Note 21 — Chapter IV · The Malay Pantheon
Reading edition
The following account of Genii (printed in the Selangor Journal, vol. i. No. 7, p. 102) was given me by a Mecca pilgrim or “Haji.” This man was a native of Java who had spent several years in the Malay Peninsula, and as Mecca is the goal of the pilgrimage to all good Muhammadans alike, it is important to know something of the ideas which are there disseminated, and with which the Malay pilgrim would be likely to come in contact. “In the unseen world the place of first importance must be accorded, on account of their immense numbers, to the ‘Jins’ (the ‘Genii’ of the Arabian Nights).”
“The Javanese, drawing a slightly stronger line of distinction (than that of good and bad genii in the Arabian Nights), call these two (separate) classes the Jin Islam and the Jin Kafir, or the Faithful and the Infidel. Of these two classes, the former shrink from whatever is unclean, and the latter only will approach the Chinese, to whom the Jin Islam manifests the strongest repugnance. The good genii are perfectly formed in the fashion of a man, but are, of course, impalpable as air, though they have a voice like mortals. They live in a mosque of their own, which they never leave, and where they offer up unceasing prayers. This mosque is built of stone, and stands beside a lake called ‘Kolam Yamani’; into this lake the whole of the waters from the neighbouring country drain, and the overflow runs down to the sea. In this lake the good genii bathe, and if any wicked or childless mortals bathe in it they carry them off and detain them in the mosque until they (the mortals) have shown proof of their reformed character by continuing for a long while without committing a wrong action, when they are sent back in safety to their native land. I should add that the Jin Islam exact tribute from the unfaithful—e.g. Chinamen—and if they do not receive their due, they will steal it and give it to a son of Islam. [They may be bought from the “Sheikh Jin” at Mecca for prices varying from $90 to $100 each.]
“The Jin Kafir, or bad genii, are invariably deformed, their heads being always out of their proper position; in short, they are Othello’s