The Death of Materialism – Part 4

By: Dave Hunt; ©2000

For the past few months, Dave Hunt has been exploring reasons why the occult has been able to gain such a stronghold in our society. This article will continue that discussion.

Compounding the Error

Many people who call themselves Christians are drawn into the occult because it ac­knowledges the reality of the soul and spirit and can even sound biblical in doing so. This apparent agreement with the Bible is a deliberate setup by Satan in order to lead simple souls into deeper deception.

Professor Brown believes that the human soul exists throughout the entire universe at all times. Thus to view anything going on anywhere in the universe is simply to change one’s center of awareness from the body to the soul. Here is “The Mission of the Farsight Institute”:

The Western scientific paradigm postulates that consciousness is a phenomenon strictly related to brain physiology: when the brain stops functioning, consciousness ceases to exist. This belief has dominated society, and it has inhibited scientific investigation into the nature of the soul. The consequences have been devastating… [to the] spiritual aspect of life….

The Farsight Institute of Scientific Remote Viewing seeks to overturn this flawed paradigm before it is too late. Research at the Farsight Institute demonstrates that consciousness is … eternal and unbounded… basic to and permeates all of physical creation…[making] knowledge of all things… possible.

At The Farsight Institute, we are dedicated to the practical and benevolent use of Scientific Remote Viewing… [for] helping humanity to discern that which is real in… a universe filled with mystery…. Using the controls of modern science… our goal is no less than to perceive the nature of God….^[1]

“To perceive the nature of God” by some “scientific” technique operating in the spiritual realm would seem to pave the way for the ultimate delusion. You may be certain that Dr. Brown’s god is not the God of the Bible or he would look to His Word for an understanding of God. Science is still on its throne even after the death of materialism. That is a recipe for disaster.

An Unshakable, Universal Conviction

Throughout history and in all cultures, mankind has held a common and unshakable conviction that a nonphysical realm inhabited by spirit beings does indeed exist. That even atheists are not immune to this universal sense of the noumenal (a reality beyond the senses) can be easily demonstrated. A suspenseful mystery, for example, or a realistic war movie can stimulate a certain fear in readers or audiences. Horror films or novels about the occult, however, are much more unsettling. Why?

Facing a gun is one thing; facing an unseen “ghost” that is throwing furniture around the room brings terror of a different sort, even to the dogmatic materialist who denies the exist­ence of such entities. As philosopher A. E. Taylor argues:

The “uncanny” is precisely that which does not simply belong to “this” everyday world, but directly impresses us as manifesting in some special way the presence of “the other” world….

It is hard to believe that the most skeptical among us does not know the experience….^[2]

That sense of the “uncanny” to which Taylor refers is normal. It may be repressed, but it remains, no matter how deeply buried. In the former Soviet Union, even after more than 70 years of enforced atheism and the most severe measures against all religious faith, occult­ism is rampant. Belief in the supernatural is so much a part of human consciousness that it persists in spite of all the arguments that skepticism can marshal.

Spirit Entities and the Occult

Robert Jastrow (founder and for many years director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies) theorizes that the evolutionary process could have been going on ten billion years longer on some other planets than on Earth. While the theory of evolution is mathematically impossible, Jastrow’s conclusions are nevertheless of interest. He suggests that some entities could have evolved beyond the limitations of space, matter, and time:

Life that is a billion years beyond us may be far beyond the flesh-and-blood form that we would recognize. It may… [have] escaped its mortal flesh to become something that old-fashioned people would call spirits. And so how do we know it’s there? Maybe it can materialize and then dematerialize. I’m sure it has magical powers by our standards….^[3]

Sir John Eccles, Nobel Prize winner for his research on the brain, describes the brain as “a machine that a ghost can operate.” As a result of his research, Eccles believes there is compelling evidence to support the traditional religious belief in the existence of a non­physical soul and/or spirit—and that it is this “ghost” which actually operates the human brain and through it the body. It is certainly reasonable to assume that the “operator” could very well survive the death of the “vehicle” it was operating.

If the human spirit operates the brain, which in turn operates the body, then psychedelic drugs, yoga, hypnosis, TM, and any other technique for altering consciousness could very well loosen the normal connection between the spirit and the brain. That temporary discon­nection could allow another spirit to operate the brain and thereby subject that person to occult bondage and delusion.

John Lilly invented the isolation tank, which became the inspiration for the movie Al­tered States. He has devoted himself to exploring “altered states of consciousness.” Some of his observations are interesting:

From certain experiences that I have had of leaving the body while in the isolation tank, I would say that the spirit contains the being that is contained in the brain….

Now, if you work in the tank, what you’ve done is to shut down all the known senses… the gravitational field effect is reduced to the minimum possible….

Once you get the input to the brain down to the minimum possible… you’re free to go. Some people call it lucid dreaming…. It’s a lot easier if you have a psychedelic in you, but a lot of people … can just meditate and go into these alternate realities…. I suspect that a lot of new science can come out of this….^[4]

Materialism is Dead

Lilly was only one of many psychiatrists, anthropologists, and other researchers who realized the connection between drugs and the occult. Here was another powerful factor in the death of materialism. Psychedelic drugs open the doorway to a whole universe beyond the material world. Two generations of Westerners have been set free from materialism by drugs, only to be swallowed up by the occult.

No argument could any longer convince those who had experienced the “altered state” that reality was limited to the physical world. The sights, tastes, smells, sounds, and above all the exhilarating feelings in this strange new land of the mind often seemed even more vivid and real than those in the so-called “real world.” Ordinary reality seemed drab and tasteless by comparison. The magical door to what Carlos Castaneda called the “sorcerer’s world,”^[5] a realm surpassing even Alice’s Wonderland, had swung open, and America would never be the same. That world was inhabited by entities who would masquerade in any form that best suited their purpose.

Though Harvard professor William James at one time was convinced that human personality and behavior could be explained in materialistic/deterministic terms, he became a supporter of religious and mystical experiences for which there was no materialistic expla­nation. Unfortunately, he clung to the “scientific method” for understanding the realm of the spirit. As a consequence, James, not unlike the cult members of Rancho Santa Fe, fell victim to the belief that “higher powers” exist and are at work to save the world.

Why should these allegedly “higher powers” be interested in saving the world? Might they not be determined to destroy us for their own selfish reasons? Is it not possible that such evil entities as demons actually exist?

Demonic Possession?

That demonic possession could result from entering an altered state of consciousness is being increasingly acknowledged by scientists and psychologists and other researchers into parapsychology. Jon Klimo, author of one of the most definitive books on channeling, explains:

If your own mind can affect your own brain, then the similar nonphysical nature of another mind might also be able to affect your brain [if it is in a state of receptivity], giving rise to your hearing a voice, seeing a vision, or having the other mind speak or write [through you] by controlling your body the same way you normally control your own body.^[6]

Charles Tart admits reluctantly, “There’s enough evidence that comes in to make me take the idea of disembodied intelligence seriously.”^[7] William James, one of the most highly regarded psychologists of this century, wrote:

The refusal of modem “enlightenment” to treat [demonic] “possession” as a hypothesis… in spite of the massive human tradition based on concrete human experience in its favor, has always seemed to me a curious example of the power of fashion in things “scientific.”

That the demon-theory… will have its innings again is to my mind absolutely certain. One has to be “scientific” indeed to be blind and ignorant enough to suspect no such possibility.^[8]

Psychiatrist Stanislav Grof, pioneer researcher into LSD and altered states, reports that some of the LSD subjects he has studied have had encounters with “astral bodies,” and in some cases this has led to “the characteristics of spirit possession.” Friedrich Nietzsche indicated that the inspiration for Thus Spake Zarathustra came as a form of possession. “It invaded me. One can hardly reject completely the idea that one is the mere incarnation, or mouthpiece, or medium, of some almighty power.” It takes little thought to realize which “almighty power” inspired this great inspirer of Hitler.

Famed architect Buckminster Fuller, after staying up half the night reading Marilyn Ferguson’s groundbreaking book The Aquarian Conspiracy (the New Age Bible), sug­gested that “the spirits of the dead” had helped her to write it. Ferguson laughed and said, “Well, I sometimes thought so, but I wasn’t about to tell anybody.”^[9]

What Does it All Mean?

Materialism is dead. It is no longer the brain, a mass of matter, that is credited with thought, but the mind, a nonphysical entity that is not part of the brain or any other part of the body and thus could apparently survive the death of the body. The mind could therefore entertain perceptions quite independent of the body and its five senses.

Unfortunately, while the delusionary lie of materialism has been largely discredited, it has been replaced by a new spirituality that still remains tied to this universe and to sci­ence. There is a belief in nonphysical “entities,” including “angels,” but their identity is decided entirely on the basis of what they say about themselves. At the same time, there is an even greater skepticism toward belief in demons, Satan, the God of the Bible, and Jesus Christ as the only Savior.

A major problem with scientific spirituality is its inability to deal with life on a moral basis. It can only promise power to supposedly gain control of one’s life. The Bible, on the other hand, claims that the problem with the world is sin and that it cannot be dealt with by “higher powers.” No amount of power, no matter how high, can solve a moral problem.

Notes

1. ↑ Taken from website www. farsight.org.
2. ↑ Essays Catholic and Critical, ed. Edward Gordon Selwyn (Macmillan, 1926), pp. 74-77.
3. ↑ “GeoConversation,” an interview with Robert Jastrow in Geo, February 1982, p. 14.
4. ↑ MAGICAL BLEND: A Transformative Journey, Issue 17, 1987, p.1 3.
5. ↑ Carlos Castaneda, The Power of Silence (Simon and Schuster, 1987), Front fly of jacket, Foreword, etc.
6. ↑ Jon KIimo, Channeling: Investigations on Receiving Information from ParanormaI Sources (Jeremy P. Tarchet, Inc., 1987), p. 249.
7. ↑ Ibid., interview with Tart, p. 253.
8. ↑ William James, “Report on Mrs. Piper’s Hodgson Control,” in Proceedings of the En­glish Society for Psychical Research, 23:1-121.
9. ↑ Klimo, Channeling, p. 313.