speaker 1: other countries. And I was also interested in comparing how
Speaker 1: the how the Gin behaved with with the alien phenomenon
Speaker 1: in the United States, alien abductions and so forth. In
Speaker 1: the Middle East, the Gin do the same kind of
Speaker 1: abducting as as aliens in Western culture are said to do.
Speaker 1: And so I thought there were there might be some
Speaker 1: parallels here and things worth exploring. And I started digging
Speaker 1: deeper into the material, and before you knew it, I'd
Speaker 1: come up with a plan, and I put it down
Speaker 1: on paper and moved from there The people that I
Speaker 1: know in Saudi Arabia who believe in the Gin phenomenon
Speaker 1: are very reasonable, ordinary folk, and the fact that they
Speaker 1: take this so seriously indicates to me that I should
Speaker 1: at least try to understand where they're coming from. And
Speaker 1: that's what the book is about, an attempt to understand
Speaker 1: how people can believe in a phenomenon like this, and
Speaker 1: what does it mean for them? And does it have
Speaker 1: more meaning than simply a fireside story. Is it more
Speaker 1: than something to scare kids with in the evenings, or
Speaker 1: is there something to it that is deeply embedded in
Speaker 1: human nature? And I think there is, I really do.
Speaker 1: I think that the belief in in Gin here. I've
Speaker 1: compared it among the number of societies and in some cases,
Speaker 1: I mean, it takes a while to get into the
Speaker 1: Gin phenomenon. But there are evil Gin and good Gin.
Speaker 1: There are the Gin r a creature of a sentient
Speaker 1: being with the ability to distinguish right from wrong, the
Speaker 1: ability to act on free will and make choices. And
Speaker 1: some of them end up being believers in God or
Speaker 1: a higher power, can be any religion. Others reject religion,
Speaker 1: and yet they're inextricably linked with it because they associate
Speaker 1: themselves with the devil, and you have the evil gin
Speaker 1: are they fall into several categories. You've got the effrite, well,
Speaker 1: actually you got a lesser category called the Chatans, which
Speaker 1: simply means the Satans like demons. Then they're the Afrite,
Speaker 1: which are are often larger and more frightening than the Chatans.
Speaker 1: And then you have the Marids, which are the largest
Speaker 1: and most powerful of all gin. And all these beliefs
Speaker 1: in evil gins are balanced by a belief that there
Speaker 1: are good gin. Some of them become partners of people
Speaker 1: and protect them. Some of them protect houses like the
Speaker 1: old and the old Roman concept of the genii or
Speaker 1: the genius household deity. And so we have to have
Speaker 1: all these kinds of things going on at the same time,
Speaker 1: and it's it's kind of interesting to try and separate
Speaker 1: them out and figure out, you know, why somebody belie
Speaker 1: use in this sort of thing, and why and to
Speaker 1: what extent it prevails. I mean, you'll find some people
Speaker 1: who will tell you that they think this is these
Speaker 1: are all fairy stories, or or they're like that they're
Speaker 1: not really they're not really true. And then yet you
Speaker 1: will find these same people are uh, will be frightened
Speaker 1: to go into an empty house for fear of disturbing
Speaker 1: the Gin. And and also they'll use you use religious
Speaker 1: formulas to protect them from the Gin under many, many circumstances.
Speaker 2: So how seriously are the Gin taken? I mean, as
Speaker 2: you said, some people, some people believe in them, and
Speaker 2: others don't. Is it is it a case of where
Speaker 2: all good Muslims necessarily believe in the existence of Gin,
Speaker 2: or is it a case for example, Well, for example,
Speaker 2: I mean that one analogy that I got from the
Speaker 2: book was in some ways you might compare Gin to
Speaker 2: demons or angels, probably demons in the Bible, where you know,
Speaker 2: not all Christians necess already literally believe in the existence
Speaker 2: of angels, but many of them do.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, now, this is right. If you talk to
Speaker 1: a westernized a Muslim in this part of the world,
Speaker 1: they'll often tell you that there may perhaps be a
Speaker 1: metaphorical explanation for the Gin. There are some interpretations that
Speaker 1: say GIN could be simply bad people or unusual people.
Speaker 1: There are some who feel that who don't accept the
Speaker 1: concept at all. I mean, you have a complete spectrum
Speaker 1: of people. The more religious the people are, the more
Speaker 1: they tend to believe in it. The more traditional they are,
Speaker 1: the more they tend to believe in it. And we
Speaker 1: have a lot of traditional people here in Saudi Arabia,
Speaker 1: and they tend to tend to accept it. In fact,
Speaker 1: the government of Saudi Arabia is very very opposed to
Speaker 1: the the notion of black magic, which would be the
Speaker 1: kind of sorcery or magic that summons gin to do
Speaker 1: your bidding. That can be a criminal offense here. In fact,
Speaker 1: in some cases you can be sentenced to death for it,
Speaker 1: which indicates that they believe it's not simply a case
Speaker 1: of fraud but of a person trying to defraud someone
Speaker 1: by by claiming that they have access to the gin
Speaker 1: and can tap their powers, but rather that they that
Speaker 1: indeed it is a real threat and it's a threat
Speaker 1: to goodness and really disbelief.
Speaker 3: So so how is how is the the Arabian gin
Speaker 3: concept different from like the Western eyes version of the
Speaker 3: genie in the bottle?
Speaker 1: Well, that's that's pretty much entertainment. And you do find
Speaker 1: that in the culture here. If you go back to
Speaker 1: the Arabian Nights tales, there are a number of those there.
Speaker 1: There are genies and bottles, but they're only a small
Speaker 1: it's a small, uh small fraction of of Gin belief,
Speaker 1: and it really is is purely for entertainment. The storytellers
Speaker 1: will tell stories about Gin who have have these powers
Speaker 1: and that you can you can call on them to
Speaker 1: do these do things for you. But in terms of
Speaker 1: day to day life, nobody here expects to come across
Speaker 1: a bottle with a genie in it on the beach.
Speaker 1: What they what they think will happen, is that they
Speaker 1: might encounter Gin in in remote places, places that are
Speaker 1: desolate ruins, archaeological ruins for example, uh sewers, dark places, caves.
Speaker 3: You mentioned that. I that was actually one of my
Speaker 3: questions was it seems like they inhabit abandoned places in
Speaker 3: that way, in in that particular way, they sort of
Speaker 3: fulfill the same niche as ghosts do here in the US.
Speaker 3: For people, it's a haunted thing of it haunts ruined places.
Speaker 3: Is there more belief in Gin than ghosts in Saudi
Speaker 3: Arabia or they don't.
Speaker 1: There isn't a belief in ghosts as we know it, Okay,
Speaker 1: ghosts being spirits of the dead. At least I haven't
Speaker 1: come across it. Anytime someone will tell you that an
Speaker 1: abandoned old building is haunted, it's haunted by gin. And
Speaker 1: gin are not considered to be the spirits of the dead.
Speaker 1: They are a separate species of being, an intelligent being
Speaker 1: that lives on earth with man. In fact, lives in
Speaker 1: other places as well, perhaps in another dimension. Perhaps since
Speaker 1: they're invisible frequently, it's hard to tell where they where
Speaker 1: they hang out, but there are stories about about that.
Speaker 1: But the Gin have the ability to pass from invisibility
Speaker 1: to visibility, and they do that through means that though
Speaker 1: we can't explain, and there's some people I think my
Speaker 1: book indicates some people who tried to speculate as to
Speaker 1: whether perhaps the Gin are visible in spectra that we
Speaker 1: can't see the infrared or the ultra violet. Infrared generally
Speaker 1: for gin and ultra violet for angels. Is the way
Speaker 1: that people in this part of the world look at it.
Speaker 1: Anyone who tries to find a scientific explanation for these creatures.
Speaker 1: But they live, they guard treasure, they live in abandoned places.
Speaker 1: They and yet at the same time, the Gena are
Speaker 1: known as as a tribal people. They are said to
Speaker 1: live to have families and like human beings and tribal
Speaker 1: groups clans. There have been stories of them doing the
Speaker 1: pilgrimage to Mecca by camel caravan, people encountering them in
Speaker 1: the desert, So there are they have a whole lot
Speaker 1: of a whole range of actions and experiences that they
Speaker 1: go a little bit beyond haunting. They also seem to
Speaker 1: have the ability to possess human beings, much as a
Speaker 1: demon would in the Western tradition, the exorcist kind of thing.
Speaker 1: And there are people in this country and in others
Speaker 1: in the area, religiously oriented people, religious scholars and so forth,
Speaker 1: who specialize in helping to exercise demons from afflicted people.
Speaker 1: This gets into the area of psychology, of course, and
Speaker 1: some people. There are cases of people who have gone
Speaker 1: through psychiatric treatment without benefit and then went to a
Speaker 1: religious leader and were exercised and were cured. Of course,
Speaker 1: there are probably many cases where that doesn't happen, but
Speaker 1: there are people will do talk about that. So you
Speaker 1: have possession as one another aspect, and well you have
Speaker 1: a whole lot of things. The origin of gin are
Speaker 1: getting go way back. I mean, this is not something
Speaker 1: that started with Islam, even though the Islamic faith confirmed
Speaker 1: the existence of gen as. The people here would say
Speaker 1: they go back at least as far as the ancient Sumerians,
Speaker 1: and and there were there were a number of Oh,
Speaker 1: I guess they were. One would consider them early deities,
Speaker 1: perhaps nature spirits, wind gods and that sort of thing
Speaker 1: who eventually became gin. And you hear about the the
Speaker 1: demon of the Exorcist the movie and and the book
Speaker 1: was that is thought to be an early gin form.
Speaker 1: He he comes out of the basu uh is comes
Speaker 1: out of the hot desert wind. And that is one
Speaker 1: interpretation of how the gin are born or or created. Generally,
Speaker 1: people here believed that they were they're created from smokeless fire,
Speaker 1: that God originally created them from smokeless fire, like he
Speaker 1: was is supposed to have created man out of clay.
Speaker 1: But they there are some who believe that that the
Speaker 1: that the Gin actually come from hot desert, the scorching
Speaker 1: desert wind. But for the purposes in my book that
Speaker 1: when I call them fire spirits, I'm referring to that origin,
Speaker 1: not that they have any connection with fire. Now, just
Speaker 1: as humans would not be considered to be clay creatures.
Speaker 1: But it simply identifies their origin and the views of
Speaker 1: most people in this part of the world.
Speaker 2: Getting back to you're talking about how it was originally
Speaker 2: associated with the winds and stuff it was. It struck
Speaker 2: me reading the book that in many ways, the gin
Speaker 2: come from a long tradition of blaming sort of the
Speaker 2: supernatural or natural other for bad things that happened. You know,
Speaker 2: you have drop, you have sandstorms, you have bad areas
Speaker 2: or areas where where wise travelers either don't go or
Speaker 2: tread very lightly, and it seems like that the gin
Speaker 2: reside in those places. And so in some ways it
Speaker 2: seems like the gin are used as other monsters are
Speaker 2: throughout the world, as well as sort of a boogeyman,
Speaker 2: you know, watch out, you know, if you if you
Speaker 2: don't stay too far off the path, because you know,
Speaker 2: bad things will happen to you. And you also talk
Speaker 2: for example, about how about how gin are said to
Speaker 2: appear in the form of snakes, and that there's a
Speaker 2: prohibition against killing snakes because well, don't don't kill a
Speaker 2: snake because if it turns out to be a gin,
Speaker 2: you're going to be in bad trouble. So it's sort
Speaker 2: of again sort of the the social control aspect of
Speaker 2: of of gene. Can you can you talk a little
Speaker 2: about that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's this. They can take the form of
Speaker 1: many things. Snakes is one of the most common.
Speaker 5: But uh.
Speaker 1: There the fact that I mean the number of stores
Speaker 1: is uh. In Islamic lore about people who have killed
Speaker 1: snakes and have been punished for it either gone before
Speaker 1: gin courts or or or been put to death or
Speaker 1: by by spirits or there are lots of ways that
Speaker 1: they could take revenge.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: But the idea of in Islam is that if you
Speaker 1: if you have a doubt as to whether a creature
Speaker 1: is is actually a gin. If you if you see
Speaker 1: an animal and you think it perhaps is a gin,
Speaker 1: you use a religious formula. You recite a religious formula
Speaker 1: to determine if that's the case, generally what they call
Speaker 1: the bismela or in the name of God bislaman Rahim,
Speaker 1: in the name of God the compassionate and merciful. If
Speaker 1: you say something like that, and there are a number
Speaker 1: of other formulas, but that's the most common, the gin
Speaker 1: will flee from you and you won't have to worry
Speaker 1: about having to kill them. In the case of a snake,
Speaker 1: it would leave you or even insects in your house
Speaker 1: if if they happen to be jin and you recited
Speaker 1: one of these formulas, then they would leave you.
Speaker 3: Well, that's very similar to the way that Christians often
Speaker 3: deal with demonic forces. Is an incantation of hill Mary,
Speaker 3: that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: Yes, so, and what you were saying about the about
Speaker 1: the forces of nature is actually, I think pretty pretty
Speaker 1: close to the case in some respects. Certainly there are
Speaker 1: all kinds of environmental hazards in this part of the
Speaker 1: world that it can be explained by by the by
Speaker 1: the intervention of supernatural creatures, and I think that's that
Speaker 1: probably is the case, but they're also there are also
Speaker 1: other there are explanations that that are not related to nature,
Speaker 1: and so we have we have all kinds here. The
Speaker 1: animal thing is is interesting. Shape shifting seems to be
Speaker 1: one of the characteristics of the most common characteristics of
Speaker 1: gin and why they would take one shape rather than
Speaker 1: another as hasn't really been well explained to people. But
Speaker 1: you do see them in just about every animal form
Speaker 1: except the wolf, and that is has is kind of mysterious.
Speaker 1: But there there is apparently the gin cannot or will
Speaker 1: not emulate a wolf, for some reason there there is
Speaker 1: a Gin creature in Yemen that does take the form
Speaker 1: of a wolf, and that's the sort of the exception
Speaker 1: that proves the rule. It's something called the Udrut and
Speaker 1: it appears on the scene when someone has been killed
Speaker 1: and there is blood, When there is some sort of
Speaker 1: a violent act and there is a dead person, the
Speaker 1: groot creature as a wolf will come and lurk and
Speaker 1: scare people. But it never does anything. I mean, it
Speaker 1: never attacks anyone. It's just a visible presence. That's the
Speaker 1: only time that I've ever come across Gin in the
Speaker 1: form of wolves, and that's only in Southern Arabia. In
Speaker 1: the other parts of Arabia that they would never the
Speaker 1: Gin would never take the form of a wolf.
Speaker 3: So is the scope culturally? Is the scope of the
Speaker 3: influence of Gin tied to Islamic culture or is it
Speaker 3: tied to North Africa or how do you think that
Speaker 3: plays out? Because I know there's a lot of shape
Speaker 3: shifting beliefs and sort of shamanistic parts of Africa, But
Speaker 3: I don't remember in Southern Africa, for example, hearing about Gin.
Speaker 3: I don't remember coming out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that you do have the Gin in in certain
Speaker 1: parts of Africa, mostly ones where the influence of Islamic
Speaker 1: culture is uh the strong, particular areas where Arab traders
Speaker 1: came through, but and also in Nigeria up up near
Speaker 1: the Sahara where the influence came across the desert from
Speaker 1: the Berbers, the tware Eggs and other nomadic people. But
Speaker 1: North Africa has its own They have its own twist.
Speaker 1: The North Africans have their own twist on on Gin belief.
Speaker 1: Some of it's really interesting, UH that there's the famous
Speaker 1: character of a woman who is like a Lilith figure.
Speaker 1: In the book, we talk about Lilith as being not
Speaker 1: only creature of of Jewish law, an ancient Jewish law,
Speaker 1: but also of of Arabic law and also pre Islamic
Speaker 1: Arabic or because the ancient Babylonians have a Lilith figure,
Speaker 1: which would be a female that seduces men and and
Speaker 1: uh Greek's havoc on on babies and does a number
Speaker 1: of things very anti social things that that result from
Speaker 1: how that that legend developed the the Lilith creature. In fact,
Speaker 1: Lilith is sometimes viewed in the in the Babylonian tradition
Speaker 1: as a vampire, which maybe I mean there are some
Speaker 1: Middle Eastern parallels to to some of our famous Western monsters,
Speaker 1: and that that may be one. But the this Ayisha
Speaker 1: Candisha character in Morocco and Algeria, to a limited extent,
Speaker 1: Tunisia is is a very powerful force. This is like,
Speaker 1: uh it so along the lines of the incubus or succubus.
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly exactly that.
Speaker 1: Seduces men particularly uh well, not just single men, but
Speaker 1: they seem to be particularly often victimized, but also married
Speaker 1: men because the tradition is of course that Lilith or
Speaker 1: Ayisha Kendisha as was, was rebuffed by well left Adam.
Speaker 1: Actually she made the choice to leave Adam because of
Speaker 1: her unwillingness to accept his domination during very sexual relations
Speaker 1: and because she wanted to be on top basically, and
Speaker 1: that that that belief that that she h in leaving
Speaker 1: Adam was filled with rage and and went to the
Speaker 1: Red Sea and made it with a number of demons
Speaker 1: and produced all kinds of evil gin Particularly this character,
Speaker 1: this Lilith character is in North Africa has become is
Speaker 1: named Ayisha Candisha, and she is there's even a band
Speaker 1: that's named after her. It's quite interesting how powerful that
Speaker 1: influence is. You also find character. You also find in
Speaker 1: Tunisia some some strange stuff. Uh. They have Gin of
Speaker 1: of the land, sea and air and and this is
Speaker 1: probably the only place where you'll really see an in
Speaker 1: depth portrayal of Gin as aquatic creatures. They're sort of
Speaker 1: like mirror creatures merman and mermaids. So that's that's really interesting.
Speaker 1: But it comes out of the fact that Tunisian is
Speaker 1: as strong merchant tradition, and there's the sight of ancient
Speaker 1: Carthage and so forth, and that belief goes back at
Speaker 1: least as far as the Carthaginians.
Speaker 2: Mentioned the historical character Willith. If I'm not mistaken, King
Speaker 2: Solomon is also supposed to have a connection to Gin.
Speaker 2: Can you talk about that.
Speaker 1: Yes, King King Solomon. It's funny this time of year
Speaker 1: in Saudi Arabia, when you're walking in an area where
Speaker 1: there are trees and some grass, you'll often see a
Speaker 1: bird called the hoopo. It's a rather colorful but it's
Speaker 1: it's a light brown bird with black stripes on it
Speaker 1: and a tuft on its head, and it's really a
Speaker 1: striking looking bird. You see a lot of them this
Speaker 1: time of year. And this was a bird that is
Speaker 1: very famous uh in ancient lore in Arabic, it's called
Speaker 1: the hood hood Hud Hud and this, and it's also
Speaker 1: very important in Jewish law. And the Hoopo brought to
Speaker 1: King Solomon and Jerusalem word of the Queen of Sheba
Speaker 1: the first time he ever heard of her. Now, Sheba
Speaker 1: is supposed to be Asian Saba, which is down in
Speaker 1: the corner of Arabia and Yemen, and she is supposed
Speaker 1: to be half Gin. I'm trying to think now whether
Speaker 1: it was her mother or father, but I don't know
Speaker 1: which one. Uh was supposed to be of Gin origin
Speaker 1: and Uh, the Hoopo told Solomon, because Solomon had the
Speaker 1: the ability from God to communicate with animals, and Gin
Speaker 1: told Solomon that this beautiful queen was was down in
Speaker 1: uh Saba and that that he really ought to check
Speaker 1: her out. So he invited her to come up to Jerusalem.
Speaker 1: And then you know, the rich lore of Solomon and
Speaker 1: Sheba followed out of that. In fact, he even at
Speaker 1: one point wanted to find out whether she had Gin characteristics.
Speaker 1: And Solomon is said to her have created a fake
Speaker 1: pond in one of his palaces a pond that looked
Speaker 1: like water but was actually glass, and invited the Queen
Speaker 1: of Shebos, she was known an Arabic tradition as Bill
Speaker 1: Tice asked her to walk across it. It was very shallow,
Speaker 1: of course, it seemed, and she did, and she lifted
Speaker 1: her skirts, and he wanted to catch a look at
Speaker 1: her legs to see if she could possibly be a gin.
Speaker 1: Based on her legs, some people said that they had
Speaker 1: hairy legs or even goat feet. These beliefs, of course,
Speaker 1: they vary depending on where the story comes from, but
Speaker 1: there is the outcome of that particular incident has been
Speaker 1: kept secret from all of us, so we don't know
Speaker 1: exactly what Solomon saw. But Solomon he did have the
Speaker 1: ability to control the Gin based on a ring that
Speaker 1: God gave him, This magic ring which had the seal
Speaker 1: of Solomon on it, which is essentially the star of David.
Speaker 1: This ring has been lost to history if it ever existed,
Speaker 1: but it was said to have the power to make
Speaker 1: evil Gin do his bidding, and they in effect became
Speaker 1: his servants and built a number of palaces and castles
Speaker 1: throughout the Middle East on Solomon's behalf. There are a
Speaker 1: number of other stories that talk about these gin when
Speaker 1: they have some of them got free, and you know
Speaker 1: what happened, what happened there there. There's some good stories
Speaker 1: in the Arabian Nights in relation to this. Some of
Speaker 1: them are tied in with some very old history from
Speaker 1: al Adolis or Islamic Spain, in connection with something called
Speaker 1: the city of Brass. There was said to be in
Speaker 1: the Sahara as somewhere as city built of brass, and
Speaker 1: one of the governors of Aldolous, at the request of
Speaker 1: the Caliph in Damascus, went on an expedition into the
Speaker 1: desert to find the city, and in the process he
Speaker 1: found the city. But he also found somewhere near the
Speaker 1: sea a collection of sometimes described as casks, sometimes as
Speaker 1: other types of containers that were in the that were
Speaker 1: at the bottom of the sea, and they were said
Speaker 1: to contain gin. And he had them brought out by
Speaker 1: by divers and placed on the shore and opened, and
Speaker 1: as he opened them, the the gin who were in
Speaker 1: the these casts flew out rapidly into the sky and
Speaker 1: expressed great fear of Solomon. They thought Solomon was still alive,
Speaker 1: and they fled from him because he had put them
Speaker 1: in these boxes many many years ago, according to tradition.
Speaker 3: Would you say that fear of Solomon is their generic response.
Speaker 1: Yes, they are definitely generically frightened by Solomon. He was
Speaker 1: the guy with the power, and that's why there have
Speaker 1: been some people who have looked for that ring of
Speaker 1: power that he had and tried to figure out where
Speaker 1: it could have been. Of course, that assumes that the
Speaker 1: story is true. But all we know is that it's
Speaker 1: a great story. And there are a number of castles
Speaker 1: and structures various parts in the Middle East, and this
Speaker 1: one that I mentioned in the Sahara was supposed to
Speaker 1: have been built by Solomon too, with Gin laborers. The
Speaker 1: story of Solomon is grander than the reality, obviously, and
Speaker 1: his the extent of his empire was was immense according
Speaker 1: to the ancient belief. This is the same as Alexander
Speaker 1: the Great, of course, who was was dramatized even more.
Speaker 1: I think in the romances of Alexander the Great. I
Speaker 1: don't have any good, good jin stories about.
Speaker 3: Well, there's a lot of stories about them doing miraculous things,
Speaker 3: but then there's the more sinister side about abduction. So
Speaker 3: why do you think they're reported to abduct children. What
Speaker 3: is that all about.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know what it's about. I
Speaker 1: think it's basically it's it's an explanation, you know, for
Speaker 1: for for having a child that it doesn't appear to
Speaker 1: be the child of the of the parents. It's it's
Speaker 1: one way change. It's the changeling and uh, you know
Speaker 1: you see that sometimes and who else could have taken
Speaker 1: the child? But but the Gin and substituted one of
Speaker 1: their own, who is obviously not from our family. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know really, But there are abductions of adults
Speaker 1: as well that take place. In some cases people that
Speaker 1: lived many years with the Gin, some of them eventually escaped.
Speaker 1: There was I remember reading one there's a story in
Speaker 1: the book about this. There's one one guy who was
Speaker 1: I think he spent seven years with the Gin and
Speaker 1: he finally escaped when he came across some roue, which
Speaker 1: is a plant that the Gin hate, and was told
Speaker 1: to stay away from it, that they hated it, and
Speaker 1: because they had him, he was out and in and
Speaker 1: the wilderness with the Gin, and they by by running
Speaker 1: toward that rue and grabbing it and holding it to himself,
Speaker 1: he managed to frighten the generally, so he was able
Speaker 1: to go home to his family. But there are cases
Speaker 1: where you know, people are captured by them and I
Speaker 1: guess enslaved by them. But that any kind of story
Speaker 1: you can imagine probably has been told somewhere in the
Speaker 1: Middle East about the Gin. I think they they cover
Speaker 1: a multitude of sins. I was going to ask.
Speaker 2: One thing that intrigued me about about the book and
Speaker 2: your discussion of Gin was that is that they not
Speaker 2: only can they take basically any form they want, primarily
Speaker 2: of course animals, but of course they can look exactly
Speaker 2: like us and so and you know, in your book
Speaker 2: talks about people who believe or sort of suspect that
Speaker 2: they may have encountered Gin previously, people either who either
Speaker 2: did bad things to them or did good things to
Speaker 2: them in a couple of cases do favors for them.
Speaker 2: So how assuming that gen exists, and that that's a
Speaker 2: big assumption, assuming they exist, how would we how would
Speaker 2: we know who's the who's the Gin and who's not?
Speaker 2: I mean, if if they can act like us, if
Speaker 2: they can get married, if they have kids, if they
Speaker 2: have you know, jobs and religions and faith and if
Speaker 2: if in just about every other way they can be
Speaker 2: exactly identical to us, are doppelgangers, how do we tell
Speaker 2: how do we tell them?
Speaker 1: Apart we can't that they they can duplicate people and
Speaker 1: and act just like them. And there if they're not
Speaker 1: doing it for evil purposes, there's no way you can
Speaker 1: tell if they are doing it for evil purposes. You
Speaker 1: can use religion two to expose them because they're they're
Speaker 1: they're the evil gen fear the word of God according
Speaker 1: to tradition, and you can use the uh, the formulas
Speaker 1: to to sort of like garlic, you know, to bring
Speaker 1: them out as as as you might with the vampire.
Speaker 1: I think there are probably cases, and you read about
Speaker 1: them in lore of you know, people who were who
Speaker 1: are gin and go many years without being detected. But
Speaker 1: generally something they either they slip up or or in
Speaker 1: the cases where or they are somehow detected. But you know, generally, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, they can do it for quite some time
Speaker 1: and you wouldn't know. And then you see examples of
Speaker 1: modern examples of this in the book where there's a
Speaker 1: girl of Bangladeshi girl who is talking about a girlfriend
Speaker 1: or hers who that she's convinced is ginya or female gin,
Speaker 1: But there are and she didn't realize that at first.
Speaker 1: But you know, people then they conclude, after seeing certain
Speaker 1: behaviors that that these people are gin.
Speaker 2: So so often sort of a retrospective diagnosis.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, well it's an explanation, you know, how do
Speaker 1: you explain some bizarre behavior or how do you explain anything?
Speaker 1: Will you draw up on your traditions? And that's where
Speaker 1: the gin come in, And they're I'm trying to think
Speaker 1: of some interesting examples of that for you.
Speaker 3: But I well, they can read the book, right.
Speaker 1: I think that's what it's for me. Basically, I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to persuade anyone of anything in this book. I
Speaker 1: really I just want to open them up to the
Speaker 1: to the tradition and let people look at it and
Speaker 1: enjoy it, because I think there's some interesting and amusing
Speaker 1: and scary stuff to be learned from it.
Speaker 3: Well, and for a lot of us, even people who
Speaker 3: read up on monsters in this supernatural a lot the
Speaker 3: just because we live in the Western nis world, we
Speaker 3: aren't able to be exposed so easily to some of
Speaker 3: the folklore and cultures from other parts of the world.
Speaker 3: So This is a great thing for you to put
Speaker 3: that out.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I want to do some more writing on the
Speaker 1: connections between our traditions and the people here in the
Speaker 1: Middle East, because I've found some interesting connections of some
Speaker 1: of our monsters from the European tradition. And i was
Speaker 1: just doing some study of one of the monsters that's
Speaker 1: well known in the West, even though it isn't European phenomenon.
Speaker 1: That's the zombie, it is very popular today. Originally comes
Speaker 1: out of a Haitian tradition, and before Haiti came out
Speaker 1: of Sub Saharan Africa. But the zombie as we see
Speaker 1: it today in modern folklore, which you'd have to say
Speaker 1: includes some motion pictures, is quite different from the zombie
Speaker 1: of Haiti or New Orleans. Even the zombie that we
Speaker 1: see in George Romero is the Knight of the living Dead,
Speaker 1: is actually bloodthirsty, flesh eating creature. And I've seen a recent,
Speaker 1: fairly recent study of George Romero's work, and he's a
Speaker 1: real pioneer in the modern zombie. It says that he
Speaker 1: actually borrowed that concept from the Middle East from the
Speaker 1: ghoul is a very is a flesh eating monster. It's a.
Speaker 1: It's a Gin origin and it's when you think about it,
Speaker 1: it ties in very well with a Knight of the
Speaker 1: Living Dead.
Speaker 3: And my next question is going to be you cover
Speaker 3: gouls quite a lot. What is the relationship between the
Speaker 3: ghoul and the gin.
Speaker 1: Well, it's kind of a specialized gin. It's an evil one.
Speaker 1: It's that it doesn't fit into the major categories when
Speaker 1: I said the sheik Tan and the Afrite and the Mayri,
Speaker 1: that's it doesn't fit into those or into the run
Speaker 1: of the mill gin, which would be either just the
Speaker 1: gin as we know it, or the jan which is
Speaker 1: the collective of all these creatures. They call them jan
Speaker 1: j n n. But the ghul Is is a particularly
Speaker 1: frightening example. It's almost universally believed to be a gin. However,
Speaker 1: I'm sure there are some you'll find some people say no, no,
Speaker 1: it isn't. But it is a monster that is said
Speaker 1: to inhabit caves and remote places that will trick you.
Speaker 1: Often it's it's a female, often called the gula, and
Speaker 1: the Gula will will first present itself as being very
Speaker 1: beautiful and then suddenly reveal it's it's It's a frightening
Speaker 1: appearance it's it's a large, hairy, ugly beast and and
Speaker 1: it loves to eat human flesh. And there's some wonderful
Speaker 1: stories out of Yemen on this. There was a guy,
Speaker 1: King Safe, who's one of the kings of Yemen, who
Speaker 1: ends up going to He gets an effect dropped into
Speaker 1: a valley of the Ghules and it's kind of is
Speaker 1: stuck there and trying to figure out how to survive
Speaker 1: because he knows that this valley in Yemen is filled
Speaker 1: with these evil ghouls. So he goes up into a
Speaker 1: tree and to spend the night, and when he wakes
Speaker 1: up in the morning, there's all the tree is surrounded
Speaker 1: by these monsters that just want to eat him, and
Speaker 1: they can they can smell him like Jack and the
Speaker 1: beanstalk Giant, you know Feefi Foe from They know they
Speaker 1: can smell human flesh and human blood, and they were
Speaker 1: around the tree ready to chomp on him. He eventually
Speaker 1: gets out of this by cutting a deal with the
Speaker 1: queen of the Ghules, and it's a long story, but
Speaker 1: he's a hero, so he gets to escape. But these
Speaker 1: kind of things, the Ghules are, those legends still exist
Speaker 1: in Egypt. They're very popular in Egypt. I haven't heard
Speaker 1: a lot of that in Saudi Arabia, but as I said,
Speaker 1: Yemen is rich territory for the ghoul as well.
Speaker 3: Well do you do you do? You do you read
Speaker 3: HP Lovecraft or Roberty Howard? Sure, yeah, I was gonna
Speaker 3: say it's interesting how especially Howard's work ties in the
Speaker 3: sort of Arabic gin and the sort of take on
Speaker 3: the Celtic little people and Arthur Makin's take on the
Speaker 3: little people as not something that's just a fairy tale,
Speaker 3: but something that's really horrible and frightening. So this looks
Speaker 3: Captain Howard sort of form that nexus within fiction of
Speaker 3: tying that folklore together really neatly.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I agree, it's very very interesting, and a
Speaker 1: lot of this stuff that comes out of the Middle
Speaker 1: East has been integrated into into Western literature, and I
Speaker 1: think that's well, that's one of the reasons I got
Speaker 1: interested in it. I came into it sort of to
Speaker 1: the back door and then realized, oh, this is the
Speaker 1: Middle East. I mean, they're all talking about this area
Speaker 1: where I live, and I was happy to be able
Speaker 1: to do the research to find out more about this,
Speaker 1: and I this is something that I think people around
Speaker 1: the world can enjoy, particularly as literature. I mean, there's
Speaker 1: a there's a lot of really interesting general related tales
Speaker 1: that the people can can I can grab onto if
Speaker 1: they are of a mind to. It's if you're if
Speaker 1: you're tired of the old monsters, try some of these
Speaker 1: that are even older. But they look a little newer
Speaker 1: because you haven't you haven't seen them much.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're there. There's sort of a new a new variation,
Speaker 2: new twist on a lot of a lot of what
Speaker 2: people think. That's That's one of the things that I
Speaker 2: was that surprised me, frankly about your book was that,
Speaker 2: you know, I knew it was about you know, genies
Speaker 2: and Gin, but then all of a sudden, we're talking
Speaker 2: about ghouls, and I'm talking about you know, urban legends,
Speaker 2: we're talking about suck you Bay and and it was
Speaker 2: interesting to sort of see how how there's all these
Speaker 2: these tangential monsters and creatures that are actually actually you know,
Speaker 2: trace their roots back to Gin and certainly have common
Speaker 2: common roots. Let me ask about you talked about one
Speaker 2: very one version of it, uh in seducing men, So
Speaker 2: people believe that you can have sex with Gin well,
Speaker 2: what do what did the the gen experts say? I mean,
Speaker 2: is it the other There are people.
Speaker 1: Who there's a lot of dispute over that that it
Speaker 1: is not. It's not one hundred percent. If you ask
Speaker 1: an Islamic scholar, you could come up with one one
Speaker 1: answer or the other. There are a number of them
Speaker 1: who say, oh, yes, it's it's purely normal and natural
Speaker 1: for these two different species two to have relations sexual relations.
Speaker 1: Others will say, no, it's impossible, and and I think
Speaker 1: I referred to both of these traditions, but there the
Speaker 1: more interesting one is where where the two species can
Speaker 1: interact in that way, And there's I think that I
Speaker 1: think on the popular level it's it's more it's more
Speaker 1: accepted than than the one that says that they can't
Speaker 1: have relations. Uh, it's accepted because it's it's more interesting,
Speaker 1: it's more tantalizing. And also some of it ties in
Speaker 1: with these I don't know, there's there's an awful lot
Speaker 1: of heavy symbolism involved in all of this stuff. That's
Speaker 1: the gin stuff. And one of the things I'm thinking
Speaker 1: of an example would be the Palestinians. The Palestinians who
Speaker 1: have have had had relations with Gin that who were
Speaker 1: Jewish Gin had sexual relations with them. So, I mean
Speaker 1: it's kind of a I mean, it's sort of like
Speaker 1: trying to solve the Middle East conflict through bizarre monster.
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's kind of really unusual, but there.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you read up on in the ps
Speaker 1: psychiatric literature in Israel, there's a lot on this there.
Speaker 1: Israeli psychologists and psychiatrists have taken great interest in the
Speaker 1: in the belief in in the Gin and and there
Speaker 1: and the connections with the political situation. And generally it's
Speaker 1: the Palestinians who were the ones who were most affected
Speaker 1: by the gin phenomenon there. Most of the Israelis are
Speaker 1: pretty westernized or modern in their perspective.
Speaker 3: As Islam has spread, have the Gin spread as well?
Speaker 3: I mean it's like is American people, Uh, would would
Speaker 3: they expect American Islamic people? Would they expect to see
Speaker 3: a gin instead of a ghost in the house? Is
Speaker 3: that you know what I mean? I mean, as a floor,
Speaker 3: it's carried over.
Speaker 1: It carries over. And there are cases of gin possession
Speaker 1: and gin activity in the States. They've been I've been
Speaker 1: collecting this kind of lore for a long time and
Speaker 1: only could put a fraction of in this book. But
Speaker 1: there are a lot of news stories. You'd be surprised
Speaker 1: how many times did GIN pop up in places where
Speaker 1: they're not expected. One of them is in the United
Speaker 1: States and it's been involved in Jin belief was tied
Speaker 1: in with with the the terrorism issue. There there were
Speaker 1: cases of people who are associated with terrorist groups who
Speaker 1: were believers in GIN, and I think you saw some
Speaker 1: of that in Iraq as well. There were people who
Speaker 1: were saying that Saddam Hussein and made a pact with
Speaker 1: the GIN. It looks like they didn't keep their side
Speaker 1: of the bargain.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was gonna ask about that because I earlier
Speaker 2: this year there was actually a story that came out
Speaker 2: that ad ran his foes and and I think people
Speaker 2: in his cabinet were accused of using GIN and using
Speaker 2: for their own purposes. So it's fascinating to me again
Speaker 2: to sort of see the way that this ancient tradition
Speaker 2: can be sort of rebottled and respun and used for
Speaker 2: for political purposes and you know, just dust it off.
Speaker 2: Do you think that's going to continue or what? Do
Speaker 2: you Why is that such an effective If it isn't
Speaker 2: if I don't want to put words in your mouth,
Speaker 2: Do you think that is an effective strategy?
Speaker 1: And if so, why, well, I don't. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's it gets as far as as it as it
Speaker 1: might have been the old days. I know that that
Speaker 1: issue did come up, but I think it also died
Speaker 1: down pretty fast. So I don't think it was as
Speaker 1: effective a tool, particularly in those among those people who
Speaker 1: are not extremely traditional. Now you have someone like madinajad Is,
Speaker 1: but he's a mixture, you know, and he comes out
Speaker 1: of a tradition that's very, very supportive of the GIN.
Speaker 1: But at the same time he's he's tried to distance
Speaker 1: himself from some of the religious leaders who support that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. So I don't know. I don't. I
Speaker 1: think you're going to see more of it in particularly
Speaker 1: in developing countries, more GIN references as as political excuses,
Speaker 1: you'll see. I think we've seen that in We've seen
Speaker 1: it in certain countries in Africa. I think we saw
Speaker 1: it in Afghanistan, and but this is uh. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's something that's that's on the rise,
Speaker 1: because the belief in the GIN, I don't think is
Speaker 1: necessarily on the rise. I think it's reached a sort
Speaker 1: of a stabilized level, and if anything, will be declining
Speaker 1: as time goes on.
Speaker 3: So how would when distinguished a gin from some other
Speaker 3: supernatural entity? What what kind of powers did they have
Speaker 3: of that make them unique?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 1: Different gin have different powers. They have the power to
Speaker 1: enter a human body, which is one thing. They have
Speaker 1: the power to fly. Many gin have been known to
Speaker 1: fly great distances and very very short amount of time.
Speaker 1: And and this is Solomon and others used to use
Speaker 1: this ability to for reconnaissance that they would find out
Speaker 1: about what was going on in a neighboring country by
Speaker 1: sending gin off. There are depends on again on the
Speaker 1: on what type of gin there are. Some of them
Speaker 1: have the ability to two to speak through human beings
Speaker 1: when they when they possess they can take over the
Speaker 1: In addition to controlling the they control the body and
Speaker 1: the mind, apparently because they're able to speak through the
Speaker 1: person and say what they want to be said. I think.
Speaker 1: And then you've got gin that are just they're just
Speaker 1: living their lives and they're not trying to perform tricks
Speaker 1: or exert powers over people. I've talked to people who've
Speaker 1: actually said they were Gin. You can never these are
Speaker 1: actually remote contexts by email and then have no validity scientifically.
Speaker 1: But people who who are actually Saudi and said they
Speaker 1: were Gin and described in great detail the kinds of
Speaker 1: lives they led and where they came from, where they
Speaker 1: went to school, and what their tribe was like.
Speaker 3: Did you notice which internet service provider at the GIN prefers.
Speaker 1: I think they're wherever there is email, there are GEN.
Speaker 3: I know that in at least in Western culture. The
Speaker 3: Gin are really famous for having these really tricky contracts,
Speaker 3: like in order to get them to do something for you, you
Speaker 3: have to be very specific in how you word it,
Speaker 3: and that sort of conflict between that kind of contract
Speaker 3: mind and the people who do internet service providers contracts.
Speaker 3: Oh clever, it could be really, it could be tight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I really could. But I for the most part,
Speaker 1: Gin are not going to do you any favors. You
Speaker 1: can count on that, and if they're forced to, they will,
Speaker 1: But you're going to have to find a way to
Speaker 1: compel them. And that's that's where the problem lies.
Speaker 2: That's let me ask you about that, because the first
Speaker 2: time that I really investigated GIN was in Africa in
Speaker 2: two thousand and seven when I was in Zanzibar, off
Speaker 2: the coast of Tanzania, and I was looking into a
Speaker 2: mysterious creature called the Bawa, which is the means bat
Speaker 2: wing or batfoot, and it's this sort of combination of
Speaker 2: gin go most vampire creature. And I interviewed locals about
Speaker 2: the monster, and some some people believed a lot of
Speaker 2: them didn't believe in it at all. They just thought
Speaker 2: it was just sort of a piece of folklore, but
Speaker 2: many of them did. And what really interested me was
Speaker 2: that when I asked them, well, where what do you
Speaker 2: think the nature of this creature is? Oftentimes the explanation
Speaker 2: was that it was a gin. It was not only
Speaker 2: was a gin, but it was basically a gin that
Speaker 2: had escaped its master. Uh. And I was told that
Speaker 2: there were for lack of better word, wizards or witch
Speaker 2: doctors who lived near Zanzibar, maybe in Pemba or in
Speaker 2: the Comoros islands that that could control gin. And and
Speaker 2: you talked a little bit about that with like the
Speaker 2: Seal of Solomon. But I guess I have two questions.
Speaker 2: One is, how would a modern day wizard either capture
Speaker 2: and or control a gin? And number two, how do
Speaker 2: modern Muslim sort of reconcile the belief? And again you
Speaker 2: sort of touched on this earlier, but you know, how
Speaker 2: how did they go about their daily lives thinking that
Speaker 2: there is, you know, an evil gin that's doing bad
Speaker 2: things in their midst.
Speaker 1: Well, the wizards use spells, and there are spell books,
Speaker 1: medieval spell books that teach you how to how to
Speaker 1: do this sort of thing, how to control the gin.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen any of these. I've just read about them.
Speaker 1: I did have an offer to see a translation of
Speaker 1: one at one time from a Pakistani graduate student who
Speaker 1: said he was going to try out some of these spells. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: he had a very bad experience and only shared a
Speaker 1: little bit of it, but he insisted that it worked
Speaker 1: and that it left his apartment scorched black on the walls,
Speaker 1: and that he never wanted to do this again. So
Speaker 1: I don't, I haven't. This is not an area where,
Speaker 1: particularly in Saudi Arabia, you don't get into this sort
Speaker 1: of thing in any great detail. It's it's considered black magic,
Speaker 1: or what they call the condemned system sorcery is uh
Speaker 1: is not legal in Saudi Arabia. However, there are people
Speaker 1: around the Islamic world who practices and we all know
Speaker 1: that that's the case, and they use spells, and I
Speaker 1: would venture to say that most of them are very
Speaker 1: ancient Arabic groomoires basically, and these books are out there,
Speaker 1: some of them are are accessible. Whether they work or not,
Speaker 1: I can't say.
Speaker 2: Well, put.
Speaker 3: So we have to ask every everybody who comes on
Speaker 3: our show, we try to ask them what is your
Speaker 3: favorite monster?
Speaker 1: My favorite monster? M hm. I would have to say
Speaker 1: Pazuz the demon. I would say he's the best.
Speaker 3: That's a good one. A lot of people like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, simply because I really enjoyed The Exorcist and I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that it actually had an actual basis and
Speaker 1: one of the Middle Eastern demons.
Speaker 3: So it's a film that turned a lot of heads.
Speaker 1: And I've spent a lot of time in Georgetown where
Speaker 1: they did some of that shooting, the video, the filming
Speaker 1: of that movie.
Speaker 3: So yeah, my niece is at Georgetown now, so I
Speaker 3: want to I want to go visit at some point
Speaker 3: and get a picture of the staircase.
Speaker 1: So you have to have to go it.
Speaker 4: Will well.
Speaker 3: I want to say, Robert, thank you so much for
Speaker 3: being on the show. Your book's very interesting and we'll
Speaker 3: put a link to it in our show notes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's a really fine piece of work, and
Speaker 2: I meaning I would consider essentially the definitive book on Gin.
Speaker 2: I mean, I know there are others out there, but
Speaker 2: this is certainly the most recent and I think the
Speaker 2: most thorough and it just does a does a great job.
Speaker 1: So good job on it, Thank you. I point out
Speaker 1: one thing but before we go, this being the end
Speaker 1: of Ramadan. During the month of Ramadan, the Gin are
Speaker 1: imprisoned by God and they're all chained and they can't
Speaker 1: do all the evil that they normally do. This is
Speaker 1: God's way of giving cutting a break for mankind. But
Speaker 1: Ramadan's over, so they're on the loose again. Better be careful.
Speaker 3: At least you can have something to eat while you
Speaker 3: ponder how to handle that.
Speaker 1: Right. I can't wait.
Speaker 3: Thanks a lot, Thank you very much, Monster. Thanks for
Speaker 3: listening to another episode of Monster Talk. You've been listening
Speaker 3: to Blake Smith and Ben Radford interview author Robert Lebling
Speaker 3: about his book Legends of the Fire Spirits, which is
Speaker 3: all about the Arabic tales of Jen, Jeanie and Ghoules.
Speaker 3: A link to his book is in the show notes.
Speaker 3: If you've enjoyed Monster Talk, I hope you'll consider donating
Speaker 3: a buck or two to our transcription project. Thanks to
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Speaker 3: Brian Beeden, John Saint Clair, Shane Brady, and David Rodriguez,
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Speaker 3: so far. Having the transcripts helps in several ways. It
Speaker 3: helps Google searchers find us, it helps people reference our
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Speaker 3: It makes sense that they would be communicating with telephones
Speaker 3: because they could be locked in with Solomon's ring tone, a.
Speaker 1: That would have tremendous power if we could think we
Speaker 1: could duplicate Solomon's ringtones.
Speaker 3: I'll promise Ben, I'll take these jokes out and post