Joy Online
The girl, Patricia, had practised witchcraft for five years and, practically overturned the fortunes of her family.
She was exorcised by Prophet Michael Osei of the Ebenezer Healing Church, Kasoa, after she delivered a live snake in the presence of hundreds of worshippers during an all-night service at the church's premises last month.
God revealed to the holy man that the spiritual pot belonging to Pat in her hometown, Achiase, would have to be exhumed before the witchcraft spirit allegedly given to her by a grandmother, would be totally off her.
Opposition came from the witches' camps in the area and the evil ones, according to the prophet, mounted a full spiritual and physical attack on him and his prayer warriors who went with him.
"When we reached the town, the first thing I saw was a 10-year-old-boy who was playing with his colleagues in an open space. He was walking about upside down, that is, his head was on the ground, his legs high in the air with fire coming out from his backside (anus).
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The Post
The incident took place in a district known for gold mining—Obuasi in the Ashanti Region. The "wizard" in question is a 17-year-old boy I will not name for ethical reasons even though he is named in the news report. Apparently, he was sitting on top of a tree in a forest when a James Ankrah, 37, opened fire on him with a shotgun, wounding him in both hands and his shoulders.
The only evidence of witchcraft was villager suspicion, no more.
But the facts are that the boy is still in hospital and his assailant is cooling his heels in a police cell awaiting trial for attempted murder.
I wondered: what fate awaits the teenager when he returns to his village? For sure, there will be no welcoming committee to drape a garland of flowers round his neck when he is discharged. Instead he might find a lynch mob, which is not uncommon in this part of the world.
In the same edition, The Spectator regaled readers with another bizarre report of an 11-year-old witch who was exorcised by a prophet from the Ebenezer Healing Church to a small village, also in the Ashanti Region. The prophet also exhumed a "spiritual pot" containing a snake which belonged to the girl. According to the report, she'd used the pot to impoverish the village and to cause the businesses of family members to fail.
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thejc.com
A renowned Israeli master of kabbalah, Rabbi Dovid Batzri, has attempted to remove a dybbuk, or disembodied spirit, from a Brazilian man via the internet.A video posted on Charedi website ladaat.net, shows Rabbi Batzri, surrounded by dozens of supporters, reciting kabbalistic verses and praying for the exorcism of the dybbuk. He connected with the possessed man via Skype.
According to another Charedi site, kikar.net, the story began when a Brazilian yeshivah student started shouting in shul that he could "smell many sins" and that "the end is very near".
Although he could only speak Portuguese, he was yelling in Hebrew and Yiddish, and "his lips did not move". The commotion caused the women of the unnamed synagogue to flee.
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BERNAMA.COM
KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 30 (Bernama) -- An Al-Arqam follower who is charged with murdering a couple admitted in the High Court here today that he had hit the victims with a piece of wood, crash helmet and mop handle to exorcise them.
The accused Muhammad Ilyas Abdul Razak, said he, however, had no intention of causing death to the couple as they were his uncle and aunt, and was unaware that his action during the exorcism would cause their deaths
"I had hit my uncle with a helmet and a piece of wood from a broken table. He did not protest, cry or say that he was in pain.
"I also asked my aunt to sit on the floor and hit her with a mop handle, the helmet and a detached table until she bled," Muhammad Ilyas said from the dock.
He said after the house had been cleaned of the blood spots, he ordered Muhammad Fauzi to pour hot water over the couple's motionless body to revive them.
"I had no intention of causing the death of my uncle and aunt as they were among the people closest to me and we loved each other. I only wanted to do good for them.
"Nobody, including my uncle and aunt, had restrained me and I only knew that they had died when the police came to arrest me," he said
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Smithsonian.com
Ah, the homeowners association, which dictates everything from the shape of your shrubs to the color of your house. Such meticulously planned communities are generally thought to be a modern phenomenon, but a recent archaeological excavation near England's Hamme-on-Rye unearthed a 14th-century document that suggests otherwise:
A covenant set to hand this Twelfth Day of June in the year of our Lord 1365 between the Manor by the Meadow Association of Freeholders and the owner in fee symple. Whereas the owner hath entered into this covenant in order to enjoye the especial liffestyle offered by the Manor and to avoid all unnecessary discord, the owner doth hereby acknowledge and acquiesce to certaine rules to ensure the faithful and serene enjoyment of the properties hereby governed, to witte:
...
Clinic
Manor doth operate a clinic at the barbershoppe to provide physic and the healing artes to all residents. Bledeing, leeches and the treatment of excess humours are available upon request. Herbes and medicines will be administered to those possessed of the supplementary potion plan. (Please note that neither exorcism nor treatment for curses is available on site.)
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Physorg.com
The 150 word neatly written fragment - discovered by Dr Renate Smithuis from The University of Manchester - describes a ceremony to dispel the evil spirit of Nissim Ben Bunya from his widow, Qamar Bat Rahma.
Dr Smithuis thinks the Hebrew document was most likely written in the eighteenth century and probably originated from Egypt or Palestine.
The fragment provides what is likely to be unique evidence of the prayer ritual's actual use in a synagogue.
It is one of the 11,000 manuscript fragments held at The University of Manchester's John Rylands Library - rescued from a 1000-year old storeroom - or Genizah - at the Ben Ezra synagogue in Cairo.
The fragment contains the second part of a prayer ritual in which the husband - or husband-to-be - of a widow recites an exorcism prayer, to which the other men gathered in the synagogue respond with a similar prayer.
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6minutes
Former directors of an evangelical Christian charity have admitted to falsely claiming their residential counselling program offered professional support from GPs and other health professionals.
A ruling from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has declared this claim to be a misrepresentation, saying the now-disbanded Mercy Ministries only allowed access to health professionals at the direct request from residents who were being treated for eating disorders, self harm, and the effects of drug, alcohol, physical and sexual abuse.
The 18-month ACCC investigation originated from complaints from former residents that exorcism and prayer were used to treat serious health problems.
Through a range of advertising the organisation also claimed to offer its services for free, however the ACCC found most residents were required to sign over their Centrelink payments for the duration of the treatment.
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AFP
LUSAKA — A former Zambian archbishop Saturday said he wanted the Roman Catholic Church to pay him pension for the 23 years he worked in Italy, after he was defrocked for consecrating married men as bishops.
Emmanuel Milingo, 79, who has practised exorcism and advocates optional celibacy for priests, told the private Radio Phoenix station he was still a fully ordained Catholic cleric.
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The Jewish Community Online
A fragment of a manuscript measuring 6in by 5in has lifted the veil over the long-vanished world of Jewish exorcism.
The fragment, containing 150 words of a handwritten Sephardi Hebrew prayer of exorcism from the 18th century, is almost certainly unique, according to the academic who discovered it.
Dr Renate Smithuis is the official cataloguer of Manchester’s John Rylands Library Geniza, a treasure trove of 11,000 manuscript fragments rescued from a 1,000-year-old storeroom at the Ben Ezra Synagogue in Cairo, now held at the University of Manchester.
Dr Smithuis, who has collaborated with Prof Gideon Bohak of Tel Aviv University, said: “This is not an account of an exorcism or a story, it is an actual exorcism ritual prayer with the names of the three people involved, recited in a synagogue. When you read it you feel almost as though you are in the synagogue. That’s what makes it so exciting.”
A ghostly trace of the Jewish Occult
Haaretz.com
The 150-word text provides a haunting insight into the often forgotten world of the Jewish occult. While exorcisms are frequently described in Jewish texts from the Middle Ages on, this appears to be the first text that provides the prayer used in a specific exorcism.
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Star-Telegram
The seven-member court, which handles civil and criminal nondeath penalty appeals from 12 counties, has ruled on a range of issues, from child custody to investment fraud, from whether Arlington had to refund street maintenance fee collections to whether a church could be held liable for a teenager’s injuries during an exorcism.
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AllAfrica.com
Among the Zambians was the controversial Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, who was summoned to Rome because of his exorcism of spirits and later excommunicated.
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Examiner.com
If these walls could talk - they might help explain why the Catholic Church ordered an exorcism in Hinsdale, New York, on February 14, 1974.
Father Alphonsus Trabold from nearby St. Bonaventure University and New York-based Psychic Alex Tanous ventured into what we now call the Hinsdale House. Fr. Trabold carried out the exorcism and Tanous conducted a "de-psyching" of the house.
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The image is of Terrance Cottrell. He was killed during his exorcism.
This article is intended as a call for the scientific investigation of exorcisms and a collection of data for a forthcoming article
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