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Thank you for your responses.
I am aware of Abhinna powers. I should have phrased my question better. I wanted to ask if phenomena such as spirit possession being done either willingly by a spirit/mara/yaksa/demon or through black magic is effective on Ariyas or those with Noble attainments.
It is sometimes said that spirit possession or mind-related paranormal phenomena is done by building on the person’s worst nightmares/fears. I suppose someone without bad gathi i.e. to the level of say an Anagami would not be affected due to these. I was asking if such an example exists in Tipitaka.
I read somewhere that Ven. Moggallana in one of his past lives was a high-ranking Yaksha (not sure if term is right) and theres a story of him possessing a young boy. Is it possible for a Yaskha to possess someone with noble attainment?
I come from an area where out of jealously, people buy amulets from black magic experts who can cast these spells and have unwholesome spirits/beings possess the targeted people and inflict unspeakable harm on them. Being a potential target of such practices, I wonder how to deal with such situations.
In my previous religion which was Islam, we used to recite verses from Qur’an and the effects of black magic or spirits/demons were lessened and even removed. I don’t know how Buddha would recommend dealing with such situations. I know arahants would have no problem even if someone casted a spell on them because they cannot suffer mentally.
I’m clearly on the right path, have felt enormous change and purification of the mind using teachings in this website. But I’m still curious as to how one can protect oneself in these cases. I thought chanting buddham saranam gacchami (with understanding) would work in uplifting black magic effects, but I don’t know how that would work.
Ofcourse I know that there’s no protection out there (anicca) and being target of the effects of these occult practices might very well be kamma vipaka of my past actions, but just like crossing the road without looking left and right is a foolish thing to do, in the same way, simply giving in to these practices without doing anything about them would do me any good either. And I do not feel reciting a mundane religion’s verses is a way to go either because there must be some higher wisdom in the supramundane aspect of Dhamma that can help me in this area.
Thank you.
Another question came up while studying Dhamma. It is said that a Sotapanna removes the wrong views and permanently removes the 5 thoughts that result in the Kamma that leads to 4 apayas, which means a Sotapanna will never do acts that generate the apaya Kamma in future. How does that fix the problem of a Sotapanna’s past Kamma that could result in Apaya?
Forgive me if I’m missing something very obvious here.
