# What is the 'jinn of the gaps'?

*A catalogue of disorders once unexplained, and the 'jinn of the gaps'*

- URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/13/
- Date: 2018-04-15 · Kind: lesson · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Jinn: Myth and Reality in Islam by Mufti Abu Layth (48:28–55:02)
- Status: general teaching
- Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeXzvtf9YGA&t=2908s
- Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/

**Topics:** Jinn possession; Science, the universe and big questions; Reason and revelation

**Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** It is Mufti Abu Layth's name for blaming the jinn for anything not yet understood, as atheists accuse believers of a god of the gaps. He lists conditions such as Capgras delusion, hemispatial neglect, aphantasia and foreign accent syndrome that have or will have natural explanations but would once have been called possession.

**Checked position (checked by two independent reviews, not by the channel):** Mufti Abu Layth holds that attributing whatever cannot yet be explained to the jinn is a 'jinn of the gaps' argument, as weak as the god of the gaps that atheists criticise, and that not knowing an answer does not mean it cannot be known.

**Evidence, his words at 54:41:** “this is like the Djinn of the gaps like the moment we don't know anything it's the Djinn” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeXzvtf9YGA&t=3281s)

## Longer summary

Mufti Abu Layth runs through conditions that would have baffled people in the past. Prosopagnosia, where a person recognises a voice but cannot recognise a face, which after a stroke might once have been blamed on magic or possession. Mirror-touch synaesthesia, where one feels the touch or pain one sees another receive. Phantom limbs, where an amputated arm still hurts. Alien hand syndrome, where a limb seems possessed and acts involuntarily, which he says a one-size-fits-all view would simply credit to the jinn. The Capgras delusion, found in paranoid schizophrenia or after brain injury, where a loved one is believed with total certainty to have been replaced by an impostor. Hemispatial neglect after a stroke, where half the world is not processed, so patients eat half the plate or draw a clock with only the numbers twelve to six. Aphantasia, as in a sixty-five-year-old who after angioplasty lost all ability to picture things in his mind. Exploding head syndrome, a loud bang heard inside the head with no harm. Foreign accent syndrome, where after an incident a person wakes speaking with a Chinese, French or southern accent, which neurologists still cannot explain. He says not knowing an answer does not mean it cannot be known: atheists accuse believers of a god of the gaps, and this is the jinn of the gaps, where whatever we cannot explain must be the jinn.

## Sources and names cited

- prosopagnosia (face blindness)
- Capgras delusion
- hemispatial neglect
- aphantasia
- foreign accent syndrome
- god of the gaps (and the 'jinn of the gaps')

## Transcript (machine tier, 48:28–55:02)

[48:13] health sometimes and they say maybe two to two-and-a-half percent of people in the world are born with it it is an inability to distinguish between faces so there's a section in what we said the fusiform gyrus which is known as the FFA the facial fusiform area which humans used to distinguish between faces why does your face not look like his face not look like like if you think about like if you look at a crawl right a crawl all their faces all look the same to us but to the crows they I'm sure they can distinguish so how do humans distinguish

[48:49] between human faces like we use this area in the brain now there is a disorder known as prosopagnosia where you can't tell the difference like if I hear your voice I would say oh my god that's you but when I look at you I can't I think I just can't recognize your face like I can see your face but I can't recognize it now that is and when that happens it happens later on in like let's say with a stroke or something and you can imagine the whole crowmon how would people in the past say say well maybe magic has been done on to you maybe you've had the you know some something has possessed you there's

[49:29] something known as mirror-touch synesthesia now this is where you can actually feel what somebody else that you're looking at may be feeling so if right now let's say somebody hugged somebody else and if you have suffered from mirror-touch synesthesia you would actually feel being hugged you would actually sometimes feel pain like if I saw somebody getting hurt I would feel that pain under this you can google phantom limbs sometimes people have lost

[50:08] their limbs and yet they can still like they've been amputated in an accident or something and they can still so they've lost their arm but they can still feel the pain in their arm there is huge Studies on this and how that works in the brain how would you answer that in the past there's actually there's one speaking or alien hand syndrome where you feel your hand or your part of your body is possessed by an eight and acts involuntarily somebody could just say well that's easy because the jinns controlling it well but I mean see this is that your view fits all here's an interesting one this is known as the

[50:47] Capgras delusion right where you pee where people feel that a loved one somebody close to them is actually replaced by an impostor and you think this is and this happens to people often sometimes with paranoid schizophrenia or if they've had brain injury you actually feel that it's the same like it looks just like the same person but you actually believe 100% that that is an impostor he knows the same things but it's an impostor and you can actually search the cases that have happened in real life

[51:26] the Capgras delusion now here and this is is another interesting one hemispatial neglect happens sometimes after a stroke or other kind of brain injuries or lesions hemispatial neglect is where half of the the world half of perception becomes blind to you can't you just can't it just doesn't get processed so you don't see half like it's not that you don't see like you can see but you will not see what's on that half so you will just see this half so these people will sometimes only eat half a plate if you give him a plate

[52:06] they'll only eat from that half or if you showed him a clock and said can you copy the clock they will copy it from with the numbers twelve to six only and they don't see the others how would you explain that if you lived in the past and here's an interesting one as well ah Fantasia now this was an interesting one that and it happened there was a famous case of a 65 year old man who went for he'd gone for some angioplasty surgery and after it this was a side effect that he lost the ability to visualize anything you just

[52:45] can't picture up anything in your mind anymore like right now if if I want to think of an elephant if I want to think of a phone or a car in your mind you can think of it he could no longer think of and you can't visualize any images now you can imagine how that so easily people would just say well maybe somebody's done check on you well somebody's or demon has possessed you I mean just think in the past trying to answer these difficulties things like there's actually one known as an exploding head syndrome which causes no

[53:24] harm no pain but you can just occasionally hear a really loud bang inside your head but it doesn't harm you it's no pain but you just hear like a bang you think and you can but I definitely heard it but it's not real and one that you can actually this one you can actually see on YouTube you can go and search several cases an interesting one the foreign accent syndrome just really fascinating it's a speech disorder sometimes develop spontaneously or sometimes after an

[54:02] incident something's happen where they just wake up or they're regaining something it could be an accident or river and they develop a foreign accent so you've got the case on YouTube with the lady speaking in it Chinese accent and somebody in a French accent they've never been to France somebody in a southern accent they're from northern England I mean the solo some speaking in a southern accent in xsplit they can't explain even today neurologists don't know why it happens but it happens due to see not knowing something doesn't mean see this is what atheists use so often to attack people of religion or what they call the God of

[54:41] the gaps or the moment you don't know anything oh it must be good and and in this phenomenon this is like the Djinn of the gaps like the moment we don't know anything it's the Djinn or we can't explain it must be the Jim let the Djinn of the gaps so it's it's it's not just because we don't know the answer it doesn't mean we can't know the answer the hadith that you heard earlier on that the Prophet said my angel allowed Minda in allah and allah llahu Schieffer and in rewire the prophet said i lima home and alamo jahiliya home and jail those who know that she fire will know it and those who don't know it won't know it meaning go out find it like you

## Cite

Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment LeXzvtf9YGA/s/13. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/13/

Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.