You know, all things grow and restrain each other. If there are demons in this world, there must be gods.
The priest’s troubles began after the nun committed suicide.
A very young nun, wrapped a thick rope around her neck, stood at the monastery window and jumped down, shouting before her death, "God, forgive me."
After that, the corpse stayed in front of the door, with only half of a face left, and the crow was pecking badly. The blood on the stone steps is also fresh, dripping down the toes, people have been dead for a long time, but they are not clean when they are old.
The priest heard that he rushed from the Vatican to this ruined monastery. The ups and downs were repeated, and he finally saw the demon appearing. He jumped up, holding the cross and pierced the priest's crotch.
"Sprink me some holy water on the cross!" The priest covered his wound and ordered to go down, then shouted at the devil——
The evil spirits have taken over your body. In the name of God and the Holy Spirit, I ask God, Jesus Christ, the holy fire to come, and the evil spirits to retreat!
[Nun] is a common exorcism subject, while the cross, holy water and the Bible are common methods of exorcism. But whether this dates back to the ancient times or the early shamans, no one can tell.
There is a record in the "Gospel of Matthew" that one day and night, many people who were possessed by demons came to Jesus, and with only one sentence, Jesus drove the ghosts out and healed those people. ——
He takes the place of our weakness and bears our disease.
Afterwards, Jesus went to Gadara and encountered two more demonic-possessed people. They were extremely vicious. Not far away, there are pigs chewing food.
Jesus only said two words, "Go ahead." The ghosts attached to people were driven into the pig group. In a short while, the pigs rushed down the cliff, plunged into the sea and drowned.
This is the earliest extant record of exorcism.
In 65 AD, the "Gospel of Mark" was written, and the ninth chapter of the book also contained one, which was more detailed than the former.
Said that there was a boy who was possessed by a dumb ghost, foaming at the mouth, gritting his teeth, and his body withered. When I saw Jesus, he fell to the ground and twitched. Jesus rebuked the ghost--
You deaf and mute ghost, I tell you to come out of him and never go in again!
The ghost screamed and made the boy go crazy before coming out. The boy seemed to be dead, and everyone said that he was dead.
But Jesus took his hand, and he stood up.
The disciples asked in private, "Why can't we cast out ghosts?" Jesus said, "If he doesn't pray, he won't come out." It is a kind of exorcism. As for what to pray and how to pray, I will talk about it later.
In any case, it is precisely because of these stories that the Catholic Encyclopedia defines the term "exorcism":
When a person or thing is occupied or infected by the devil or evil spirit, or is easy to become a tool for the latter to vent its maliciousness, the act of expelling or avoiding the latter.
The summary of the Encyclopedia of Judaism is simpler and clearer: the ritual to drive demons out of people.
According to Roman Catholic literature, this ritual can be traced back to 1614, but it is not called "exorcism," but merely prays and appeals. It spread throughout the Middle Ages, leaving many related works of art.
Later, approximately in the 19th century, some supernatural phenomena occurred during the prayer process. The Holy See decided that this matter was not trivial, and slowly attributed this ritual to "exorcism."
Lord, have mercy on my son!
In the seventeenth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, someone knelt before Jesus and shouted, “My son suffered from epilepsy and fell into the fire and water many times. I brought him to your disciples, but they were unable to heal him.”
Jesus sighed, called his disciples to come forward, and said:
I tell you the truth, if you have faith like a mustard seed, you just say to this mountain,'You move from here to there,' and it will also be removed. As for this type of ghost, if you don’t pray and fast, you can’t drive them out.
There is an illustration in the medieval "Luxury Hours of Prayer Book", which depicts the scene of Jesus expelling demons from a woman through fasting and praying.
It can be seen that there is a black creature with wings above the woman's head. It is one of Solomon's seventy-two pillars: Valak .
The English name of the movie [nun] is that word. In order to exorcise the devil, the priest has read countless ancient manuscripts and has also seen this black creature.
In 1519, in a painting depicting an exorcism scene, the priest also prayed and expelled countless Valaks from the woman's mouth.
But what are they praying for?
The Roman Catholic Church has a book of "The Book of Roman Liturgy" , some chapters describe this exorcism prayer, divided into "supplications" and "commands."
The former is "a merciful and forgiving God, please accept the prayer of your servant, and may your kindness forgive those who are bound by the shackles of sin".
The latter is the priest asking the devil to leave in the name of God:
Leave, your disrespectful existence. Leave, your cursed existence. Leave with your lies, because God is determined to protect that person.
All these must be fasted and prayed, as Jesus said, you must have faith. More importantly, let the devil know that he is in the name of Jesus Christ.
Later, the Roman Catholic Church extracted the contents of exorcism in the Roman Ritual, and revised it in accordance with the Ritual Charter to form a book of Exorcism Rituals , covering the entire process from the preparation period to the end.
And through several exorcism experiences, the church found that once a person is possessed by a demon, his physical strength will exceed the limits of human beings, and it will be extremely disgusted with symbols of Catholic faith such as God and the cross .
Therefore, they added sacred objects such as crosses and holy water as tools for exorcism in the "Exorcism Ceremony".
In January 1999, the Vatican also issued a revised exorcism ceremony, divided into fixed steps and prayers. It requires that during the preparation stage of the ceremony, the priest needs to wear a white garment next to his body, and then put on a purple holy belt.
After reciting the prayer, everyone in the room should be sprinkled with holy water, a cross is painted on the victim, and then the victim is touched with a Catholic holy object . The so-called holy things are things related to Jesus.
In the movie [Nuns], the bottle of "Christ's blood" found by the hostess after opening the catacombs of the monastery belongs to this kind of sacred object.
Use it when necessary to seal the devil.
In 1949, in Maryland, USA, 14-year-old boy John Hoffman and his aunt were playing a psychic board game, and he was suddenly possessed by an evil spirit in the process.
After that, my aunt died suddenly, the bed was shaking up and down, the furniture moved for no reason, and there were often inexplicable dripping noises in the room.
The boy also became irritable, moody, incontinent, and some red spots and strange words appeared on his body, and he was able to shout out an ancient Middle Eastern dialect when he was convulsed.
The priest first invited some psychiatrists to determine whether the boy would be physically dysfunctional. After the exclusion, the authenticity of possession was confirmed, the situation was summarized to the regional bishop, and permission to exorcise was obtained.
At that time, the image of Satan appeared on the boy, and he shouted hoarsely: "I have been in John's body."
The priest stuffed the icon and the cross into the boy's hand, and then read the "Bible" aloud. After this lasted for more than a month, the boy finally became sober, and the priest succeeded in exorcising the demon, smiling and saying "the devil is gone".
Twenty-four years later, director William Friedkin adapted the matter into a movie and put it on the screen, named [The Exorcist] .
This is the first and most influential exorcism movie in film history. The scene in which the priest, played by the old drama Gussydoff, prays with a cross and splashes holy water has attracted countless films from later generations to follow suit.
For example, in the [Exorcism] in 2005, the priest wore a white shirt next to his body and a purple holy band on his shoulders. He held a copy of the "Exorcism Ceremony" in his hand and read the prayers to the heroine who was possessed by the evil spirit. .
In the 2010 [Last Exorcism] , the priest pressed the Bible on the head of the possessed girl with his left hand, and held the cross necklace with his right hand.
The following year, [Ritual] was released, and the priest was Antonio Hopkins, who played the ogre Hannibal in [Silent Lamb].
At that time, he was 74 years old, with white hair and spirit, with a purple holy band on his shoulders, and a cross in his hand, as if all demons had nowhere to hide.
There is also the 2012 [Dead Soul Box] .
It is an old but unique wooden box. Humans don't know that once the box is opened, it will invite evil spirits to invade. Fortunately, there are priests, like Jesus who rebuked evil spirits a thousand years ago, "In the name of the Lord, leave this flesh!"
You see, even after so many centuries, the exorcism ceremony has not fundamentally changed, and it is not very different from the movie.
But life is not like movies, life is much harder.
In 1974, the year that [The Exorcist] swept the world and won the 46th Oscar nominations, a 22-year-old woman named Analis Mitch in Leiblfing, Germany , was suddenly invaded by a demon. body.
She began to eat coal, flies and spiders, drank urine when she was thirsty, and shouted blasphemous words in a very strange voice.
The bishop and priest mobilized together to perform 67 exorcisms on Analis. Instead of leaving, the demon intensified.
Finally, in 1976, after a long tug-of-war with the devil, 24-year-old Annalis died due to lack of nutrition, weighing 31 kilograms.
Her parents and two clergymen were sentenced to six months' imprisonment for manslaughter, but they were all suspended for execution and did not really go to prison.
It turns out that not all exorcism cases can end with the successful expulsion of evil spirits as shown in the movie.
Moreover, although the exorcism is still going on, and 42% of Americans believe that possession exists (from the Gallup poll in 2005), there are still atheists who explain the problem with mental or mental illness.
That's fine, at least in their opinion the devil is fake.
In fact, it really doesn't matter, you know, everything grows and restrains each other. If there are demons in this world, there must be gods.
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Author/six aunts
The article was first published on the WeChat public account "Pocier"
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