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What is the difference between Jinn and Shaytan?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

The jinn are an unseen world created by Allah for His worship, and their existence is affirmed in the Quran. Whoever denies them has committed disbelief. They are bound by religious obligations, and among them are Muslims and the deviators, as Allah Almighty said: ﴿And indeed, among us are Muslims [in submission to Allah], and among us are the deviators. So whoever has embraced Islam - those have sought the right course. But as for the deviators, they will be firewood for Hell.﴾ "Shaytan" (devil) is a name for those among the jinn who disbelieved. Therefore, a believing jinn is not called a "shaytan"; rather, this term is applied to their disbelievers, like Iblis, who "was of the jinn and disobeyed the command of his Lord." The devils (shayatin) are the disbelievers among the jinn; believing jinn are not called devils.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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