to the shaykh, asking him to cure the possessed person. He would send word to his followers, who would leave that person, and the family would pay the shaykh large sums of money. Sometimes the jinn would bring him money and food stolen from people. One person, for instance, had figs in a storage bin. The shaykh asked his devils for figs, and they brought them to him. When the owners of the bin went looking for their figs, they found them gone.
Another man was engaged in learning and recitation when devils came and tempted him, saying: “We shall exempt you from prayer and bring you whatever you want.” They would bring him sweets and fruit, until he visited a shaykh knowledgeable about the Sunnah. The shaykh called upon him to repent and paid the owners of the sweets for what that man, deluded by the devil, had eaten.
Thus, anyone who departs from the Quran and Sunnah and experiences an extraordinary state—whether involving disclosure of hidden matters or the power to produce effects—has a state arising either from his own soul or from devils. If he has no such state but merely imitates those who do, his state is a fabrication.
Those with satanic states generally combine the satanic state with the fabricated one, as Allah Most High says:
“Shall I inform you upon whom the devils descend?”
“They descend upon every sinful liar.”
Al-Hallāj was one of the leaders of these people: those with satanic and fabricated states. These people comprise many groups.