Mokhì

In the cultures of Vircazihm and surrounding areas, mokhì is the term for possession. A spirit or demon is believed to possess individuals causing personality changes, illness, or endowing super natural powers. There are a variety of entities that can cause the possession. Mokhì can have beneficial or detrimental impacts or both.

Traditionally, Kìfùist priests would intentionally invite mokhì by the spirit of a lineage or clan ancestor. In these public rituals, the priest typically speaks in the voice of the ancestor to members of the lineage in attendance. In some instances the priest may behave strangely or in socially unacceptable ways. Likewise, Shungyist priests also practice intentional mokhì but rather than inviting ancestor spirits, they invite mokhì by demons from Miṛi Tĩmu, which is envisioned by Shungyists as an astral type of liminal word where entities from dreams come into existence. Shungyist priests use mokhì for a variety of reasons but usually it is for one of two reasons, either to heal mãngå̃ (soul loss), or to gain knowledge or powers from the demons of Miri Tĩmu.

Historically, lay people did not intentionally invite mokhì but could be the unwitting recipients or victims of it. This involuntary mokhì was almost always associated with illness or misfortune, however, with Ordrish influence in the Twentieth Century, gained popularity among the middle and upper classes. In time the interest in spiritism merged with the folk concept of mokhì for some people. Mokhì in the mid-Twentieth Century became a way for some to intentionally communicate with loved ones who had passed on. While the interest in spiritism waned, lay mokhì grew in popularity in the Nineties and has continued to grow in the current century spawning new varieties as well as new fears among many who view this practice as dangerous.

History
Scholarship in the early twentieth century attributed the origin of mokhì to the Heorutu, the Neolithic and Bronze Age people of the Plain of Yawhũ (the ancient term for Lower Vircazihm). While the etymology of mokhì is not known, some scholars believe its phonology is likely Heorutitic in origin. Additional evidence comes from several Heorutite pictograms that appear to show human figures in the throws of an ecstatic trance. Dissenting scholars have pointed out the phonology of the word is insufficient evidence and the pictograms can be alternately interpreted as people performing a dance. Furthermore, the concept of mokhì as a way to manifest the will of the ancestors is inexorably tied to the ancestor worship of the ancient Jovites and to the Kìfù religion that derives from it.

Ancient Arom
The first direct evidence of it comes from Iron Age Arom in the form of an inscription stating that King Djahm consulted a priest in 114 BCE who performed mokhì to seek the will of his ancestor, Queen Knotaba. The inscription reads in the Jovitic language as follows:

From this King Djahm understood that he must lay siege to the enemy's home city known for its rich Temple of the Black Swan and was victorious in the Battle of Djiik

Shungyism
In the Eighth Century CE, the Shungyist religion arose in Upper Vircazihm and gradually spread through the county bringing with it a Shungyist variation of mokhì. Monastic mokhì was esoteric and complex but was always considered part of the path toward the attainment of the True and Infinite Body in the Infinite Realm. However, Shungyist clergy also performed healing and blessing ceremonies that included mokhì for lay practitioners and the community at large. In many of these healing rituals the priest or monk would attempt to exorcise the malevolent spirit that had caused illness through possession of the victim. It was in this form that common Vircazihmese would normally encounter mokhì. As Shungyism grew and became the dominant religion, so too did this understanding of mokhì as illness causing and requiring exorcism.

Gekezist Vircazihm
Under Gekezikist rule, 1951-1992, public mokhì was repressed as superstition but people continued to believe in the mokhì illness and clergy continued to practice associated rituals behind closed doors. Also, during this period, interest in spiritism increased in urban populations, possibly response to the Gekezikist suppression of religion. This set the stage for what is now known as popular mokhì (in contrast to folk mokhì and religious mokhì).

The mokhì revival
In 1992, after the end of the civil war and the end of Gekezikist rule, a former Shungyist nun, Syùm Fsandmùm Drìnyù, published a book on mokhì (Bupùta da Mokhì) and began to give lectures and demonstrations on the topic. This was the beginning of the popular interest in the subject among the urban middle classes. Her book focused primarily on the symptoms of the mokhì illness and on Shugyist exorcism rituals to cure the afflicted, but also touched on the practice of inviting mokhì by entities of the Shungyist other world. This became a best seller in Vircazihm and soon there was growing interest in the wider phenomenon including the Kìfùist practice of intentionally inviting mokhì by the spirits of the dead.

By the mid-ninties, there were mokhì clubs in Slodos Seymi and other cities made up mostly of housewives conducting séance-like ceremonies to heal each other of everything from anxiety to cancer, to speak with dead loved ones, and to invite demons to possess members and give the possessed extraordinary powers. Eventually, the craze spawned fear and criticism. Shungyist and Kìfùist clergy alike condemned the practice as dangerous, maintaining that only qualified priests can work with mokhì safely and even priests can be harmed when mokhì goes badly.

The mokhì scandal
The first major mokhì controversy happened in 1995. A certain Ulete housewife by the name of Yũbteḍ Ḍå̃ymatle is alleged to have invited a mokhì possession of her husband in a secret ceremony as he slept on the moonless night of 21 November. On the morning of 22 November, her husband Mawjnå̃ was found in the middle of the street having apparently blinded himself and mutilated himself in various ways and was attempting to open a manhole with the intent of throwing himself into the sewer. He was admitted to Slodos Seymi Psychiatric Hospital and had to be put in five-point restraint to prevent further self harm. A further incident occurred on 13 December when in the midst of a sponge bath with his leather restraints partially undone, Mawjnå̃ broke free and attacked a CNA managing to blind her in both eyes with his thumbs before grabbing a pen and stabbing a student intern in one of his eyes. From there he proceeded to attack light fixtures and other patients, attempting to blind them, before he was restrained again. No one knows how he managed to attack his victims as well as the light fixtures while completely blind. He died in restraints three days later of unknown causes.

The episode was chalked up as acute manic psychosis of unknown etiology, that is until months later when three fellow members of Yũbteḍ's mokhì club came forward and reported on her, describing the ritual as inviting a ṭånå tå̃ tå̃ṇini demon to possess her husband. This type of demon is malicious and is believed to dwell in a dark otherworld where there is no light. It hates light and will do anything to escape it.

But, not only did they inform authorities of Yũbteḍ's alleged mokhì ceremony against her husband, they revealed that their mokhì club had offered malevolent mokhì possessions against any husband who was abusive. Scores of men who had been targeted had experienced mysterious illnesses, some were struck by sudden onset of mental illness, and some had died mysteriously. They further acknowledged under questioning that the service extended beyond targeting abusive husbands and had included husbands the wife wanted to get rid of in order to marry a boyfriend and cases of eliminating husbands for the inheritance. While this was all front page news for months and years, it mostly came to nothing. There was no direct evidence that the mokhì rituals had actually caused the alleged harm. In the end, Yũbteḍ was the only one to spend time in prison for life insurance fraud being as she had taken out policies not only on her husband but on several of the other alleged victims. Other mokhì scandals followed, but this was the most publicized.

Twenty-first century
Since the controversies of the nineties, religious mokhì ceremonies and mohkì exorcisms continued as before, but popular mokhì clubs went underground. While mokhì is not illegal, lay mokhì carries stigma and judgment. Members of mokhì clubs work to maintain their anonymity. Younger lay practitioners have branched out from the entities of traditional mokhì and have recently taken to inviting possession by characters of popular culture. While this may strike outsiders as odd, its logic is grounded in Shungyist cosmology in which the realm of Miri Tĩmu exists outside of place and time and in that realm, all things that appear in humans dreams there exist in reality. The more human dreams of a specific thing, such as a fictional super hero, the stronger that being becomes in Miri Tĩmu, albeit a dreamlike variation of the character that may differ from the imagined character in unexpected and disturbing ways.

Varieties
In Vircazihm of today mokhì exists in many forms, as a form of illness, as a form of spiritual growth, or even as a way to gain power and wealth in this life. For some mokhì is deadly serious, for others it represents the backward superstitions of Vircazihm's past holding the nation back, and for yet others it is a commodity to be sold whether in the self-improvement sector or the ethnic tourism sector.

Mokhì sickness
Physical and mental illness as a consequence of mokhì continues to be a widespread belief throughout Vircazihm. While it is more common as a belief in rural and impoverished areas where educational levels are low and access to medical treatment is limited, it also has a following among the middle classes where it is seen as a traditional alternative to the medical model. It is also common for someone to see both a medical doctor and a mokhì exorcist, if only to hedge their bets.

Mokhì sickness comes in as many forms as there are spirits in Kìfù and Shungyist cosmologies. By far the most common mokhì illness is that caused by ancestor ghosts (ovvni mokhì). Ancestor ghosts may become angry or hungry if they are provided insufficient sacrifices and veneration. Angry ghosts will possess its victim and will cause the victim to take actions that are bizarre or self-harming, examples are yelling incomprehensibly, physically attacking family members, burning down their own house, and generally becoming uncharacteristically angry and aggressive. Hungry ghosts long to be in bodies of flesh and hunger for all pleasures of the flesh. Signs of mokhì caused by a hungry ghost are ravenous eating, extreme promiscuity, excessive gambling, and similar.

The cures for mokhì sickness take one of two forms, appeasement or exorcism. Kìfù priests generally facilitate appeasement by enticing the spirit out of the victim with rich sacrifices, leading the spirit to return to the realm of the dead. Shungyist clergy prefer exorcism while animists draw the offending spirit into themselves.

Animism
While animism was largely supplanted by organized religion over the centuries, it continues to be practiced in small pockets, notably the eastern uplands of Upper Vircazihm and in the Tsvush region of Lower Vircazihm. Vircazihmese animists develop relationships with spirits and use mokhì, allowing the befriended spirit to possess the practitioner and in order for the practitioner to channel the powers of the spirit. Animists purportedly develop a skill that provides them some amount of control over the spirits by whom they are possessed, and have the power to expel the spirit at will.

Animists work with both nature spirits and the spirits of the dead. Nature spirits run the gambit from spirits of any specific animal to spirits of natural forces such as wind, running rivers, volcanism, etc. Each type of spirit