Not the Equal of God: Correcting a Misconception

There is a notion, common enough in a Western society where this whole concept is foreign, that Shayṭān is the opposite of God, possessed of equal power to Him; that people worship Shayṭān, and that he lives in hell as his own dominion — the black prince, Lucifer, the stuff of a great many films. This is not the concept at all. Shayṭān is a creation of Allah, a creature of Allah, of the jinn kind. He is powerless, absolutely: he can never make anyone do anything, and he cannot do anything at all of himself. As the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) says of his own mission in a hadith, he was sent only as a bearer of good news and a warner; his duty was to convey people to Islam, guidance being given only by Allah. Shayṭān, too, is sent into this world as a test. His task is to give waswasah, and to invite toward the path of evil and disobedience to Allah — he has no power at all to make anyone do anything; the law belongs entirely to Allah. Shayṭān can never do anything to a person except give waswasah.

This is the understanding. Allah tells him:

Excite those of them that you can with your voice, and rally against them your horse and your foot, and share with them in their wealth and children, and make them promises — but Shayṭān promises them nothing but ghurūr, illusion. If a Turkish speaker is asked what ghurūr means, he will usually say arrogance — no, that is not it. In Arabic it means someone who has been deceived, taken for a ride, tricked into believing what is not real. This present life is nothing but such a deception, a ploy meant to deceive — a kind of matrix, which Shayṭān uses very effectively before a person's eyes.