Category:The Evil Eye
From Association of Independent Readers and Rootworkers
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The evil eye is a form of spiritual damage caused by covetousness, jealousy, and envy, either intentionally or unintentionally directed toward someone who is perceived to be fortunate, happy, or lucky. It is known by a number of names in different countries, including ayin ha'ra (the evil eye), mal occhio (the bad eye), jettatore (the projection [from the eye]), bla band (the eye of evil), and mal ojo (the bad eye). Evil eye belief originated in the Middle East and is mentioned in several passages in the Bible, including the Jewish Tanakh or Old Testament and the Christian New Testament.
The effects of the envious glance vary, but they generally include dehydration, either literally, as in the drying up of a mother's milk, the premature dropping of unripe fruit, and male sexual impotence, or figuratively, as in one's luck running out, finances being drained, and sources of income drying up.
There are two phases of protection against the evil eye. The first is called apotropaic work, a form of spiritual practice which averts the gaze of the evil eye or causes its glance to reverse or reflect back to the sender. The most common form of apotropaic work against the evil eye performed by root doctors and spiritual practitioners on behalf of their clients consists making and fixing talismanic protective charms against the evil eye. Other apotropaic methods include recital of certain prayers, making certain hand gestures, or suffumigation with smoke from certain herbs and seeds.
The second phase of spiritual work is curing the person, animal, or plant of the evil eye. If diagnosis by a reputable practitioner reveals that a client has already been affected by the evil eye, the spiritual curing work is undertaken. Cures against tthe evil eye vary from one culture to another. Depending on your spiritual practitioner's traditions, they may include rituals with water and prayer and/or cleansing rituals performed with eggs.
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Diagnosing the Evil Eye
Because there are many kinds of spiritually aggressive curses -- for instance with doll-babies, bottle spells, knot spells, |imprecatory prayers, sprinkled sachet powders, or black-coloured candles -- it is important to first diagnose whether the curse one is experiencing is actually caused by the evil eye. Sometimes the evil eye is diagnosed from the evident circumstances: The child was well in the morning, was praised or gazed upon, and began sweating or vomiting. The cause is clear and the cure can begin. But other times the diagnosis and the cure are linked together in a complex series of rituals, which vary by culture.
Water, oil, spittle, and melted wax, all of them liquids, may play a part in the diagnosis -- or the ritual of discovery may center on an eye-shaped and liquid-filled natural object, the egg.
In India, the morning hours are thought to be more dangerous, because a person or animal’s first glance of the day is said to be the strongest. Later glances are less and less powerful, thus less dangerous. If the sickness came on early in the day, the cause is more likely to be an evil glance than if it occurred late in the afternoon.
In Mexico, both diagnosis and cure are often accomplished with whole uncooked hen's eggs. If a child is thought to have been given the evil eye, an egg is rolled across the child’s body or placed beneath the bed while he sleeps. When the child awakens, the egg is cracked open and examined Once a diagnosis is made, a second raw egg, rolled along the child’s spine and arms in the form of a cross, can bring about the cure. This is called the limpia or "cleansing."
In Italy, diagnosis of the evil eye is made by slowly dripping olive oil into a basin of water, a drop at a time, while reciting secret prayers that have been passed along only among females in a family. If the drops run together in the form of an eye, the evil eye is the cause of the illness. If an eye does not form, the cause is something other than the evil eye.
In Bulgaria and other regions of Eastern Europe, when the evil eye is suspected, a diagnosis is made by means of charcoal. Generally this is done by an older woman, who prays and then sets about dropping charcoal, coal, or burnt match heads into a pan of water. If they float, the cause is the evil eye and curative measures will follow. If the they sink, the problem has arisen from another cause and will be treated with a different form of curing.
In Ukraine, melted wax, either from a candle or poured from a small metal utensil, may be dripped slowly into a bowl of holy water from a church to diagnose spiritual diseases. If the wax splatters on contact with the holy water or sticks to the sides of the bowl, the patient is suffering from the evil eye.
Among Ashkenazi Jews, the diagnosis of the evil eye often is made by an assessment of the circumstances that led to the sickness. For instance, a mother takes her little toddler to town and someone sees the child and says, "Oh, how pretty she looks! She is just adorable." If the mother does not take an immediate pre-emptive step — spitting onto the child, rubbing dirt on the child and denying before God that the baby is attractive, saying "kein ayin hara" (no evil eye") or asking the person who praised the child to touch her or spit on her — the evil eye then begins to operate.
Gestures Against the Evil Eye
Spoken phrases and bodily gestures are used to combat the evil eye in the moment one senses an attack or an envious glance. Some of these regionally popular practices include:
- * Refusal to accept praise on behalf of a child
- * Putting a spot of soot or dirt on the child so it will not look pretty
- * Spitting on, licking, or kissing a child who has been looked upon by a stranger
- * Making the Descendants of Joseph or the Clasped Thumbs hand gesture
- * Reciting Genesis 49:22 ("Joseph is a fruitful vine, a fruitful vine by a fountain; its branches run over the wall [over the eye].") or saying "I come from the seed of Joseph, over whom the evil eye has no power, as it is written, Joseph is a fruitful vine, a fruitful vine above the eye."
- * Making the Mano Fica or Thumb in Fist hand gesture.
- * Making the Mano Cornuto or Horned Hand gesture
- * Saying "kein ayin hara" or "Masha Allah" or asking the perpetrator to say such a phrase
- * Keeping travel and wedding plans secret
- * Covering the food at table with a cloth before serving
In the United States we often hear that one should not announce a plan, a pregnancy, or a new job, lest we “[[:|jinx it.” Secrecy about plans for [[
- Category:Love Drawing, Romance, Marriage, Fidelity, and Reconciliation|marriage]], home-buying, job promotion, or travel is found world-wide, to avoid the evil eye of envious people.
Talismans and Amulets Against the Evil Eye
For More Information see Talismans
These are hundreds of different talismans, charms, and amulets that are worn to avert the evil eye. These vary by region and culture, but here are a few of the best-known types:
- * Mano Fico and Mano Cornuto charms are carried to embody the hand gestures of the mano fico or mano cornuto.
- * Fish charms protect from the evil eye because in [[Category:Blessing, Cleansing, Healing, and Tranquility|blessing] Joseph's sons, in Genesis 48:16, Jacob says, "And let them grow like fish into a multitude in the midst of the earth." So just as fish in the sea are covered by water and the evil eye has no power over them, Joseph’s descendants are also covered, as are people named Joseph, people whose first or las name means "fish" in any language, and all people burn under the zodiac sign of {isces, The Fishes.
- * Eye-in hand charms look like a hand with an eyeball in the palm and can be found as amulets, key rings, and wall-hangers.
- * Hamsa (Arabic) or hamesh (Hebrew) hands are two-thumbed, bilaterally symmetrical hands. Hamsa and hamesh mean "five" and refer to the digits on the hand. An alternative Jewish name is the Hand of Miriam, in reference to the sister of Moses and Aaron, and an alternative Islamic name is the Hand of Fatima, in reference to the daughter of Muhammad, Most hamsas are worn as jewelry or on key rings, in Israel one can find large ceramic or enameled metal wall plaque hamsas bearing images of fishes, five-petalled flowers, an eye, or a Hebrew prayer in the center of the palm.
- * Corno ("horn") or cornicello ("little horn") is the name for an Italian amulet to protect the penis. I looks like a long, twisted animal horn, rather freeform in design, and is carved of blood coral. In America it is called "the Italian horn."
- * Throughout Europe horseshoes are nailed to doors to prevent the evil eye from entering houses and barns.
- * In Trinidad and Tobago, especially among those of Hindu descent, protective bracelets of black jet beads are given to newborn children.
- * Among the Kalbeliya of India (the tribe from whom the European or “Bohemian” Romani descended), the mirroring back of the evil eye takes the form of ornate circular mirror charms which are crocheted, braided, and wrapped with beads, buttons, and tassles.
- * Cimaruta ("sprig of Rue") amulets or jewelry are made of silver in Italy and portray a branch of Rue decorated with other protective charms.
- * Utchat or Wadjet eyes, known as "the Eye of Horus come fraom amciemt Egypt; the All-Seeing Eye of God is another variation on this theme.
- * Blue glass eye disks or beads called Nazar Boncugu, Nazar Boncuk, or Nazar Bonjuk ("eye beas")are popular in Turkey and Greece, and their fame has spread all around the world.
Herbs, Seeds, Roots, and Fruits Against the Evil Eye
For More Information see Hoodoo Roots and Herbs
Some trees, plants, grains, and flowers avert the evil eye, but some must be protected. Fruit trees are susceptible to envy, and will drop unripe fruit if afflicted. Flowers wither if subjected to an envious gaze. Rue, Lemons, Ajvan Caraway, Cloves, and Fennel will avert the evil eye. Aspand and Cloves, if popped on charcoal, will destroy it and affect a cure.
- * The Ojo de Venado or Deer's Eye is a Mexican charm against the evil eye. The dark brown seed of Mucuna pruriens or M. prurita, in English called Velvet Bean or Cowhage, its shape is that of an eye. Typically, it is strung on red string or a red and black beaded bracelet, and finished off with a plump red wool tassel. A holy Catholic saint print is glued on one side.
- * Cat’s-eye shells look like eyes and are worn in jewelry to send the eye back to the sender.
- * In Trinidad and Tobago, Abrus pecatoria, the toxic red and black seeds known as Jumbie Beads, Rosary Peas, or Lady Bug Beans, are fashioned into jewelry that wards off maljo and evil spirits.
- * Ajvan, also known as Ajwain, Ajowan Caraway, Carom, or Carum copticum is an herb related to Caraway, Cumin, and Fennel. In India, its tiny eye-shaped fruits are tied in a cloth or small bag and hung from the neck to ward off the evil eye. European Jews do the same with Fennel.
- * The Balm of Gilead, a small, eye-shaped Poplar bud, is valued as a charm against the evil eye in African-American conjure. A pair of these buds in a mojo handfosters love and protects lovers from jealousy.
- * Rue, a relative of the Lemon, repels the evil eye. In Naples a piece of the Rue plant, which has eye-shaped fruits, may be pinned to the clothes. Esphand or Aspand, called Syrian Rue, is an unrelated plant that also averts or cures the evil eye.
- * Sephardic and Mizhrahi Jews use a needle to string whole Clove buds on a thread by their "tails" and this is worn as a protective necklace by children.
- * Lemons stabbed with nails are used for the symbolic blinding of the evil eye, perhaps because the shape of a Lemon suggests an eye. Some people long needles instead of nails, but because needles have "eyes" where the thread goes through, their eyes are broken one by one before they are stabbed into the Lemon.
- * Garlic is effective against the evil eye because it is sharp and spicy and because its individual cloves look like eyes. Five cloves of garlic in a small cloth bag evokes the five fingers of the hamsa hand talisman. Braided strings of Garlic are hung in the kitchen near the back door to repel the eye, and also for use in cooking.
Credits
This page is brought to you by the AIRR Tech Team:
- Authors: catherine yronwode, Henri Gamache [Anne Fleitman]
- Contributors: Dr. Jeremy Weiss, nagasiva yronwode, Papa Newt
- Images: catherine yronwode, Miss Michaele, Charles M. Quinlan, Unknown Photographers; photo-edited by catherine yronwode
See Also
- Spiritual Supplies
- Hoodoo Roots and Herbs
- Hoodoo Candles and Lamps
- Hoodoo and Conjure Oils
- Hoodoo and Conjure Incense
- Hoodoo and Conjure Sachet Powders
- Hoodoo and Conjure Bath Products
- Hoodoo Washes and Waters
- Hoodoo Perfumes and Colognes
- Hoodoo Health Care and Beauty Products
- Hoodoo Food and Drink
- Hoodoo Stones and Minerals
- Hoodoo Amulets and Talismans
- Hoodoo and Conjure Altar Tools
- Hoodoo Petitions and Magical Papers
Learn Talisman and Amulet Magic from AIRR
 "Amulets, Charms, and Talismans in the Hoodoo and Conjure Tradition" with Papa Gee. Magic you can wear! |
 "Terrors of the Evil Eye Exposed" with Dr. Jeremy Weiss. Henri Gamache's 1946 course on how to ward off evil. |
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Pages in category "The Evil Eye"
The following 11 pages are in this category, out of 11 total.
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