NGH Hypnosis Training – Lesson 5

A Short History of Hypnosis

Temple of Epidaurus: Healing Sleep

According to Hoffman (1998: p. 10), pilgrims visited the Temple of Epidaurus, an asclepion, in Greece for healing sleep. Seekers of healing would make a pilgrimage and be received by a priest who would welcome and bless them. This temple housed an ancient religious ritual promoting dreams in the seeker that endeavored to promote healing and the solutions to problems, as did the oracles. This temple was built in honor of Asclepios, the Greek god of medicine. The Greek treatment was referred to as incubation, and focused on prayers to Asclepios for healing. The asclepion at Epidaurus is both extensive and well-preserved, and is traditionally regarded as the birthplace of Asclepius. (For a comparable modern tool, see Dreamwork.)

Oracle at Delphi

The Oracle at Delphi was also famous for trances in the ancient Greek world; priestesses there would make predictions about the future in exchange for gold.[5]

Oral Lore and Storytelling

Stories of the saints in the Middle Ages, myths, parables, fairy tales, oral lore and storytelling from different cultures are themselves potentially inducers of trance. Often, literary devices such as repetition are employed, which is evident in many forms of trance induction. Milton Erickson used stories to induce trance, as do many NLP practitioners.

Military

The Spartans were the first to utilize music on the way to battle. They played songs on the flute and sang, which put them into a fearless state for fighting. From at least the 16th century, it was held that march music may induce soldiers marching in unison into trance states where, according to apologists, they bond together as a unit engendered by the rigors of training, the ties of comradeship and the chain of command. This had the effect of making the soldiers become automated, an effect which was widely evident in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries due to the increasing prevalence of firearms employed in warcraft. Military instruments, especially the snare drum and other drums were used to entone a monotonous ostinato at the pace of march and heartbeat. High-pitched fifes, flutes and bagpipes were used for their "piercing" effect to play the melody. This would assist the morale and solidarity of soldiers as they marched to battle.

Joseph Jordania recently proposed a term battle trance for this mental state, when combatants do not feel fear and pain, and when they lose their individual identity and acquire a collective identity.[6]

The Norse Berserkers induced a trance-like state before battle, called Berserkergang. It is said to have given the warriors superhuman strength and made them impervious to pain during battle. This form of trance could have been induced partly due to ingestion of hallucinogenic mushrooms.

Mystics

As the mystical experience of mystics generally entails direct connection, communication and communion with Deity, Godhead and/or god; trance and cognate experience are endemic. (see Yoga, Sufism, Shaman, Umbanda, Crazy Horse, etc.)

As shown by Jonathan Garb,[7] trance techniques also played a role in Lurianic Kabbalah, the mystical life of the circle of Moshe Hayyim Luzzatto and Hasidism.

Christian Mystics

Many Christian mystics are documented as having experiences that may be considered as cognate with trance, such as: Hildegard of Bingen, John of the Cross, Meister Eckhart, Saint Theresa (as seen in the Bernini sculpture) and Francis of Assisi.

Mesmer and the Origin of Hypnotherapy

Mesmer, an influential but discredited promoter of trance states and their curative powers.

Milton Erickson, the founder of hypnotherapy who died in 1980, introduced trance and hypnosis to orthodox medicine and psychotherapy—hypnosis here is something different from traditional clinical hypnosis.

Trance in American Christianity

Taves (1999) charts the synonymic language of trance in the American Christian traditions: power or presence or indwelling of God, or Christ, or the Spirit, or spirits. Typical expressions include "the indwelling of the Spirit" (Jonathan Edwards), "the witness of the Spirit" (John Wesley), "the power of God" (early American Methodists), being "filled with the Spirit of the Lord" (early Adventists; see charismatic Adventism), "communing with spirits" (Spiritualists), "the Christ within" (New Thought), "streams of holy fire and power" (Methodist holiness), "a religion of the Spirit and Power" (the Emmanuel Movement), and "the baptism of the Holy Spirit" (early Pentecostals). (Taves, 1999: 3)

Trance and Anglo-American Protestants

Taves (1999) well-referenced book on trance charts the experience of Anglo-American Protestants and those who left the Protestant movement beginning with the transatlantic awakening in the early 18th century and ending with the rise of the psychology of religion and the birth of Pentecostalism in the early 20th century. This book focuses on a class of seemingly involuntary acts alternately explained in religious and secular terminology. These involuntary experiences include uncontrolled bodily movements (fits, bodily exercises, falling as dead, catalepsy, convulsions); spontaneous vocalizations (crying out, shouting, speaking in tongues); unusual sensory experiences (trances, visions, voices, clairvoyance, out-of-body experiences); and alterations of consciousness and/or memory (dreams, somnium, somnambulism, mesmeric trance, mediumistic trance, hypnosis, possession, alternating personality) (Taves, 1999: 3).