Observations placeholder
Mircea Eliade - The sacred disease
Identifier
001629
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
The reverence for epileptics as future shamans and those who are gifted was and still is widespread amongst many cultures,
A description of the experience
Mircea Eliade – Shamanism Archaic techniques of ecstasy
Investigators have not failed to note the striking relations that appear to exist between mental unbalance and the different forms of South Asian and Oceanian shamanism.
According to Loeb, the Nuie shaman is epileptic or extremely nervous and comes from particular families in which nervous instability is hereditary.
On the basis of Czaplicka’s descriptions, J W Layard believed that there was a close resemblance between the Siberian shaman and the bwili of Malekula.
The sikerei of Mentawei and the bomor of Kelantan are also neuropaths.
In Samoa, epileptics become diviners.
The Batak of Sumatra and other Indonesian peoples prefer to choose sickly or weak subjects for the office of magician.
Among the Subanum of Mindanao the perfect magician is usually neurasthenic or at least eccentric.
The same thing is found elsewhere; in the Andaman Islands epileptics are considered great magicians; among the Lotuku of Uganda the infirm and neuropathic are commonly candidates for magic