Truth About the Evil Eye

The evil eye does exist. Your eighty-five year old Sicilian grandmother was right after all. But it doesn't function in quite the way she imagined. The true evil eye is not in the head of some elderly woman who casts her malicious, bloodshot glance your way -- it is the eye through which you look upon your own world.

The belief that misfortune can somehow be projected onto one person by another through a glance is ancient and universal. It was based on a misunderstanding of how the faculty of vision functions. Centuries ago it was thought that the eye perceives the outer world by projecting forth invisible rays onto external objects such as trees, mountains, stones and clouds. It was assumed that we became aware of our surroundings visually by a kind of optical touch that relied on these rays as channels of communication, just as we become aware of the texture of objects by physically touching them with our hands.

If these projected rays existed, the thinking went, then the sight must be an active, not a passive, sense. Unless we actively sent forth these rays from our eyes, we would be blind. This explained why some individuals were unable to see, even though their eyes looked normal and healthy.

We now know that sight is a passive faculty in the sense that light, reflected from the surface of objects in our environment, or generated from heated objects, enters our eyes without the need for us to project rays to link us to the objects. Whereas in the past our eyes were considered to be energy projectors, today they are considered to be open windows.

Neither of these popular notions is entirely accurate, since the faculty of sight entails much more than simply receiving radiant energy that shines upon our optic nerves -- sight is a perception that occurs in our brains, where the light received is processed into images that we can comprehend. But the older folk explanation for how our eyes see the world helps to explain the underlying beliefs about the evil eye.

The evil eye in its purest form was understood to be the deliberate projection of a ray of occult energy with the malicious intention to cause harm. Several factors were thought to make it more powerful. If the person sending it was from a family or tribe noted for works of black magic, it would derive increased power from this hereditary predisposition. If the eye from which the evil was projected was bloodshot, or deformed in some way, this also increased its force. If a glance from the evil eye was sent in a sidelong way, from the corner of the eye of the malicious person, it was more powerful. Most important of all, the effect was believed fatal if the person "overlooked" by the evil eye actually met the malicious gaze directly.

There are various ways to turn aside or at least lessen the harmful effects of this baleful sidelong glance. Laughter was thought to weaken its power. Other forms of ridicule, such as a bared backside, were also effective. A mirror could be used to reflect the ray back upon the person sending it out. Similarly, a shiny object such as a large, bright piece of jewelry attracted the focus of the person projecting the malicious ray, so that it did not enter the eye of the victim directly.

Another good defense was to carry the image of an eye as jewelry or embroidered into clothing or as a tattoo -- the belief was that the ray from this artificial eye would extend itself first and displace the ray from the evil eye. These artificial eyes were sometimes realistic, but often they were highly stylized and almost unnoticed in the pattern of cloth or the decoration on metalwork.

A popular gesture to defuse the power of the glance involved making a fist in which the thumb is thrust between the index and middle finger. This hand gesture was also used as the pattern for a charm to be carried on the body as a constant defense -- see the illustration at the top of this page. It's difficult to imagine what practical purpose this gesture might serve, even in a symbolic sense, but it was believed to be a highly effective means of protection.

For Christians, to cross oneself and to utter a prayer under the breath offered some protection. A cross or crucifix worn around the neck was a sentinel against not only vampires, but the evil eye as well.

Stories of the evil eye are ancient. The philosopher Francis Bacon observed "Scripture calleth envy an evil eye," a reference to Proverbs 23:6-8, which reads: "Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, neither desire thou his dainty meats; for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee. The morsel which thou hast eaten shalt thou vomit up, and lose thy sweet words."

The Greek poet Apollonius of Rhodes, who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, at the end of the first century, wrote of how the sorceress Medea destroyed the giant Talos with nothing more than the malice of her gaze:

"Then, with incantations, she invoked the Spirits of Death, the swift hounds of Hades who feed on souls and haunt the lower air to pounce on living men. She sank to her knees and called upon them, three times in song, three times with spoken prayers. She steeled herself with their malignity and bewitched the eyes of Talos with the evil in her own. She flung at him the full force of her malevolence, and in an ecstasy of rage she plied him with images of death."

The Roman historian Pliny the Elder, who also lived during the first century, recorded earlier accounts of particular tribes, the Triballi and the Illyrii, some of the members of which possessed the power of the evil eye as a genetic inheritance. He wrote about "persons of this description, who also have the power of fascination with the eyes, and can even kill those on whom they fix their gaze for any length of time, more especially if their look denotes anger."

Pliny recorded several details concerning this type of person. He wrote that the pupils of their eyes are double. The same was reported about a certain tribe in Scythia known as the Bythiae, and a tribe in Pontus called the Thibii. Sometimes the pupils in the eyes of the Thibii resembled the shape of a horse. It was said that the bodies of members of this tribe possessing the evil eye would not sink in water, not even when they were weighed down by the sodden mass of their clothing.

It was common to refer to those accused of having the evil eye as witches. One of the trials used to test a witch during the Middle Ages and Renaissance was to throw her into water and watch to see whether or not the accused witch sank. If the unfortunate person sank, she was declared innocent. Presumably someone tried to fish her out before she drowned, although this is not stated when this form of witch test is mentioned in the histories. This method of testing a witch is at least as old as Pliny's source, which places it before the time of Christ.

The term "witch" was used in an extremely negative way in past centuries. It was a catch-all term for sorcerers, murders, poisoners, baby-killers, heretics and other wicked types. What they had in common was the belief by their accusers -- usually an incorrect belief -- that they accomplished their evil deeds through the agency of black magic.

It is important to realize that the witches of modern times are sane, decent folks who do not perform black magic. Nor do they have the evil eye. There is nothing in common between the modern witch and the poor unfortunate innocents falsely accused in the Middle Ages of witchcraft. Nor is there any similarity between the modern witch and the ugly fantasy that existed in the minds of the medieval witch-finders.

In addition to those accused of sorcery and witchcraft, certain animals were also believed by the ancient Greeks and Romans to have the power of the evil eye. One such beast was the European wolf. It was thought that if a wolf approached a man unseen and set the ray of its gaze upon him, the man would at once be struck speechless with paralyzing fear. The wolf was then free to attack and kill the man, since he could neither run away nor cry out to attract the attention of others.

This spell of the evil eye would persist, even if the wolf came out from hiding so that the man could look upon it. However, if it happened that the man saw the wolf first, the gaze of the wolf would lack its paralyzing effect. It was believed that the ray from the eye of the man extending itself to the wolf prevented the ray from the wolf's eye from reaching the man -- the same theory that caused individuals to wear images of eyes on their clothing.

No such complication existed in the myth of the basilisk, a serpent whose gaze falling upon a man at once made him immobile. We still have a remnant of this ancient belief in the form of the folk tale that says a snake can charm its prey so that it remains motionless until it is killed. The same sort of belief was also held with regard to the hyena by the ancient Romans.

Belief in the evil eye has never ceased since the dawn of recorded history. It is still widely held in the Mediterranean region, where it has persisted in exactly the same form for thousands of years in an unbroken tradition. It is said to be especially common among the working classes in Italy, Greece and Sicily.

Even in modern Africa, tribal witch hunts are conducted against those unfortunate citizens accused by their neighbors of having the evil eye, and of causing bad luck or sickness by their mere glance. Countless innocent individuals, men and woman, have been murdered on the twin charges of witchcraft and the evil eye.

It would be difficult to maintain that there is no such thing as the evil eye, when the belief is so widespread across both time and cultural boundaries. At the same time it is obvious that the traditional explanation as to how the evil eye works must be incorrect. How then does it work?

When a malicious glance is sent from the eye of a spiteful person directly into the eye of another person who is susceptible to suggestion, and is predisposed to anticipate supernatural attacks and resulting misfortunes, it implants itself in the imagination of the victim like a black seed, and begins to grow, nourished by the fear and expectation of the victim. As a result, the mind of the person assaulted by the evil eye turns against itself, and actually creates the misfortunes that it most fears.

In the same way that a hypnotist can put someone into a hypnotic state and place the suggestion directly into their subconscious mind that they will feel better and better about themselves with each passing day, the glance of the evil eye implants the suggestion directly into the subconscious of a person that they will suffer greater and greater misfortune with each passing day. It does this below the level of words.

So great is the power of the human mind over the body it inhabits, the evil eye has actually been recorded to have killed some of those afflicted with it. Once a man is utterly convinced on the subconscious level that he is worthless, that he is to be despised and hated, that he is destined to suffer misfortunes and die, and furthermore that these conditions in his life are inevitable, he cannot help but begin to destroy his life by his unconscious actions.

In effect, those afflicted by the evil eye become their own assassins. Even when they do not utterly poison their lives, they can cause great suffering to themselves and by extension to those around them. Their suffering is real, and because they are at war against themselves, it is difficult to help them.

Even though there is no malicious ray or agent transmitted across space from the eye of the spiteful person to the eye of the victim, the effect of turning one's own subconscious mind against oneself can be deadly. Yet it is scarcely fair to blame the person who triggered this self-destructive cycle merely because that person looked at the sufferer in an unfriendly manner.

Indeed, many who suffer from the effects of the evil eye can not even blame it on the malicious wishes or intentions of another person. They are so predisposed to look for the evil eye in every sidelong glance from a stranger, that they bring misfortune upon themselves by imagining an evil glance where none exists. The demons they battle are inside them, and require no assistance from outside to cause misfortune.

It was common in ancient times for anyone who could not defend himself, particularly for elderly women who mumbled and had cataracts, to be accused of the evil eye without the slightest provocation, without even so much as a hard look cast upon their neighbors. Strangers, those who lived alone, or those of a different racial group were especially vulnerable to this sort of false accusation. The more they protested their innocence, the less they were believed. The evidence of their supposed crimes was plain for all to see -- wasn't the person who had accused them suffering misfortune after misfortune? Why was he sick, if not from the evil eye? This argument has no logic, but it usually prevailed, because human beings will always believe what they wish to believe.

The best defense against the evil eye is to grow up, get a life, and stop imagining evil forces where none exist. It is only the belief in the evil eye that gives it power. That is why laughter and a cynical attitude are such effective countermeasures. Unfortunately, not everyone can be so sane and adult. To those suffering from the evil eye -- those who are convinced on the subconscious level that they have been attacked -- the horror and despair are very real. They see their lives crumbling around them, and are willing to do anything to save themselves.

Victims of the evil eye frequently seek out help from gypsies and fortune-tellers, because they feel that they have nowhere else to turn. Doctors and psychologists dismiss their fears. Even priests and rabbis no longer realize that the terrible effects of the evil eye are quite real to those who suffer from them. Shut out from the churches, the clinics, the hospitals, where are they to turn?

Some unscrupulous fortune-tellers deliberately try to convince clients that they have fallen victim to the evil eye. If they are successful, they offer to lift the curse for a price -- a high price. So desperate are the suffers, they are eager to agree to almost anything. The fortune-teller performs a few meaningless gestures, mumbles a few words, or tells the sufferer to do some silly action, and takes the money to the bank.

The sad thing is that the cure of the fortune-teller often works, because it removes the black seed implanted in the subconscious mind of the victim. It stands to reason that if a man can turn his own deep mind into his enemy, he can also turn it into his friend. In the same way a person can persuade himself that he is cursed because of a glance from a passing stranger, so can he persuade himself that he is cured from that curse by following the instructions of a fortune-teller. The eye of the stranger has no power. Neither do the instructions of the fortune-teller. All power lies in the mind of the self-elected victim.

If you believe that you are the victim of the evil eye, and are suffering misfortunes because someone has cast a hateful glance upon you, this is what you may do to cure yourself. Take a piece of paper and a pen, and draw an eye upon the paper. Turn it over and write your own name upon the back. Hold it up and look at the eye for a while, and imagine the face of the person you are convinced has cast the evil eye upon you. Thrust the point of the pen directly through the middle of the eye on the paper, and at the same time say these words: "The eye is blind, it cannot find me." Repeat the words three times. Understand in your heart that you are now free from the curse. Fold the paper twice, dig a hole in the ground, and bury the paper under the earth where it will lie undisturbed in darkness. Your will suffer no more misfortunes.