Witchcraft

bingiza · Guru

Witchcraft

Ngwazi · Guru

Who will be there to oversee that those practicing witchcraft wont harm others?thats gonna be tricky!!

bingiza · Guru

People are afraid to come out coz its illegal, if given a chance to learn the trade my first task would be turn into the mythical robin hood and clean the banks clean (you know the story).

We love posting on Malawiana and some of us would love to be wizards so that we can convene and slut it out but coz its secret basi timangokanda.

abre les ojos · Guru

People this is the 21st century. There is no such thing as witchcraft. It is just illiterate to actually believe that it is possible to bewitch someone with herbs or furs of animals. That is just laughable superstition. How can you actually enforce a law whereby there is no way to prove it. How can you actually show evidence for it?

I still cannot believe how you seemingly educated people can have such pre-medieva views.

YTP · Guru

Here we go again!

YTP · Guru

Please let me know next time you are in malawi if you get time and willing to spend two nights or so at my pals home in Chileka.

The past two weeks prayers were being held for two hours every evening because the kids had found a new 'playground' which was accessible at night only and the activities were horrendous. And thats in Chileka.

I hope that that shall be proof enough since 'seeing is believing'

And education has nothing to do with it.

Ever heard of 'herbs' used for passing exams?

abre les ojos · Guru

YTP sometimes you sound like a total superstitious old lady from some village.

If herbs could help anyone pass exams we in Africa would be the most intelligent people in the world. How can a herb install knowledge in someone's mind who hasn't studied at all?

If there really were witches and wizards, even God we won't need science. We'll all just pray, won't we?

YTP · Guru

abre les ojos wrote:

YTP sometimes you sound like a total superstitious old lady from some village.

If herbs could help anyone pass exams we in Africa would be the most intelligent people in the world. How can a herb install knowledge in someone's mind who hasn't studied at all?

If there really were witches and wizards, even God we won't need science. We'll all just pray, won't we?

Lol you just made my day! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Gosh! Oh my word!!

YTP · Guru

What do you say though?

Ever heard of zithumwa and ndondocha?! Lol! Am still laughing!

You do want proof, don't you? Come on, don't be a spoil-sport now!

YTP · Guru

abre les ojos wrote:

YTP sometimes you sound like a total superstitious old lady from some village.

If there really were witches and wizards, even God we won't need science. We'll all just pray, won't we?

Am old, live in a village, etc, but that's beside the point Abres.

Am rather bewildered by your last paragraph though. Come again please?.

TT · Veteran Member

there was this malawian dude in sa and things were going so good ...untill anabeledwa wallet ...things started going bad ...panopa the dude is in malawi ...vuto lake ndilokuti the sing'anga that gave him chithumwa kicked the bucket .....ndiye basi panopa ma style anafoila

abre les ojos · Guru

TT wrote:

there was this malawian dude in sa and things were going so good ...untill anabeledwa wallet ...things started going bad ...panopa the dude is in malawi ...vuto lake ndilokuti the sing'anga that gave him chithumwa kicked the bucket .....ndiye basi panopa ma style anafoila

How people can blame misfortune or personal stupidity on external forces or spirits is beyond me. I guess people just like to relinquish responsibility for their own actions. Denial.

People say stuff like that TT all the time to me. I ask simple questions like "How"? I haven't yet received a sufficient answer yet.

TT · Veteran Member

beats me as well abre ....the most pathetic thing is that some pple cant live without it .its like they are helpless without mankhwala .................they believe in that ish hey...

bingiza · Guru

abre les ojos wrote:

People this is the 21st century. There is no such thing as witchcraft. It is just illiterate to actually believe that it is possible to bewitch someone with herbs or furs of animals. That is just laughable superstition. How can you actually enforce a law whereby there is no way to prove it. How can you actually show evidence for it?

I still cannot believe how you seemingly educated people can have such pre-medieva views.

Sometimes we live in denial of things that we know are happening within our midst. I am not a wizard nor do i have proof but all am saying is stories are all over all the time like a 4 yr old giving details of how he killed his mother yet they live 200 km apart and wasnt present when the mother died and has no access to any info on how it happened.

I know Abre will talk of science, man get this ku wenela kuja have you never seen those asingang'a ndi supa zawo akupanga masalamusi was that hoodwinking you? I bet not its something you cant explain even with science.

Where i come from in the north, there was a white man who was a doctor at Livingstonia mission hospital he was making the same claims as you do (mind you this is phoka land renowned for wizardly) three times i say three times they dumped him 5 km's away without any clothes with his science he couldnt decipher how it was done, what he did was he started consulting even on some illnesses and the phoka's were helping him if it was a case of witchcraft.

Science is good for a better understanding of some things but not everything can be told scientifically.

-- Edited by bingiza at 13:39, 2007-01-04

abre les ojos · Guru

Believe it or not EVERYTHING can be explained scientifically. Doesn't mean that science has already explained everything yet. But it is a work in progress. Science is simply a method of collating evidence and offering rational reasons for every occurrence. If something happens in this universe, rest assured that there is a rational explanation for it. It really is that simple. Everything is explainable by science.

We conveniently pick and choose the bits of scientific explanation we think sounds good as long as it doesn't contradict our preconceived prejudices or superstitions. We are happy to go to our doctors for medicine and not our preachers. But when the same scientists balk at witchcraft and demons and even try to explain evolution, we refuse to accept it. Sad or what?

Witchdoctors don't work. There is simply no verifiable evidence for it,

I remember a documentary a few years back about a little Russian girl who could apparently find tumours in sick people and cure them. She could see through people's diseases (or so she claimed).

Then of course the scientists came in to expose her to rigourous tests. She failed.

Evidence just seems to rain on people's parades. Sadly.

zonse · Newbie

In the bible, at the beginning of Jesus' ministry(thats the new testament) the only people who new that indeed Jesus was the son of God were the peolpe possesed by demonds. So you see in this ufiti case only the belivers, born agains etc..... can really tell you more about it.Because if it didnt exist they wouldnt be praying so hard.

Dont just say that it isnt there just coz ndi za anthu akuda ku Africa what about voodoo in south America?

abre les ojos · Guru

zonse wrote:

In the bible, at the beginning of Jesus' ministry(thats the new testament) the only people who new that indeed Jesus was the son of God were the peolpe possesed by demonds. So you see in this ufiti case only the belivers, born agains etc..... can really tell you more about it.Because if it didnt exist they wouldnt be praying so hard.

Dont just say that it isnt there just coz ndi za anthu akuda ku Africa what about voodoo in south America?

Oh please. You actually take some old pre-medieval text written thousands of years ago as honest truth? You people sound so uneducated it is pretty scary.

What witch-craft. Show me evidence - All I want is evidence. Not hearsay, not ancient literature. Not superstitious belief. EVIDENCE.

Let me get this straight.You said if it didn't exist they wouldn't be praying so hard. Well, maybe the reason the are praying is because it doesn't. You don't prayer when something is evidential. For example you don't need to pray for gravity or the sun to rise in the morning. And no amount of prayer can change it.

There in so such thing as Voodoo. It is always hearsay isn't it?

YTP · Guru

Methiks! The man doth protest too much!

abre les ojos · Guru

YTP wrote:

Methiks! The man doth protest too much!

As you know I feel strongly about irrational beliefs. I'm not saying Zodiac signs fear of the number 13 - those have little or no consequences. But the belief in witches and devils effect societies in extreme ways. People still get burnt in public squares in Africa for being witches.Intelligent, educated adult still believe that it is possible to bewitch someone with herbs and twigs. I mean, just read through some of the stuff you people are writing on this here thread.

YTP · Guru

Oh whatever.

mavuto · Newbie

interesting conversation ... sorry it ends with 'whatever'!!!

i'm with Guru all the way - wake up, people!! my 7 year old daughter showed me a 'magic trick' this morning, and i couldn't figure out how it was done. she got it from kids TV and when she showed me how, it was very simple. in Malawi she wouldn't dare show it to her friends in case she was branded as mfiti. ever seen Penn and Teller? or David Blaine? very clever tricks. NOT WITCHCRAFT just tricks. just because we can't see how it's done, doesn't make it witchcraft! most 'witchraft' is simply sleight of hand (pickpockets, not magicall disappearing of wallets) or medicine (virus, not ill-will from a witch). I'm sure some mankhwala works - after all, most modern medicines are based on natural plant extracts (aspirin is from tree bark). but it's not magic - we just haven't analysed it properly yet! the real danger - and it really is dangerous - is the BELIEF in witchcraft. this belief results in stonings of innocent people - even children - and some terrible murders (for body parts to protect people from witchcraft).

abre les ojos · Guru

I couldn't agree with you more. Penn and Teller actually have a show called BULL**** that debunks all of these so-called beliefs. They should know, they do "magic" for a living.

Africans have a long history of superstition. Probably the reason Christianity easily caught on and is still spreading as it declines here in Europe. I think the US is probably the only country in the west with such levels of superstition.

I agree with you point about herbs. The Natives in South America discovered quinine thousands of years ago and used it. Of course they didn't know the chemical composition of it and how is killed the malaria parasite. They thought it was some evil spirit or something. Same applies to quite a lot of African medicine.

I'll like to see a preacher or Imam or witch doctor cure AIDS or make a severed limb grow.