Nasnas

InArab folklore,Nasnas(Arabic:نسناس,romanized:nasnās,pluralnisānis) is a monstrous creature. According toEdward Lane,the 19th-century translator ofOne Thousand and One Nights,a nasnas is "half a human being; having half a head, half a body, one arm, one leg, with which it hops with much agility".

In Somali folklore there is a similar creature calledxunguruuf(Somali pronunciation:[ħunguruːf]). It is believed it can kill a person by just touching them and the person would be fleshless in mere seconds.

It was believed to be the offspring of ajinncalled aShiqq(الشق) and a human being.

Although the Nasnas have not been found in anySunni interpretationof the Quran, they are sometimes mentioned inShia sources.^[1]The mentioning of the Nasnas revolves around Surah 2:30 when God announces to the angels to create humans as a successor on earth.

Accordingly, while the angels lived in heaven, the Jinn and the Nasnas lived on earth. After 70.000 years, God lifted the veil between heaven and earth, and the angels saw the injustice and bloodshed done by Jinn and Nasnas. The angels complained that such destruction could not be tolerated on God's creation, whereupon God decides to replace them.^[2]Although similar stories exist in Sunni sources, they do not mention the Nasnas, but only Jinn.

The Nasnas in Shia sources are often portrayed as a prototype of Shia opponents, while the jinn are believed to be obedient to the Imams.^[3]

A character in "The Story of the Sage and the Scholar", a tale from the collection, is turned into a nasnas after a magician applieskohlto one of his eyes. The nasnas is mentioned inGustave Flaubert'sThe Temptation of Saint Anthony.

Sources[edit]

Robert IrwinThe Arabian Nights: a Companion(Penguin, 1994)
Jorge Luis BorgesThe Book of Imaginary Beasts(Penguin, 1974)

References[edit]

^Vilozny, Roy. "Between Myth-Making and Shiite Exegesis: Nasnās and Qurʾān 2: 30." Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 6.3 (2018): p. 297
^Vilozny, Roy. "Between Myth-Making and Shiite Exegesis: Nasnās and Qurʾān 2: 30." Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 6.3 (2018): 291
^Vilozny, Roy. "Between Myth-Making and Shiite Exegesis: Nasnās and Qurʾān 2: 30." Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 6.3 (2018): 290

[1] Vilozny, Roy. "Between Myth-Making and Shiite Exegesis: Nasnās and Qurʾān 2: 30." Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 6.3 (2018): p. 297

[2] Vilozny, Roy. "Between Myth-Making and Shiite Exegesis: Nasnās and Qurʾān 2: 30." Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 6.3 (2018): 291

[3] Vilozny, Roy. "Between Myth-Making and Shiite Exegesis: Nasnās and Qurʾān 2: 30." Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 6.3 (2018): 290

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