Wow, realizing I hit 50K! Twitter isn’t real life but thank you to each of you for joining me on this journey nonetheless!

As has become customary in thanks I’ll do a Twitter AMA on Sat at 11am PST/ 2pm EST

If you’ve enjoyed this acct, I also recommend the following:
the inimitable @TheLadyImam for Islam and feminism

The great @kecia_ali for Islamic studies and gender

The wonderful @MENALibAHS for Islamic art
The always fantastic @stephenniem for Islamic art and architecture

The brilliant @JeffreyKotyk for medieval Asia, astronomy, and astrology
The wonderful @DerilloEyob for gorgeous manuscript culture of Ethiopia

The great @MikaAhuvia for late antique Judaism and angels

The amazing @docstobar on Iranian occult and mysticism
The extraordinary @bdaiwi_historia on Islamic intellectual history

I love @Tweetistorian run by the fantastic @sasanianshah and @DrWorsTen who bring on rotating historians
Loving the podcast @KeepingIt_101 for all things religion by the stellar @ProfIRMF and @mpgPhD

and the @OttomanHistory podcast for Ottoman history
and where would we be without the work of creatives who incorporate so much history and lore in their work like @waraqamusa’s The Lover and The Jealous @SAChakrabooks’ jinn-tastic The Daevabad Trilogy @ausmazehanat’s magical Khorasan Archives and @GWillowWilson’s Alif the Unseen
and last but not least @Aphemia66’s Smokeless Fire series and @pdjeliclark ‘s A Dead Djinn in Cairo

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More from @aaolomi

13 Jan
In Islamic eschatology, the world will be flooded by a mighty invasion in the end of days.

The great army of the monstrous Yajuj and Majuj (Gog and Magog) will rampage throughout the earth.

A thread-
Yajuj and Majuj are mentioned in the Qur’an (Kahf and Anbiya).

They are sealed away behind a mighty wall by a legendary king, Dhul al-Qarnayn who is frequently linked to Alexander the Great and occasionally Cyrus the Great, though neither are exact matches
It is commonly believed they scratch at the wall daily, tearing nearly through until God intervenes and restores the barrier.

Thus sealed away, the world is safe from Yajuj and Majuj, that is, until the end of days.
Read 20 tweets
6 Jan
In Middle Eastern and Islamic lore, the jinn are associated with dreams. As subtle, invisible creatures they were treated as a separate race of beings and as a type of spirit-life.

A thread on jinn and dreams-
Jinn were said to have a special capacity to psychically influence humans through whisperings. These could fill the mind of people with doubt, fear, and lust

They could also sway the dreams of humans.
Some jinn like Kabus were described as a type of winged shadow which stalks humans at nighttime.

Slipping in through cracks, he perches on your chest causing paralysis as his icy fingers seep into the mind inducing nightmares and terror.
Read 22 tweets
3 Jan
The Horoscope of Iskandar Sultan, cast by the astrologer Imad al Munajjim for April 25th 1384 CE

It has Capricorn on the Ascendent, Venus in her kingdom in Pisces, the Sun in Taurus, and Mars in his domicile in Scorpio
the birth time and subsequent horoscope are idealized; it reflects a nocturnal birth so Venus and Mars are emphasized.

The placements likely invoke Iskandar’s grandfather Timur, with Mars in the 11th House reflecting the power to conquer the world
It’s a beautiful depiction of Persian and Timurid art and the continuation of astrological knowledge with references to the astrologer Abu Ma’shar and the use of the ancient al-hilaj technique in the commentary
Read 4 tweets
30 Dec 20
The Great Pyramids have always captured our imagination. For medieval Muslims, they were a relic of a ancient age of knowledge; an edifice of magic, astrology, and the jinn.

A thread-
By the 9th century there were several theories for who actually built the pyramids.

One stated they were built by the last jinn king, ibn Jann who ruled in the age before humanity.
In this narration, the jinn were the original inhabitants of the world. They filled the earth with wonder and corruption in equal measure.

Eventually a great jinn war broke out in which the angels sided with the goodly jinn and drove out the wicked ones.
Read 25 tweets
21 Dec 20
The Great Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn is upon us.

So ends the age of earth and so begins the age of air.

if an undead Timur i lang rises from his grave you'll know why...

we're also entering a new dawr or planetary age

so fun times ahead!

Read 4 tweets
16 Dec 20
Astrologers from the medieval Islamic world envisioned history as a series of great planetary cycles. You've heard of the Great Conjunction on December 20th and the Age of Aquarius, but the medieval writers had different ideas.

According to them we are in a new age

A thread-
While the Age of Aquarius is not really a thing in the writings of medieval astrologers, they do have several techniques which divide up history into astrological ages, or world years.

One is the conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn which we discussed in our last two threads.
The others are intiha’at, fardar, dawr, and qisma which were all related to one another
Read 21 tweets

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