Supernatural power is experienced in the healing system of the orang asli sha-mans, says Assoc Prof Dr Juli Edo, a lecturer with the Department of Anthropology and Sociology in Universiti Malaya. A shaman is a member of a tribal society who acts as a medium between the visible and invisible spirit world. He practises magic or sorcery for healing, divination and control over natural events.Edo is a Semai, a sub-group of the Senoi. The Senoi is one of the three main groups of orang asli in the country; the other two are the Negrito and Melayu Proto. “The orang asli, depending on the group or sub-group, call their God by various names such as moyang, uyang, nyenang, peruman and tohan. They pray to the Supreme Power as well as other deities whom they refer to as keramat, malaikat and dewa,” explains Edo. “The orang asli also believe in hantu (ghosts) and spirits but they have a structure in their religion.

Shamans can use one of the three methods of healing: kebut (or sewang in Malay), a singing ritual, jampi (spells), and cabut (extract), a ritual of symbolically sucking illness from the body. The Semai call the cabut ritual tohor,” explains Edo. In the healing practice of cabut, the shaman sucks out the disease and transfers it into stones, wood, charcoal or metal.

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