Spiritualism (beliefs)

Spiritualism is a metaphysical belief that the world is made up of at least two fundamental substances, matter and spirit. This very broad metaphysical distinction is further developed into many and various forms by the inclusion of details about what spiritual entities exist such as a soul, the afterlife, spirits of the dead, deities and mediums; as well as details about the nature of the relationship between spirit and matter. It may also refer to the philosophy, doctrine, or religion pertaining to a spiritual aspect of existence.[1]

It is also a term commonly used for various psychic or paranormal practices and beliefs recorded throughout humanity's history[2][3] and in a variety of cultures.[4][5]

Spiritualistic traditions appear deeply rooted in shamanism and perhaps are one of the oldest forms of religion. Mediumship is a modern form of shamanism and such ideas are very much like those developed by Edward Burnett Tylor in his theory of animism,[6] in which there are other parallel worlds to our own, though invisible to us and not accessible to us in our state. A psychic is to be one of the connecting links between these worlds. A psychic is defined as someone endowed with exceptional sensitivity to the occult dimension, who experiences visions and revelations. Some authors have stated only few individuals are said to have this capacity.[7]

Definition

Spiritualism is the belief that spirits are able to communicate with the living by agency of a medium. The earliest recorded use of the word is 1796[8] and it was used by the prominent 18th-century spiritualist Emanuel Swedenborg. The term "spiritualism" has come to have different meanings. A broad working definition of the term would include the multi-faceted belief in a vital principle within living beings, a supernatural or paranormal, divine, incorporeal being–force, spirit–anima animating bodies etc. Adherents of spiritualistic movements believe that the spirits of the dead survive mortal life, and that sentient beings from spiritual worlds can and do communicate with the living. Since ancient times, this has been an element in traditional indigenous religions.[9] In today's world, it is a growing phenomenon manifesting itself in traditional indigenous religiosity on all continents through non-aligned spiritualistic groups and many syncretistic movements and within elements of orthodox religions by which it is still seen as a challenge.[10]

Many reference works also use the term spiritism to mean the same thing as "spiritualism" but Spiritism is more accurately used to mean Kardecist spiritism. Central to adherents' faith is a belief that spirits of the dead communicate with the living usually through a medium.

The word also takes on specific alternative meanings in various differing fields of academia, see below.

Usage

Spiritualism is used in English to mean either;

Beliefs

Modern Spiritualism

"Modern Spiritualism",[13] or "Modern American Spiritualism"[14] is used to refer to an Anglo-American religious movement having its golden age between the 1840s and 1920s but which continues on to this day.

National Spiritualist Association of Churches, USA

The Nine Principles of the National Spiritualist Association of Churches, USA are;

  1. We believe in Infinite Intelligence.
  2. We believe that the phenomena of Nature, both physical and spiritual, are the expression of Infinite Intelligence.
  3. We affirm that a correct understanding of such expression and living in accordance therewith, constitute true religion.
  4. We affirm that the existence and personal identity of the individual continue after the change called death.
  5. We affirm that communication with the so-called dead is a fact, scientifically proven by the phenomena of Spiritualism.
  6. We believe that the highest morality is contained in the Golden Rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
  7. We affirm the moral responsibility of individuals, and that we make our own happiness or unhappiness as we obey or disobey Nature’s physical and spiritual laws.
  8. We affirm that the doorway to reformation is never closed against any soul here or hereafter.
  9. We affirm that the precepts of Prophecy and Healing are Divine attributes proven through Mediumship.

Christian Spiritualism

First Spiritual Temple, Boston, Massachusetts, albumen print, ca. 1885–1895

Spiritualism has been related to the practices of early Christianity[15][16] and has developed into an additional form of Christian Spiritualism, e.g. the still active First Spiritual Temple[17] in the USA founded in 1883 and the Greater World Christian Spiritualist League (later to become the Greater World Christian Spiritualist Association) in the UK which was founded in 1931.[18]

Foremost in the movement towards Christian Spiritualism in the United Kingdom was one of the leading pioneers in the spiritualism movement, medium and Reverend William Stainton Moses.[19] He was a member of the BNAS (British National Association of Spiritualists), vice-president of the Society for Psychic Research and launched the London Spiritualist Alliance which later became the College of Psychic Studies.[20]

Contemporary Christian Spiritualist denominations also include those within the American Spiritual Church Movement pioneered by Leafy Anderson,[21][22][23] such as the Metropolitan Spiritual Churches of Christ, founded in 1925,[24] Pentecostal Spiritual Assemblies of Christ Worldwide, founded in 1938, whose motto is "Pentecostal by Birth, Spiritual by Lifestyle, Apostolic by Experience, and Christian by Demand. A Spiritual Church... On a Spiritual Foundation... Walking in the Supernatural...,"[25] and Universal Hagar's Spiritual Church, founded in the 1920s.[26][27]

France Pre-1848

French spiritualism, better known as Spiritism; popular throughout France and Latin American countries.

Spiritualist beliefs are found from time to time in the early literature of the French "magnetists". As early as 1787 M. Tardy de Montravel wrote that in the trance the soul of the "somnambule" became freed from its body and was able to intercourse with other spirits. Dr G.P. Billot, and J. P. F. Deleuze and recorded discussing and documenting seances from the 1820s.[28]

Of the early French Spiritualist, Alphonse Cahagnet, publisher of spirit messages such as "Arcanes de la vie future devoiles" (1848), is one of its foremost cases. Familiar with the teachings of Swedenborg, and interest evoked by contemporary German clairvoyants, in Paris of his day Cahagnet stood almost alone belonging to no school. For the advent of Modern Spiritualism in America, Cahagnet would have found few readers but his documentation of his work with the medium Adele Maginot were at once amongst the most remarkable and the best-attested documents on which the early case for Spiritualism depended.[29]

Native American spiritualism

Representations of Native Americans images have played a significant role in nineteenth and twentieth century spiritualism[21][22][30] although in reality Natives and their tradition have suffered considerably under the influences of competing Christian churches .[31] Since 1970, there have been a number of individuals purporting to sell Native American spiritualism, sometimes called '"American Indian Spiritualism." The spread of these beliefs began with a number of literary hoaxes undertaken by non-Indians such as Carlos Castaneda and Jamake Highwater. Several Native Americans have also sought to exploit interest in Native American spiritualism, writing distortions of indigenous spiritual practices and knowledge for consumption in the mass market. This situation has been attacked by legitimate Indian scholars and by activists such as the American Indian Movement, Survival of American Indians and the late Gerald Wilkenson, head of the National Indian Youth Council.[32]

The Caribbean

Spiritualism in the Caribbean has taken different roads of expression based on its contact with other religious systems. In urban areas, for example, Spiritualists were highly literate and more apt to indulge the concepts of foreign authors. In the rural areas, however, illiteracy was widespread and practitioners held a diverse array of beliefs and practices.

In Cuba, for instance, two fundamental variants of espiritism exist:

La Mesa Blanca Spiritualism is the type of Espiritismo that made its way to US. The old line Eggungun form of service has not made much headway on the mainland. Séances, in Latino cultures, are called misas. Santería, more properly called La Regla Lucumi (as the Yoruba were called in Cuba) is famous for its magic based on a knowledge of spirits and how to interact with them.

South America

Definitions of spirit possession, channelling and mediumship within the Brazilian 'cultos' is recognised to correspond with what appears to be the majority view as described by ethnographers of spirit possession worldwide. There are a number of descriptions available concerning what happens when someone becomes possessed. Practises brought over by African slaves from West Africa,[33] Mixed with indigenous South American tradition to develop their own flavour. During the suppression of Culto Omoloco or Umbanda by the Roman Catholic Church a period of syncretism commenced that included the introduction of images of the saints present in the churches presenting a new look for repressors behind which the Africans worshipped their gods and ancestors.[34][35] This process of merger continued with the introduction of Kardecist spiritism[36] and includes spiritualists.[37]

Use of Spirit Entities
Afro Brazilian Origin Line/Tradition
Orixá Yoruba Candomblé Nagô
Vodun Dahomey Candomblé Jeje
Vodunsu, Encantado Europe, Middle East Mina
Caboclo Indigenous Amazonian Mina, healing & consultation
Animal Spirits Indigenous Amazonian Curing

From: 'Channellers, Cowries and Conversations with the Gods: explaining multiple divination methods in an Afro-Brazilian religious tradition'.[38]

In Puerto Rico, trance mediums feature in is spiritism[39] and in Cuba, syncretic spiritualistic practises similar to Santería are called Santerfa and enjoy an estimated five million Hispanic American followers.[40]

India

Spiritualism is also practised within India in both modern and ancient forms involving contacting the spirits, knowledge and wisdom of ancestors who are than worshiped for generations. Spirituality in general is looked as process of learning the secrets of the world beneath and outside to gain inner peace.[41][42] it is prevalent in both the North and the South,[43][44] and across caste divides by way of ritual, and exists in a variety of mediumship cults.[43][45]

In 'A Tale of goddesses, money, and other terribly wonderful things: spirit possession, commodity fetishism, and the narrative of capitalism in Rajasthan', anthropologist J.G. Snodgrass explores the use of spiritualism amongst Rajasthani performing communities arguing for an appreciation of the way religious forms, and particularly the use of spiritual possessions, represent a form of language.[46] Rajasthanis are possessed by a range of spiritual entities. Some of these are judged good and beneficial, some evil.[47]

Trance mediumship and channelling are also practised by the UN related new religious movement called, the Brahma Kumaris[48][49] who have their headquarters in the state.

Eastern Asia

Noted as early as 1850 by J. R. Logan in the Journal of the Indian Archipelago IV. 552 who illustrated the different forms of spiritualism which prevailed in Eastern Asia at that time". Henry Olcott of the Theosophical Society went to length to draw correlations between Eastern spiritualistic practises and Modern Spiritualism.[50]

China

Hsien-t'ien Tao sects claim to represent a way (Tao) that transcends and unites all other religions. Explicit syncretism is a noticeable feature of these groups who claim that their teachings aim to unify the "Three Religions" (Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism), the "Five Religions" or even the former three plus Christianity and Islam. Most Hsien-tien Tao groups rely heavily on spirit-writing as a means of communicating with "the Mother" as well as lower-ranking deities. Amongst practitioners, the T'zu-hui Tang differ from the other Hsien-t'ien Tao sects, which were all originally based on the Chinese mainland, in that it originated in Taiwan in post-World War II years. It was founded in 1949, when the "Golden Mother of the Jasper Pool" revealed herself through a medium in the northeastern Taiwanese city of Hualien. The cults influence reaches to Malaysia.[51]

Mesmerism, Planchette, and Spiritualism have also been noted in China, soon after the start of spiritualism in the West.[52]

Japan

in Japan, spirit mediums are called Reibai. Although the primary religion of Japan, Shintoism is essentially animistic, relating to Kami, or spirits, psychical research typical of the West was introduced to Japan by Wasaburou Asano (1874–1937). Wasaburou established the Society for Spiritual Science Research in Japan and is recognized as creating modern Japanese Spiritualism. His successor Takeo Waki further developing the movement. Later Hiroyoshi Kuwahara created Neo Spiritualism which combined Japanese Spiritualism with the content of British spirit messages.[53]

Japan Psychic Science Association (JPSA) was started in December 1946 promotes spiritualism and conducts psychical research. It provides members with the opportunities for psychic readings and healings and promotes scientific research by a team of scientists and engineers.

Recently widespread popular interest was inspired by Hiroyuki Ehara, a self-professed spiritual counselor who hosts a weekly television show Aura no Izumi where he looks into celebrities' past lives and reads their "auras". Spiritual reading are known as Seishin Touitshuka. Other notable spiritualists include, Fukurai Tomokichi (1869–1952) Japanese pioneer of parapsychology, Mifune Chizuko (1886–1911), a clairvoyant. Mita Koichi (1885–1943), a psychic and Deguchi Onisaburo (1871–1948) Leader of Ohmoto, a Japanese Shinto sect who practised channelling known as Chinkon-kijin.[54] Japan also has its own traditional form or table turning or ouija called kokkuri and[55] spirits beings are called yokai in its folklore.[56]

Other Japanese religious leaders claiming to channel spirits include Ryuho Okawa of the Japanese new religious movement Kofuku-no-Kagaku, or Happy Science, who claims to channeled the spirits of Muhammad, Christ, Buddha, and Confucius.

Pacific islands

In Samoa, Java, Tonga etc. distinctions are made between god-like and spirit-like beings, with gods representing the moral order and spirits dealing with periphery issues, both through channelling, mediumship and possession. Authors note the susceptibility of missionaries in Samoa to local spirits, remembering that spirits were a significant feature of the Victorian milieu through the revival of Spiritualism.[57]

In Micronesia, recently deceased kin often appear as spirit visitors and possess female relatives in order to provide comfort and guidance. Identically to Anglo-American practises, they deliver important messages from beyond the grave. These spirits are fully sentient beings who retain social and emotional ties with their earthly homes and families. They occupy a liminal space between this world and the afterlife.[58]

During this liminal period, spirits must learn how to "be dead", while the living struggle to reconcile themselves to the corporeal death and new spiritual life of the departed. Spirit possession and other forms of spirit communication, including the popular use of ouija boards, help to facilitate the process of "becoming dead" on both sides of the cosmological divide. Spiritualistic practices play an important role in helping individuals to understand death as a journey when it is also marked by social rupture and the problems of grief and attachment.[59]

The Antipodes

In Australia, Aborigine tribes in Victoria called spirits Mrarts, understood to be the souls of "Black Fellows dead and gone", not demons unattached.[60] The mediums, now very scarce, are Birraarks who were consulted as to matters present and future, whose practises include the 'spirit-rapping' known to the Modern Spiritualists and whistles, heard in certain Brazilian séances. The Māoris' specialty was 'trance utterance', the Tohungas being mediums.[61][62]

Africa

West-African Kongol and Bantu tradition is generally referred to as Vodun (or anglicised to Voodoo). Spirit mediumship and spirit possession are fairly common practices in Sub-Saharan Africa, both in traditional religions and in Christian contexts. As is the norm, the term spiritualism and spiritism are used generally and interchangeably to describe indigenous spiritualistic practises.[63] Spiritism, spiritualism,[64] and spiritual churches have been established in Ghana[65] and Nigeria. Following similar trends of the syncretism of traditional spirit worship and Christianity,[66][67] they pervade everyday life to the top of society where they play a part in politic elections, ritualizing to help politicians win elections and interpreting events in prophetic terms[64] and are used in healing.[68]

Kubandwa is a spirit possession cult spread all over the Great Lakes region of Africa (Rwanda, Burundi, north-western Tanzania, Uganda, Eastern Congo)[69] past women have played an important role in kubandwa, both as mediums and spirits.[70] Tromba mediumship features in Madagascar.[71]

Islam

Spiritualism is practised but not condoned in Islamic societies. The Sufi sect of Dervishes are referred to as "Eastern Spiritualists".[72] Likewise, the Zār cult of North Africa (Sudan, Egypt) and the Middle East (Iran).[73]

Spiritualistic activities

The phenomena of Spiritualism consist of; prophecy, clairvoyance, clairaudience, gift of tongues, laying on of hands, healing, visions, trance, apports, revelations, raps, levitation, automatic and independent writing and painting, photography, materialization, psychometry, direct and independent voice, and any other manifestation lending support to the continuity of life after death.[74]

Such universal practises and the giving of spiritual guidance, the different manifestations of spiritualistic activities were categorised by Sir William Crookes, a highly distinguished British physicist and chemist, as being:

Gender balance

Women have historically had a fairly constant interest in the spirit world. Spiritualism's current popularity in the West is a result of women having more power and visibility, giving the spirit world a prominence in society that it previously had only during spiritualism's "boom" periods when men became interested.[75]

Historically, the majority of mediums for tromba spirits amongst the Sakalava have also been adult women, usually in their forties or older and is likewise associated with female status.[71] In general, a Sakalava ritual in which the spirits must be fed, cannot be performed if the two are not present and represented.

Notable individuals

Swedenborg

A Swedish scientist, philosopher, politician and theologian. Widely recognized as the "Father of Modern Spiritualism" but practicing before the movement started. A clairvoyant medium who used his spiritualist gifts for the royalty of Sweden.

Allan Kardec

Developed the 19th-century spiritualist philosophical doctrine of Spiritism, popular in Francophone and Latin nations.

Edward Burnett Tylor

Anthropologist, introduced the term animism.

Joseph Campbell

American 20th-century mythology professor and author best known for his work in the fields of comparative religion.

Carl Jung

Carl Jung's doctoral dissertation was not medical research but the investigation of a medium, his maternal cousin, Hélène Preiswerk.[76] The spiritualist narrative in Jung's personal life reached a climax in 1916 when he became convinced that his house was crammed with spirits. He practised a typically mediumistic activity of ‘spirit-directed' writing.[77]

See also

References

  1. ↑ , Spiritualism in Answers.com, retrieved February 14, 2008.
  2. ↑ Conan Doyle, Sir Arthur (1926). The History of Spiritualism. There has, however, been no time in the recorded history of the world when we do not find traces of preternatural interference and a tardy recognition of them from humanity.
  3. ↑ "Spiritualism, Pathway of Light; Ancient and Modern Spiritualism". National Spiritualist Association of Churches. Archived from the original on 2008-02-01. Retrieved 2008-02-11. Ancient and Modern Spiritualism; so often in a lecture or a book, we hear the term "Modern American Spiritualism". Why Modern? It is Modern Spiritualism to distinguish it from the ancient form of Spiritualism, for spiritual manifestations and communications between the physical world and the spiritual world have been evident and recorded by all civilizations. In fact, every religion that has ever been, has registered Spirit manifestations. Most all of the great spiritual leaders conversed or communicated with spirits although they were called other names, such as devas, pitris, gods, ancestral spirits, ghosts and magic.
  4. ↑ Kucich, John J. (2004). Ghostly Communion: Cross-Cultural Spiritualism in Nineteenth-Century American Literature. Hanover: University Press of New England. ISBN 1-58465-432-5.
  5. ↑ Lang, Andrew (1995). Myth Ritual & Religion. Senate, London. ISBN 1-85958-182-X.
  6. ↑ Stocking, Jr., George W. (1971). "Animism in Theory and Practice: E. B. Tylor's Unpublished 'Notes on "Spiritualism"". Man, New Series. 6 (1): 88–104. doi:10.2307/2798430.
  7. ↑ Brockway, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Religion, Robert W. (2007). "The Roots of New Age: Esotericism and the Occult in the Western World". Brandon University, Brandon, Manitoba, Canada: 120. Spiritualistic traditions are deeply rooted in shamanism, and, as such, are perhaps the oldest forms of religion. The medium is the modern urban shaman. In the séance she enters into a deep trance. While she is in that state, a control from "the other side" takes possession of her vocal cords and sense organs. The control is also a medium, a departed spirit who has capacities analogous to those of the psychic. Those who have "passed over" are thought to be still embodied, but their bodies are much more subtle than ours, though not perfect. Some occultists speak of the "beyond" as the "astral plane" inhabited by "astral bodies." This idea is very much like that discussed by the nineteenth-century ethnologist E. B. Tylor in his theory of animism. There is another world parallel to our own, though invisible to us and not accessible to us in our state. However, all forms of organic life as well as inorganic matter is eternal and is translated from one sphere of reality to the other. The connecting link is the medium, the person endowed with exceptional sensitivity to the hidden or occult dimension, who experiences visions and revelations.
  8. ↑ spiritualism – Definition from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
  9. ↑ Lawrence, Edward (2003) [1921]. Spiritualism Among Civilized and Savage Races. Kessinger Publishing. ISBN 0-7661-5005-4. What spiritualism is — The belief that beyond the present natural, visible, material universe there exists another world — real, but invisible; of a super-natural character; a sort of spiritual replica of the present, inhabited by the disembodies souls of men — is not only the most primitive concept of the human race, but the most far-reaching dogma, ethically and religiously, ever enunciated by man. It is a belief that meets us in every stage of the culture, and forms the foundation upon which the varied creeds of savage and civilised races have been reared. Under its modern name, Spiritualism, or Spiritism, we are assured by its exponents that this spirit world can be scientifically attested, and that there exists no longer any satisfactory reason to doubt its truth. As we shall see, such manifestations are not restricted to the seances held by modern Spiritualist but form the common procedure among barbaric and civilised peoples alike. Intelligent intercourse between these embodied or disembodied spirits is asserted to be possible by means of specially endowed persons called mediums.
  10. ↑ Wulfhorst, Ingo (2006). Spirits, Ancestors and Healing: A Global Challenge to the Church. Geneva, The Lutheran World Federation. ISBN 3-905676-49-4.
  11. ↑ Engel Pascal, Psychology and Metaphysics from Maine de Biran to Bergson Pascal Engel Université Paris Sorbonne
  12. ↑ Tempest, Gerard (1991). Gerard Tempest: Abstract spiritualism. Bergen Museum. p. 71. ISBN 1-880456-00-1.
  13. ↑ Podmore, Frank (1903). "Modern Spiritualism. A History and a Criticism". The American Journal of Psychology. The American Journal of Psychology, Vol. 14, No. 1. 14 (1): 116–117. JSTOR 1412224. doi:10.2307/1412224.
  14. ↑ Britten, Emma Hardinge. (1870). Modern American Spiritualism. New York,.
  15. ↑ Crowell, Eugene (1875). The Identity of Primitive Christianity and Modern Spiritualism. New York,.
  16. ↑ Hyslop, Prof. James (1906). The Borderland of Psychical Research. G. P. Putnam's Sons. The fact is that Christianity probably originated in psychic phenomena. The Gospels are certainly full of references to events which we should to-day classify as psychic, or claiming to be psychic phenomena of importance
  17. ↑ "The First Spiritual Temple". The First Spiritual Temple. Retrieved 2008-01-19. The First Spiritual Temple is an independent Christian Spiritualist Church, founded by Marcellus Seth Ayer on June 28, 1883. Spiritualism is the process whereby all religions came into being as a result of communication with God and God's Kingdom of Spirit. Our Spiritualism is both universal and ancient. We seek to understand the many and varied aspects of Spiritualism which have existed upon our planet from the moment we stepped into physical form. We are Christian Spiritualists in that we look to the Master Jesus as a most profound example of Spirit alive in the world. We embrace his teachings and accept his challenge to do even greater things than he.
  18. ↑ "Greater World Christian Spiritualist Association". Greater World Christian Spiritualist Association. Retrieved 2008-01-19. The Greater World Christian Spiritualist League (later to become the Greater World Christian Spiritualist Association) was founded on 30 May 1931. It is an organisation of the Christ Mission to the four corners of the earth. The inspiration for this movement, which resulted in Winifred Moyes dedicating her life to the work of the Greater World, came through her guide Zodiac, who was a teacher in the temple at the time of our Lord.
  19. ↑ Schofield, A. T.. Modern Spiritism: Its Science and Religion
  20. ↑ F. W. H. Myers, 'The Experiences of W. Stainton Moses – II', PSPR, 11 (1895)
  21. 1 2 Jason Berry (1995). The Spirit of Blackhawk: a Mystery of Africans and Indians. University Press of Mississippi.
  22. 1 2 Jacobs, Claude F.; Kaslow, Andrew J. (1991). The Spiritual Churches of New Orleans Origins, Beliefs, and Rituals of an African-American Religion. The University of Tennessee Press. ISBN 1-57233-148-8.
  23. ↑ Smith, Michael (1992). Spirit World: Pattern in the Expressive Folk Culture of New Orleans. Pelican Publishing. ISBN 978-0-88289-895-7.
  24. ↑ "Metropolitan Spiritual Churches of Christ". Retrieved 2011-05-15.
  25. ↑ "Pentecostal Spiritual Assemblies of Christ Worldwide". Retrieved 2011-05-15.
  26. ↑ "Universal Hagar's Spiritual Church". Retrieved 2011-05-15.
  27. ↑ Baer, Hans A. (1984). The Black Spiritual Movement: A Religious Response to Racism. University of Tennessee Press.
  28. ↑ Billot, G. P.. Recherches psychologiques sur la cause des phénomènes extraordinaires observés chez les modernes voyans, improprement dits somnambules magnétiques, ou correspondance sur le Magnétisme vital, entre un solitaire et M. Deleuze (2 vols.) . Paris, 1839.
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  30. ↑ Aldred, Lisa (1903). "Plastic Shamans and Astroturf Sun Dances: New Age Commercialization of Native American Spirituality". The American Indian Quarterly. 24 (3): 329–352. doi:10.1353/aiq.2000.0001.
  31. ↑ Dombrowski, Kirk (2001). Against culture: development, politics, and religion in Indian Alaska. Lincoln: Univ. Nebraska Press. p. 247. ISBN 0-8032-1719-6. The fact is that Christianity probably originated in psychic phenomena. The Gospels are certainly full of references to events which we should to-day classify as psychic, or claiming to be psychic phenomena of importance
  32. ↑ Churchill, Ward (1981). Fantasies of the Master Race: Literature, Cinema and the Colonization of American Indians. Common Courage Press 1992. ISBN 0-9628838-7-5.
  33. ↑ The Voduns of Maranhão: Maria AP Barretto, San Luis, Fund. Cultural of Maranhao, 1977.
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  39. ↑ Michtom, M. (1975). Becoming a Medium: The Role of Trance in Puerto Rican Spiritism. New York University.
  40. ↑ González-wippler, M. (1999). Santería: The Religion (World Religion & Magic). Llewellyn Publications,U.S. pp. 44–50. ISBN 1-56718-329-8. Santerfa can be traced to a similar belief among the Yoruba. In Nigeria, the spirits of the ancestors are believed to take possession of the living. ... he eggun are the spirits of one's ancestors. In Santerfa they include not only the spirits of relatives. Macumba, Spiritism, and Candomble combined ecstatic African traditions with European Spiritualism.
  41. ↑ Wood, Earnest (1999). The Occultism and Spiritualism of the Hindus : Practical Guidance on Raja Yoga, Hath Yoga, Concentration, Meditation and 'Spiritualism'. Delhi, Pilgrims Publishing. p. 202. ISBN 81-7341-105-0.
  42. ↑ Leavitt, J.; Leavitt, J.H. (1997). Poetry and Prophecy: The Anthropology of Inspiration. University of Michigan Press. p. 62. ISBN 0-472-10688-0.
  43. 1 2 Nuckolls, C.W. (1991). "Becoming a Possession-Medium in South India: A Psychocultural Account". Medical Anthropology Quarterly. 5 (1): 63–77. JSTOR 648961. doi:10.1525/maq.1991.5.1.02a00090.
  44. ↑ Carrin, M.; Tambs-lyche, H. (2003). "'You don't joke with these fellows.'Power and ritual in South Canara, India". Social Anthropology. 11 (1): 23–42. doi:10.1017/S0964028203000028. Retrieved 2008-01-27.
  45. ↑ Claus, P.J. (1979). "Spirit possession and spirit mediumship from the perspective of Tulu oral traditions" (PDF). Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry. 3 (1): 29–52. doi:10.1007/BF00114691. Retrieved 2008-01-27.
  46. ↑ Snodgrass, J.G. (2002). "A tale of goddesses, money, and other terribly wonderful things: spirit possession, commodity fetishism, and the narrative of capitalism in Rajasthan, India". American Ethnologist. 29 (3): 602–636. doi:10.1525/ae.2002.29.3.602.
  47. ↑ Jeffrey, G. (2002). "Imitation Is Far More Than the Sincerest of Flattery: The Mimetic Power of Spirit Possession in Rajasthan, India". Cultural Anthropology. 17: 32–64. doi:10.1525/can.2002.17.1.32. Rajasthanis are possessed by a range of spiritual entities. Some of these are judged good and beneficial: spirits of murdered royalty, a god of the underworld referred to as Bhaironji, and deceased Muslims saints. Others are regarded as evil and malevolent, perpetual debtors who die perpetual debtors, stillborn babies whose mounts (ghorala, related to the Hindu term for horse) open and close their mouths in a sucking motion like a breast-feeding child, deceased widows (considered sexually voracious or "hungry" entities who lust after the bodies of newlyweds), and foreign tourists (particularly those who have committed suicide far from home and wander the grounds of Rajasthan's palace hotels). Possession by a spirit, even by those who are considered good, is typically construed as undesirable.
  48. ↑ Klimo, Jon (1998). Channeling: Investigations on Receiving Information from Paranormal Sources. North Atlantic Books. p. 100. ISBN 978-1-55643-248-4.
  49. ↑ Wilson, Bryan (1999). Bryan Wilson, ed. New Religious Movements: Challenge and Response. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-20049-3.
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  59. ↑ Dernbach, K.B. (2005). "Spirits of the hereafter: death, funerary possession, and the afterlife in Chuuk, Micronesia" ( – Scholar search). Ethnology. Ethnology, Vol. 44, No. 2. 44 (2): 99–123. JSTOR 3773992. doi:10.2307/3773992. Retrieved 2008-01-27.
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  61. ↑ Best, E. (1954). Spiritual and Mental Concepts of the Maori. RE Owen, Govt. printer. ISBN 0-477-01326-0.
  62. ↑ Ellwood, R.S. (1993). Islands of the Dawn: The Story of Alternative Spirituality in New Zealand. University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8248-1487-8.
  63. ↑ Wynn, W.C. (1943). An Examination of the Sociological Aspects of African Spiritism.
  64. 1 2 "Aliu Mahama, Superstition, and Elections". The Statesman, Ghana. 17 July 2007. The influence of superstition, which can come in the form of all sorts of dabbling in native spiritualism, on politics reflects how deep superstition has penetrated the Ghanaian society and its progress. The influence of superstition on politics also reveal how skeptically weak is the Ghanaian intelligentsia. It also shows a society which elites cannot extricate itself from the irrational, and sometimes at the mercy of prophets, juju-marabou mediums, Malams, and other spiritualists. Such superstitious practices need not be during general elections, it is part-and-parcel of the political elites. All these demonstrate the influence of the Ghanaian culture on politics. In Ghana politics and culture are inseparable, especially the influence of the spiritual aspects of the culture, negative or positive, on politics.
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  67. ↑ Kalu, O.U. (1995). "The Dilemma of Grassroot Inculturation of the Gospel: A Case Study of a Modern Controversy in Igboland, 1983–1989". Journal of Religion in Africa. Journal of Religion in Africa, Vol. 25, No. 1. 25 (1): 48–72. JSTOR 1581138. doi:10.2307/1581138.
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  74. ↑ "Spiritualism, Pathway of Light; Ancient and Modern Spiritualism". National Spiritualist Association of Churches. Archived from the original on 2008-02-01. Retrieved 2008-02-11. The phenomena of Spiritualism consists of prophecy, clairvoyance, clairaudience, gift of tongues, laying on of hands, healing, visions, trance, apports, revelations, raps, levitation, automatic and independent writing and painting, photography, materialization, psychometry, direct and independent voice, and any other manifestation which proves the continuity of life..
  75. ↑ Scheitle, Christopher P. (2004–2005). "BRINGING OUT THE DEAD: GENDER AND HISTORICAL CYCLES OF SPIRITUALISM". The Journal of Death and Dying. 50 (3): 237–253. doi:10.2190/KF90-QELU-FVTH-1R4U.
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