Jassasa, Al

Jassasa, Al (or the Spy), a Mohammedan name for a beast which is to be one of their signs of the approach of the day of judgment: When the sentence shall be ready to fall upon them, we will cause a beast to come forth unto them out of the earth, which shall speak unto then.

It is supposed by them that it will appear first in the temple of Mecca, or on Mount Safa, or in the territory of Tayef. She is to be a monster in size, and so swift that no human being shall be able to pursue her in her rapid flight through this world, marking the believers from the unbelievers, "that every person may be known at the day of judgment for what he really is." See Sale, Prelimt. Dissert. to the Koran, p. 79; Broughton, Biblioth. Hist. Sac. 1, 506.