The Structure of Heaven

An encyclopedia of the paranormal, How Spirit is organized and how it affects your daily life

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  • About The Structure of heaven
  • Introduction
  • 1. Skepticism and Classical Physics
    • Skepticism/Humanism
    • Skepticism/Relativity and Quantum Physics
    • Skepticism/CSICOP
    • Skepticism/Why the Skeptics are Wrong
    • Skepticism/The advantages of belief
  • 2. The Human Soul
    • Why do we live in a material Universe?
    • The Human Soul and its Relationship to the Body
  • 3. God and Theodicy
    • Does God cause bad things to happen to good people?
    • Guardian Spirits and the Life Plan
    • What is Theodicy?
      • Zoroastrian Theodicy
      • Jewish Theodicy
      • Christian Theodicy
      • Why is Theodicy important?
      • Can Love conquer all??
  • 4. Psychics and mediums- an overview
    • What are psychics and mediums?
    • Why mediums can’t seem to agree about the afterlife
  • 5. The Structure of Heaven
    • The Universe according to Emanuel Swedenborg and Frederick Myers
    • A Map of the spiritual realm
    • Spirit Portals
  • 6. Heaven, Hell and the planes of illusion
    • Introducing The transitional plane (The Earth Sphere)
      • The functions of the transitional plane.
      • Crossing over
      • Time traps on the transitional plane
    • Evolution within the planes of illusion
      • The Summerlands and above
      • The Winterlands
    • The Hells
      • The Conditions in the Hells
      • Who goes to Hell?
      • Hell and the transitional plane
    • How spirits from different levels perceive each other
    • Vertical Stratification of the Spiritual Realm and How Spirits Progress
    • Horizontal Stratification and Spiritual Social Groups
  • 7. What happens when we die?
    • There is no external Judgement in the Afterlife!
    • Death doesn’t change a soul’s attitude
    • The life review
    • What do spirits look like?
    • Ghosts and their clothes
    • Zombies
    • Time In the spiritual world
    • Time in the planes of illusion
    • Memory in the planes of illusion
    • What’s it like to be dead?
  • 8. Spiritual laws/The Law of Divine Love
    • Spiritual Laws/The law of compensation
    • Spiritual Laws/Spiritual Gravity
    • Spiritual Laws/Spiritual Frequencies
    • Spiritual Laws/The Law of Attraction
    • Spiritual Laws/The Law of Free Will and Good vs. Evil
    • The red devil and the white angel
    • The spiritual advantage of Living in a Material World
    • Why does God allow bad things to happen to good people?
  • 9. The Human Aura and Theosophy
    • The Aura as a Protective Spiritual Skin
    • The Aura and Spiritual infection (Obsession)
  • 10. Dr. Carl Wickland and Thirty Years Among the Dead
    • Dr. Wickland’s Spirit Dialogs
    • Spirit Related Insanity
  • 11. Spiritual Infection and Modern psychiatry
    • Emanuel Swedenborg’s Spiritual Insight
    • Wilson Van Dusen
    • Wilson Van Dusen’s Heavenly and Hellish Voices
    • Entities that invade the minds of the living
  • 12. Earthbound Spirits
    • Will I end up an earthbound spirit?
      • Three reasons that GOOD souls get stuck on the transitional plane.
    • Where do ghosts get their energy?
    • Human Spirit Obsession
    • Human Spirit Possession
    • Criminal culpability and spiritual infections
    • Enthrallment by the living and Hypnosis
      • Enthrallment and Abusive Relationships
      • Enthrallment: Cults
      • Enthrallment in the afterlife
      • Enthrallment by God and angels
  • 13. Angels and demons
    • The Provenance of Angelic Beings
    • The War in heaven
    • Angels and their function in religion
    • Magic and Wicca
    • Demonology
      • The structure of Hell
      • How demons infect a person or place
      • The five stages of demonic attack
      • Why do demons want to possess people?
      • The characteristics of demons
      • Thought Forms
  • 14 exorcim
    • Major exorcisms (also called imperative exorcisms)
    • False, or fake possessions
    • How Religion Views Demons Vs. Ghosts
    • Avoiding Demonic Repossession
    • Who can Remove Demons?
    • Removing Human ghosts
    • Exorcism and poltergeist activity in disturbed children
    • Haunted Dolls and Other Objects
    • Dealing with Family and Marriage Disturbances Caused by Ghosts
    • Goodness and ghosts
  • 15. Poltergeists, Ghosts and Hauntings
    • Poltergeists versus Ghosts
    • How spiritualists view ghosts
    • How Parapsychologists view ghosts
    • Children and Poltergeist infestations
    • Poltergeists that make the news
    • Ghosts and spiritual imprints
    • Ghosts of famous people
    • Why do ghosts seem bound to the same location?
      • Ghosts and sensory deprivation
    • A Ghost Story
    • Differentiating between Human and Demonic hauntings
      • Hauntings by Human ghosts
        • Human Ghost hangouts
      • Hauntings by Demonic spirits
  • 16. All about Psychics and others prone to spiritual infections
    • 1. Psychic Sensitives
      • Psi and the human brain
      • The five general categories of psychics
    • 2. Spiritual infection and mental illness
      • Are the spiritually infected mentally ill responsible for their criminal acts?
    • 3. Spiritual infection and Acquired Negative Lifestyles
      • Spiritual infection and drug and alcohol addiction
      • Spiritual infection as a result of negative personality traits
    • 4. Spiritual infection and childhood abuse
  • 17. Criminals and Spirits
    • Why are criminals more prone to spirit obsession than other people?
  • 18. Religion and Government
    • The birth of Morality
    • Religion = Spirit + Politics
    • The paranormal and religion
    • Human Nature-The REAL reason for religion
      • Sex and Religion
      • Religion and War
      • Religion vs. Secular law
    • Religious Dogmas
      • The Catholic Sexual Abuse Scandal
    • Spiritualism
    • Why are the dark spheres necessary?
  • 19. Spirit Lies and Tall Tales!
    • Edgar Cayce
    • Edgar Cayce and Atlantis
  • 20. Suicide and its Spiritual Consequences
    • Nondiscretionary Suicides
    • Discretionary Suicide
    • Why you should never choose to commit suicide
    • Suicide Terrorists
  • 21. Reincarnation (An Introduction)
    • Spiritualism and Reincarnation
    • Allan Kardec and the Spirits’ Book
    • Allan Kardec, a warrior for reincarnation
    • Theosophy and Reincarnation
      • Madame Blavatsky
    • A House divided
    • Karma
    • Swedenborg on reincarnation
    • The group soul (the oversoul)
  • 22. Reincarnation: The evidence
    • The evidence for possession as an alternative to reincarnation
    • The early church and the history of reincarnation in the West
    • Past Life Regression
    • Is reincarnation really a part of God’s plan?
      • Why would a soul choose to reincarnate?
      • The Pitfalls of Reincarnation
      • If a soul reincarnates, what happens to the old personality?
      • The ultimate fate of old personalities 
  • 23. The Cross Correspondences
  • 24. The Fox Sisters and the Birth of Spiritualism Page 1
    • The Fox Sisters and the Birth of Spiritualism page 2
    • The Fox Sisters and the Birth of Spiritualism page 3
    • The Fox Sisters and the Birth of Spiritualism page 4
    • The Fox Sisters and the Birth of Spiritualism page 5
    • The Fox Sisters and the Birth of Spiritualism page 6
    • The Fox sisters: Original report of the Hydesville Haunting
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Allan Kardec, a warrior for reincarnation

Allan Kardec (Denizard-Hyppolyte-Leon Rivail) might be called the father of reincarnation in the western hemisphere since it was his book, The Spirits’ Book, which popularized the doctrine of reincarnation in the popular mind.  It must also be admitted that he was not the disinterested academic that he and his followers claimed him to be.

First, the origins of the book may not be exactly as Kardec’s admirers have recorded.  It is likely that instead of bringing questions to the spirits, Kardec actually took information that had previously been channeled by a famous medium and then correlated it in the form of questions and answers before publishing them.  

Second, Kardec’ main somnambulist was Celina Japhet.  She was a trance medium who entered her trances by means of hypnosis.   According to a Biographic entry from Fodor’s Encyclopedia of Psychic Science (published in 1933):

The story of Rivail’s first investigations into spirit manifestations is somewhat obscure. Le Livre des Esprits (The Spirits’ Book), which expounded a new theory of human life and destiny, was published in 1856. According to an article by Alexander Aksakof in The Spiritualist [magazine] in 1875 the book is based on trance communications received through Mlle. Celina Bequet, a professional somnambulist who, for family reasons, took the name of Celina Japhet and, controlled by [her three spirit guides], her grandfather, M. Hahnemann and Dr. Franz Mesmer, gave under this name medical advice. Her mesmerist [hypnotist], M. Roustan, believed in the plurality of existences [i.e. reincarnation]. This may or may not have had an influence. 

The fact is that in her automatic scripts the spirits communicated the doctrine of reincarnation. In 1856 Rivail was introduced to the circle by Victorien Sardou. He was entrusted with the scripts, correlated the material by a number of questions and published it without mentioning the name of the medium. It is difficult to say how far Aksakof’s informations cover the truth. He obtained them in the course of a personal interview with Celina Japhet in Paris. It was she who revealed that the name Allan was borne in a previous incarnation by Rivail.  Kardec was revealed by Rose, another medium by whose help he formed a circle of his own. 

The term “somnambulist” literally means “sleep walker”, but was taken at the time to mean a trance medium.  Franz Mesmer was one of the spirits who communicated through Celina Japhet.  Mesmer was, in life, the originator of the process that came to be known as “mesmerism”.  Mesmerism is popularly known today as hypnotism, and in fact, the medium was brought into her trances by a hypnotist who himself believed in reincarnation.  It is possible that Rivail was not even present during the sessions which produced the transcripts that eventually became the Spirits’ Book.  After Celina Japhet’s revelation, Rivail took the pen name “Alan Kardec” by which he has been popularly known ever since.

This leads us into the second question:  Was the information received by the medium truly from the mind of disembodied spirits, or was it unconsciously produced by a hypnotist with a preexisting belief in reincarnation and telepathically transmitted to the medium?  It is virtually impossible to rule out the possibility of unconscious telepathy on the part of the sitter during a reading, or, in this case, on the part of the hypnotist.  

Lastly, far from being a disinterested academic, Rivail became a dogmatic defender of the ideas presented in his popular books.  Fodor’s Encyclopedia of Psychic Science continues:

“In 1857 [The Spirits’ Book] was reissued in a revised form and later attained to more than twenty editions. It has become the recognized textbook of spiritistic philosophy in France. This philosophy is distinct from spiritualism as it is built on the main tenet that spiritual progress is effected by a series of compulsory reincarnations. Allan Kardec became so dogmatic on this point that he always disparaged physical mediumship, and any objective phenomena which did not bear out his doctrine. [For example], Allan Kardec ignored the important mediumship of D. D. Home after he declared himself against reincarnation. He [also] encouraged automatic-writing [to avoid] the danger of contradiction, owing to the psychological influence of preconceived ideas.  As a consequence experimental psychic research remained twenty years behind in France.”

In short, Rivail (Alan Kardec) essentially founded the religion of Spiritism, and spent the remainder of his life enlarging and defending it.  In the process, he introduced the doctrine of reincarnation into modern spiritualism.  Unfortunately, he also disparaged further scientific exploration of psychic and spiritual matters. In a way, in addition to being the Carl Sagan of his day, he was also the L. Ron Hubbard of his day. (L. Ron Hubbard was the science fiction author who invented Scientology, which is a cult founded upon one of his own science fiction novels.)

Theosophy and Reincarnation>>>>

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Science, Math and God

Science, Math and God is the companion book, originally written as a preface to The Structure of Heaven. It's a book that explains why the skeptics are wrong, and why modern science no longer rules out the paranormal. Learn why God now has a place to live. (Also available as an eBook and paperback at Amazon.com)

The Lower Reaches of Heaven

The Lower Reaches of Heaven is a modern rendition of an of an old book; Thirty Years Among The Dead by Dr. Carl Wickland. It is essential reading if you want to understand Earthbound Spirits and the dynamics of their environment. It also contains lots of editorial comment and historical facts, as well insight into how ghosts think.

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