The Ear Infection Caused By Evil Eye

By Isaac Yomtovian

“The Ear Infection Caused by Evil Eye” is an excerpt from Isaac Yomtovian’s autobiography ‘My Iran: Memories, Mysteries, & Myths.’

I laid in bed, tears running down my face; I was suffering from an ear infection, one that kept coming back no matter how many penicillin injections I was given. My mother tried to make me more comfortable, tucking me under a heavy blanket that was thrown over the top of the korsi, a low table that everyone in Iran had in their house, with a heater underneath it and blankets thrown over it. My mother was at her wits’ end. “Here, my darling son, drink some of this,” she said soothingly, offering me a glass of hot milk with honey. When I refused to sit up and take the glass from her, she gently lifted my head and held the glass to my mouth. I took a few sips. “There, that’s better,” she said as she felt my forehead and cheeks. I was burning with fever.

As the day wore on, my mother realized that she needed to call for assistance. She sent for Farha Khanom, my grandfather’s wife. Farha Khanom was a short, fat woman with thick glasses and a face scarred by smallpox. She arrived at our house with a look on her face that meant business. She was determined to rid me of the Evil Eye. Farha checked me out, nodding her head knowingly as she did so.

“Ezat Khanom, give me a raw egg!” she commanded my mother. “I will also need a clean white napkin, a coin, and a black pencil or piece of charcoal.” Farha Khanom wrapped the raw egg and the coin in the napkin. She held the egg over my head and began to move it with a circular motion, as she chanted an incantation. Next, she placed her hands, one on each end of the sequestered egg, and gave it a squeeze, pressing her hands towards each other. As she attempted to break the egg, she called out a person’s name— someone in the neighborhood who might want to do me harm. The egg did not break. She then took the pencil and drew a dark circle on the egg. She repeated the ritual of calling out the names of neighbors or acquaintances who might be jealous or envious of me, all the while squeezing the egg, until the egg finally broke.

“This is good, Farha Khanom!” my mother exclaimed “Now Es’hagh will get better.”

“Baleh, the spell on him is no more,” affirmed Farha Khanom. Soon, I was feeling better; later that day, I was able to eat some starchy boiled rice with a little piece of carrot and a few small bites of chicken. I wondered if I was cured forever or if the curse of the Evil Eye would come back. Was the act of breaking a raw egg stronger than administering penicillin?

Isaac Yomtovian was born to a Jewish family in a Muslim neighborhood in Iran. Growing up in pre-revolution Iran, he has a unique perspective on the relationship between Jews and Muslims. He is the author of the book “My Iran: Memories, Mysteries, & Myths”.