Sending Evil Back to the Sender. The “Back to Sender” Prayers of African Spiritual Warfare Put to the Test of the Bible

1. Introduction

1.1. A scene from an all-night prayer meeting

Let us imagine a composite scene, built from formulas attested in the sources cited later in this article. It is past midnight. In a rented hall, on a sports field or in a large church, hundreds of worshippers are standing. A pastor calls out a sentence into the microphone, and the congregation shouts it back, fists clenched. "Every arrow fired against me, go back to your sender, in the name of Jesus!" Then another: "The enemy must die by fire!" And the crowd repeats it, louder still.

The elements of this scene are not imaginary. African researchers have observed them in Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe and South Africa. Two Ghanaian theologians, Frederick Amevenku and Isaac Boaheng, wrote in 2015 that it is not unusual to see Christians gathered on playing fields, in classrooms or in chapels, loudly "decreeing" and "declaring", and commanding God to put their "enemies" to death or to harm them. Some even come with canes and ropes, in order to tie up and whip their enemies symbolically.

These formulas are called "Back to sender" prayers. The expression is borrowed from the postal service: a wrongly addressed letter is returned to the person who sent it. Applied to prayer, it means the following. If someone has sent me a misfortune, an illness, a spell or a curse, I send it back to them, and they are the ones who will suffer its effects.

1.2. The question

Many Christians who pray in this way are sincere. They are afraid, and they sometimes live in great insecurity, surrounded by illness, early deaths and failures they cannot explain. They turn to God, and that is a good thing. The question, then, is not whether they are right to pray, but whether this particular way of praying agrees with Scripture.

Is it biblical to ask that evil return to the person who supposedly sent it, or that an enemy "die by fire"? And how does this practice fit with the teaching of Jesus, who asks us to love our neighbor as ourselves, and even to love our enemies?

1.3. The thesis of this article

The answer defended here can be summed up in three statements.

First, sending evil or a curse back to its presumed source has no solid scriptural support. The biblical texts usually quoted say something other than what they are made to say. They affirm that God alone executes justice, that evil eventually turns back against the one who commits it, and that the victim may place his or her complaint in God's hands. None of them teaches a technique for turning a spell around.

Second, the practice directly contradicts the teaching of Jesus Christ and the apostles: "bless those who curse you" (Luke 6:28), "bless and do not curse them" (Romans 12:14), "do not repay evil for evil" (1 Peter 3:9). It also contradicts the commandment that Jesus places, together with the love of God, at the summit of the Law: "you shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 22:39).

Third, in practice these prayers often slide from the spiritual enemy (the devil, demons) toward very real human beings: an uncle, a mother-in-law, a neighbor, a colleague. They then contribute to a climate of suspicion that can have serious consequences.

One essential point must be added, and it runs through the whole article. The strongest criticisms of these prayers do not come from Europe. They come from Africa, and often from Pentecostal leaders and scholars themselves. The aim, therefore, is not to cast an outsider's condescending gaze on Africa or on charismatic churches, but to listen to a debate that is taking place within these churches.

1.4. A few words of vocabulary

To make the reading easy, it is useful to define at the outset a few terms that will come up often.

Pentecostalism is a Protestant movement born at the beginning of the twentieth century. It emphasizes the experience of the Holy Spirit, speaking in tongues, healing and deliverance. The charismatic movement refers to the spread of this spirituality into other churches, including the Catholic Church (the "Charismatic Renewal"). Neo-Pentecostalism refers to more recent churches, often centered on a founder, on prosperity and on deliverance. In South Africa, Mookgo Kgatle studies the "new prophetic churches", in which a "prophet" reveals to the faithful the hidden cause of their problems.

Spiritual warfare is the idea, biblical in principle (Ephesians 6), that the Christian faces evil spiritual powers. Since the 1980s, however, the expression has also referred to a body of books and practices that organize this combat according to methods and formulas. It is in this second sense that the term raises questions.

Deliverance refers to prayers intended to free a person from the influence of evil spirits. The New Testament shows Jesus and the apostles casting out demons. In some circles, deliverance has become a central ministry, with specialized sessions.

"Prayer points" are short formulas, often numbered, which a leader calls out and the congregation repeats forcefully. They are typical of spiritual warfare prayer meetings.

Witchcraft, finally, must be understood here in the anthropological sense: the belief that a person can, by an occult power, harm others (make them ill, barren or poor, or cause their death). We will see that this belief is very widespread and that it shapes the way many people understand misfortune.

1.5. Method and the author's position

This article is a literature review: it does not rest on original fieldwork. It draws on peer-reviewed scholarly articles, most of them written by African researchers; on reports by international institutions (UNICEF, Amnesty International, the United Nations); on statements of the Lausanne Movement, a major worldwide evangelical network; and on one dated primary source, a sermon published by a Nigerian church.

The author writes from within evangelical Protestant Christianity: Scripture serves here as the standard, and it is quoted to demonstrate or to refute. This imposes a requirement, namely to read every biblical text in its context by asking who is speaking, to whom, why, and in what literary genre (law, prayer, proverb, narrative, letter). Only what could be verified will be quoted, and estimates will be presented as such.

---

2. What are we talking about?

2.1. The most common formulas

Researchers who have studied these prayers note a fairly stable vocabulary. The following table gathers formulas attested in the sources consulted. They are given in their original language (English, the language of many churches in anglophone Africa), with a plain-language explanation of their meaning.

Around these formulas gravitates a whole vocabulary: the "arrows" supposedly fired by an invisible enemy, the "enemies of my father's house" (the extended family), the "village people", the "covens" (assemblies of witches) or the "Holy Ghost fire". Kgatle specifies that these rhetorics are used above all during night vigils and deliverance sessions.

2.2. A dated and documented example: the sermon "Back to the Senders' Prayers" (2025)

Let us take a precise, public and dated example. On 10 August 2025, Dr Daniel K. Olukoya, General Overseer of Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries (MFM), a church founded in Lagos in 1989, devoted a Sunday service to "back to the senders" prayers. The transcript was published on 1 December 2025 on the church's official sermon website.

The preacher announces several biblical texts: Psalm 7:16; Nehemiah 4:4 and 13:2; Psalm 9:15; Psalm 35:8; Psalm 70:2-3 and Psalm 109:17 (in the numbering of the King James Version). He then sets out the principle of his sermon: "Our major prayer focus this morning is what I call 'back to the senders' prayers. You did not initiate the war. You did not initiate the arrows. The enemy initiated it. So we have a right to send it right back to where it is coming from."

A little further on, he specifies where these arrows come from: "Any arrow fired against you from your village, from your compound, from your place of work, from your place of birth in a sevenfold manner; I command them to backfire, in the name of Jesus." The point is important. The source named is not only the devil. It is human and close at hand: the village, the compound where the extended family lives, the workplace.

The sermon relies on testimonies. A manager who had recommended that a church member be dismissed is himself dismissed after she prays a "back to the senders" prayer. A woman who had accused a man of rape withdraws her accusation after his mother pours prayer water ("Manna Water") on a copy of the court papers while praying in the same way. This second story should give us pause: the retraction of a woman who said she had been raped is presented as a success of prayer.

The preacher justifies the logic of confrontation: "You cannot organize a peace rally against witches. [...] Wars are won by force, strength, resistance, power, violence, aggression. [...] And one way you can teach the enemy a very good lesson is to fire their arrows back to them, back to the senders." Twenty prayer points follow, for example: "Dangerous sacrifices offered against me, go back to your senders" or "Arrows of envious enemies, you are liars, backfire".

This sermon is valuable as an example because it shows what research observes elsewhere: the vocabulary moves constantly from "Satan and his demons" to human beings, to "envious enemies", a colleague, the "village".

2.3. A widespread practice, but not a universal one

This way of praying is not peculiar to a single church. Studies locate it in several countries and several traditions.

In Nigeria, the biblical scholar O. G. Chukwuma (2026) observes that imprecatory prayers (prayers that call down misfortune on someone) are common, especially in Pentecostal churches and in the so-called "white garment" churches (African Independent Churches of the Aladura type), and that they are gaining ground in some mainline churches. J. O. Ekechi (2025), drawing on observations in the streets of Lagos, shows that these expressions have passed into everyday speech, politics and popular culture. They have considerably widened the notion of the "enemy" and sustain a diffuse climate of fear, mistrust and vigilance.

In Zimbabwe, Kudzai Biri and Molly Manyonganise (2022) named their study after a hit gospel song, "Back to Sender", by the singer Sabastian Magacha, itself inspired by a sermon of Emmanuel Makandiwa, founder of the United Family International Church. According to the two researchers, the song expresses the idea, increasingly popular among Pentecostals, that taking revenge on witches is not a sin.

In Zimbabwean Catholic charismatic circles, the priest Misheck Mudyiwa and the scholar Sekgothe Mokgoatšana (2021) note that the "back to sender" concept has become the trademark of most self-appointed exorcists of the Charismatic Renewal. They give this definition of it: any power that uses witchcraft or magic to crush, attack, possess or hinder prosperity must be sent back to haunt or destroy those who sent it.

In South Africa, Kgatle (2020; 2024) shows how some prophecies in the new prophetic churches sustain the fear of witchcraft and feed accusations within families. In Ghana, the work of Opoku Onyinah and J. K. Asamoah-Gyadu has long documented deliverance ministries. In the diaspora, A. Adogame (2004) studied the "rhetoric of spiritual warfare" of Aladura churches established in Europe.

One nuance must be stressed strongly. Not all Pentecostal or charismatic churches pray in this way, and many leaders fight against these prayers (Part 7). Biri and Manyonganise also note that in Zimbabwe these prayers often remain "untargeted", since no one knows who will be struck, which may have prevented direct violence. It would therefore be unjust to equate African Christianity as a whole, or the charismatic movement as a whole, with this practice.

2.4. From the demon to the neighbor: a documented shift

The most worrying point is raised by the researchers themselves. In principle, these prayers target evil spirits. In practice, they often target people.

Kgatle writes it plainly: spiritual warfare prayers are sometimes directed at individuals rather than at evil spirits; the "die by fire" and "back to sender" rhetorics therefore sometimes target people. This, he adds, has caused conflicts between members of the same family, between relatives, and even between members of the same church.

Biri and Manyonganise analyze the mechanism. Witches are seen as the devil's human instruments, and the boundary between the two is blurred. When people pray "back to sender", they act as if they were sending evil back to the devil, forgetting that the imagined "sender" is a human being. The 2025 sermon illustrates this: village, family compound, workplace.

---

3. Where does this practice come from?

Understanding is not excusing, but one cannot respond honestly to a practice without grasping its roots.

3.1. The cosmology of witchcraft

The word "cosmology" refers here to the way a culture pictures the world and its forces. In many societies of sub-Saharan Africa, misfortune (illness, barrenness, repeated failure, early death, poverty) calls for a personal explanation: people ask not only "how" it happened, but "who" caused it. Witchcraft is then thought of as an occult power, often exercised by people close to the victim.

The anthropologist E. E. Evans-Pritchard described this as early as 1937, in a study that must today be read critically. P. Geschiere (1995) showed that these beliefs are not relics of the past: they adapt to money, to the city and to politics. He speaks of the "modernity of witchcraft".

Kgatle sums it up: the African religious worldview does not separate the profane from the sacred, and so the majority look for a spiritual answer to almost every problem, down to unemployment or the refusal of a visa.

On one point, this worldview agrees with the Bible, which recognizes the existence of evil spiritual powers. The question is not whether to deny the spiritual world, but how the Christian faces it, and against whom he or she is fighting.

3.2. The traditional logic of "sending back"

In several African traditions, sending evil back existed long before Christianity, as a practice of counter-witchcraft, that is, a ritual response to a supposed attack.

Biri and Manyonganise, drawing on G. Chavunduka for the Shona world (the main cultural group of Zimbabwe), explain that traditional healer-diviners (n'anga) conducted rituals that protected people, but that also allowed them to take revenge by sending back to witches the evils they intended for their victims, so as to make them "taste their own medicine". For South Africa, they cite Y. Ally (2015): a healer can be consulted to send the affliction back to those suspected of causing it.

Their conclusion: the idea of revenge rituals in songs, declarations and prayers seems to come from familiarity with these traditional rites. Mudyiwa and Mokgoatšana add that this concept is consistent with the African idea of justice and balance, but incompatible with a Christology (an understanding of who Christ is and what he does) of non-violence, non-retaliation and turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:38-48).

This rite assumes that evil is a kind of object (an arrow, a charm) that an effective word can redirect almost mechanically. This is the very structure of magic: a result guaranteed by a technique. The Lausanne Movement consultation held in Nairobi in 2000 together with the Association of Evangelicals in Africa said so clearly: "Any suggestion that a particular technique or method in spiritual conflict ministry ensures success is a magical, sub-Christian understanding of God's workings." Biri and Manyonganise, for their part, raise a decisive question: do those who take revenge not become witches themselves?

3.3. A colonial and missionary pastoral vacuum

Colonial and missionary history also plays its part. Colonial administrations often banned both witchcraft and witchcraft accusations (in Zimbabwe, by an 1898 law, the Witchcraft Suppression Act), without being able to destroy these beliefs, as Biri and Manyonganise note. Many missionaries denied the reality of the spirit world without answering the fears of converts. The Lausanne consultation in Nairobi (2000) records that Christians from the global South had encountered Western missionaries "who were unaware of these spiritual realities, and were thus unable to minister" to them pastorally.

This point is essential if we are to avoid caricature. The success of deliverance ministries partly fills a pastoral vacuum. Believers were afraid, and they were told that their fear had no object. Deliverance churches, by contrast, take this fear seriously. That is one of their strengths. The problem lies in the answer they sometimes give to it.

3.4. "Breaking with the past" while keeping its fears

The anthropologist Birgit Meyer (1998) shows that Ghanaian Pentecostals call for a "complete break with the past", but that by presenting the traditional gods and spirits as demons, they maintain their reality. This is "diabolization": one does not say that these powers do not exist; one says that they are diabolical. Deliverance becomes a space in which people confront what they want to leave behind but which still troubles them.

The Pentecostal theologian Opoku Onyinah, former chairman of the Church of Pentecost (Ghana), considers (2002) that deliverance has taken the place of the old anti-witchcraft shrines. He coined the word "witchdemonology" to describe the synthesis between traditional Akan religion (the Akan being a large cultural group in Ghana) and Christianity, in which witchcraft and demons merge. He recounts that an observer once mistook a Christian prayer center for an anti-witchcraft shrine.

The UNICEF report on children accused of witchcraft (Cimpric 2010) observes that in many countries, revivalist, charismatic or Pentecostal pastor-prophets identify witches through visions and dreams, then offer a treatment, and that this "spiritual" work, often violent, reinforces belief in witchcraft and increases accusations. It quotes J. Tonda (2002): the more the servants of God fight witchcraft, the more, in the end, they extend its resources.

3.5. Globalized spiritual warfare and the "Third Wave"

A final root comes notably from the United States. In the 1980s and 1990s, the missiologist C. Peter Wagner, a professor at Fuller Theological Seminary, popularized the idea of a "Third Wave" of the Spirit: after Pentecostalism and then the charismatic renewal in the mainline churches, a third wave was said to be reaching evangelical churches, with an emphasis on signs, miracles and deliverance.

He also spread "strategic-level spiritual warfare": "territorial spirits" were said to rule over cities or nations, and they had to be identified, named and fought with specific prayers. His books, notably Engaging the Enemy (1991) and Warfare Prayer (1992), circulated throughout the world.

No source consulted establishes a direct influence of Wagner on the "back to sender" prayers of any particular African church. One can only speak of a shared global context, in which an abundant literature presented spiritual warfare as a technique to be mastered.

This current was criticized very early by evangelicals. In 1995, R. J. Priest, T. Campbell and B. A. Mullen reproached it for taking over animistic and magical notions (power attributed to objects, curses and places, reliance on the testimony of demons): a "missiological syncretism", that is, an unacknowledged mixture of the Christian faith with beliefs foreign to it.

In 1993, the Lausanne Movement warned against the danger of reverting to pagan worldviews and against "an undiscerning application of Old Testament analogies that were, in fact, superseded in Jesus Christ"; the remedy, it said, is "the rigorous study of the whole of Scripture, always interpreting the Old Testament in the light of the New." The text adds: "We heard with concern of situations where warfare language was pushing Christians into adversarial attitudes with people [...]. We saw that the language of peace, penitence and reconciliation must be as prominent in our speech and practice as any talk of warfare."

The Nairobi consultation (2000), co-written with African leaders, Pentecostals among them, names "scapegoating as a means of legitimizing violence" among the works of Satan. It affirms that "Christ's willingness to sacrifice himself in contrast to fighting back is a model for spiritual conflict." It warns against "an overemphasis on spirits that blames demons for the actions of people", and against approaches that "tie new converts to the very fears from which Christ died to free them." Spiritual authority, it says, must be exercised "in compassion and love", without becoming spiritual abuse.

---

4. What this produces

4.1. A methodological caution

We must begin with a warning. No simple cause-and-effect link can be established between a "back to sender" prayer and a specific act of violence. What the sources establish is more diffuse, but real: these prayers are part of a larger whole (prophecies that name a culprit, deliverance sessions, a permanent fear of the enemy close at hand) that sustains a climate of suspicion, which in turn feeds witchcraft accusations. We will therefore speak of a climate, of a possible contribution and of a documented shift, not of mechanical causation.

4.2. Accused children

In 2010, UNICEF published an anthropological study by A. Cimpric on children accused of witchcraft in Africa. These accusations are a recent phenomenon, linked to urbanization, poverty, conflict and the weakening of families. "Pastor-prophets" identify "child witches" through visions and dreams, then offer, in exchange for money, a "soul cure". Children from the Democratic Republic of Congo testify to forced fasting: "For three days we were not allowed to eat or drink." The report recommends mediation between pastors, families and children, and regulation of the activities of healers and revival churches.

In Nigeria, an Al Jazeera investigation (M. Ellison, 2018, supported by the Pulitzer Center) in the states of Akwa Ibom and Cross River reports a 2008 estimate, repeated in the press, of about 15,000 children accused of witchcraft in these two states. This figure is a press estimate, and the original report behind it is not clearly identified. The investigation describes children who were chained, starved, beaten and burned. A local child protection official estimates that 60% of the abuse cases she handles are linked to witchcraft and are often triggered by a pastor's declaration. A local law of 2008 makes labeling a child a witch punishable by up to ten years in prison, yet ten years later no one had been convicted. The investigation also points to a Christian film, End of the Wicked (1999).

A local Christian organization, Way to the Nations, contests the literal reading of Exodus 22:18 ("You shall not permit a sorceress to live"; in the King James wording quoted locally, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live") used against these children: "we do not believe that the Bible was written to be used to hurt people."

4.3. Accused elderly women

In Ghana, Amnesty International published in April 2025 a report entitled Branded for Life on women accused of witchcraft. In July 2026, the organization recalled the case of Akua Denteh, aged 90, lynched on 23 July 2020 in Kafaba, in the Savannah region, following an accusation of witchcraft. Two women were sentenced in 2023 to twelve years in prison for homicide.

Hundreds of accused women live in "witch camps" (Gambaga, Kukuo, Gnani and others) in inadequate conditions. The accusations usually arise within the family or the community after an illness or a death, and they mainly target women who are elderly, poor, ill or disabled. A bill against these accusations, passed in July 2023, was not signed into law; in September 2026, according to the Ghanaian press, the government announced its intention to take it up again.

4.4. The position of the United Nations

On 12 July 2021, the UN Human Rights Council adopted resolution 47/8 on the elimination of harmful practices related to accusations of witchcraft and ritual attacks, followed by a study by the Office of the High Commissioner (A/HRC/52/47, 2023). The resolution protects belief, which falls under freedom of religion, but condemns practices that violate human rights.

4.5. What a Pentecostal theologian describes

Onyinah (2002), writing from within Ghanaian Pentecostalism, identified eight negative effects of "witchdemonology". The accusation spares people from acknowledging their own faults and shifts the blame onto someone else, often a poor person, who becomes the enemy of the whole community. It brings psychological pressure, forced confessions, stigmatization and, in extreme cases, death. Medical symptoms are treated as witchcraft. Deliverance often divides the extended family. It sustains a servile fear that holds back development: some people give up building in their home village for fear of witches. Those who are exorcised are often women, children (especially girls) and domestic workers.

4.6. Fleeing responsibility

Finally, Biri and Manyonganise describe "back to sender" as a form of escapism: it removes responsibility for economic collapse from the country's leaders and places it on invisible enemies. Kgatle makes the same point: corruption, incompetence and greed are not spirits. If every misfortune comes from a witch in the village, there is no longer any room for personal responsibility, social engagement or medicine.

The Nigerian priest Kelvin Ugwu put it strikingly in December 2025: "We want to kill enemies rather than face responsibility. But the enemies are not dying — they are multiplying."

---

5. The verses invoked, reread in their context

5.1. Three simple questions

In his 2025 sermon, Olukoya says: "I did not write these scriptures. I am just reading them to you." But reading a text also means asking what it says in its context. Three questions are enough to check whether a verse really provides a basis for sending evil back.

1. Who acts? Is it God, or is it the believer who sets evil in motion by a word?
2. What kind of text is it? Is it a prayer, a law, a proverb, a narrative? A proverb that observes is not a rite that commands.
3. Against whom? Against a real and known oppressor, or against a relative designated as a witch by a dream or a prophecy?

5.2. The so-called "imprecatory" psalms

An "imprecation" is a word that calls down misfortune on someone. The term "imprecatory psalms" is used for psalms that contain such words against enemies, notably Psalms 35, 58, 69, 109, 137 and 140. These are harsh texts, and many Christians do not know how to read them.

Their literary genre. These psalms are first of all complaints, what specialists call "laments". A person (or the people) is suffering, often unjustly, and cries out to God. Very often the setting is a law court: an innocent person is falsely accused, surrounded by false witnesses, and appeals to the supreme Judge. The German exegetes Hossfeld and Zenger thus propose calling Psalm 109 a "psalm of justice" rather than a "psalm of cursing". Zenger (1994, translated into English in 1996) reads these texts as the cries of victims who hand violence over to God.

Giving up vengeance. D. G. Firth (1996) showed that in the individual laments, the one who prays surrenders retribution to God instead of carrying it out personally. Chukwuma, summarizing Brueggemann and Bellinger, writes that Psalm 109 does not encourage any thirst for revenge but teaches that one may ask God for justice. The imprecations of the psalms are words addressed to God, not orders addressed to "arrows".

Psalm 109 in detail. Olukoya quotes this psalm at verse 17: "He loved to curse; let curses come upon him!" Let us look at the text closely.

In verse 4, the one who prays says: "In return for my love they accuse me, but I give myself to prayer." In Hebrew, the end of the verse literally reads "and I, prayer". The man who speaks has loved his adversaries and has prayed for them. He is not a spiritual warrior; he is a victim who prays.

Then, in verses 6 to 19, a long series of curses is spoken in the singular. Yet many exegetes (Allen, Anderson, Mays, Clifford, and Chukwuma after them) consider that these curses are a quotation of the curses that the accusers pronounce against the psalmist. In other words, it is the enemy who is speaking, and the psalmist reports these words before God. Other specialists, such as Hossfeld and Zenger, see them as the words of the psalmist himself. The debate remains open, but one thing is striking: verse 17, quoted to justify sending evil back, belongs precisely to the passage whose attribution is disputed. It is therefore unwise to make it the basis of a practice.

Finally, verse 28 gives the key to the psalm: "Let them curse, but you will bless!" The psalmist does not send the curse back. He leaves it with those who speak it, and he counts on God to bless. Mays, quoted by Chukwuma, sums it up: the enemies may curse, but God alone has the right to decide on whom misfortune will fall.

An honest nuance. Chukwuma defends a certain legitimacy for these psalms as the prayer of the defenseless: in the face of the violence of Boko Haram and of armed bandits, it is better to cry out to God than to take up arms or consult diviners. But he acknowledges that they do not agree with the New Testament's teaching on love and forgiveness, and that they authorize no thirst for revenge. Allowing a victim to cry out his or her anger before God is not the same as handing that victim a technique for destroying a suspected relative.

A reading in the light of Christ. The New Testament quotes Psalms 69 and 109 in connection with the Passion of Jesus and with Judas (John 2:17; 15:25; Acts 1:20; Romans 15:3). Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1940) proposed a reading that has become classic: Christ prays the psalms of vengeance by taking God's vengeance upon himself, while praying for his enemies; the Christian therefore prays them "in Christ", through the cross. C. S. Lewis (1958) saw in them the truthful expression of wounded anger, not a model to be imitated. The psalm then becomes a prayer that evil be destroyed, not people.

5.3. "Whoever digs a pit will fall into it"

Several texts affirm that the wicked person falls into the trap he has set: Psalm 7:14-16; Psalm 9:15; Psalm 35:8; Proverbs 26:27; Ecclesiastes 10:8. According to Biri and Manyonganise, Proverbs 26:27 is even the main text of justification in Zimbabwe: "Whoever digs a pit will fall into it, and a stone will come back on him who starts it rolling."

Their genre. These are observations of wisdom. They describe a moral law of the world created by God: evil carries within itself its own ruin. The German biblical scholar Klaus Koch (1955) called this the connection between an act and its consequence. Psalm 7 is very clear on this point. It is written in the indicative, as a description: the wicked person "falls into the hole that he has made. His mischief returns upon his own head" (Psalm 7:15-16). The one who prays observes God's justice; he does not trigger it.

There is no action by the one who prays. In these texts, no one "sends back" anything. No one commands the trap to close on the person who set it. Turning a proverb into a rite ("Every trap set for you shall catch the owner") changes the nature of the text: we move from an observation of wisdom to a magical command.

The same book forbids revenge. "Do not say, 'I will repay evil'; wait for the LORD, and he will deliver you" (Proverbs 20:22). "Do not rejoice when your enemy falls" (Proverbs 24:17). "If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat" (Proverbs 25:21), a text taken up in Romans 12:20. Above all, just before the verse about the pit, we read: "Like a sparrow in its flitting, like a swallow in its flying, a curse that is causeless does not alight" (Proverbs 26:2). If an undeserved curse does not land, there is nothing to send back.

5.4. Esther 7: Haman hanged on his own gallows

The book of Esther tells how Haman, a high Persian official, plans the extermination of the Jews and has a gallows built for Mordecai. In chapter 7, his plot is uncovered and he is hanged on the gallows he had prepared. This story is readily cited as an example of "back to sender".

But it is a narrative, built around an ironic reversal. Esther does not pray for the gallows to turn around. She comes before the king without being summoned, at the risk of her life, and pleads for her people: a legal and political step. The sentence is pronounced by the king. The story celebrates the hidden providence of God, who is not even named in the Hebrew text. Making it a prayer technique turns a narrative irony into a rite.

5.5. Nehemiah 4 and 13

Nehemiah is a Jewish leader who, in the fifth century before Christ, rebuilds the walls of Jerusalem despite the opposition of hostile neighbors. In chapter 4, faced with mockery and threats, he prays: "Hear, O our God, for we are despised. Turn back their taunt on their own heads" (Nehemiah 4:4). This is a prayer placed in God's hands, in a real political conflict with known and declared adversaries. And it is followed not by a rite but by work and vigilance: "And we prayed to our God and set a guard as a protection against them day and night" (Nehemiah 4:9).

The second text quoted by Olukoya, Nehemiah 13:2, says the opposite of sending evil back. It recalls Balaam, a diviner paid by the king of Moab to curse Israel (Numbers 22-24): they "hired Balaam against them to curse them; yet our God turned the curse into a blessing." God does not send the curse back; he transforms it. Balaam acknowledges it: "How can I curse whom God has not cursed?" (Numbers 23:8); "For there is no enchantment against Jacob, no divination against Israel" (Numbers 23:23). Biblical protection against cursing comes from God and needs no retaliation.

5.6. Galatians 6:7: "Whatever one sows, that will he also reap"

The verse is famous: "Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap." It is quoted to say that the one who sends evil must reap it.

But here Paul is writing to the Christians of Galatia (in present-day Turkey) about life in the community. Just before, he asks them to restore gently anyone who has fallen (6:1), to bear one another's burdens (6:2) and to examine their own conduct (6:4); just after, he concludes: "let us do good to everyone" (6:10). The verse calls for personal responsibility: I am the one who will reap what I sow. It is not a weapon for making others reap.

5.7. Exodus 22:18: "You shall not permit a sorceress to live"

This verse (numbered 22:17 in the Hebrew text and 22:18 in most French and English translations) is sometimes quoted to justify the fight against witches, even to the point of violence.

It is a criminal law of ancient Israel. It targeted a specific practice (magic, divination) and was applied within the framework of courts, with witnesses. It did not concern suspicions arising from a dream or a prophecy. It authorizes no private execution, much less a "spiritual" execution by prayer.

When confronted with magic, the apostles call people to conversion. Peter says to Simon the magician: "Repent, therefore, of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord" (Acts 8:22). In Ephesus, former practitioners of magic who have become believers burn their own books (Acts 19:18-19).

Kgatle proposes a simple key for reading this text: Exodus 22:18 must be read together with Mark 12:31 ("You shall love your neighbor as yourself"). Then, he writes, African neo-Pentecostals can understand that even if their neighbor were a witch, Christ commanded believers to love their neighbor.

5.8. Other texts we must face squarely

In fairness, we must examine a few texts that might be set against this reading.

Acts 13:8-11. Paul strikes with blindness "for a time" the magician Elymas, who was opposing the gospel before the proconsul of Cyprus. This is a one-off, temporary prophetic judgment against a public opponent, and it leads the proconsul to faith. It is neither a prayer for someone's death, nor the accusation of a relative, nor a model for repeated prayer.

2 Timothy 4:14 and Revelation 6:10. Paul writes that Alexander the coppersmith did him great harm, and adds: "the Lord will repay him according to his deeds." The martyrs in Revelation cry out: "how long?" In both cases, justice is handed over to God, without any rite of sending back.

Matthew 11:12 ("the violent take it by force") is quoted to justify a style of prayer "by force, by fire". It is a difficult verse, whose most probable meaning describes the violent opposition suffered by the kingdom of God, not a method of prayer.

Isaiah 66:16 ("For by fire will the LORD enter into judgment") is invoked in support of "die by fire". But it is a text about the final judgment, in which it is God who judges, not the believer who directs the fire. In the New Testament, the fire of the Spirit (Matthew 3:11; Acts 2:3) purifies and sends people out on mission. It kills no one.

5.9. Entrusting justice to God is not demanding evil

An objection often comes up: "But I am not doing anything myself; I am asking God to do justice." Two attitudes must be distinguished here.

The first is biblical: entrusting one's cause to God. This is what Romans 12:19 does: "Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.'" This verse takes vengeance away from human beings. It asks us to let go, to let God judge as he wills, when he wills and in the way he wills, including through the conversion of the guilty party.

The second is not biblical: demanding a specific evil against a specific person, by ordering arrows to turn back sevenfold against the one who launched them, or by commanding that an enemy die by fire. This is no longer handing justice over to God. It is an attempt to delegate justice to God while fixing the sentence and the target oneself. Romans 12:19 does not permit this, and the next verse shows it: "if your enemy is hungry, feed him."

---

6. What Jesus teaches

6.1. The heart of the Law: loving one's neighbor, without revenge

When Jesus is asked about the greatest commandment, he answers by quoting two texts from the Old Testament: to love God with all one's heart (Deuteronomy 6:5) and "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22:37-39; Mark 12:31). This second commandment comes from Leviticus 19:18, and the verse must be read in full: "You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD."

The commandment of love is stated in the same verse as the prohibition of revenge. In the Law of Moses, loving one's neighbor and renouncing revenge are one and the same thing. Now the neighbor targeted by "back to sender" prayers is very often a member of the family, a neighbor or a colleague: exactly the neighbor of whom Leviticus speaks.

The Old Testament already goes far. The Law requires one to bring back an enemy's straying animal and to help his donkey when it has collapsed under its load (Exodus 23:4-5). Job declares that he has not let his mouth sin by asking for the life of his enemy with a curse (Job 31:29-30). Elisha, having the enemy army at his mercy, has a meal served to them before sending them away (2 Kings 6:21-23).

6.2. "Love your enemies": Matthew 5 and Luke 6

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus addresses his disciples and the crowd. He takes up familiar teachings in order to reveal their deeper demand. "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil" (Matthew 5:38-39), that is, do not answer him with the same violence. Then: "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good" (Matthew 5:43-45). Later manuscripts, followed by the King James Version, also include in verse 44 the words "bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you", which appear in any case in Luke's parallel. The conclusion is: "You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48).

The Gospel of Luke reports the same teaching (Luke 6:27-36) with a phrase that answers exactly the scenario of the sending-back prayers: "bless those who curse you" (Luke 6:28). Jesus therefore envisages precisely the situation in which someone curses us. And he does not say: send the curse back to him. He says: bless him. Luke concludes: "Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful" (Luke 6:36). The reason is theological: the disciple must resemble the Father, who does good to the wicked.

6.3. Fire refused: Luke 9:51-56

This passage is probably the most direct answer to "die by fire" prayers. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, where he is going to die. He sends messengers into a Samaritan village to prepare lodging for him, but the villagers refuse to receive him. James and John, two of his closest disciples, react: "Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?" (Luke 9:54). They are thinking of the prophet Elijah, who had called down fire on soldiers sent against him (2 Kings 1).

Jesus' answer is immediate: "But he turned and rebuked them" (Luke 9:55). Some later manuscripts add: "and he said, 'You do not know what manner of spirit you are of; for the Son of Man came not to destroy people's lives but to save them.'" This addition is absent from the oldest manuscripts, but it is ancient and faithful to the meaning of the passage.

6.4. The cross and the first martyr

On the cross, Jesus prays: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). At his arrest, he had said to Peter: "Put your sword back into its place" (Matthew 26:52). Peter would draw the lesson: "When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly" (1 Peter 2:23).

Stephen, the first Christian martyr, stoned in Jerusalem, dies saying: "Lord, do not hold this sin against them" (Acts 7:60). He does not say: "may your stones return to their senders." The Lausanne consultation in Nairobi saw this clearly: Christ's willingness to sacrifice himself rather than fight back is a model for spiritual conflict.

6.5. The teaching of the apostles

Romans 12:14-21. Paul is writing to the Christians of Rome, a small community exposed to hostility. Having set out the gospel, he draws its practical consequences: "Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them" (12:14); "Repay no one evil for evil" (12:17); "Beloved, never avenge yourselves [...] 'Vengeance is mine'" (12:19, quoting Deuteronomy 32:35); "if your enemy is hungry, feed him" (12:20, quoting Proverbs 25:21-22); "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (12:21). Kgatle relies precisely on Romans 12:19 to reject what he calls a "theology of retaliation".

1 Peter 3:9. Peter is writing to Christians scattered across Asia Minor who are suffering slander and mistreatment: "Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless, for to this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing." Blessing is not an option; it is a calling.

Other texts point in the same direction. "When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure" (1 Corinthians 4:12). James is indignant that the same tongue should be used to bless God and to curse "people who are made in the likeness of God": "My brothers, these things ought not to be so" (James 3:9-10). Love "is not ... resentful" (1 Corinthians 13:5); literally, it "does not reckon evil", the opposite of a culture of suspicion toward the people around us. And "Judge not" (Matthew 7:1): the "prophet" who designates a witch within a family pronounces a judgment that God alone can make.

6.6. The true nature of spiritual warfare: Ephesians 6:10-18

The classic text on spiritual warfare is Ephesians 6:10-18. Paul, in prison, is writing to the Christians of Ephesus, a city known for its magical practices (Acts 19). He takes up the image of a Roman soldier to describe the Christian life.

Three observations are called for. First, the adversary is not human: "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" (Ephesians 6:12). "Flesh and blood" means human beings. A combat that targets an uncle, a mother-in-law or a colleague therefore directly contradicts this text.

Second, the armor is defensive. The main verb is "stand" or "stand firm" (verses 11, 13, 14). The belt, the breastplate, the shoes, the shield and the helmet all serve to protect. The only weapon is "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" (verse 17). There is no question of arrows being sent back, nor of fire directed against anyone.

Finally, the prayer is intercession: "praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication [...] for all the saints" (verse 18). Spiritual warfare leads to prayer for others, not against them.

Other texts confirm this. The Christian's weapons "destroy arguments" (2 Corinthians 10:4-5): they kill no one. We resist the devil by submitting to God (James 4:7) and by standing firm in the faith (1 Peter 5:8-9). When Paul, in Philippi, casts out a spirit of divination from a young slave girl, he addresses the spirit, not the girl (Acts 16:16-18). Kgatle stresses this: Paul and Silas confronted the spirits rather than the person.

6.7. A victory already won

For the New Testament, victory over the powers of evil is not something to be conquered by our prayers: it has already been won by the cross. God "disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them" (Colossians 2:15), a triumph accomplished in Christ and his cross. Christ delivers "all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery" (Hebrews 2:15). "He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:4), and "perfect love casts out fear" (1 John 4:18). Nothing, neither rulers nor powers, can separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:38-39).

The consequence is simple. The believer does not need to send evil back in order to be protected. Christ's victory makes retaliation unnecessary, and fear of the hidden enemy is precisely what Christ sets us free from.

---

7. African voices saying the same thing

One might think that the critique of "back to sender" prayers is a Western critique. The opposite is true. The strongest voices are African, and many of them are Pentecostal.

Opoku Onyinah, a Ghanaian Pentecostal theologian and former chairman of the Church of Pentecost, judges "witchdemonology" to be "quite alarming". In his view, its preoccupation with demons and witches shows that it is a reassertion of the old order (2002).

Mookgo S. Kgatle, a professor at the University of South Africa (UNISA) and a specialist in Pentecostalism, affirms that a Pentecostal theology of spiritual warfare must not be a theology of retaliation, such as the one found in "back to sender" rhetoric. It must target spirits and not people, be centered on God rather than on the devil, in keeping with the word of 2 Chronicles 20:17 ("You will not need to fight in this battle"), and recognize that not all of life's difficulties come from the spirit world (2024).

Kudzai Biri and Molly Manyonganise, Zimbabwean researchers who are themselves members of Pentecostal churches, describe "back to sender" as a form of escapism and ask whether those who take revenge do not themselves become witches. They report the argument of internal critics: no human being is an enemy, even if he or she does evil; the devil is behind all evil, and "back to sender" prayers are therefore a disguised form of revenge, which Jesus forbade.

Ezekiel Guti, founder of the Zimbabwean Pentecostal church ZAOGA, calls, according to Biri and Manyonganise, not for accusing others of witchcraft but for praying for witches so that they turn away from evil, quoting Matthew 5:44.

Misheck Mudyiwa, a Zimbabwean Catholic priest, and Sekgothe Mokgoatšana, of the University of Limpopo, judge the concept problematic and incompatible with a Christology of non-violence and non-retaliation (2021).

Frederick M. Amevenku and Isaac Boaheng, in Ghana, criticize the imprecatory prayers of which they collected examples, and argue that Christian prayer must be ordered differently (2015).

Bishop Emmanuel A. Badejo, Catholic bishop of Oyo in Nigeria, was very firm in his Pentecost 2026 message: "'Holy Ghost Fire, Back to Sender or Die, Die and Die by Fire' prayers are not Christian at all." He called on Christians to "stop these nonsense prayers and begin to speak the language of the Pentecost: Unity and Love." He recalled the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22) and Jesus' forgiveness on the cross. His harshest phrase calls those who pray in this way "pagans": this is the language of a pastor who wants to alert his own flock, not an outsider's judgment.

Father Kelvin Ugwu, a Nigerian priest, denounced in December 2025 these prayers that turn the Holy Spirit into a "hired assassin" and an "errand boy".

These voices, Pentecostal, Protestant and Catholic, converge. It is not Europe judging Africa. It is African Christians calling their brothers and sisters back to the gospel.

---

8. Praying differently

8.1. Distinguishing the legitimate from the unbiblical

Criticizing a practice is not enough. Those who pray "back to sender" often have real fears and real needs. We must show them what the Bible permits and encourages. The following table summarizes the distinction.

8.2. An example of a prayer of protection without cursing

The Bible offers many models of prayers of protection: the Lord's Prayer ("deliver us from evil", Matthew 6:13), Psalms 91 and 121, Jesus' prayer for his disciples ("keep them from the evil one", John 17:15), and the priestly blessing ("The LORD bless you and keep you", Numbers 6:24-26). Drawing on them, one can pray like this:

"Lord Jesus, by your cross you have defeated every power of evil. Keep me and keep my family. May every work of darkness be brought to nothing by your victory. I entrust to you those who wish me harm: touch their hearts, deliver them too, and bless them. I place all justice in your hands. Amen."

This prayer does not deny evil. It asks for protection, it targets the works of darkness and not people, it intercedes for those who do evil, and it hands justice over to God.

8.3. Pastoral directions

Take fear seriously. We do not mock those who feel attacked. The New Testament recognizes the reality of evil (Ephesians 6:12). The answer is trust in Christ's victory, not the denial of suffering.

Offer lament rather than retaliation. Real victims of violence and injustice need a space in which to cry out their pain before God, in the spirit of the psalms, without that cry becoming a rite of destruction.

Break the chain that leads from accusation to violence. Never validate a "revelation" that designates a relative as a witch. Teach Matthew 7:1 and Ephesians 6:12. Refuse paid or violent deliverances (imposed fasting, beatings), especially on children, as UNICEF recommends.

Support accused persons. Welcome, physical protection, family mediation, and referral to social and legal services. In Ghana, organizations that partner with Amnesty, such as Songtaba, support accused elderly women. Jesus touched those who were excluded and restored them to the community.

Look for human causes. Consult a doctor or a psychologist: the Lausanne consultation in Nairobi calls for distinguishing the psychological from the spiritual, and Onyinah points out that epilepsy and mental disorders are sometimes mistaken for witchcraft. Acknowledge one's personal responsibility. Engage in society.

Train leaders and watch over children. Learn to read texts in their context and the Old Testament in the light of the New, as Lausanne (1993) urges. In the European diaspora, remain vigilant about child protection wherever deliverance is practiced, while engaging in respectful dialogue with pastors.

---

9. Conclusion

"Back to sender" and "die by fire" prayers arise from real fears, in a world where misfortune strikes hard and where many Christians have felt abandoned in the face of the spirit world. They draw on a traditional logic of counter-witchcraft, and they have spread within a global context in which spiritual warfare has become a technique.

Examined in the light of Scripture, they do not stand. The psalms of lament hand vengeance over to God. The proverbs about the pit observe God's justice without triggering it, and a causeless curse does not alight. Esther pleads, Nehemiah prays and sets a guard, and God turns Balaam's curse into a blessing. Galatians 6:7 points each person to his or her own responsibility, and Exodus 22 justifies no private or "spiritual" execution.

The teaching of Jesus is unambiguous: bless those who curse us, refuse fire from heaven against a hostile village, pray on the cross for one's executioners. The apostles forbid cursing and repaying evil for evil. Spiritual warfare never targets "flesh and blood", and the victory over the powers has already been won. Sending evil back to a neighbor contradicts the commandment that Jesus places at the summit of the Law: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

This article has its limits: it rests on published sources, not on fieldwork; French-language research on the "back to sender" formula remains scarce; some figures are press estimates; and no simple causal link can be established between a prayer and an act of violence. But the convergence of the sources, and above all of the African voices, is sufficient to reach a conclusion.

The Christian answer to fear is not retaliation. It is trust in the victorious Christ, who sets us free from fear and makes us able to love even our enemies. Paul sums it up in a sentence that could replace all the prayer points of retaliation: "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Romans 12:21).

---

Sources

A. Scholarly articles

1. Adogame, A. (2004). "Engaging the Rhetoric of Spiritual Warfare: The Public Face of Aladura in Diaspora". Journal of Religion in Africa 34(4): 493-522. https://doi.org/10.1163/1570066042564392
2. Ally, Y. (2015). "'Burn the witch': The impact of the fear of witchcraft on social cohesion in South Africa". Psychology in Society 49: 25-45. https://doi.org/10.17159/2309-8708/2015/n49a3
3. Amevenku, F. M. and Boaheng, I. (2015). "Use of Imprecatory Prayers in Contemporary African Christianity: A Critique". E-Journal of Religious and Theological Studies 1(2): 86-104. https://www.ajol.info/index.php/erats/article/view/293026
4. Asamoah-Gyadu, J. K. (2005). "'Christ is the Answer': What is the Question? A Ghana Airways Prayer Vigil and its Implications for Religion, Evil and Public Space". Journal of Religion in Africa 35(1): 93-117. https://doi.org/10.1163/1570066052995834
5. Awojobi, P. O. (2024). "A plea for vengeance in Psalm 35:1-3 and its reflections in Africa (Yoruba) indigenous churches". Verbum et Ecclesia 45(1). https://doi.org/10.4102/ve.v45i1.3192
6. Biri, K. and Manyonganise, M. (2022). "'Back to Sender': Re-Visiting the Belief in Witchcraft in Post-Colonial Zimbabwean Pentecostalism". Religions 13(1): 49. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel13010049
7. Chukwuma, O. G. (2026). "A critical look at imprecatory prayers in Psalm 109 and their usage among present-day Christians in Nigeria". Verbum et Ecclesia 47(1). https://doi.org/10.4102/ve.v47i1.3653
8. Ekechi, J. O. (2025). "'Back to Sender': Pentecostal Prayer Forms and Language Dynamics in Nigeria's Contemporary World". Journal of African Cultural Studies 37(4): 513-530. https://doi.org/10.1080/13696815.2025.2476741
9. Fancello, S. (2008). "Sorcellerie et délivrance dans les pentecôtismes africains". Cahiers d'études africaines 189-190. https://doi.org/10.4000/etudesafricaines.10382
10. Firth, D. G. (1996). "Responses to violence in some lament Psalms of the individual". Verbum et Ecclesia 17(2): 317-328. https://doi.org/10.4102/ve.v17i2.520
11. Kgatle, M. S. (2020). "Propagating the fear of witchcraft: Pentecostal prophecies in the new prophetic churches in South Africa". Journal of the European Pentecostal Theological Association 40(2): 132-143. https://doi.org/10.1080/18124461.2020.1795420
12. Kgatle, M. S. (2024). "Engaging the Evil Forces in the Spirit Realm: A Theology of Spiritual Warfare in African Neo-Pentecostal Spirituality". E-Journal of Religious and Theological Studies 10(4): 66-72. https://doi.org/10.38159/erats.20241041
13. Luc, A. (1999). "Interpreting the Curses in the Psalms". Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 42(3): 395-410.
14. Maxwell, D. (1998). "'Delivered from the Spirit of Poverty?': Pentecostalism, Prosperity and Modernity in Zimbabwe". Journal of Religion in Africa 28(3). https://doi.org/10.1163/157006698X00053
15. Meyer, B. (1998). "'Make a Complete Break with the Past.' Memory and Post-Colonial Modernity in Ghanaian Pentecostalist Discourse". Journal of Religion in Africa 28(3): 316-349. https://doi.org/10.1163/157006698X00044
16. Mudyiwa, M. and Mokgoatšana, S. (2021). "Back to Africa: (Re)appropriating the 'Back-to-Sender' Concept in the Zimbabwe Catholic Charismatic Renewal". Studia Historiae Ecclesiasticae. https://doi.org/10.25159/2412-4265/9261
17. Onyinah, O. (2002). "Deliverance as a Way of Confronting Witchcraft in Modern Africa: Ghana as a Case History". Asian Journal of Pentecostal Studies 5(1): 107-134. https://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/ajps/ajps-05-1_107.pdf
18. Onyinah, O. (2004). "Contemporary 'Witchdemonology' in Africa". International Review of Mission 93: 330-345. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1758-6631.2004.tb00463.x
19. Oyelade, O. K. and Omobowale, A. O. (2022). "Pentecostal Conceptions of Warfare Prayer among the Yoruba in Southwestern Nigeria". Journal of Religion in Africa. https://doi.org/10.1163/15700666-12340243
20. Quayesi-Amakye, J. (2016). "The problematic of exorcism and spiritual warfare: a dialogue with Apostle Dr Opoku Onyinah". Journal of the European Pentecostal Theological Association 37(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/18124461.2016.1258252

B. Books, reports and church documents

• Amnesty International (2025). Branded for Life (report on the camps for women accused of witchcraft in Ghana, April 2025); press release of 23 July 2026. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2026/07/ghana-witchcraft-akua/
• Asamoah-Gyadu, J. K. (2005). African Charismatics. Leiden, Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789047406303
• Bonhoeffer, D. (1940). Das Gebetbuch der Bibel (English translation Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible).
• Cimpric, A. (2010). Children Accused of Witchcraft: An Anthropological Study of Contemporary Practices in Africa. Dakar, UNICEF WCARO.
• United Nations Human Rights Council (2021). Resolution 47/8, Elimination of harmful practices related to accusations of witchcraft and ritual attacks, 12 July 2021.
• Evans-Pritchard, E. E. (1937). Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande.
• Geschiere, P. (1995). Sorcellerie et politique en Afrique. La viande des autres. Paris, Karthala.
• Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (2023). A/HRC/52/47. https://docs.un.org/en/A/HRC/52/47
• Kalu, O. (2008). African Pentecostalism: An Introduction. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195340006.001.0001
• Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization (1993). Statement on Spiritual Warfare. https://lausanne.org/content/statement/statement-on-spiritual-warfare-1993
• Lausanne Committee and Association of Evangelicals in Africa (2000). Deliver Us from Evil. Consultation Statement (Nairobi). https://lausanne.org/content/statement/deliver-us-from-evil-consultation-statement
• Lewis, C. S. (1958). Reflections on the Psalms.
• Meyer, B. (1999). Translating the Devil: Religion and Modernity among the Ewe in Ghana. Edinburgh University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781474471008
• Onyinah, O. (2012). Pentecostal Exorcism: Witchcraft and Demonology in Ghana. Blandford Forum, Deo. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004397101
• Priest, R. J., Campbell, T. and Mullen, B. A. (1995). "Missiological Syncretism: The New Animistic Paradigm". In E. Rommen (ed.), Spiritual Power and Missions: Raising the Issues. Pasadena, William Carey Library.
• Wagner, C. P. (ed.) (1991). Engaging the Enemy; Wagner, C. P. (1992). Warfare Prayer. Ventura, Regal.
• Zenger, E. (1996). A God of Vengeance? Understanding the Psalms of Divine Wrath. Louisville, Westminster John Knox (German original 1994).

C. Primary source and press

• Olukoya, D. K. "Back to the Senders' Prayers", sermon of 10 August 2025, published on 1 December 2025 on MFM H/Q Sermons. https://mfmsermons.com/2025/12/01/back-to-the-senders-prayers/
• ACI Africa, "'Stop these nonsense prayers': Bishop Urges Christians in Nigeria to Speak 'the Language of Pentecost' Amid Insecurity", 24 May 2026. https://www.aciafrica.org/index.php/news/21959/stop-these-nonsense-prayers-bishop-urges-christians-in-nigeria-to-speak-the-language-of-pentecost-amid-insecurity
• Al Jazeera, M. Ellison, "How Nigeria's fear of child 'witchcraft' ruins young lives", 14 November 2018. https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2018/11/14/how-nigerias-fear-of-child-witchcraft-ruins-young-lives
• Citi Newsroom, "Gov't to take over Anti-Witchcraft Bill over financial implications", September 2026. https://www.citinewsroom.com/2026/09/govt-to-take-over-anti-witchcraft-bill-over-financial-implications-gender-minister/
• Kwale.com.ng, "Fr Kelvin Ugwu Warns Against 'Die-By-Fire' Prayer Pattern", 4 December 2025. https://www.kwale.com.ng/postshow/fr-kelvin-ugwu-warns-against-die-by-fire-prayer-pattern

Bible quotations follow the English Standard Version (ESV) unless otherwise indicated. Quotations from the Olukoya sermon, the Lausanne statements and other English-language sources are given in their original wording.