Deep in Oman’s parched interior, the ancient oasis town of Bahla abounds with myths of camel-eating, fire-mouthed hyenas and men turning into donkeys — a reputation for magic and mystery that persists to this day. Some superstitious Omanis shun the isolated desert settlement because of its stories of jinn, the spirits that have been part of Arab folklore since before the dawn of Islam.
Bahla, a quiet town of palm groves and eerie, abandoned mud-brick homes, lies about 200km southwest of the capital, Muscat, in Ad Dakhiliyah Governorate, with an imposing double-archway at its entrance.
Here, in one of Oman’s oldest inhabited settlements, belief is firm in jinn, which are described as supernatural beings distinct from humans and angels that live alongside mankind.
Photo: AFP
“We believe that jinn are among the creations of God ... so it is not strange,” said tour guide Hamad al-Rabaani at Bahla’s medieval fort, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Magical stories permeate Bahla, including the popular myth that supernatural forces built the 13km wall around the town in a single night, to protect it from invaders.
“The legend is of two sisters, both jinn, one of whom built the wall for protection ... and the other who created an ancient irrigation system for agriculture,” Rabaani, 55, said.
Photo: AFP
The concept of jinn predates Islam, but descriptions of the spirits feature in Islamic texts, which declare them subjects of God.
Few places are as strongly linked with jinn as Bahla, where “you hear stories of men who suddenly transform into donkeys and other animals,” Rabaani said.
One old woman often used to hear someone milking her cow after midnight, but whenever she went to check, she found no one there, he said.
“You hear, but you never see, because your mind couldn’t take it,” he added.
In Bahla’s old market, as silence descends after midday prayers, some residents are uneasy discussing the town’s reputation for spirits, fearing it might tarnish its image.
Mohammed al-Hashemi, a Bahla native in his 70s, said most of his life has been shaped by supernatural beliefs.
As a child he was told stories of hyenas hungry for camels and with mouths of flames that roamed the desert at night.
“They used to warn us not to go out after sunset because of magic,” he said in an air-conditioned supermarket.
Oral folklore and certain ancient texts say jinn are common in the Arabian Peninsula’s far reaches, said Ali Olomi, a professor of Islamic history at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.
Oman and neighboring Yemen, the peninsula’s southernmost countries, “both earn a reputation as not only ancient places with great historical significance, but as lands of the jinn,” he said.
“In Bahla, there are stories of phantom blazes and fires, animated desert storms and even edifices built by supernatural forces,” said Olomi, who specializes in Islamic esotericism and astrology.
Part of the reason Bahla is rife with such stories is that it was a remote outpost in ancient times, surrounded by desert and the dramatic Hajar mountains.
“The presence of jinn in places like Bahla can tell us a great deal about the history and culture of the Arabian Peninsula,” Olomi said. “This is a history of a people living in far-off settlements, linked precariously to other human settlements, and who keenly feel the presence of nature all around them.”
Among younger Omanis, not everyone is convinced about jinn, including Mazen al-Khaterri, a 24-year-old math teacher in Bahla.
“These are just stories told by our grandparents,” he said at a cafe in the old market. “We don’t know if they are right or wrong.”
However, Hasan, a 30-year-old who lives in Muscat, said suspicions of Bahla remain commonplace all the same.
“My family would never let me go,” he said, asking to use only his first name to protect his privacy. “The rumors say it is a city of jinn, where they live and have more freedom.”
DENIAL: Pyongyang said a South Korean drone filmed unspecified areas in a North Korean border town, but Seoul said it did not operate drones on the dates it cited North Korea’s military accused South Korea of flying drones across the border between the nations this week, yesterday warning that the South would face consequences for its “unpardonable hysteria.” Seoul quickly denied the accusation, but the development is likely to further dim prospects for its efforts to restore ties with Pyongyang. North Korean forces used special electronic warfare assets on Sunday to bring down a South Korean drone flying over North Korea’s border town. The drone was equipped with two cameras that filmed unspecified areas, the General Staff of the North Korean People’s Army said in a statement. South Korea infiltrated another drone
COMMUNIST ALIGNMENT: To Lam wants to combine party chief and state presidency roles, with the decision resting on the election of 200 new party delegates next week Communist Party of Vietnam General Secretary To Lam is seeking to combine his party role with the state presidency, officials said, in a move that would align Vietnam’s political structure more closely to China’s, where President Xi Jinping (習近平) heads the party and state. Next week about 1,600 delegates are to gather in Hanoi to commence a week-long communist party congress, held every five years to select new leaders and set policy goals for the single-party state. Lam, 68, bade for both top positions at a party meeting last month, seeking initial party approval ahead of the congress, three people briefed by
Indonesia and Malaysia have become the first countries to block Grok, the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot developed by Elon Musk’s xAI, after authorities said it was being misused to generate sexually explicit and nonconsensual images. The moves reflect growing global concern over generative AI tools that can produce realistic images, sound and text, while existing safeguards fail to prevent their abuse. The Grok chatbot, which is accessed through Musk’s social media platform X, has been criticized for generating manipulated images, including depictions of women in bikinis or sexually explicit poses, as well as images involving children. Regulators in the two Southeast Asian
ICE DISPUTE: The Trump administration has sought to paint Good as a ‘domestic terrorist,’ insisting that the agent who fatally shot her was acting in self-defense Thousands of demonstrators chanting the name of the woman killed by a US federal agent in Minneapolis, Minnesota, took to the city’s streets on Saturday, amid widespread anger at use of force in the immigration crackdown of US President Donald Trump. Organizers said more than 1,000 events were planned across the US under the slogan “ICE, Out for Good” — referring to the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is drawing growing opposition over its execution of Trump’s effort at mass deportations. The slogan is also a reference to Renee Good, the 37-year-old mother shot dead on Wednesday in her
RSS