Translations:Manāyā/4/en

Related practices appeared in Arabia. People used rope to protect themselves from the evil eye. One poet’s parents were afraid the evil eye would harm him, so they took him to a sheikh (elder), who tied rope to his arm as an amulet. For this reason, the poet earned the nick-name Dhul-Rumma, (owner of rope). Some believed practitioners of witchcraft tied knots into rope to harm people. The traces of this art are reflected in the Quran where the believer seeks refuge “from the evil of the witches who blow into knots” (Q 113:4). The tradition says that the verses were revealed to Muhammad after magic was worked into his hair using a cord with knots, concealed under a stone at the bottom of a well. Another metaphor of Fate is the arrow, launched at unwitting victims like in the elegy of Rabīʿah bin Mukaddam: But the arrows of Fate, whomsoever they strike, no medicine man nor sorcerer can avail. And Labid's Mu'allaqa: Indeed, Fate’s arrows never miss their mark. Kahins (oracles/seers) would use bows to symbolically catch and shoot these arrows.