Voodoo Doll? Answers needed...

[Starwitch]

Hi everyone...

I received this email from a lady named Lisa and I thought I'd post it here and let her get opinions and advice from all of you since I'm sure there are many of you here who know more about Voodoo dolls and the like than I do.

So here is the email... thanks!

Hi !

I attached our previous email so you might
remember me, as I am sure your inbox is loaded
with strange bleatings daily hehehe!

I wonder if you could take a moment to give me a
bit of advice. When this came up, I immediately
thought of you. I have an intense amount of
respect for someone with knowledge I do not
possess (that would be you). I'll bet you know
exactly what this is, as your average moron has
no idea (that would be me).

Okay: Now that I made you laugh, I get to waste
your time on this little bit of stranginata.
Here's the story:

Lady buys old house from the 1880's. Decides to
remodel a bit of it. In the WALL, sealed inside,
she finds (da-da-da-DUM) a very strange little
doll.

He is apparently male, his head has very detailed
features and appears to be made of paper mache
or something similar. Has vivid green eyes made
of I cannot imagine what, but they are VERY alive
looking. The doll is made, or dressed, in black
cloth. The chest is white material, may be
muslin or cotton, and a pentagram has been drawn
on it, over where the heart would be. Looks like
by a fingertip or maybe a burnt stick. The "ink"
appears to perhaps be an ashes mixture, possibly
ashes and wax or ashes and...eeew.

He is stuffed with dust, or ashes possibly (I
think dust of some kind), and she says there is a
black ball inside that may be glass or smoky
quartz, possibly obsidian (I haven't actually
touched or seen it).

Around his neck is writing and some numbers
(again, I have no details on what exactly is
there and I cannot tell from the picture) and
what appears to be a ribbon of indeterminate
color. (Could be black or faded crimson, they
both go reddish with age). And on the back of his
head is supposedly 666. (Charming). Could be some
other symbols, tho. Pic is not clear. That is
just what she is saying.

Now, if this wasn't interesting enough, this
woman claims that whenever she speaks the name of
someone and is holding this guy, evil befalls the
person in question (lost job, injury, other
unnamed horrors).

She also says that it has never hurt her, and she
feels warm all over when she holds it. For some
unfathomable reason, she does not want to keep
it. SOOOOO, she gave it to a friend of hers who
does not want it in the house and keeps it
outside under her stairs (Boo Radley anyone?).
She is trying to dump it to anyone who will take
it off of her hands.

Now, as I obviously lack the good sense God gave
a bag of grapes, here come the questions:

What IS this thing?

WHY is this thing?

What is it supposed to do, protect the house from
evil? It IT evil itself?

I mean, it doesn't sound very cheery, but so help
me, I kinda like it. It's really strangely
facinating. For some reason, I think I want this
thing. Looks sort of lonely to me, if that's
possible. Or, is it something unmentionable that
SHOULD be freaked out over?

I know I've read about this somewhere, or
something similar, but searching on the Net for
this is SUCH A PAIN! I don't want to send Madame
Mysterious 40 bucks to give croth rot to my
enemy. I just want to find out what this is and
why I personally think its verry cool...

I mean, the part about shooting evil at deserving
people has a lot of merit, don't you think? (I
have a list...)

Just think of the possibilities! So many
practical uses!

Imagine...

You're driving along, and you see a traffic scrum
made solely by that guy on his cellphone in the
fast lane...

Then there's the woman who lets her dog crap on
the sidewalk in front of the store and never
picks it up...

The unhandicapped handicapped parker...

The rude ass customer...

Cheating prick boyfriend...

The slobs down the street with the yard from
Sanford & Son...

The creep at work who always takes credit for
your work...

Oooh, the uses! What a handy little friend!

All funnies aside, what IS this thing?
Is it dangerous? Obviously, the person who
originally made it took it VERY seriously.

I mean, you know what I know about magick could
be written on a grain of sand, but even I am not
so dull as to not realize this is someone's old
spell.

What do you syuppose it was for? COULD it still
hold power? The maker, and the intended
recipient must both be long dead by now. The
lady who found it says it was an original part of
the house that had never been remodeled, so its
been in that wall at least 100 years. Probably
put in there when the house was built.

What do you think? And, more to the point,
should I take it? I have no idea why I am even
considering it. That in itself is odd. I kind of
like it, really, I just keep looking at the
pictures. But, I don't want to get sucked into
the serventh level of Hell, either, especially as
I am an utter boob about anything like this. Any
spells I ever tried either did not work or made
things worse until I was smart enough to give it
up as a bad job.

So, if you feel like helping the magickally
handicapped today, I eagerly await your reply.

Cheers!

Lisa


Any comments are welcome!

[WolfWitch]

I'm no expert on VooDoo but, from reading this, I see a patern evolving. It's not a pretty one either (excuse me if i sound like a doomsayer.)

The original owner (since discovery in the wall.) was able to send negative force towards people by thinking about them and felt warm and comfortable holding it despite this. It was given to someone who does not want it and now, after seeing the pics alone, your friend wants to take it off of the hands of the person who despises it. Also, your friend seems eager to use it, despite having said that this really "isn't like her at all..."

Please tell me I'm not the only one seeing this.

The doll (for lack of a better word) seems to be quite potent regardless of it's century long "nap".

It seems to "want" to be used.
It seems to "want" to be owned, preferably by someone who "wants" it.

I think it knows the current holder does not want it, therefore won't use it. I think it's making your friend want to aquire it, use it.

Just my speculation, I don't like this whole situation. It smells a bit TOO weird.

Can your friend aquire a VooDoo priestess? Can we forward this to one for a "proffesional's" opinion? Someone who knows and deals with this kind of magick on a regular basis?

It sounds like it's a lot bigger deal than it's trying to make itself out to be. Something just seems fishy.

WW.

[juliaki]

The story has all the qualities of an urban legend, and a lot of the "magickal aspects" don't add up given the time period in question. It sounds like something someone made in the mid-1950s to early 1990s, based on available literature at the time. Certainly not Vodoun in nature, but a great urban legend to pass along around a campfire.

[hedge*]

I'd love to see some photo's. Any chance she could send you them and you could post them here?

[[SanityIsLost]]

This post sparked my interest so I looked up some information on voodoo dolls and I found out that a voodoo doll is usually made to hurt one person (most people have heard of this) and usually is made with personal items of the "prey", such as hair or clothing. So, I'm assuming these dolls are not usually made to hurt a bunch of people just by saying a name as it takes time and personal items to even tie the doll to a person. I also came upon this paragraph "Once in possession of an authentic Voodoo doll, you can request the doll to call upon powerful forces known as Loa. You can perform a simple but effective ritual to fulfill a specific dream, an urgent desire. This timeless ceremony is carried out to persuade the spirits to exert their influence in this world" The Loa are ancient African Gods. This could make sense in some way because perhaps by holding the doll and thinking of a person it is a sort of ritual evoking these Gods to perform the desire. Although I can't see why this person would have been wishing bad things to happen to these people as I got from the post it was an accident at first. Most dolls these days are not real and people in the religion dont really use them, they are just souvenir types of things. But, if this one was hidden away and there is no idea of it's origin it could possibly be real. Either way, I don't think this doll is something to mess around with, (and not just because I'm Wiccan and would not harm people who let their dog poop somewhere.) I recommend this doll goes back in a dark hidden place or find a way to safely destroy it. I'm not an expert though, just what I've read.

[juliaki]

Ouch... whatever site you got that from has a *lot* of misinformation. I'm not a practitioner of that path, but I do know some folks who are...

voodoo doll is usually made to hurt one person (most people have heard of this)

That's the same kind of Hollywood stuff that says that witches are eeevil. Most voodoo dolls are used for other purposes, but not to cause harm.

The Loa are ancient African Gods

They are *not* gods.

Most dolls these days are not real and people in the religion dont really use them, they are just souvenir types of things

There are still people out there who know how to make them and people out there who use them.

You can find a good overview of the religion here:

http://www.religioustolerance.org/voodoo.htm

[Comus]

" this woman claims that whenever she speaks the name of
someone and is holding this guy, evil befalls the
person in question (lost job, injury, other
unnamed horrors)."

uhh? Honestly, if you or I were to pick up a wierd voo-doo doll like thing, the last thing you would do is to hold it and loudly annunciate another persons' name...especially more than once. It's not a thought that would naturally occur. 'Oh, let's see if I can make my ex-boyfriend fall under a truck,..wow that worked, now I'll do my boss." Sounds like we have a crazy on our hands.

I doubt it is an authentic "voo-doo" (vodun) piece (666? definitley not a part of that religion). In fact this lady may have made it herself and is enjoying causing a stir. My advice would be to burn the thing, pure and simple. Or better yet to put it in a comost bin and let nature turn the evil into good purified fertilizer. If she can't bring herself to do that I doubt that the thing is 'posessing' her. For an effigy to draw a particular person so strongly would require some sort of highly specific programming, and , given that this thing is apparently ancient, the person who made it would never have even heard of the lady in question. Therefore: she is drawn to the thing for reasons of her own (either she likes the feeling of power, is fascinated by the occult, whatever).

[Tinu]

I agree with the idea of burning it, that's one of the ways to get rid of the doll, and dissipate the spell surrounding it. Let the energies go back to the earth to be used as best as the Gods see fit.

[[GeekyPagan]]

In my personal opinion, it's not a voo doo doll. It seems to be something very strange to say the least. While the story does sound an awful lot like an urban legend, it just seems a little too detailed. I think I would need to see pictures. Lots of pictures.

This kind of stuff is just interesting to me. It could very well be from a very long time ago. Finding stuff like that in old houses is not unheard of. My mother's best friend found a box of very old and very damaged objects behind a false wall in thier attic - thier home is quite old as well, probably built around the turn of the century.

Or, it could not. One thing though, it's definately not a voodoo doll, that much can be told.

On a side note: I used a Voodoo doll, just once. I used it for good (I don't know, I read using white tipped pins for good effects), to help a friend. Turned out to have disasterous effects for me - as if my luck and positive energy was channeled away to her. So, yeah, these things are not something you want to mess around with.

[[SanityIsLost]]

Sorry guys, I got my info from about 5 different sites... I guess you just can't trust anything you read. Disregard my above post as I am ignorant.

[Rein]

Now, I'm going to sound like a very odd young woman for bringing this up, but I'm going to say it anyway....

Now here are the things about this that seem so bone chilling to me:

1) Now, it's obvious that the original owner would be long since passed on, but what most of you aren't taking into account is that, when a person creates such a thing, they have to put some of their energy into it. Whoever possessed it then controlled it by manipulating it with their will. However, when this person died, all that energy is still locked inside the doll. Now, in absence of the one that placed it there, that energy can be manipulated by the will of anyone who holds the doll. And, if the possesser doesn't have a specific "will", then the energy would most likely do the last thing the original owner wanted it to do, which means that if the last mission it had 100 years ago was to do harm, it will do harm.

2) There is an old Native American belief, that when you give something a face, you invite a spirit to live inside it. All those years it was trapped in a wall, it would've been influenced by the energy of the people living there. Is it a stretch to say a spirit, or even a poltergeist created by one of the residents, could've taken up residence inside of it? And even if that didn't happen, there was probably alot of built-up emotional energy in such an old house that could've had an effect on it.

One last note: Most voodoo dolls are made to do harm to one person, but that's because alot of people don't know their full usage. I've read that those rumors started when women in the old days started practicing voodoo and such that they learned from the african slaves. So with that in mind, if the doll was made to hurt one person, that person would also be long dead now. So...without it's intended victim alive, what's to stop it from hurting other people?

(Note that everything I've just said was under the assumption that the woman didn't make this all up. There's always the possibility that this is all horse hockey )

This thing should never be allowed to unleash that power on anyone again.

[[ravenwing]]

Oh come on now --- no one sees the disparity in this?

See if you can answer THIS question with any kind of logic whatsoever:

WHY would the original creator of such an object, which that person can use whenever he/she wishes (and having created it obviously to inflict evil whenever he/she wanted to) - why would this person bury it in the wall to begin with? If he/she didnt want it, arent there a LOT easier ways to be rid of it than building a wall around it?

[[GeekyPagan]]

Oh come on now --- no one sees the disparity in this?

See if you can answer THIS question with any kind of logic whatsoever:

WHY would the original creator of such an object, which that person can use whenever he/she wishes (and having created it obviously to inflict evil whenever he/she wanted to) - why would this person bury it in the wall to begin with? If he/she didnt want it, arent there a LOT easier ways to be rid of it than building a wall around it?

You make an excellent point.

But who can tell why some people do the things they do? If someone was driven to create a doll like *that*, it actually seems perfectly logical to put it into a wall. The person could have been mentally unbalenced for all we know and perhaps they thought the best thing was to put it into a wall. Maybe it was a kid who made it, and saw the wall as the best hiding spot, so mom and dad wouldn't find it. Maybe the person wanted the imbue the house with the "evil" energy of the doll? We never know.

[Tinu]

The whole story sounds so Edgar Allen Poe-ish.

[[ravenwing]]

The
lady who found it says it was an original part of
the house that had never been remodeled, so its
been in that wall at least 100 years. Probably
put in there when the house was built.

The fact that this area had never been remodeled tells you it was sealed in, not in some little cubbyhole or other opening - but IN the wall.

Just doesnt make any sense.