Mystery of Christ's Wounds

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Mystery of Christ's Wounds

 

 

08/30/2004 15:35

 

 

 

Stigmata appeared

for the first time on the hands of the founder of the Franciskan order,

St. Francis

Mental processes,

emotions and

feelings are closely connected with the human body. The interaction of

'body and soul' is exposed most explicitly on human skin. The

phenomenon of stigmata is still considered a religious enigma. However,

one may say there are a lot of religious people, whose hands may start

bleeding on religious holidays, particularly during The Passion. "In

Christian mysticism, bodily marks, scars, or pains suffered in places

corresponding to those of the crucified Jesus-on the hands and feet,

near the heart, and sometimes on the head (from the crown of thorns) or

shoulders and back (from carrying the cross and being whipped),"

Encyclopedia Britannica says.

The phenomenon appeared

long

ago. At the end of the 19th century doctors examined Louise Lato -

bleeding wounds appeared on her hands during religious holidays for no

particular reason. Doctors put a sealed bondage on one of the girl's

hands prior to a religious holiday. The bondage was removed on Good

Friday - members of the Belgian Academy of Sciences saw bleeding ulcers

on the girl's hand.

Teresa Neiman (deceased

in

1962) was kept under profound medical supervision for a very long time.

Teresa was suffering from Christ's Wounds too: blood would start

flowing spontaneously, causing terrible pain to the woman. Wounds would

then heal up in a week without scarring. Furthermore, the woman was

suffering from bloody tears and bloody sweat.

As it is known from the

history

of religion, stigmata appeared for the first time on the hands of the

founder of the Franciskan order, St. Francis (1182-1226). Over 300

cases have been described since then. It is noteworthy, religion is not

the only ground that causes stigmata to appear. Writers may suffer from

them at times too, when they become too much preoccupied with their own

characters. Charles Dickens wrote, for instance, that his face had

swollen when he was working on the story "The Chimes." Soviet writer

Maxim Gorky fainted, when he was writing a scene, in which a jealous

husband stabs his wife in the liver. A bleeding wound soon appeared on

Maxim Gorky's body, in the area of his liver.

Mysterious bodily wounds

may

appear, if relatives endure too much of their relatives' sufferings. A

sister witnessed her brother being whipped - her back was then covered

with bleeding scars reminiscent of her brother's. The fact was

officially documented. Doctor Faivishevsky described similar

occurrences with women, who were forced to witness their children being

beaten.

Stigmatization as a

result of

nightmares has also been described in medical literature. A medical

college student attended the autopsy procedure for the first time in

her life. The next day she said she had had a very bad dream, in which

the dead man was choking her and grabbing her hands, trying to drag her

away. When she woke up, she found her neck and wrists bruised. Doctor

Kolbin described a child, who had lost his hair after a nightmare. The

little boy had a dream, in which his grandfather rose from the casket

and grabbed the boy's hair. The child had the nightmare several nights

in a row, losing more and more of his hair.

The phenomenon of

imaginary

pregnancy is to be categorized as autosuggestion, when sterile women

develop lipopexia on their stomachs, which in its turn incites adequate

breast changes. "It comes from your head, your dreams, to influence

such a quiet vegetative process as the augmentation of adipose tissue,"

scientist I.Pavlov wrote.

Some experts believe

stigmata

appear due to brain activities, such as imagination. A religious

fanatic may suffer from Christ's Wounds, if he or she thinks too much

about the crucified Jesus. Writers may suffer from this bodily ailment

if they share the suffering and pain of their own literature

characters.

Doctor A. Lechner

hypnotized a

girl in 1993, having reproduced Christ's Wounds on her hands. Doctor A.

Kartashev was keeping a female patient under his observation in 1936.

In a state of hypnosis the woman had been convinced she had been taking

quinine. Nettle-rash developed for the woman several hours after the

seance. Bruises, frostbite, edema, rash and pigmentation are possible

to be caused with hypnosis.

The above-mentioned story

about

the boy, who had lost his hair because of the nightmare, can also be

classified as autosuggestion. A well-known Russian "psychotherapist"

Anatoly Kashpirovsky was very popular in the USSR. He conducted healing

sessions and seances for audiences numbering in millions on live Soviet

television at the end of the 1980s. A girl's body was covered with hair

as a result of one of such "healing sessions." One may assume

Kashpirovsky caused a rough dysfunction of endocrine glands, which made

hairs appear all over the girl's body. Kashripovsky claimed he did not

use hypnosis in his session - he did not say the world "sleep," as he

explained in an interview. One has to acknowledge, however, modern

medicine does not identify hypnosis with sleep now. An up-to-date

definition says hypnosis causes a state of constricted conscience,

which may evolve not only as a result of a verbal influence.

"Extrasensory individuals,sorcerers" and other "healers" use the

effect of autosuggestion in their practice. However, they do not think

that hypnosis reminds the work of a surgeon. Putting a person in a

hypnotic trance can be compared to an abdominal surgery. Just a cut on

a patient's stomach does not determine the skills of a surgeon. The

mastery of a psychotherapist implies the reasonable influence on a

patient prepared to comprehend the medical treatment by suggestion. The

diversity of this influence is similar to the diversity of illnesses.

Complications are possible to occur when this condition is broken.

V. Lebedev

Doctor of psychological sciences

 

 

 

 

 

Read the original in Russian:

(Translated by: Dmitry

Sudakov)

 

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