Possession and self-possession
Journal of the British Association for the Study of Religions January 1, 2008 Geoffrey Samuel
Recent scholarship on Tantra often treats it as a path to enlightenment, separate from ritual healing, mediumship, and spirit possession. Frederick Smith’s book The Self Possessed argues the opposite: that healing, sorcery, and spiritual liberation all share common assumptions and a common idiom. Smith presents the idea of entry, pervasion, or possession (avesa) as a fundamental trope in Indic thought, encompassing conception, Tantric ritual, occupying another body, and malevolent spirit attack. This article questions whether we are applying the wrong categories to understand Indic and other religious traditions, and sketches an alternative way to view the field of possession, exploring its implications.