Demonic Possession and Exorcism - Research Paper Example

Demonic Possession and DID I Introduction Except for such film ics as The Exorcist, demonic possession cases are at present, unheard of especially in First World countries. In the 18th century, however, and in centuries before that demonic possession was a common occurrence, especially in various areas in Europe. Demonic possession had its origin in the Bible, especially in the New Testament, where Jesus was oftentimes described to have cast off many demons from out of hapless victims. Historically, demonic possession was part of the Judeo-Christian faith and that many cases mimicked biblical demonic possession, where demons supposedly took control of their victims manifesting evil characteristics and abilities not associated with the persons hosting such evil spirits. In the last half of the 20th century, an epidemic of a personality disorder called dissociative identity disorder (DID) emerged, which is primarily characterized by the presence of two or more personalities or alters that compete in taking control over the same person. A comparison of their respective symptoms, causes and treatment indicate that DID and demonic possession are almost identical. II Background Demonic possession, both individual and collective, is a significant part of the Judeo-Christian faith in Europe and the Middle East and documented cases were noted up through the 1700s with isolated cases emerging in the 1800s up to the present. 1 The Old Testament refers to demonic possession sparingly but the New Testament is replete with it, such as Jesus casting out ‘unclean spirits.’ In Luke 8:30, for example, Jesus exorcised the demons called Legion and cast them into a group of pigs. Some other biblical passages on the subject are: Luke 9:38-43, where an epileptic boy is said to be possessed by a demon; Luke 11:14 a person is made mute because of demon; Luke 13:10-13, a woman was possessed by a demon who crippled her for 18 years, and; Matthew 15:21-28, a woman pleaded with Jesus to cast a demon from out of her daughter. 2 In the Middle Ages, the Church became preoccupied with demonic possession suspecting anyone exhibiting out-of-the-ordinary behavior of being possessed by the Devil. During the Inquisition, people believed to be possessed by demons were arrested, tried and executed if found guilty. The Catholic Church issued a procedure for exorcising demons in 1614 included in a document called Rituale Romanum, which can be performed by a priest alone while the Protestant Reformation discarded the idea of demonic possession. 3 III Symptoms, Causes and Treatment of Demonic Possession The known symptoms of demonic possession are: sharp pains that cause the victims to cry out; vomiting; distended parts of the body; uttering of blasphemous words and parallel behavior; extraordinary physical or mental ability; melancholia;4 convulsions; loss of speech or hearing or appetite; hallucinations, and; breathing problems. 5 The Catholic document Rituale Romanum prescribes four symptoms: repugnance towards holy objects, such as holy water, crucifix, the Bible; the sudden ability to speak in languages that were previously unknown to the subject; superhuman strength, and; unexpected knowledge of facts that are supposed to be secret. 6 Nevius (1968), listed his own observations of major symptom: an emerging new personality or personalities that tries to control the old one; introducing of the new personality of itself as a demon; using personal pronouns with “I” representing the demon and “he or she” for the person possessed; using titles and names; physical manifestations of the demon in the body of the possessed; the manifestation of new mental abilities not possessed by the subject previously, and; complete change of moral character. 7 During the Middle Ages, most demonic possession victims were young girls or female adolescents. One psychologist observed that the affliction seemed to attach only to people with little influence and importance in the community who had no outlet to vent their frustrations in social inequities. In early modern Europe, most victims of the affliction were nuns and girls living in restricted environments but it was early modern France, which had the biggest numbers of demonic possessions reported between 1562 and 1642, where French nuns exhibited outrageous sexually shocking behavior such as pulling up their habits and other lascivious acts, which a London doctor at that time called symptoms of hysteromania or erotmoania.8 Before the Age of Enlightenment, cases of demonic possession were treated by exorcism and one of the foremost exorcists was Johann Joseph Gassner, a Catholic priest, who performed exorcism by laying-on of hands rather than the rites prescribed by the Church. Gassner started to gain recognition in a small village in Switzerland, and eventually achieved fame in Europe. Gassner identified demonic possession by speaking to patients in Latin and when the patient responded with convulsions, proceeding to taming and ejecting the spirit, all the while speaking in Latin. 9 In 1775, however, a physician Franz Anton Mesmer developed the pseudophysical theory of animal magnetism, the precursor of modern hypnosis, where he proposed that all illnesses, including demonic possession, could be cured by channeling the universal magnetic fluid supposed found in a person’s body. Mesmer was asked to investigate Gassner’s work because the Church did not approve of his unorthodox method of exorcism. Mesmer applied his theory and obtained the same results as Gassner except that he did not attribute his work to faith but science. He offered the explanation that Gassner himself was practicing animal magnetism, without his knowledge. 10 IV Demonic Possession vis-à-vis Dissociative Identity Disorder Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), formerly referred to as Multiple Personality Disorder (MPP), is a controversial area in psychiatry, with passionate advocates on one hand and skeptics on the other. The reason is that the primary symptom of this illness, which is the existence of multiple personalities in one person, is not really easy to digest. Added to the fact is that most studies done on it are more anecdotal than empirical, and are therefore not scientifically validated. A DID epidemic was observed in the United States in the latter half of the 20th century, which coincided with the release of such movies as The Three Faces of Eve and Sybil and which took many American physicians, with scarce knowledge of the illness, by surprise. Previous to this, attention to DID was nil and it was then considered a part of the hysteria syndrome, but in 1966, DID received its own nomenclature and was separated from hysteria. 11 The primary symptom of DID is the manifestation of two or more personalities, that have no knowledge of the other or others existence and take control of the person at various times, unjustified by known medical conditions. 12 Other secondary symptoms of DID are: flashbacks, voices and conversion. Other researchers, such as Dell (2002, 2006), also noted disassociation-related symptoms: “memory problems; depersonalization; derealization; trance; flashbacks; child voices; persecutory voices; voices arguing or conversing; influences playing on the body; thought insertions; thought withdrawal; time loss, and; fugues.”13 DID is allegedly caused by prolonged childhood trauma, such as physical and sexual abuse, which accounts for the fact that many of DID patients are women. It is believed that girls are more prone to sexual and physical abuse during their childhood than boys, and the splintering of personalities is a coping mechanism for such abuses.14 There are different perspectives in DID treatment. One school of thought thinks that the patient should accept that the different personalities are real and are part of identity, but another school of thought believes that patients should understand that alters are not real but are merely self-generated. Even therapists differ in their goals of helping DID patients: some believe that the goal should be integrated functioning to be achieved by patient recall of repressed memories of traumatic experience, detraumatizing them and integrating the secondary personalities or alters to the primary personality, and; the fusion of all the alters into one cohesive personality. In all types of therapies, the basic treatment modalities are hypnosis and psychodynamic therapy. 15 Spirit or demonic possession is believed to be a form of DID. Désiré Bourneville, a 19th century French neurologist, restudied the documentation of demonic possession cases and saw the basic clinical symptoms of DID (then referred to as ‘doubling of the personality”) in them. In the case, for example, of a 16th century Dominican nun named Jeanne Fery who underwent exorcism for demonic possession in 1584 and 1585, a diagnosis of DID was successfully made helped by the well documented history of trauma and core clinical manifestations of DID. V Conclusion DID and demonic possession share the same symptoms, causes and even treatment, which could make one conclude that these two conditions are one and the same. Demonic possession, for example, is caused by trauma and usually afflicts persons who have lowly station in life and have no avenues for their suppressed anger and other emotions, while DID have been noted to afflict individuals who had a long history of trauma caused by sexual or physical abuse. The personality changes seem to be a way of coping with trauma and repressed emotions in both cases. Even the types of victims are shared by the two: in demonic possessions, young girls and nuns were the usual victims, which is also true in DID. The symptoms are identical as well, with both manifesting the existence of new personalities that are very much at variance with the original personality. Moreover, the same types of treatment seemed to work for both. Exorcism and animal magnetism, a precursor of modern hypnosis, are the only known treatment modalities which seemed to work with demonic possession. Exorcism itself as performed by Gassner was just a form of animal magnetism as explained by Mesmer. On the other hand, animal magnetism is fundamentally hypnosis, a technique now being used in treating DID. 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