Read the previous post on this series here.

The Place of Spirits

This topic comes up a lot in conversations relating to depression and suicide. I’ve had one or two persons mention it to me as something that should be discussed in this series.

And just to set things clear, these (evil) spirits are said to possess a person and manipulate them to harm themselves up to the point where they take their lives. So they should be considered one of the causes of depression, right?

But I’ll tell you a short story of something that happened in class one time. Dr. Ken, a lecturer at the Department of Microbiology, threw a question to us, the then final year students.

“A woman who had HIV got pregnant. She managed to carry the child for 9 months and deliver a HIV-negative child. She did not undergo any special treatment while pregnant. It all just happened naturally. How do you explain this?“

This was his question. People made attempts to answer it. This guy, however, stood up and said,

“Our God works in mysterious ways…“

He didn’t get to finish because everyone started laughing. Note, he was not wrong. Of course, God works in mysterious ways. If he said this in a church or a casual conversation with friends, no one would laugh. It would be welcomed and commended. But not in a science class; that line of debate is not a valid one.

Now, where am I going with this? In the book, Weep Not, Child, the protagonist was very close to hanging himself in the end. There was a voice in his head that urged him to take his life, told him he was useless, all sorts of terrible things. The voice was clear and convincing.

This is what one would consider being possessed by an evil spirit. But a spirit is a supernatural being. And to the best of my knowledge, secular literature, which hinges on social and physical sciences, will most likely not acknowledge the role of spirits. It just won’t be a valid conversation. The closest they get is to recognize these voices (as a part of the person’s mind, not an entire foreign being).

That is why in the book, Weep Not, Child, the author gives an account of the character’s experiences and the terrible things he went through, and tries to present it as an explanation for the deterioration of the character’s mental state.

Does this mean he was not possessed by a spirit? Not necessarily. This practice just won’t acknowledge it. Maybe in a religious analysis, the involvement of spirits can be discussed in earnest.

There are thinner lines that I would have loved to get into, but this is already a long post. Would have worked better if this were a speaking engagement and we had ample time to discuss.

Anyway, that’s what I think. I’d like to hear yours.

to be continued…

©Tochukwu Precious Eze

founder, MeHAA.