Beware of the Evil Eye: A Charm from Baghdad

From The Jewish Chronicle

When Jack Shamash's sister was expecting a baby, she asked him for the family's protective charm: a small bundle of gallnuts, turquoise discs, a tiny gold fish, and a cowrie shell, bound with gold wire, that their grandmother had brought from Baghdad. In their family, no baby arrived without protection from the evil eye.

An ancient belief

The fear of envy

The belief that an envious look can cause harm goes back at least 3,000 years and appears in cultures from China and India to Africa, the Mediterranean, and northern Europe. Many Jews still take it seriously, saying “kein ayin hara” (no evil eye) after good news, or tying a red string for protection.

Charms and customs

Many ways to keep it away

Shamash, who has spent some twenty years researching the subject, describes the many forms protection has taken: blue beads in Greece, red threads, eye shaped pendants, cowrie shells, and herbs such as rue. Some families gave a child a new name, or kept a baby looking plain, so as not to attract the evil eye's attention.

In Jewish life today

Old customs, new places

Opinions differ within Judaism, and some Jews dismiss the evil eye as superstition. Yet Shamash notes that a home for new mothers in London still hangs prayers against the evil eye above each newborn's cot. For his own family, the charm from Baghdad is both protection and a link to the grandmother who carried it from Iraq.

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This summary was written by JIMENA and is based on “Beware of the evil eye” by Jack Shamash, published by The Jewish Chronicle (July 3, 2020). The original article belongs to The Jewish Chronicle.