Touch Wood

To touch wood or knock on wood is a superstition action to ward off any evil consequences or bad luck, perhaps because of some recent action you’ve taken or untimely boasting about your good fortune (“I’ve never been in danger of drowning, touch wood”); it can also be a charm to bring good luck. The origins of the belief can be traced to pagan times when wood spirits were believed to dwell in trees. The Christian root of this practice comes from the fact that Christ was crucified on a wooden cross. Some writers have pointed to pre-Christian rituals involving the spirits of sacred trees such as the oak, ash, holly or hawthorn. There is, I’m told, an old Irish belief that you should knock on wood to let the little people know that you are thanking them for a bit of good luck. There’s also a belief that the knocking sound prevents the Devil from hearing your unwise comments. Others have sought a meaning in which the wood symbolises the timber of the cross, but this may be a Christianisation of an older ritual. It wasn’t always wood that was lucky: in older days, iron was also thought to have magical properties, and to touch iron was an equivalent preventative against ill-fortune. The children's game of tag in which you are only safe so long as you are touching wood is not likely to be connected (an indicator of this may be that at times iron was substituted for wood if there was no wood handy). The phrase itself is relatively modern, as the oldest citation for the British version of the phrase, touch wood, that I can find dates only from 1899. The American equivalent knock on wood is roughly contemporary, with my first example from 1905.

i think your wish come true then we say " touch wood ".

The saying exists also in Spanish: "Toco madera sin patas" (I touch wood without legs). Touching a wooden table or chair would be of no use against bad luck.

its something about the relationships...

I never heard "touch wood", I have heard "knock on wood". That is a superstitios thing to not have that thing happen to you.

To touch wood or knock on wood is a superstition action to ward off any evil consequences or bad luck, perhaps because of some recent action you’ve taken or untimely boasting about your good fortune (“I’ve never been in danger of drowning, touch wood”); it can also be a charm to bring good luck.

I'm not sure... Here in Italy we say "touch iron"... So who knows... LOL!