Suivant le diagnostic fait, les démons et malédictions sont ces forces qui terrassent la vie quotidienne de l'humanité. Jean TSHIBANGU, à l'instar du Médecin donne non seulement le diagnostic, mais aussi la prescription spirituelle. Lorsque vous vivez une vie de blocage continuel, de sécheresse, les maladies chroniques, les avortements, ou fausses couches régulières, les accidents à répétition, les amendes et pannes intempestives, lorsque vous déployez beaucoup d'efforts, mais vous n'accouchez que la souris, la pauvreté criante a trouvé domicile dans votre vie, les divorces ou célibat prolongé, n'hésitez pas de vous asseoir pour décider de voir les médecins spirituels. L'auteur essaie de répondre par ce livre aux questions communément posées à ce sujet lorsque rien ne marche ou marche lentement ou difficilement, lorsque les choses ordinaires deviennent spéciales. Il y a des moments de la vie où l'homme vit toutes ces différentes oppressions, afflictions, persécutions. L'Auteur présente aussi les voies et moyens de s'en défaire. Nous sommes rassurés que la lecture de ce livre vous apportera la consolation et surtout brisera toutes les barrières qui bloquaient votre épanouissement. Car la volonté de Dieu est que vous viviez une vie de victoire. Christ a tout accompli pour vous par l'oeuvre de la croix

Previous ed.: New York: Barricade Books, c1996.

This is a book about curses. It is not about curses as insults or offensive language but curses as petitions to the divine world to render judgment and execute harm on identified, hostile forces. In the ancient world, curses functioned in a way markedly different from our own, and it is into the world of the ancient Near East that we must go in order to appreciate the scope of their influence. For the ancient Near Easterners, curses had authentic meaning. Curses were part of their life and religion. They were not inherently magic or features of superstitions, nor were they mere curiosities or trifling antidotes. They were real and effective. They were employed proactively and reactively to manage life’s many vicissitudes and maintain social harmony. They were principally protective, but they were also the cause of misfortune, illness, depression, and anything else that undermined a comfortable, well-balanced life. Every member of society used them, from slave to king, from young to old, from men and women to the deities themselves. They crossed cultural lines and required little or no explanation, for curses were the source of great evil. In other words, curses were universal. Because curses were woven into the very fabric of every known ancient Near Eastern society, they emerge frequently and in a wide variety of venues. They appear on public and private display objects, on tomb stelae, tomb lintels, and sarcophagi, on ancient kudurrus and narûs. They are used in political, administrative, social, religious, and familial contexts. They are the subject of incantations. They are tools that exorcise demons and dispel disease; they ban, protect, and heal. This is the phenomenology of cursing in the ancient Near East, and this is what the present work explores.

Alongside the formal development of Judaism from the eleventh through the sixteenth centuries, a robust Jewish folk religion flourished—ideas and practices that never met with wholehearted approval by religious leaders yet enjoyed such wide popularity that they could not be altogether excluded from the religion. According to Joshua Trachtenberg, it is not possible truly to understand the experience and history of the Jewish people without attempting to recover their folklife and beliefs from centuries past. Jewish Magic and Superstition is a masterful and utterly fascinating exploration of religious forms that have all but disappeared yet persist in the imagination. The volume begins with legends of Jewish sorcery and proceeds to discuss beliefs about the evil eye, spirits of the dead, powers of good, the famous legend of the golem, procedures for casting spells, the use of gems and amulets, how to battle spirits, the ritual of circumcision, herbal folk remedies, fortune telling, astrology, and the interpretation of dreams. First published more than sixty years ago, Trachtenberg's study remains the foundational scholarship on magical practices in the Jewish world and offers an understanding of folk beliefs that expressed most eloquently the everyday religion of the Jewish people.