Here's a news story about a spell from the African nation of Namibia the likes of which I've never seen before.
- Perform some sort of magical ceremony, the details of which have not yet been published, causing one of your cows to give birth to a strange creature resembling a human baby.
- Bury this (presumably dead) creature in the same place as the grave in which you previously buried your dead son.
- Magically acquire more cattle.
Does it work? I suppose we'll never know, since local law enforcement caught the would-be magician disturbing his son's grave and exhumed the "creature," probably a malformed calf of some sort.
Absent the particulars, it's hard to say for sure exactly what happened. A ritual could have been done, utilizing say a loa or deity or something else, and a petition made to allow something not typically allowed into this world to incarnate here by utilizing a pregnant or soon to be pregnant animal. If it was something really foreign, it could result in significant deformities. I would assume, however, if such a thing were allowed access after such a petition to something powerful enough to bring it into this world, it would also be born alive.
ReplyDeleteFrom there said creature may have been buried as an offering to a dead person or loa, or it may have been to seal it into the ground and utilize it to bring fortune. Utilizing a dead relative, as was done here, wouldn't be atypical in vodun practices.
I was a little dismayed to see the article refer to African Shamanism as a dark and mysterious art. It, and its Caribbean cousins, are full rich and cultured magickal practices and information which is often dismissed as either evil or con-artistry.