ray of sunshine

fyi

//iranian.com/main/blog/nur/white-magic-ruhaniya

thank you!

i want to thank you very much for posting that information. i found it fascinating and would definitely love to read more about this subject. as i said, i did not realize how prevalent it is in that area of the world. thanks for your time in posting your reply.

Long history of magical practice, sorcery & shamanism in Iran

There is a long, long and well established history of the practice of magic, sorcery and shamanism in Iran, both in the pre-Islamic period as well as the Islamic period - which includes both the conventional use of magical incantations, squares and rituals as well as the utilization of certain plants and herbs. I think I might make a blog of this at some point, since I am a practitioner myself.

Without getting into the intricate history, note that the use of the Syrian Rue (peganum harmala), known by all Persians in its form as Esphand, has a long history of magical/occult usage. The smoke from the Esphand is widely known amongst practitioners as the ultimate repellent for dark and evil spirits. For someone known to be demonically possessed, the dried seeds are either crushed or brewed into a tea and given orally to be ingested. Note that there is a consensus that the Syrian Rue is one of the components that made up the ancient Haoma brew - which the Prophet Zarathushtra was apparently high priest to - and which would have been some kind of a psychoactive concoction much like the Amazonian Ayahuasca one of whose plant ingredients BTW includes the same properties as the Syrian Rue.

During the Islamic period, and up to the present time, the practioners of (white) magic and shamanism have been concentrated mainly amongst the Sufis and the Sufi orders. Throughout the Islamic world this knowledge and practice is known as either ruhaniya (literally 'spirituality' but meaning 'white magic') or 'ilm'ul-hikma ('science of Wisdom'). This is to be contrasted to black magic and sorcery, which is properly sihr.

What we see in the footage is basically a mild, but typical, ritual of exorcism. With the Sufis of Kurdistan - particularly the Qadiris - it gets even more elaborate and wild.

In any case, I've written about the theoretical aspects of this area, here.

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