Here
is the story of the haunted wine box, exactly
as it appeared on eBay. You form your own opinion.
The first buyer an antique buyer-refinisher
All of the events that I am
about to set forth in this listing are accurate and may be verified
by the winning bidder with the copies of hospital records and
sworn affidavits that I am including as part of the sale of
the cabinet.
During September of 2001,
I attended an estate sale in Portland Oregon. The items liquidated
at this sale were from the estate of a woman who had passed
away at the age of 103. A grand-daughter of the woman told me
that her grandmother had been born in Poland where she grew
up, married, raised a family, and lived until she was sent to
a Nazi concentration camp during World War II. She was the only
member of her family who survived the camp. Her parents, brothers,
a sister, husband, and two sons and a daughter were all killed.
She survived the camp by escaping with some other prisoners
and somehow making her way to Spain where she lived until the
end of the war. I was told that she acquired the small wine
cabinet listed here in Spain and it was one of only three items
that she brought with her when she immigrated to the United
States. The other two items were a steamer trunk, and a sewing
box.
I purchased the wine cabinet,
along with the sewing box and some other furniture at the estate
sale. After the sale, I was approached by the woman's granddaughter
who said, I see you got the dibbuk box. She was referring to
the wine cabinet. I asked her what a dibbuk box was, and she
told me that when she was growing up, her grandmother always
kept the wine cabinet in her sewing room. It was always shut,
and set in a place that was out of reach. The grandmother always
called it the dibbuk box. When the girl asked her grandmother
what was inside, her grandmother spit three times through her
fingers said, a dibbuk, and keselim. The grandmother went on
to tell the girl that the wine cabinet was never, ever, to be
opened.
The granddaughter told me
that her grandmother had asked that the box be buried with her.
However, as such a request was contrary to the rules of an orthodox
Jewish burial, the grandmothers request had not been honored.
I asked the granddaughter what a dibbuk, and keselim were, but
she did not know. I asked if she would like to open it with
me. She did not want to open it, as her grandmother had been
very emphatic and serious when she instructed her not to do
so, and, regardless of the reason, she wanted to honor her grandmother’s
request.
I finally ended up offering
to let her keep what seemed to me to be a sentimental keepsake.
At that point, she was very insistent and said, No, no you bought
it!
I explained that I didn’t
want my money back, and that it would make me feel better to
do what I thought was an act of kindness. She then became somewhat
upset. Looking back now, the way she became upset was just plain
odd. She raised her voice to me and said, you bought it! You
made a deal!
When I tried to speak, she
yelled, we don't want it! She began to cry, asked me to leave,
and quickly walked away. I wrote the whole episode off to the
stress and grief she must have been experiencing. I took my
purchases and politely left.
At the time when I bought
the cabinet, I owned a small furniture refinishing business.
I took the cabinet to my store, and put it in my basement workshop
where I intended to refinish it and give it as a gift to my
Mother. I didn't think anything more about it. I opened my shop
for the day and went to run some errands leaving the young woman
who did sales for me in charge.
After about a half-hour, I
got a call on my cell phone. The call was from my salesperson.
She was absolutely hysterical and screaming that someone was
in my workshop breaking glass and swearing. Furthermore, the
intruder had locked the iron security gates and the emergency
exit and she couldn't get out. As I told her to call the police,
my cell phone battery went dead. \ I hit speeds of 100 mph getting
back to the shop. When I arrived, I found the gates locked.
I went inside and found my employee on the floor in a corner
of my office sobbing hysterically. I ran to the basement and
went downstairs. At the bottom of the stairs, I was hit by an
overpowering unmistakable odor of cat urine (there had never
been any animals kept or found in my shop). The lights didn't
work. As I investigated, I found that the reason the lights
didn't work also explained the sounds of glass breaking. All
of the light bulbs in the basement were broken. All nine incandescent
bulbs had been broken in their sockets, and 10 four-foot fluorescent
tubes were lying shattered on the floor. I did not find an intruder,
however. I should also add that there was only one entrance
to the basement. It would have been impossible for anyone to
leave without meeting me head-on. I went back up to speak with
my salesperson, but she had left.
She never returned to work
(after having been with me for two years). She refuses to discuss
the incident to this day. I never thought of relating the events
of that day to anything having to do with the cabinet.
Then, things got worse.
As I already indicated, I
had decided to give the cabinet to my Mother as a birthday gift.
About two weeks after I made the purchase, I decided to get
started refinishing it. I was surprised to find that the cabinet
has a unique little mechanism. When you open one of the doors,
the mechanism causes the opposite door, and the little drawer
below, to open at the same time. It is very well made. Inside
the cabinet, I found the following items: 1 1928 U.S. Wheat
Penny; 1 1925 US Wheat Penny; One small lock of blonde hair
(bound with string); One small lock of black/brown hair (bound
with string); One small granite statue engraved and gilded with
Hebrew letters (I have been told that the letters spell out
the word SHALOM); One dried rosebud; One golden wine cup; One
very strange black cast iron candlestick holder with octopus
legs.
I saved all of the items in
a box intending to return them to the estate. The family has
refused the items, so they will be included in this sale of
the cabinet.
After opening the cabinet,
I decided not to refinish it. I cleaned it, and rubbed in some
lemon oil. It was at this time that I noticed that there was
an inscription in Hebrew carved into the back of the cabinet.
I have no idea what it says or if it is significant. I have
included a picture of that inscription below. On my mother’s
birthday, October 28, 2001, my mother called to tell me that
she was going out of town with my sister for three days, and
we postponed celebrating her birthday together until she returned.
On October 31, 2001, my mother came to my shop. We were going
to have lunch together, but before we were going to leave, I
gave her the wine cabinet. She seemed to like it. While she
examined it, I went to make a phone call. I hadn't been out
of sight more than 5 minutes when one of my employees came running
into my office saying that something was wrong with my mom.
When I went back to see what
the matter was, I found my mom sitting in a chair beside the
cabinet. Her face had no expression, but tears were streaming
down her cheeks. No matter how I tried to get her to respond,
she would not. She could not. It turns out that my mother had
suffered a stroke. She was taken to the hospital by ambulance.
She ended up suffering partial paralysis, and losing her ability
to speak and form words (she has since regained the ability
to speak). She could understand things being said to her, and
could respond by pointing to letters of the alphabet to spell
out words she wanted to say. When I asked her the following
day how she was doing, she teared up and spelled out the words:
N-O G-I- F-T. I assured her that I had given her a gift for
her birthday, thinking that she didn’t remember, but she became
even more upset and spelled out the words: H-A-T-E G-I-F-T.
I laughed and told her not to worry. I told her I was sorry
she didn’t like the cabinet, and that I would get her anything
she wanted if she would promise to get well soon.
Still, I didn't associate
anything that had happened with the cabinet itself or anything
paranormal. Frankly, I don’t think I ever even used the term
paranormal until this last month.
I'll try to make this short
now. I gave the cabinet to my sister. She kept it for a week,
then gave it back. She complained that she couldn't get the
doors to stay closed and that they kept coming open. There are
no springs in the door mechanism and I have never found that
the doors come open. I gave it to my brother and his wife who
kept it for three days and then gave it back. My brother said
it smelled like Jasmine flowers, while his wife insisted that
it put out an odor of cat urine. I gave it to my girlfriend
who asked me to sell it for her after only two days. I sold
it the same day to a nice middle aged couple. Three days later,
when I came to open the shop for the day, I found the cabinet
sitting at the front doors with a note that read, This has a
bad darkness. I had no idea what that meant. Anyway, I ended
up taking it home.
Then, things got even worse.
Since the day I brought it
home, I began having a strange recurring nightmare. Every time
I have the horrible dream it goes something like this: I find
myself walking with a friend, usually someone I know well and
trust at some point in the dream, I find myself looking into
the eyes of the person that I am with. It is then that I realize
that there is something different, something evil looking back
at me. At that point in my dream, the person I am with changes
into what can only be described as the most gruesome, demonic
looking Hag that I have ever seen. This Hag proceeds then, to
beat the living tar out of me. I have awakened numerous times
to find bruises and marks on myself where I had been hit by
the old woman during the previous night. Still, I never related
the nightmares to the cabinet, nor do I think that I ever would
have.
About a month ago, however,
my sister, and my brother and his wife came over to my house
and spent the night. The following morning, during breakfast,
my sister complained that she had had a horrible nightmare.
She said that she recalled having had it a couple of times before,
and went on to describe my nightmare exactly to the last detail.
My brother and his wife froze as they listened, and then chimed
in that they had both had had the exact same dreams during the
night as well. The hair was standing up on the back of my neck
and still is. As we talked, it became clear that the common
denominator was that each of us had had the nightmare during
the times that the cabinet was in our respective homes. I called
my girlfriend and asked if she could recall having any nightmares
recently. She described the same nightmare, same Hag, everything.
When I asked her if she remembered the date when she had the
nightmare, she said she did not. Then I asked if it happened
to be the night before she gave me the cabinet back to sell
for her. She said, Yeah! Hey, how did you know that?!!!
Now then, since my family
discussion, it seems like all hell is breaking loose. For a
week afterward I started seeing what I can only describe as
shadow things in my peripheral vision. In fact, numerous visitors
to my house have claimed that they have seen these shadow things.
I put the cabinet in an outside storage unit and was awakened
when the smoke alarm in the unit went off in the middle of the
night. When I went to see what was burning, I opened the door
and didn’t see any smoke. However, I did get hit with the smell
of cat urine. When I went back inside, the smell was there in
my house. I DO NOT OWN A CAT AND I NEVER HAVE. I went back outside
and grabbed the cabinet. I brought it back inside and tried
to research it on the Internet. While I was surfing the net,
I fell asleep and once again had the same freakin nightmare.
I woke up at around 4:30am (when it felt and smelled like someone
was breathing on my neck) to find that my house now smelled
like Jasmine flowers, and just in time to see a HUGE shadow
thing go loping down the hall away from me.
I would destroy this thing
in a second, except I really don’t have any understanding of
what I may or may not be dealing with. I am afraid (and I do
mean afraid) that if I destroy the cabinet, whatever it is that
seems to have come with the cabinet may just stay here with
me. I have been told that there are people who shop on EBAY
that understand these kinds of things and specifically look
for these kinds of items. If you are one of these people, please,
please buy this cabinet and do whatever you do with a thing
like this.
Help me.
You can see that I have no
reserve price or minimum bid. If I can make things any easier
let me know and I will do everything within my abilities.
One more note. On the same
day my Mom had her stroke, the lease to my store was summarily
terminated without cause.
The measurements are 12.5"
x 7.5" x 16.25"
ALL
OF THE ITEMS THAT I ORIGINALLY FOUND INSIDE THE CABINET ARE
INCLUDED IN THE SALE AND WILL BE DELIVERED WITH THE CABINET.
On
Jun-12-03 at 02:15:30
PDT, seller added the following information:
There is no way that I can respond to all of the e-mails I've received
since I put this thing on-line. I'll try now to update and answer
the most common questions I've been receiving.
1. No, I am not religious.
2. No, I do not wish to have or participate in any sort of exorcism,
or case study, or photo sessions at my home.
3. No, I will not sell any of the individual pieces which were originally found
separate from the other pieces and the cabinet.
4. No, I do not speak Hebrew nor do I know what the word "keselim"
means. I don't know that the word is even a Hebrew word.
5. At the end of the auction, I have decided to take an opportunity to speak
with the winning bidder for two reasons: a.)To make sure that
the winning bidder is a serious adult who has employed some
valid reasoning skills in making the decision to accept whatever
this is. I will not be judgmental. Do whatever you want or need
after the sale. b.)To offer full details of the events that
have transpired. After I have carried out those responsibilities,
and upon payment, I will have the cabinet and its contents delivered
by U.S.MAIL, FED-EX, or UPS to the winning bidder. At that point,
I will have no further involvement with the matter in any way,
shape, or form. Period.
6.) To all of you who have offered to pray, I may not be religious,
but I am certainly open to the possibilities --no matter what
your religion might be. THANK YOU!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On Jun-14-03 at 05:216 PDT, seller added the following information:
Here is another update for everyone following this listing.
NO! No, I will not circumvent, or make any deals outside of
EBAY - EVEN FOR MORE MONEY THAN THE FINAL AUCTION PRICE!!! If
you want to win the auction and have the kind of money some
of you are offering, there shouldn't be any reason why you cannot
simply place your bid in an open honest fashion. I'm sure you
can understand why I might be suspicious.
ALSO....
For those of you wanting to know if I am still experiencing anything
out of the ordinary, I thought everything was going OK until
I got home on Friday - the 13th of June - and found that the
fish in my fresh water aquarium - all 10 - were dead.
I'm still hoping that all of this is coincidental crap.
-------------
Here
is information from the second buyer a college student in Missouri.
I bought the box from the first
seller above in the Ebay auction around June of 2003, out of
curiosity about the 'haunted' box. After receiving a deluge
of e-mail about the box, I set up a web site to answer some
questions, which I stopped updating in September and haven't
updated to this day because I didn't want to talk about it with
anyone.
For the sake of information,
I found that a dibbuk/dybbuk in Jewish folklore/mythology/teaching/whatever
is a misplaced spirit that can neither rise to Heaven nor descend
into Hell, essentially stuck in Limbo or purgatory. Here's another
definition I found: 1. (Jewish folklore) a demon that enters
the body of a living person and controls that body's behavior.
Synonyms: dybbuk. 2. Evil Spirits, that cause mental illness,
rage and changes of personality. The spirit or soul of a dead
person that inhabits the body of a living one, with sometimes
evil, sometimes positive results.
If you believe in paranormal
phenomena, the box contains or is possessed by at least one
dibbuk, possibly two, as the grandmother stated: a dibbuk, and
a keslim. Keselim is a term similar to a turkish word that means
"priest." This would probably correspond to the pair
of wrapped strands of blonde and brown/black hair.
The Hebrew carving on the back,
to my knowledge, is a relatively common Jewish prayer: Hear
O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one. Blessed is the
name of his honored kingdom forever. Said frequently at times
of fear, death, etc...
I was doubtful of the 'haunted'
box, and I still don't believe in the paranormal. What happened
in August and September is likely coincidental, so I will relate
it as I originally wrote it down in a log.
Sunday, 31 August 2003 Over
the last week some interesting, though possibly coincidental,
items of note have come up. Firstly, I share a house with six
other people; we have been taking turns sleeping with the box
in each of our rooms.
Two people are now complaining of burning eyes, one is listless
and depleted of energy, and another became spontaneously sick.
[In retrospect I would say it was allergies.]
A few days after these ongoing annoyances started, the air outside
our house was filled with small bugs for several hours (a Friday).
[Weird summer stuff?]
Last night (Saturday) we discovered that the box, now located
in the back corner of the house, had come mostly open, though
it had been shut and it seems unlikely that anyone could or
would have touched it.
Wednesday, 10 September 2003
Though it seems impossible to prove that the box is a direct
cause of misfortune, we have definitely seen a tidal wave of
"bad luck."
Strange odors now permeate the house, the dumpster out back
overflows with trash and decay, one roommate suddenly got bronchitis,
and I broke a finger.
Several mice have died in the engine of one car, and more electronic
devices seem to be dying everyday: xbox, toaster, t.v., and
watches.
------
I don't really want to talk
about anything between September and January, so I'll just say
that I'm selling the box now for a couple reasons:
- Around October 6th, I started feeling bad, with trouble sleeping.
This problem has persisted through today.
- I live alone now, and as of late I have noticed replacing a lot of
burnt out lightbulbs, and getting many unusual car repairs
(transmission fluid was burned out of the reservoir.)
- I've started seeing things, sort of like large vertical dark blurs
in my peripheral vision.
- I smell something like juniper bushes or stingy ammonia in my garage
often, and I have no idea what from.
- Most disturbingly, last Tuesday (1-27-2004),
my hair began to fall out. Today (Friday) it's about half
gone. I'm in my early twenties, and I just got a clean blood
test back from the doctor's. Maybe it's stress related, I
don't know.
Anyhow,
for personal reasons I very strongly do not want this box anymore.
I hope there's someone on eBay that will take this thing off
of my hands. [I would just throw it away in the woods or something,
but I know there has been some interest in it in the past.]
Information from the current owner
 |
Up
until June 26th, 2004 when I traveled to Portland, Oregon
to research on site the Dibbuk Box history, I have never
met, never talked to, nor had I ever seen the previous two
owners of the Dibbuk Box. We three owners have had no connection
at all in our lives to one another, other than each buying
this wooden box through various auctions. Our connection
has only been the box. After five months of research, I
located the first owner Kevin. When we met over coffee at
a Starbucks, it was obvious that Kevin's curse had remained
in tact. I was |
intrigued to see
that Kevin had never followed up on the box after his eBay sale
in June 2003. Kevin was completely unaware of the interest that
his family's events with the box had generated worldwide and
he was completely taken aback by it all. Since that meeting,
Kevin has been brought up to date. Together he and I are trying
to find out as much about this box and the circumstances on
it being created. Hopefully we will be able to lift the curse
and remove the entity that continues to plague his family.
I sought the purchase
of this unique artifact with its strange history and spiritual
reputation after hearing that it was once more available on
eBay in early February 2004. I won the bid miraculously it would
seem and once I had the box in my possession, I set out almost
immediately to locate the original buyer and learn more about
this item's history and to attempt to locate the family of the
woman who created the Dibbuk box. I searched for clues to discover
the nature of this artifact. Was it an item of family folklore?
… a hoax? … or was it an artifact of great spiritual
energy - a connection to the spiritual world, an item more important
than most might imagine? It took me over five months of searching
and false leads to finally locate that first buyer, Kevin, who
made the purchase of the box at the old woman's auction. I sought
out genealogical sources, census records, and even public records
to zero in on Kevin. His phone number unlisted and his e-mail
changed, locating him was very difficult. I got lucky with my
leads and a family member connected me to his current phone
number.
At our face-to-face meeting the evidence that Kevin presented
to me about the store where the box was first opened, his mother's
injuries caused by the box, and the location of the estate auction
where the box was purchased was over whelming to me. I visited
the physical sites and was stunned. It could all be confirmed
that Kevin's information was true from start to finish as written
in the original eBay listing. The events of the Dibbuk Box are
indeed true, tight with no gapping holes in the facts. The next
pressing issue was to find the family that created the Dibbuk
Box and learn its purpose. To do this would require Kevin to
trace his steps so he could locate the auctioneers to find the
family and have them shed light on this mystery.
But
let me go back to the beginning of my involvement with the box.
I learned about the Dibbuk Box like most readers - word of mouth.
I became aware of the Dibbuk Box through a college student that
has worked with me for several years. It seems the second buyer
of the box spent a lot of time at this college student's apartment
as a guest, which is shared by six college men. The college
student who works with me mentioned one morning, well over a
year ago now (mid-June 2003) that I might want to go on-line
to see what a guest in his apartment had just bought through
eBay. The college student pulled up the eBay listing for the
Dibbuk Box on the computer for several others and me. Like many,
the story written by the first buyer of the box struck a nerve
in me to read - and it was fascinating - like nothing I had
ever heard told before and yes a bit creepy too! I remember
right away I started teasing about the Dibbuk and how I would
like to borrow the box if it arrived - I wanted to see if this
item appeared to have been faked. This teasing went on for several
days to those who knew of the box's reputation. Any problems
we had were quickly blamed on the Dibbuk being sent to our town.
When the wooden box did arrive, a 100-year-old tree fell into
my home and I spent the rest of the summer removing the tree
and repairing the damage that it caused to my home. Could the
Dibbuk in this box have done this kind of damage? The tree falling
due to a mini storm whipped up just around my home was odd and
it was very unexpected. I don't know if it was a Dibbuk that
caused the damage, but the phrase "Don't mock the box!"
was coined at work, and this box was mentioned only in respectful
terms after that incident.
I
had fleeting thoughts about the Dibbuk Box off and on all summer
and into late fall. I finally mentioned to the college student
that I would like to see this artifact first hand. The student
who first told me about the box said that the owner was only
a guest at his apartment. He went on to tell me that he was
sorry but that the guest had left some time ago to live with
other people, and that he had taken the Dibbuk Box with him.
So I decided that's the end of that mystery - I guess I will
never know. It was odd to feel such a loss inside, why this
item affected me in such a manner is still unexplainable.
Then,
in February 2004 out of the blue, I was told by the college
student that first alerted me to the box that he had heard that
the Dibbuk Box had been put back up for auction on eBay. Upon
my questioning this student about his past experiences, I learned
of several additional odd events he had remembered when near
the box before the box was removed from his apartment. I decided
to bid on the box knowing the original winning bid was $140
and I was feeling I had pretty good information from a reliable
source that I trusted… that something was really unique
about this artifact. From my auction experience, I figured that
I would set my highest bid a few dollars over double the original
winning bid, and to put this bid in during the last 15 seconds
of the auction. I would either win the box or not. As the auction
hours came closer to completion and the number of hits to the
auction site grew to 5,000 - it had double in just the last
hours, I was no longer sure if I was going to win the bid for
the box. In the end, I actually won the box by only $6. If the
auction had run just 10 more seconds I am confident I would
have lost the box to another buyer. My top price was $286 -
the box realized $280 when time ran out. I continue to wonder
if it was destiny for me to end up with the Dibbuk Box. I received
the box and checked out the box's construction and its contents.
I was pleased that the artifact, indeed, appeared genuine with
reasonable wear for its age, the various objects inside had
the feeling of a planned set that took some time to collect.
Then, I put the artifact in storage. The morning after I received
the box and handled it, I woke with my eyes blood shot and my
right eye looked like it had been severely poked. It was odd,
but no big deal. However, after two weeks of no improvement
to my eyes, I went to see two separate eye specialists.
Both
doctors said there was no virus or injury to cause the damage.
I had a spontaneous drying of my eye whites. Medication was
used and has helped, but I have noticed a distinct loss of vision
for small items like map numbers. I am not sure that this had
anything to do with the box, but a similar problem occurred
with the college students that lived in the apartment with it
fall 2003. I decided to have the box checked to see if there
was any type of residue on the box that could cause this type
of irritation (like ammonia), but no residue was found on the
box.
That
first week with the box, those near the box reported several
incidents of harm had come to their family members. So the box
was moved from human proximity. I personally witnessed the Jasmine
and cat urine smells in dealing with the box. Also, while reading
a blog that said, "I should burn the box - my computer
hard drive erased leaving the monitor still on , but all functions
to the Internet were gone. Several other odd things have happened.
I don't care to share them, these issues could be caused because
I am more aware of my surroundings and I may be relating coincidence
to the supernatural. I have not tried to do any research on
the box pertaining to the supposed spirits - keeping this artifact
boxed and stored away. Instead my current interest has been
in finding the connection of this artifact with its unique Jewish
history. I am investigating and doing research to understand
how and why such an artifact with its contents was put together.
With Kevin's help I am hoping to learn this artifact's ultimate
purpose … and, to know the life story of its creator.
All
information to date leads me to believe that this item has come
from a family with a very, strong Jewish background, but not
necessarily Cabbalist influences. The wooden box itself with
its grape appliqué seems to be circa 1960's. The work
looks similar to the Swiss cabinetmaker's style (mistakenly
called "Black Forest"). It has been suggested that
the box could not function as a wine cabinet (wine bottles are
too tall and wine glasses don't fit in the small racks on the
doors). It has been mentioned by several Jewish people that
the box has a very odd resemblance to the Aaron HaKodesh shrines
found in synagogues that hold Jewish scrolls - or Torahs. The
choice of a box with a magical opening design as this one may
have been purposely selected to mimic the religious arks that
hold spiritual materials. Such portable arks do exist in synagogues
and typically are for use with Shiva (seven days of mourning).
If someone wanted to create a very powerful spiritual piece
a sacred box in this style would make sense. I have found another
box from a later time period and it was originally created as
a liquor cabinet with small square liquor decanters, shot glasses
and tumblers for making drinks. In all ways it matches the Dibbuk
Box. I believe that was the original use of the wooden cabinet
that is the Dibbuk box.
The
wine cup is a Leonard Company silver-plate double jigger - an
item I have found only in Oregon. The cup shows great amounts
of wear and damage from use with wine (the lip of the cup is
stressed with cracks from acid in the wine). I have worked with
a Rabbi and a monument company and the marble piece could possible
be made from broken headstones. Put together in this fashion
it becomes a Matzevah or religious pillar - an item that those
in the Jewish faith are told not use for worship. The candleholder
is Victorian circa 1890 -1910 made by the Peking Glass company
I have seen several of these at antique shops. These candleholders
can be bought on eBay or found in antique malls. The candleholder
has the natural wear in the black paint of being handled often
using a thumb and pointing finger - and appears to have survived
a very hot fire. The octopus legs seem to be bent backwards
from extreme heat. Using a black light, melted wax was found
dribbled on the outside door of the box. The naked eye does
not see this. No biological material was found using the black
light in or on the box.
A Rabbi from the UK told me that the prayer on the back has
the name God written with a hyphen so as to remove sacredness
to a degree that the box could be destroyed without committing
a sacrilegious act - something known to the Jewish sect. Jewish
Museums and other Rabbis have contacted me, none seem to doubt
that this is a piece of Jewish origin; however, its purpose
is not known and use of something like this is not typical with
the Jewish faith. I have been told this was not for Shabbat.
Working with the first buyer of the Dibbuk Box, Kevin, I have
recently been able to learn more about the family that created
the box. The story of the Dibbuk Box goes back to the 1930's.
The Dibbuk Box owner's nick name was Havela (she was the 103
year old woman that wanted to be buried with the box). Havela
and other family members in Poland resorted to holding séances
hoping to talk to the dead… nobody in particular, it was
a carryover from the Victorian parlor fads but very popular
in Poland at this time. It was a game of sorts to do for fun
in the evening hours. Havela, friends and family members thought
they had reached a true spirit and as time went on ...it was
easier and easier to talk with this spirit through their séance
group. Soon they were having regular meetings with this spirit.
However, if they were not punctual in calling upon the spirit
- at the next séance, the spirit would do psychological
harm to them by revealing personal secrets held by the members
or some such thing.
At
this point in their dealings with the other world, it was the
séance group's belief that more than one spirit was communicating
with them. It seemed the spirits were more and more involved
with the decision making of the séance group's daily
lives. Then, the spirit then wanted to bargain with them to
perform a
ritual that would bring it (and others) to this world/side permanently.
The group decided the best way to end this spirit's influence
was to bring it to this world and trap it. On November 10, 1938
they tried to capture the spirit(s) and they said it went very
wrong. They believe that what they tried to do - actually had
an affect on Kristallnacht - when Jews were first attacked by
Germans destroying their shops and many being pushed into Poland
from Germany. The family of the Dibbuk Box indicated that the
method of madness and breaking glass was consistent with their
spirit.
Oddly that is the exact kind of damage that this spirit did
to Kevin's shop when released. Breaking all his light fixtures
- causing terror to the worker and creating a mini Kristallnacht
on basement floor of Kevin's shop. The ending of Kevin's lease
mysteriously so Kevin (of Jewish descent) was without a business.
The
Dibbuk Box that I now have was not originally used by the group
to capture the spirit, but was created many years later to hold
the spirit as they tried to pull them back together - and undo
the evil they felt that they had released. All this information
comes from a cousin of Havela who was the youngest in the group
and now she regrets being involved in the whole thing. I didn't
believe this story could be any stranger. I was wrong. The spirit
came from séances held in 1938 just before WWII .
Who
would have thought that the Dibbuk Box story would have led
to the years prior to WWII and that those involved would feel
that they somehow created/or at least played a role in a horror
against people greater than most of us could imagine. The violence
and destruction of Kristallnacht (when the evil spirits were
released) that night … true horror was not really expected
even by Hitler, but unstoppable evil seemed to be unleashed
like a current through the German people that would not normally
be so inhumane. It makes one wonder did something in the air
so to speak make the attack on the Jews that night more intense.
And once that barrier was passed the following acts and atrocities
upon the Jewish people did not seem so bad. Were the evil spirits
that are said to have been guiding Hitler - one and the same
as those reached by Havela's group?
Do
a goggle search and you can find many sites on the nature of
Hitler his supposed demonic possession, séances and the
occult.
Thule
member Dietrich Eckart prophesied that the day had come; he
began introducing him in Munich occult circles as "the
long-awaited savior". To Alfred Rosenberg he said: "I
believe in Hitler; above him there hovers a star." Eckart
was following his own mission revealed to him in a séance:
that when "Lord Maitreya" would soon make his appearance
as a German messiah to "lead the Aryan race to final victory
over the Jews", he, Eckart, was charged with the responsibility
of "nurturing" him.
The
Thule Society considered the Jew ("Juda") their cosmic
enemy. As early as 1920, Sebottendorf advocated a "Final
Goal" of "cleaning out the Jews once and for all",
using "the most ruthless measures, including Sammellager
[concentration camps] and sweeping out the Jewish vermin with
an iron broom."
It
is amazing that this little group of pretty typical Polish people
messing around with séances should tap into something
that they recognized as so evil and that on the eve of their
trying to trap it, Adolf Hitler was on the eve of releasing
it upon humanity. No wonder they were devastated to witness
what followed ... the turning of their world to destruction
in just hours after dealing with the spiritswho wanted to enter
this world.
Here
is a piece of history that I have never thought of and quite
frankly would have laughed at just a few months ago. This Dibbuk
Box has led back to opening a 75-year-old event that most people
do not know about. It makes me wonder what forces were really
in play at the beginning of WWII and did this little group truly
stumbled into it. I do know that they have felt responsible
ever since and tried to make amends to capture and hold the
spirits because it is the right thing to do against all odds.
Hence, this box was created later and possibly others like it.
The biggest part of the Dibbuk Box story is out - the beginning
and the end - more bizarre than anything you could try to make
up.
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Now
I hope the cousin of Havela will be able to fill in the
details of what happened in-between. I could be wrong,
but this may explain why this box seems to have a mystical
power that draws people to it. And many that write to
me become almost addicted to what is happening with the
box in ways they cannot understand, but they cannot seem
to just let it go. It is a strange and amazing story.
Putting all the pieces together and looking at it now
feels right. The box had to come from someone, to account
for some event, and then to fulfill some ultimate purpose.
One must remember that with the Holocaust, much history
and many of the Cabbalist rituals once performed have
vanished with the many that died. Authors, screenwriters,
religious leaders, and a host involved with the spiritual
world, have contacted me and I have tried to answer questions
as truthfully and objectively as possible. I have not
made plans for the Dibbuk Box except to document its history,
and the Dibbuk Box is not for sale. I will continue to
keep this
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site posted with what I learn of its history and purpose, which
is my main interest. Until more is known about this artifact,
as a precaution, the box continues to be stored with its contents
shut inside. Indeed, the box is being kept away from people as
much as possible.
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