What are devils? They are not ghost or spirits. They have many names; jinns genie's, demons, shadow people, gray people etc.
The Muslims believe that God created three beings; Angels, humans and jinns(In other religions and cultures these are known as devils).
The jinns were created with 'smokeless fire' and are invisible although they exist on Earth. They live on another plane of existence and humans very rarely see them.
Jinns, like humans, may be good or evil. Like us they too have their own traditions, customs, families, religions etc
The Quran vaguely mentions some gifts these creatures have. They seem to be the power of invisibility, teleportation, the ability to travel to other planes of existence (thus allowing them to catch glimpses of the future), great strength and they are also able to communicate with man.
Like the bible, which warns man of the devil, the Quran also warns that some jinns may be evil and that they may induce man to commit sins.
In fact surah 2:102 in the Quran states that the jinns taught man magic which causes harm.
The bible verses are somewhat similar to that of the Quran's verses on these jinns/devils.
Bible verses talks in detail about the powers devils have which includes all that is mentioned Quran plus some additional abilities such as levitation, pyschokeniss, possession etc
Both the bible and the Quran seem to be of the opinion that these devils/jinns induce man to deviate from God. In fact the bible expressively states that these devils all work for Satan and are evil.
This seems to be the greatest difference between the bible and the Quran in the matter of the jinns/devils.
Where the Quran states that some jinns are good, the bible says all are evil.
Judaism also believes in these devils. There are three classes of devils. They could be evil nature spirits like satyrs. They could be the children of Lilith the first wife of Adam according to the Talmud. Mention of Lilith doesn't take place in Islam or Christianity. The belief is that Lilith was either too willful to stay in Eden or was too evil and thrown out of Eden. She cohabited with spirits producing demon offspring.
Some demons could be also humans who were not given a physical form. The latter, since they were deprived of a human form, are sometimes jealous of us humans and can cause us harm.
Judaism seems to see these devils as a tempter much like Christianity but they seem to be an agent of God rather than God's adversaries.
Their duty is to test man and though they try their best to succeed, they secretly hope that they fail.
These devil like creatures in Judaism also have many supernatural abilities mainly they have the power of possession as well as the ability to have sexual relationships with humans. They also seem to like disturbing and upsetting humans.
Curiously, other than the monastic religions of Islam, Christianity and Judaism, many other religions also belief in these devil/jinn creatures.
Hinduism calls these creatures' Asuras. Asuras are supernatural spirits that can be good or evil. Some are noble whereas some challenged God himself.
Buddhism also believes in demons. Notably that of Mara who came many times to tempt Buddha away from the path of enlightenment. In Buddhism, devils seem to act much like the devils in Judaism in the sense that they try to test man.
Some common beliefs of these jinns/devils/demons are that they occupy empty homes. This is one reason why some Muslims give the 'salaam'(peace) greeting even when they enter an empty house. This is also why some Muslims do not like to leave a home uninhabited for long.
Another common belief of some Muslims and Christians is that these creatures like to torment some people. These creatures can move things, imitate the voices of people they know, open and close doors etc. On a more serious level they can also possess or drive people insane.
Some Jews believe that besides insanity, devil are to be blamed for various illnesses including blindness.
There some conjectures that aliens, fairies, Doppelgangers as well as other supernatural entities in popular folklore are actually these jinns/devils/demons. I found the following websites rather interesting
http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/UFOs/past.html, http://www.thejinn.net/
These websites have some interesting explanations on how some of the greatest mysteries on earth such as the presence of aliens and UFOs can be explained using devils/jinns.
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