those very demons who are their own kind, or else it issues as babble devoid of sense or meaning. People endowed with spiritual unveiling know this by direct witness and clear sight.¹
Those who walk into flames after casting off the Sacred Law belong to the same class, for the demons so overtake a person that all feeling in his body is suspended. An epileptic can be beaten severely without sensing it and without a mark appearing on his skin; in precisely the same way, these people are possessed by demons, which make them enter the fire and may even lift them into the air. A demon fastens itself to someone only when his reason is absent, just as it fastens itself to the epileptic.
In the lands of India and the Maghreb there is a tribe of Zott among whom one is called “the Roaster,” for he is scorched by the fire as these people are scorched: a demon possesses him, makes him enter the flames, fly through the air, stand on the tip of a spear-head,² and perform feats even more extraordinary than theirs. They are Zott who have no share in faith, and the jinn snatch up many human beings, hide them from people’s sight, and fly off with them into—