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Speaker 9One of the most continually surprising aspects of spiritual belief is just how many common features are shared by religions separated by vast distances, language, and culture. This is the result of cultural mores. Before it was possible for the average person to engage in intercontinental travel, and well before the advent of instant communication, faith was restricted to whatever was passed down within one's own immediate environment. And yet, despite some obvious differences, there are certain aspects which are shared by virtually all of the world's religions. Each employs designated sites of worship, whether it be something rudimentary, like a tree, or an altar stone, to more sophisticated structures, like synagogues and mosques. Many have a figure who stands for the ultimate personification of good, as well as a corresponding evil force that must be fought against or resisted in order to achieve salvation. And each of Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism, and the Abrahamic traditions at least, involve the story of a messianic figure with special fealty, which is that he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being, and he is the supreme being. Perhaps one of the most insidious common features shared by every major religion is the idea that we are vulnerable to possession by evil. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. In fact, this is a very common phenomenon in Buddhism. 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She couldn't stop thinking about her maternal grandmother, who'd recently passed away, how much she would have loved to have been there with everyone that night. Nearby, Janet's uncle John was concerned. He'd spotted Janet from across the room, staring blankly at the wall. When he asked her what was wrong, Janet explained that she wasn't feeling great and asked John if he'd seen her Aunt Glennis anywhere, who'd promised to give her a lift home. When Glennis eventually caught up with her, she was shocked at just how drawn out Janet looked. She could have passed for a woman in her fifties, she thought, instead of the dynamic young woman of twenty-two she knew her to be. Without a second thought, Glennis suggested that Janet and her kids crash at her house for the night, where she could keep an eye on her and help with the kids. While Janet tried to get some rest. With any luck, she thought, Janet would be back to her usual self in no time.
Speaker 3This message is brought to you by Kroger. If you're listening for a laugh or a fresh take on everyday life, you know it's often the little things that make everything more enjoyable and easier. And even on busy nights, Kroger has easy meal solutions ready to serve you. So dinner doesn't turn into a whole situation when you already have enough going on. Order online and get groceries delivered in as little as one hour. Kroger.
Speaker 2Texas proud since 1955. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it at Progressive.com. Progressive.com. It's a casualty insurance company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
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Speaker 9Get in the game now. Get in the game now. Get in the game now. Get in the game now. Get in the game now. Get in the game now. Get in the game now. Get in the game now. It was just after 1pm when Glennis arrived with Janet and the girls in tow. Uncle John had been expecting them, and not just because Sunday was normally when the family sat down for their weekly meeting. Glennis had phoned John first thing and explained everything that was going on. Glennis had phoned John first thing and explained everything that was going on. He couldn't help feeling that his poor young niece had finally been driven to the brink by the demands of parenting and her bad relationship. John resolved to sort it out once and for all. Since his mother had died, he had taken on his role as head of the family with gusto, and it both heartened and terrified him to be looked upon with so much responsibility. By then other family members had already arrived and were sat all around the living room drinking coffee. Over the course of the next few hours, members of Janet's family took it in turns to reassure her that they loved her, perhaps hoping that that might be enough to bring her out of her stupor. All the while, despite the heat, Janet simply sat stock still in her jacket and remained silently staring at the ground. When the family meeting was over, Glennis took Janet to convalesce at the former home of her grandmother where her mother, now lived, who was waiting for her when she arrived. Janet seemed exhausted. A bed was set up for her in a spare room next to a large stone statue of a lion. The lion had been acquired a few weeks before by her sister from the grounds of the Grey Town Hotel located about an hour's drive away. Because the lion was seen as a natural talisman of the family, her sister thought it would bring good fortune to their house. It was around 1 o'clock the following morning when a horrific scream ripped through the silence of the house. Janet's mother rushed into Janet's room to find her daughter in hysterics, claiming that the spirit of the statue was tormenting her and scratching her from the inside out. She was sweating so much from her forehead, it looked as though she'd just come out of the shower. Janet's mother did her best to calm her down and soothed her back to sleep. But the following day, her mood seemed to have grown worse. Things only deteriorated further from there. It wasn't clear who said it first, but soon, the family began to wonder if Janet was succumbing to Markutu. Barely able to lift herself from bed with an ever-growing sense of paranoia, it was clear that Janet was in severe trouble, and it was time to seek help. It was early on the morning of Monday, 8th October, when Timi Rahi arrived at Janet's mother's home. In his bag was a leather-bound copy of the Bible and a bottle of holy water. Timi was renowned within the local Maori community as a kaumatua, or spiritual advisor, and had even worked as a cultural attache to New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark on matters pertaining to native spirituality. From Timmy's perspective, human beings were completely composed of both physical and spiritual elements, and it was his belief that the spiritual was vulnerable to influence from both good and bad otherworldly beings. On his arrival, John quickly ushered Timmy into the house, where countless other members of Janet's extended family were also gathered, and in the middle of them all was a completely unresponsive Janet. Timmy couldn't help being deeply concerned by Janet's exhausted state and the distant look in her eyes. Though he couldn't be sure what was wrong exactly, after reciting some prayers but getting nothing in response, he suggested the best option would be to conduct a makutu lifting, a ceremony to rid any potentially disruptive energies in case things got worse. At this stage, it merely involved blessing Janet with water and saying special koans, paradoxical riddles designed to break patterns of thought over her prone body in an effort to ward off the perceived evil. But as the afternoon progressed, something strange occurred. Timmy claimed to have a vision of three claws ripping into Janet. It was the stone lion from the hotel, he said. The implication was clear. It wasn't a negative essence that Janet was struggling with, some kind of malignant, demonic entity had got into her. As it turned out, the stolen statue was actually part of a pair. The way Timmy saw it, the pair had been together for over a hundred years, so when Janet's sister stole one of them, the other's protective spirits had become angry and placed a curse on Janet's family. A shudder of fear passed between all those present. Were they all in danger now? They wondered. Not wanting to take any chances, Janet's uncle John immediately sprang into action and ordered the statue be taken back to the hotel without delay. The statue was dragged from the house and placed in the back of a truck and driven away from the house at speed. A convoy of eight further vehicles, containing nearly 40 members of Janet's family, many who'd called off sick from work, escorted the statue back to the graveyard. Janet was then taken to the town hotel. Inside one of the cars, Janet became restless. Seeming to suddenly snap out of her otherwise placid state, she began to spit and rail at the people around her and even threatened to kill her paternal grandmother when she tried to calm her down. With no time to spare, the family finally arrived at the hotel. Several people jumped out and hurriedly pulled the heavy stone lion from the back of the car. The car then dragged it back to the exact spot from where it had been taken. Once back in place, the relief among them all was palpable. To be sure it had done the trick, Timmy Rahi conducted a short service to formalise the statue's return and pray for forgiveness. Back at Janet's mother's house, the family had dinner together. Then, on the advice of Timmy Rahi, now hopeful that all would soon return to normal, Janet was ordered to try and get some rest. But Rahi was unsettled. Despite everything, returning the statue had not fixed the problem. As he explained to John, the lion's return had only removed two of the claws from his vision. He could still see one clinging onto Janet. The Makutu was still there, and it was now somehow linked to Janet's partner, Shane. On Wednesday 10th October, the family gathered again at Janet's mother's home. Though he didn't know exactly how it was done, Uncle John decided to continue the Makutu lifting. He began by ordering the family to surround Janet. Just then, someone pointed out the bone necklace around her neck, a gift from Shane. It was a gift from Shane. It was a gift from Shane. He was promptly cut off and thrown away. Then, together, under John's guidance, the family began to chant blessings as they passed around a cup of water, taking it in turns to sip from it. They began to stomp in unison, as though they might somehow stamp the Makutu out of her. Outside, unsettled neighbours listened with increasing concern to the deafening sounds of chanting and stomping coming from inside the property, while inside, as the temperature rose ever higher, hitting 40 degrees Celsius, the family took to splashing themselves with cupfuls of water to help cool down, as they continued to stamp and shout for the Makutu to leave Janet. At some point, Janet's paternal relatives began to wonder if she might be better off going to hospital, but their concerns were waved away. Instead, with nothing, Janet was pulled into the shower fully clothed and sprayed with cold water, in the belief that subjecting her to cold temperatures would make the Makutu that still clung to her uncomfortable. When this also didn't work, Janet was led back to the living room, where the lifting continued with ever more gusto.
Speaker 3If you're into entertainment podcasts, you know it's all about the details that pull you in and keep you engaged. The right details make everything feel seamless. And even when plans change, Kroger makes it easy to shift to dinner, so you can still get something on the table and keep the rest of your night on track. Order online and get groceries delivered in as little as one hour. Kroger. Texas proud since 1955.
Speaker 2This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
Speaker 10Picture this. You're the owner of a plumbing company descending into an 18-inch crawl space to hydrojet a sewer line. Don't ask.
Speaker 11Ah, boy, this is tight. I knew I shouldn't have had that extra helping of mashed potatoes last night.
Speaker 10Now let's say your phone rings.
Speaker 12Uh-oh.
Speaker 10It could be a lead on a very big job.
Speaker 12I better get that.
Speaker 10Or it could just be a spam call.
Speaker 12Oh.
Speaker 10But thanks to Ruby's call screening and seamless integration with the CRM system you already use, by the time you come up for air, your next job will already be waiting. Oh.
Speaker 12Oh.
Speaker 10This is Ruby, the team of remote receptionists who answer all your calls live. We do everything a great receptionist does, only better. Experience the new Ruby for yourself. Visit ruby.com. Or, better yet, call us. 866-GET-RUBY.
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Speaker 9By Thursday, 11th of October, the heat which enveloped Wellington had become virtually unbearable. That morning, Janet's mother, along with some younger members of the family, arrived at the house where Janet was being kept. What they found there shocked them to the core. Numerous members of the family sat about in various states of lucidity, clearly having been up all night. Uncle John hadn't changed his clothes for days and he was babbling incoherently about something evil in Janet's eyes. While all about, the house was completely flooded. Worst of all, Janet, who veered from restless sleep to lugubrious bouts of wakefulness, was no better than the last time her mother had seen her. With her mother's arrival and Janet seemingly subdued for the moment, John took the opportunity to try and get some rest. But no sooner had he closed his eyes, Janet started screaming. They're coming, she growled. They're coming, Several family members shot up and began shadow boxing around her, as if they were fighting off invisible entities. At some point, John noticed that some of the children had begun to act strangely too. Some were staring blankly off into the distance, seemingly in a trance, while others seemed to be muttering incoherently to themselves. It was the thing they'd feared the most. The makutu was spreading. Hurriedly, the children were all made to vomit in order to purge any evil that was thought to be inside them. Anything solid that came up was swiftly stamped on by the others in an effort to obliterate any evil spirit that it might contain. From that point on, everyone was banned from looking Janet in the eyes, lest they also succumb to the malignant curse. At some point, perhaps growing increasingly terrified by the ritual's inability to expunge the makutu from Janet, the family decided to take things up a notch. Believing the purifying qualities of water held the key to her salvation, Janet was held down while water was poured into her eyes and her mouth in the hope it might finally purge the evil from her. Janet was then taken to the hospital, where she was taken to the hospital. When she closed her eyes to shield them from the deluge, others reached out and pried them open. Some believed when they did so, they could see the demons swimming about inside them. When Janet closed her mouth, unable to hold any more water in her throat, again came the frantic hands to pull her mouth apart. As Janet's eyes grew progressively scratched and red, and she struggled for breath, the young woman grew increasingly distressed. Clearly, the family thought it was finally working. Janet's struggling, they reasoned, was simply her struggling to free herself from the demon possessing her. And so, despite her increasingly desperate protestations, the family held firm and continued the treatment. When Janet's jaw locked, nobody present understood that she was in fact drowning. Moments later, she was unresponsive. With no desire to call the authorities, and no one on hand able to perform CPR, it was sometime around 8am on Friday, October 12th, when Janet's heart stopped beating. And yet, even then, the Makutu lifting was not complete. Janet, now dead, it seemed to many present that whatever had been stalking her, had somehow wormed its way into her 14-year-old niece. She too was held down and doused with water. Fingers clawed at her eyes to keep them open, as the supposedly purifying liquid was repeatedly thrown onto her face, until eventually she passed out. Just then, a neighbour appeared at the front door. He told everyone to stop immediately. He claimed he'd received a message in a, dream from Janet's deceased grandmother, that the demon was now gone, and that with Janet's death, the evil had been dispersed. He said that the grandmother's spirit was angry that the younger family members had been subjected to all the madness. Then he blessed Janet's body, and advised that the emergency services be called. The lifting was over. In the days following Janet Moses's death, numerous members of her family were taken into custody and quizzed about their involvement. In the end, nine people were charged with manslaughter and cruelty to a child. No intoxicants were found in any of the participants of the ritual, while several experts in Maori culture testified that they had never heard of an exorcism being conducted in a family. In the days following Janet Moses's death, numerous members of her family were taken into custody and quizzed about their involvement. In the end, nine people were charged with manslaughter and cruelty to a child. No intoxicants were found in any of the participants of the ritual, while several experts in Maori culture testified that they had never heard of an exorcism being conducted in a, As it turned out, the lion ornaments that had apparently been revealed to spiritual advisor Timi Rahi in a vision to be over a hundred years old, were in fact nothing of the sort. Instead, they were simply mundane objects, purchased recently from an everyday garden centre. In June 2009, five of the nine family members were found guilty of manslaughter. In June 2009, five of the nine family members were found guilty of manslaughter, including Janet's uncle John and four of her aunts. However, not one received a jail sentence, but were instead sentenced to community service and to undertake cultural sensitivity training, which may seem odd given the severity of the crime. Because here's the thing, whether or not Janet was ever truly possessed, there is absolutely no denying that her family were only acting with the very best of intentions, according to how they saw the world. Despite their abstract beliefs leading to the very real physical consequence of Janet's death, it feels almost cruel to condemn them for it, given the sincerity, even purity, of their conviction. It is perhaps a little hollow given the tragic consequences of their actions, but this single detail raises some vital and uncomfortable notions about the world we live in. The world we share with each other. In China Mieville's novel, The City and the City, the plot unfolds effectively in two locations, the cities of Betzel and Alcoma, that in a remarkable and brilliant conceit, in fact, occupy the same physical space. Their inhabitants have been conditioned from birth, to unsee and unhear one another, thereby enabling them to live side by side, despite inhabiting entirely separate perceptual realities. Each population moves through the same streets and buildings, but perceives only its own city's architecture, people and culture, mentally erasing anything belonging to the other. To notice or acknowledge the other side is a crime called breach, punishable by a mysterious, quasi-supernatural force. Mieville uses this strange, surreal set-up to explore how societies construct and maintain invisible boundaries, political, cultural, psychological, and how they allow people to coexist in the same reality while living entirely separate lives. But crucially, for the most part, those who have to live in this reality do not do so out of animosity or hatred to the others outside. It is simply a consequence of their innocently and organically acquired beliefs. And that is a complicated truth at the centre of all this, and one that bears repeating. That whatever others may believe, and however wrong we might think those beliefs to be, it is often not hatred or a calculated rejection of our beliefs that drives them. Janet Moses' family did what they thought was right. They believed they were trying to save her. And yes, that ill-informed belief killed her. But here's the thing. It might be easy for some to look at Janet's family and see something strange, alien even. A relic, perhaps, of less enlightened and more superstitious times. But the truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. The truth is, in the end, it's the truth. But the truth is, we all live like this. Each of us are caught inside abstract systems of belief, be they political, cultural, spiritual, that tell us who we are, what is right, and who to fear. A lot of the time, those beliefs rub quietly against each other. But often, they collide in devastating ways. And when they do, we're reminded how fragile our sense of the world really is. In truth, our world has never been one thing. It has always been a series of overlapping realities, each coexisting with the other, sometimes helpfully, other times less so. But the danger, in many ways, comes not from belief itself, but from the moment we stop looking across the divide. The moment we no longer see the other's city. Because that's when belief hardens into something colder. And that is how the world fractures. Not, for the most part, through malice, but through conviction. Through the seductive fallacy that only one version of the world is correct, or indeed, is needed. This episode was written by Richard McLean-Smith, and James Connor-Patterson. Richard McLean-Smith. All other elements of the podcast, including the music, are also produced by me, Richard McLean-Smith. Unexplained the Book and audiobook is now available to buy worldwide. You can purchase from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones and other bookstores. Please subscribe to and rate the show wherever you get your podcasts and feel free to get in touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding the stories you've heard on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation or a story of your own you'd like to share. You can find out more at unexplainedpodcast.com and reach us online through X and Blue Sky at UnexplainedPod and Facebook at facebook.com forward slash unexplainedpodcast. We'll see you next time. X and Blue Sky X and Blue Sky
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