Snippets from South Africa, February 2010
Suspected Witchcraft Killer on the Loose
In a suburb of Verulam, near Durban, in August 2009, a body with missing organs and skin was found dumped in the bush, causing the residents to live in fear of a suspected muthi (magic potion) killer being on the loose.
A resident said he heard bloodcurdling screams and called the police, who failed to respond. He then contacted a private security company, and the mangled, mutilated body was discovered. The young black man had been sliced open from his chest to his abdomen, and his heart, lungs, genitals and the skin around his inner thighs and from his buttocks had been neatly cut out, which are favourite body parts to be used for witchcraft purposes. And what is even worse, it is believed the man was taken to this lonely spot and mutilated while still alive.[12] This is a quite common practice, as it is believed it makes the organs more potent for muthi purposes.
Frightened residents said a number of people had gone missing in the weeks prior to this, and they believed they were being killed for muthi. People had become too afraid to go out at night and children had been told not to walk home late from school.
This is the grim, gruesome reality in South Africa, even today: witchcraft is very much alive and well and being practiced by black Africans all over the country, as it is in many parts of Africa. When South Africa was governed by white Africans and the Gospel of Christ was proclaimed throughout the land, such demonic practices were greatly suppressed and those who practiced them did so in isolated areas and always with the fear of being caught and punished. But the African National Congress, even before it became the government in 1994, had openly sought the blessing of witchdoctors upon its leaders and made it clear that such men and women would be welcome in the new South Africa. Consequently there has been a huge upsurge in witchcraft in SA ever since, with ritual muthi murders becoming increasingly commonplace, even in urban residential areas. When men either have no true knowledge of God and the Gospel of Christ, or depart from even the intellectual knowledge of it which they had, they rapidly sink into all kinds of sins, including especially the abominations of false religion. Before white missionaries arrived in South Africa, witchcraft was an integral part of the religious systems of the black tribes. Today we are witnessing a reversion to such religious beliefs, and a consequent rise in ritual murders and in a black population that is again beginning to live in fear. For African religions are religions of fear, death, and mutilation. Satan holds his subjects in bondage. Only in the Lord Jesus Christ is there love, and joy, and peace.
Witchcraft Behind a Case of Shocking Cruelty to a Dog
In a witchcraft ritual carried out by sangomas (witchdoctors), a puppy was stabbed and buried up to its neck for three days in the residential suburb of Azalea, Pietermaritzburg, in early January. Two spears had been pushed through its hind legs and protruded above ground. Yet did any of the Zulu people living in that neighbourhood go to its rescue? No – the reason being they were too afraid of being bewitched if they did so! All that some of them would dare do was to remove the earth above its head to allow it to breathe. And so there it stayed, howling for three days until someone called the SPCA, which rescued it.[13]
When the SPCA inspector removed the puppy from the ground, it was discovered that it had been buried with two dead chickens and numerous candles of various colours. Its legs had also been poked with needles. And the SPCA said that, far from being an isolated case, this was the third incident of a similar nature that they have dealt with in recent times.
Once again we see the grip of fear which belief in witchcraft has on black people in Africa. The residents of this suburb were so afraid of being bewitched themselves if they came to the dog’s rescue that they just left it to howl for three days! And they tell us that all religions and cultures are equal? They tell us that people are happy with their own religions and don’t need Christian missionaries to preach the Gospel to them? When we look at African traditional beliefs, we see such paralysing fear that people will not even come to the rescue of a poor puppy, suffering extreme pain. Compare this cruelty with what the Bible says: “A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast” (Prov. 12:10). The brute beasts are not to be put on an equality with man, as is happening in much of the world today; but nor are they to be treated with cruelty. A righteous man will treat his animals with kindness, because they are God’s creations and also because the Lord’s grace has softened his own heart, making him show mercy and kindness even to dumb animals. The verse goes on to say, “but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.” Yes, even the most “tender” things they do are cruel.
A religious belief that prevents a man from even showing common tenderness and mercy to a suffering beast is from the very pit of hell. Even the Pharisees, merciless men that they were, showed more kindness than this; for Jesus said of them, “Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day?” (Lk. 14:5). Yet this puppy, buried up to its head and having been stabbed, was left three days without anyone showing kindness to it!
Of course, other sangomas were adamant that such a ritual was not the way they performed their witchcraft. One of them said that in 30 years of working as a sangoma she had never seen such callous cruelty.[14] She did concede that some rituals to supposedly cleanse oneself of “bad spirits” were carried out in a similar way, but never with dogs or with cruelty, and never in a residential area (as if that makes it right). And just how truthful was she being? After all, even though she had witnessed the entire incident as it had occurred right next to her house, notice that even she did not attempt to rescue the dog! She is a sangoma herself, and tells us that this was cruel, that dogs should not be used – and yet she was too afraid to help the dog! She clearly believed in the potency of the ritual then, despite her condemnation of it!
After the incident various sangomas spoke out against the ritual – but only permitted the use of their last names in doing so. Clearly they were afraid of reprisals. One, identified as MaNgcobo, said that the real ritual is called ukulahla isilwane (to rid oneself of evil spirits) and does not involve the use of animals. She said, “The person who is to undergo the ritual is taken to a mountain away from other people’s homes and bathed in traditional medicine. Incisions are then made on all of the patient’s body joints so they bleed and you remove their blood with a small river rock and rub powdered medication into the incisions.”[15] Then the blood and the waters mixed with medicine used to bathe the person are poured into a hole and the patient leaves without looking back, leaving the bad spirits behind him.
Another sangoma named Sifiso said what was done to the puppy was barbaric and demeaned the practice of “traditional healing.” He said traditional medicine is used in the cleansing ceremony, and some use a chicken, but never a dog. So it is all right to be cruel to a chicken! How then is Sifiso’s version of the ceremony any less barbaric? If he thinks that using a dog somehow “demeans” his so-called “healing” methods but that using a chicken doesn’t, he is sadly mistaken.
What a religion of darkness! Truly, the difference between biblical Christianity and African witchcraft is the difference between day and night. How wonderful the words of the Lord Jesus who has said, “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (Jn. 8:36).
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