Religious tradition

Religious tradition

Aisha Qandisha

Aisha Qandisha is a female spirit of Moroccan belief, described as a beautiful woman who may have a goat's or donkey's legs. Members of the Hamadsha and of zār groups seek possession by her in their rites.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Aluxes

Aluxes are small beings of Maya belief said to live in the bush, forests and fields, guard the milpa and play tricks. Some people still leave them offerings.

Provenance · Living tradition

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Religious tradition

Engkanto and diwata

Diwata and engkanto are spirits of Philippine belief. Colonial writers recorded the word divate in 1573, and people interviewed by GMA News in 2013 still described diwata as real and dangerous.

Provenance · Living tradition

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Religious tradition

Hungry Ghost Festival: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan

An observance held during the seventh lunar month, known as Zhongyuan in China and Yu Lan in Hong Kong, with offerings to ancestors and rites for wandering ghosts. It is practised in mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Hungry Ghost Month in Singapore and Malaysia

The lunar calendar's seventh month, when many Chinese Buddhists and Taoists in Singapore and Malaysia believe the gates of Hell open and spirits wander. Communities hold rites and offerings for the dead and stage shows for them.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Jinn

In Islamic scripture and theology, the jinn are beings made from fire who live unseen alongside the visible world. The Qur'an names them often, and its chapter 72 carries their name.

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Religious tradition

Keramat shrines

Keramat are holy places of Malay communities where people make vows, often linked to pious figures. Singapore's Kusu Island has three, visited by Malay and Chinese pilgrims, while religious authorities in Malaysia and Brunei have acted against the practice.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Kitsune and Inari

Foxes in Japanese religion and folklore. Fushimi Inari Taisha in Kyoto reveres them as the unseen messengers of Inari Okami, while folk tales tell of fox wives, and of foxes said to haunt houses or to be kept by families.

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Religious tradition

Kumari, the living goddess

The Kumari is a Newar religious institution of Nepal's Kathmandu Valley in which a girl who has not reached puberty is worshipped as the goddess Taleju Bhawani. Michael Allen dates the earliest known written references to Kumari to the late 13th century.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Lilith

Lilith is a female figure of Jewish texts and practice, feared as a threat to childbirth and newborns and, in a medieval telling, Adam's first wife. Childbirth amulets tied to her story are still used by women today.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Ma'nene, the Toraja rite for the dead

Ma'nene is a rite of the Toraja people in which the bodies of the dead are taken from the grave, washed, groomed and dressed in new clothes. One Torajan quoted in the press says it also brings together relatives who live far away.

Provenance · Living tradition

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Religious tradition

Mae Nak Phra Khanong

Mae Nak is the ghost of a woman who died giving birth while her husband was at war, the most popular Thai ghost story according to the Bangkok Post. Her shrine on Sukhumvit Soi 77 in Bangkok draws devotees who bring offerings and requests.

Provenance · Living tradition

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Religious tradition

Mami Wata

A water spirit honoured by worshippers and priestesses in much of Africa, and carried to the Americas by enslaved Africans. Her name is pidgin English and can be read as Mother Water.

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Religious tradition

Nahual

The nahual, or nagual, is a Mesoamerican religious idea still held among Indigenous peoples of Mexico and Guatemala: a guardian spirit tied to an animal, or the animal form some powerful people are said to take.

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Religious tradition

Nuno sa punso

The nuno sa punso is a tiny old spirit said to live in earth mounds. People still say "tabi tabi po" to ask its leave when they pass, a courtesy on record since about 1731.

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Religious tradition

Nyaminyami, the Zambezi river god

A river god of the Tonga people along the Zambezi, pictured with a serpent's body and a fish's head. A 2020 study reports that many believed he opposed the building of the Kariba dam.

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Religious tradition

Nyi Roro Kidul

The ruler of the southern sea, also called Kanjeng Ratu Kidul. The Yogyakarta palace ties its labuhan offering at Parangkusumo to her promise to help Panembahan Senopati and his descendants.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

Qallupilluit

The qallupilluit are beings of Inuit tradition who live beneath the sea ice and take children away. Cousins, an Inuk from Iqaluit, told Nunatsiaq News in 2024 that the story warns children who play at the floe edge as the ice breaks up, where they could drown.

Provenance · Living tradition

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Religious tradition

Rakshasa

Rakshasas are beings found in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and the folk Islam of Indonesia, according to Wikipedia. A Rigveda hymn to Agni hails him as their slayer, and in the Ramayan Ravan calls himself their king.

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Religious tradition

Shambhala

A hidden kingdom of Tibetan Buddhism, ruled by the future Buddha Maitreya and told of in the Kalachakra tantra.

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Religious tradition

Taniwha

Taniwha are supernatural beings in Māori tradition, often guardians of water, whose forms vary between tribal traditions. In 2002 Ngāti Naho's objection on behalf of a taniwha led Transit New Zealand to reroute part of a Waikato highway.

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Religious tradition

The 37 nats of Myanmar

The 37 nats are the chief spirits of Burmese folk religion, each said to be a person who died a violent death. Believers in Myanmar honour them with offerings and festivals, including a yearly gathering for the Taungbyon brothers that draws tens of thousands.

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Religious tradition

The Aghori

A group of Hindu ascetics devoted to Shiva as Bhairava, known for rituals that set aside ideas of purity, and for a leprosy ashram run by an organisation of its tradition.

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Religious tradition

The dakini

A figure of Hindu and Tibetan Buddhism whose meaning differs by tradition: a flesh-eating demoness in some texts, an enlightened female presence in Tibetan Buddhism.

Provenance · Religious tradition

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Religious tradition

The jinn of Feroz Shah Kotla

At a ruined fort in Delhi, visitors write letters to the jinn believed to live there, and a crowd gathers every Thursday.

Provenance · Living tradition

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Religious tradition

The night marchers (huakaʻi pō)

In Hawaiian belief, the huakaʻi pō, or marchers of the night, are processions of spirits dressed as chiefs or gods. Martha Beckwith recorded in 1940 that many Hawaiians have seen or heard them.

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Religious tradition

Vetala

The vetala is a being known from a Sanskrit cycle of twenty-five tales, the Vetalapanchavimsati, later retold in Braj-bhasha and Hindi as the Baital Pachisi. Wikipedia reports a strong cult of the vetala in the Konkan, under the names Betal, Vetal and Vetoba.

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Religious tradition

Yakshi and Kalliyankattu Neeli

Yakshis are female spirits of nature in Hindu, Buddhist and Jain traditions. In Kerala the best known is Kalliyankattu Neeli, who in one telling found refuge in a temple.

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Religious tradition

Zār

Zār is a healing rite of drumming and dance, led and attended mostly by women, practised in Egypt, East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula; on Iran's southern coast, zar is one of the winds people believe in. The leader of Egypt's Mazaher ensemble says the rite has gone public through its music.

Provenance · Living tradition

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