WEBVTT - All In Your Head 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:06.480 Yah. Welcome to the Hidden Gin, a production of I 0:00:06.600 --> 0:00:30.720 Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Minkey. Before 0:00:30.720 --> 0:00:34.480 we begin this week, a gentle word of warning. There 0:00:34.479 --> 0:00:38.120 are references to sexual assault in this episode, so please 0:00:38.360 --> 0:00:43.080 proceed with care. Decades ago, I knew a family that 0:00:43.200 --> 0:00:45.960 lived in my mother's town that had three young daughters. 0:00:46.720 --> 0:00:49.159 The lady of the house was a close friend of 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:51.720 my mother's, and so, in other words, she was kind 0:00:51.760 --> 0:00:54.040 of an auntie to us, and every so often Auntie 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:56.520 would drop bif for a visit, bringing boxes of homemade 0:00:56.520 --> 0:00:59.200 sweets or a platter of rice or some little treat 0:00:59.280 --> 0:01:02.600 to share over a cup of hot gi and oftentimes 0:01:02.600 --> 0:01:05.200 whatever her daughters would come with her. The eldest was 0:01:05.240 --> 0:01:08.520 maybe around twenty and the youngest was an early teen. 0:01:09.440 --> 0:01:12.120 For years, though I never met the third daughter, the 0:01:12.160 --> 0:01:15.880 middle one. Once in a while Auntie would mention her name, 0:01:16.319 --> 0:01:19.000 she would ask my mother for prayers, say something in 0:01:19.040 --> 0:01:23.280 passing about her doing better or worse. One day, after 0:01:23.280 --> 0:01:26.080 she left, my mother sat shaking her head, looking deeply 0:01:26.160 --> 0:01:29.600 sad about whatever Auntie had shared with her, and I asked, 0:01:29.600 --> 0:01:33.640 what's wrong. My mother took a deep sigh and responded 0:01:34.120 --> 0:01:37.800 she thinks her daughter has a gin. That's when I 0:01:37.800 --> 0:01:40.199 finally learned that the third daughter, the one I never saw, 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:43.480 had an entire host of what her parents understood to 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:46.800 be symptoms of either the evil Eye or gin possession, 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:50.560 or a combination of the two. But my mother explained 0:01:50.600 --> 0:01:53.240 to me it was just as possible that the daughter 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:56.480 had mental health or medical issues if she did, though, 0:01:56.880 --> 0:02:01.240 Auntie wasn't prepared to accept it and seek professional advice. Instead, 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:05.520 she saw it help elsewhere, soliciting prayers and charms from 0:02:05.560 --> 0:02:09.120 spiritual healers, hoping something would drive away the demons that 0:02:09.200 --> 0:02:12.040 caused a young girl to lash out, that kept her 0:02:12.080 --> 0:02:15.800 tongue tied and frustrated, that kept her afflicted, suffering, and 0:02:15.880 --> 0:02:19.320 isolated from the rest of the world. But nothing worked. 0:02:20.840 --> 0:02:22.600 My mother tried to counsel her to take the girl 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:25.600 to see a doctor, or a psychologist, or even a psychiatrist, 0:02:25.639 --> 0:02:29.400 but the advice didn't land. Auntie was convinced that someone 0:02:29.480 --> 0:02:32.120 had put a curse on her daughter, a curse for 0:02:32.200 --> 0:02:36.200 a gin to torment her. At some point, maybe a 0:02:36.240 --> 0:02:38.360 few years after I first got to know Aunty, I 0:02:38.440 --> 0:02:42.200 finally met that third daughter. She was sweet and kind, 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:45.680 shy and mostly quiet, But though when she did speak, 0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:49.720 her words were halting and repetitive. I didn't get a 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:53.120 sense that she was haunted or tormented by anything. But 0:02:53.200 --> 0:02:55.680 one thing was painfully clear to me and to anyone 0:02:55.720 --> 0:02:58.760 else who might be familiar with the condition. The young 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:04.880 woman was tistic. So what happens when developmental or mental 0:03:04.880 --> 0:03:09.880 health issues, physical disabilities, disease, chronic illness, emotional disregulation, or 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:14.160 any one of hundreds of physiological and psychological conditions that 0:03:14.280 --> 0:03:18.600 human beings experience is understood through the lens of the supernatural. 0:03:19.680 --> 0:03:21.799 How do you know whether you're suffering from a treatable 0:03:21.800 --> 0:03:24.880 condition or you've been struck by a gin? Is the 0:03:24.919 --> 0:03:28.920 affliction in the psyche or in the soul? While the 0:03:28.960 --> 0:03:31.720 lines have been blurred throughout history, and today we'll explore 0:03:31.760 --> 0:03:34.880 what it looks like over the centuries when medicine, psychology, 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:39.720 and the supernatural cross paths. I'm Robbia Audrey, and I'll 0:03:39.760 --> 0:03:42.160 be your guide into the ancient world of the hidden gin. 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:59.760 Welcome stars are the celestial doubles of human beings. Jin 0:04:00.080 --> 0:04:03.480 milliars are their underground doubles, and the leaves of the 0:04:03.520 --> 0:04:07.320 trees of paradise are their doubles in paradise. When human 0:04:07.360 --> 0:04:10.160 beings are sick, the jin double is sick with the 0:04:10.240 --> 0:04:13.840 same sickness. His star pales, and the leaf of the 0:04:13.880 --> 0:04:18.039 tree of Paradise yellows and curls. At the hour of death, 0:04:18.480 --> 0:04:21.840 the jin dies first, the star falls from the sky 0:04:21.920 --> 0:04:25.000 as a shooting star, and the leaf detaches from the 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:33.160 Tree of Paradise. That is from a collection of cosmology 0:04:33.200 --> 0:04:38.120 collected in Marrakesh, Morocco that documented, among other things, the 0:04:38.200 --> 0:04:42.120 belief that the human condition exists in several planes at once, 0:04:42.800 --> 0:04:47.039 and whatever it goes through, whatever it experiences, is experienced 0:04:47.040 --> 0:04:51.560 by corresponding entities linked intimately to each of us. For 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:54.760 every person a leaf on the tree of Paradise, a 0:04:54.839 --> 0:04:58.040 star in the heavens, and a gin in the underworld. 0:04:58.920 --> 0:05:01.720 The gin will live, get sick, and die with us. 0:05:02.760 --> 0:05:05.080 But what about the gin who actually make us sick? 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:09.040 According to a book titled The Gin and Human Sickness, 0:05:09.560 --> 0:05:13.400 an entire host of conditions can and are attributed to Gin, 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:20.960 including depression, anxiety, epilepsy, personality disorders, psychiatric breaks with reality. Now, 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:23.680 the movements of the Gin in and upon the human 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:27.360 body can't really be tracked. Because the dinner created as 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:31.359 smokeless fire and energy that cannot be contained, they're able 0:05:31.400 --> 0:05:36.920 to move with our bloodstream itself. They say. There are 0:05:36.920 --> 0:05:40.440 two ways in which gin physically afflict human beings. They 0:05:40.440 --> 0:05:44.960 can either strike a person or possess a person. Striking 0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:47.960 a person could mean sudden paralysis or blindness, or any 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:51.200 other physical condition that just appears out of nowhere, or 0:05:51.240 --> 0:05:53.720 even a more literal strike, like suddenly you lost all 0:05:53.760 --> 0:05:56.120 your hearing in one ear. Maybe it was because the 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:58.960 gin slapped you on that side of the head. But 0:05:59.080 --> 0:06:01.599 you must be asking yourself why would any gin be 0:06:01.640 --> 0:06:04.839 bothered enough to strike a person. More often than not, 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:09.360 it's because the gin was offended or disrespected, knowingly or unknowingly. 0:06:10.440 --> 0:06:13.800 Urinating the wrong spot, let's say, in a shadowy corner 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:17.839 a gin called home could incurage. Wrath or wearing the 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:20.320 wrong color and the wrong place the wrong time might 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:23.400 anger a gin, and you might really peeve one off 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:29.680 if you disrespect it by rejecting the existence of gin altogether. Sometimes, though, 0:06:29.680 --> 0:06:32.560 the affliction is actually a way to connect a gin 0:06:32.680 --> 0:06:36.320 to a person, a means of establishing first contact, you 0:06:36.320 --> 0:06:41.000 could say, and shaking that contact isn't always easy, but 0:06:41.080 --> 0:06:43.520 for thousands of years there have been healers and magicians 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:48.159 to help take care of such bothersome attachments. It seems 0:06:48.160 --> 0:06:51.160 that the idea that illness stems from and therefore requires 0:06:51.360 --> 0:06:56.360 spiritual or supernatural interventions, is as old as history itself. 0:06:58.520 --> 0:07:01.680 Unto the side of the water, or have drawn nigh, 0:07:01.920 --> 0:07:05.760 casting a woeful fever upon his body. A bane of 0:07:05.839 --> 0:07:09.159 evil had settled on his body, and evil disease on 0:07:09.279 --> 0:07:12.600 his body. They have cast an evil plague had settled 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:15.560 on his body, Evil venom on his body. They have 0:07:15.680 --> 0:07:20.400 cast an evil curse had settled on his body. Evil 0:07:20.640 --> 0:07:24.080 and sin on his body. They have cast venom and 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:30.840 wickedness have settled upon him. This priestly Assyrian chant, as 0:07:30.960 --> 0:07:34.559 thousands of years old, a litany of the many ways 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:38.440 evil spirits attacked some poor soul. And the doctors of 0:07:38.480 --> 0:07:42.200 ancient times were in fact the healers and the magicians, 0:07:42.240 --> 0:07:47.600 and the priests, sometimes indistinguishable between any of them. They 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:49.520 were the ones who were called upon to help heal 0:07:49.600 --> 0:07:53.560 the sick. With little space between medicine, religion, and magic, 0:07:54.760 --> 0:07:58.240 these healer magicians were regarded by society as honored warriors 0:07:58.600 --> 0:08:01.680 waging war against un seen forces on the battlefield of 0:08:01.720 --> 0:08:05.600 the human body. They wielded an array of tools. Each 0:08:05.600 --> 0:08:10.160 instrument specialized to deal with whatever demon was causing the sickness, 0:08:10.200 --> 0:08:13.559 and also used chance, spells and rituals to drive away 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:17.160 the forces of illness. But how did they know which 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:20.960 demon it was and what tools to use, Well, it's 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:24.040 pretty simple. It all depended on which part of the 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:28.240 body was ailing. The symptoms of whatever ailment a person 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:33.360 was struck with themselves gave rise to the diagnosis. For example, 0:08:33.559 --> 0:08:37.839 a painful throat pointed to Utuku, the demon jin, who 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:42.280 well lived to attack human throats fevers. You're dealing with 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:46.920 a suku skin disease. The demon Rabisu was the culprit. 0:08:48.040 --> 0:08:51.840 The ancient Greeks likewise, believed both that evil spirits could 0:08:51.840 --> 0:08:55.040 cause every matter of sickness, but also that there were 0:08:55.080 --> 0:08:57.720 gods you could turn to for healing, so it kind 0:08:57.760 --> 0:09:00.880 of balanced it out. And sometimes times the evil spirits 0:09:00.960 --> 0:09:03.520 themselves began to be worshiped as gods as a way 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:07.959 to appease them through rituals of praise and even blood sacrifice. 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:13.760 For example, there's the demigod al Maharik. He was a fierce, 0:09:13.880 --> 0:09:17.160 angry and ancient pre Islamic god that was worshiped in 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:20.360 parts of the Middle East. His name means the one 0:09:20.400 --> 0:09:24.040 who burns, and he lords over a crimson throne read 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:27.480 as flames. Al Moharak was known to be a god 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:31.000 of the underworld, and much like his Babylonian counterpart, the 0:09:31.040 --> 0:09:35.120 god Nergill, he was a deity of disease, but al 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:40.320 Moharak didn't just attack one person. His wrath was more efficient. 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:44.840 You could say Al Moharak sent plagues to sickened entire regions, 0:09:45.440 --> 0:09:48.160 and later his legend morphed into him being the Jin 0:09:48.440 --> 0:09:53.199 of plagues and pestilence. According to Ottoman mystics, the Jin 0:09:53.400 --> 0:09:57.240 afflicted humans with the plague and other epidemics by piercing 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:00.400 them with the tip of a disease ridden spear or arrow. 0:10:01.920 --> 0:10:05.640 Treatises written in the fifteenth and sixteenth century also share 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:08.679 that sometimes these plagues are spread by the direct command 0:10:08.920 --> 0:10:12.120 of Satan himself, who directs his legions of Gin to 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:17.439 go rampaging against hapless humans. But according to the same treatises, 0:10:17.760 --> 0:10:21.280 there is a way to protect yourself if the plague 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:24.480 is a war on man said by Satan, man can 0:10:24.520 --> 0:10:27.600 fight back by invoking a powerful name of God against 0:10:27.640 --> 0:10:32.120 the disease. A famous Turkish historian scholar by the name 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:36.640 of Tasco Prosiati prescribed the following for protection against the 0:10:36.679 --> 0:10:41.480 plague carrying gin. Repeat Albaki, a name of God that 0:10:41.520 --> 0:10:44.960 means the everlasting a hundred and thirty six times a day, 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:50.439 and no such jin could touch you. Tesco Prosati wrote 0:10:50.440 --> 0:10:52.640 about a story in which a group of students living 0:10:52.640 --> 0:10:56.040 in Kaskar, a city on the Silk Road bordering Afghanistan, 0:10:56.559 --> 0:10:59.880 saw frightening shadows on a wall. The shadows were of 0:11:00.000 --> 0:11:03.559 figures carrying arrows, but was more frightening was that there 0:11:03.640 --> 0:11:06.280 was nothing in the room to actually cast the shadows, 0:11:06.800 --> 0:11:10.240 which could only mean one thing. The figures were gin 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:13.920 and the tips of the arrows they carried were poisoned 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:17.040 with plague. The students were told to write down the 0:11:17.080 --> 0:11:19.720 powerful names of God on pieces of paper as a 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:23.720 talisman to protect themselves. According to the story, those who 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:29.840 followed instructions were saved and those who didn't perished. Hundreds 0:11:29.840 --> 0:11:34.480 of similar prayerful invocations are prescribed throughout Islamic Plague treatises 0:11:34.480 --> 0:11:38.240 from that time, and likewise Christian and Jewish writings reflect 0:11:38.240 --> 0:11:42.559 the same ideas and even language. Take for example, Psalm nine, 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:47.280 a prayer that reads, you who live in the shelter 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:49.439 of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of 0:11:49.440 --> 0:11:52.719 the Almighty, will say to the Lord, my refuge and 0:11:52.800 --> 0:11:56.000 my fortress, my God, and whom I trust. For he 0:11:56.040 --> 0:11:58.280 will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:01.800 from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his opinions, 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:05.240 and under his wings you will find refuge. His faithfulness 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:07.960 is a shield and buckler. You will not fear the 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:11.520 terror of night, or the arrow that flies by day, 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:15.199 or the pestilence that stalks and darkness, or the destruction 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:21.080 that wastes at noonday. While Muslims, Christians, and Jews have 0:12:21.240 --> 0:12:24.439 always had much in common to discuss and interfect gatherings, 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:27.920 having a shared belief in dark, evil forces that shoot 0:12:28.040 --> 0:12:31.600 arrows of disease probably comes as a surprise to many 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:44.840 of us on the subject of physical ailments. If there's 0:12:44.880 --> 0:12:47.880 every convenient time to blame a gin, it's when the 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:52.640 issue is well a deeply personal one. In two thousand 0:12:52.720 --> 0:12:55.960 and eighteen, a medical journal published a piece by a 0:12:56.040 --> 0:12:59.520 doctor from the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the 0:12:59.600 --> 0:13:05.320 Health Medical Center in Dubai entitled quote Infertility Caused by Gin. 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:10.160 This same doctor, Dr Amira Bajirova, had previously written an 0:13:10.240 --> 0:13:13.319 article for the Archives of Sexual Reproductive and Health titled 0:13:13.400 --> 0:13:19.320 quote infertility caused by decreased oxygen utilization and GIN. Now, 0:13:19.360 --> 0:13:22.000 I was as surprised as you define such pieces in 0:13:22.080 --> 0:13:26.360 recent medical journals, But such is the power of spiritual belief. 0:13:27.480 --> 0:13:30.120 Now that thesis of these pieces is that evil gin 0:13:30.320 --> 0:13:33.480 take no greater pleasure than they do in wrecking marriages 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:37.680 through all kinds of means, like causing and medie between 0:13:37.679 --> 0:13:43.120 spouses over finances, disputes over family issues, lessening their attraction 0:13:43.200 --> 0:13:46.320 for each other, or just making them irritable and hateful 0:13:46.360 --> 0:13:49.200 to each other. But if none of that works, they 0:13:49.200 --> 0:13:55.520 can take more direct action to like causing sexual disorders, miscarriages, impotence, 0:13:55.640 --> 0:14:01.439 premature ejaculation, early menopause, and yes, infertility. Sometimes the gin 0:14:01.559 --> 0:14:03.319 might do it on their own, but more often than 0:14:03.360 --> 0:14:08.000 not they cause these problems because someone, a rival or enemy, 0:14:08.440 --> 0:14:11.480 has summoned them with black magic to destroy the happy 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:14.360 life of a couple that they want to harm. The 0:14:14.480 --> 0:14:17.960 articles come complete with very official looking charts and lists 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:21.600 dozens of sexual and reproductive disorders that might be inflicted 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:24.880 by the gin or could be actual symptoms of being 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:27.640 possessed by one. And there are a number of very 0:14:27.640 --> 0:14:30.960 interesting cases presented in these pieces, like the one in 0:14:31.000 --> 0:14:34.600 which a patient suffering from polycystic ovaries failed to follow 0:14:34.640 --> 0:14:38.720 the doctor's instructions and then disappeared for a couple of years. 0:14:38.720 --> 0:14:41.840 She then returned to the doctor after a frightening experience. 0:14:42.720 --> 0:14:44.480 She was standing in front of a mirror one night 0:14:44.520 --> 0:14:48.160 applying lipstick when suddenly a bright red patch appeared in 0:14:48.200 --> 0:14:53.000 her clothing below her pelvis. She was bleeding heavily, and 0:14:53.080 --> 0:14:55.400 it wasn't clear whether it was menstrual blood or not. 0:14:56.240 --> 0:14:59.400 Whatever it was, it shocked her into returning for medical treatment. 0:15:00.360 --> 0:15:03.440 The case summary in the article concludes, and a quote 0:15:04.040 --> 0:15:07.480 mirror attracts the gin. The gin is circulating in the body, 0:15:07.960 --> 0:15:11.080 settles in the womb and opens the uterine vessels, causing 0:15:11.120 --> 0:15:15.920 abnormal bleeding. The doctor also had a theory behind male 0:15:15.960 --> 0:15:20.120 impotence and other sexual dysfunction. This happens apparently when a 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:23.240 female gin. Well, the doctor conceded that maybe a male 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:27.240 gin too was sexually attracted to a human male and 0:15:27.320 --> 0:15:30.400 messed with his system so he could neither find satisfaction 0:15:31.000 --> 0:15:35.440 or give satisfaction to another human partner. Talk about being 0:15:35.520 --> 0:15:39.680 possessive anyhow. If that caught your ear, don't worry. We'll 0:15:39.720 --> 0:15:42.480 be getting into the phenomena of human gen relationships in 0:15:42.480 --> 0:15:47.240 a later episode. But spoiler alert, the relationships aren't always voluntary. 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:52.440 Getting back to the connection between evil forces and sexual 0:15:52.480 --> 0:15:55.520 and reproductive issues, we have to keep this in mind. 0:15:56.440 --> 0:15:59.320 One effective way to lessen the stigma of these conditions 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:04.120 and lesson the personal blame some might ascribe themselves, maybe 0:16:04.120 --> 0:16:07.520 to find an external cause when it's black magic, the 0:16:07.520 --> 0:16:10.320 evil eye, or a wicked gin. It affords a bit 0:16:10.360 --> 0:16:13.080 of protection to those who might otherwise be mistreated by 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:16.960 their partners or families or society for failing to fulfill 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:21.960 their obligation to go forth and multiply. It's ironic, actually, 0:16:22.000 --> 0:16:25.640 that such proscriptions might just be a compassionate way of 0:16:25.760 --> 0:16:29.560 letting people off the hook, including medical and health professionals. 0:16:30.160 --> 0:16:33.400 All faults and deficiencies get attributed to the gin, freeing 0:16:33.480 --> 0:16:37.880 people of accountability, blame and shame. At the same time, though, 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:40.480 it also keeps alive a thriving source of income for 0:16:40.520 --> 0:16:43.360 the people and institutions who claim to be able to 0:16:43.400 --> 0:16:47.040 heal the things that science cannot, and it opens the 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:50.840 doors for criminals and predators who prey on the vulnerable. 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:54.760 A two thousand twelve article in the Pakistani newspaper Dawn 0:16:55.240 --> 0:16:58.960 reported the arrest of a faith healer promising to free 0:16:59.000 --> 0:17:03.120 a young girl of gin, but instead the girl's mother 0:17:03.240 --> 0:17:05.560 caught the man in the act of raping her daughter. 0:17:06.600 --> 0:17:10.440 Thankfully he was arrested, but catching such culprits isn't always 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:13.960 so cut and dry in South Asia, and maybe it 0:17:14.000 --> 0:17:16.000 happens in other parts of the world, but at least 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:19.040 I can personally vouch for this region. While there are 0:17:19.119 --> 0:17:22.399 doctors and clinics, of course, that can treat infertility, what 0:17:22.520 --> 0:17:25.840 happens when a wife unable to produce any children gets 0:17:25.920 --> 0:17:32.000 repeatedly checked out and the medical professionals say she's just fine. Well, 0:17:32.000 --> 0:17:34.840 thanks to misologyny and the patriarchy getting the way of 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:38.240 good judgment. Oftentimes no one thinks to check the husband's 0:17:38.280 --> 0:17:42.679 reproductive health, because well, that would be unthinkable. So the 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:47.359 only remaining explanation then is supernatural, a curse that woman 0:17:47.440 --> 0:17:50.719 is suffering from, or maybe a gin. And so there 0:17:50.720 --> 0:17:54.160 have been countless stories of women, once humiliated for being 0:17:54.200 --> 0:17:58.640 barren and unable to conceive, miraculously becoming pregnant after being 0:17:58.680 --> 0:18:02.320 left alone for treatment with some fraudulent holy man who 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:04.879 claimed that he could drive out the gin preventing conception. 0:18:06.040 --> 0:18:10.399 Imagine then the situation these women face finally pregnant to 0:18:10.440 --> 0:18:13.000 the great joy of their families, but not through some 0:18:13.119 --> 0:18:17.320 mysterious spiritual healing. Instead, because they're the victims of sexual 0:18:17.320 --> 0:18:21.520 assault by these fake religious healers, these women are left 0:18:21.560 --> 0:18:24.960 to hold this terrible secret, a secret they undoubtedly share 0:18:25.000 --> 0:18:28.359 with dozens of other victims, the secret that more often 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:31.720 than not, you don't have to fear the supernatural, because 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:45.360 the worst monsters are usually human. A two thou five 0:18:45.440 --> 0:18:47.600 article in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 0:18:47.600 --> 0:18:50.240 presented the case of a twenty five year old Iraqi 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:53.000 woman living in the UK with no history of any 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:57.080 psychological or psychiatric disorders, who began to slowly but surely 0:18:57.119 --> 0:19:00.760 withdraw from life. Over time, you stopped being in the 0:19:00.800 --> 0:19:04.960 company of other people, stopped communicating and eventually even stopped eating. 0:19:06.080 --> 0:19:11.359 Doctors diagnosed with severe depression and subjected her to electroshock therapy, 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:14.080 which did nothing for the patient but further confirmed her 0:19:14.119 --> 0:19:17.440 family suspicion that they were dealing with something else here. 0:19:18.320 --> 0:19:21.040 They secretly believe that their daughter was under the influence 0:19:21.160 --> 0:19:25.960 or possessed by a jin. Without telling the medical professionals involved, 0:19:26.119 --> 0:19:28.520 They ferried the young woman off to see a faith healer, 0:19:28.920 --> 0:19:31.359 who assured them that he could cure her with prayer 0:19:31.400 --> 0:19:35.320 and ritual. After all, faith is often the last resort 0:19:35.400 --> 0:19:38.600 of the desperate. The healer put his patient through a 0:19:38.600 --> 0:19:42.800 few sessions of spiritual therapy, and miraculously, her appetite returned, 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:47.320 as did her previous emotional health. She reported that she 0:19:47.400 --> 0:19:49.240 wasn't sure what had happened to her, that she was 0:19:49.280 --> 0:19:52.240 fully aware of her condition, but she just couldn't bring 0:19:52.240 --> 0:19:55.040 herself to do anything to come out of it, even 0:19:55.040 --> 0:19:58.880 though of her own admission, she wasn't particularly feeling sad 0:19:58.960 --> 0:20:02.439 or depressed about anything at all. According to the article, 0:20:02.720 --> 0:20:05.800 even five years later, she was still doing fine without 0:20:05.840 --> 0:20:09.919 any medications or any other treatment since the spiritual healing. 0:20:10.920 --> 0:20:13.920 But of course, not all such stories have happy endings. 0:20:14.600 --> 0:20:18.240 For some, the spiritual healing itself becomes a private hell. 0:20:27.320 --> 0:20:30.960 People have long both feared madness and been in awe 0:20:30.960 --> 0:20:34.680 of it. The ancient Greeks thought some madness to be sacred, 0:20:34.960 --> 0:20:39.440 opening divine portals and the power of prophecy. And then 0:20:39.480 --> 0:20:41.959 there's a dark side of madness, the one that's not 0:20:42.080 --> 0:20:47.000 caused by gods or saints, but by demons, or sometimes 0:20:47.000 --> 0:20:50.960 by something in between, like Lyssa, known to the Greeks 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:55.160 as both the goddess and demon of rage and frenzy. 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:59.040 In the Greek tragedy The Madness of Heracles, Heracles, the 0:20:59.080 --> 0:21:03.000 son of Zeus, stands before his father's altar, ready to 0:21:03.040 --> 0:21:09.000 purify himself, when suddenly Lissa strikes him with madness. Heracles 0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:12.520 spun around, his eyes, rolling in his head, mouth foaming, 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:17.560 and mounted an imaginary chariot. He bellowed maniacal laughter as 0:21:17.600 --> 0:21:20.560 he drew his bow and took aim at his own children. 0:21:21.600 --> 0:21:24.199 He didn't know they were his children, though in his 0:21:24.320 --> 0:21:27.320 madness he believed they were the children of an enemy. 0:21:27.880 --> 0:21:32.760 Heracules terrified children tried to save themselves. One child hid 0:21:32.760 --> 0:21:36.600 behind his mother, another behind a temple pillar, and the 0:21:36.640 --> 0:21:40.600 third one under an altar, but it didn't deter Heracles. 0:21:41.240 --> 0:21:43.760 He killed all three of his children and his own 0:21:43.800 --> 0:21:46.960 wife before finally being struck by a rock that put 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:51.119 him in a deep slumber. Greek mythology is full of 0:21:51.160 --> 0:21:56.800 madness caused by demons or curses, leading to murder, suicide, infanticide, 0:21:57.119 --> 0:22:01.879 and other unthinkable acts such evil You see can madness be? 0:22:02.960 --> 0:22:06.159 And the line between madness and evil forces is just 0:22:06.400 --> 0:22:09.920 as straight. In the Arabian tradition, both predating and after 0:22:09.960 --> 0:22:12.720 the seventh century, when Islam emerged as a religion in 0:22:12.760 --> 0:22:17.080 the region, a mad person is called much new and 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:20.680 madness itself is called janine. Both of these words have 0:22:20.800 --> 0:22:24.560 the same three letter origin as jin, those letters in 0:22:24.560 --> 0:22:30.400 the English alphabet being j and and much noon januin jin. 0:22:31.240 --> 0:22:34.479 They're not only related. Much noon literally means possessed by 0:22:34.480 --> 0:22:37.680 a jin, whether or not that person is actually possessed. 0:22:38.280 --> 0:22:41.400 So how do the jin drive a person mad? Well, 0:22:41.440 --> 0:22:44.280 they have a few tricks up their sleeves. First is 0:22:44.320 --> 0:22:49.520 the insiduous was swassa, the whisperings, am I good enough? 0:22:49.800 --> 0:22:52.680 Am I pretty enough? Is my husband cheating on me? 0:22:53.080 --> 0:22:56.280 Are my friends talking about me? Did my brother steal 0:22:56.359 --> 0:23:00.520 from me? Is that woman following me? Are my children safe? 0:23:01.040 --> 0:23:05.760 Will my parents die? Those doubts and negative thoughts that 0:23:05.800 --> 0:23:09.040 you can't get rid of, that continuous, persistent stream of 0:23:09.119 --> 0:23:13.800 anxious questions and insecurities that circulates in your mind constantly. 0:23:14.440 --> 0:23:17.359 It may well be a jin whispering to you in 0:23:17.400 --> 0:23:21.280 your very own voice. Maybe it's even your caree, that 0:23:21.440 --> 0:23:24.240 constant companion jin that's born with you and for you, 0:23:24.320 --> 0:23:27.680 and dies with you too. The Gin know that if 0:23:27.680 --> 0:23:29.800 they're at it long enough, it can lead people, if 0:23:29.840 --> 0:23:34.680 not to shear madness, then to depression, panic attacks, resentment 0:23:34.720 --> 0:23:39.240 and anger, and even suicidal ideation. And if that doesn't work, 0:23:39.280 --> 0:23:42.280 they'll try to drive you mad with their music. It's 0:23:42.320 --> 0:23:44.720 not really music, though, it's more of a sound, not 0:23:44.960 --> 0:23:48.840 unlike a siren song, but a bit more creative. It 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:52.360 can sound like a constant buzzing of flies or bees, 0:23:52.800 --> 0:23:55.600 or the incessant shirp of a bird. It could be 0:23:55.600 --> 0:23:59.359 the sound of wind or a far off whale, or 0:23:59.440 --> 0:24:03.160 never ending murmurs, or maybe the faint beating of drums 0:24:03.240 --> 0:24:06.840 for hours and days, both when you wake and sleep. 0:24:07.760 --> 0:24:10.480 It could just be a sound repeated over and over, 0:24:10.920 --> 0:24:13.600 like it was reported by an ancient poet who described 0:24:13.640 --> 0:24:23.600 it as zizizema, zizimma, zizizimma. Before the advent of modern 0:24:23.680 --> 0:24:27.440 psychiatry and psychology, this was all understood to be symptoms 0:24:27.480 --> 0:24:31.400 of external malevolent forces. But even in the modern era, 0:24:31.480 --> 0:24:33.600 it can be hard for many to draw lines between 0:24:33.600 --> 0:24:36.600 the natural and the supernatural, to know when to take 0:24:36.600 --> 0:24:38.960 a loved one to a psychiatrist and when to take 0:24:39.000 --> 0:24:42.680 them to a spiritual healer, and in some places there 0:24:42.720 --> 0:24:47.000 are almost no options but to choose the latter. In 0:24:47.000 --> 0:24:49.920 the small town of boya Umer in the heart of Morocco, 0:24:50.080 --> 0:24:54.040 there stands a mausoleum dedicated to a sixteenth century saint. 0:24:54.440 --> 0:24:58.399 The town itself was named after this particular saint was 0:24:58.480 --> 0:25:01.320 known to cure those suffering and what we today understand 0:25:01.359 --> 0:25:05.359 to be psychiatric disorders, but before modern medicine was generally 0:25:05.359 --> 0:25:09.960 considered madness caused by gin, and this mausoleum, a shrine 0:25:10.000 --> 0:25:12.359 for that saint, became a place of hope for the 0:25:12.440 --> 0:25:14.520 loved ones of those who were thought to be touched 0:25:14.560 --> 0:25:19.280 by madness, but a place of despair for the afflicted themselves. 0:25:20.480 --> 0:25:24.080 Families came from near and far to leave their sick children, siblings, 0:25:24.200 --> 0:25:26.960 elders at the shrine in the hopes that the healers 0:25:27.000 --> 0:25:30.320 working there and the power of the shrine itself would 0:25:30.359 --> 0:25:33.960 cure their loved ones. Whether the families were driven by 0:25:34.040 --> 0:25:37.600 love or fear, guilt or faith, their patronage brought a 0:25:37.600 --> 0:25:40.760 steady stream of revenue to the shrine, which charged a 0:25:40.800 --> 0:25:43.479 monthly housing fee for their patients and made nearly a 0:25:43.560 --> 0:25:47.960 million dollars a year from their services. The healers there 0:25:48.080 --> 0:25:50.800 claimed they could heal through their own power derived from 0:25:50.800 --> 0:25:54.159 the deceased saint himself, that they had power over the 0:25:54.200 --> 0:25:57.760 gin that were either afflicting to patients, or by employing 0:25:57.760 --> 0:26:00.880 the gin that were already in their control to battle 0:26:01.040 --> 0:26:04.879 the ones that were not in their control. People passing 0:26:04.920 --> 0:26:09.080 by would hear howling and screams, sobs and cries for mercy, 0:26:09.600 --> 0:26:11.560 all which was chalked up to the torment of the 0:26:11.640 --> 0:26:15.560 gin who were being exercised from their victims, except that's 0:26:15.600 --> 0:26:18.960 probably not what it was. Not too many years ago, 0:26:19.080 --> 0:26:22.720