Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
January 16, 2019
Niklas Foxeus
The achievement of independence in 1948 was in many ways a watershed in Burma’s history. At this time, a variety of Buddhist movements emerged that were part not only of a ‘Burmese Buddhist revival’, in which even the government was involved, but also a general re-enchantment of Asia. In the period following World War II, projects of nation-building and further modernization were implemented in...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
January 16, 2019
Kaj Björkqvist
The biological study of man is one of today's most rapidly advancing sciences. There is no reason for not utilizing these methodologies of research and the knowledge already gained when studying ecstasy and other similar religious phenomena. Drugs have been used in all parts of the world as an ecstasy technique. Since mental states and physiological correlates always accompany each other, it is...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
January 16, 2019
Göran Ogén
The purpose of this essay is to shed some light on the phenomenon of religious ecstasy as met within Islamic mysticism and there particularly during its classical period. In this case, the expression "classical Sufism" refers to the period of Sufi history from about 850 A.D. until circa 1100 A.D. In the Sufi vocabulary there is even a rather differentiated terminology concerning these ecstatic...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
2011
Tuija Hovi
10 citations
Rhythmic body movements and dancing, as well as singing, have been used as a means and inspiration for both individual and communal spiritual experience throughout the history of religions. This article takes a tentative look at the contemporary neocharismatic culture of celebration as a means of aiming at religious experience through collective bodily practice; namely praising, which is...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1996
Desmond Ayim-Aboagye
2 citations
The Akans of Ghana are traditionally accustomed to celebrating different rituals which are enshrined in their cultural life. Libation pouring, which accompanies the celebration of great rituals, amidst the subsidence of the sound of music and dance, can display a special art in religion. The primary objective of this paper is to examine libation as a ritual experience, and in so doing to draw...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1996
Umar Habila Dadem Danfulani
1 citation
Chadic-speakers perform annual festivals of the ancestors, kok nji; cropping kop; harvesting, dyip and hunting kwat, which are usually accompanied by dancing, singing and other numerous rites and rituals. These ritual dramas symbolically and overtly express the religious experience, feelings and emotions that are deeply buried in the religious consciousness of the people. This article intends...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1993
Antoon Geels
4 citations
Ritual prayer (salat), performed five times a day, belongs to the fundamental obligations of all Muslims. In addition to this fact, there is another type of prayer, associated with mystical orders in all Islamic countries. Repetitive prayer (dhikr) in mystical Islam (Sufism) belongs to the most central activities of the orders. Despite the geographic spread of the Sufi orders (turuq), accounts...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1993
Jonathan Horwitz
3 citations
Most of the previously practiced methods of investigating the shamanic rite have only shown half the picture. For a deeper understanding, it is also necessary to examine the rite's content. Taking the shaman's point of view into consideration, listening to how the shaman describes his experiences, and honoring that description as valid, is the first step.The work of the shaman has always been a...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1991
Rolf Kristoffersson
Research on the Saami shamanic drum has mainly concerned the pictorial world of the drumhead. Therefore, studying the sound picture may give new insights into the Saami Shamanic drum. In my study of the Saami drum I have tried to find the answer to two questions: 1) Is it possible to detect the sound pictogram from some of the drums preserved? 2) Are there marks of usage which might indicate...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1991
Åke Hultkrantz
Shamanism has not been restricted to northern Eurasia and the American Arctic, although it was here that it received its most remarkable forms. It is thus central to consider whether the drum is an integrative part of shamanism and should be examined against a general, and not a regional background. It is important to distinguish Arctic shamanism from other forms of shamanism. Arctic shamanism...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1987
Daniel Merkur
The present contribution to the phenomenology of witchcraft will depend for its data on the traditional conceptions, rites, and folklore of witchcraft among the Inuit (Eskimo) of Čanada and Greenland. A phenomenological definition of witchcraft may be obtained through recognition of its position within Inuit religion. Like many native North Americans, the Inuit epitomized their religion in the...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1987
Juha Pentikäinen
What is the history of the drum, which once arrived from the Saami area in northernmost Europe to the collections of an Italian museum, L. Pigorini museum? At the moment, it is the only Saami drum the existence of which is certain in Italy. Saami drums were probably popular objects of export in the 17th and 18th centuries. Missionaries and explorers brought dozens of drums from various parts of...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1987
Åke Hultkrantz
Often the saiva (or saivo) spirits have been defined as the guardian and helping spirits of the shaman. In this way, Saami shamanism appears as a counterpart to shamanism in Siberia and North America where guardian-spirit beliefs have similarly played a distinctive role. These beliefs should be considered as one of the constituent elements of shamanism. However, the concept of guardian spirits...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1982
Hans Hof
1 citation
Phenomena such as ecstasy and mysticism display both psychological and physical features. The purpose of this paper is finding and understanding the structures in human consciousness which characterise the experience of certain kinds of ecstasy. The context in which this task is performed is an outline of fundamental changes in consciousness brought about by those methods of meditation which,...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
1982
Antoon Geels
Since the turn of the century, mystic researchers have pointed to the similarities between mystics on the one hand, and artists, poets, mathematicians, musicians, in short, all those who are involved in creative activity. One common denominator, using the terminology of the day, is a state of inspiration, a sort of creative ecstasy, an immediate insight of some form. However, the question of...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
August 1, 1967
Jenö Fazekas
It is claimed that it is possible to recover an important segment of the religion of pre-Christian Hungary and its intellectual culture by attempting to isolate the shamanistic survival in Hungarian folk tradition. According to certain scholars this shamanistic element came from the East some thousand years ago to the region now dominated by Hungarian folk tradition along with the migrant...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
August 1, 1967
Erik Holtved
Shamans and shamanistic performances have been described from almost all parts of the Eskimo world, from the Pacific Ocean and Bering Strait to East Greenland, and to judge from the records it seems that the position and traditional functions of the shaman in general have had a rather uniform stamp all over this vast area. Apparently shamanism has been narrowly connected with Eskimo culture far...
Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
August 1, 1967
Odd Nordland
Our usual conception of the shaman is, indeed, that he employs monotonous effects to fall into ecstasy and arrive at the state of trance: he sings and dances alone, or along with others. The auditory stimulations and the motoric movements, in increasing intensity, and the emotional induction from the crowd around him result in his falling into a trance in the end, and the disconnecting of...