Closely connected with the primitive conception of sin, is that of a curse. In fact, the injurious energy attributed to a sinful act, is in many cases obviously due to the curse of a god. The curse is looked upon as a baneful substance, as a miasma which injures or destroys anybody to whom it cleaves. The curse of Moses was said to lie on mount Ebal, ready to descend with punishments whenever there was an occasion for it.[202] The Arabs, when being cursed, sometimes lay themselves down on the ground so that the curse, instead of hitting them, may fly over their bodies.[203] According to Teutonic notions, curses alight, settle, cling, they take flight, and turn home as birds to their nests.[204] It is the vulgar opinion in Ireland "that a curse once uttered must alight on something: it will float in the air seven years, and may descend any moment on the party it was aimed at; if his guardian angel but forsake him, it takes forthwith the shape of some misfortune, sickness or temptation, and strikes his devoted head."[205] We shall later on see that curses are communicated through material media. In some parts of Morocco, if a man is not powerful enough to avenge an infringement on his marriage-bed, he leaves seven tufts of hair on his head and goes to another tribe to ask for help. This is _l-[(]âr_, a conditional curse, which is first seated in the tufts, and {58} from there transferred to those whom he invokes. Similarly, a person under the vow of blood-revenge lets his hair grow until he has fulfilled his vow. The oath clings to his hair, and will fall upon his head if he violates it.[206] [Footnote 202: _Deuteronomy_, xi. 29.] [Footnote 203: Goldziher, _Abhandlungen zur arabischen Philologie_, i. 29. Wellhausen, _Reste arabischen Heidentums_, p. 139, n. 4.] [Footnote 204: Grimm, _op. cit._ iv. 1690.] [Footnote 205: _Ibid._ iii. 1227. Wood-Martin, _Traces of the Elder Faiths of Ireland_ ii, 57 _sq._] [Footnote 206: The same practice prevailed among the ancient Arabs (Wellhausen, _op. cit._ p. 122), and some other cases are recorded by Dr. Frazer (_op. cit._ i. 370 _sq._). I cannot accept Wellhausen's explanation (_op. cit._ p. 124) that the hair is allowed to grow for the purpose of being sacrificed when the vow is fulfilled.]