Communication with the divine and the otherworldly

Many claim to communicate with the divine or some sort of intelligence beyond human, including with the realm of the dead. We use all sorts of names for these people, among them: channelers, oracles, psychics, mediums, and even prophets. There are numerous YouTube channels where grieving parents claim to be channeling their dead children by asking them questions about the afterlife, for example. It’s best to reserve one’s judgment when coming across people claiming to communicate with the dead, but that goes without writing (or saying).

A lot of conmen (conman comes from confidence man, by the way, and emphasizes the way they build trust and confidence with their victims) prey on grief because they know grief makes people particularly vulnerable and open to suggestion. Grief isn’t something you can fix or patch up – it’s a gaping black hole sucking all the joy into it after you lose someone important to you. The hole that’s likely always going to be there, even if you manage to make it smaller, you’re unlikely to make it vanish. No wonder all sorts of ”after-death communication experts” jump on a chance to make a quick buck. Does it mean there are no genuine psychics, and others communicating with the world beyond our own? Of course not, but one needs to ask really detailed questions to find out if it isn’t just mind games, keen observation skills, willingness, if not desperation to believe, and the power of suggestion. Or as the Catholic Church would have us believe: it’s all demonic. You can even try recording the voices of the dead on digital devices. People do it and some claim to get great results.

Spooky, huh? It is, indeed.

Then, there are people who claim to be channeling ETs or interdimensionals/ultraterrestrials (aliens or humans from other realities, some realities similar to ours, some vastly different). Most of these so-called channelers are comical and exaggerate ET languages that are likely either made-up nonsense words or languages constructed on a whim. Yes, there are people that construct languages from scratch. Esperanto is the world’s most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Created by L. L. Zamenhof in 1887 to be ‘the International Language’, it’s intended to be a universal second language for international communication. Zamenhof was a Polish Jew. His family spoke Yiddish, Russian, and Polish at home, and he learned Hebrew as well.

Prophets, of course, are particularly significant in the grand scheme of things. If someone is considered a prophet, every word the prophet conveys to the group of believers is considered divinely inspired. Prophets were treated in all sorts of ways throughout history. From veneration to humiliation.

Some were abducted and forced to tell the future and give advice to powerful people and groups.

Prophets sometimes occupy the liminal space. That in-between-worldness, suspension between worlds of the living and the dead, existing between the mortal and the divine, gives them special insight into the inner workings of the universe. I guess we might say they can hack the Matrix.

Liminality can even extend to genders. In Greek mythology, Tiresias was turned into a woman for seven years as punishment by Hera. His prophecy-giving ability stemmed from his unique experiences, including living as both a man and a woman. He also faced awkward questions from the gods who were curious to learn who had more pleasure in life.