Experience vs. Explanation: Jinn and Demons in Islam and the Desert Fathers as a Case Study in Spirituality

The discipline of spirituality can be described as the study of human experience of encounter with the transcendent and our lived response to that encounter. There are commonalities to our experience of transcendence that cross the divides of culture and language, commonalities which are often obscured when we theologize about our experience. If we examine the concept of jinn, both among pre-Islamic peoples and in the Qur’an and Hadith and compare this to the demons described in The Life of Antony and The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, we see remarkable similarities. These similarities give evidence that the beliefs in jinn in early Islam and in demons among the Desert Fathers are grounded in a common desert experience. As the centers of theological activity move away from the desert, we find this experience explained by Christianity and Islam in diverse ways. The contrast between descriptive narrative and the subsequent theologizing exemplifies a movement from common spiritual experience to differing theological interpretation.