Do Demons Exist?

It's been six weeks since I last posted to this blog. During that period, I've been traveling and had a fascinating visit to Warsaw, Poland. I've also had some elective surgery (which, perhaps, will become a topic for a future blog post). During my recovery, I've made a point of carefully studying a fascinating film from 2005, The Exorcism of Emily Rose.

The film largely takes the form of a courtroom trial in which the question of the reality of possession and exorcism is debated. Strong cases are made for both pro and con positions. Further, the film is based upon a true story, an actual case history -- and does, by Hollywood standards (which, admittedly, are very sloppy when it comes to sticking to a true story) a fairly credible job of presenting the case as it occurred. At the end of the trial, the jury verdict favors the materialist position. The exorcist priest is convicted of negligence in the death of a young woman who, we are led to believe, should have received more medical/psychiatric treatment.

Nevertheless, the movie's special effects -- as well as a few sub-plots -- point in the other direction. Demonic forces seem to be at work, even affecting the attorney hired to defend the exorcist. Furthermore, in the trial itself, an anthropologist is put on the stand who testifies eloquently that "possession" is a state of consciousness that is recognized in many cultures throughout the world.

Interestingly, the anthropologist character is clearly based upon Felicitas D. Goodman, author of The Exorcism of Annaliese Michel, the true story of the case upon which the movie was based. Goodman's position is actually similar to my own: one can accept the existence of a cultural reality based upon "possession" and even the pragmatic utility of a procedure such as "exorcism" without the requirement of accepting the ontological reality of the metaphysical assumptions inherent in that cultural reality.

I like this point of view. As a parapsychologist, I can say that I have witnessed various states of possession -- but none of them have ever struck me as being in the least bit demonic. I have to say that, to my knowledge, there is nothing in the literature of parapsychology or psychical research that would support the Judeo-Christian concept of demonology.

Now, at the urging of my friend, film reviewer Victoria Alexander, I have been reading several books that endeavor to prove the reality of demons in general, and, in fact Satan, in particular. These books include Hostage to the Devil by Malachi Martin, Glimpses of the Devil by M. Scott Peck, and Demon Possession and Allied Themes by Revs. John L. Nevius and F. F. Ellinwood. If taken at face value, these books do indeed support fundamentalist Christian theology regarding the existence of Satan as the embodiment of evil -- and the power of Jesus Christ as the antidote to demonic infestation. However, there is also another, more parsimonious explanation.

In Jungian thought, possessing entites can be viewed as manifestations of archetypes. They may be thought of as semi-autonomous complexes of psychic energy -- capable of taking various forms and personas, or masks, depending upon the psychological needs of the people with whom they interact. In particular, archetypal energies tend to emulate the traditional stories embodied in the great myths of human culture. In this sense, one might say that the demons of Christianity are, indeed, real -- but not absolutely, ontologically real. Their reality, rather, is relative to the social circumstances in which they manifest.

Such archetypal energies may also manifest themselves in various cases of criminal insanity, such as the notorious Son of Sam case.

I find it ironic, however, that some true believers find that the existence of such cases ostensibly providing evidence for the embodiment of absolute evil to be a confirmation of their religious faith. Absolute evil is, afterall, a contradiction of the theological notion of a world created by a god who is the embodiment of absolute good. This conundrum is traditionally known as the "problem of evil."

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