Long John Nebel

by Way Out World

  According to Morey Bernstein, many “facts” came to light indicating that Bridey had actually lived in Ireland at the time she had designated.

  It was ascertained that a man with the name of Bridey’s father-in-law, and two more with the names of grocers mentioned by her, had actually existed during the proper years and had been engaged in the work she ascribed to them. Her references to myths and legends were correct, and so were comments about a book, various geographical locations, language usages, and proper names.

  Later a couple of reporters were sent to Ireland to get more material on the Bridey Murphy story, but the results were very superficial. Assistant Editor William Barker of the Denver Post went over for several weeks to look into the case, coming back with interesting conclusions.

  He believed that Brian wasn’t a “barrister,” but a clerk who worked for a tobacco company, possibly a hardware firm, and maybe Queens College. Further, he was of the opinion that her father hadn’t been a barrister either, but rather a farmer. Apparently, according to Barker, the lower class Irish girl was always embroidering her story so as to make her family appear far more important that it actually was. Nonetheless, in summing up his discoveries, the reporter is clearly convinced that a dozen or so of his points come close to proving the Murphy tale.

  The next development in this increasingly spectacular case was the interest of the Chicago American in the early summer of 1956. This was the first big debunking. The story claimed that “Ruth Simmons” (whose real name, by the way, is Virginia Burns Tighe) had constructed “Bridey Murphy” and her Ireland from subconscious memories of her youth in Madison, Wisconsin, and Chicago. The report asserted that “Ruth Simmons” had had an aunt more Irish than the Blarney Stone, who had filled her with wild and fanciful tales of the “ould sod” when she was a child. A subsequent article asserted that the “real” Bridey had been found in the person of “Bridey Murphy Cockell,” who had lived just across the way from “Ruth” in Chicago.

  A Denver Post reporter tried to discredit the Chicago American story with an article which attempted to refute the refutation. Life magazine got into the act a couple of times. And back and forth it went.

  Now, years later, looking back over the affair, one has to admit that it’s almost as confused a mess as it was when it was at its height. Many of the fundamental facts have gone unproven. No record of any “barrister” named Duncan Murphy, with or without a wife Kathleen, living in Cork at the end of the 18th century, has ever been located. No evidence that they, nor anyone, had a daughter Bridget Kathleen Murphy, nor that such an offspring married a Sean MacCarthy…naturally, all that would obviously follow from the original “fact” is set aside when it’s necessary to discard the original “fact.” There are simply no traces of the birth, marriage, death, parents, or friends of Bridey Murphy.

  On the other hand, when Bridey mentions two grocers named Farr and John Carrigan it stirs the interest, since gentlemen with those specific names were the only ones in all of Belfast in the food business. Her designating “The Meadows” as the place she lived is supported by the discovery that a particular area of Cork went under that name at that time. She makes accurate reference to “Queens College,” proper use of several uncommon words, and informed allusions to mythic stories of that period.

  So, neighbors, what do you end up with? Fact or fake? Reincarnation or remembrance?

  One thing you can be sure of—if it was a fake, Morey Bernstein did not perpetrate it; because this is one of the most honest and sincere men ever to operate on the periphery of the field of psychic phenomena. To be involved in any fraudulent activities would not prove to be of any value to him personally, as it is reported that he’s a millionaire—a brilliant man and extremely successful in the normal channels of commerce.

  Take another striking example of regression experimentation. The case of Lord Thomas Grover, the pre-natal life form of a young man who was called merely “George.” This gentleman was brought to me by a hypnotist named Edward Sunwall, who was able to put his subject into a very deep trance state and regress him to a point prior to his birth, or it so was claimed. In this previous incarnation “George” was an English nobleman living in London in the 16th century.

  I must admit that I was very impressed with the first “performance” of the regression staged for my radio show by these two young men. Following an opening interview which established that Mr. Sunwall was a businessman by profession and that “George” was an unemployed actor, the induction got under way.

  Physically, “George” was about twenty-five years old, pleasant looking, with fairly even features. As he dropped deeper into trance, the face became more relaxed and lineless, until it was a countenance at peace. He even looked several years younger. In the first questioning stage, “George” identified his age as about six. In response to Ed’s questions, he named a couple of class mates, described the schoolroom he was in, and the like. The most interesting thing was the speech pattern, which was that of a small child—the pronunciation, and the vocabulary, and the phrasing.

  The regression was continued until the subject was supposedly about two years old. The effect was really amazing. “George” was baby-talking in the most convincing manner. Which, coming from a husky, if reclining, young man, was amusing and surprising. The lines of the face, the motions of the mouth, the entire effect was amazingly infantile.

  Finally, Edward Sunwall told the subject to “go over the hump,” meaning that he should jump from the two-year-old state to a pre-natal consciousness. Slowly, the face began to alter. Lines returned to the forehead, and the corners of the nostrils down past either side of the mouth. The eyebrows seemed to more aggressively project over the eyes, which narrowed. The nose gave the effect of becoming more prominent. The mouth looked as though it had thickened and the corners turned abruptly, and sourly, downwards.

  As the face changed so measurably, the voice continued to mumble unintelligibly, but the tone of it dropped at least an octave. By the time Sunwall posed his first pre-natal question, “George” seemed to have assumed a striking, but arrogant and commanding, appearance. His voice was of that quality when he spoke.

  He described himself as being in his middle thirties, of poor health, and a member of the House of Lords. Apparently he had a home in London and a country castle. Both were described in considerable detail. Although he was of a high social position, it soon became obvious that his education and culture were sadly lacking. He had never heard of the major poets and authors of his time, and the name of the Prime Minister of England was unfamiliar to him. He complained of the gout and of a general dissatisfaction with life. As I recall the interview, he died at a fairly early age.

  Following his death, he spoke of having watched his body being burned, and so disposed he wandered off into the spirit life.

  The most amazing thing about the sessions I observed with “George” was the extraordinary change that took place as he moved, in his trance state, from his present personality to the early childhood, and then “over the hump” into his “Lord Grover” life. The face, attitude of the body, and the voice ran an entire gamut. And while I don’t buy this bit any more than any other, still, it was really something to see.

  Needless to say, there are many theories of reincarnation, but, in general, they fall into several major categories. Some believers hold that as we die we immediately pass into another existence; that is, we’re conceived again, but without any memory of what went before. And following each death there is a total loss of any connection with former lives. In this version, there is no definite pattern from one life to another. A variation on this theme is that once one dies he moves to another existence, either immediately or after a stay on a spiritual plane, and is rewarded either for a good previous life, or punished for a bad one. If the former earth time has been exemplified by behavior of a “high moral order,” then the following incarnation will be appropriately elevated. If one has left an undesirable record behind him,
then he will become an inferior man—or possibly even an animal.

  From time to time speculation runs rampant among reincarnationists regarding sex. Believers seem about evenly divided on the two major aspects of this consideration. First, that in going from one life to another an individual maintains the same sex; and second, that sexual relations are to be found in the “in between” phases, and on the “higher planes,” and generally are described as being even superior in quality and kind to what is available on earth.

  Of course, the entire idea of reincarnation (and transmigration) is very ancient. Among the earliest records are those which refer to the Egyptian beliefs in this philosophy. As a matter of fact, one of the major aspects of the mystical tradition of that time and place was the repeating life concept. It was a popular conviction in Greece, and carried over into Roman culture.

  The concept of rebirth is common to the Christian Bible, the Talmud and kabala. A number of the saints obviously preached it. It’s part of the dogma and/or lore of Brahmanism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, and many other theological and theosophical orders of thought.

  Of course, almost every group supporting the idea of rein carnation views it in “a different manner. As a matter of fact, about all you can find among them that is similar is the assertion that we each live more than one life. For instance, the established average time between births ranges from a mere twenty-five years to a millennium—a thousand years. The reported number of lives one has to go through ranges from seven to seven hundred and seventy-seven. In the larger number, the word is that the first seven hundred are lived in bleak and black ignorance, the next seventy in knowledge and culture, and the last seven in bliss and wisdom. After that, either they don’t tell you what happens or they simply say that you are absorbed into the supreme cosmic consciousness. Whatever that is.

  As is the case with most offbeat, occult, or mystical gaffs, the arguments presented to convince the nonbeliever of the bit are long, complicated, and pretty difficult to understand. They’ll say, for instance, that “the idea of immortality demands it.” Usually they completely overlook the possibility that the listener may totally disbelieve in immortality to begin with. Secondly, it’s quite possible that if he does accept the promise of more life after death, he will, in all likelihood, expect it to be in heaven, or an equally orthodox other-life place. Why should he consider another existence on a physical level in a material body the inevitable result of dying?

  Another writer will claim that the “nature of the soul” requires it. Well, again the reincarnationist is assuming that his audience believes in the existence of a soul. Then he’s assuming that the hearer means the same thing by the word soul that he means. And even if he gets by these two barriers, how in (or out of) the world is he going to prove that “the nature of the soul requires it?”

  And one after another they attempt to solve mystical problems and answer mystical questions with even more mystical replies. When confronted with objections to the idea of rein carnation, the rationalizations are really wild.

  And yet, recognition of the exponents of these far-fetched phantasies comes from surprising sources. Recently the memory of Leon-Denizarth-Hippolyte Rivail, better remembered as Allan Kardec, was noted by the Brazilian government by the issuing of millions of postage stamps featuring his portrait and the words: “First Centenary of Organized Spiritism.”

  Kardec, born in France just after the turn of the 18th century, was the originator and organizer of a pseudo-religious sect based, primarily, on the ideal of reincarnation. He was a powerful and prolific writer, a phrenologist, hypnotist, psychic investigator, and general double talker. In a number of books he transcribed—the actual writing being done by spirits—he brought to the world his, or rather the “true,” facts about reincarnation, the spirit world, and what have you.

  He had no success in England, nor in the United States. But France, and the South American countries, found him to be just what they had been waiting for—and he really began to grow. In one of his volumes he lists categories of medium types, among which are included “Calm Mediums,” “Mediums for Trivial and Obscene Communication,” “Illiterate Mediums,” “Mediums for Apparitions,” “Touchy Mediums” and on and on.

  According to Kardec, reincarnation is all part of God’s plan by which He means for Man to eventually reach perfection, even though he may have a pretty rough trip. There’s no choice about the whole thing as he tells it; an individual progresses whether he likes it or not. Even though it’s only an inch each life, Man must move up the ladder; he can never move back down. Finally everyone makes it, or so the “Spiritism” spirits claim.

  Unlike many of the reincarnationists, Kardec drew a rather bleak and forbidding picture of the after-life. He saw it as an almost endless and completely lonely journey through time, where once one died he lost all memory of his friends, relatives, and/or loved ones, never to know them again.

  He was ahead of his time, however, in terms of imagination. He visualized Mars as a virtual penal colony of spirits who were of an even lower order than earthians. Jupiter supposedly housed a spiritual civilization of superior souls. The Sun was the resting place of radiant non-physical wraiths.

  This was the man honored with a postage stamp all his very spiritistical own.

  Almost a hundred years after Kardec and half-way around the world, an incident occurred which seemed far more persuasive to the doubting mind than the story of Kardec—or so it has been reported.

  In the late 1920’s, a child named Shanti Devi was born in New Delhi, India, of unexceptional parents. At the age of seven or eight, she began speaking of a small town named Muttra where she had lived previously, describing her “former home,” the community, and the like. As the next couple of years went by, the little girl’s “memories” continued to pour out. Among the various experiences reported by the child was that she had been raised to adulthood in the hamlet, married, bore three children whose names she mentioned, and even identified her own other-life name.

  We’re told that on the occasion of a visit to her father by a man who had come to discuss business she immediately identified the stranger as “my husband’s cousin.” It was quickly established, although the man didn’t recognize Shanti, that he did live in Muttra, did have a cousin who had lost a wife ten years before, and that the wife had had the name Shanti claimed she formerly had.

  Upon being taken to the town of Muttra, she instantly knew her “husband,” his mother and brother, all the town landmarks, pointed out her house, and greeted her ancient father-in-law. She also conversed freely in the local native dialect, although she and her parents knew only Hindustani. Without hesitation, she recognized her two oldest children, but curiously not the one which had caused her death.

  As reported, the story was fully documented by Indian authorities, who never found nor offered any explanation for the extraordinary case. Shanti is grown, of course, and when last heard of worked in New Delhi, having decided to live but one life at a time.

  Reincarnationists find almost unlimited sources to quote from in support of their multiple-life theories, but the favorite references are statements of famous men. For example, they’ll cite Napoleon’s exclamation: “I am Charlemagne! Charlemagne! Don’t you remember who I am? Charlemagne!” Or they’ll tell you of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who said: “The balance of evidence shows that Reincarnation is a fact.” Or even the practical-minded Henry Ford’s observation: “I believe that we are here now and will come back again.”

  And these are but three of scores they have on file who’ve indicated that they were inclined to believe in the repeating life concept. As a matter of fact, there are lists of names of famous people who were followers of the word which add up into the hundreds. And although I don’t know exactly what the basis for their inclusion in these lists is, you’ll find such differing and unexpected personalities as Alexander the Great, St. Augustine, Balzac, Edgar Cayce, Cicero, Confucius, Da
nte, Edison, St. Francis, Gandhi, Goethe, Hegel, Hermes, (!), Hugo, Leibnitz, Plato, Shakespeare, Voltaire, and the names are almost endless. But again I must point out, I have no idea of what kind of flimsy evidence was used to justify the inclusion of many of the notable people.

  There has always been a ready acceptance in the East of the general concepts of reincarnation, while in the West the tendency has been, at least for the public at large, to doubt it. In India, for example, the advocates of the previous life theory have innumerable reports to bolster their contentions. Earlier I told of the case of Shanti Devi, but that’s only one of many. Another is the story of Jagdish Chandra, born in 1923, who lived in Bareilly, India. It was his assertion that he had previously existed in Benares, and he proceeded to relate many details to prove same. We’re told, as we are in most such cases, that the story was verified by “authorities.” Who the officials were, I don’t know. But the point is that, in that particular country, tales of reincarnation are quite common and readily accepted.

  Generally speaking, throughout recorded history, there has been a tremendous inclination and desire to believe in reincarnation, or metempsychosis, or palin-genesis, or pre-existence, or whatever you wish to call it. It’s claimed that, in the second five hundred years of the Christian era, over a hundred thousand persons were executed for supporting the philosophy. At one time or another, most of the major religious movements have endorsed the basic principles of re-life. The figures vary widely as to the number of people believing in reincarnation in the United States today, but a million would probably be a reason able, if not conservative, estimate.

  It’s easy to understand how the least fortunate, starving people of the underprivileged countries of the world might well have sought and accepted the idea that they would be given another go at life. Another time around when the chips wouldn’t be stacked so terribly against them. But it’s even more interesting, and maybe a little sad, that in this, the most prosperous nation on earth, a million persons are so dissatisfied with the lives they’re leading, or have led, that they feel a great need to come back and do the bit again. For obviously this isn’t the religious fervor of after-life, heaven, or union with God; this is the drive to return to earth, not merely one time, but hundreds of times—the need to hope that once more will the individual be, not rewarded with the glorious life eternal, but subjected to the troubles and ignominies, pains and disappointments, frustrations and foolishnesses of this world.