Satanism Today - An Encyclopedia of Religion, Folklore and Popular ...

246 Season of the Witch
Flash photograph taken during the Warrick-Deane series
of 1924-1929. There is considerable table levitation,
movement of the séance trumpet, and ectoplasm on the lap
of Mrs. Deane, 21 April 1925. (Fortean Picture Library)
Devil—agents who merely pretended to be the
spirits of departed loved ones.
There are references to séance-type communications
that go back as far as the third century
neo-Platonist, Porphyry. A candidate for the earliest
recorded séance may be Meric Casaubon’s A
True and Faithful Relation of What Passed Between
Dr. Dee and Some Spirits (1659). Little was written
on this topic until the time of the Fox Sisters and
early Spiritualism in the midnineteenth century,
when the popularity of such gatherings boomed.
Séances are still popular, although twentieth
century gatherings usually feature mental mediumship.
Nineteenth-century séances were often
dramatic, producing phenomena associated with
physical mediumship.
Séances usually, though not always, take place
in the home of one of the participants, often in the
house of the medium if a professional psychic is
involved. Certain guidelines have been developed
which, it is claimed, increase the probability of
successful communications. As much as possible,
sitters should be an even admixture of male and
females, and should sit in a circular pattern.
Younger participants have more psychic energy,
and skeptics seem to place a damper on such
proceedings.
Other kinds of guidelines are that new people
should only very cautiously be included in a
regular meeting circle. To avoid becoming too
obsessed with spirit contact, meetings should be
restricted to two or three per week and, under
normal circumstances, for periods of two hours or
less. Sitters must also respect the medium by not
grabbing or jarring her or him. Like the ceremonies
in contemporary Spiritualist churches,
such gatherings often began with prayers and
hymns to set the proper “mood.” The home circle
was a type of popular séance, oftentimes not
involving a medium, which helped make spiritualism
a popular movement extending well beyond
spiritualist denominational boundaries.
Low lighting, it was claimed, was necessary
for spirit communications. Skeptics naturally
felt that this particular condition served only to
help the medium fake phenomena. In the nineteenth
century, when séances were characterized
by the fantastic phenomena associated with
physical mediumship, drafts of cool air, rapping
noises, and strange lights signaled the arrival of
discarnate entities. Contemporary mental
mediums have dispensed with such dramatic
manifestations.
See also Demons; Possession and Exorcism
For Further Reading:
Chaney, Rev. Robert G. Mediums and the
Development of Mediumship. Freeport, NY:
Books for Libraries Press, 1972.
Fodor, Nandor. An Encyclopaedia of Psychic Science.
1933. Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1966.
Pearsall, Ronald. The Table-Rappers. New York: St.
Martin’s Press, 1973.
Season of the Witch
In this 1973 film a middle-aged suburban housewife
going through a midlife crisis becomes
involved in the neighborhood’s local black
magic Satanic witch cult (seems like they’re
popping up on every street corner these days).
Following a fling with her teenaged daughter’s
boyfriend, she has to fend off a demon who lusts
after her body.