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One of the varieties of sleep is the
state of hypnosis. For many centuries, hypnosis was an inexplicable phenomenon
and gave rise to superstitions and false ideas in people.
Since ancient times, sorcerers and
shamans, magicians and priests have widely used various techniques and means
that caused some people to enter a state of unusual concentration and
detachment from the environment, numbness, drowsiness, prayerful ecstasy, etc.
The fact that a person does not react to bright light, or noise, or pain from
burns, cuts and injections, but completely submits to the will of the one who
put him to sleep, amazed the imagination of believers, it seemed to them a
"miracle". It was believed that in this case the human soul leaves
its physical shell and enters into direct communication with
"spirits" and "gods". The priests of ancient Egypt induced
a state of similar "prophetic" sleep in teenage boys by making them
stare at a polished copper lamp for a long time while stroking their foreheads
with their hands. Many other methods and means are known - rhythmic monotonous
sounds of unique musical instruments, smoke from incense containing
intoxicating, narcotic substances, repeated spells and prayers. The priests
used all these techniques of hypnosis, without being able or trying to
understand its true nature. On the contrary, they shrouded their actions in
mystery in every possible way, giving them a supernatural meaning, trying to
support the belief in the existence of their gods, the belief that only they,
the ministers of religion, had the gift of "working miracles", the
gift of calling upon "good" and driving out "evil spirits",
of contemplating "visions", of foreseeing the future, of learning
about the past and of performing "miraculous healings". In the second
half of the 18th century, the whole of Europe was filled with the fame of the
Viennese physician Franz Anton Mesmer, who had discovered a way to cure
diseases with the help of a new "miraculous" force, which he called
"magnetic fluid". A specially appointed commission of scientists
rejected the existence of the "fluid" and declared Mesmer's
assertions unscientific. But this only fueled the ardor of numerous lovers of
"miracles" and sensations. Traveling "magnetizers" began to
travel everywhere, surprising the public with extraordinary phenomena that were
supposedly accomplished with the help of their inherent power of "personal
magnetism". The "magnetized" could not open their eyes at will,
froze in unnatural poses, did not hear the shot from a pistol that rang out
right next to their ear, and at the same time obediently carried out the orders
of the "magnetizers". Only in 1843, when the book
"Neurohypnology" by the English surgeon James Brad was published,
these "miracles" first received a scientific explanation. Brad proved
irrefutably that many seemingly inexplicable phenomena that
"magnetizers" supposedly cause with the help of "miraculous
magnetic force" are nothing more than the natural external manifestation
of a special nervous sleep, which he called hypnosis (from the Greek
"hypnos" - sleep). Brad induced hypnosis in his subjects by asking
them to stare at the blade of his lancet without looking away. In their effect
on the human nervous system, Brad wrote, this method of inducing hypnosis is no
different from the techniques used thousands of years ago by ministers of
religious cults; the supposedly "magnetizing" passes of mesmerists
also act in the same way. Among these scientists, the names of our compatriots,
physiologist V. Y. Danilevsky, psychiatrist A. A. Tokarsky and
psychoneurologist V. M. Bekhterev, French researchers and doctors A. Liebeault,
I. Bernheim, J.- M. Charcot and P. Richet, German physiologists
W. Preyer, R. Heidenhain and many others should be mentioned.
A complete scientific explanation of
hypnosis was given in the works of I. P. Pavlov and his followers. I. P. Pavlov
called hypnosis incomplete, partial sleep. Usually a person in deep sleep does
not react to anything around him (of course, if the stimuli acting on him are
not too strong, otherwise he wakes up). This happens as a result of inhibition
that has taken over the brain of the sleeper. However, sleep is not always so
complete. Sometimes the sleeper, not perceiving most of the noises around him,
wakes up from some specific sounds, even if they are weak. A mother who has
fallen asleep by her baby's crib immediately wakes up from the barely audible
sound of his voice, but does not react to anything else. In such incomplete
sleep, inhibition does not cover the entire cerebral cortex, some part of it
remains free. Pavlov figuratively called such areas "guard" or
"on-duty" points. The nerve cells of the "guard" point
respond very sensitively only to certain stimuli. One of the forms of such
partial, incomplete sleep, in which the overwhelming mass of cortex cells is
inhibited, and the "guard" point is tuned to the sound of the
hypnotist's voice, is hypnosis. The "on-duty" point ensures rapport,
which is the medical name for the phenomenon of special contact between the
hypnotized and the hypnotist, which previously seemed inexplicable and
surprising. Such a waking point remains isolated during hypnosis against the
general background of the sleeping cortex of the cerebral hemispheres. The
irritation from the sound of the hypnotist's voice is perceived by this
"guard" point, deprived of interconnection with the rest of the
inhibited cortex and therefore free from its controlling and competing
influence. In this case, the activity of the excitation center, “tuned” to the
doctor’s voice, increases, which explains the increase in the power of
suggestion in hypnosis. That is why any word of the hypnotizer, even a very
quietly spoken word, has a bright, strong, indelible effect on the brain of the
hypnotized person. This explains phenomena that previously seemed completely
incomprehensible. Let’s take such an interesting example. A person immersed in
hypnotic sleep is given a bitter medicine, say, quinine powder, and is
suggested that it is sugar. And the person thinks that he really has something
sweet in his mouth. By suggesting to a hypnotized person who is in a warm room
that he is very cold, one can cause him to shiver, constrict his blood vessels,
etc. Another example is no less interesting. The hypnotized person behaves in
accordance with the age suggested to him. For example, an adult who is
suggested that he is a two- or three-year-old child walks around the room with
small, unsteady steps, answers questions with childish babble: instead of
"car" he says "cal", instead of "horse" -
"holse", etc. Young people who are suggested that they are old, walk
as if with difficulty, their backs are bent, their speech resembles that of an
old man. This property of hypnosis to increase a person's susceptibility to
suggested images, thoughts, actions, as well as the ability to cause profound
changes in the activity of his body with words has been used since ancient
times by priests, as well as all sorts of healers and charlatans to demonstrate
imaginary miracles. The priests of ancient Egypt inspired boys, who were put
into a hypnotic sleep, to see gods and hear their voices. The child repeated
the words suggested to him in a dream by the priests, and the people perceived
them as the "will of the gods" revealed to the boy immersed in sleep.
This was a convenient way for priests and rulers to influence the people, to
instill in them those thoughts and actions that were beneficial to them. Since
ancient times, the state church has been especially willing to resort to
"miracles of healing". From century to century, here and there,
rumors were born about "holy" stones and springs that bestow health,
about "all-powerful miracle workers" who rid the sick of illness with
a wave of their hand or a single word, legends multiplied about the healing
power of "revealed" icons and relics of "saints". Belief in
"miraculous healings" has survived for thousands of years. Even
today, thousands of patients flock from all over the world to the French town
of Lourdes, famous for its spring that supposedly saves from illnesses "by
the grace of the Mother of God". And many in other places still seek
relief from illnesses not in the doctor's office, but in the water of
"holy" springs. The rumor of such "miraculous healings" is
based on the deliberate deception of believers by the "church", which
has no relation to the biblical God the Creator. There have been isolated cases
of actual healing of the sick, but there is no "miracle" in this
(unless they are supernatural or performed by occultists, agents of Satan, and
similar "miracle workers").
Sometimes in these cases, suggestion
is used, made to the patient immersed in hypnotic sleep. From the effect of
suggestion on such patients, those rare cases of recovery occurred, which were
observed from time to time in places of religious pilgrimage, especially since
in such places many externally hypnotizing moments are deliberately created
(the glow of candles, quiet monotonous singing, repeated prayers, etc.), and
the hypnotic state greatly enhances the effect of suggestion. The scientific
explanation of hypnosis reveals the essence of other "miracles" as
well. For example, during a hypnosis session, spectators were always amazed by
the detachment of the hypnotized person from his surroundings, his indifference
to the most severe pain, including burns and wounds. To what, if not the
patronage of "spirits", could the Chukchi in former times attribute
the fact that a shaman, who had gone mad during a shamanic ritual, would grab
hot coals from the hearth by the handful, without feeling any pain, without
changing his face at all? Hindu believers explain the amazing insensitivity to
pain, unbearable cold and scorching heat of a yogi frozen in a "sacred
sleep" by the communication of his soul with the "deity". And
scientists see the explanation of these phenomena in the fact that in deep
hypnosis, some areas of the cerebral cortex can be inhibited much more strongly
than in natural sleep, and then a person does not feel pain from a burn,
although any pain caused to him during normal sleep would immediately awaken
him. However, this does not refute the position on the close relationship
between sleep and hypnosis. The most important argument in favor of the
correctness of the concept of hypnosis as a type of sleep developed by I. P.
Pavlov and his followers is that the same conditions are essentially necessary
for the emergence of both of these states, namely, everything that promotes the
emergence and development of cortical inhibition has a hypnotic effect. For
example, in order to induce hypnotic sleep in a person, it is best to act with
weak or moderate, but long-term and monotonously repeated stimuli, be they
rhythmic movements, monotonous sounds, concentration of the gaze, repeated
words or light stroking of the skin. This explanation sheds light on what has
been hidden under the mask of mystery for many millennia and continues to hide
under it in some places even now. Here is the solution to the mystery of the
"magic" drum, the incessant roar of which accompanied the frantic
dance of the shaman during the rite. The "magic" means of immersion
in the "sacred sleep" of yogis, who repeated monosyllabic words
countless times, become clear. The secret of the action of the
"magnetic" passes of Mesmer and his followers is also revealed. And
the words of prayers and spells, repeatedly pronounced after the priests in the
churches of the Orthodox and Catholics, are they not nothing more than
conditions that increase the suggestibility of believers and thereby sometimes
prepare the ground for the demonstration of imaginary miracles. Science and
true faith in God have forever dispelled the fog of superstition and delusions
around hypnosis. The use of hypnosis is extremely dangerous, because in this
state a person voluntarily gives himself over to the power of another person,
and this is often used by the devil, criminals and false religions. There is an
alternative to all this: genuine biblical faith in God the Healer and natural
methods of healing without the use of zombification and deception.
