Schoeck_2010_EnvyATheoryOfSocialBehaviour.pdf

54 ENVY AND BLACK MAGIC
In our opinion this is typical of the fundamental attitude from which
the more complex processes of envy are built up. The evidence of such a
basic impulse in man, independent of his absolute material situation and
directed towards someone who may be a stranger, or may indeed be a
purely hypothetical person, leaves room for doubt whether it is ever
justifiable to state the principle that the object of envy is responsible for
the envy (A. Riistow, among others). The vandal, in our own society,
who, for instance, strews nails over the road because he cannot stand
people who drive cars, may still be impelled by a specific experience of
envy. It is 'meaningful' to imagine oneself owning a nice car and saying:
'Well, if I can't have it, at least I can spoil the pleasure of people who
can.' But the primitive man who has just experienced a deprivation or
escaped a danger and wishes to inflict it magically on others has in no
way been provoked by his victims. He wishes to drag down others (who
may, of course, be personally known to him) to that level of existence to
which he has been temporarily reduced. While there are some forms of
envy having at least a certain 'progressive' element, this particular action
bears the mark of retaliation. 'Since I cannot revenge myself on fate and
often there is no such concept in a culture for my painful lot, I shall look
for some other person upon whom to wish the same suffering. '
A truly classic description of envious black magic is that of Karsten,
drawn from his observations among the Jivaro Indians:
When the Indians try to produce rain by magical means they nearly
always do so merely out of wickedness, that is, to cause their fellow
tribesmen harm or annoyance, especially when they are travelling on the
river. When in 1917 I came from my long river expedition down to the
Achuares on the middle Pastaza, I was surprised by heavy rains which lasted
for weeks, caused the Bobonaza to swell, and made the ascension of the
river extremely trying for my Indian crew. When at last we approached
Canelos, one of my Indians said that he would make the rains continue so
that other travellers would have the same difficulties as we had had. 30
There is, perhaps, no case of envy so pure as that directed against
others who, we believe, are about to experience less privation, fear, etc. ,
30 R. Karsten, The Head-Hunters of Western Amazonas. The Life and Culture of the
Jivaro Indians of Eastern Ecuador and Peru (Societas Scientiarum Fennica. Commentationes
Humanarum Litterarum, Vol. VII, No.1), Helsinki, 1935, p. 452. Between
1917 and 1928 Karsten spent a total of three years among these tribes.