Early version. Transcripts and tags are labelled by accuracy tier. A position is shown only after two independent reviews have found it in his own words.
102 answers in 27 recordings, 2017 to 2021. 69 with a checked position in his own words.
Indexed so far: 259 of 1,859 recordings (1,904 answers, 2014 to 2025). Anything below may change as the rest are indexed. Limits of the data
Thought Evolution
2017answers checked positions2021
Oldest first. A checked position shows what he holds, then the sentence he says, word for word from the transcript, with its moment. Years without one list the answers that have not been checked yet. Recordings not yet indexed may hold more.
Mufti Abu Layth says the belief in possession took root because the ulama, as the most learned people in pre-modern societies, were asked to explain every worldly phenomenon and answered as best they could with the knowledge of their time.
“people were coming with normal whatever problems asking these people to explain them and they had took they were trying to come up with some answer to help these people”
Mufti Abu Layth says the riba verse 2:275 describes how such people will rise on the Day of Judgement or pictures their greed, and that like the zaqqum fruit resembling the heads of devils it is imagery drawing on human imagination, not evidence that possession is real.
“imagery that Allah grows upon the imagination of mankind when he's addressing them let's take another example”
Mufti Abu Layth says not a single hadith cited for possession is free of criticism, that the sound version of Uthman ibn Abi al-As's report in Sahih Muslim mentions no jinn, as al-Nawawi notes, and that a Prophet sent as a mercy would not have left a phenomenon affecting everyone untaught.
“he never transmits this he doesn't teach people about this and think think about it this is going to impact us all every day and he forgets to tell us”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Quran itself calls people to reason rather than to belief on its own say-so, so a claim like possession must be tested against reason, and that the hadith of Shaytan flowing in the blood concerns human suspicion, as its Safiyya context shows, not possession.
“the Quran itself comes with this understanding that look you have to resort to reason”
Mufti Abu Layth says Muslims accept anecdotal experiences of possession while dismissing other faiths' miracle claims by reason, that possession seems to afflict only those who believe in it, and that people switch off their reasoning for their own faith.
“the question is why only our experiences why not everybody's experiences why not other faiths”
Mufti Abu Layth says that explaining anything unexplained by the jinn is a one-size-fits-all paradigm like a child's conspiracy theory or Basil Mitchell's partisan, a non-propositional faith that no evidence or reason can touch.
“if you've just got one version to answer everything then yes you can do that but it doesn't make it true”
Mufti Abu Layth says the belief in possession must be tackled because it mocks Islam and its Prophet and sustains a tyranny of abuse, from beatings and sexual violence to the extraction of money and property, and that Islam will be left to carry the blame as mythology.
“what's going to take the brunt of in the end is Islam so people will just say you know what Islam is just a load of nonsense”
Mufti Abu Layth says conditions such as palinopsia and Charles Bonnet syndrome show how abnormalities in the brain produce visions of people and shapes that someone in the past could only have explained as demons.
“how would I explain that in the past what an abnormality in the brain no maybe you're a demon I see you in many places”
Mufti Abu Layth says that apparent cures through ruqya or exorcism can be explained by the placebo and nocebo effects, which Ted Kaptchuk's sham acupuncture trial showed produce real symptoms and real relief, or by people who would have recovered anyway.
“it's called psychosomatic behavior when you actually can get ill it's called the nocebo effect and the placebo effect where you can actually get better”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Quran's healing is for what is in the hearts, meaning disbelief and superstition, and that ruqya and the taught du'as are a scaffolding Allah gave to steady people's iman because humans fall easily into superstition.
“so it is a scaffolding it's like a Zimmer frame to help you walk until you can walk”
Mufti Abu Layth says the many neurological conditions science now describes, from prosopagnosia to foreign accent syndrome, show that attributing the unexplained to jinn is a 'jinn of the gaps' fallacy, and that the Prophet's hadith on cures tells people to seek the knowledge.
“in this phenomenon this is like the Djinn of the gaps like the moment we don't know anything it's the Djinn”
Mufti Abu Layth says that dissociative disorders in the community occur more often among women with backgrounds of trauma, excessive control, forced or pressured marriages and beatings, and that the psyche breaks down under such treatment as the body would, which is what gets called possession.
“a lot of these cases happen usually more so than more often in our communities amongst women and they these people have a background of trauma abuse”
Mufti Abu Layth says Muslims' stigma against mental illness pushes them to blame jinn or magic, and that jinn, if considered at all, belong to a different domain of life from humans, like extremophile Archaea, so they do not fall in love or wreck marriages.
“so offended if you say this could be a mental health issue so what do you mean like my mom my mom ain't mental”
Mufti Abu Layth says the exorcist whose 'jinn' professed love for him was displacing his own guilt by projecting feelings he could not own onto a jinn, sincerely but not truly, and that the 'jinn of the gaps' is nonsensical, makes religion a joke and leaves real abuse untouched.
“to say it's the Djinn of the gaps is is nonsensical it's absurd and it makes religion into a joke and beyond that it doesn't tackle the greater issues of abuse”
Mufti Abu Layth refuses a diplomatic stance that treats possession as one of two valid opinions, because unlike a difference over raising the hands in prayer this belief underwrites mass exploitation and abuse and brings ridicule on Islam and its Prophet.
“this is why i refuse to have a diplomatic stance on this that this abuse is unacceptable it needs to be brought to an end”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that jinn or demonic possession, as popularly pictured, does not exist when examined against the Quran, the authentic Sunnah and reason, and that the first question to ask is what objective the jinn would have in possessing anyone.
“gene possession demonic possessions the way people pictured this understanding that we've defined does not actually exist”
Mufti Abu Layth says that the ulama were historically the only learned class and so were asked to explain worldly phenomena with the knowledge of their time, which is the backdrop against which the belief in possession took shape.
“the ulema are using the resources to come up with answers these are not necessarily religious questions these are just worldly human questions”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the riba verse's image of one driven unstable by Satan's touch is Quranic imagery drawing on human imagination, read by commentators as describing the resurrection or greed, and is not evidence for possession, just as the zaqqum tree's 'heads of devils' is not.
“this verse is one of the key verses that is misused or misinterpreted by people”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that no hadith cited for jinn possession is free of criticism, that the sound version of Uthman ibn Abi al-As's complaint in Sahih Muslim mentions no jinn, as al-Nawawi notes, and that the Prophet, sent as a mercy to mankind, never taught about so ubiquitous a danger in any sound transmission.
“not a single hadith that is free of criticism there are a few hadith I mean there are many hadees which are just completely week or week”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Quran calls people to reason rather than to belief because it says so, and that a claim such as possession, which no one would derive from the Quran without a cultural inheritance, must be tested against reason through the Quran.
“the Quran itself comes with this understanding that look you have to resort to reason”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the hadith that Satan flows through the son of Adam like blood, read in its context with Safiyya, concerns human suspicion and insinuation, since the men addressed were not possessed, and that it does not support possession.
“they were just the facts suspicion that's what the Prophet was speaking about that look I'm not saying you were being suspicious but it is human to sometimes have insinuations”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that Muslims apply reason to dismiss other religions' miracles and doctrines but switch it off for possession once a belief has been Islamised, relying instead on anecdotal experiences that only ever afflict believers.
“you'll never resort to reason but to discount and discredit other religions immediately the voice of reason is called up”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that using the jinn to explain anything unexplained is like a child's all-purpose conspiracy, an unfalsifiable non-propositional faith such as Basil Mitchell's partisan holds, which no evidence or reasoning can touch.
“if you've just got one version to answer everything then yes you can do that but it doesn't make it true”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the belief in possession must be confronted because it exposes Islam to mockery and underwrites an industry of beatings, sexual violence and financial exploitation, for which Islam itself will be blamed by coming generations.
“why is this so important to tackle this topic it's important because one the mockery that is being made out of Islam”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that conditions now explained neurologically, such as palinopsia and Charles Bonnet syndrome, would in the past have been read as demons or possession for want of any other explanation.
“how would I explain that in the past what an abnormality in the brain no maybe you're a demon”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the placebo and nocebo effects, demonstrated in Ted Kaptchuk's sham-treatment study, explain why people genuinely feel better or worse after exorcisms and ruqya, and that some would have recovered anyway.
“so when people are going through gin exorcisms or rupiah or things like this things can actually work”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Quran's healing is for what is in the hearts, meaning disbelief and superstition, and that ruqya and the du'as taught against omens are a scaffolding, like a walking frame, that steadies people's iman because the human mind clings to ritual.
“rukia and these things have been set as a scaffolding with a large name to guide people to a pure Iman so it is a scaffolding it's like a Zimmer frame to help you walk until you can walk”
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.
“this is like the Djinn of the gaps like the moment we don't know anything it's the Djinn”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that the hadith that every disease has a cure known to those who know it is a call to seek explanations, and that many cases called possession in Muslim communities, especially among women, are breakdowns under control, forced marriage and abuse that the stigma around mental health prevents families from naming.
“we have such a stigma towards mental health Muslims get so offended if you say this could be a mental health issue”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that even if the jinn exist they would belong to a domain of life as remote from humans as archaea, so the idea of a jinn falling in love with someone or wrecking a marriage is absurd, and people must take responsibility for their own relationships.
“they're not the same species or genus they're not even the same domain as us”
Mufti Abu Layth reads the exorcist's 'jinn', who professed sexual love for him, as a displacement of guilt, the projection of desires the man could not own as a religious figure, sincerely believed but not true.
“so displacement of guilt it's easy look at psychoanalysts explain it all the time you just project your demons onto”
Mufti Abu Layth refuses to treat possession as one of two acceptable opinions, since unlike a difference such as raising the hands in prayer it unleashes mass exploitation and abuse and brings ridicule on Islam and the Prophet, and he notes that a number of scholars, among them al-Razi and al-Shawkani, rejected it.
“this is why I refuse to have a diplomatic stance on this that this abuse is unacceptable it needs to be brought to an end”
Mufti Abu Layth says the narrative that the Prophet had magic done on him was retrospectively reinforced to support a sectarian turf war with the Mu'tazila.
“even the Prophet had magic done unto him you see this was retrospectively reinforced as a narrative to support the sectarian turf war that was going on”
Mufti Abu Layth says that if a person is an atheist it is their choice, as there is no compulsion in Islam, and he does not judge people who have doubts or have left the faith.
“if a person is an atheist it's his choice or her choice I believe there's no compulsion in Islam”
Mufti Abu Layth says the evidence suggests the Quraysh army at Badr was probably at least a thousand strong, outnumbering the believers.
“they were outnumbered that part seems to be you know what the evidence clearly suggests that the army of grace were probably at least a thousand strong”
Mufti Abu Layth says that this is unfortunately the state of Muslims and why they are a laughing stock.
“you would see the fire but you're just blowing into cold ashes this is the state of Muslims unfortunately you know so this is why we are a laughing stock”
Mufti Abu Layth says that the Tirmidhi report of Ibn Mas'ud's night of the jinn, if true, most likely describes a psychoactive experience connected with the nabidh he carried, and that the report praising the harmala seed, though not authentic, shows that such a narrative existed in early Muslim society.
“This if anything would have been a kind of most likely would have been a psychoactive experience uh that would have had and he explains that I had with me this particular drink.”
Mufti Abu Layth says people approached the Quran with a confirmation bias, already believing in the evil eye, and so found it in verses that do not mention it.
“there is not one verse in the quran that mentions the evil eye but they approach this trying to find it”
Mufti Abu Layth says Jacob told his sons to split up at the gates to look out for them, not because of the evil eye, which makes no sense since they had already been to Egypt.
“split up because if you are gonna go then go like that because he's trying to obviously look out for them the evil eye makes no sense”
Mufti Abu Layth says there can be no balanced version of a supernatural claim, since jinn possession is either real or not, and that if disobedience, missing prayer or riba invited possession then most of the globe would be possessed.
“because there is no balance to nonsensical it's either sensical or it's nonsensical”
Mufti Abu Layth says that if jinn could possess people or take any form, as Ibn Taymiyya held, nothing in Islam could be trusted and no one would be responsible for their crimes, and he notes that only Muslims who believe in possession seem to be afflicted by it.
“if you accept jin possession everything in islam becomes redundant this screen that you're watching now”
Mufti Abu Layth says the riba verse 2:275 uses the image of being struck by the devil as a frame of reference the Arabs knew, just as 37:65 likens the tree of hell to the heads of devils, and that it does not establish jinn possession.
“the actual verse has nothing to do with jin possession everybody is in agreement the actual verse is speaking about people who consume riba on the day of judgment”
Mufti Abu Layth holds that 14:22, in which Satan says he had no power over people and only invited them, rules out jinn possession, because if the devil could physically prevent prayer or cause illness people could not be blamed and moral responsibility would be meaningless.
“if a jinn is beating me up when i'm praying why do i have to pray that's stupid and why is it my fault for not praying then”
Mufti Abu Layth cites al-Shafi'i's refusal of the testimony of anyone who claims to have seen the jinn, Ibn Hazm's ban on adding to what is soundly narrated about them and al-Tahawi's denial that Satan can cause actual harm, and says that what is called possession is mental illness and that accepting possession would leave no will and no taklif.
“this completely ruins the message of islam there is zero will irrada there is zero taklif because you don't know who's possessed who isn't”
Mufti Abu Layth says the hadith cited for possession prove nothing: the Bukhari report that Satan runs in the veins concerns suspicion, the Bukhari report of the epileptic woman treats epilepsy as an illness to be borne patiently, and the remaining reports in Ibn Majah and elsewhere are weak.
“my point of saying these people is that there is nothing authentic to prove this hocus pocus”
Mufti Abu Layth says the exorcism and ruqya industry is largely fraudulent and drenched in abuse, and he cites al-Jahiz's observation that no Mu'tazili, who rejected possession, was ever afflicted by a jinn.
“the bulk of them are utterly fraudulent right maybe some of them are sincere and just delusional”
Mufti Abu Layth says the evil eye was the science of the day, based on the belief that the eye shoots out rays, rather than a matter of religion for them.
“the evil eye was something that was the science of the day and age”
Mufti Abu Layth says that, depending on how the report is read, its statement that the figure was Jibril is the companion's interpretation rather than something the Prophet taught them.
“so this hadith is really the interpretation that he says that that was jibril and the he here was the companion now they assumed that it's not that the prophet taught them”
Mufti Abu Layth says no verse speaks of hell during Ramadan, and that the hadith on the devils being chained means that doing good becomes easier in the shared spirit of the month.
“no there's no verses like that about hellfire and ramadan etc but this hadith saying that the shayateen will be locked up and stuff and basically that just means it'll be easier to do good deeds”
How many of these answers cite each (guest speech left out). Cited means named as evidence or discussed, not necessarily accepted: open the answers to see which.
