Introduction
A great deal of Jesus’ ministry was devoted to exorcising ‘‘evil spirits’’ or ‘‘demons.’’ Seven specific accounts in the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) show him casting them out of their human victims. All over the Third World right down to the present day, ‘‘spirits,’’ both good and bad, are taken for granted as realities that share our world and sometimes must be dealt with. Exorcisms are commonplace throughout South and Southeast Asia, Central and South America, and sub-Saharan Africa; and there is no place in the world where they are unknown. Before the Communist Revolution, casting out evil spirits in China was a normal part of a Taoist priest’s job. In the United States, according to Catholic theologian Malachi Martin, there was ‘‘a 750 percent increase in the number of Exorcisms performed between the early 1960s and the mid-1970s’’ (Martin, 1992, p. xviii). And in England, according to Dom Robert Petitpierre, editor of the Anglican ‘‘Exeter Report’’ on exorcism, ‘‘incidents of demonic interference . . . since 1960 have become ‘virtually an explosion’’’ (Malia, 2001, p. 66). Yet the vast majority of readers of this journal think that ‘‘spirits,’’ at least the kind that oppress or possess us, are not real. Indeed the very raising of the question, Do evil spirits molest us? seems to most of us like a return to the Dark Ages and might be greeted with derision. In a dreamlike state of delirium the agnostic Ivan, in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, yells at the devil, ‘‘No, you are not someone apart, you are myself, you are I and nothing more! You are rubbish, you are my fancy!’’ (Dostoevsky, 1957, p. 582). Doesn’t Ivan speak for almost all of us?
Yet there is mounting evidence today that evil spirits do oppress and occasionally even possess the unwary, the weak, the unprepared, the unlucky, or the targeted.
Before proceeding, let me clarify both what I mean and do not mean by ‘‘evil’’ or ‘‘demonic spirits.’’ I don’t mean anything like devils with tails and pitchforks who fell from heaven with Lucifer and have been cursed by God to an eternal life in some cosmic ghetto, from where they tempt us to a similar perdition under the leadership of a head devil named Satan; none of what I say here is based on Christian or any other theology or mythology. By ‘‘evil spirits’’ I mean more or less intelligent beings, insensible to us, with a will of their own who seem to bother or oppress us or, in rare cases, possess our bodies outright, and with whom we can relate in a variety of ways. In this essay I will survey and assess some of this evidence, then suggest what psychiatry’s reaction to it might be.
The Evidence
Evidence of evil spirits is voluminous and comes from many sources. One source is Spiritualism. In the first half of the twentieth century it was common for Spiritualists to conduct ‘‘spirit help’’ sessions where ‘‘earth-bound’’ spirits were led to freedom by methods analogous to counseling. This gentle form of exorcism is very different from what we might see elsewhere. In India, right up to the present day, earth-bound spirits are forcibly and often spectacularly evicted from their victims by holy men (babas). Until recently in China, Taoist priests conducted sometimes epic battles against malevolent spirits in the hope of expelling them from their victims. In the West, several prominent psychologists have opened their minds to the possibility of ‘‘demonic’’ oppression, gone public with their evidence, and participated in exorcisms. And in Christian ‘‘deliverance’’ circles, demons are forcibly commanded to leave the oppressed victims in the name of Jesus. I will now summarize each type of oppression or possession. (In order to avoid the tedium of constant qualification—‘‘alleged,’’ ‘‘ostensible,’’ ‘‘putative,’’ etc.—I will report the following cases as if the spirits were real. It should not be assumed, however, that I am myself certain of this.)
Spiritualism
In 1924 Dr. Carl Wickland, a psychiatrist practicing in Los Angeles, published 30 Years Among the Dead, a unique record of verbatim conversations he had with departed spirits using his wife as a medium. Wickland divided his book into chapters based on what kind of spirit spoke through his wife. Some, both before and after their deaths, tormented women, others had been criminals, still others suicides. One chapter is devoted to spirits who were alcoholics during earth life and continue, after death, to ‘‘drink’’ through their victims. In one case Wickland talks to a spirit who has been parasitically using the body of a woman named ‘‘Mrs. V’’ to drink. Wickland uses electric shock to dislodge the spirit, then transfers the spirit to his wife’s body, a trained Spiritualist medium. Once inside his wife’s body, the spirit is addressed by Wickland, who tries to persuade the spirit to leave. Eventually he succeeds in making the spirit understand who he is, that he has died, that he is ruining a woman’s life, and that he can get help for himself. As the session ends, the spirit, guided by his deceased mother, departs. Wickland closes the account with these words: ‘‘After the foregoing experience a friend reported a marked change for the better in Mrs. V., saying that no further desire for intoxicants was manifested. Mrs. V. herself acknowledged this change and expressed her gratitude for the relief obtained’’ (Wickland, 1974, p. 176).
Spirit Possession In India
Unfortunately, most spirits are not as obliging as Mrs. V’s. When they are treated rudely or violently, as they are by most exorcists all over the world, they often make a spectacle of themselves. India is typical.
A spirit healer in Western India is called a baba (‘‘father,’’ ‘‘holy man’’), as is the god he works with and who gives him power to heal. (I will use the term here to refer exclusively to the human healer.) The way it works is this. A person who is deranged—we in the West would use words like severely depressed, manic-depressive, schizophrenic, or psychotic—is brought to the healer by her family. As she approaches the temple, she usually becomes visibly agitated. Or rather the earthbound spirit, called a bhut (‘‘ghost’’), within her does. Once the healing ritual is underway, the body of the victim becomes completely possessed by the tormenting bhut. At the climax of the ritual, the baba waves a tray of lights (arati) in front of each of the victims. These lights embody the power of the baba and the sponsoring god, and there is apparently nothing so agitating to a bhut. The body of the person may fall into a cataleptic trance, or moan and shake, or bash its head against a wall, or exhibit bizarre gyrations of supernatural force. John M. Stanley interviewed many spirit victims in the 1970s at a healing center in Pune, India, after their recovery and found that none had been aware of any pain: ‘‘. . . all of the writhing and all of the agonies are experienced only by the bhut. The person himself, entirely unconscious, feels nothing’’ (Stanley, 1988, p. 39). He also discovered that most of the afflicted persons who came regularly to the sessions—bhuts do not usually depart for good until they have been subjected to repeated exorcisms—were completely restored to normalcy.
Spirit Possession In China
The Russian Taoist Peter Goullart presents a horrifying account of the last day of a three-day Taoist exorcism that he observed at a monastery near Shanghai in the 1920s. We are told what happened when a young farmer with ‘‘a wild, roving look in his fevered eyes’’ was approached by a Taoist abbott holding ‘‘an elongated ivory tablet, the symbol of wisdom and authority’’ (Goullart, 1961, p. 86). The abbott commanded the spirits—for there were two—to come out of the man in the name of Shang Ti, the supreme Taoist Godhead. The spirits cursed the abbott ‘‘out of the energumen’s distorted mouth in a strange, shrill voice, which sounded mechanical, inhuman—as if pronounced by a parrot’’ (Goullart, 1961, p. 87). Then the havoc began. ‘‘With unutterable horror, we saw that [the man’s body] began to swell visibly. On and on the dreadful process continued until he became a grotesque balloon of a man.’’ Then, as the abbott concentrated and commanded more fiercely, ‘‘streams of malodorous excreta and effluvia flowed on to the ground in incredible profusion.’’ This process, accompanied by an appalling stench, continued for an hour until the man finally resumed normal size. But the spirits were not finished:
Another scene of horror evolved itself before our dazed eyes. The man on the bed became rigid and his muscles seemed to contract, turning him into a figure of stone. Slowly, very slowly, the iron bedstead, as if impelled by an enormous weight, caved in, its middle touching the ground. The attendants seized the inert man by his feet and arms. The weight was such that none of them could lift him up and they asked for assistance from the onlookers. Seven men could hardly lift him for he was heavy as a cast-iron statue. (Goullart, 1961, p. 89)
Eventually, and suddenly, the man regained his normal weight. Then began the final struggle, abbott against spirits. As the abbott enlisted the help of Shang Ti (the ‘‘Supreme Power’’) and yelled ‘‘Get out! Get out!’’ the onlookers saw the victim’s body convulse, his fingers claw his body until it was covered with blood, his eyes roll up under his skull, and then the final twisting paroxysm as the spirits came out of him with a wild scream, ‘‘Damn you! Damn you! We are going but you shall pay for it with your life’’ (Goullart, 1961, p. 89). Suddenly, the man resumed his normal personality and asked where he was. He had no memory of anything that had happened. The exorcist was completely exhausted and had to be helped away.
Exorcism In The United States
Malachi Martin, Catholic theologian and former professor at the Vatican’s Pontifical Biblical Institute, published in 1976 Hostage to the Devil: The Possession and Exorcism of Five Americans. This is the most convincing and authoritative book available on the subject. It was praised by the New York Times Book Review, the Washington Post Book Review, Newsweek, the Psychology Today Book Club, and a host of other prominent publications when it first appeared. We shall come back to it below. Then in 1983 M. Scott Peck, Harvard-educated psychiatrist and author of the hugely popular self-help book The Road Less Traveled, startled the psychiatric community by describing his participation in two exorcisms. Peck says he personally confronted a profoundly evil spirit on both occasions. In a number of ways these Christian exorcisms remind one of the Chinese account above. The demons reveal themselves to be utterly and horrifyingly malevolent; they cling to their victims with unbelievable tenacity and exhibit superhuman strength; and the exorcism requires a lot of time, often several days, to complete. Further, the demons are expelled only after divine assistance is called on repeatedly, and the entire ordeal is exhausting to the exorcist and his team.
Peck tells us that the two patients he observed ‘‘were gravely ill from a psychiatric standpoint before their exorcisms’’ (Peck, 1983, p. 202), yet that after the exorcisms the mental state of these patients was dramatically improved. As one of the victims put it, ‘‘Before, the voices were in control of me; now I’m in control of the voices’’ (Peck, 1983, p. 198). Following additional psychotherapy, the voices died out and both patients made a full recovery.
Deliverance In The United States
‘‘Genuine possession, as far as we know,’’ writes Peck, ‘‘is very rare’’ (Peck, 1983, p. 183). ‘‘We should use the word possession only when it fits—for the rare Charles Mansons of the world,’’ writes Francis MacNutt (1995, p. 73), a former Catholic priest and leading authority on evil spirits. In MacNutt’s experience most people under the influence of evil spirits are merely ‘‘oppressed’’ by demons—he likes the word ‘‘demonized’’—but not completely possessed. And for these, exorcism is neither necessary nor desirable. Rather, such victims need ‘‘deliverance.’’ Furthermore, the ‘‘true demons from hell,’’ the kind that usually require a full-scale exorcism, ‘‘represent a relatively small percentage’’ of all the spirits capable of influencing us, says MacNutt, ‘‘perhaps only 10 percent’’ (MacNutt, 1995, p. 88).
MacNutt believes that many mentally ill people—both within and outside of mental institutions—are oppressed by spirits. These spirits range from the truly Satanic to the ‘‘dead who are not at rest’’ (MacNutt, 1995, p. 93). These latter are not so much evil as confused. Yet in their blind selfishness these ‘‘earthbound spirits’’ can do serious, if unintended, harm. In relation to us, therefore, they are ‘‘evil.’’
What happens when an oppressing spirit or spirits are being delivered from a victim? MacNutt summarizes the signs under three headings: ‘‘bodily contortions, changes in the voice, and changes in facial expression’’ (MacNutt, 1995, p. 77). MacNutt’s generalizations are reminiscent of the Asian cases we surveyed above. Spirit victims sometimes show supernatural agility or strength. They ‘‘may arch their spines backward, while still others roll on the ground.’’ Unnatural and unseemly bodily postures and motions are commonplace. Furthermore, ‘‘the tone of the person’s voice changes. A woman may start speaking in a husky voice like a man, or a mild-mannered person may begin speaking in a snide, insulting tone of voice’’ (MacNutt, 1995, p. 78). Often the voice uses the plural we, and on rare occasions a foreign language is spoken. As for changes in facial expression, MacNutt writes:
Perhaps the most common external indication of demonization comes when the person’s facial expression changes. It is as if you are no longer looking at the same person you started talking to. The old saying ‘‘The eyes are the windows of the soul’’ becomes especially meaningful. It is as if the evil spirit is peering out at you. The eyes become filled with hate, mockery, pride or whatever the nature of that particular spirit is. Now that the evil spirit has surfaced, you are no longer directly in touch with the person you have been praying for. (MacNutt, 1995, p. 78)
Other predictable features include rolling eyes, screams, gagging, fetid smells, and a feeling of cold in the room. Finally, near the climax of the deliverance it is not uncommon, reports MacNutt, for the threatened spirit to temporarily possess the victim, as we saw in the Indian cases. When that happens,
She probably will remember nothing she said or did during that time. She may have been shouting curses at you, or thrashing around and screaming, but afterward, mercifully, she will have no memory of it at all. In the end she will probably feel refreshed and ready for a celebration, while you and your team will feel exhausted and ready to sleep on the spot! (MacNutt, 1995, pp. 170–171)
I have not surveyed cases of possession from Africa or South or Central America, where they are frequently reported. The above cases, however, should be adequate for the preliminary form of evaluation that I am interested in providing here.
Evaluation Of The Evidence
What do we do with all this evidence of apparent spirit oppression? In particular, can it be squared with the materialist worldview of Western psychiatry? Is ‘‘spirit oppression’’ always to be placed within quotation marks, or can we leave them off? Are ‘‘spirits’’ the hallucinations of a sick brain, or do they have an independent existence? I think every reader must grant, however grudgingly, that on the surface the phenomena we have surveyed point to a dualist metaphysics: we are one kind of being, and spirits are another. We are visible, and they are not. We are subject to the laws of physics, and they are not. We have physical bodies, and they do not. Yet they are as conscious as we are, as individual as we are.
But what do we find when we look below the surface? Can a materialist metaphysics be salvaged in the face of all this evidence? Can it be salvaged without sounding farfetched and perhaps disingenuous? More importantly, should psychiatry make room for, or even embrace, the ‘‘spiritual’’ therapies used in the above cases? Should it place them alongside the brain-altering drugs and electro-convulsive therapies (ECT) presently used? Should it learn to accept them as alternative therapies—just as medical science learned a generation ago to accept chiropractic? Or are there good reasons for maintaining the status quo, as would surely be the case if materialism is true? Is some form of dualism less of a stretch than materialism, or is it the other way round?
Only a book could do justice to these questions fully, but the following line of reasoning seems to me fruitful and suggestive. I will evaluate the evidence under four headings.
Experience Of The Victim
Let us begin with an argument from introspection. A spirit victim, now healed, tells us he made intimate contact with an invisible, intelligent, malevolent ‘‘something’’ that seemed completely alien to him. ‘‘Solemnly and of my own free will, I wish to acknowledge that knowingly and freely I entered into possession by an evil spirit,’’ wrote one of Malachi Martin’s five possessed persons some months after his successful exorcism (Martin, 1992, p. 403). Is it proper to dismiss such a confession as having no possible validity? Are any of us in a better position to speak with epistemic authority about some of the most mysterious ‘‘facts’’ of our own experience? When we assure ourselves that we are free and not determined (to take but one example from philosophy), do we have any finally convincing evidence? Libertarians and determinists endlessly argue back and forth without coming to any conclusion on the matter. Indeed it is hard enough making intelligible the notion of a genuinely free will—so much so that many are driven to the scarcely intelligible compromise called soft determinism. Yet almost all of us believe in free will implicitly and live by that belief. Why? Because our direct experience speaks with an authority that silences all arguments. In a similar manner the direct experience of victims of possession points with equal psychological force to spiritual possession.
Universality
If spirit oppression were unique to one culture or religion or geographical region, it would be to me highly suspect. Why would bothersome or evil spirits ‘‘pick on’’ only one kind of people? The fact that they do not discriminate, that their passions and machinations are as prevalent in India and China as in the Christian (or post-Christian) West, that they work their mischief all over the world makes us take them more seriously. What are taken to be spirits behave in the same generic way whether they oppress Americans or Chinese or Indians. They cause the victim’s voice and face and movements to be changed dramatically. They feel just as threatened by a Taoist priest holding an ivory tablet as a Catholic priest holding a crucifix or an Indian baba waving a tray of lights (arati). They are put to rout not by human agency acting alone, but by divine power, whether by Shang Ti or by an avatar of Krishna or by Jesus.
Part II coming soon.