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Wolf Messing –the true story of Russia’s greatest psychic – Tatiana Lungin

Here are some of the most impressive parts of a report written by Vladimir Safonov:

The following events took place last autumn in Moscow at the House of Medical Workers, where Messing demonstrated his abilities to a group of workers. I accidentally wound up as a member of the panel, and this situation made it possible for me to carefully examine what was happening both on the stage and among the spectators.

Messing's next to last experiment consisted of his performing a task mentally dictated to him without contact with the sender's hand.

To tighten the conditions, Messing was removed from the hall by two members of the panel. During his absence an object was selected and hidden in the room for Messing to find upon his return. After some heated discussions, the object - a pen - was hidden behind the wall paneling.

Messing was led back on stage. The audience froze, but Messing immediately headed right toward the girl who had hidden the pen and brought her onto the stage. He looked her intently in the eyes and demanded:

"Think! Give a mental image!"

Suddenly a mischievous thought entered my mind. What if I were to try to confuse Messing? So I immediately began to suggest to him the following: 'Don't listen to the girl. The pen is not where she thinks it is. It's on the top of the column to the left of the wall."

While I was concentrating I cast only a fleeting glance at Messing who was ten feet away from me. 'The pen is on top of the column,’ I persisted in thinking.

To tell the truth, I didn't expect what subsequently took place.

Messing cast an angry burning glance in my direction and said with irritation:

"l don't need your superfluous commands. It would be difficult to climb up there, since there's no ladder."

I, of course, became extremely embarrassed and began to mutter something to justify myself.  l stopped generating false signals right away.

Messing began concentrating again, and one could sense that he was going inside himself. He stood suspended in that manner for several minutes.

When I had finished reading the copy, Messing said, "So Taibele, I found the pen without difficulty of course. But I've given you this to read so that you can appreciate the difficulties I have to overcome at times.  Sometimes the public will hinder me unconsciously; their stray thoughts echo like a discordant chorus. In order to penetrate through to the thoughts of the inductor, I have to screen out this continuous hum. It is like being at a market place, where all the merchants are vying with each other by shouting out their wares. You turn your head left and right, but you can’t tell where any one voice is coming from.

"The contact with the sender's hand lightens the task and helps me distinguish the one essential thought I must respond to from the others. And that is all.

"But I can easily make do without such a beacon. By the way, when my eyes are bound, the task becomes easier, and I can completely switch to the inductor's vision. There is less interference when I rely on visual perceptions than mental influences. Many think I can walk easily and freely around the hall with my eyes bound because I had instantly memorized the room's configuration, but, in point of fact, a bridge comes into being between my optic nerve and that of my sender, and I can see everything that the inductor perceives."

Wolf returned the magazine to me, signifying that our discussion of the article was finished.