Reader question: Buddhist peculiarities, who can tell more about them?
I am a 66 year old Amsterdammer, ex Horeca entrepreneur. As a manager, I have seen a lot of people come and go in those 20 years, from Jan with the cap, to well-known artists, writers and TV presenters (Dutch celebrities).
Now I think that I have also built up a nice knowledge of people and am very down to earth in life.
I've been living here for almost 5 years now Thailand. I have been married for 4 years now to a highly educated Thai 44 year old woman who speaks good English. This allows me to communicate well, debate, but also discuss our different ways of thinking about faith.
I myself am not a believer in anything or everything, mainly believe in myself, respect everyone's beliefs but there are limits in my acceptance. Like Buddhism, which my wife adheres heavily to. She tries to comply with the rules, can distinguish good from evil, but all the curiosities around it go way too far for me, such as belief in ghosts and ghosts. Most Thais here believe in spirits, at every house there are those spirit houses where the necessary offerings are regularly made, water / fruit / rice / soda and sometimes whiskey.
Even here in the area houses are empty, unsaleable, because evil spirits are said to live in them. Oh, had my thoughts on that and took it all with a grain of salt. Until the next thing happened.
Tuesday, September 4, it was once again a Buddha day. The wife (name Poei) of a friendly Swede living here, asked to visit them with a few other Thai women, because she opened her Buddha house. The house, 4 x 4 meters, is specially built and contains at least one hundred (100) different Buddha statues, from large to small.
Once there, Poei walked in a white trouser suit and a sash around her shoulders. When all the ladies were there, they went to the house and everyone took a seat. My wife sat on the threshold, due to lack of space. I could see her sitting, as I was drinking coffee with the man at a table near the cottage. A little later I heard the rituals begin. After about five minutes, I see my wife beckon me to come to her.
Now after a few steps I was at the door and when I looked inside, Poei was sitting on the floor with a bowl in her hands. The ladies were busy putting a flower in it. But what I saw to my surprise looked like an exorcist movie scene. Poei suddenly began to talk differently, her features changed, her mouth became toothless, and she heard a very old creaky man's voice, coughing in fits and starts. Her hands began to shake as you often see in old people. I watched in disbelief and amazement.
I looked to see if I could detect something about Poe, whether it was comedy or something. Well, in that case, I've never seen such a good actor in my life.
Well, because I couldn't follow the conversation, I went to sit at her husband's coffee table again, but I did hear what was going on in the house.
Suddenly I heard laughing, screeching and roaring, went to look again and then I saw another figure in Poei, a boy. Unmistakable to hear the voice and the movements too. She appeared to have a lot of fun with the ladies. Suddenly he turned to my wife and started to tell her something. I could see on her face that she was surprised. When she told me everything later, it turned out to be her son, who lives in another province. And what only we knew, there were disturbances, disinhibited money he had to get from others. He would get into trouble with that, which we already suspected.
After the session was over and Poei came to sit with us I asked her if she remembered anything. Who was that old man? She herself knew nothing more and which spirits had visited her.
Who has experienced something like this here in Thailand, what are your findings and thoughts on this?
Henk Biesenbeek
Dear Henk, this spectacle has nothing to do with Buddhism. Most Thai, and certainly from Isaan, are animists. Animists believe in ghosts.
Explanation of animism: form of primitive religion in which the life principle of man is regarded as an independent being independent of the body, in which nature (plants, mountains, rivers, etc.) is experienced as animated and in which these souls or spirits are regarded as personal powers are feared, hated and revered.
What you have seen, you also see in the Netherlands at the 'Calling up spirits'. A trance or something.
I am religious myself (not strict about sitting in the front every Sunday or something) and have nothing to do with animism / ghosts.
Well, I did something that sticks with me.
I was in Thailand with my girlfriend (now my wife), I was going to be bad, and with a ritual of monks (wrapping such a rope around you and lying under a sheet) I was supposed to be okay.
I had my doubts about this, but so as not to hurt her I cooperated.
Then to a fortune teller to see if it worked, he said that everything was fine, but I would have a serious car accident.
Now that is not such a very difficult prediction and I had long forgotten it after a few weeks (now at home).
Until I park my car under a truck on the highway (the bumper stops right in front of the windscreen, so it is broken), then I call my girlfriend (no strange time or anything) she answers the phone and without me or her saying hello has said she says: I told you you would have an accident…….., are you okay????
How could she know that I called to say that I no longer had a car…………
Remains strange. But still don't believe it.
No separately. I'm not religious and have nothing to do with ghosts. But I have also been to such a fortune teller and he managed to tell me things that my girlfriend or no one in Thailand could know at all. Then again, some of those predictions are so general that it might as well be a guess. They mentioned to me a car accident in the past. To which I replied that it was very easy because 75% of people have had a car accident. But I was immediately told that I had been in a serious accident (which is correct, car racing accident at 200 km/h on a crash barrier…)
But skeptical as I am, I think of a horoscope, for example, which is also always written in such a way that it seems to be correct for almost everyone. There is quite a bit of money going around with the fortune tellers etc in Thailand, so it must be something like that.
I believe that there is more between heaven and earth than what we humans can perceive and that there are indeed people who are paranormally gifted. However, there are also those so-called spiritual (vague) types who pretend to be that and in my opinion they are dangerous to the state. They randomly predict death or near-death causes (such as serious car accidents), because that sounds interesting.
For example, years ago I came to a Thai party in Amsterdam. Upon entering, most (ladies) were already quite drunk with alcohol and yes, one of those ladies was palm reading. After much insistence from others, I had to have my hand read too. At the first sight, the now heavily intoxicated lady was shocked as if struck by lightning. I thought, what has that crazy person got.
Then I was briefly told that before a certain age I would be in a very serious car accident and probably not survive. When you hear something like that, you freak out. A. you didn't ask about it and B you're obviously not waiting for something like that. My whole evening was ruined.
Now I have read something about palmistry and know that you actually have to read both hands to really be able to say something meaningful (prediction). It also seems to be the case that outside your life line, the other lines can change in the course of your life. I therefore insisted that she also read my left hand and then that aunt corrected her statements. My fright quickly turned into anger, I could wring that crazy person's neck.
I did indeed have a serious car accident, albeit almost 20 years ago. We are now 12 years further and fortunately I have already passed the age mentioned. But to be honest I must say that it has kept me quite busy and I think that's the dangerous thing about predictions.
I am religious in my way and therefore believe that it is only for the Lord to determine how long you stay here on this planet. In principle I am therefore averse to hearing predictions, although I am prepared to accept something from real clerics, such as Buddha monks, but they do not comment on such ominous matters and do not ask for money for their predictions. . It is then up to you what you want to give them in return.
I am also quite skeptical and do not want to believe in predictions, but a few years ago I also witnessed a colleague of mine sitting with her mouth open in amazement at a fortune teller in Bangkok.
This one was a palm reader on a side street off Patpong. It was the middle of the night, when you could still go out until morning.
She wanted to go to the fortune teller, didn't dare to go alone, so I accompanied her. I don't remember what he told her, but one of the first things he found out was that her mother had died two months earlier. Not vaguely saying that an acquaintance was dead, but really her mother, and that was exactly the case.
I thought it was creepy and still think about it often. You wouldn't guess something like that and she hadn't said anything that would indicate this.
There are apparently people who have a highly developed ability to “read” what is on someone else's mind. They sense what is wrong with someone. As a result, they can sometimes say sarcastic things. Furthermore, when a curious coincidence occurs, people draw conclusions from it, but they forget that this coincidence does not occur thousands of times. If someone predicts that you will win the lottery and you don't win anything, you forget it. However, if you do indeed win, you will believe in the prediction. The events described seem to me, as Peter argues, to be traced back to autosuggestion, in which people go into a trance. Of course everyone can believe what they want, as long as you don't cause any trouble to others. By nature people tend to faith and religion, because there is simply a lot that cannot be explained. In the long run, all those religions are untenable and there are so many that it is impossible for them all to be based on truth. For me a reason to assume that none of them are based on truth. Well, that's why it's called believing.
Hello BramSiam,
Would my colleague have fallen under such a trance and told it herself, but through auto-suggestion got the idea that the fortune teller had read it from her hand? Seems strong.
And such a coincidence out of thousands. So that man is going to tell almost everyone who comes to him that his or her mother, father, grandfather, grandmother died at the same time as he says it?
I think I'm more likely to win the lottery.
I myself have sometimes been to people who played cards or who thought they could predict the future for me. I don't really believe in that, although some had nice predictions.
But what happened that night in Bangkok still strikes me as strange and I can't find a good explanation. I also find it hard to accept yours.
There are several things mixed up here! Ghosts and divination and predictions have nothing to do with religion or belief, but with the still unknown areas of our brains. If you have to blindly believe everything when it cannot be explained, yes then I will stop! Religion is the source of much evil and hundreds of people die every day due to ambras between religions. They don't have me anymore!