Pah - wraith The Pah - wraiths were non - corporeal beings , and enemies of the Bajoran Prophet s . Bajoran religious texts related that the Pah - wraiths once resided in the Celestial Temple alongside the Prophets . For reasons unknown , they were banished to the Fire Caves on Bajor . According to ancient Bajoran texts , they were " false Prophets " . The name " Kosst Amojan " was sometimes used to refer to them . The Pah - wraiths typically took the form of fire spirits ( from which they got their name ) . Other than that , they were virtually identical to the Prophets . They could induce visions in corporeal beings , appearing as familiar figures as the Prophets did in such visions . However , the Pah - wraiths in such visions acted smugly , whereas the Prophets displayed very little emotion . ( ) They were vulnerable to high levels of chroniton radiation . This was discovered in 2373 , when a Pah - wraith took over the body of Keiko O ' Brien and attempted to destroy the Prophets by firing a chroniton beam directly at the Bajoran wormhole , only to be foiled and destroyed by Keiko ' s husband , Miles O ' Brien . ( ) A year later , one of the Kosst Amojan took over the body of Jake Sisko in order to fulfill the ancient prophecy of " The Reckoning " . The entity was driven out after Kai Winn Adami flooded the station with chroniton radiation before the battle was completed . ( ) In the same year , Gul Dukat released a Pah - wraith from an ancient artifact , which then took over his body and used him to get to the Orb of Contemplation on board the space station Deep Space 9 . Jadzia Dax happened to be in the shrine at the time , and was fatally wounded by the Pah - wraith . The Pah - wraith was then released into the Orb , allowing it access to the wormhole and collapsing the entrance on the Alpha Quadrant side , starting a war between the Prophets and the Pah - wraith . ( ) In 2375 , Benjamin Sisko received vision s from the Pah - wraith , during his quest for the Orb of the Emissary , in an attempt to confuse him from what the Prophets wished him to do . It failed and Sisko opened the vessel containing that orb , reopening the Bajoran wormhole . ( ) The imprisonment and release of the Pah - wraiths was detailed in the " Book of the Kosst Amojan " and the legend of the " Kosst Amojan " . Followers of the teachings of the Pah - wraiths joined the Cult of the Pah - wraiths . Dukat posed as the Emissary of the Pah - wraiths in 2375 , on board the abandoned Cardassian space station Empok Nor . ( ) In the same year , Kai Winn received visions which she initially believed to be from the Prophets , only to learn that it had been the Pah - wraiths that had been communicating with her . ( ) Dukat , in disguise as Anjohl Tennan , then convinced her that the Pah - wraiths were the true Prophets , and that they had to be released from the Fire Caves . She agreed , and consulted the " Book of the Kosst Amojan " . ( ) Later that year , Sisko tried to stop the Pah - wraiths . However , they resurrected Dukat with near - omnipotent power . Dukat revealed the Pah - wraiths ' plans to Sisko : to spread from Bajor in all directions , burning the universe in their wake . In order to stop them , Sisko threw himself , Dukat , and the " Book of the Kosst Amojan " into a fire pit , sealing the Pah - wraiths forever in the Fire Caves . ( ) Appendices . Background information . According to the script for " The Assignment " , their name was pronounced as " PA - rayths " . " " The Pah - wraiths were originally conceived during the writing of the first season episode . In that episode , Sisko and Jake are supposed to visit the Fire Caves on Bajor , and there was a line in the original teleplay where Sisko is told jokingly to " " watch out for the Pagh - wraiths " . " The Pagh - wraiths were Robert Hewitt Wolfe ' s idea and were supposedly little goblin creatures that lived in the Fire Caves . This line was omitted from later drafts . While developing , René Echevarria was trying to come up with a concept that would tie into the " " mythology . He didn ' t want the being who possesses Keiko to simply be some random entity , but rather something that would fit into the overall scheme of the show . Unaware of Wolfe ' s original idea , he suggested that perhaps the aliens in the wormhole weren ' t all good , and that there were in fact some evil members of the race . Wolfe then proposed a revival of his Pagh - wraiths concept . ( " " , p . 389 ) The scripts consistently used the spelling " Pah - wraith " . However , Wolfe maintains that " Pah " is a misspelling , from my point of view . " " ( " " , p . 389 ) Ronald D . Moore has also commented that he believes that " pagh " was the correct spelling . " The Assignment " co - writer David Weddle counters , " " Not if it comes from Ancient Bajoran . The g ' s were added centuries later , when the seventh hemisphere became more influential . " " ( " " , p . 389 ) According to René Echevarria in the " " , the Kosst Amojan was not referred to as an individual . The term was always referred to using the article " the " , as in " the Kosst Amojan . " Thus , it may not be the proper name of an individual , rather the name of an object or the title of a group . Apocrypha . During the " " trilogy , the crew discovers the existence of a third group of Prophets , with this third group representing the alleged " True " Prophets who reside in an initially - inactive red wormhole while those in the blue wormhole represent a splinter faction who broke away to explore the possibility of a world outside their realm , the Pah - wraiths being those who were banished from both groups and now seek to reunite the Temples so that they can destroy everything that those responsible for their exile have created .