Cave and Cosmos: Shamanic Encounters with Another Reality - Michael Harner 2013

We Exist! The Spirits Call for Recognition

Readers may naturally wonder if what happened to me in the cave was a product of my imagination. That is understandable, for there were no witnesses who could validate my experiences. Fortunately, however, sometimes the spirits demonstrate their existence and power to two or more people at a time, and even to large groups of people. When this happens, these public demonstrations are often called miracles.

For the shaman who is intimately interacting with helping spirits, miracles are almost routine events in healing work. In fact, spirit-produced miracles of healing are probably shamans’ most celebrated feature in indigenous societies. Separate from helping shamans carry out healing activities, spirits often attempt to communicate their reality through miracles and “micro-miracles.” These “wake-up calls” that the spirits send, often with the help of a shaman or shamanic practitioner, are perhaps best understood as attempts to educate people about their existence. I will now share a few in which I was personally involved.

MIRACLE 1: THE NEW PAIR OF DIMES

In August 1993 I was invited to give two presentations at the annual meeting of the Transpersonal Psychology Association in the Asilomar conference center in Pacific Grove, California. The theme of the conference was “New Paradigms in Psychology.” For one presentation, I was asked to introduce an audience of hundreds of people to shamanism as an example of one of these new paradigms.

My plan was not only to talk about shamanism, but also to give everyone the opportunity to take a shamanic journey to the Upper World so that they could get a real taste of the power of shamanic work. Frankly I was not sure that these hundreds of persons, sitting in rows of chairs, would succeed, but I thought it was worth a try.

I silently asked my spirits to help me in impressing the audience about the reality of spirits. They replied that I should have the lecture hall’s lights turned off and then to take two large quartz crystals out of my bag. I knew from my experience in shamanism that when used correctly, quartz crystals have the effect of amplifying whatever spirit power is being put into them.

After the lecture hall was completely dark, I called silently for the help of the spirits and activated the crystals in an ancient way. In the darkness they briefly glowed with a faint light. At that moment, there was a scream in the audience. I asked that the lights be turned on. Then I saw a woman standing in the audience, waving her outstretched right hand.

I asked her to come to one of the standing microphones in the aisles of the auditorium and to share her experience. I expected her to share a few words about her subjective experience and then to sit down, to be replaced by some other volunteer doing the same. But I was in for a surprise.

At the microphone, she continued to hold her hand up high and announced that she had screamed because two dimes had suddenly materialized in her hand.

I was stunned and delighted at the same time, for I had never expected anything of this magnitude. I invited the woman, whom I had never met, to come up on the stage. She displayed the coins to me and everyone, to great applause. I told the audience that the two ten-cent pieces were so shiny they looked freshly minted.

I thanked her and, I must confess, felt rather self-satisfied about the public materialization. I thought the matter was done. However, as she left the stage to return to her seat, a man’s voice called out from the audience something I had completely overlooked. He shouted, “New pair o’ dimes!” He had perceived that it was not just a materialization but a message, a message reiterating the theme of the conference, “new paradigms.”¹

There were more than four hundred witnesses to this event. A few years ago, the same woman approached me at a conference and reminded me who she was. She said she had kept the two dimes ever since, and pulled them out of her purse to show me again. They still looked new and shiny.

MIRACLE 2: RECEIVING AN “IMPOSSIBLE” HEALING AND SPEAKING IN HAWAIIAN

In successful shamanic healing work, miracles are almost routine events when the spirits wish to intercede. They particularly like to help a shaman who is their lineal descendant and are of even greater service if the patient is also helping that shaman in some way. An additional plus, but not necessary, is for the patient to be a lineal descendant, too.

In the early 1990s I was diagnosed by three different eye specialists as having macular degeneration. They all agreed that the condition was irreversible. By the late 1990s the doctors found it was getting worse and concluded that nothing could be done.

Since my wife Sandra and I were planning a vacation on the Big Island of Hawaii, one of my students suggested that we visit an elderly Hawaiian shaman-priest on the Kona coast, a spiritual kahuna with whom she was acquainted, to ask him for help. It seemed like the right thing to do. I was also curious to meet the man, Lanakila Brandt, who, although half-German in descent, had converted completely to the Hawaiian religion and reputedly was one of the last five authentic spiritual kahunas left on the Islands.

We found him in the small community of Captain Cook, so named because it was a few miles from Kealakakua Bay, where the famous eighteenth-century British explorer and navigator made his initial landing in Hawaii and was later killed.

Lanakila generously agreed to treat my eye condition if I followed a daily schedule that he outlined. For five mornings and evenings, as I lay silently on my back, he prayed over me in front of an altar of leaf- and flower-bedecked wooden images of traditional Hawaiian gods.

I experienced nothing eventful until the fifth and last evening, when I felt the spirit of a deceased person entering my consciousness and showing me a scene in color. We (the spirit and I merged together) were looking southward down at a bay. I guessed that it was the nearby Kealakakua Bay and that we were partway up the cliff overlooking it. Before me on the water were two square-riggers at anchor. I did not know at that time that Captain Cook had come in two ships, but I thought, Captain Cook! and wondered if the spirit was that of a British seaman or even Cook himself. Then I wondered if the spirit was Hawaiian. Still, I was not sure.

Next something very strange happened: the spirit began speaking clearly to me in a language I did not understand. I did not even know if it was Hawaiian, since the only words I had learned in that language, like any visitor to the Islands, were “aloha” and “mahalo” (thank you). But the spirit, who clearly seemed male, kept repeating himself over and over, apparently insistent that I remember his words. I gradually memorized the message with some difficulty, as I had to focus on ignoring the background prayers being chanted by Lanakila. I kept repeating the words silently to myself as I lay on my back with closed eyes, hoping that when the ritual was over Lanakila could tell me whether or not they resembled Hawaiian. As soon as Lanakila’s healing work was done, I wrote the words down, explained to him what had happened, and read them aloud. The words were:

Hele hele aku i ka pono.

“This a very good sign,” he smiled broadly. “You have just spoken Hawaiian. What you said literally is this: Go! Go! Forward to everything positive. The meaning of this message is: ‘Go ahead with full force (with your life); everything is positive, for you are on the straight path.’ ”

Recently I sent the words the spirit gave me, together with Lanakila’s translation of them, to a professor of Hawaiian language at the University of Hawaii (Hilo) to check the accuracy of the sentence I received and its translation. He replied, “… the Hawaiian is quite correct and even includes the directional particle, aku.” The only suggestion he made was to add “a comma after the first hele.” Of course, the spirit never told me about a comma!²

I asked Lanakila, “What is the straight path?” for the phrase was new to me.

“It is the moral path, the correct path,” Lanakila said, adding, “You have been blessed with support for your life, and the outcome for your eyes should be good. Keep in mind that the cure may take a few months.”

Indeed, several months later when I asked my eye doctors to recheck my ocular condition, they could find no evidence of any macular degeneration whatsoever. Such a reversal, they said, was impossible, and the only explanation was that my previous diagnoses were wrong (although the diagnoses had been made repeatedly for almost a decade!).³

About three years later I came across a new book on Fiji (another Pacific Island culture) by Richard Katz, titled The Straight Path of the Spirit. The title jumped out at me, for I had not found any mention of “the straight path” since that meeting with Lanakila. In Katz’s book I discovered that what the spirit had told me was consistent with what other Pacific Islanders knew, and furthermore, the concept was central to their spiritual culture.

MIRACLE 3: SPEAKING IN FINNISH

When shamans merge with or “embody” a helping spirit, it is only natural that they talk in that spirit’s language. What is remarkable, as in my case as a patient in Hawaii, is that the words can be translated if someone is present who knows the language.

Here is another personal example. In one of my courses, helping spirits are invited to merge with participants in order to provide them with healing power. To the beat of drums, each participant patiently waits until a healing spirit unites with him or her and causes the participant to start singing and dancing to bring healing power to others. They do this one by one.

On this particular occasion, a helping spirit merged with me. As usual, when I experienced its healing power, I (“we”) started singing and dancing spontaneously within the circle of the group. As I did so, words came out of my mouth that I could not understand, repeating themselves with great forcefulness until my dance ended and I finally sat down.

At the end of the session, there was some sharing by participants. One of them, a Finnish woman, raised her hand and asked me if I knew what I had been singing. I did not have any idea. She then said that I had been singing in Finnish and repeating the phrase, “No more university!” This caused a great deal of astonishment and laughter in the group, since the students knew that I had recently rejected university life as a professor.

And, of course, I knew no Finnish.⁴

MIRACLE 4: SPEAKING IN ARCHAIC NORWEGIAN

As in the example above, what seems impossible or miraculous to the nonshaman is really quite simple and even routine when one knows that (1) spirits really exist, and (2) if the spirits wish to, they can speak through shamans. While instructing an advanced initiations course in 2008, I asked for a volunteer for a demonstration of these realities. Amanda Foulger, one of our faculty members, kindly agreed.

I asked her if she knew the nationalities of her ancestors. She said that they were primarily English, secondly Scottish, and distantly Norwegian. Of these nationalities the only language she knew was English, being a Californian.

Then I asked her to enter the shamanic state of consciousness, or SSC, with the aid of repetitious drumming, to merge with an ancestor from the 1500s or earlier, and to have the unknown ancestor speak through her. All this was in the presence of some forty people.

After a couple minutes of drumming, Amanda stood up, and the drumming stopped. She began to speak loudly, slowly waving her arms back and forth. After she finished and sat down, the students looked at each other, puzzled, for her words seemed completely unintelligible.

However, one person in the group, a student familiar with Scandinavian languages, raised her hand. She said that Amanda had spoken in an archaic form of Norwegian. Furthermore, she said, the spirit speaking though Amanda was apparently on a hunt and had been discussing with a companion in which direction they should go. This astonished all the students, including Amanda herself, for she did not know any Norwegian whatsoever.⁵

MIRACLE 5: A CURE THE PHYSICIAN SAID HE COULD NEVER PROVIDE

This next report was written by Ken Emerson, who acted as a demonstration client in a group practice known as “the spirit boat.” Sometimes called the “spirit canoe” or “spirit raft,” this practice has long existed in one form or another among peoples on the Northwest Coast of North America, in the Northwest Amazon, in Australia, and in Indonesia. Here is what he says:

Early in 2004 I was diagnosed with alpha 1-antitrypsin deficiency (A1AT). A1AT is synthesized in the liver, and when deficient, results in emphysema. Eventually damage occurs to the liver, resulting in cirrhosis. Replacement therapy is available through weekly IV infusions of the A1AT protein. I had been receiving these infusions since 2004; however, my lung function continued to decrease.

In April 2011 I attended the Foundation’s two-week intensive workshop with Alicia Gates and Amanda Foulger. I was chosen as a client for the spirit boat exercise. At the conclusion of the session I immediately knew I had received a healing. My lungs were clear, breathing was no longer labored, and my heart was beating regular and strong.

After arriving home I consulted my pulmonologist for a scheduled appointment. He conducted all the regular tests, including chest X-ray, spirometry, and blood workup. He was amazed at the results, believing that the equipment had failed! He ran the tests again only to find the same results as before. The chest X-ray showed virtually no signs of emphysema, although some tissue damage was still apparent. The spirometry reading revealed lung function at 82 percent of normal; the previous reading was 77 percent. The A1AT protein level had increased from 74 to 77 (normal is 90–200).

My doctor could not medically explain the reasons for these drastic changes. As I was smiling like a child on Christmas morning, he asked me what was going on. Without revealing the details, I related the results of my healing from the loving compassionate spirits. He just shook his head and said I had received something that he could never provide. He discontinued the IV infusion therapy, and we scheduled a follow-up appointment for six months later.

At the next appointment the same tests were conducted. This time the results were: no signs of emphysema, lung function at 112 percent of normal, and A1AT protein level at 80. We will continue to monitor my condition every six months. This time when I left the office, we were both smiling!⁶

In the examples given in this chapter, the spirits were not only educating us about their existence, but they were also showing their ability to heal and help. I remember a popular book that was first published some years ago called A Course in Miracles. I resisted the temptation to call this chapter (from the shaman’s perspective) “Of Course They’re Miracles!”