A page from this ms.

Ibrahim Hamedi:  Kitab Kanz al-Walad

(The Child's Treasure) (d1162)

-------------------------------------------------

Taken from: O ye Gentlemen: Arabic Studies on Science and Literary ...Arnoud Vrolijk, ‎Jan Hogendijk

We learn that the downfall of the evil genius is done through seven barzakhs (1) seven places of punishment of increasing

impurity. Impious soul leaves the right path, human, sublime and Arabic (al-Sirat al-sawi Bashari al-al-Arabi al-sani),

which ranks seventh climate, to incarnate in human envelopes increasingly vile. Descending the hierarchy of climates,

it falls to the first climate in the bodies of Negroes (Zanj), the lowest barzakh (1), halfway between man and beast.

 

…the vilest human souls are linked to the most abject bodies - those of Turks and Zang, categories of people excluded

from the outset of salvation - as the most perfect souls belong to the Arabs, Persians and Greeks….

(1) Barzakh is an Arabic word meaning "obstacle", "hindrance", "separation", or "barrier".