WATANI International
2 January 2011
For ages people have been intrigued and frightened by, stories of jinn and other evil spirits. These beings are mainly discussed in relation to religion, psychological disorders and parapsychology.
“That evil spirits are real is a proved fact according to the Bible,” Anba Benyamin, Bishop of Menoufiya told Watani. “The Bible tells us about Jesus exorcising evil spirits from people, or giving his disciples power over evil spirits”.
Diagnosing possession
According to Anba Benyamin, such spirits can take hold of a person who has withdrawn from or is apart from God. They get into him through a sin that he performs repeatedly and is unable to give up, and thus he becomes an easy target for the devil, who finds no resistance when he attempts to enforce his power on that person. Other people—magicians or frauds—make deals with Satan, who gives them access to his demonic power to inflict evil on earth. It is very difficult, Anba Benyamin says, to exorcise these spirits from such people, even for priests who specialise in exorcism. Judging from several factors, the priest can see the difference between an evil spirit and a psychological disorder. The person possessed by Satan is perturbed by prayer and cannot stand receiving Holy Communion; he or she gets fits of convulsions if subjected to any of them. On the other hand the person with a psychological disorder is not negatively affected by prayer or Communion.
Anba Benyamin explained that not every priest can exercise exorcism; it is a talent God grants those whom He finds fit.
Not so common
While some psychologists believe that evil spirits exist, others think the idea is preposterous. “Evil spirits do exist; they are mentioned in the Bible, no one can deny this,” insists psychiatrist Victor Samy. “But their occurrence is not as widespread as people believe. Whenever people notice strange symptoms in a person they jump to the conclusion that he is possessed by evil spirits, while the reality is that only one person out of 1,000 of those who suffer from psychological disorders might be possessed by such spirits.
“People confuse demonic possessions with psychological disorders because in many cases their symptoms may appear to be alike, such as meaningless utterings, loss of memory or identity, convulsive fits, sudden blindness or deafness, and several other indicators. Priests who have the talent to exorcise evil spirits are very able to differentiate between cases of evil spirits and psychological disorders. They usually refer cases of the later to specialised clinics where they are diagnosed.
“It is true that psychology does not believe in ‘evil spirits’, but a few years ago a branch of psychology which stresses the significance of spirituality and faith was developed. The first seminar of this branch took place at St Catherine’s in Sinai a few years ago.
Fiercely opposed
Most psychologists, however, are diametrically opposed to the idea of possession. “I absolutely don’t recognise the existence of this phenomenon,” Maher al-Dabie, professor of psychology at the American University in Cairo, told Watani. “I believe that people who think they are possessed by evil spirits actually suffer from human psychological disorders. Unfortunately, with time, those persons are so convinced of the belief that they start acting weirdly—just as people possessed by spirits are expected to do. In fact these people are suffering from psychiatric disorders or diseases such as schizophrenia and paranoia.”
Watani asked Dr Dabie how he could explain the references to evil spirits in the Bible. His interpretation during Biblical times, especially when Jesus Christ lived on earth, the devils were in a state of turmoil.
Folk healers
The concepts of evil spirits’ and jinx, or evil eye, have been upheld throughout history, as Hashem Bahari, professor of psychology at al-Azhar University, explains. Uneducated and illiterate people opted for public resolutions to exorcise evil spirits from the body. However, with the evolution of science many have realised that the problem lies with psychological disorders, and thus have relinquished such superstitious notions. “But unfortunately more than a few people still choose folk remedies, spiritual healers or religious figures rather than seeking the help of professional medicine,” Dr Bahari says. The collapse of medical ethics could be one of the reasons behind people seeking treatment elsewhere.
Dr Bahari told Watani that we live in a community whose members have utter faith in religious figures, especially those with charisma. Religious figures do not prescribe medicine, which is considered by the public as a financial burden; they only refer to religion and the Holy Books in their treatment. Bahari agreed with Dabie in that Psychology does not believe in ‘evil spirits’, he said that there might be diseases which are still unknown to scientists and which are behind the weird symptoms, explained by some as demonic possessions.
Watani talked to a spiritual healer in Alexandria who told us that he could exorcise spirits by reading certain passages from the Qur’an. After only one session of incantation with the possessed person, the spirit leaves. Browsing through the Internet one can find websites for spiritual healers advertising their expertise and ability.
Supernatural
Parapsychology, a term first used in 1882 by Max Dessoir, aims at investigating the existence and causes of psychic abilities, near-death experiences, and life after death using scientific methods. In Egypt and the Arab World it is still perceived by many as a supernatural spiritual ability or as a sixth sense. Parapsychology attempts to answer questions about demonic possession and supernatural abilities such as telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, hypnotism, Reichenbach’s phenomena, apparitions, haunts, and the physical aspects of Spiritualism such as table-tilting and the appearance of matters from unknown sources. In its quest to find answers parapsychology employs such sciences as psychology, physics, biology and sociology. A line, however, should be drawn between parapsychology and psychology, since scientists—and first and foremost Sigmund Freud—do not believe in demonic possession and reject the notion of hunting the unknown in the spiritual world. Freud explained all manifestations of demonic possessions as psychological disorders and imaginary perceptions.