Sacred Geography
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pp. 211-297 – IV. "The Tuvinian-s"
shamanic practice in Tuva
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p. |
practice |
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247 |
"January 21, 1992 was the official registration of the Society of Tuvinian shamans, the "Dungur" Society ("dungur" – drum). ... They now have a house for the Dungur Society ... in the center of town where shamans can practice healing. In 1993 the first official shaman ceremony occurred in the courtyard of the museum – the Scythian stone figures were sanctified". |
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"Shamans who are members of the Dungur Society receive an I.D. card saying "Kham – Shaman" on it, showing their name and number. ... a member of the Dungur Society receives a license with a photograph of the shaman (somewhat like a driver’s license) and also a document to practice healing, do rituals and foretell. ... the rituals can be addressed to the sun, moon, sky, earth, water, mountains, bear, to the big bear (big dipper in the sky), a prayer done with ritual sprinkling of milk to the sky, and a prayer to the spirits of fire. The Tuvinian shaman can pray to five types of spirits : the spirits of his own family ancestors, the spirits of heaven who live in the sky (Azarlar), the spirits of evil (Albis and Aza), and the spirits of earth and water. ... The eeren (ongons for the Buryats) are representations of spirits that are the shaman’s helpers. When the shaman does "kamlat", the term signifies that he goes to the other world with the help of a drum (buben), or mirror (ku:zu:ngu:) or a jew’s harp (khomos) or staff, wand (diyak, djezl); also necessary is the shaman’s song, anthem, or incantation." "A shaman may receive his powers not only from his own ancestors but also from a spirit. There are five possibilities. [1st] ... a person may be stuck by lightning, then he knows that it is from azar, the sky (these shamans are called "deer kham") [2nd] ... in a dream, in his sleep, the bad spirit Aza or Albis takes his soul. he becomes sick – "shaman’s sickness." Then another big shaman will go to the spirit and bring back the soul of the person and therefore he must become a shaman. Aza ... appears in a big storm, a hurricane or |
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in a wind; such shamans are called kara kham (black shaman). [3rd] ... Abis, usually a woman with long hair and very long breasts which she may throw over her shoulders. She ... may come in the form of a male, appearing in sleep, in dreams. [4th] ... spirits ... related to the earth and water – male or female spirits, wolf, bear, ram, badger. [5th] ...ancestral spirits. For example, the son sees Azar, the sky spirit, and prays to his father and to Azar. When he sees the spirit of the sky as a skeleton will all its organs, then he knows he has seen this spirit." |
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[kamlanie ritual by shaman :] "After being helped into his shaman outfit, he ritually cleansed the house with smoking artysh (a Siberian juniper used as incense). His drum would be warmed by the fire, "enlivened" and then he fed it (feeding the horse) with libations ... . Some shamans were known to begin their kamlanie with imitations of bird sounds such as raven, owl or cuckoo. The shaman would sit with his back to the gathered people {like an Eastern Orthodox priest performing eucharist} and begin to slowly call his helping spirits, often keeping his eyes closed. Gently beating his drum, the shaman ... began ... to travel on his (horse ) drum to his spirits. He explained the sickness of the patient to his helping spirits and traveled to the world of the evil spirits who had caused the illness or soul loss. Once he found these spirits, he tried to persuade them to disappear but if this did not succeed, he would fight with the spirit. Ultimately, once the evil spirit was conquered, he would throw him out of the door of the yurt. ... A kamlanie would end with fortune-telling, the shaman throwing the beater of the drum next to the sick person and if the curved side fell up, ... the patient would recover." |
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"the spirit of fire in her home represents the stove ... . ... She gives sacrifices of arika, meat, little grains, milk, cheese, and sour milk products to the fire." |
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"Trees, mountains, rivers and springs had souls. ... a particular kind of tree, the "kham-yiash" or "shaman-tree" which was characterized ... as several trees growing out of one root, was honored with genuflections, colored strips of cloth, white food sacrifices and other cult rituals". "Every morning it was customary for the mistress of the yurt to worship the Sun by sprinkling milk with a spoon with nine hollowed-out spaces, in or to bring in the good spirit of well-being for the home and family." "The location of the soul varies depending on the age of the person. The location of an unborn baby’s soul is inside his mother, whereas the soul of a child of less than three years may be located in his swaddling clothes, in the cradle or on top of his head. The soul of children from three to nineteen years can live in boots, headgear or other clothing, or may reside in animals presented to the child, such as a lamb, or foal, or young deer. ... From age 13 until death, the person is considered an adult and has two souls, a main soul and a gray soul. The [main] soul does not necessarily live in the body, if male preferring to live in grandfather’s camping site, ... in a shelter of branches, in a horse, in the eeren (spirit representation), in a pipe, saddle, etc. If female, the soul may reside in adornments or household belongings such as earrings, chavaga (ornamented adornment for braids), a thimble, pillow, a bucket, a mortar to pound |
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tea, a poker, a tripod, or in the fire itself. The shaman’s soul can be found in more specialized places such as his drum, rattle, headgear, shamanic overcoat, ... in the shaman’s eeren or in a shed where a dead shaman lies. ... The shaman is the only one who can see the soul ... . The gray soul, on the other hand, stays in the yurt after death. Farewell rituals to the gray soul are accomplished by a person beating on the yurt with a red whip while the shaman beats his drum. After both go around the yurt, the shaman reaches the doorway and seems to catch the gray soul in a wooden plate. The other person takes the wooden plate with the soul pressed into it ... . After the 49-day ceremony when the shaman speaks with the soul, ... the shaman will be asked to hold an autumn fire when he will again speak with the soul ... . ... the dead person’s soul flies freely in space and stays in its native place, showing up ... where an old yurt was, perhaps in the form of a mythical being or a horrible giant." |
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["excepts from shaman algyshes (hymns) to the lost soul" :] "It is the red dragon {cf. red dragon seen by Merlin} which is howling horribly and Roaring all over the peaks of the Kyzyl-Taiga ridges Near the red monster’s claws I see A lash, made of red meadow-sweet. ... |
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And you, the lost soul, come fast like a wind. ... here is the soul, be quick to catch it. ... ... I have found your soul in the Sky of Denger." |
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[shamanic se’ance :] "the shaman ... consults the winged eeren, bald badger and bear. The shaman-tree is angry and wrathful ... . ... The shaman consults the moth (like the bee or second soul of the Buryats). ... |
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The shaman often began his se’ance by praising previous shamans or shamanesses ... . He might recite verses speaking of his ancestors who were shamans, their travels as great shamans to distant worlds". |
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"Soyot (the name given to Tuvinians prior to the Revolution) shamaness" : "a tall feather headdress |
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formed in a kind of cluster, a headband with fringe ..., a long-sleeved robe covered with stuffed snakes hanging thickly from the collar-bone area over the entire robe, fur cuffs on the sleeves ..., and a large round drum. ... the Soyots ... think of the Lower World as having three layers which take the soul three years to wander through. At the lowest level is the kingdom of Erlik-Khan. There exist also shamans who appear from time to time on the earth in the form of a longhaired bull with big horns. The spirits of living shamans often visit the Kingdom of the Lower World and meet there with earlier shamans from whom they are instructed in the arts of healing." |
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[(in museum) equipment of a shamaness :] "a little figure of a human being, made of felt, holding in its left arm a little drum and drumsticks and snakes. On the upper part of the tent were two snakes – a smaller red and yellow snake with green eyes ... and a lilac snake with nine new heads and red tongues. There were snakes hanging on her garment and 5 rings with arrows, owl feathers on the shoulders of the garment like wings ... . The owl feathers on the shoulders and in the headdress symbolize the ability of the owl to fly silently at night, which is the daylight of the spirits. Owls can see demons in the dark and eat them. ... her helpers are snakes and anurga, the great water snake who appears with many heads (seven) ... . ... |
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Snakes protect against bad spirits ...; all snakes were held in high esteem and could not be killed." |
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[eeren :] "Some eerens can only be owned by shamans, whereas others can be owned by anybody. Eerens may be spirits of ancestors or ancestors of shamans, spirits of animals, fish and birds. Representations of animals or only parts of them may be used. Living domestic animals are sometimes considered as eeren. The bear eeren is the most powerful personal eeren of the shamans ... . It is possible for the shaman to have wooden figures of the bear or else bear paws with claws, which ... only a powerful shaman would possess. Not only shamans, but also ordinary people may possess hare-eeren (ak-eeren). This eeren will protect people from joint problems and stomachaches. The owl eeren helps the shaman by sensing evil spirits at night in the forest. The raven eeren is the emissary of the shaman ... . During the course of the kamlanie (shamanic se’ance), the cuckoo is a helping spirit for the shaman and often cries of this bird ... are uttered by the shaman. Snake eeren, stuffed with fabric, were strong personal protectors for shamans; in addition, ... wolf and badger eerens in the form of wooden figures or dried paws, were used by the shaman to help in encounters with bad spirits. ... Agyr-eeren in the form of a male and female figure made out of metal are placed in graves". |
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"The Ku:zu:ngu:, a flat metal disk with strips of cloth attached (like a bronze or copper mirror) is ... a shamanic attribute ... . It is worn around the neck of the shaman, always when shamanizing. It is considered to be a spirit mirror, deflecting evil spirits ... . {this is Daoist} |
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The word ku:su:ng means "opposition" in Yakut language and implies that the mirror will protect against the burning hot glance of evil spirits". |
personal narrations & biographies in Tuva
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p. |
biography |
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215 |
[shamaness :] "She speaks to the spirit of the deceased ... . ... She passes messages back to the family. It is necessary for the soul to feel free to fly, move, without boundaries of walls or buildings. In this period after death, until 49 days have passed, the soul flies around and observes problems ... in the world and reports on them to the shaman[ess] ... . When a person dies, the soul goes into an animal or bird or insect ... . In order for |
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the soul to go into another human being, she has to do the ritual of 7 and of 49 days and then the soul will settle into a human being. She is the connection between the spirit world and the world of the living. She has this discussion with the soul of the dead person and his relatives ... . ... The first time [the shamaness] saw the soul of a dead man was some years ago when she visited an apartment where nine days previously the husband of the woman had died. ... suddenly she saw the man sitting in the armchair. .... Then when she sat at the table, the man came up to her and said different things – he explained how he died, gave advice and told what he did not like at home. She told the family what he said and the relative asked questions which she then asked the spirit. She was the channeling person for him. ... There was no need for burning a fire because she actually sees the spirits without it, but she just asks the people to make a fire ... . ... She heals by non-touch massage, energy-giving, and talking to a person. ... She can do massage ... without touching, giving bio-energy. {cf. esoteric Daoist non-contact acupuncture, by energy-transfer without touching} ... |
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She says in her work as a shaman, she works by how she feels inside. ... She goes into a group of people and can understand the thoughts of the people there; she sees many different spirits around the person. ... She sees a person on the street with a bear or dog (not real), or a person walking along with one leg going one way and the other leg in another direction. Sometimes she sees a person with only a part of a body; as she explains it she sees the part that has energy but does not see the part without energy. These people are seen partialized because their energy is twisted. If a person is sitting and she does not see the legs, it means that this person does not have a connection with the earth or does not want to live in that house. Negative energy is the most important thing in the mind. ... She tells the story ... in the following way. She had so much energy she was jumping and running up walls. Her spirit told her to go to Mongun-Taiga region, ... special energy was pushing her there – that’s why she had so much energy. When she went there, her spirits said dig up a hole. Suddenly there was a big storm. Her spirits stopped and left. The reason her spirits came and then left was that ... a big lama ancestor ... had hidden his books in that place and then he died. ... |
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She sees only spirits of the earth and people who have died. She can feel bad energy in a house, how people suffer, and how difficult it is to live in such a building. When she comes into such a situation, she immediately cleans the place using her own energy in order that the place will be a good place for her and it will be easier to help people. ... One of her helping spirits, a Chinese person, showed her an energy form that eats out the bad energy. She can clean energy from everywhere – even clean the sky. |
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[description by this shamaness of activities of "a shaman with whom she had done many healing sessions together" :] "when he collects the bad energy from people, he throws it back and something here ... devours the energy. He actually created this (animal) himself so that it will not harm anyone else when he throws the bad energy. He could throw the energy down but it could get stuck on the third or the first floor of the apartment building, so he created this animal. ... when they first started working, they threw the energy from one to the other. Now each has their own animal who devours the energy. She threw the bad energy to ground waters, but ... she was sent there and some voice told her "go clean." Then she thew it to the moon. Some voice said "clean your garbage." Then she burned it ... . {according to the Hevajra Tantra, "when ham is burned, the moon melts." (IEB, p. 233)} She went into a trance for two hours in order to figure out where to send the bad energy. ... She saw a huge fish with a big mouth. ... She decided to throw the bad energy into his mouth. From the back of the fish good energy comes out, so she had developed an energy-cleaning machine! ... she first saw the spirit of the mountain at Arzan Shivilig, a sacred spring west of Teeli. ... When she was carrying the soup, she suddenly saw a woman who said : "Why are you eating without offering to me first?" The spirit pushed down on one side of the soup pot ... . After this, when walking to the spring, she heard a woman’s voice saying "there is no need to take a bath. You |
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will cure yourself." This was the second time [she] had a sign that she was to become a shaman[ess]. The first time was when she ... saw a sick woman and suddenly could not see her and she had a feeling like someone made a tube of this woman’s body and the woman had crawled out of her house. ... Then she saw a man on the street and suddenly could not see him. After this, she went to the Bai-Taiga region to visit ... . ... She was sleeping but suddenly she felt she was flying somewhere. {astral projection, transvection} The shaman was doing a ritual ... . She was flying over him, and while flying she saw herself sleeping. She was afraid so she sat down and looked at what he was doing. While he was singing his songs there was some kind of invisible power dragging her soul out. ... He sent a black ball to her which got stuck in her throat so that she could not breathe. She felt like she was in a state of hypnosis. She fainted because she was not able to breathe. She went to the sink and put her fingers in her throat in order to throw up the black ball. Something yellow, like a ball, went out of her mouth and broke. ... [Later, she] was pregnant and ... her sister ... invited a shamaness. ... She woke up with the same kind of ball in her throat, but she could breathe. ... When she swallowed the ball, it stopped where the foetus was and ... the baby ... was born prematurely and died. ... [Afterwards,] she felt car crashes and other things that would happen; her friends said that she would slap her legs and scream when a car crash had happened or was about to happen. She could not remember doing this. ... [Still later,] when she saw the spirit of the natural spring, she realized that she could not refuse this "gift"; it was part of her life so she should admit it. At first she tried to refuse it. She was |
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walking on the street and an invisible power would throw her into a big pail of snow. ... "They" were just faces she saw {as expressions of natural patterns?}, but she became like a slave to them and they told her different things. ... People came to her and asked her different questions, like where were their lost objects. ... Spirits that helped her disappeared, and other spirits showed up, a Chinese person and a buffalo with red eyes. ... The Chinese was very wise, the buffalo very powerful. When she went to the U.S. a few years ago, she received nine brown bears from a Native American shaman. While sitting in a sweat lodge, sweating, she saw this shaman place red-hot rocks and the nine brown bears came to her as a gift of the shaman. ... When we did the ritual in the open, she said, she saw the spirit of the place who was a man ... . ... Formerly she used to use bread or tsampa as a receptacle for all the negative spirits, but now she can send all the bad energy to the whale ... whom she invented ... . ... now she goes into a trance state for only a short period of time during which she speaks to the spirit and discovers the problem. ... Formerly, she went into a trance without a drum and saw different people all the time. ... Her spirit can be without limits – no walls, no earth, her thought can go anywhere. In her dreams she can fly and be simply free. Now she likes her dreams or if she does not, she can |
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stop the dream and other one comes. ... She goes in her thoughts to the Lower World and talks to the prince of devils, a 50 year old man in a gray cloak. She can even describe the fasteners on his cloak and his face, stern and Asiatic but not Tuvinian. She recalled a particular time ... when she had a special reason to go down to this prince. A young man was sick and the spirit of the cemetery, in a black cloak and only the bones of a skeleton, wanted to bring him to the burial place so that he would die. So therefore she went on a shamanic journey to the prince of devils to ask why the spirit of the cemetery went to collect people. She went by a village and she saw this spirit walking. There was a tunnel, and half-asleep, she went down and met three devils who wanted to cut her hair. She thought ... that they wanted her hair to spin, so she created a bunch of sheep fleece and she went further down and three devils came up and they wanted her eyes so she created a little pack of eyes and gave it to them. Then she went further and three devils wanted her bones so she created a packet of bones and she went further and three devils wanted the sinew of her muscles. ... Then she went to a place neither dark nor light, but gray in color with gray mountains and rivers, and was led to the Master of the place. This was how she met the prince of the devils in his gray clothing ... . He gave her a white horse to take her up to the Middle World, but the trip was full of dangers. The horse had to cross the river on a bridge made of one human hair; the water was full of devils who would try to catch her. If she falls in the water, ... they will catch her. So she sat there and thought ... the spirit is very light, and so she decided it can walk on a bridge made of one human hair. Therefore she sat on the horse and the horse took her back to her body. After this, she did not see the spirit of the cemetery walking all over the village anymore. This shamanic journey occurred when she was invited in the village of Kyzyl-Dag ... and she could not get up because the spirit of the cemetery sat on her. She was cleansed with artish and ... went home and fell asleep. While she was asleep, the spirit of the cemetery came up several times and asked her to go home with him. ... Then some spirits of dead people came and said "I’m your relative, come with me." ... |
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Her father could see the skeleton of a person and could foretell with stones. ... There is a book that tells how to arrange stones by birthdate, year, and constellation. The shaman knows how to lay out the stones based on these data ... . ... She said there are so many shamans because there are so many spirits. People can meet these spirits all the time. When people herd sheep, they can meet low-level spirits of earth and nature. There are may spirits of the earth and mountains and when, as has been the case, many rituals are done asking the mountains for help, then the spirits become strong. ... |
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When spirits are asked for help, it means the person believes in these spirits, and this belief ... makes spirits strong, gives them strength." |
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[account of shaman :] "when a shaman sings khomeii (throat-singing) it is very impressive for people but the shaman loses energy by this intense singing. Therefore he needs to use metal balls (Chinese healing balls with bells inside) ten times on his left side and ten times on his right to regain energy for himself when he sings or when he get sick. If the shaman has an illness, he can not heal. He can heal only if he is well himself. ... He heals women’s sicknesses. When he presses at a point above the breast, he can diagnose the problem. He can feel illness ..., which he can cure in one se’ance. ... He uses an "eeren medved" (bear claw) to heal children with its touch". |
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[shamaness :] "when she got this gift, she went to the Holy Shaman tree – the family tree. This is a typical shaman tree with one root and many trunks. It is located in the very deep taiga close to the Mongolian border in the southwestern part of Tuva, near Dus-Dag and Torgalyg. Deposists of a special orange-colored salt are located there. This salt also comes in different colors – blue, orange-yellow, and white." |
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Shaman’s ancestor "used to disappear. Parts of him would disappear – first one part, then another, and then he disappeared altogether. When people asked him where he was, he said, "I was flying with eagles." He used to come to people and say what will happen to a person or tell about lost animals". |
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Shaman (same one as alluded to on p. 218) "uses demchik bells without clappers to create an aura. This helps him to bring back the lost soul of a person. He feels with his hands that the soul is lost. He calls the soul back and then feels that the soul is there. He goes into a trance when he is drumming ... and dances very well like a bear. He does not know himself how it is because he is in a trance while he is drumming. ... When he collects the bad energy from people, he throws it back and something back there devours the energy." |
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[shamaness :] "Sometimes she sees spirits and sometimes she just listens to them ... . She learns from the spirits if there will be any future losses in the family and what may happen. ... She went for a walk alone and suddenly she saw a bright light. She thought it was ... a U.F.O.; ever since then she has ... established a connection to aliens. ... She feels these entities like aliens, not like people, she hears their noises ... . She says that she is a Sky shaman[ess], and that she received her powers from the sky. ... |
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She calls for help from the sky ... . When she does he 7 and 49-day rituals for people, she finds a man to light the fire and a woman to feed the fire. ... When she is doing these rituals, she can see death coming to one or another of the relatives on either side. ... For the 7-day ceremony she lights the fire, takes the clothing of the dead person and burns it, as well as the sheets on the bed if the person died in bed. ... When she does the 49-day ceremony ... all the belongings of the dead person are cleansed with artish and salted water ... . She uses water and milk to cleanse the road of the people who came, using milk with artish in it." |
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[accoutrements of shaman :] "his feathered headdress, his large brown drum with 12 white circles painted on it, ... a shaman’s whip to chase bad spirits, ... a drum stick with the face of a spirit on it ... . ... His coat ... had bells and snakes on it. His headdress had a red and green band and feathers standing upright, exactly like the Plains Native American headdress." |
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"during the old times there was a girl who sat and could not get up; it was like she was tied up by bad spirits. With a knife [the shamaness] cut the invisible threads and the girl was relieved. ... |
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She does 7-day and 49-day rituals and speaks to the soul of the dead person. She calls for the spirit and the spirit comes and she asks how the person died. ... One day she went to the toilet and while she was sitting there she perceived an arrow come over her head and strike like lightning into the ground. ... she understood it was a vision – a light so bright like a candle – and the light started to talk to her." |
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[shamaness "in Barlik, a large village next to the town of Kyzyl-Madjalik."] "she saw three people coming down from the sky, wearing green, white and yellow clothing and dancing and talking to her. Her left arm and left leg were paralyzed. ... She has an eagle and a big white bird as spirit helpers. When she looks at people, a ball comes from her right shoulder, navigates around the person’s head and then returns back to her left shoulder. And then a kind of light comes out and |
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she receives information about the person. When the ball comes back it sits on her shoulder and gives her information. These three people, in white, green and yellow clothing and sitting behind her head, are her helpers. The white bird helps healing children. Sometimes when the three people leave her, then the eagle comes. ... She tells the future ... and heals illnesses. She ... can also tell the future three years before it will happen ... . ... (... the more active talkative yellow and green spirits who point out mistakes and can predict the future would be more helpful to shamans.) ... the yellow one tells her, ... when she watches TV and sees politicians, what kinds of things they are doing ... . ... The green one can tell her different changes in the earth and water – what was before, what will be – in nature. She once saw a |
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spirit of a natural water spring. It was a very tall man who started to communicate with her green spirit. The water spirit told her ... he could teach her to be a shaman[ess]. ... Suddenly with great speed, the yellow spirit showed up, did something with his hand and the tall spirit disappeared. ... She only goes into a trance at night. The green spirit takes her soul and her astral body to fly. She can see her body lying there while she is flying. When she awakes, the spirits say – go back to the body." |
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[shamaness informant (& her "psychic" relatives) "in this small village of Khaiirakhan next to Chadan."] "She started seeing different silhouettes and shadows and gradually saw more clearly and started talking to them. Her spirit is an old man. She could talk to the spirit of the mountains and the spirit of houses." This shamaness with her younger brother "were running around the room after the spirits who were turning the furniture over and flinging it about." This shamaness’s younger brother "can stop curses by calling low-level spirits at midnight." |
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This shamaness’s female cousin "saw cows talking to each other before they died. Each cow had a white ball moving upwards and then all got together in one big ball and went to the sky." The shamaness "herself ... said that the first spirit she saw was a woman with long breasts which she could fling over her shoulders." {also known in Caucasus region} |
IEB = Ronald M. Davidson : Indian Esoteric Buddhism.
varieties of Turkish shamanism
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p. |
Turkish shamanism |
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300 |
[Burh^anism] "in 1904 ... a vision ... was received by an Altai Turk, Chot Chelpan. There are four groups classified as Turks of the Altai Mountain region, among them the Southern Altai Turks, the Northern Altai Turks, the Abakan Turks [Abakan in H^ah^asia (pp. 186-189)], and the Soyot-Karagas, or Tuba, or Uriangkhai – the Tuvinians ... . The vision which Chot Chelpan received was that of a white horse with a rider dressed in white. This rider proclaimed that Oirat Khan would imminently return to earth ... and would re-establish the ancient Oirat Khanate. ... On his leaving, twin rainbows appeared and behind them the heavenly maidens. ... They also foretold the imminent establishment of the Altai khanate ... . ... His return was associated with a change in the shape of the high peaks of the Altai. In 1900 such a change had taken place, ... a result of an avalanche, and ... had announced ... the returning Oirot Khan." |
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["Khakhasian shamaness" :] "When she gets into a trance, it is on an energetic level where she feels vibrations. ... [healing :] When a person is suffering from a mental disease ..., she feels a disturbance in the field around the person. She gets a feeling where he goes and whom he communicates with, and then she can tell the person what is wrong. ... When a person hears a drum, he makes vibrations and it is easier to pull diseases out of him. ... The traditional Khakhasian idea of the soul is that there are seven bodies {maya-kos`a-s} and three souls {linga-s`arira-s}. ... When she sees the soul, usually the soul lies on |
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the bottom under water and it is hard to reach. She will go to reach this soul in order to help the patient by putting herself in a trance with her drum. ... Sometimes she uses the drum and at other times when she is working with a patient she can make him and herself go into a trance using bells. She feels the soul and the spirit of a person very clearly; if a person is sick, she tries to find out the reason. She becomes that sick person and comes into him completely, watching every organ, the liver, the heart ... . When she has to heal a person, ... her soul leaves her and go to look in all generations of a person to see if there were ancestors who are creating a problem for the patient." |
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BIBLIOTHECA SHAMANISTICA , Vol. 12 = Eva Jane Neumann-Fridman : Sacred Geography : Shamanism. Akade`miai Kiado`, Budapest, 2004. [wife of Jonathan D. Fridman]