The last Carpathian magician

That’s what molfar (sorcerer) Mykhailo Nechay, whom we visited whilst travelling in the Carpathians, calls himself. He can cure people and control nature

By Antonina Maley
Photos by the author

What does «molfar» mean? Are you a wizard?

Molfar is a cunning man and a sorcerer, a wizard. This word derives from «molfa» – an object, charmed for good or evil. A molfar knows the connection between nature and humans. In olden times, competition between molfars was great, sometimes they even killed each other. My sworn brothers have died and now I am the last molfar. And those psychics, who claim to be magicians waving their hands, are all liars. They do not have the healing power. A real magician can cure and kill with a word. The word is the most powerful and dangerous weapon. What a molfar says will come true.

Why are there no more molfars?

Because I do not teach them. And I don’t because they love money more than people now. But it must be the other way round. I do not charge people – I’ll take what people give for my work. If they don’t, God will provide. When a person is poor and not burdened by wealth or popularity, then this person has a strong word. I have a strong word from Mother-Nature and can control it.

What can you do?

I can make the sun shine on a rainy day or the other way round. When a hail cloud comes to the village with thunder, lightning and howling wind, which can destroy the harvest, I send this cloud to the forest and rocky places and won’t allow a single hailstone to fall down on the fields. I drive evil spirits out of people, cattle and houses. Nature listens to my word and I listen to nature. I am a master of hermetic medicine – it is a science that preserves the biography of every plant and methods of collecting herbs. Some herbs are toxic. By the way, if you want to live without wrinkles till the age of 80, here’s what you have to do: find some Lady’s Mantle. This plant grows alongside village lanes. It collects morning dew on its leaves. If you collect that morning dew before dawn and wash your face, your skin will remain young till old age. We grow older because our cells are dying, and where there are such gaps, soon wrinkles will appear. And this morning dew regenerates the cells and rejuvenates the skin. We all are a part of nature, it treats us both gently as a mother and strictly as a prosecutor. If we suffer from some disease, it’s a punishment, we must have broken the laws of nature. I treat people not only with words, but also with music, playing the drymba (jaw harp). Sonic vibrations are cosmic vibrations, they influence the subconscious and treat the nervous system. But a person can cure himself or herself. All it takes is to believe. No matter what illness you suffer from, but if every day you keep believing that you are getting better, that’s what’s going to happen in the end. Thoughts can be materialized.

Who taught you all this?

My grandmother was a molfar. Though I was born in the Carpathians, my family comes from Zaporizhzhia region. One of my ancestors was the legendary Cossack, Colonel Danylo Nechay, who understood the occult and was practiced in folk medicine and magic. He was very bellicose, and people were afraid of him. By the way, Sirko and Vyshnevetsky (Cossack military leaders) are my ancestors too. Those were people who could work miracles. God gave me unique powers. At the age of seven I could already stop others from bleeding.
Once my friend and I were shepherding. The sun was blazing down, we could not find shade. The boy had  sunstroke and his nose started bleeding. They tried all kinds of remedies – water, cold and salt – nothing helped. His nose was terribly swollen, so I touched it with my fingers and at that very moment not a drop more of his blood fell. But I did not pay attention to that, because I was little. But some ten years later I went to the forest to cut wood with a man from the village. He cut himself and severed a vein, the blood was gushing forth. I decided to try again and touched his wound. At that very moment the blood congealed. But I only began to understand the whole sense of my gifts after my military service.

Do molfars serve in the army?

Of course! I had a difficult life. From 1941 through 1942 we were blockaded by the Germans. They starved us. My grandmother starved to death, and I had to eat grass and drink water to survive, but Mother-Nature did not let me perish. After my dad had to join the Soviet Army, people started saying he had done so voluntarily and threatened to burn our house and to hang us. My Mom and my younger brother had to sleep in a different house every night, and I slept in the snow in the forest when it was -25°C. I had to do that the whole winter. I was so exhausted and starved that I could not walk, I could only crawl on my knees. Afterwards I fell ill with typhoid. I was declared clinically dead twice. I can tell you what it was like: it was an endless ocean of people’s terror, when the physical world is transformed into a spiritual one. Those were some of the sorrows and troubles I had to go through, and I have never been happy and will never be. I give happiness to other people. But I accumulate so much negative energy during a year, that I actually can feel this burden. And I have to clean myself from this negative burden, given to me by people, who come with their sorrows and weaknesses to me.
Once a year, in the hottest season, I go into a deep cave, where I seal myself off from the outside air and light. I stay there for 12 days like a baby inside a placenta. But it takes years of training to be able to undergo such purification. If somebody followed me to that cave, he or she would probably die there.

Do you have children? Can you pass your knowledge to them?

Two sons, one died. Under the Soviet Union he served in Rostov-on-Don in the missile troops, where he was exposed to radiation. I, a cunning man, fought that terrible disease for 18 years. But when the Chernobyl catastrophe took place, I could not save my son. They took him to Kyiv, to the Oncology Research Institute, where he died after an operation. And my other son is alive, I have grandchildren and great-grandchildren – I am already 78. They must have been granted some talent – they are studying medicine at University. But I am not going to pass my knowledge on to them either. But I ask God to give me a disciple to whom I could pass on all I know. And I have so much power that when it is time for me to die, there will be great storms here which will tear the roofs from the houses.