Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Pow-Wow Folk Healing

Pow-Wow Folk Healing
Pennsylvania Dutch Pow-Wow

Pow-Wow, also referred to as hex work or Speilwerk, is Pennsylvania Dutch/Pennsylvania German folk-healing. This system combines both the Pennsylvania Dutch Germanic/Nordic European healing traditions with religion and Native American traditions.

David W. Kriebel writes in this work, Powwowing: A Persistent American Esoteric Tradition, that Powwowing, or "brauche" in the Pennsylvania German dialect, is "a magico-religious practice whose chief purpose is the healing of physical ailments in humans and animals," 

Other aspects of powwowing were based on the work of Albertus Magnus, a 13th-century Dominican monk, and "The Sixth and Seventh Books of Moses", which contains procedures for conjuring spirits.

Few powwowers would admit to owning a copy of this book, Kriebel said, because it encroached upon "black magic" or "hexerei."

The noted Bruce Teeple, curator of the Penns Valley Area Historical Museum in Aaronsburg, stated that "Powwowing is more akin to faith healing -- "braucherei" or "white magic.""

Pow-Wowers use a variety of European magic spells, recipes, and folk remedies with simple rituals to cure health ailments, protect livestock, cast or remove hexes & curses, and invoke blessings.

Pow-Wowers are Christians and believe their powers are spiritual gifts from God. The Amish and Mennonites oppose Pow-Wow, considering it to be a satanic practice.

Pow-Wowing can only be taught from teacher to student, who must be of the opposite sex. A man can only teach a woman and a woman can only teach a man. The belief is that anyone who would break the rule by teaching a person of the same sex would become weak and lose their powers.

Pow-Wowing is not very common today, but there are still practicing Pow-Wowers in the PA Dutch community.


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A Pow-Wower's Source Of Spells 
A Pow-Wower's source of spells comes from these books:

The Bible
The most common source of Pow-Wowing incantations.

The Long Lost Friend, or Der lang verborgene Schatz und Haus Freund
Written by John George Hohman in 1819 and first published in 1820 in Reading, Pennsylvania.
It is a collection of recipes, spells, and procedures.

Egyptian Secrets of Albertus Magnus
This is one of the main sources for The Long Lost Friend. Its compiler is the Swabian Dominican monk Albertus Magnus (A.D. 1200-1280), a saint in the Roman Catholic Church and known as a scientist, philosopher, and theologian.

The Sixth and Seventh Books of Moses
The Sixth and Seventh Books of Moses is associated with black magic because it contains procedures for conjuring spirits, it is often considered a hex book.

Secrets of Sympathy by William Wilson Beissel
Originally published as a 16-page chapbook in 1938 and republished in 1998 as a section of the book Powwow Power, by William Wilson Beissel's great-nephew James D. Beissel.



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AzureGreen- Celebrating All Paths to the Divine



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