Shapeshifters, Shamans, Therianthropes and UFO's

For some time now, I have been interested in prehistory... in particular, the Paleolithic. From my initial interest in the mysteries surrounding standing stones, henges, mounds, etc., I soon became aware of the hundreds of symbols which are synonomous with that age.

Spirals, crosses, zig zags and other entopics are found everywhere in the places Homo Sapiens Sapiens called home during that era. One of the main characteristics of these early symbols, going back over 70,000 years, is that of the therianthrope, a being half human and half animal (mostly). We have representatives of these mythical beings in modern times, as is evident in lycanthropy and vampires. There is also the pantheon of Egyptian gods such as the jackal-headed Anubis or the ibis-headed Thoth.

(also examples among many other civilizations, ie the Maya, Inca, etc)

From what I have learned, these therianthropic depictions (on cave walls or rock shelters in the earliest instances)- are representations of shamanic journeys into the spirit world. It is evident in the record (over 70,000 years of cave art, etc.), that the shaman could take on animal form...partially, and even completely, through 'shapeshifting'.

Recently, I purchased Graham Hancock's book, Supernatural. In it, he discusses in depth a great deal of the material aforementioned. While it is admittedly speculation on his part, he does raise an important question tying together the UFO phenomenon, shapeshifting, abductions and our well known grays into one grand idea...

from Supernatural by Graham Hancock publisher Doubleday Canada

page 312

Could 'aliens' and 'spirits' be the same thing - or the same class of thing? And if so, what might this mean for our understanding of the human condition and the nature of reality? Could the realm from which UFO's appear - and then seem to disappear back into again 'between one blink of the eye and the next' - be the spirit world, as John Mack came increasingly to believe? More intriguingly, what are the chances of this being the same spirit world, with its well-charted supernatural geography and inhabitants, that shamans have entered and negotiated with by means of hallucinatory out-of-body journeys since time immemorial?

The idea seems absurd by the tenets of Western science, which holds all spirit worlds to be illusory of the contents of our own minds. Still, I couldn't help being intrigued by the close parallels I'd found between the piercings and inexplicable surgical procedures supposedly carried out on shamans by spirits, and the same sorts of procedures experienced by UFO abductees at the hands of aliens. I began to re-examine ethnographic studies of shamanism side by side with casebooks of UFO abductee reports to see if there were other such similarities. Gradually I became fascinated and immersed - for there seemed not just to be similarities here but a whole network of closely interwoven and interdependent connections so intricate and extensive that they could not possibly have arisen by chance.

Hancock goes into great detail in the following chapters outlining those similarities, and to my eye does so very convincingly.

My question to you, finally, is this...is it possible that the UFO phenomenon could, in comparison to the wealth of information you have accumulated, originate from 'a' spirit world?

Could there be a 'rift' between 'dimensions', through which 'aliens' visit our 'world', just as shamans in the distant past (and still do today), have visited theirs?
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Supernatural is indeed a very interesting book, if you haven't already, I really think you should read it, David.
I'm currently reading Supernatural, and I sometimes get te feeling Hancock 'borrowed' some idea's from you about RNA/DNA being a receptor for information, which you talk about in your book 'Infinite love'.

Have you read anything by Jacques Vallee? He wrote a book called "Passport to Magonia" back in the '70's I believe. It deals with this subject very well. Jacques is brilliant and makes some excellent points. He has seriously studied UFO's pretty much all of his life and knows a great deal about them.

-Forestlady

Originally posted by forestlady
Have you read anything by Jacques Vallee? He wrote a book called "Passport to Magonia" back in the '70's I believe. It deals with this subject very well. Jacques is brilliant and makes some excellent points. He has seriously studied UFO's pretty much all of his life and knows a great deal about them.

-Forestlady

Thanks for that, forestlady. I haven't read much by Jacques Vallee, and basically came at this subject from paleoanthropology. There are a number of books out there that hold clues from that angle; The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age, by Richard Rudgley and The Quest for the Shaman by Miranda & Steven Aldhouse-Green to name a couple of the more recent books.

'Supernatural' just seemed to tie things together for me.

I found a good interview of Vallee by a bit of Googling, and you're right...he does touch on the same idea. Now I'll have to get his book as well...thanks!

link

In 1969, Vallee published another groundbreaking book, Passport to Magonia, in which he collected a body of folkloric "myths" that read remarkably like modern UFO encounters, from Celtic tales of fairyland abductions to Biblical passages and medieval chronicles of "visitors" from beyond. Building on Carl Jung's thesis that UFOs are a sociological phenomenon, a product of the collective unconscious, Vallee forever left behind the space-bound E.T. theorists. But his folklorist's approach to the problem would influence a number of later researchers and writers who continue to echo his ideas about other-dimensional forms of consciousness. Best-selling author Whitley Strieber, Harvard "abductee psychologist" John Mack, and journalist Keith Thompson (author of Angels and Aliens all owe a debt to Vallee. Stephen Spielberg paid homage to Vallee in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, basing his French scientist character (played by Francois Truffaut) on the real French UFO theorist.

nice addition to the thread, forestlady...much appreciated. I'll need to go through my collection of Carl Jung's books now too.
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I have read that aliens or some aliens can exist on higher vibrationary levels to ours, much like ghosts are supposed to. Which would account for their mysteriousness.
I wonder if when this supposed shift in the humanitys vibrationary level occurs, we will more easily see ufos zipping around, whereas before we couldnt. : ) Perhaps that will be a large part of our 'awakening'.... or something.

Hi there, I have never read Supernatural, but I have read many fascinating and interesting books.

Phenomenon , Everything you need to know about the Paranormal by Sylvia Browne- is an excellent MUST read. Although I am a bit dissppointed with her at this time, there is a ton of awesome information in there, that does make sense, and it is not hogwash.

Mothman Prophecies by John Keel- This is an excellent read! this is a whole series of events tied together by personal experiences regarding UFOs, MIB, mothman, and even some aliens.

They Cast No Shadows- I have heard that this is an awesome book! I haven't read it myself, but I definetely will! Check it out here www.amazon.com...=8-1/qid=1141741187/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-9325101-4177419?%5Fencoding=UTF8

I am going to buy that book.

*K*

I'm becoming convinced that the UFO phenomena is the result of the supernatural world becoming evident through a growing awareness in the collective mind of humankind.

I am basing this on two conclusions:

1. The human mind has the capacity, without drugs, through dreams and visions, to experience the supernatural world on an increasing scale as we 'open our minds' to the possibility that it indeed does exist as an actual alternate reality seperated from our normal reality only by the thinnest of veils...our lying brains telling us to ignore it

2. The supernatural is the source for all the worlds religions and, while in the distant past, the travel to it was restricted by shamanism, it is today entering into the 'collective consciousness' per the UFO phenomena.

from The Quest for the Shaman by Miranda & Stephen Aldhouse-Green, published by Thames & Hudson.

Lewis-William's line of reasoning has two main elements: first, that both abstract and representational art were effectively absent from Neanderthal contexts, being associated only with anatomically modern humans; second, that the art did not appear as a result of copying from life but, rather was a consequence of depicting images seen within the human brain, particularly in sleep or when the subject had achieved an altered state of consciousness. Such 'states' are widely accepted by archaeologists and anthropologists as being an integral part of shamanism. Neanderthals, according to Lewis-Williams, were neither able to remember their dreams nor talk about them and so were doomed to be 'congenital atheists'. Moreover, he believes, religion was born simultaneously with art in the minds of anatomically modern humans as a consequence of the 'fixing', and subsequent interpretation, of dreamed and trance images in two-or three-dimensional form.* Additional to this, the fact that the learned ability (as opposed to neurobiological capacity) to enter trances was limited to a few people meant that art and religion were associated with the appearance of stratified societies.

*note- bolding mine

Speculating here...but I think we (humankind) are becoming more aware. I think we are on the verge of as great a paradigm shift as the one from Neanderthals to modern man. The interaction between the spirit world and what we loosely call 'reality' is a perfect fit for the abductions, surgical procedures and saucer craft which is reported in what we call UFOlogy.
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very interesting Masqua

The thought has crossed my mind before and when it comes to aliens and ufos I have three possible explanations.

a) real aliens, from far away galaxies visiting us (???)

2) natural human brain functions or deficiencies like sleep paralysis, or some undiagnosed disfunction that causes us to see certain visions (??)

3) natural earth bound entities on another plane or dimension, that occassionaly cross our paths, some could call these spirits, or demons or aliens (??)

Now being that there has always been some of record of alien visitation and ufos in history, I tend to think more of the spiritual/dimensional aspect, imo if it were real aliens from other planets travelling to see us, why after hundreds of years havent' they decided to give us more definitive proof?
I think the reason that ufos and aliens will remain an enigma to many is because our encounters with them are purely accidental, a rip in time, a brief fluctuation in magnetic fields, etc could be the reasons why we get glimpses of these things. For all you know the aliens could think we're the aliens and we're intruding on them?

also if you look at hindu mythology, the descriptions of various incarnations of god and the weapons used seemed to be very much "alien" in description, so there is the aspect that our entire human culture is based on "alien"/"supernatural" worship.

I also feel that in times previous, mankind was more open and susceptible to the forces of the supernatural, but as we evolved we were either trained or evolved to block it out. Are people becoming more "aware"? yes most likely, but I don't think it has to do much with evolution anymore but more because of human desire to want to know more. Just as how we study ancient cultures and prehistoric beasts, we're are beginning to question and want to know more about how we and why we think we do then and now.

sorry for the ramble, I'm slightly distracted as I write this and feel I haven't expressed myself too aptly on this topic, I'll try to revisit later.

Originally posted by worldwatcher

also if you look at hindu mythology, the descriptions of various incarnations of god and the weapons used seemed to be very much "alien" in description, so there is the aspect that our entire human culture is based on "alien"/"supernatural" worship.

Are you referring to the Bhagavad-Gita and the Vimanas? I remember reading about plains of glass (as in nuclear war) as well. I need to dig through my books and read it again. Thanks for your input, ww...another avenue to check out...

I'll try to revisit later.

Looking forward to your further input, Bollywood
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*channeling David Icke*
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nevermind I really can't contribute well enough to this thread with no proper knowledge, so I wont try.

[edit on 14-3-2006 by think2much]

Masgua
Your question was, " Does the UFO phenomena originate from the spririt world" ?
I have never thought of that. When we speak in such advanced terms as we do here, is all not originated from the spirit world? Just trying to complicate the question (I have not read these books)
Awareness, my favorite subject. Yes I believe we as humans have an infinite capacity to grasp " infinity". Awareness is the key I believe, on all levels. Fear holds us from our destiny. To become conscious, to percieve, conscious beings in mind, body and spririt.
Is this how we have gained contact to the "ET" world. I doubt it, my only contact was very physical, I sense they are physical. But I don't know, both perhaps.
I think we are destined to become fully conscious I think it "is time" that it's urgent that "man" holds his whole truth.
The past 20 years I have walked the path of awareness and I still consider myself a novice. I feel it is crucial that we wake up.
Just ramblin.
Thank You WIS

Originally posted by WalkInSilence
Your question was, " Does the UFO phenomena originate from the spririt world" ?
I have never thought of that. When we speak in such advanced terms as we do here, is all not originated from the spirit world? Just trying to complicate the question

(I have not read these books)

good point, WIS...I personally believe everything is part of the spirit world since I'm a Pantheist. However, the 'reality' around us is shaped by our perception of it...we understand our surroundings objectively and do not question that a stone is a solid (when not lava) or that water is a liquid (when not frozen). In our daily lives we just accept these observations as the reality even though we now know the underlying facts related to atomic structure and how (IMO) there really is nothing but space and energy.

It is possible, when people are in a shamanic trance, that they then become aware of the true nature of the surrounding reality...that they are looking through the 'Crack in the Cosmic Egg' (to quote an old book title).

What is most remarkable about the visions a shaman has is the consistancy of those visions compared to other shamans and their experiences.

In the first post in this thread I spoke of Entoptics (spelled it wrong initially). These are 'imagery symbols' which shamans have universally seen from the Paleolithic Age to the present. They are associated with the earliest cave and rock art found to date, going back ~70,000 years, but are seen also by the present day shaman. These images are universal to humankind though they exist only as a result of the hallucinatory experience. Such images are in the form of dots, crosses, crescents, wavy lines, basketry patterns and many other 'standard' visions of 'symbols'. These entoptics are visible in the initial stage of the three visionary experiences...progressing from such symbology to recognizable items such as objects during the 'transitory' stage and finally on to the final stage where the shaman becomes and meets the therianthropes.

All through these stages, the imagery is consistent in all shamanic experiences. Such consistency can only mean that the spirit journeys all go to the same 'place'...and that the shaman then sees the 'true reality'.

Fear holds us from our destiny.

Oh, so true...

I sense they are physical.

When we dream, we are walking, running, feeling, seeing, touching emotional beings totally involved with the reality of the dream. AS we dream, there is no other reality than the dream. It has a physical presence.

Your personal experiences would seem physical.

The shamanic hallucination is no different. What we experience in the dream can be as real to us as our time awake.

I feel it is crucial that we wake up.

It's only a matter of time...modern humans have been around for 190,000 years, co-existed with Neaderthals for 160,000 of those years and throughout that time have progressed in our understanding of reality. The next 'jump', like I said earlier, will be another paradigm shift.
.

I've talked to many shamans and many modern therianthropes as well as the weres of various types. In fact, I did some research on them (academic research.)

Originally posted by masqua
Spirals, crosses, zig zags and other entopics are found everywhere in the places Homo Sapiens Sapiens called home during that era. One of the main characteristics of these early symbols, going back over 70,000 years, is that of the therianthrope, a being half human and half animal (mostly).

Less than that. 20,000 years.

From what I have learned, these therianthropic depictions (on cave walls or rock shelters in the earliest instances)- are representations of shamanic journeys into the spirit world. It is evident in the record (over 70,000 years of cave art, etc.), that the shaman could take on animal form...partially, and even completely, through 'shapeshifting'.

Not necessarily. In some cases these are animal helpers and in others they relate to ceremonies such as the Peyote Ceremony (one of the rock shelters I study has art dating back 1500 years and more and there's a clear depiction of the Deer God and a peyote ceremony.

The idea seems absurd by the tenets of Western science, which holds all spirit worlds to be illusory of the contents of our own minds.

Hancock needs to talk to a few more psychologists, psychiatrists, and anthropologists.

Still, I couldn't help being intrigued by the close parallels I'd found between the piercings and inexplicable surgical procedures supposedly carried out on shamans by spirits, and the same sorts of procedures experienced by UFO abductees at the hands of aliens.

(quiet eye-rolling)
Actually, the shamans did it to themselves, consciously, to enter into the trance. (this also includes genital piercing and so forth.) Unusual stress makes it easier to enter a trance state.

(be glad to discuss this one via U2U... I'm almost never in here and would likely not see replies.)

Originally posted by Byrd
Less than that. 20,000 years.

www.aboriginalartonline.com...

The earliest evidence of human occupation yet found in Australia is in two rock-shelters in Arnhem Land. In the lowest layer of material at these sites there are used pieces of ochre - evidence for paint used by artists 60,000 years ago! These shelters lie at the foot of the western Arnhem Land escarpment in the Kakadu region of the Northern Territory.

Hancock needs to talk to a few more psychologists, psychiatrists, and anthropologists.

He talked to David Lewis-Williiams, who is currently upsetting the apple cart of the accepted standards of anthropology.

(quiet eye-rolling)
Actually, the shamans did it to themselves, consciously, to enter into the trance. (this also includes genital piercing and so forth.) Unusual stress makes it easier to enter a trance state.

This is true...especially evident in South American culture, where the king bloodlets for the benefit of his people. However, this does not relate to the experiences of the UFO abductees, does it?.
(please, I could do without the 'eye rolling' comment...it's not very polite)

(be glad to discuss this one via U2U... I'm almost never in here and would likely not see replies.)

I may take you up on that offer, but, for now, I'd like to hear what David Icke has to say in regard to the intent of the thread.

edit to fix quote
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[edit on 15-3-2006 by masqua]

Byrd;

I'm regretting the caustic remark I made on your "eyes rolling" comment.

It was late and I was tired and I apologise. roll your eyes all you want, I shouldn't be so 'thin skinned'.

That said...I feel it is necessary to show how Graham Hancock defends the sources for his book by picking a few relevant quotes.

from Supernatural by Graham Hancock, published by Random House Canada

It is worth remembering that in archaeology, a turn of the spade can change everything. Still, on todays evidence, it looks very much as though the human symbolic revolution remained 'stuck' more or less at the Blombos phase (of shell jewellery and geometric patterns) for a rather long while- from 77,000 years ago until the great cave art began to appear in Europe more than 40,000 years later. (p 29)

-snip-

Lewis-Williams and Dowson describe their 1988 paper as only 'a conservative beginning to an investigation of possible Upper Palaeolithic mental imagery'. Having gone through it closely now, I have no doubt, and neither do any of the growing number of top-rank scholars who have publicly endorsed the neuropsychological theory since 1988, that the authors made their case well, and that there is indeed- a strong suggestion that at least a significant component of Upper Palaeolithic art...derives from altered states of consciousness and that many of the 'signs' depict entoptic phenomena in the various transformations we have described (p 213)

-snip-

Good new ideas are often very annoying to people who have built their careers around old bad ones. I was therefore startled to learn that Lewis-Williams' work has been violently attacked by a faction of his fellow scholars. In this respect he is like every innovator in this field of study since the amateur archaeologist Marcelino Sanz de Sautoula first tried to tell the world the truth about the cave of Altamira. As we saw in Chapter Six, de Sautoula's good name was destroyed, and his life shortened, by the vile assaults and insults of a cabal of leading nineteenth-century prehistorians. The fact that he was right and the prehistorians wrong didn't make any difference at the time because his opponents so heavily outweighed him in the academic pecking order and because really only one mainstreal scholar- the redoubtable Vilanova y Piera of the University of Madrid- was prepared to offer him open support. (p 214)

-snip-

...according to the prestigious Cambridge Archaeological Journal (CAJ), Lewis-Williams' theories have in recent years 'come to dominate the field, margiinalising interest in other cultural themes such as totemism and records of everyday foraging'. Leading US rock-art expert David Whitley, who makes active use of the neuropsychological model in deciphering Native American shamanic Art, goes so far as to state that Lewis-Williams' contributions represent 'a landmark in the development of Western Archaeology'.

(italics and bolding mine)

edited for spelling (and punctuation) only




[edit on 15-3-2006 by masqua]

[edit on 15-3-2006 by masqua]

Ups, we have a Super Moderater in here.
Masqua you are a super writer and I am nowhere near the littary copasity of you nor others in here, but I do have some practical experience.
( I still can't qoute, forgive my disabilty)

(Qoute Masqua) When we dream we are walking runing......) Yes Dear, I know, the past some 10 years I have made an effort to make use of my dream time becuase my days are so busy. I don't differ between my time awake and at sleep, I am equally active.
This is off topic, Sorry.
(Qoute Masqua) Your personel experience would seem physical.
OH, how I hate argueing on line. Friend, it was physical just as my garden trees, my dreams. The thoughts of others are physical to me.e here
I haven't had much time to indulge in various wise mens scriptures, but (I know he is a cliche) I have studied the teachings of Carlos Castaneda and Arnold Mindell for many years, it is simple teaching. They speak of awareness.
Good post Masqua.
WIS

Ive long considered there is a lot that is shamanic about David Icke...

Surely it his (essentially) shamanic experiances that led to his development as a writer and public speaker, not the other way around?

With regard to Hancock, I certainly found "supernatural" to be the most interesting of his works Ive come across, it has the "feel" that he is onto something...

(alignments with stars and the great pyramid interesting me somewhat less, though obviously remarkable: and just where did the slaves get the trees for the rollers, huh?)

I have all of Carlos Castaneda's books, WIS...I've had them so long they've turned brown and tattered...but they hold a special place with my best collections. Cliche or not, I learned from them.

Below, I typed out one of my favourite poems by the great William Wordsworth. It's about the dream-state and seems to fit very well with your last post...

Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and we become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.

William Wordsworth 1770-1850

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The quote button is on the top right hand corner of each post. When you click on it, you get the entire post you'd like to quote from. By holding down the left side of your mouse and moving your cursor over the text, you are then able to highlight the parts you do not want to include in your post. Just click 'delete' to erase the highlighted bits and you are left with the quote you wish to comment on.

But, the way you're doing it works just as well...

Originally posted by masqua

My question to you, finally, is this...is it possible that the UFO phenomenon could, in comparison to the wealth of information you have accumulated, originate from 'a' spirit world?

Could there be a 'rift' between 'dimensions', through which 'aliens' visit our 'world', just as shamans in the distant past (and still do today), have visited theirs?

In the old days people saw monsters and angels. Now we see apparently tecnological objects.

Carl Jung explored the question in his book 'Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Skies'

He kinda agrees with what you're saying, but says it in a very different langauge. He thought ufo sightings were encounters with 'the self' or the numinous godhead.