Satan - A Jinn Not A Fallen Angel

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Correcting The Biblical Perspective
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Allah ﷻ has given free will to two types of creation on earth: humankind and jinns. Just as humans exercise their freedom of will, similarly the jinns can do it as well. Satan or Iblees (one of his names in Quran) was a jinn and not an angel, who do not carry free-will, as clearly mentioned in the Quran: (Al Quran 18:50) AND [remember that] when We told the angels, ‘Prostrate yourselves before Adam,’ they all prostrated themselves, save Iblis: he [too] was one of those jinns (invisible beings), but then he turned away from his Sustainer command.

Satan is one of the jinn kind and not an angel who one day decided to disobey Allah’s will, a corrupted concept taught to followers of bible which, to me, confuses more than it helps make sense of everything. Jinns are a separate creation from the angels as taught in the Quran unlike the Bible that does not distinguish this fact. The concept that angels have free will appears in the Bible. Bible says angels do have free will, which confuses everything like angels becoming devils due to freedom of will to reject commandments of God. A believer of this biblical concept may very well doubt the authenticity of revelation process because God has always assigned angels to deliver His messages to the Prophets and Messengers, as also taught in the Quran. Since Bible does not distinguish these two creations is maybe why Jews and Christians believe satan is a "fallen angel". This may be the reason why many Jews and Christians, in their ignorance, also believe that satan was the "fallen angel" to appear to Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, not Archangel Jibraeel (Gabriel)  and in their hastiness conclude that he was a false prophet. 

Every word in Islam has relation to its meaning and so does the term "satan". Satan is correctly spelled in Arabic as shaytaan - which is derived from the verb shatan means "he was [or became] remote" i.e. he became the farthest from divine mercy and remote from all that is good and true due to his disobedience to Allah ﷻ thus he is referred to with this term. As per Islamic traditions, satan’s real name was Azazeel and he was born among the jinns on earth, was extremely pious and renown for Allah’s worship that he was given a spiritual status high enough that placed him among the heavenly angels. 


References:
[1] Al Quran 18:50 – Asad Translation.

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