THE POWERS OF DARKNESS
BEING A RECORD OF SOME OBSERVATIONS IN DEMONOLOGY
THE Chinaman, though perhaps the most materialistic of Easterners, is no
exception to his neighbours in the large place which the occult takes in
his outlook. For him, the physical world is peopled with spirits good
and evil, capable of exercising the most far-reaching influences on the
fortunes of men. These spiritual beings are bound up in the forces of
nature, and combine to constitute that geomantic system known by the
Chinese as _Feng-shui_ (wind and water), by reference to which, matters
of human life, inasmuch as they are designed to court the good
influences and avoid those which are inauspicious to the man, the time,
and the place, are decided.
The Chinaman can never experience the feeling of complete solitude which
the Westerner knows in wild and lonely places; for him the hillside, the
ravine, and the mountain gorge are peopled with presences best described
as fairies, though in nothing resembling the light-hearted beings which
this description generally conveys to the Western mind. To him they
present the appearance of aged, venerable beings, short of stature,
with white beards. Country, town, and human habitations are alike
haunted by psychic beings whose condition cannot be exactly expressed by
the word _spirit_, neither form of Chinese belief admitting of the
conception of a pure spirit without matter.
These beings may be grouped into three classes. _Gwei_ is the term most
constantly used by the common people to indicate the being whose
influence is feared by all, and who receives from every family some
measure of propitiatory sacrifice. We read in the _li chao chuan_,[6] or
_Divine Panorama_, that "every living being, no matter whether it be a
man or an animal, a bird or a quadruped, a gnat or a midge, a worm or an
insect, having legs or not, few or many, all are called _gwei_ after
death."
Apart from these are the _shen_, which have been defined as _emanations
de la nature personnifiees_, not, as the _gwei_, spirits of the dead,
but an emanation of nature clothed with a personality. They possess
varying degrees of intelligence and power. Their interest is not only in
the affairs of men, to the knowledge of which they have access, but also
in the secret springs of human action. They reside in man as well as
amongst men, and witness to his good or evil works before the tribunal
of heaven. The classics of Chinese literature, recognising this, urge
upon readers the duty of decorum, purity, and care even when unseen by
human eyes and according to the teachings of Confucius; one of the
characteristics of the Princely Man is the discipline he will exercise
upon himself when alone.
Other spiritual beings are those who, by their ascetic practices, have
attained to a life higher than that of humanity; it will endure through
many centuries, and they are free to live in the pleasant places of the
earth with considerable licence to enjoy good things, yet free from the
material claims which govern human life. These are known by the term
_hsien_, and are referred to above as fairies. Each and all of these
beings touch the destinies of man at various points.
It is, however, in the important events of life--birth, marriage, and
death--that the interference of the spirits is strongest, and such
occasions are used by the sorcerer as a means of extorting money from
his unfortunate victim. In the _Divine Panorama_, we read that: "It is
not uncommon at the time of reincarnation to see women asking to be
allowed to avenge themselves in the form of _gwei_ before being changed
into men. On their case being examined, it is found as young women they
have been seduced or have been betrayed in other ways, such as the
husband refusing after marriage to fulfil his promise to support the
girl's parents, and in consequence of her disgrace the woman has
committed suicide." From that moment terror has dogged the steps of her
husband, and he has gone in hourly fear of sickness, accident, or sudden
death. If he be a student, the day of examination presents terrors
calculated to ensure failure, for he knows that the _gwei_ has power to
hold his mind in subjection so that he cannot write his competitive
essay. The only hope he has of release is the taking of a vow, whereby
he undertakes to study and make known _The Divine Panorama_ or _precious
record_ transmitted to men to move them, being a record of examples
published by the mercy of Yu Di, that men and women living in this world
may repent them of their faults, and make atonement for their sins. The
punishments described include all the most painful tortures of which
Chinese ingenuity can conceive. Truly, idols are the work of man's
hands, and they that make them are like unto them!
Sculptural art also has left nothing undone to represent the god as
animated by the worst passions of man, but skill and ingenuity must
inevitably stop short of the final act necessary to convince man that
communication is possible between him and the spirit world. In order to
bridge this chasm a class of men and women called sorcerers (_mo-han_
and _sheng-po_) has come into being, whose work it is to be the
spokesmen of the gods. With deliberate intent and elaborate ritual they
develop the mediumistic gift, and learn how to attain conditions of
frenzy and of trance during which period the body is controlled by a
spiritualistic force. Not only as the medium of the gods, but also as a
resting-place for longer or shorter periods to the homeless, unclean
spirit, do these sorcerers serve. At tremendous physical cost--for the
medium is never long-lived--they accumulate great wealth, exorbitant
sums being demanded in recognition of services rendered when freeing a
family or village from the visitations of a tormenting _gwei_. When
sickness enters his home, the Chinaman's instinct is to attribute it to
any cause rather than a natural one; his appeal on such occasions is to
the sorcerer whose time is largely occupied in giving what is called
medical advice, but is in reality the practising of the rites of
exorcism. Sometimes he will declare that the spirit of a sick person has
strayed from the body, and means will be set on foot to secure its
return. A woman I know, whose boy had apparently died from typhoid
fever, was told that his spirit had been enticed away by a god whose
shrine was built on the mountain side near the city where she lived. She
took the child's coat and walked to the temple; here, standing before
the idol, she burned incense and begged that the boy's spirit might be
restored to her. Holding the child's coat open to receive it, she swayed
to and fro, and with heart-rending cries besought it to return. She
waited until she felt her request had been granted, and with a movement
as though to enfold the little wandering ghost, she clasped the coat in
her arms and swiftly returning home, laid it upon the lifeless body. The
child revived, and is alive to this day.
Frequently, after supplication to the gods, the clothes of the patient
are carefully weighed; a procession is then formed in which one of the
sorcerers holds a mirror directed backwards, others, wearing scarlet
aprons, carry brooms and with slow and mystic movements sweep widely on
either side with the intent of gathering up the wandering soul.
Meanwhile crackers are fired to the weird sound of a minor, falsetto
lilting. After a considerable journey over the countryside they return
to prove the success of their venture. For this the clothes of the sick
man must be reweighed to see whether the weight of the spirit has been
added to that of the patient's garments. Should the smallest discrepancy
be detected all is well, and after feasting and opium the _mo-han_
pockets his fee and departs, frequently leaving a prescription behind
him, the results of which may be more or less harmful. Whatever the
result, nothing will shake the faith of the people in these degraded
villains, for they can, by threatening to call in the intervention of
the gods on their behalf strike terror to the heart of any man, and once
having sought aid of the sorcerer, the family is pitiable indeed.
In a case which came under my personal observation, the spirit of a
young woman from a village at some distance from the one in which I was
staying, who had recently died in childbirth, was said to have returned,
having found herself in difficulties in the spirit world for lack of
means to defray the necessary expenses. Illness became so prevalent that
necromancers were called in and agreed that a medium must be employed.
The spirit made its requirements known, and by promising the sacrifices
ordained, the family passed under a bondage from which none dared to
emancipate himself by omitting the prescribed rites. Night after night,
at the medium's command a table was spread at the cross-roads, on which
were laid the fantastic foods suitable to the requirements of the
departed spirit. Gold and silver paper money was plentifully burned,
crackers were fired, and following the medium, a party of men left to
place earthen bowls containing grains at various corners of the roads.
Nothing but the deliverance of Christianity, or a daring known to few,
can set free those who have been entangled in such practices.
I saw this medium whilst under spirit control. Before a table
elaborately decorated on which incense burned, she threw herself into
extraordinary contortions, quivering and shaking, her finger and thumb
forming a circle, whilst the little finger vibrated continuously. She
sustained a perpetual chant in the peculiar spirit voice, the minor
strains of which I find it impossible to describe. A relative of the
deceased acted as questioner, and she dictated the terms by the
fulfilment of which the spirit consented to a reconciliation.
Another manifestation of mediumship may be found in the more or less
conscious yielding of the personality to a controlling spiritualistic
influence, known as _demon possession_. Remarkable cases have come under
my own personal observation, and all incidents which I quote have been
witnessed by foreign missionaries who are prepared to vouch for their
accuracy. Those brought to my notice by reliable Chinese are too
numerous to include in this book, but the fact that men and women who
lay themselves open to demoniacal influences become possessed, is
beyond dispute. In many cases the possession follows upon a fit of
uncontrolled temper, such as is not uncommon amongst the Chinese; in
others it is connected with the taking of a vow on the occasion of
illness in the home, when service was promised to some particular god;
or again, it has been undoubtedly connected with the neglect to
completely remove idols from the home of a Christian.
In yet other cases, a spirit may take temporary possession of a human
body in order to find a means of expression for some important
communication, and after delivering its message leave the person
unconscious of that which has taken place. An instance of this occurred
in a family with which I am intimate. The eldest daughter was married
into a home where she received ill-treatment from her mother-in-law. For
several years she was systematically underfed and overworked, and when
at last she gave birth to a son we all expected she would receive more
consideration. The hatred of her mother-in-law was, however, in no
degree abated, and when the child was a month old she brought her
daughter a meal of hot bread in which the girl detected an unusual
flavour which made her suspicious. She threw the remainder to the dog,
and before many hours had passed both the unfortunate girl and the dog
were dead.
Her father was away from home at the time, the young men of the family
meanwhile carrying on the work of the farm. A few days later her
brothers and first cousins, strong, vigorous young farmers, being
together in the fields, her cousin, aged twenty-two, suddenly exhibited
symptoms of distress. He trembled and wept violently. Those with him
becoming alarmed at so unusual a sight went to his assistance, intending
to take him home. He wept, however, the more violently, saying: "I am
Lotus-bud; I was cruelly done to death. Why is there no redress?" Others
of the family were by this time at hand, and recognising the effort made
by the girl's spirit to communicate with her own people whom she had had
no opportunity of seeing in the hour of her death, spoke directly to
her, as though present. Telling her the facts of the case, they
explained that all demands must remain in abeyance until her father's
return, when the guilty party would be dealt with by her family whose
feeling was in no sense one of indifference. In about an hour's time the
attack passed, leaving the young man exhausted and unconscious of what
had taken place.
The criminal law of China can only be put in action under such
circumstances by the girl's own family undertaking a long and expensive
lawsuit, the result of which may end in the punishment of the criminal,
or may terminate in quite a different way. In this case the demands took
the form of a requirement, the granting of which constituted a tacit
acknowledgment of guilt. The demand in fact was that a funereal monument
should be erected in memory of the dead girl. This constituted so
uncalled-for an honour paid to one in her position, as to be a public
recognition that redress was due to her, and a law case was avoided.
It may be remembered that in the first chapter of this book an incident
is recorded of Mrs. Hsi herself being tormented by a demon which had
gained its power over her, by reason of neglect to completely destroy
all idols at the time when they were removed from the home. Such a case
is not singular.
Our first woman patient in the Hwochow Opium Refuge became interested in
the Gospel, and on her return home destroyed her idols, reserving
however the beautifully carved idol shrines which she placed in her
son's room. Her daughter-in-law who occupied this room, a comely young
woman, desired to become a Christian and gave us a warm welcome whenever
we could go to the house. About six months later we were fetched by
special messenger from a village where we were staying, to see this girl
who was said to be demon possessed. We found crowds of men and women
gathered to see and to hear. The girl was chanting the weird minor chant
of the possessed, the voice, as in every case I have seen, clearly
distinguishing it from madness. This can perhaps best be described as a
voice distinct from the personality of the one under possession. It
seems as though the demon used the organs of speech of the victim for
the conveyance of its own voice. She refused to wear clothes or to take
food, and by her violence terrorised the community. Immediately upon our
entering the room with the Chinese woman evangelist she ceased her
chanting, and slowly pointed the finger at us, remaining in this posture
for some time. As we knelt upon the _kang_ to pray, she trembled and
said: "The room is full of _gwei_; as soon as one goes another comes."
We endeavoured to calm her, and to make her join us in repeating the
sentence, "Lord Jesus, save me."
After considerable effort she succeeded in pronouncing these words, and
when she had done so we commanded the demon to leave her, whereupon her
body trembled and she sneezed some fifty or sixty times, then suddenly
came to herself, asked for her clothes and some food, and seemingly
perfectly well resumed her work. So persistently did she reiterate the
statement that the demons were using the idol shrines for a refuge, that
during the proceedings just mentioned her parents willingly handed over
to the Christians present these valuable carvings, and joined with them
in their destruction. From this time onwards she was perfectly well, a
normal, healthy young woman.
Upon recovery from illness a woman I knew yielded herself to the lord of
hell for a certain period, during which time she was under a vow to wear
black garments, to perform certain rites as required by the devil, and
to chant instead of speaking. She told me once that she knew all I could
tell her of the Lord of Heaven and of the death upon the cross of His
Son, but that she served the lord of hell, and his servant she remained,
only giving up her peculiar dress and manner when the time of her vow
had expired.
The yielding of personality to the possession of a spirit no doubt
seriously weakens the will power. Many cases are on record of those who
once delivered, like the man in the Gospel from whom the evil spirit had
been cast out, unconsciously again prepare the empty house to receive
the evil guest, and whose latter state is worse than the former.
It was to a woman, terror of the district in which she lived, that a
Chinese evangelist was called. After prayer in which he and some
inquirers took part, the evil spirit in obedience to their command
departed. A few weeks later on yielding to violent temper, she fell into
a worse state than before. The missionary of the district was this time
begged to go himself. As soon as he entered the room the woman threw
herself upon the _kang_, rolling about in seemingly great agony. The
Chinese helper, Mr. Li, rebuked the spirit, saying: "We ordered you to
leave. Why have you returned?" "I could find no dwelling-place," was the
answer, given with extraordinary rapidity, in the curious spirit voice.
"Find me a place to rest, and I will leave at once." "We have come,"
said Li, "to command you to leave, not to find you a place." Upon this
the woman laughed and clapped her hands, and in the struggle it seemed
as if the powers of evil were in the ascendancy. As she still chuckled
with amusement, Li said: "Let us sing a hymn," and immediately the voice
replied: "I too can sing," and forthwith shouted some theatrical songs.
Mr. Li then prayed, but there was seemingly no power and the voice also
mockingly prayed. The missionary then interposed, saying: "I have not
come here to hold intercourse with demons," and forthwith
authoritatively commanded the demon to leave her. There was a struggle,
and she fell down unconscious on the _kang_.
She came to herself in a normal condition and apologised to the
missionary for her state of deshabille. Faithfully and sternly he
rebuked her for sin and for giving place to the devil. She recognised
her fault, and was from that time a changed woman.
An evil spirit has been known to claim a young girl as its possession,
forbidding her marriage under severe threats. It was in such a case that
a demon, driven from a man who had become a Christian, went to a village
eight miles distant and possessed a young woman. Speaking through her,
it forbade her marriage and manifested itself in the same manner as it
had done in the man from whom it came, compelling him to perpetually rub
one side of his face and head until there was no hair left there. When
questioned as to whence it came the demon replied by giving the name of
this man, and to the question: "Why have you left him?" replied: "I have
been turned out, for that man has become a Christian."
Two methods of exorcism are used by the sorcerers--defiance and bribery.
The Christian method is that of commanding the evil spirit in the Name
of the Lord Jesus Christ to release the victim.
Some have been set free from the power of a tormenting spirit who have
not been subsequently kept free, through refusing to yield to the
control of the great Spirit of Liberty. Pastor Hsi, than whom none
better understood the conflict in the Heavenly Places, in earlier days
would cast out demons from all the possessed who were brought to him,
but in later years as experience grew, he refused to do so unless idols
were destroyed, and he had reason to believe there was a sincere desire
to obey the commands of God. He doubtless saw, as others have done, the
futility of temporary relief during which, in that mysterious way so
graphically described in the Scriptures, the demon wanders in waterless
places, joining himself to others more evil than he.
Pastor Hsi learned to distinguish between the greater and the lesser
demons. With the latter he would deal summarily, but not so with the
former. "This kind," he would say, "goeth not out but by prayer and
fasting;" and thus he would prepare himself for an encounter with the
powers of evil.
Young believers, doubtless impressed by the Pastor's command over
unclean spirits and perhaps sometimes eager for a similar power, were,
as in the instances recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, in serious
danger. Pastor Hsi urged them not lightly to undertake the casting out
of demons. He had been faced by the awful realities of the spirit world,
and on one occasion at least, by reason of a thoughtless word, had been
troubled by the very demon he had cast out and which attached itself to
his person.
The experiences recorded here may be unfamiliar to many readers, and
some will doubtless think that madness, hysteria, or epilepsy may
account for them. To such I would suggest the following points for
consideration: Firstly, the striking, detailed resemblance between the
cases seen now in heathen lands and those recorded in the Scriptures;
secondly, the complete and lasting restoration resulting from prayer
and from the command in the Name of the Lord Jesus that the demon should
depart; thirdly, the appalling sense of the reality of the conflict with
the evil one at the moment of supreme test, as the missionary is called
upon to prove his personal faith, and to give the command which shall
decide whether God or demon remains conqueror on the field.
When the promise was given by Christ that His witnesses should cast out
demons, it was with the foreknowledge that such equipment was essential
to those who obeyed His command to disciple the nations. Let the signs
following be a reminder to weary warriors that the Captain of our
salvation is actively leading His hosts; and to the indifferent and
half-hearted who profess and call themselves Christians, let it be a
matter for serious reflection that there exist churches in many heathen
lands, the members of which have not lost their first love and faith,
and against whom the enemy has come with his whole strength.
A feeble conflict may provoke a feeble resistance, but it behoves the
aggressive warrior to prepare for the fight of his life when he invades
the enemy's territory, where the conflict is not with "mere flesh and
blood, but with the despotisms, the empires, the forces, that control
and govern this dark world."
FOOTNOTE:
[6] _The Precious Regulations_, a book written under the Sung Dynasty.
Its main tenets are derived from Buddhism, though some writers inscribe
the book among the Taoist documents. Its sub-title explains its
contents: "A precious record of examples published by the mercy of Yu Di
(the Jade Emperor to whom is entrusted the superintendence of the world,
the Jupiter of the Taoists), that men and women may repent them of their
faults and make atonement for their sins." It includes a description of
the Ten Courts of Hell and the judgments pronounced therein.
THE LIFE STORY OF PASTOR WANG
"Happy the meek;
For they shall inherit the earth."
"The labourer whom Christ in His own garden
Chose to be His helpmate."
DANTE.
"He went out to seek wisdom, as many a one has
done, looking for the laws of God with clear eyes
to see, with a pure heart to understand, and after
many troubles, after many mistakes, after much
suffering, he came at last to the truth."--H.
FIELDING HALL.