Spiritist Knowledge

Jorge Rizzini (1924-2008). The different varieties of mediums rest upon special faculties whose principle are still unknown to us. At first sight and to those who haven't made a systematic study of this science yet, it seems easier for a medium to write prose than verses. One would say - mainly if one deals with a mechanical medium - a spirit can both make the medium write in a foreign language and make him sketch or write music. However, that is not so. Although at every moment one can see sketches, verses and music made by mediums who, in the normal state, are not draftsmen, poets nor musicians, it is certain that not all them are able to produce such things. In spite of their lack of knowledge, they have an intuitive faculty and flexibility which transform them into gentle instruments. That is what Bernard Palissy said when he was asked about his choice of Mr. Victorien Sardou, who couldn't draw, to make his admirable sketches (Revue Spirit, April/August 1858). "I...

I t is presently a mystery how some lost animals - usually cats and dogs - find their way home. A recent case was Pero (1), a four-year sheepdog which was back to home 15 days later after its scape. Somehow Pero was able to find its home 240 miles (~400 km) away.  Many other "anecdotes" accumulate, narrated by many families and now Pero's case seems to have confirmed this surprising ability. According to the present scientific knowledge, animals are endowed with a multitude of "sensors" (2) used to provide accurate information and supporting the notion that they are able to guide themselves through long distances. Such sensor are not only far superior than the human versions (dogs, for example, have acute smell and hearing, cats see very well in the dark etc), but represent perhaps other sense modes as, for example, magnetic sensing. Birds and bees have their own inner "compasses". Magnetic substances have been found in the retina of many animal...

This life is the crossing of a sea,  where we meet in the same narrow ship.  In death we reach the shore  and go to different worlds.   (R. Tagore, in Stray Birds,  1916 (4)) So I will sing and mine will be poems and songs of immortal kind.  (R. Tagore, psychography Divaldo Franco, Pássaros Livres , 1990 (5)). Certain things had happened to me  when alone in my room which convinced me  that there are spiritual intelligences  which can warn us and advise us.   William Butler Yeats (1865-1939). A ccording to A. Kardec, mediumship, as the faculty of "people who can serve as intermediaries between the spirits and men" (1), is not simply a hability to communicate and exchange information. Psychography in particular is the ability that mediums have to lend their minds so that spirits can use them for writing including for manifesting artistic content. In this process, the spirit mentally induces ideas and concep...

W e know that mediumship is a human faculty that allows us to get in contact with the Spirits (1). Mediumship is a neutral ability, that is, it is not attached to the "good" or the "evil" side or, putting in another way, it does not depend on the bad or good use we make of it. Moreover, it is not equally distributed among all people. Organic dispositions make it a gorgeous capacity of some people while , for the majority, it is almost imperceptible. In the past, mediums were highly regarded and persecuted. It is possible to identify traces of mediumship in many past personalities of the human history. In the Old Testament, prophets were consulted and called "Seers" (see, for example, Isaiah 30:10, Samuel I, 9:18 and 19). In ancient Greece, the Oracle of Delphi listened to all kinds of problems of private and public life. Religious dogmatism, however, in several times, also persecuted mediums who were regarded bearers of unknown and diabolical powers...

A ballet dancer (*) by Degas through Luiz Gasparetto.  Painting and Drawing mediums: those who paint and draw under the influence of spirits. (A. Kardec, 1861," The Book on Mediums ", 2nd Part, Chapter XVI, 'Special Mediums'.) The literature of psychic phenomena has many colorful types of mediumship manifestations, of mediums with amplified human skills. These were the ancient wizards of primordial times, the prophets of the Biblical past. All types of human manifestations are, in fact, possible through mediumship including highly specialized abilities such as music composition, poetry and painting (rarely called psychopictography ). The most notorious example of music composition was Mrs. Rosemay Brown (1916-2001). In English speaking countries the poetic mediumship of Patience Worth (Braude, 2003) became very notorious. However, painting is also a registered feature of mediumship phenomenology. Although both kinds of 'artistic mediumship' are...

By Michael E. Tymn Although little is known of him outside of Brazil and other parts of the Portuguese-speaking world, Francisco Candido "Chico" Xavier is considered by those who knew him and witnessed him to be one of the greatest mediums ever. His biographer, Guy Lyon Playfair of the United Kingdom, a long-time investigator of psychic phenomena, subtitles his book, "Medium of the Century." Xavier, who dropped out of school at age 13, produced, by means of automatic writing, 458 books with sales in excess of 50 million. All of the royalties were donated to charity as Xavier lived on a very modest income from his government job and pension. In 2000, a newspaper in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerias asked its readers to vote for "person of the century." With more than 700,000 readers responding, Xavier won the vote over an aviation pioneer, a former president of the country, and the legendary soccer player, Pelé. More than 120,000 people lined up in a ...

To find each of the language levels discussed before in many automatic writtings by C. Xavier is an interesting exercise. Mophology, sintax, semantics, pragmatics and intention all show up vividly in the many psychographic letters, but not with the same intensity and uniformity. Such observation reveals hidden aspects of the mediumship process that are totally in accordance with the notion of interference of the mediumship vehicle. The presence of medium's interference is a strong evidence of a communication process in action, since every communication occurence is affected by interference to some degree. The influence of interference in automatic writtings depends, however, on the linguistic level that is taken into account, but it increases at lower levels. the higher the cognitive functions that are required to manifest certain linguistic features (at higher levels) so the weaker will the interference be. Pragmatics and intention in F. C Xavier automatic writtings is dire...

" Of mediumship there are many grades, one of the simplest forms being the capacity to receive an impression or automatic writing, under peaceful conditions, in an ordinary state; but the whole subject is too large to be treated here ." Sir Oliver Lodge. Read more about this case here (access to SKL repository).   I n simple terms, a communication process is a set of stages that transfers a message from emitter to receiver. This is a very popular image of communication and we can call it ‘information transfer’ model. It is, however, severely limited in spite of its success in a variety of cases, mainly electronic devices. Recently, research about communication has been carried out by modern linquistic theories although other research fields – such as semiotics – study communication of ‘non human’ content (e. g. plants, animals etc). Modern linguistic approaches attempt to explain communication not in terms of information transfer only. An efficient communication proces...