Exorcism and Possession

Exorcism is typically the fare of Hollywood but there is apparently a growing demand for the service as of late.

What happens at exorcism school?

I can see why people would be more inclined to seek exorcism in the current world climate, whether there is a legitimate possession or not.  The above article reassures me as it tells me that Catholic exorcists are actually very levelheaded and don't jump right to the crucifixes and holy water.  This makes me wonder though:  What about possession and exorcism in other faiths?  I'm certain that Catholicism is not the only faith that believes in possession and exorcism.  This would suggest that unwanted possession is a universal human problem.  Perhaps it is faith and personal power that exorcises, no matter where it comes from?

One thing that I take issue with is the notion that delving into the occult opens one up to possession.  This may be true in a sense, as if you are involved with the occult then you are more likely to perform evocations of entities that are commonly called demons.  I'm sure that inevitably some of these go wrong.  However, it's common for every "one true religion" to demonize all the others so this allegation toward occult practice is really nothing new and really nothing to get too upset over.

I've had a bit of a fascination with evocation as of late so I thought I'd write about this related issue.  As an occultist, I find that if you do your homework and cross your t's and dot your i's then you really have nothing to worry about.  Exorcism, in all its forms, is still a very interesting subject that I hope to learn more about.

Commonalities Between Aliens and Demons

I've written about the commonalities between modern extraterrestrial encounters and encounters with supernatural entities like demons before.  Paul Schroeder over at UFO Digest has recently written about the subject and you may find it of interest.

How To Exorcise Aliens: Possession of the Fourth Kind

Internet Demons

I've talked a little bit about demons before but I thought I would discuss the idea of demons on the Internet for a bit.  It seems logical to me that with more and more of humanity migrating onto the Internet for various reasons that demons (in the neutral non-human spirit sense and in the malevolent entity sense) would follow.  Indeed, the Internet has become a realm of its own.

So, what if there are demons on the Internet?  This provides some new ground for exploration in the dated study that is demonology as well as some new opportunity for magickians.  Maybe it even provides new opportunity for the sciences now that technology is inherently involved with the demonic activity.

This idea could even be spread to cover those strange electronic gremlins that each of us gets from time to time.  I'm sure I'm not the only one that has had a computer do something incredibly strange and then never do it again.  Could this be the hi-jinks of an Internet demon trying to upset me and feed on my emotion or is it attributable to the fickle nature of modern technology?  Hard to say really.

I think that this is a neat idea, as neat as the idea that the Internet is its own living entity, and it could be expanded on greatly.  I'll leave that for others to do though.  I think the big question is:  Have our demons followed us online?  There probably is no definitive answer to that but the link below gives a short, somewhat disturbing, account of the ramifications.

Demons in the 'Net

Demons: Evil or Misunderstood?

In a lot of modern occult circles any talk of demons is generally frowned upon unless it's talk of how to defend yourself from them or exorcise them.  This is interesting as it wasn't always this way.  This is evident in the Keys of Solomon, specifically the Goetia.  The Goetia focuses almost entirely on various demons and their means of summoning.

Demons were not always seen as the malevolent forces that most Westerners view them as now.  In the beginning, demons (or daemons/daimons) where seen as non-human spirits that coexist with mankind.  Just as there are good and evil people there were some spirits seen as good and some spirits seen as evil.  With this in mind, it seems reasonable for a magician to summon a benevolent demon in order to solicit its help in some manner.  No soul-selling or pacts necessary, just the petition to a non-human spirit.

I think that Christianity gets the most credit for the contemporary view of demons as evil beings out to possess your body and damn your soul.  I only bring this up because even though the original concept of demons has been tinged by time and translation, there are still occultists that adamantly insist that one not deal with demons.  It should be said that these people are usually "right handers" or "white witches."  I find it ironic that they would hold to and support a predominantly Christian view of demons with the knowledge that they have been just as demonized for being witches of any kind.  In light of this inaccuracy (largely translation-based in the first place), you would think that these occultists might be more sympathetic to demons.

Just something to think about the next time you see mention of summoning spirits or demons.  For a much deeper view of demons, please see the link below.

Wikipedia on demons.

Summoning Demons

Recently I've been very interested in sigils and sigil magic.  It just so happens that when browsing some darker areas of the Internet in the wee hours of the morning I stumbled upon an image file containing 99 sigils.  Ninety of these are specific to particular demons, apparently.  The remaining nine have more general purposes.

I don't typically dabble with spirits or demons but I thought this might be relevant to the interests of my readers.  Whether you choose to work with this is up to you.  I thought I recognized some of these names and symbols from somewhere but I've searched my books as well as the Internet and the closest I can turn up is this image, apparently found in a number of places on the Net besides the place I got it from.  Some of these are evocative of the Keys of Solomon, but I can't find any matches.  I haven't studied Solomon's works that closely though.

For those of you that might be brave enough to try this, let me know what happens.

Shifting shadows or "shadow people."

Hang around paranormal circles long enough (or even watch paranormal television shows for longer than ten minutes) and you'll probably hear about "shadow people."  Shadow people are exactly what they sound like:  They are shadows that look like people that are entities in their own right.  There are many theories about shadow people and many explanations of what they are.

Suppose you're just hanging out, doing whatever you would normally be doing at a certain time of day, when you see what appears to be a person standing in your peripheral vision.  Your natural inclination is to turn in that direction to see who it is, right?  When you turn to catch a glimpse of this person no one is there.  No one is even in the vicinity.  Sometimes you might even actually see the figure slink away into the shadows or around the corner, never to be discovered.  Most people have probably had an experience similar to this before.  Personally, I've had a few experiences like this, mostly with smaller shadows though.  Shadow "bugs" or shadow "mice."  I'll turn to see what it is and there isn't actually anything there.

I fully acknowledge that a lot of these experiences of mine are probably just fatigue, insomnia, and tricks of the eyes.  Those of you that read the timestamps on my blogs should find it unsurprising that I'm usually up at the wee hours and this is most often when I have such experiences.  I won't go into the scientific reasons why the eyes can trick us in this way; I'll only acknowledge that there are perfectly rational explanations for some "shadow people" experiences.

All of this in mind, I have had one experience that I cannot immediately chalk up to tricks of the eye.  The most startling shadow person experience that I have ever had occurred perhaps two years ago.  It was late at night, I had just brushed my teeth, and I was about to retire to my room but I was looking back into the rest of the first floor of the house to make sure the lights were off before I went to the stairs.  I stood in the darkened living room looking down the night-lighted hallway into the kitchen.  As I stood there for those few seconds a shadow suddenly appeared on the lighted hallway wall, a shadow vaguely human shaped and sized.  This shadow did not stay still for long, immediately moving along the wall and off into the darkness.  This would not have been so startling to me if I hadn't been standing still the entire time, surveying the kitchen to make sure the lights were off.  This solidified in my mind that it was not my shadow.

There could be a rational explanation for my encounter but I'm unable to come up with one.  This said, I'm also unable to come up with a paranormal conclusion about the experience.  I was admittedly tired when this happened, but I have never had a fatigue-induced shadow appear in the center of my field of vision and then move off into the shadows.  I do think it should be noted that there have been some somewhat unexplainable occurrences in my house, but I generally attribute most of them to settling, wind, and other natural phenomena as the house is over a century old.  There is a door that used to mysteriously come open no matter how well you made sure it was closed (it no longer has this problem).  Sometimes there would be a mysterious sound coming from outside that sounded exactly like a ball being bounced on the driveway when no one (and no ball) was there.  That particular phenomenon hasn't occurred, to my knowledge, for at least several months.  There are countless creaks, groans, moans, and thuds that occur in my home everyday (most notably at night, probably due to it being more noticeable during the quiet hours).  I make no claims of living in a haunted house, but strange things do occasionally happen.  This shadow person encounter was by far the strangest and most inexplicable.

So, what are shadow people?  This often depends on who you ask.  A popular theory I see often is that shadow people are supernatural entities that feed on negative energy.  I'm not a ghost hunter, just a paranormal researcher.  Ghosts and shadow people and other such things are not a primary area of interest to me but I have looked into those subjects a bit.  When it comes to shadow people, it seems that anyone is free to come up with just about any explanation they want.  I can't claim to know what causes the most drastic cases of shadow people or other shadow phenomena, but I do have some ideas.

I do not think that shadow people are deceased humans, if they are indeed real entities and not just illusions.  In my research of encounters with what are ostensibly deceased humans I can't recall a mention of the deceased appearing in a shadow form.  When taking a form at all, the deceased seem to always take a form close to the stereotypical vision of the ghost:  That of an ethereal, transparent, replica of the person as they were in life.  I do acknowledge that I have not examined every case of spirit communication ever though.

I do not think that shadow people are demons, or at the very least, not dangerous demons.  I am speaking of demons in the popular sense:  A malevolent supernatural entity that preys upon mankind; an evil spirit.  I feel that if shadow people are demons they would not make themselves so apparent and would not be so obvious.  Shadow people also do not fit with typical tales of demonic activity that I have encountered.  Usually, when a malevolent entity is attacking someone, the entity is completely invisible to human eyes.  Shadow people, overall, seem to be rather indifferent to human beings, choosing to simply observe from a distance rather than interact.  It's not uncommon to see reports of people claiming to be watched by shadow people.  I'm unaware of any case of shadow people actually causing harm or attacking anyone.  In my opinion, this means that the idea of shadow people being malevolent entities (or at least overtly malevolent entities) is out.

What do I think shadow people are?  I think that they (if they exist at all) are probably benign non-human spiritual entities.  In my view, they are a natural part of the greater picture similar to the idea of nature spirits.  They seem to me to be just as natural as human beings or trees; they are just another part of the world that we inhabit, albeit not as well understood as the other examples.  This is, of course, just my opinion.  I don't claim to hold the absolute truth about much of anything, especially not something as seemingly unverifiable as the phenomenon of shadow people.

If you have ever experienced shadow people (or shadow critters of any kind) then you probably have your own ideas about what they are.  I'm always interested in hearing new ideas so feel free to drop me a comment and let me know what you think.  If you're someone better versed in the subject then feel free to correct me on anything I may have wrong here.  All I have to go on is my limited experience and what research I've done.

That's all until next time.  I won't think less of you if you leave the light on.

Extraterrestrials as demons?

UFOlogy is a very deep and complex subject and I expect to discuss various aspects of it as I post more blog entries.  The specific topic I'm going to focus on now however is the view that what are commonly seen as extraterrestrials and their spacecraft are actually demons.  To clarify, I mean demons in the sense that most of Christianity knows them (and demons are a whole topic all by themselves).  I'm talking about malevolent supernatural entities, commonly seen as the antithesis of angels.

I think I was first introduced to the idea that extraterrestrials (aliens, if you will) are actually demons about eight or so months ago at a UFO/Paranormal lecture.  The speaker was a religious man, having gone to divinity school if I'm not mistaken.  Since I don't get the opportunity to attend such lectures very often I thought I'd check it out even if I thought it was a little strange that someone with that background claimed to be a paranormal scholar of this variety.  Without going into too much detail (this story could provide a completely separate blog post of its own), about halfway through the night the speaker began to "get down to business," so to speak.

At this point we had discussed predominantly UFOs and extraterrestrials, covering all the major bases of the UFO/alien lore.  Then this lecturer dropped a bit of a bomb on me.  He suggested something that seemed completely strange and absurd to me at the time because it seemed very foreign to my way of thinking.  He suggested that aliens were not actually creatures from another planet and that they were actually demons.  Malevolent spiritual entities taking the form of "aliens" in order to corrupt and damn us.  I won't go into all of the intricacies of this because I honestly can't.  At this point the night seemed to take a more evangelical turn and that had me in something of a squirm-in-your-seat kind of uneasiness that lasted until I left the building.  That said, this lecturer brings to mind an interesting suggestion.

Typing this now, I remember seeing references to extraterrestrials (or at least the "bad" ones) as being evil, followers of Satan, working against God, etc. prior to this lecture but I can't recall someone ever stating that ETs were literal demons taking form to torment and deceive mankind before this.  While studying Fortean lore, I came across the concept of one being taken away and brought back by fairies.  Again, fairies may even merit their own individual blog post; there's a lot more to fairies than Tinkerbell.  Anyway, when looking over these accounts, there are a lot of similarities between ancient encounters with fairies and modern encounters with UFOs/aliens, abduction being just one of the commonalities.  Could extraterrestrials be supernatural entities rather than flesh and blood creatures from other planets?

Everything we claim to know through science suggests that it is very, very unlikely that extraterrestrials are visiting or ever have visited Earth.  The vastness of space and the technology required make the possibility of aliens visiting our planet a very slim one indeed.  This is what science tells us.  But what if the "aliens" are already here?  There are a number of avenues to go from this question, but for the purpose of this post I'm going to choose the fairy folk/demon avenue.  Suppose these entities are supernatural beings, mostly native to our planet (or at least our general level of existence) that have been here as long as we have or longer.  What if only our perception of them has changed?  In the past it was fairies and magic; in the modern age it is extraterrestrials and spacecraft.  Perhaps this is how we rationalize these experiences in the the current age.

None of this really sheds any new light on the subject of UFOs/aliens and I'm certainly not the first person to propose this line of thinking, but it does give one something else to consider.  Personally, I'm on the fence.  I'm convinced of the reality of the UFO phenomenon but I have absolutely no idea what is behind it, whether it's extraterrestrials, fairies, demons, Earth energies, or any of the other less-than-conventional ideas.  I can't throw down an opinion one way or another.  Maybe you can though.

Let me know what you think in the comments or use the poll to the right.  Or you can do both if you're so inclined.