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According to Judaism and its scriptures, Solomon-known as Prophet Sulayman in the Qur'an-was one of the greatest monarchs in Jewish history. His reign denoted the zenith of ancient Israel's political, economic, and cultural ascendancy.
Among his most celebrated achievements were the construction of the First Temple in Jerusalem, his legendary wisdom-granted in response to his prayer for divine guidance to govern justly-an era of widespread peace and prosperity, and a flourishing of scientific and artistic endeavors.
Yet Solomon's legacy is deeply ambivalent. His later years were marred by actions that rendered him a complex, and at times morally troubling, figure-far from an archetype of ideal kingship. He is accused of embracing and promoting idolatry, precipitating national moral decline, indulging in opulence, imposing heavy taxation, and administering forced labor. These policies and spiritual compromises laid the groundwork for the eventual rupture of Israel's unity, though the formal division occurred under his son Rehoboam.
This fragmentation triggered a chain of events that culminated in exile and subjugation-first by the Assyrians, who obliterated the ten northern tribes (subsequently described as "lost"), and later by the Babylonians, who exiled the southern kingdom comprising two tribes. Unlike their northern counterparts, the latter eventually returned to the Holy Land-emptied, disoriented, and shrouded in historical and spiritual haze. In the aftermath, they struggled to preserve the fading remnants of Israelite identity and faith, piecing together a fractured legacy amid the ruins of former glory.
Thus, Solomon's trajectory from exalted hero to cautionary figure embodies both the pinnacle and the nadir of Israelite socio-cultural and religious evolution. It is no exaggeration to assert that after Solomon, the course of Israelite history-biologically, politically, and spiritually-was irrevocably altered. Many have labored-albeit in vain-to reconcile his towering political preeminence with the starkness of his religious and moral downfall.
The essence of Solomon's baffling reign, and his even more perplexing legacy, is captured in these solemn words from the Old Testament: "The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord's command. So the Lord said to Solomon, 'Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates'" (1 Kings 11:9-11).
In Islam, Sulayman is portrayed as a mighty prophet and king, divinely commissioned to invite humanity to the authentic teachings of Islam, the sole religion before Allah and the faith upheld by all earlier prophets, including Adam, Nuh (Noah), Ibrahim (Abraham), Musa (Moses), and his father Dawud (David).
Sulayman discharged this sacred mission with honor and integrity, embodying the prophetic attributes of infallibility, sincerity, and trustworthiness-qualities inherent in all messengers of Allah. His legacy is thus one of monumental and flawless achievements, made possible through Allah's countless and awe-inspiring miracles. Throughout his life, he was characterized by extraordinary wisdom, miraculous authority, and unwavering devotion to Allah and the divine mandate entrusted to him.
The Qur'an clearly affirms that Sulayman was granted exceptional knowledge and sound judgement, and it explicitly states that he neither disbelieved nor blasphemed (al-Anbiya' 79; al-Baqarah 102; al-Naml 19, 40, 44).
These verses highlight not only Sulayman's extraordinary command but also the divine sanction behind it. His authority extended across realms-human, animal, and jinn-yet it remained rooted in spiritual legitimacy, not occult manipulation.
As a brief digression, it's important to note that like humans, the jinn possess free will and are morally accountable for their choices. On the Day of Judgment, they too will be judged and destined for either Paradise or Hell, depending on their response to divine truth during their earthly lives. Since no prophets have been sent from among the jinn, they are expected to receive guidance through human messengers.
In terms of spirituality, the jinn do not differ significantly from humankind. Allah's statement that the jinn are of various factions and follow divergent paths-"Among us are those who are righteous and those who are less so. We have been of different factions" (al-Jinn 11)-suggests that the religious diversity found among humans is reflected in the world of the jinn as well: from Muslims to Jews, Christians, polytheists, atheists, and pagans.
This means that the jinn employed by Sulayman included believers as well as nonbelievers. The believing jinn were spiritually aligned with him, while the disbelievers rejected his prophethood. Thus, they were divided into religious camps, just as humans have historically responded to prophets in varied ways.
Put differently, the believing jinn during Sulayman's time were adherents of Judaism, mirroring the religious status of the Children of Israel. Judaism was their religion too and they constituted a jinni Jewish community. Remarkably, this pattern continued until the time of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), when a group of jinn-previously Jews-embraced Islam and believed in him as the final Messenger (al-Ahqaf 30).
This continuity is not surprising, given that the Tawrat (Torah) of Prophet Musa was, according to the Qur'an (Alu 'Imran 3-4), revealed as "a guidance for the people." While "the people" primarily refers to the Children of Israel, the guidance was not exclusive. It extended to all seekers of truth who lacked direct revelation, including the jinn. This indirect universality underscores their inclusion in the broader spiritual narrative.
Let us recall-parenthetically yet pointedly-that Pharaoh was the first to be addressed by the prophetic mission of Musa and his brother Harun (Aaron). Notably, Pharaoh's wife and his court magicians were among those who embraced faith. They became adherents of the original, unadulterated Judaism, which, in its pristine form, was none other than Islam-the sole religion recognized by Allah.
In its earliest expression, Judaism was a spiritual path rooted in divine truth and submission to God. National identity, while present, was subordinate to spiritual purpose. It was only later, through historical distortions and sociopolitical entanglements, that nationalistic aspirations began to eclipse the spiritual core. The elevation of ethnic or national struggles to the level of religious orientation-and at times even above it-signaled a departure from the original covenant and marked the onset of corruption within the tradition.
The Qur'an alternates between references to the jinn and shayatin, suggesting that Sulayman's dominion included the full spectrum of spiritual dispositions-from obedient believers to defiant rebels. Managing such a diverse mosaic of the religious orientations of the jinn required distinct strategies and safeguards, tailored to the nature and degree of their spiritual (Judaic) alignment or opposition-again, just as prophets have historically dealt with varied human responses to divine guidance.
A hint at this complexity is given in the verse: "And of the devils (shayatin) were those who dived for him and did work other than that; and We guarded them" (al-Anbiya' 82). Here, the Qur'an emphasizes that shayatin-tasked with underwater labor and other demanding duties-had to be constantly guarded, lest they flee, sabotage, or underperform. Their rebellious nature necessitated containment and control, even while in service.
Further elaboration is found in: "And the devils (shayatin), every builder and diver, and others bound together in chains" (Sad 37-38). This verse reveals that some shayatin were physically restrained, likely to suppress their disruptive tendencies and ensure compliance. The imagery of shackles conveys not only physical control but also spiritual subjugation.
Notably, these provisions of containment and strict oversight are associated specifically with shayatin, not with the general category of the jinn. The latter is simultaneously harmless and easily manageable. This distinction is reinforced in another verse: "And among the jinn were those who worked for him by the permission of his Lord. And whoever deviated among them from Our command-We will make him taste the punishment of the Blaze" (Saba' 12).
Although the last verse explicitly mentions the jinn, its message is general in scope, encompassing at once the believing and the non-believing among them. The warning of punishment is directed at those who deviate from divine command-most notably shayatin, who constitute the primary exceptions to the earlier inclusive reference.
Indeed, it is shayatin-not the believing jinn or humans-that pose a spiritual threat and require vigilance. A watchful eye was ever upon them. The Qur'anic narrative makes clear that Sulayman's miraculous dominion was not merely about command, but about discernment, discipline, and divine justice in dealing with the unseen forces under his rule.
While the Qur'an does not explicitly state this behavioral persistence, it is implicitly affirmed in the account of Sulayman's death: "And when We decreed for Solomon death, nothing indicated to the jinn his death except a creature of the earth eating his staff. But when he fell, it became clear to the jinn that if they had known the unseen, they would not have remained in humiliating punishment (of their tasks)" (Saba' 14).
The verse's emphasis that the jinn did not know the unseen (ghayb) suggests that the group in question were shayatin, not the believing jinn. Claiming knowledge of the unseen is a hallmark of disbelief and satanic arrogance-an affront to the contingent nature of creation and the tawhidic transcendence of Allah. True believers, whether human or jinn, are categorically exempt from such blasphemous pretensions.
Commentators of the Qur'an are unanimous in interpreting this verse as a direct refutation of the claims made by the devilish factions among the jinn. These entities had propagated the notion that they possessed near-complete knowledge and were inherently superior to humans. On that basis, they asserted their ability to both harm and benefit human beings-an assertion that formed the ideological foundation of witchcraft and its associated dark arts.
The devils exploited this belief as a manipulative tool, using it to instill fear and seduce humans into spiritual subservience. By presenting themselves as powerful intermediaries, they lured individuals into a state of vulnerability-physical and metaphysical-where sorcery appeared to offer protection, advantage, or forbidden insight. In reality, this was a deceptive inversion of the divine order, one that preyed on human weakness and obscured the truth of tawhid and prophetic guidance.
The Qur'anic statement thus serves a dual purpose: it debunks satanic propaganda and reassures the believers. As devoted servants of Allah, the faithful stand above the reach of demonic manipulation. It is they who occupy the pedestal of dignity, while the devils remain chained, monitored, and debased-a reality symbolized by Sulayman's dominion over them.
Shayatin, in their desperation, sought to invert this ontological hierarchy, attempting to dethrone the believers and usurp their spiritual station. Yet they were powerless to do so. Their efforts were thus redirected towards those humans who either shared their rebellious nature or were gradually succumbing to it, becoming susceptible to the allure of darkness.
Because of this, there exist narrations - weak and unauthenticated though they may be - submitting that the jinn were kept unaware of Sulayman's death until a creature of the earth gnawed through the staff upon which his lifeless body was leaning. This was for several reasons. One was that the jinn were engaged in arduous, beyond-human-capacity projects, and had they known of his death, they would have abandoned their tasks and fled, leaving the work incomplete. Though not doctrinally binding, these reports reflect the extraordinary nature of Sulayman's authority and the precarious balance it maintained. After him, there remained no binding authority over the jinn.
In a similar vein, an incident from the life of Prophet Muhammad further underscores Sulayman's unique status. On one occasion, the Prophet was confronted by 'Ifrit from among the jinn, who sought to disrupt his prayer. He later stated that, after being enabled by Allah to capture him, he intended to bind 'Ifrit to a pillar of the mosque, so that the people could witness him the next morning. However, he recalled Sulayman's supplication: "My Lord, forgive me and grant me a kingdom such as will not belong to anyone after me" (Ṣad 35).
Out of reverence for that divine grant, the Prophet released the jinn, humiliated. As narrated in Sahih al-Bukhari, this incident confirms-and Allah knows best-that physical dominion over the jinn was a unique feature of Sulayman's prophethood, not to be replicated.
With Sulayman's passing, no one could fill the shoes of the prophet-kings Dawud and Sulayman. As expected, the Israelite kingdom began to unravel. Religious laxity and moral degeneration accelerated the decline, plunging the community into a state of spiritual and political freefall. The kingdom fractured, followed by foreign conquests and enslavement.
Sulayman left no binding will regarding succession, nor did he designate a divinely mandated heir. His ministers installed his son Rehoboam on the throne. However, Rehoboam proved to be unworthy, his coarse manners and lack of spiritual depth mirroring the deteriorating moral state of the people. It was clear he could not sustain the grandeur of his predecessors.
The stage was thus set for catastrophe-what the Qur'an refers to as "the first of the two": "And We conveyed to the Children of Israel in the Scripture: You will surely cause corruption on the earth twice, and you will surely reach (a degree of) great tyranny" (al-Isra' 4).
This downfall was self-inflicted, a consequence of the Israelites' corruption and their descent into oppression. The prophetic legacy of Sulayman, once a beacon of divine order, was eclipsed by human failure and spiritual arrogance.
They arrived in Babylon spiritually and morally ruined, which was a condition undoubtedly ill-suited to serve as a crucible for renewal. The subsequent efforts towards rebirth and restoration, manifested in the rise of synagogue worship, the compilation of sacred texts, and theological developments, were articulated largely under spiritually compromised conditions. It was precisely in this context that many distortions of the original teachings of Judaism occurred: some teachings were lost, others twisted, misinterpreted, interpolated, or outright misrepresented. Some of this was intentional; much of it was the inevitable result of backbreaking circumstances.
This overall abominable state is described in the following passage from the Old Testament: "Furthermore, all the leaders of the priests and the people became more and more unfaithful, following all the detestable practices of the nations and defiling the temple of the Lord, which he had consecrated in Jerusalem. The Lord, the God of their ancestors, sent word to them through his messengers again and again, because he had pity on his people and on his dwelling place. But they mocked God's messengers, despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of the Lord was aroused against his people and there was no remedy" (2 Chronicles 36:14-16).
Moreover, the Jews' collective rebellions and apostasies were relentless: "But I gave them this command: Obey Me, and I will be your God and you will be My people. Walk in obedience to all I command you, that it may go well with you. But they did not listen or pay attention; instead, they followed the stubborn inclinations of their evil hearts. They went backward and not forward" (Jeremiah 7:23-24).
There were even instances when idolatry and degeneracy flourished to such an extent that the Torah was entirely neglected or even put out of sight: "Then Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the secretary, 'I have found the Book of the Law in the temple of the Lord.' He gave it to Shaphan, who read it... When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his robes" (2 Kings 22:8-11).
After decades in Babylon, many Jews were unfamiliar with the teachings of the Torah. They had become complete strangers to it. And when Ezra read its contents-his knowledge of the virtually lost scripture being a mixture of remembrance, revival, and even reinvention-the people responded as though it were a new revelation: "They told Ezra the teacher of the Law to bring out the Book of the Law of Moses... He read it aloud from daybreak till noon... and all the people listened attentively to the Book of the Law" (Nehemiah 8:1-3).
The seventy years of Babylonian exile are generally understood as involving two full generational exchanges. Those taken into captivity were often adults or young families, and by the time the exile ended, it was their children and grandchildren who returned to the land of their ancestors. Many of these returnees had never seen Jerusalem, and their knowledge of the Torah was either secondhand or entirely lost.
The assumed background of the verse is as follows-and Allah, the Almighty, knows best.
As seen earlier, during the reign of Sulayman, shayatin were held in captivity. In that period, they became additionally familiar with the spiritual vulnerabilities and moral weaknesses of the Jews, who had already suffered a profound collapse simultaneously in faith and character. Once liberated, shayatin resolved to exploit these weaknesses to the fullest. It was, in a sense, a time for revenge.
They also harbored a deep grudge against their former master, Sulayman, who had remained unwavering in his monotheistic faith and in his moral and humanistic valor. Driven by spite, they conspired to fabricate lies about him, seeking to tarnish his honorable reputation. This slander served a dual purpose: it enabled them to deepen their influence over the Jews by turning them against their former prophet-king, and it obscured the true nature of Sulayman's legacy.
So multilayered and otherworldly profound was the life and mission of Sulayman, and so spiritually incapacitated and myopic had the Jews become, that it was not difficult for shayatin to push the Jews over the edge of depravity, plunging them into unprecedented moral and theological lows.
The following are the key takeaways from the mentioned verse (al-Baqarah 102):
First
The Jews pursued the bait of shayatin, and instead of following the prophets and their revealed guidance, they embraced what shayatin had fabricated about the magnificent rule of Sulayman. Their role models became shayatin, not the prophets.
Second
One of the fabrications concocted by shayaáąin-and tragically adopted and propagated by the Jews-was the claim that Sulayman was a disbeliever. However, Allah decisively exonerates His great prophet from any association with disbelief, idolatry, or wrongdoing, declaring: "Never did Sulayman disbelieve; rather, the devils disbelieved." This uncovers a recurring pattern of distortion within Jewish religious history, pointing to the tip of the iceberg in terms of how their religion was altered. It is for this reason that the Biblical and Qur'anic narratives concerning Sulayman-and indeed much else-differ vastly as much in profundity as in substance.
Third
As al-Maududi writes in his "Tafhim al-Qur'an": "When the Jews fell to the lowest depths of degeneration, morally and materially, and lost all the noble qualities because of their captivity, ignorance, poverty, homeless wanderings, etc. they turned to magic, sorcery, enchantment, witchcraft and other black arts and 'occult sciences.' They began to adopt methods through which they could attain all their ends without putting in any kind of labor and toil."
Sorcery became for the Jews like a drug, offering temporary but intrinsically false relief, satisfaction, and escapism. Shayatin, preying on them more than ever before, saw in this an opportunity to destroy them further. The nature of Sulayman's remarkable reign became the most fertile ground for deception. Shayatin convinced the Jews that Sulayman's greatness and unparalleled kingdom were the result of sorcery. Refusing to acknowledge that their subjugation under him was a divine miracle, they claimed that sorcery was also the reason for their control and enslavement. The message of shayatin was clear: if the Jews desired success and greatness, they must follow the path of sorcery-Sulayman's way-and that no one could teach it better than the devils themselves on account of their purported knowledge of the unseen (ghayb).
It is likewise possible that the Jews and shayatin fed off each other's evil tendencies. Perhaps the Jews initially succumbed to the temptations of sorcery due to its widespread presence in Babylon, and shayatin later capitalized on this. Alternatively, shayatin may have recognized sorcery as the perfect means to extinguish the Jews' fading religious authenticity, introducing sorcery through forged claims about Sulayman. The novelty was then easily nurtured in Babylon's sorcery-saturated environment.
Fourth
Sorcery in Babylon-especially among the Jews-became so prevalent and deeply entrenched that it effectively became part of the region's culture. So much so that Allah sent two angels, Harut and Marut (or possibly two human beings bearing those names), to teach people the true nature of sorcery: how devastatingly harmful it is and how to avoid it. Their presence served as a divine antidote to the extensive evil of magic and occult practices: "...But the two angels do not teach anyone unless they say, 'We are a trial, so do not disbelieve (by practicing magic)...'" (al-Baqarah 102).
Fifth
Unfortunately, instead of heeding the angels' warning and learning how to resist sorcery, the majority of people-foremost among them the Jews-used their teachings to deepen their knowledge and commitment to it. Such was the Jews' desperation and ill disposition towards themselves, their religion, and others.
The mentioned verse contains a stark allusion to the depths of their moral and spiritual decay: "And (yet) they learn from them (Harut and Marut) that by which they cause separation between a man and his wife...and (they) learn (only) what harms them and does not benefit them."
That the sorcery business-an epitome of the Jews' unbounded misconduct-was a sign of self-ruin in both worlds, including the corruption of their religion and the distortion of their scripture, is confirmed by the verse's conclusion: "But the Children of Israel certainly knew that whoever purchased the magic would not have in the Hereafter any share. And wretched is that for which they sold themselves, if they only knew" (al-Baqarah 102).
"Selling themselves for a vile and miserable price" is a verdict so severe it sends trepidation down the spine. One is compelled to ask: what transgression could merit such condemnation? The answer, stark and sobering, is this: selling a religion by corrupting and altering it. And in doing so, one sells not merely a creed, but the very self and identity bound to it.
Free Will: Not Using Our Intellect Leads to Hell
