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Mircea Eliade - Siberian Shamanism and the Cosmic mountain
Identifier
010976
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
Mircea Eliade – Shamanism Archaic techniques of ecstasy
The fundamental unity of Central and North Asian shamanism will appear when we study the technique of séances. The cosmological structure of all these shamanic rites will then be elucidated. It is, for example, clear that the birch symbolises the Cosmic Tree or the Axis of the World and that it is therefore conceived as occupying the Centre of the World, by climbing it the shaman undertakes an ecstatic journey to the centre…………..
The seven nine or twelve ‘notches’ represent the heavens, the celestial planes. It should be noted that the shaman’s ecstatic journey always takes place near the centre of the world. We have seen that among the Buryat, the shamanic birch is called udesi-burkhan, the ‘guardian of the door’, for it opens the entrance to the sky for the shaman