The evil eye is irrational. Abandon it at your peril

When I was a child, I went to the wedding of a cousin I barely knew. After the sun had set, I watched the newly married couple walk through the crowd and begin to dance together. As they moved, the voices of dozens of guests rung out in a loud, high-pitched trill: lililililili!

Curious, I asked my aunt what they were doing. She explained that, during happy occasions, like weddings, the loud noise frightened away evil spirits and protected the couple. As I grew older, I began to notice the other protections my family used against the evil eye.

Charms were fastened onto necklaces and bracelets, and the phrase ‘tfu tfu tfu’ would be uttered anytime someone received a compliment. During significant, unpredictable processes – negotiating the price of a car, for example, or attending interviews for a new job – one might even refrain from telling anyone, just in case the evil eye sabotages them. And, of course, wedding ceremonies rang with ululations.

These are just a small handful of the ancient protections that humans have summoned against envy. For envy is the mechanism by which the evil eye operates. It emerges whenever someone looks at another person with resentment and jealousy, even unintentionally.

Bad luck then follows, targeting things of value: wealth, health, good jobs and happy marriages. Eventually, customs against the evil eye became a regular part of my own life. But, to members of cultures that do not subscribe to it, this ancient superstition, passed down over millennia, is often treated with suspicion, and considered incompatible with modern rationality.

The contrast between these attitudes prompts the question: should we let go of old familial superstitions in favour of reason? Belief in the evil eye goes back to the earliest known civilisation: Sumer. Texts written on clay tablets around 5,000 years ago show that the Sumerians believed the evil eye was a destructive power capable of destroying harvests, depleting wealth and causing illness.