Friday, February 27, 2015

Such a choice

In order to counteract problems of this type [a curse being directed against you], a person had two management options. First, he or she could consign the rābiṣu to an associate demon that is equally “evil.” Because two negative beings, both hostile to life, naturally nullify each other, then the result enhances existence. It cuts off the evil and creates a blessing. A “medical text” from the same period affirms the notion…

The second strategy petitioned a deity who had power over these beings. The suppliant in the above “medical text” prays to Dumuzi: ‘Separate me from the Sentry, an evil demon who has attached itself to me to cut off my life’. A petitioner in another Neo-Assyrian text pleads with Marduk to eliminate a stalking ghost in the following manner: ‘Drive it away from my body, cut it off from my body, remove it from my body!’ Here a positive force, Marduk, is to attack a negative force, the ghost, by severing it from the victim’s person.— Cursed Are You!, pages 334–35

<idle musing>
Not exactly my idea of great options. No wonder Christianity had such an appeal...
</idle musing>

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