THE ritual of obeah has been outlawed in Jamaica for 246 years but its practice is prevalent, and now there are indications that its associated potions have entered mainstream commerce in at least two pharmacies found in downtown Kingston.

Obeah is associated with the dark arts, but cultural experts say some of its features resemble religious rites and are no more harmful.

A branch of obeah, known as myal, actually promotes wellness, healing and a multiplicity of cures.

Some of those cures were found on sale in two pharmacies on West Queen Street, Kingston, whose shelves were stocked with potions and paraphernalia of the trade – March’s Drug Store, and Prescriptions Limited.

Both stores had a variety of candles carved in the image of men, women, penises, vaginas, skulls and the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ – with prices ranging from $190 to $750.

There were potions ranging from $200 to $400 with names such as Dragon’s Blood, Conquer All, Love Me, Black Cat’s Bone, Oil of the Seven Holy Spirits, Controlling, among others, but no labels spelling out the ingredients.

March’s manager allowed the Sunday Observer to view its range of products and note the prices but refused to comment on his business, saying he was a victim of bad press in the past.

But at Prescriptions Limited, a man who identified himself only as ‘Doc’, called his service ‘spiritual counselling’ but eschewed the title of obeahman, saying that he was a ‘spiritual lecturer’.

“Obeah is when you go to graveside an’ summon spirit,” he said, adding that he mostly specialises in driving out demons from people and houses, or exorcism, described by the Bible as one of the miracles that Jesus performed and which some church denominations like the Roman Catholics still practice.

The Vatican is reported to have last published an updated ritual for exorcisms in 1999. The police, meantime, say they have more pressing crimes to deal with, like murder, than chasing after the purveyors of enchantments.

The parish of St Thomas is notorious for obeah practitioners, as are parts of Clarendon, with ‘balm yards’ easily identifiable by flying coloured flags.

But checks with the police in St Thomas revealed that no case involving the occult had been prosecuted in the past decade.

“Too much serious crime deh bout fi police a run down man fi obeah,” remarked a female officer at a police station in the Area Five division where the Sunday Observer had gone in search of Constable Davis.

Davis, who recently transferred from St Thomas and spoke on condition that his first name not be used and his place of work not identified, had, in his line of work, come across obeah trappings.

In one of those instances, he told the Sunday Observer, he and a colleague had visited a two-storey house in Retreat, St Thomas to resolve a problem between a landlord and her tenant.

While there, he said, they stumbled upon a “little magic.”

“There were human skulls, animal remains, pots of blood, oils and essence,” said Davis.

He said too that “photographs of people from all walks of life”, including entertainers and policemen, were haphazardly hung on the walls, some burnt along the edges, perhaps from a ritual using fire.

“(My colleague) run out and say him head a swell,” he said.

“I never run out because I don’t believe in those things.”

Nevertheless, he said, they took the situation no further because they had managed to resolve the tenant dispute for which they had been called to the house.

Sergeant Desmond Roach, Constabulary Communications Network liaison officer for St Thomas, says while he cannot recall an obeah case being brought before the court in the last 10 years, the parish is not short of practitioners.

The ‘balm yards’ can be identified by the colourful array of flags perched atop fences and even roofs, but those trappings, he said, were insufficient evidence of the occult.

“The law speaks to instruments of obeah,” Roach said, adding that “anyone can decorate their house with flags.”

He believes the basis on which to charge someone for obeah is the claim to supernatural powers – a characteristic not unique to obeah workers.

Laws against obeah originated first in 1760, but the most recent legislation was promulgated on June 2, 1898, just over a century ago.

The Obeah Act identifies the practitioner as “any person who, to effect any fraudulent or unlawful purpose, or for gain, or for the purpose of frightening any person, uses, or pretends to use any occult means, or pretends to possess any supernatural power or knowledge.”

The penalty is imprisonment up to a year, and both the occultist and the client are subject to prosecution.

“Frankly, if we were to take the law as it is, then we could charge people who are making these claims under the guise of religion,” said Roach.

In fact, an academic treatise on obeah defines it as an institution that encompasses a wide range of rites and beliefs, and is primarily concerned with divination, healing, ancestral veneration as well as manipulating and controlling supernatural forces.

Divination is synonymous with ‘prophecy’, an accepted, though sometimes controversial Christian norm, claimed as the mode of communication between God and followers, through so-called messengers.

The St Thomas police spokesman told the Sunday Observer that legal authorities usually get wind of obeah cases only after a deal goes sour.

But such cases are often prosecuted as fraud.

“A lot of times the situation involves passport and visa rackets, where the obeahman takes money or the book (passport) and does not deliver . then people show up to complain,” said Roach.

“There are so many laws in the books that need to be revised; this might be one of those,” said the policeman, adding however that the use of obeah to harm or defraud should remain illegal, but its cleaner cousin myal should be allowed.

“There is much confusion between obeah and myalism,” he said. “Based on the history, (they) are almost opposing things.”

Doc believes that the spirit realm is more formidable than the physical, and as such, he says, services like his are around to stay, notwithstanding the laws against it.

“In the days of old there was a lot of ritual,” he said, alluding to the Bible. “Pharaoh used to work his ritual down in Egypt . it was from the beginning and it must come to the end. Nothing, not even the law, can stop it,” said the spiritualist.

Doc declined to say how much he charges for his services, saying his fees were quoted according to the severity of the case.

Like Doc, David Stimpson, a cultural specialist and curator of the Sacred Things exhibition, now on at the Institute of Jamaica, believes obeah will continue to thrive, saying the police cannot combat what they do not understand.

Stimpson maintains that the obeah remains a crime only because Jamaica is largely a Christian society that retains European mores, which paint the obeahman as evil.

“They are seen as charlatans . just using an aura to get money,” said Stimpson.

He sees both obeah and myalism as spiritual practices that have their own idiosyncrasies, saying their characteristics were enough to define them as legitimate religions.

He added that other religious movements like Revivalism and Pentecostalism still have African retentions, but are not illegal because early “shepherds” adopted more Christian orientations to gain acceptance among traditional churches like the Baptists and Anglican movements.

“I may be a heretic, but it’s the same reasons people flock to the church,” said Stimpson. “Everybody wants to feel protected and have hope for prosperity.”

Kenneth Bilby and Jerome Handler, co-authors of Obeah: Healing and Protection in West Indian Slave Life, published in The Journal of Caribbean History 2004 by the UWI Press, posited that obeah was cleverly used as a form of resistance to the oppressive structures in which Africans found themselves during slavery.

The British slavemasters then outlawed both obeah and myal, citing them as oppressive forces, said the Bilby/Handler academic paper.

Even though the law is hardly enforced today, Stimpson says it will remain on the books, even if only to serve as social commentary for succeeding generations.

“By having the law you are stating the social norms that are desirable . that will have it remain on the books,” he said “Anything else is anti-social.”

henryr@jamaicaobserver.com