Ali and His Demons

This week I spent some time praying with Ali, a Turkish friend who has been a professing believer for a couple months. We meet at my house to read and pray and talk about our spiritual lives. I had been feeling like I should bring up the issue of demons and spiritual power so I asked him, "Have you had any experiences with demons?" The Turkish word I used is also the Muslim word for a kind of spirit being. Ali immediately started describing an oppression that he says he has endured for many years. "I feel like there is a specific demon that attacks me all the time," he said. "It makes me uncomfortable and interferes with my thoughts, especially after I have sinned and want to repent." He even described a physical symptom that occurs whenever the demon is attacking him: he yawns. I'm sure I don't have the invisible spirit world figured out. In fact, I don't think I know very much about it at all, but while he was telling this story he started to yawn quite a bit.

Ali went on to explain that he had been to a "hoca" (pronounced hoe-ja) four different times to try to rid himself of the demon. A hoca is something like a Muslim witch-doctor. The religious teachers at the mosque are usually very opposed to people going to visit hocas, but that doesn't stop people from going, especially to resolve issues like this one. The hoca, who has a reputation for having power over spirits, talked with Ali for a while and determined that someone had cast a spell on him. Ali took home a counter-spell, written by the hoca, and tied it around his neck as an amulet. The next day, according to Ali, the amulet disappeared. He says he didn't lose it, it didn't fall off, it just disappeared. When he went back to the hoca he was told that the demon had taken it. So, the hoca wrote another one for which Ali paid a token fee to the hoca. This one Ali kept in his wallet. It's effect was only supposed to last a couple months, but now, a year later, he still had it in his wallet.

Ali reached for his wallet, and as he unfolded the small piece of notebook paper, he yawned several times. The paper was beat-up and fading, but the handful of Arabic words written in pencil were still visible. Together with another believer who was sitting with us, I talked about spiritual powers, explaining that Jesus is the source of all good spiritual power, so that if we look outside of Jesus (to a hoca or magic spells based on the Qur'an for example) for control over demons, then we are actually consulting with Satan. In other words, by going to a hoca for a counter-spell for his demon problem, Ali was asking for help from the very enemy he was trying to be delivered from.

As part of the conversation we read the passage from Acts 19 about Paul's ministry in Ephesus:

"Many of those who believed now came and openly confessed their evil deeds. A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly. When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to fifty thousand drachmas. In this way the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power."

Eventually I brought a bowl and a lighter into the living room and placed them in front of Ali. We prayed together while Ali confessed to God that he had sinned by trusting in spells for deliverance. While we prayed he burned the spell that had been in his wallet. It was an exciting moment.

I don't think Ali's spiritual problems are solved, but it was an important step in the right direction.