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Asian witchcraft encompasses various types of witchcraft practices across Asia. In ancient times, magic played a significant role in societies such as ancient Egypt and Babylonia, as evidenced by historical records. In the Middle East, references to magic can be found in the Torah and the Quran, where witchcraft is condemned due to its association with belief in magic, as it is within other Abrahamic religions.
In South Asia, there is continued and abuse of women accused of witchcraft in countries like India and Nepal. These deeply entrenched Superstition have perpetuated acts of violence and Social exclusion against those accused of witchcraft, underlining the urgent need for legal reforms and human rights protections to counter these alarming trends.
East Asia has diverse witchcraft traditions. In Chinese culture, the practice of Gong Tau involves black magic for purposes such as revenge and personal gain. Japanese folklore features witch figures who employ foxes as Familiar. Korean history includes instances of individuals being condemned for using spells. The has its own tradition of witches, distinct from Western portrayals, with their practices often countered by indigenous .
Belief in the supernatural is strong in certain parts of India, and for witchcraft are reported in the press from time to time. According to the Indian National Crime Records Bureau, at least 2100 suspected witches (known as dayan) were murdered between 2000 and 2012. It is believed that an average of over 150 women per year are killed accused of being witches, concentrated across central India. Murder is commonly carried out by means of being burned, hacked or bludgeoned to death, often preceded by ritual humiliation, such as being stripped naked, smeared with filth and forced to eat excrement. For those accused of witchcraft who are not murdered, nearly all suffer permanent ostracism or banishment and their families face social stigma.
Punishment can range from receiving severe beatings with sticks or other blunt object to being forced to consume human excreta, a common practice in the plains area of Nepal. Women who are accused of witchcraft may be marked with soot on their faces or garlands of shoes around their necks. These traumatized women are forced to endure mental and physical torture that can lead to ostracization, emotional disturbance and even death.
In Terhathum, there is a rock called ‘boksimara’ which translates to “witch killer stone”. It is said that 200 years ago, accused women were taken to boksimara to be hanged from its precipice. To this day, these types of outdated customs and traditions continue to be prevalent among various Caste and tribes. Laxmi Maya Nepali, a victim and inhabitant of Shrijung Village Development committee from Terhathum expresses her pain of being accused of being a witch:
I had to stay alone in an old house, it was difficult to move around for me, people used to call me witch; even my own relatives did not let me stay at home accusing me of being a witch. One of my relatives gave birth to a dead baby and they accused me as their baby was dead because of my witchcraft powers. Even my son was badly beaten by his own nephew.
The atrocities that these women face can also prevent them from equal access to education. Without the tools to succeed academically, the accused women are not able to change their societal status. The traditional ways and superstitious beliefs of Nepali culture trap accused women in a vicious cycle. This continues as they are denied opportunities to educate themselves and they are forced to suffer, oftentimes in poverty, for the rest of their lives.
The legal system has done nothing to address the horrors that Nepali women suffer to this day if they are accused of witchcraft. The state has not formulated any concrete law regarding the “crime of witchcraft”. The Nepali legal system also does not have provisions to punish individuals who have been involved in witch-hunts. If an individual has a complaint filed against them and they are found guilty, they are only imprisoned for a short period of time and may walk away with a fine. Section 10 of Muluki Ain or the National Civil Code states that if a person makes an accusation of witchcraft, they shall be jailed for three months to two years or fined five thousand to twenty-five thousand Nepalese rupee or both. This is the only punishment for those who would commit atrocities against innocent women.
Philippine witches are the users of black magic and related practices from the Philippines. They include a variety of different kinds of people with differing occupations and cultural connotations which depend on the ethnic group they are associated with. They are completely different from the Western notion of what a witch is, as each ethnic group has their own definition and practices attributed to witches. The curses and other magics of witches are often blocked, countered, cured, or lifted by Philippine shamans associated with the Indigenous Philippine folk religions.
During the 1580s in Manila, Philippines, the Spanish wife of the ex-governor (Guido de Labezaris) of the Philippines, Inés Álvarez de Gibraleón and their daughter Ana de Monterrey were put on trial for being accused of witchcraft and black magic. It resulted in two trials, however, due to there being no personal investigations, the ecclesiastical investigation was the result of hearsay. There is a record of this trial in the Archivo General de la Nación in Mexico City. However, the civil trial involving Ana de Monterrey and her husband Captain Juan de Morón disappeared.
Unlike Western notions of witches, indigenous or traditional Filipino witches are not entirely evil by nature, but rather, considered as simply malevolent. Locals may also consult them to initiate a form of criminal punishment through black magic for cases where families feel that an injustice to the victim was not properly taken cared of by prosecutors, leading to the freedom of the accused. There is a widespread belief that black magic does not work on people who are innocent. In these cases, "wrongdoers" may include thieves, adulterous spouses, or land grabbing, among others. As this type of sorcery is seen as a kind of "justice", especially for people who can not (or failed to) legally prosecute a wrongdoer, it has continued to be in usage for the benefit of the victims of wrongdoers. Many people also consult Philippine shamans through rituals, but Philippine shamans do not attack people using their rituals, as their main role is to heal, purify, and strengthen community bonds, while bridging the human world with the spiritual realm. Because of this, some individuals consult Philippine witches to attack people for reasons concerning the "justice" that those individuals view as fit against certain wrong-doers. In this way, both shamans and witches serve their purpose for the community. (1977). 9780520034204, University of California Press. ISBN 9780520034204
In modern times, Gong Tau in Hokkien, Teochew in Cantonese or Jiang Tou in Mandarin Chinese is the term used when someone is suspected of having been attacked by black magic and is believed to be a fusion of poison skills which originated in Yunnan and witchcraft seen in Southeast Asia. It is used to either seek revenge, resolve relationship issues or even to assist with money problems.
A fox under the employ of a human can provide him with many services. The fox can turn invisible and be set out to find secrets and it still retains its many powers of illusion which its master will often put to use in order to trick his enemies. The most feared power the kitsune-tsukai possesses is his ability to command his fox to possess other humans.
Magical girl animation is typically referred to as mahō shōjo and majokko anime in Japan and the target audience is intended for female prepubescent viewers at first, later this genre of anime gradually shifted to target audience male anime fans. The protagonists of these anime are normal schoolgirls who suddenly happen across a mystical item that transforms them into super-beings who have magical abilities. Despite the repetitive story lines that are supposed to be aimed at children, the magical girl genre brings attention to the surrounding Gender role and identities. Some argue that the magical girl genre is empowering for young audiences as the characters become superheroes who take down the bad guys. However, other theories accuse the magical girl anime of depicting an abundance of eroticism and violence.
Toei Studios produced the first heroine anime which was also the first magical girl anime, Sally the Witch. The settings and character elements were heavily borrowed from many live-action television programs which included the American comedy, Bewitched. While the concept of witches waned in the United States, the symbolism of magic and witchcraft translated well into Japanese culture.
has been suppressed throughout Korean history under a succession of dominant ideologies including Confucianism, Japanese colonialism, and [[Christianity]]. Attempting to influence others through spells in [[Joseon]] was widely censured by the royal court. On discovering that Consort [[Hwi-bin Kim]] had used witchcraft on the crown prince, Sejong the Great (1397–1450) described her as a "[[sorcerer|Witchcraft]]" or "evil monster" (: "sorcery; witchcraft") and had her thrown out of the palace.
In 1890, Horace G. Underwood, an American Presbyterian missionary, defined the Korean translation of the English word "witch" as "" in his English-Korean Dictionary. French Catholic missionaries also equated ceremonies with Western witchcraft, in the same way that Christian missionaries rejected magic in other mission fields. Confucian yangban elites also considered to be witchcraft, and many Korean intellectuals eager for modernisation came to regard it as a superstitious practice that should be eradicated; they increasingly referred to it with the term ("superstition"). These ideas were endorsed in Tongnip Sinmun, Korea's first vernacular newspaper published between 1896 and 1899. Many of these intellectuals were Christian, thus regarding the spirits as evil demons. In 1896, police launched a crackdown by arresting , destroying shrines, and burning paraphernalia.
At the start of the 21st century, the remained widely stigmatized in South Korean society, facing widespread prejudice. In 2021, Sarfati observed that while the religion was "still stigmatized," it was experiencing "growing acceptance" in South Korea. The religion's critics often regard as swindlers, people who manipulate the gullible. Critics regularly focus their critique on the large sums of money that the charge, and maintain that the expenses required for its rituals are wasteful. Critics have also accused of disrupting the civil order with their rituals.
Kendall noted that there was a "generally adversarial relationship" between and Protestants in South Korea, the latter regarding as "Devil worship". Mainline Protestant theologians have sometimes blamed for predisposing Koreans to Pentecostalism and the idea that prayer can generate financial reward. Christians have sometimes harassed at their places of work or during their ceremonies, which some regard as religious discrimination.
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