Mediumship And Religious Belief

The careful student will of course notice that this communication with

the higher planes of life and being--this so-called "mediumship"--does

not depend upon any particular form of religious belief, or teaching,

concerning the nature of the state or place of abode of the departed

spirits of men; but, on the contrary, is common to all form of religion

and to all phases of belief in the survival of the human soul.

Theref re, a scientific consideration of the general subject does not

necessitate the acceptance of any one particular phase of religious

belief, or of any particular system of teaching concerning the nature or

state of "life after death." All that is required of the person

accepting the general fact of "higher plane communication" may be stated

as follows: (1) Acceptance of the fact that the human soul persists

after the death of the body, and independent of and removed from the

dead body; (2) acceptance of the fact that the decarnate souls of human

beings may, and do, establish communication with human beings still

dwelling upon the earth-plane of existence.



We may state here that the term "decarnate" means "away from the

physical body," or "out of the flesh;" the term being the opposite of

"incarnate," meaning "clothed with flesh, or embodied in flesh." We may

also state here that the teachings of most philosophies of the life

after death hold that the decarnate human soul is not entirely devoid of

a body, but rather occupies a body composed of some ethereal substance;

this ethereal body being called the "astral body," or the "spiritual

body."