Glass ball (occultism)
A glass ball (or crystal ball ) is a traditional occult prop that is used for clairvoyance . It was also used in parapsychology to research special forms of perception.
origin
Fortune telling with the help of translucent or reflective surfaces ( catoptromance , crystal romance ) goes back to antiquity . In the German-speaking countries, mantic texts (magic spells, “crystal blessings”) were particularly widespread in the late Middle Ages , but also beyond. Crystal or simple glass balls were used to perform a magic similar to analogy. A glass ball as an occult instrument is supposed to make hidden things visible. Starting with the wave of spiritualism at the end of the 19th century, glass balls were examined and used more systematically, for example by Rudolf Tischner and others.
Before the technical possibilities for manufacturing large glass bodies existed, small, polished crystal spheres or segments were in use. Optical instruments such as mirrors and lenses did not become available until the late Middle Ages and early modern times and were extremely expensive at the time and only affordable for a few. The later technically possible shoemaker's balls (actually filled with water-filled balloon bottles) were used from around modern times and with widespread use in the 19th century to illuminate workplaces and for reading and were also used for mantic. Today these are usually full glass spheres made of clear glass.
method
The glass ball serves as a transmission medium in clairvoyance. What can be seen when looking inside, such as an arrangement of cards, the oscillations of a pendulum or the lines of a hand, should serve as the basis for an interpretation of directly intangible, past, future or spatially distant events . This interpretation takes place by a person called, for example, a fortune teller .
The intensive fixation of a shiny object is an extremely proven method for initiating hypnosis and trance , also for self-hypnosis . In trance or hypnosis, attention is often focused on an object or person. This can be a way in which the “seer” can react better to non-verbal signals from the person seeking information and thus deliver a prediction that is acceptable to that person.
The paranormal “seeing” with a glass ball is related to crystal vision and mirror vision , where a look into a transparent object such as a rock crystal or a reflective surface such as a mirror or a water surface is supposed to make hidden things visible. This view can be found in numerous fairy tales and folk tales (“Mirror, mirror on the wall”) and was already used in the early modern times. For the mystic Jacob Böhme , according to a report by Abraham von Franckenberg, it is documented that he gained his central gazes, mystical vision experiences indirectly, when he saw reflections of the light reflected by a cobbler ball on the smooth surface of a pewter vessel. The use of the glass ball can also be found in novels and fantasy, for example with the Palantíri , 'the seeing stones' in the context of the wrestling stories by JRR Tolkien.
Rudolf Tischner also saw the glass ball effects as a memory aid and reproduction of mental or unconscious processes. The associated effects were considered and researched more systematically with the - also scientific - consideration of occultism and spiritualism from the middle of the 19th century. Hans Bender and other parapsychologists have carried out corresponding experiments, including with specially prepared masks and in special environments or with test subjects under the influence of drugs (such as mescaline). The corresponding perceptions can be very realistic. Among other things, vivid, film-like scenes are reported, for example occasionally in the form of childhood memories. Because when you look into the crystal ball you are well aware that the corresponding impressions are not actual perceptions, they are demarcated in psychology as eidetics from a hallucinative experience.
Delegated Use
The jocular reference to a defective crystal ball is also in support - forums - and newsgroups o for missing details when an error description. Ä. used. "Kristallkugel defekt" (original title: "Housesitting for Pokipsi") was also the title of the 25th episode of the animated series Alf - Memories of Melmac .
See also
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Anton Birlinger: On Goethe's Faust and Gross-Kophta. Crystal and magic mirror seeing. In: Alemannia . Volume 9, 1881, pp. 71-74.
- ↑ Volker Zimmermann: Crystal Blessing. In: Author's Lexicon . Volume, V, Sp. 382 f.
- ↑ a b Rudolf Tischner: Introduction to Occultism and Spiritism . J. F. Bergmann, Munich 1923, ISBN 978-3-662-29995-1 ( google.com [accessed October 30, 2015]).
- ↑ Mark Pendergrast: Mirror Mirror: A History of the Human Love Affair with Reflection . Basic Books, 2009, ISBN 0-7867-2990-2 ( google.de [accessed October 30, 2015]).
- ↑ Peter Gan: Collected Works . Wallstein Verlag, 1997, ISBN 3-89244-094-8 ( google.com [accessed October 31, 2015]).
- ↑ Frank-Rutger Hausmann: Hans Bender (1907–1991) and the “Institute for Psychology and Clinical Psychology” at the Reich University of Strasbourg 1941–1944 . Ergon, 2006, ISBN 3-89913-530-X ( google.com [accessed October 31, 2015]).
- ↑ Hans Walter Gruhle: Psychiatry of the Present, Part 1A: Basic Research on Psychiatry, edit. by J. C. Brengelmann et al .; Part 1B: Basic research on psychiatry, edit. by M. Bleuler et al .; Part 2: Basics and methods of clinical psychiatry, edit. by G. Bally et al. Springer, 1967 ( google.com, accessed October 31, 2015).
- ↑ Efficient work comes before efficient writing. In: blog.content.de. Retrieved October 30, 2015 .