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Past Lives, Reincarnation and Karma decades of droppings, there was the carving exactly as she had Almost single-handedly over several decades, Ian Stevenson drawn it! Again, Ramster and others provide many more pioneered research into children who spontaneously recall past similarly impressive cases. lives. Only now, in semi-retirement, is he starting to achieve the The other way in which past-life regression provides recognition he so richly deserves. Many of his cases involve ver- impressive proof of reincarnation is in those cases that involve ifiable details that are so obscure they could not have been dramatic therapeutic benefits. Many of the pioneering past-life obtained by normal means, unless deliberate collusion and decep- therapists, whose work blossomed in the 1960s and 1970s, were tion were involved—and his methodology has been deliberately scientifically trained psychologists and psychiatrists but most of designed to spot these and other suspect motives. them were initially of a sceptical or atheistic persuasion. These To summarise just one of his more impressive cases, from an pioneers included Alexander Cannon, Denys Kelsey, Morris early age Swarnlata Mishra spontaneously recalled details of the Netherton and Edith Fiore (see The Book of the Soul). life of another Indian girl called Biya Pathak, who had lived in a The regression technique had been used sporadically for separate town some way away from her present home and whose decades beforehand, but it appears that these therapists family was eventually traced. Stevenson found that, in all, she discovered it independently and more or less by accident, often made 49 statements about her previous life, when regressing patients into their only a few of which could be regarded as in childhood. Imprecise commands are taken any sense inaccurate and 18 of which were literally by those under hypnosis, and when made before there had been any contact the patients were asked, for example, to "go whatsoever between the two families. back further", they suddenly began These statements included identifying describing events that could not have related former family members, sometimes while 9 to their current life. being actively misdirected, coming up with But even if Intrigued, the pioneers experimented to her former husband that he had taken HEI ENE ais pavehological and.» paychosomatie 1,200 rupees from her money box— completely unable to disorders—which had remained virtually something known only to the two of them. explain these various untouched by years of conventional There are many more similarly impressive therapy—were completely alleviated, cases in Stevenson's files. types of evidence sometimes after only a few sessions of past- If we now turn to past-life regression, its satisfactorily, are there life therapy. And the therapy was successful 3 value as a proof of reincarnation lies in . irrespective of whether or not the two main areas. The first and most alternative paranormal patient or, for that matter, the therapist obvious again involves cases in which H believed in reincarnation. It was this historical details emerge that are not explanations universal experience that convinced all only verifiable but also are so obscure that do not involve of the pioneers that this was no mere that they could not have been obtained by any normal means—and, again, in which the possibility of deliberate deception is so remote as to be negligible. Some of the finest examples come from Australian psychologist Peter Ramster's research, which has certainly placebo effect, and that reincarnation is a reality. But even if materialists are com- pletely unable to explain these various types of evidence satisfactorily, are there alternative paranormal explana- tions that do not involve reincarnation? One suggestion is that subjects are tap- not had the ongoing exposure, at least ping into ancestral memories passed on outside of Australia, that it undoubt- in their genes. But many past lives are edly deserves. Ramster became so intrigued by the past-life found to be close together and yet to involve different continents memories of several of his better subjects that he decided to take or even races, at a time when people were generally not particu- them to Europe where these lives had supposedly taken place and larly mobile. Moreover, many of Stevenson's cases involve lives which they had never before visited in their current life. He also separated by only a few years, in which the two families involved put together a documentary film crew to record the events under are demonstrably not genetically linked. controlled conditions. The other potential paranormal explanation is that the subjects One of his finest subjects was Gwen McDonald. She initially are tapping into some sort of universal memory or consciousness, remembered a number of obscure details of the 18th-century life and that the past lives accessed in this way do not belong to the of a girl called Rose Duncan, who lived in Glastonbury, England. individual concerned. But therapeutic results could never be When she was brought to England, local historians and residents obtained if this were what was happening. In addition, most verified all these details—including obscure or obsolete names of _ cases of past-life regression show clear karmic linkages between places and people, obsolete elements of local dialect, and details lives that are personal and individual. reincarnation? of houses and other buildings as they had existed in the 18th Nowhere is this more evident than in the most extraordinary century. cases investigated by Stevenson—those of children born with Most stunning was her insistence that she had been taken to a unusual birthmarks and defects. By investigating post-mortem cottage whose floor stones had been stolen from Glastonbury reports and so on, he found that in a number of cases the birth- Abbey; one of them had an obscure carving on it, which she had marks and defects corresponded exactly to the wounds that killed sketched while still in Sydney. When she led them to what was the previous personality the child claimed to have been and for now a dilapidated chicken shed and after they swept away the whom other verifiable data had been given. But even if completely unable to explain these various types of evidence satisfactorily, are there —Ma oe wate 2 ee +e alternative paranormal explanations that do not involve century. Most stunning was her insistence that she had been taken to a cottage whose floor stones had been stolen from Glastonbury Abbey; one of them had an obscure carving on it, which she had sketched while still in Sydney. When she led them to what was now a dilapidated chicken shed and after they swept away the 50 + NEXUS materialists are reincarnation? www.nexusmagazine.com DECEMBER 2005 — JANUARY 2006