Illness and misfortune: practices that mark them

What people do when someone falls ill or luck turns: consult, cleanse, ward.

Illness and misfortune are the moments when people most often turn to magic. When someone falls ill, a business fails, a child is lost or luck turns, families ask why, and consult a healer, diviner, priest or mediums. Examples include the Mexican limpia, the African consultation of a diviner, the Islamic ruqyah, the Hindu or Buddhist temple rites, the Korean gut and the Catholic blessing of the sick. This page covers the pattern and its risks. It is not medical advice, and illness needs real medical care.

Why and who

Many traditions ask two questions: how did this happen, and why to me? A medical account answers the first. Traditional systems often address the second, linking misfortune to relationships, envy, taboo or spirits. A consultation then names a cause and a remedy, which may involve cleansing, offerings, protective objects or a ceremony. A diviner may be consulted, a healer called, a priest asked to pray or a shrine visited, and in many households several of these happen at once.

Help and hope

Rites of crisis bring people together, give a role to the family and offer hope when treatment is limited. Researchers have documented comfort and reduced distress after ritual. Many people use medicine and ritual together, and many healers support that. The pattern becomes dangerous only when ritual displaces treatment. Many practitioners also give practical advice about rest, diet and family conflict, and some of this advice is sound and some is not.

Blame and exploitation

Crisis also creates a market for fear. Fraudulent healers tell clients they are cursed and sell expensive cleansing. Accusations of witchcraft often follow illness, with violence against the accused. Exorcism of people with mental illness has caused injuries and deaths, including documented cases in churches in several countries. In some societies, a bad event is the signal for a ritual of the whole community, with confession, reconciliation and shared offerings.

Care and context

Public health programmes now involve community healers in work on issues such as HIV, maternal health and mental health, since many people consult them first. Scholars of medical anthropology call this a plural system of care. The sensible approach is to seek qualified medical help promptly and treat other support as company. Public health bodies urge anyone with a serious illness or injury to seek a clinician at once, and to treat traditional help as complementary to that care and never as a replacement for it.

Illness and misfortune on EveryJaadu

The entries written up so far, best known first.

RegionSouth Asia Southeast Asia East Asia Central Asia and the Caucasus Middle East North Africa Sub-Saharan Africa Europe North America Latin America and the Caribbean Oceania

KindTradition Rite Charm Oracle Substance Being Figure Text Illusion Belief

PurposeProtection Healing Seeing and foretelling Luck and prosperity Love and attraction Cursing and harm Cleansing and purification Speaking with spirits and the dead Change and initiation Binding and oaths Power and authority Wonder and entertainment

WhoShamans Folk healers Priests and ritual specialists Witches, sorcerers and cunning folk Diviners and readers Mediums and the possessed Ceremonial magicians and alchemists Households and ordinary people Stage magicians Scholars and sceptics

BeliefHindu and Tantric Buddhist Jain Muslim and Sufi Jewish Christian Sikh Zoroastrian Shinto and Taoist Indigenous and shamanic African and Afro-diasporic Pagan and Neopagan Esoteric and occult Folk and village custom Secular and stage Other traditions

StandingLiving Revived Fading Historical Legendary Performed

OrderBest known A to Z Newest Living first

🇨🇺 Cuba and 4 moreSanteríaRegla de Ocha An Afro-Cuban religion blending Yoruba spirits with Catholic saintsTradition · Protection · Healing Living

🇭🇹 Haiti and 2 moreHaitian VodouVodou An Afro-Haitian religion blending West African traditions with Catholicism and FreemasonryTradition · Protection · Healing Living

🇲🇽 Mexico and 3 moreCurandero A folk healer in Latin America and the United States who blends indigenous and Catholic traditions.Tradition · Healing · Protection Living

🇯🇲 Jamaica and 5 moreObeah A Caribbean tradition of ritual healing and spell-casting with African rootsTradition · Protection · Healing Living

🇪🇹 Ethiopia and 4 moreBudaቡዳ An Ethiopian and Eritrean belief in the evil eye and hyena transformationBelief · Cursing and harm · Protection Living

🇨🇫 Central African Republic and 5 moreWitchcraft in Africa Beliefs about supernatural harm and the social responses to accusations across the continentBelief · Cursing and harm · Protection Living

🇪🇬 Egypt and 3 moreEx-voto A gift left in a shrine to mark a vow kept or a miracle receivedCharm · Protection · Healing Living

🇬🇧 United Kingdom and 4 moreCunning folk European practitioners of folk medicine and helpful magic from the Middle Ages to the twentieth centuryTradition · Protection · Healing Historical

🇳🇿 New Zealand and 5 moreFace tattoo Marks inked on the face for spiritual protection, identity, rank, and rite of passageTradition · Protection · Power and authority Living 🇺🇸 United StatesBraucherei A Pennsylvania German folk healing tradition using prayers and gestures to cure illness and remove curses.Tradition · Healing · Protection Fading

🇺🇸 United States and 3 moreHoodoo A spiritual tradition of the African diaspora in the American South using herbs and charms for protection and justice.Tradition · Protection · Healing Living

🇬🇹 Guatemala and 3 moreMaya religion The living spiritual practices of the Maya peoples, shaped by centuries of contact with Catholicism.Tradition · Protection · Healing Living

🇬🇷 Greece and 5 moreVotive offering Objects left in sacred places to honor a deity or fulfill a vow, never to be recovered.Tradition · Protection · Healing Living

🇹🇹 Trinidad and Tobago and 4 moreTrinidad Orisha A syncretic Afro-Caribbean faith blending Yoruba spirit work with Christian and other traditions in Trinidad.Tradition · Speaking with spirits and the dead · Healing Living

🇪🇬 Egypt and 5 moreAmulet A portable object worn or carried to ward off harm and invite protection.Charm · Protection · Healing Living

🇪🇬 Egypt and 5 moreAfrican divination Methods used across the continent to understand present realities and predict future events.Oracle · Seeing and foretelling · Healing Living

🇬🇧 United Kingdom and 1 moreMagic in Anglo-Saxon Englandgaldorcræft Healing charms and protective rituals practiced by early English tribesTradition · Healing · Protection Historical

🇮🇹 Italy and 1 morePalladiumΠαλλάδιον (Palladion) A wooden statue of Athena said to protect cities, stolen from Troy and brought to Rome.Charm · Protection Historical 🇧🇬 Bulgaria and 5 moreApocryphal prayer A folk prayer text blending church forms with apocrypha and incantations for protection and healingText · Protection · Healing Living 🇫🇮 Finland and 1 moreFrog coffin A Finnish folk magic burial of a frog in a tiny coffin to steal luck or reflect harmRite · Protection · Cursing and harm Historical

🇫🇮 Finland and 2 moreTietäjä A traditional Finnic healer and sage whose power came from memorised spells and deep knowledge.Figure · Healing · Protection Historical

🇮🇹 ItalySegnature An Italian folk healing rite using gestures and prayers to cure illness and remove cursesRite · Healing · Protection Living

🇿🇦 South Africa and 1 moreSacred caves of the Basotho Cave networks in South Africa and Lesotho used by the Basotho for ancestral rituals and healingTradition · Healing · Protection Living

🇬🇷 Greece and 3 morePalladium A sacred image or object believed to guarantee the safety of a city or nationCharm · Protection Historical 🇫🇷 FranceTempestarii Medieval figures accused of controlling storms and the beliefs surrounding them.Belief · Cursing and harm · Protection Historical

Photo credits on this page

The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.

Maya mythology: Unknown author, Public domain, source
Bald's Leechbook: Unknown, the Internet Archive scan is low quality, and some of the tex, Public domain, source
Folk healer: calliopejen, CC BY-SA 2.0, source
Haitian Vodou: Sam Fentress, CC BY-SA 2.0, source
Amulet: Anonymous ( Egypt ) Unknown author, Public domain, source
European witchcraft: Unknown author, CC BY 4.0, source
Egungun: Ìṣẹ̀ṣeAssembly, CC BY-SA 4.0, source
Obeah: Various, published by David Nutt, Public domain, source
Buda: Aberdeen Bestiary, Public domain, source
Segnature: SeAnstapa, CC0, source
Sacred caves of the Basotho: JMK, CC BY-SA 3.0, source
Palladium: Marie-Lan Nguyen ( Jastrow ), Public domain, source
Ex-voto: JTSH26, CC BY-SA 4.0, source
Tietäjä: Robert Wilhelm Ekman, Public domain, source
Cunning folk: Midnightblueowl at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, source
Face tattoo: Gottfried Lindauer, Public domain, source
African divination: Unknown author, CC BY 4.0, source
Hoodoo: Hoodoowoman, CC BY-SA 4.0, source
Votive offering: Walter J. Pilsak, Waldsassen ( W.J.Pilsak at de.wikipedia ), CC BY-SA 3.0, source
Santería: Jorge Royan, CC BY-SA 3.0, source