Ghosts, Authentic or Mystical: A Review
Ghost is an expression adequate to make anybody plug up with a manifestation of fear. Many inhabitants often have live encounters with them and whenever they commit to their memories about their experience with ghosts they quiver in terror. Diverse group of people have unusual viewpoints about ghosts. If we spotlight on the customary views, a ghost is typically outlined as a spirit or soul or a person or animal that is departed and can also materialize in the perceptible form or may bear resemblance to any living thing. The depictions of ghosts vary extensively ranging from translucent to visible shadows or even facade of any living individual. Many persons in the past or even today crack to ascertain touch with the spirit of a deceased individual and these intentional efforts are elected as necromancy. Literature throws light on many such shots for instance, the funeral rites, exorcisms and certain practices of spiritualism and ritual magic are the customs to make contact with the souls of dead.
Ghosts are normally pain staked to reside in meticulous settings and are allied with fussy stuffs and such spots share the group of haunted. These haunted buildings or haunted houses are themselves enough to startle anyone. The paranormal activities going inside such haunted places are commonly coupled with some tragedies like murder, suicide or any other violent actions. It is also promising that all such places may not allocate category of haunted. Many religions and cultures also believe that the souls prolong to exist forevermore in the haunted places.
The English word ghost is whispered to have advanced from the Old English word gast which in general is thought to have progressed from the Common Germanic theoretical word gaistaz. Apart from being used for epitomizing the spirits, the word gast is also used as a synonym for a Latin word spiritus meaning blast. Gast can be used to specify the souls of good and the evil. In Holy Bible the word gast is used to signify the demonic possession especially in the gospel of Matthew 12:43. During the Old English period this word was used to designate the spirit of God as Holy Ghost. The Dutch synonym spook has penetrated the English language of United States during the nineteenth century. The word shade portrays spirits of the underworld in the ancient Greek mythology. Haint is a synonym used for ghost in the regional language of the southern United States and haint tale is a regular attribute coupled with their literature and traditions. A German word poltergeist is often used for a spirit which bears the supremacy of swaying objects as well as screening its indiscernible charisma by movements. The word wraith is assumed to have originated in Scotland from the Scottish Romanticist literature during the eighteenth and nineteenth century that also embodies spirits. The same word was also used to indicate the aquatic spirits during the olden times in Scotland.
A very eminent Scottish poet John Mayne has used the term Bogie in his distinguished poem Halloween in 1780. The term revenant is used for a lifeless person who is thought to have revisited from dead to irk the living individuals and this word can be interrelated with the phrase fetch which is identified as a perceptible ghost. Gallup Poll News Service reports that the number of haunted houses, ghosts, communication with the dead and witches has amplified in the United States by the end of 1990. A topical report of Gallup poll in 2005 propounded that 32 percent of the Americans believe on the reality of ghosts.
The stature of ghosts and demons in the form of transparent and paranormal entities is a universal cultural conviction and it is often believed to be involved with the ancestor worship. Ancestor worship is associated with rituals to thwart the revenants and other rancorous souls from antagonizing the existing folks.
Such sacraments were often concerned with sacrifices in the form of giving food or drink to the souls of the dead or even using magical banishment. The ceremonies of feeding the spirits of dead are still in practice in the Chinese culture and even the western world today exults the All Souls Day for the spirit of deceased. The magical banishment is still a part of burial customs of many cultures even today. An anthropologist James Frazer during the nineteenth century has also avowed about the existence of souls as vivacious glooms in his classical work entitled The Golden Bough. Ancient literature also corresponds to human souls as birds or some other animals and even the verifications also advocate that human souls are having the strict body structure like that of the dead creature and also wear the equivalent clothing that they wore at the time of their death. A book entitled Egyptian Book of the Dead illustrates life of the souls after death and symbolizes that the souls have the similar dressing sense as well as the hair style which they had when they were alive.
According to one of the well-liked ideas ghosts are made up of airy and murky material. Anthropologists deem that ghosts, accurately talking are the souls of dead persons very prominent in the ancient history as white mists. Many conventional beliefs report, ghosts as souls of the dead lodging on earth either for taking vengeance or incarcerated for the bad things they did during their existence. Sometimes ghosts are also evaluated with appalling omens leading to death. In rural areas souls of dead ladies dressed in white have been noticed and it is said that they have died due to calamity or something bad had transpired with them. The obsessed tales of such white ladies are admired all over the globe. These white ladies are believed to have been deceived either by their husbands or fiancé and are believed as heralds of death who take retribution from the family of coupled persons. If any one of the linked person's family sees them he or she is at the jeopardy of being dead. The myths of ghost ships are very popular during the eighteenth century as depicted in the Flying Dutchman. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge also gives a picture of ghost ships.
The Mesopotamian religions explicitly the religions of Sumer, Babylon, Assyria and other early states in Mesopotamia are encumbered with the citations of ghosts. The traces of beliefs of these religions even got continuation in the Abrahamic religions. These religions believed that ghosts are created at the time of death of any individual and these beliefs later on traveled towards Netherlands where people started believing that ghosts have figures akin to the living entities. The relatives of the dead persons started giving food and drinks to the souls in order to set them free. It was also believed that the ghosts can bring infirmity of any individual. Ancient Egyptian literature also believes that ghosts are the souls of dead which bear the prospective to harm anyone and there is also a leeway of second death. The Egyptian culture believed for more than 2,500 years about the consequences of afterlife. The Egyptian Book of the Dead accentuates some of the beliefs of different periods of ancient Egyptian history. Even in the modern world people believe that the mummies also materialize in the form of ghosts and take reprisal and these facts are often shown in the horror movies also.
The Bible and the Hebrew Torah also demonstrate some of the quotations about spirits and some supernatural behaviuors. The first book of Samuel in the Holy Bible expresses about King Saul who visited the Witch of Endor to talk with the spirit of the dead prophet Samuel. The New Testament of Bible also describes about the statement of Jesus where he tells his disciples that he will be in present in the form of spirit after resurrection. The disciples of Jesus thought that Jesus is a ghost when he came to them by walking on water. Christian belief is in opposition to the act of communicating with the souls of dead.
Even the book of first Timothy also describes that some souls are evil and engross living individuals from God. The Book of second Corinthians also represents that Satan himself predicts that he is the Light of the World. The people of ancient Rome believed that ghosts take revenge from people and impair them by scuffing their body and even chuck them in the graves. Plutarch has represented about the ghost of an executed man at Chaeronea during the first century AD. The appalling and strident thuds produced by the ghost made people of the town to shut the doors of the building and houses.
Pliny Younger also describes about a haunted house in Athens where a chained ghost shrieks in pain. These sounds ruined when the skeleton of the man was given reburial. Plautus and Lucian have also described about haunted houses. Lucian of Samosata was the first person during the second century AD who expressed his incredulity in spirits. A Christian priest, Constantius of Lyon, during the fifth century AD documented about the case of a ghost who was reprehensively buried. The haunting wrecked when the skeleton was recovered and given reburial. Homer has defined ghosts in his creation Odyssey and Iliad as a white coloured vapour. He states that ghosts have very diminutive interface with the living world and in general do not panic humans and often emerge in the form that escorted them to death. By the end of the fifth century BC the ghosts of the ancient Greek literature have been noticed to scare humans and were also accountable for evil or good works. The spirits were reflected to linger around cemeteries, haunted houses so humans avoided lodging near such places. The ancient Greeks celebrated festivals in which the dead souls were requested for food and drink and then they were called again next year for the same purpose. A play entitled Oresteia was the first act in which ghosts first appeared in the world of fiction.
Medieval Europe believed on two types of ghosts namely the souls of the dead and demons. The souls of dead were thought to have crossed the threshold after death in order to solve an unambiguous problem while the demons existed to entice or terrify humans only. The souls of dead could spell out their rationale through living and can leave the body of living with the help of Jesus Christ while the demons can be banished through Holy name. The ghosts were dispensed in the category of Purgatory where they were castigated for the crimes they have done during their lifetime. Ghosts have been discerned to ask the livings to pray for them so that their anguish may come to an end and they have also been seen praying to God to set them free. The ghosts of the medieval Europe predominantly those of the Victorian age were more alarming and often have been observed to wrestle with the living persons unless and until a priest comes for their rescue. They have been described as misty shadows and often dressed in grey rags. Most of the ghosts have been found to be the spirits of males. Ghostly armies have been heard to fight in a battle during night in a forest at Wandlebury, near Cambridge, England. Arabian Nights also features haunted houses during the ninth century.
Renaissance magic has penetrated the tradition of necromancy. A Swiss reformed Pastor Ludwig Lavater has focused about this act in his book entitled Ghosts and Spirits Walking by Night. Child ballad Sweet William's Ghost states the story of a ghost who returns to beg a woman to set him free from the pledge of marrying her so that his soul may rest in peace. He also states that if the woman will rebuff the promise his soul will moan in pain forever. This imitates a popular British belief that the dead haunted their lovers if they got committed with a new love without their consent. The Unquiet Grave expresses a more convoluted nature of ghosts. It underscores that ghosts can be provoked by the heartache and bereavement of their loved ones for them.
Spiritualism can be measured as a monotheistic belief or a part of religion converging humans to rely on God but data of haunting by the ghosts or spirits and without exchanging a few words with them it is not feasible to get knowledge of what happens after life. Spiritualism is believed to have instigated in the United States which attained its crest during the 1840 and 1920s principally in the English nations. By the end of 1897 there were more than eight million cohorts of spiritualism in the United States as well as in Europe. Spiritism is essentially based on five books of Spiritist Codification written by French educator Hypolite Léon Denizard Rivail. His work was based on both scientific as well as philosophical truths which were later on liked by a number of authors. The number of supporters of spiritism was in a great deal in Spain, United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, France, England, Argentina, Portugal and especially Brazil.
The scientific principles affirm something bizarre about the subsistence of ghosts. Joe Nickell, a spokesperson of Committee for Skeptical Inquiry recommends that there is no scientific confirmation for the survival of ghosts and spirits. Mundane corporal elucidations and precincts of human philosophy can account for configuration of obscure metaphors which we judge as ghost for instance, conversions in air pressure inside a room are liable for the banging of door and lights from a momentary car when smack the window of a home can result in creation of redundant images. Skeptics believe that pareidolia is a property of a person to be acquainted with some of the blueprints while kept in dim light condition is what we consider as ghost. Nickell advocates that ghost is nothing but simply misleading of vision especially at night when brain is exhausted and is more prone to misconstrue sounds and sights. We can say that the sensitivity of human peripheral vision is responsible for construction of typical descriptions that we consider ghost. Another researcher, Michael Persinger of Laurentian University, Canada states that the changes in the geomagnetic fields of earth bring amendments in the temporal lobes of brain which are coupled with the imagination of something haunted. Sound can also be responsible for something extraordinary for example, Richard Wiseman wraps up that infrasound in a room can bring a human to fill with anxiety, extreme sorrow, a feeling of being watched, or even the chills. Carbon monoxide poisoning also impedes the auditory and visual alertness of brain so ensuing in unusual imagination.
Gigantic numerals of Malay ghost myths are admired which are still customary in the contemporary states of Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei which have been later on fashioned by Hindu, Muslim and Buddhist beliefs. The tales of women in the form of women like Pontianak and Penanggalan are still in the reminiscence of people of some regions. Ghosts are still an accepted theme in the Malaysian and Indonesian movies. The beliefs on the ghosts are still in practice in Polynesian culture. Chinese culture is also loaded with testimonials of ghosts and Confucius even states that people must admire God and Ghosts and must keep themselves away from them. Many of the beliefs about ghosts in the Chinese culture are also alleged in the neighbouring countries like Japan and south-east Asia. These beliefs are frequently based on ancestor worship known as Taoism. Later on these beliefs got prejudiced by Buddhism and are now popular as Chinese Buddhist beliefs. Many Chinese people today celebrate a festival where they believe that it is probable to get in touch with the souls of their adored ones. Ghosts are critical elements of Chinese literature and movies at the moment.
The literature of the Indian subcontinent promotes the subsistence of ghosts as mystic images of a dead person bearing the prospective to impair someone. These uncanny creatures are dubbed as bhoot. The soul of person who has been a spectator of brutal death or death due to some unsettled affairs or unacceptable rituals of funeral is predisposed to alter into a ghost. Hindu mythology believes on an evil spirit known as Baital which takes demonic tenure of corpses and Pishacha is a tissue eating evil spirit. The Mexican culture is also not unharmed by the stories of ghosts. Ghosts ought to have an exceptional declaration in the Tibetan Buddhist religion which forecasts that a human after death enters the world of ghosts. A famished ghost has a petite throat and a hefty stomach which on no account fills so the ghost can never be contented. Ghosts can be exterminated by some rituals. Dalai Lama envisages that the spirit of a Tibetan monk of the seventeenth century, Dorje Shugden is a malevolence spirit which is conscientious for the gash in the Tibetan émigré community.
Ghosts are very imperative essence of literature as well as mythologies of approximately all nations. In English literature, Shakespeare's story entitled The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark also spotlights on ghosts. In The Tragical History of Hamlet the ghost requests Prince Hamlet to take the reprisal of his assassination from his uncle King Claudius. In another conception of Shakespeare, Macbeth, a man named Banquo was massacred and became a ghost. Ghosts have been a vital part of British ballads during the sixteenth and seventeenth century principally in the Border Ballads. Ballads of this type usually embrace The Unquiet Grave, The Wife of Usher's Well and Sweet William's Ghost which depict about the ghosts who are interested in returning back to their lovers or children. In the ballad King Henry, a ravenous ghost demolishes king's horse and forces him into bed and the king rouses from sleep and investigates for the ghost which renovates into a gorgeous woman. Harry Price, Peter Underwood were most well-liked professional parapsychologists during 1920s and 1950s who had shared their incidents as well as a number of anecdotes about ghost encounters. Children's most popular ghost story for example, Casper the Friendly Ghost was also animated in the form of a movie in 1995. A very trendy Indian movie, Mahal became one of the prime box office hit in 1949 starring Ashok Kumar and Madhubala. The movie was directed by Kamal Amrohi and was based on reincarnation. The movie unbolted a new track for Indian gothic fiction.
We can terminate by saying the imprints that we scrutinize in our day-to-day life are in fact not ghosts because the imprints like ships, trains are all inanimate objects. Here we can ask how they came into action? Well the researchers advocate that they move due to some sort of energy stockpiled in finicky locations. Now another question comes into mind is that what sort of energy? Some say electromagnetic fields and electrostatic forces are to be blamed for such actions. Researchers imply that human body safeguards electromagnetic energy and ghosts caught by the EMF detectors support this analysis. Duncan McDougall performed an experiment to verify that ghosts have some body mass. He calculated the body weight of five patients before and after death and accomplished that the patients have lost some ounces before death but what happens after death no one knows. The science falls short to remark on afterlife possessions and ghosts are still a subject matter of anonymity. Research is going on and in the coming years we anticipate that we will accomplish something to know about it.
Navodita Maurice
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