Isya Joseph

Devil Worship, The Sacred Books and Traditions of the Yezidiz Isya Joseph

In the Name of the Most Compassionate God! With the help of the Most High God, and under his direction, we write the history of the Yezidis, their doctrines, and the mysteries of their religion, as con- tained in their books, which reached our hand with their own knowledge and consent. In the time of Al-Muktadir Billah, A. H. 295, there lived Mansur-al-Hallaj,2 the woU-carder, and §eih 'Abd-al-Kadir of jilan.^ At that time, too, there ap- peared a man by the name of Seih *Adi, from the mountain of Hakkari, * originally from the region of Aleppo or Baalbek. He came and dwelt in Mount Lalis, '^ near the city of Mosul, about nine hours dis- tant from it. Some say he was of the people of Harran, and related to Marwan ibn-al-Hakam. His full name is Saraf ad-Din Abu-1-Fadiil, 'Adi bn Musafir bn Ismael bn Mousa bn Marwan bn Al-Hasan bn Marwan. He died A. H. 558 (A. D. 1162-63). His tomb is still visited; it is near Ba'adrei, one of the villages of Mosul, distant eleven hours. The Yezidis are the progeny of those who were the murids (dis- ciples) of ieih *Adi. Some trace their origin to Before all creation this revelation was with Melek Ta'us, who sent 'Abd Ta'us to this world that he might separate truth known to his particular people. This was done, first of all, by means of oral tradition, and afterward by means of this book, Al-Jilwah, which the outsiders may neither read nor behold.