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Lost Powers Lost Powers 962B :? 2 D@D2==I 5:776B6?D G2I K925 82:?65 >I Jivaro Indian tribe in the upper Amazon basin, enlightenment, the shaman’s light of brain and reported his own dramatic experience during a body...” trance in much the same terms as the Indians In modern Western societies, most All the shaman’s power’s apparently themselves: people consider those claiming to depend on his ability to enter a state of trance in “I found myself, although awake, in a have psychic powers as oddities. But which, according to shamanic beliefs, his soul is G@B=5 =:D6B2==I 36I@?5 >I G:=56CD 5B62>C K>6D bird-headed people, as well as dragonlike separated from his body. This trance may be in ancient times, the early induced in a variety of ways. In some societies, creatures who explained that they were the true equivalents of today’s mediums, the shaman fasts and mortifies his flesh in a gods of this world. I enlisted the services of channelers, or diviners were not hermit-like solitude until the necessary visions other spirit helpers in attempting to fly through viewed as freaks on the fringes of appear or spirit voices speak. More often, there the far reaches of the galaxy.” But the psychic flight does not always society. They were important public is a public ritual with insistent drumming and entail a vision of the spirit world, It may include rhythmic dancing. The suggestive power of the figures. This remains true today in music and dance is sufficient to put the shaman a journey to another part of our own planet. those parts of the world where tribal in a trance state. In South America particularly, Among the Jivaro Indians, shamans are societies have survived relatively the shaman and other tribesmen may consume frequently asked to see what a person is doing at some distant location - to check, for example, various hallucinogenic plants or drinks. intact. When in a trance, some shamans whether a woman is being faithful in the experience possession and speak with the voices absence of her partner. Or the shaman may be From the Tungus and Innuits of the Arctic to the of spirits - a practice very similar to that of asked to summon up the vision of a crime that Jivaro of the Amazon basin, tribal peoples have spiritualist mediums. But most shamans simply has been committed, in order to identify the traditionally depended on their shamans, or provide a running commentary on what they perpetrators as effectively as a video camera medicine men, to cure them of monitoring the scene. Of illness and to supply many course, it is extremely difficult other vital services, both to substantiate such claims but practical and spiritual - from in 1946 anthropologist Tomas controlling weather conditions Roessner produced intriguing to communing with the spirit evidence for the validity of world. shamanic visions. His claims The shaman, usually a were based on his experiences male, may be chosen by living among Indian heredity, succeeding his father tribesmen in the remote in the role, or he may be Ucayali River region of marked at an early age by his eastern Peru. The Indians, unusual behavior - having who had not contact with visions of spirits or gods, modern civilization, claimed developing a taste for solitude, to be in the habit of making and wondering off alone into spirit voyages to view distant the forests or mountains for cities. According to Roessner, weeks on end, or becoming “Indians have asked white chronically absentminded and men what those strange things talking or singing to himself are that run so swiftly along all day. the street: they had seen automobiles which, of course, Chosen by the gods they were not acquainted But whether born to be a with.” shaman or, as shamanic belief would have it, chosen by Tribal responsibilities spirits or gods, the would-be The perceived practical value shaman generally must go of the shaman to his tribe is through a dramatic crisis of manifold. He is responsible initiation before he can adopt for controlling the weather, the role. In some cases, he may begin to see witness and undergo during their psychic identifying the location of game, and visions, working up to a climax in which he has voyage. interceding with the spirits to guarantee good convulsive fits and falls into a long period of un hunting. He foretells the future and locates consciousness. While the initiate is in this Superhuman shaman valuable objects that have been lost. His central deathlike state, apparently induced by the power Shamans believe that, during a trance, their function however, is to cure the sick. In the of suggestion, he experiences a horrific dream souls are separated from their bodies. This shamanic view of the worls, illness is the result or vision. This ordeal prepares him for habitual permits them to fly through the air at will, both of an evil object entering the body or ot the soul contact with the spirit world. In some cases, he across earthly distances and through the of the patient being stolen. The shaman can may witness his own death at the hands of supernatural spaces of heaven and hell.They can embark on a psychic voyage to find the stolen devils. One shamanic initiate recorded that, in capture souls and steal or return them to their soul and return it to its rightful owner, or he can his vision, devils sliced off his head and then put owners.They may communicate with spirits and suck the evil object out of the sick person’s it to one side so that he could watch while they with the souls of the dead. They may be capable body. dismembered the remainder of his body. of becoming invisible or of disguising themselves as animals - usually the jaguar in Continued on Page 15 Changed perception South America. They can perceive events far off When the chosen young man recovers in time and space, and can kill an enemy from a consciousness following his visionary ordeal, distance. And they are impervious to both fire "0- B&C (65- ),16 "$A!06= he will have the exceptional spiritual powers and pain. with Rob McConnell necessary to act as a shaman. In the 1930’s one There is no question that shamans do www.xzoneradiotv.com Innuit shaman told the Danish Arctic explorer experience visions and the illusions of flight. In or listen to our podcasts Knud Rasmussen what it was like to have 1961 anthropologist Michael J Harner, who was attained the magical status: “I could see and initiated into the shamanic practices of the www.xzonepodcast.com