That Old Black Magic
That Old Black Magic
By Jack Kinsella
You can’t get a date. You’ve developed a bad case of hives. Your hair is falling out. Your face has exploded with acne. You’re having the worst run of luck imaginable. You wake up with a sore arm and can’t work that day.
Maybe you’ve fallen in love with your housekeeper…or perhaps you woke up to find a severed wolf’s head wrapped in your lingerie…
What is your first assumption? You are victim of witchcraft, right? Somebody has given you the “evil eye” and has cast all kinds of spells and incantations against you.
What do you do?
Well, you have two options. In the first, you can hire another sorcerer to undo the spell you are under.
And if that doesn’t work, you can always call the federal Anti Witchcraft Unit and ask them to send out special investigators to track down the sorcerer for you.
But whatever you do, you don’t want to tell the AWU officers that you first tried hiring a sorcerer to cast a counter-spell.
The Anti-Witchcraft Unit was created in order to educate the public about the danger of sorcerers and “combat manifestations of polytheism and reliance on other gods.”
In Saudi Arabia, there really IS an official Anti-Witchcraft Unit, which is part of and subordinate to the Saudi Interior Ministry, that was formed specifically to combat sorcery.
“The unit is charged with apprehending sorcerers and reversing the detrimental effects of their spells. On the CPV website, a hotline encourages citizens across the kingdom to report cases of sorcery to local officials for immediate treatment.”
In the case of the wolf’s head, the Anti-Witchcraft Unit in Tabouk was able to break the spell. The Saudi daily Okaz reported on Monday that the unknown family that had fallen victim to the spell had been “liberated from the jaws of the wolf.”
Last October, a judge accused of receiving bribes in a real-estate project told a court in Madinah that he had been bewitched and is undergoing treatment by Quranic incantations, known as ruqiyah, a common remedy for the evil eye.
Witchcraft and sorcery are as much a part of Islam as are alms and ritual washing. One Islamic website I found even lists some of the things that can happen to someone who is under the spell of, or possessed by, a jinn (genie).
For example, a person possessed or under the influence of a jinn might:
– Be repulsed by the Koran or hearing the call to prayers
– Suffer epileptic attacks
– Suffer frequent nightmares
– Have a tendency to avoid people
– Take a dislike to one’s spouse
– Inability to have marital relations with one’s spouse
– Frequent miscarriages
– Sudden, obvious changes in behavior
– Loss of appetite
– Express sudden obedience and love for a particular person.
In Islam, Black Magic spells are used to;
– bring about sickness and unnatural illness,
– break up relations between husband & wife,
– create crossed conditions,
– force people out of their jobs,
– wreak justified vengeance,
– destroy homes,
– attract wrathful spirits and demons to aid in hurting others, or curse and hex people to death.
– Black magic spells can be gentle or strong, suggestive or coercive; their main purpose is to hurt, harm, goofer, jinn, or hot foot peoples.
What is the cure for getting a hot foot, or otherwise being possessed by a genie? It’s a little complicated, since the person that is possessed is by definition also repulsed by the Koran, but according to Islam Q&A they have to read it, anyway.
But there are other cures, just in case that one doesn’t work. Like drinking your bathwater…
“Reading Qur’aan and known supplications expressing seeking refuge, the most important and effective of which is sura 113 and 114, Al-Falaq and Al-Naas, which were used to cure the Prophet himself. Surah 112, Al-Ikhlaas, is recommended along with them, as well as the opening chapter of the Qur’aan, Al-Fatihah. To cure black magic some have successfully used seven lotus-tree leaves. The leaves should be crushed, then mixed them with water enough for taking a bath. The following verses from the Qur’aan are then recited: verse Al-Kursi (2:255), surah Al-Kafiroon (109), surah 112, 113, 114; the verses which mention magic, which are: in surah Al-Baqarah (2:102), Al-A’raaf (3:117-119), Yunus (10:79-82), and Taha (20:65-69). The possessed person drinks some of the water, and the rest is used to give him a bath.”
A couple of other cures also mentioned include eating seven special kinds of dates from a special tree, unless you can’t find it. Then any dates will do. “Cupping” or blood-letting might work, says IslamQA.
Until you get to the last line. That’s where you find out the following:
“And we ask Allah to cure your brother and ease your hardship and his, as He is the One who cures and there is no one else who can cure. — (signed) Sheikh Muhammed Salih Al-Munajjid Islam Q&A”
Great! What if you went to this guy, and started following his directions starting at the top. You found somebody qualified to read the Koran. You found somebody else to find seven lotus leaves. You ate seven special figs.
You even drank your bathwater – and then you find out that none of these cures will work because nobody can cure it but Allah. Well, at least you got a bath out of the deal.
And you’re not thirsty anymore…
Assessment
Islam claims that Allah is the same God Who is revealed in the Bible. Mohammed was an itinerant trader who spent a great deal of time among Christians and Jews some six hundred years AFTER Christ.
He was exposed to the teachings of both faiths, incorporating parts of each into his subsequent ‘third testament’, the Koran.
Mohammed attests to the truth and validity of both Testaments: (Suras 2:87, 29:46, 32:23, 5:44, 6:154, 6:155, 2:87, 5:46, 5:68, 29:46 and 43:63)
For example, Sura 5:68:
“O People of the Book! ye have no ground to stand upon unless ye stand fast by the Law (Torah), the Gospel (Injeel), and all the revelation that has come to you from your Lord.”
But the Koran itself is a mass of contradictions with the Revealed Word, falsifying both the facts and teachings of both testaments.
According to the Koran, the line of spiritual succession goes through Ishmael and not Isaac. Moses was a Muslim.
Jesus was not the Son of God, and was neither crucified nor Resurrected. The Islamic Jesus (Isa) was a mortal human being. He was not crucified, did not atone for the sins of mankind, and was not resurrected on the third day.
He is recognized as the last prophet God sent to the Jewish people and revered as a forerunner to Mohammed.
Adherents to Islam do NOT read or study the Gospel. The possession of a Bible by one of the ‘People of the Book’ in Islamic fundamentalist states can result in a death sentence. Belief in a single god does not mean that the God of Scripture is the one being worshipped by Islam.
And, because the God of the Bible was known and worshipped many centuries before Mohammed came along, it is also clear who the true God is.
The New Testament clearly states that prophets must follow the same God as the One revealed through Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Moses. (Deuteronomy 13:1-5).
It is no offense to Muslims that Islamic doctrine is different than Christian doctrine. Things that are different are not the same. Judged by the standards of Christian doctrine, the Koran cannot be a Third Testament because it directly contradicts the First and Second (Old and New) Testaments.
It is a source of endless curiosity to me that Islam insists upon being considered older than Judaism and Christianity despite its having first appeared twenty-six hundred years after Abraham, two thousand years after Moses, and six hundred years after Christ.
Equally unfathomable is Islam’s insistence that Allah is the same god as the God of Christians and Jews, but that the God of Christians and Jews is not the same as Allah.
Muslims claim to worship the same God of Christians and Jews, but at the same time, believe Christians and Jews are following a false god.
It is not an insult to Islam to recognize that there are irreconcilable differences between Christianity and Islam – any devout Muslim will immediately agree.
But that is just about the only point of common agreement. It isn’t hateful. It isn’t intolerant. It is simply true. Things that are different are not the same.
Are they?
This Letter was written by Jack Kinsella on July 21, 2011.