In a fascinating story related by Rav Elchanan Wasserman, Rav Eliyahu, a disciple of the Chofetz Chaim, was instrumental in exorcising a dybbuk (clinging spirit) from a young girl. Her father had brought the 14-year-old to Radin when she had taken ill shortly after a horse had died in the barn.

Upon returning from the barn, the girl, who had been sweating profusely, drank some cold water from an open vessel. Soon afterwards she began convulsing and fell to the floor in a dead faint. When she came to, she couldn’t recall what had happened to her.

Following repeated incidents of this nature, she suddenly began to speak in a strange voice, saying that she was the soul of a daughter of elderly parents who had converted to Christianity when she was 12. The family had later moved to another town, where the Jewish children taunted her. In her rage, she strangled two Jewish children.

At the age of seventeen she died and was condemned by the Heavenly court to a 15-year reincarnation. At first her soul entered a cross that was erected on her grave, but when it was crushed it migrated to a nearby tree. When the tree was cut, her soul entered a stone that happened to be in the stall where the horse was kept. The horse had stepped on the stone and fallen lifeless. The soul then infiltrated the vessel of water that the girl drank from.

The father asked the soul why she had possessed his daughter. The voice answered that his daughter had sinned when she drank the water without making a blessing. Had she made a bracha, the soul would have been unable to overtake her.

The Chofetz Chaim asked a group of rabbanim, including Rav Elchanan and Rav Eliyahu, to see the girl. The soul informed Rav Eliyahu Dushnitzer that it was ceaselessly tormented by demons – except for when it entered an object, which offered her a respite. She was asked whether she was aware of whom the Chofetz Chaim was and she answered that she knew he was a great Tanna. Upon further interrogation, she conceded that if he were to tell her to leave, she would go and would not return – provided two rabbanim would say Kaddish for her soul for one week’s duration.

The soul was instructed to leave the girl’s body through her small finger. The four people who witnessed the phenomenon related that the girl’s hand swelled, and the sound of shattering glass was heard as the dybbuk left.

The father took his daughter home and the Chofetz Chaim arranged for Kaddish to be said, in addition to instituting the learning of Mishnayos for the soul.