Dybbuk Possession and Mechanisms of Internalization and Externalization: A Case Study
May 8, 2018 DOI: 10.4324/9780429478567-11 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Case report |
|---|---|
| Population | A Jewish woman in a nineteenth-century Eastern European Hasidic community, discussed through case reports of dybbuk possession |
| Citations | 17 |
| Key points | Argues that projective identification is particularly relevant to spirit possession and examines the case of a Jewish woman whose career in a nineteenth-century Hasidic community ended with dybbuk possession. Contends that dybbuk possession, unlike socially approved ceremonial possession in other cultures, appears in case reports as a crystallized syndrome with behavior patterns that remain relatively stable across time and space. |
Abstract
This chapter discusses the peculiar career of a Jewish woman in a nineteenth-century Eastern European Hasidic community, a career ended by an episode of dybbuk possession. Although various concepts of internalization and externalization are employed in this work, it is particularly projective identification which seems intriguingly related to spirit possession. While case studies of spirit possession in various cultures are well represented in the anthropological literature, the dybbuk has been the exclusive domain of creative writers such as S. Ansky and I. B. Singer. Dybbuk possession, by definition, involved spirits of the dead as possessing agents. Unlike many other cultures, Judaism did not possess the positive category of ceremonial possession, in which the dissociative state is not stigmatized but socially approved, and the adept seeks to establish a symbiotic relationship with the possessing agent. Dybbuk possession is depicted through the case reports as a crystallized syndrome, the behavior patterns of which remain relatively stable across time and space.