The Judaic faith is not new to the belief in mysticism and the belief of otherworldly spirits. In fact, it may be the biggest modernly believed faith that has such beliefs as well as the most extensive history with them. An uncommonly found, yet popular, spirit within the faith is the dybbuk. The dybbuk, דיבוק, meaning stick, adhere, or cling, is believed to be the dislocated soul of someone deceased. This spirit possesses an individual in order to act out a task of varying degrees. They can only be exorcised by the most violent means. .
The dybbuk becomes this detached soul because of the severe sins they committed in their past life and because of the grand weight of these sins were not even allowed to transmigrate to a true afterlife. Because of this they wander the earth searching for a host. Early experiences with a dybbuk were confused with an interaction with a devil or demon, as opposed to the inherent ghost that this spirit apparently is. It was later deduced that to have a dybbuk enter your body, it was due to a secret sin you have committed and this synergy of two sinful souls allowed the dybbuk to form a connection. An early rabbi, believed to be an expert in Jewish mysticism and was a monumental provider in establishing a historical grounding for the Kabbalah, Moses Cordovero, even referred to a dybbuk possession as an 'evil pregnancy.' .
Symptoms of being possessed by a dybbuk was severe hysteria and appeared to passersby as extremely emotionally disturbed. In scientific hindsight, it can easily be said that people believed to have been possessed by a dybbuk could be schizophrenic or having something as extreme as Dissociative Identity Disorder. It should be noted that nowhere in any Talmudic writings or in the Kabbalah is the word dybbuk ever mentioned and that this term actually originated in the 16th century.
The most famous encounter with a dybbuk would be the story of the Widow of Safed.
