Malay Magic: Being an Introduction to the Folklore and Popular Religion of the Malay Peninsula (Oxford in Asia Hardback Reprints) [Hardcover]

Walter William Skeat (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 18, 1984 | Series: Oxford in Asia Hardback Reprints

This book is a facsimile reprint and may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages.

--This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English

Product Details

• Hardcover: 710 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (October 18, 1984)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195825985
• ISBN-13: 978-0195825985
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,735,733 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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5.0 out of 5 stars Malay charms, superstitions and bomohs (medicine men), April 10, 2011

By 

Isaac Ho (Canada) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Malay Magic: Being an Introduction to the Folklore and Popular Religion of the Malay Peninsula (Classic Reprint) (Paperback)

Malaysia, despite being a modern "Islamic" country and its stated "official" religion being Islam, is by and large steeped in acute superstitions and common folklore believe in the supernatural...strange as these may seem! Don't pretend for a minute that the native (Malay) folks are really dedicated to their acquired official religion called Islam as belief in supernatural force is very common and practiced throughout the countryside. I often see native people, when they are ill or enraged with revenge, to seek the services of a bomoh or medicine man which practices black witchcraft, casting spells and curses or taking out both! Even the Western-educated Malay still subscribes to the belief in black magic (or voodoo). Some Malay girls when their boy friends leave them would seek the help of a local bomoh to cast a spell on their oppositie sex just to get even! However, such revengeful black magic would work or not to work depending on the effectiveness of the bomoh in question. Sometimes the bomoh would engage to fight back with another bomoh and try to cast a spell on him or her in which their client's requests have been neutralized...! I have seen all these black magic wars when in Malaysia. Even ambitious and corrupted politicians seek the services of these bomohs to make them popular and hide their corruptions from the public, as evidence today in the State of Sarawak! Thus the writer of this book comes into usefulness to those who are currently going research in Malay magic in Malaysia today and even though the book was written a long time ago, its findings have still relevance in today's Malaysia which is seething with political and racial polarization and jealousies among its politicians to unseat one another via black magic...!
I, a former Malaysian, is buying this book in order to learn more about the current superstition and black magic rivalries among the politicians and bureaucrates so that their bad deeds and especially corruption are not revealed by rivalers and archenemies...! Remember: those who do bad deeds will somehow be made known in time to come...hence, do not do evil and seek no evil...! I highly recommend this interesting book in Malay Magic to all who are interested to understand the nature of the Malay man's and woman's dark nature...Cheers!