The hex-men
The Sunday Times speaks to spiritual healers who lead seemingly normal lives
By Nur Dianah Suhaimi
To her friends and neighbours, Madam Aminah (not her real name) is a freelance masseuse who is married with three children.
She lives in an HDB flat in Sembawang and the family has regular karaoke sessions.
What they do not know is that the 45-year-old is also what is known as a 'spiritual healer', or tukang ubat in Malay. She claims to be able to chase away evil spirits which disturb people and haunt homes.
Her tools are a broom made of coconut leaves and a packet of salt.
She sweeps the air using the broom and sprinkles some salt around the client, who will be lying down. Then, reciting some Arabic phrases, Madam Aminah claims she can scare spirits into submission and imprison them.
'I will trap the spirit in a glass jar and throw the jar into the sea so they cannot come back,' she said, adding that she has done this at least 50 times.
While bomohs, or medicine men, are believed by the Malay community to perform black magic and cast evil spells, spiritual healers are the ones who help get rid of these hexes.
At least 100 bomohs and spiritual healers are believed to be practising in Singapore, said practitioners.
While some might view these happenings with incredulity, the scene is, by some accounts, thriving.
A 30-year-old officer at an airline company who does spiritual healing in his spare time said: 'In the eight years I have been a spiritual healer, I have seen a non-stop flow of patients who were black magic victims or suffered from spiritual disturbances. My weekday nights and weekends are all booked up.'
Bomohs came up for mention in the High Court recently in the case of an odd-job worker who was sentenced to hang for hurling his wife from the 13th floor of a block of flats in Stirling Road.
Tharema Vejayan Govindasamy, 40, said he believed that his family was under a spell placed by his in-laws. He said they wanted to break up his marriage because he refused to convert to Islam.
Desperate to end the spell, he consulted several bomohs but this did not seem to help.
On July 1, 2007, a drunk Tharema hurled his factory worker wife, Madam Smaelmeeral Abdul Aziz, 32, from the block. She fell to her death.
Bomohs seldom crop up in court cases here, but there have been cases involving them in Malaysia, the most famous one being the trial of bomoh Mona Fandey.
She was approached by politician Datuk Mazlan Idris to advance his political career. Halfway through a ritual, she and her husband killed him instead, decapitating him and chopping his body into 18 parts.
Mona, her husband and her assistant were found guilty of murder and hanged in 2001.
In Malay communities of old, bomohs were seen as folk medicine practitioners and were revered in rural societies. However, over the years, some switched to the dark side and practised black magic instead.
To differentiate themselves from the bomohs, the folk medicine practitioners choose to call themselves spiritual healers.
According to the 1951 book, The Malay Magician by Richard Winstedt, the Malay bomoh's practice incorporates animistic, Hindu and Islamic traditions.
Religious teachers said that Muslims believe in the existence of spirits and black magic as these concepts are mentioned in the Quran.
However, using black magic and invocating spirits are strictly forbidden, said Muslim religious scholar Ustaz Pasuni Maulan.
'Hurting others and interfering with the spirit world is wrong. That is very clear in Islam,' he said. The religious teacher was also the former Registrar of Muslim marriages.
Other communities here also have their own otherworld beliefs.
Taoist faith healers or mediums are readily available at temples and often advertise their healing services in the Chinese newspapers, said Mr Tan Kok Hian, adviser to the Taoist Federation.
Catholic priests are equipped with the ability to heal people who are disturbed by spirits, Archbishop Nicholas Chia told The Sunday Times.
The Sunday Times went on a search of bomohs and found six spiritual healers here. We could not find any bomohs as no one wanted to be identified as that.
The six healers - four men and two women - lead seemingly normal lives and hold full-time jobs in the day, ranging from information technology officer to masseuse.
However, at night and on weekends, they claim to help people get rid of spirits. They refused to be named to protect their privacy.
All said they only help people get rid of spirits and do not place evil spells or hexes.
Said Madam Aminah: 'There are bomohs out there who cast evil spells for a fee. I don't do such things. It is wrong and un-Islamic.'
The spiritual healers claimed they could see spirits from the time they were young. They then decided to make use of this 'gift' to help those disturbed by spirits. Most will do house calls to 'treat' their patients at their home.
One female spiritual healer in Woodlands does not do house calls but uses her four-room flat as a mini clinic instead.
When we visited last week, there were at least six women of various races knocking at her door to seek help. Their grievances ranged from cheating husbands to problems at the workplace. Each left with a bottle of water which promised to soothe their nerves and solve their problems.
The spiritual healers said they do not charge a specific fee but their clients will usually give them a monetary token of appreciation, ranging from $20 to $50.
They also do not advertise their services but will get new patients through word of mouth.
Each healer has his own method of healing.
One man makes use of sand, steel nuts and bolts to shoo away evil spirits. Two male healers who work together go into trances to cure people who think they are being possessed.
Ustaz Pasuni said that even when intentions are good, not all bomoh practices are allowed as they may sometimes clash with Islamic values.
'Sometimes, the bomoh would give people charms which they claim can protect them from harm. This goes against Islamic teachings because only God can protect us from harm, not charms or trinkets,' he said.
Instead, people who are troubled should pray and read specific verses in the Quran, he added.
Consultant psychiatrist Ken Ung said that help from spiritual healers can be effective.
'Sometimes, people feel better after being counselled by bomohs or mediums. They feel good that someone listens to them and believes what they have to say,' he said.
Religious leaders urged people not to become preoccupied with spirits and healers.
Said Ustaz Mohd Yusri Yubhi Md Yusof, executive imam of Al-Falah mosque: 'Some people like to blame all their problems on black magic. Some go to bomohs or spiritual healers whenever they have the slightest problem. This is not right. They need to take control of their lives.'
It is a view mechanic Ilyas Ahmad, 26, shares.
He noted how bomohs might be an important icon from the past but today, they seem to be doing more harm than good.
'From stories I've heard, many of them just seem to be conmen, doing it for the money,' he said.
Nurse Siti Nur Ain, 34, agreed.
Said the mother of two: 'There is no scientific proof as to what the bomohs and spiritual healers do. Most of the time, the successful cases that you hear about seem to come from people who want to believe in them, rather than because they really work.'
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MOST RECENT CASE IN SINGAPORE
Last Monday, odd-job worker Tharema Vejayan Govindasamy (above), 40, was sentenced to hang for hurling his wife from the 13th floor of a block of flats in Stirling Road.
He said he believed that his in-laws had placed a spell on his family because they wanted to break up his marriage as he had refused to convert to Islam.
Desperate to end the spell, he consulted several bomohs but this did not seem to help.
On July 1, 2007, a drunk Tharema hurled his factory worker wife, Madam Smaelmeeral Abdul Aziz, 32, from the block. She fell to her death. MOST FAMOUS CASE IN MALAYSIA
In 2001, bomoh Mona Fandey, her husband and her assistant were hanged for the murder of Datuk Mazlan Idris. The politician had approached her to help him advance his career. Mid-way through a ritual, they killed him .
