Ecstasy and vision

Authors

• Anders Hultgård

DOI: https://doi.org/10.30674/scripta.67142

Keywords:

Experience (Religion), Jewish literature (Hellenistic), Ecstasy, Vision, Altered states of consciousness, Judaism and Zoroastrianism, Revelation

Abstract

In this paper we shall present some observations on the role played by ecstasy in the activity of the seer, as he emerges in ancient Jewish and Iranian texts. In the Jewish religious literature of the Hellenistic-Roman period, visions are described on almost every page, and visions were the most important means of divine revelation. Specific techniques for inducing the ecstatic state are not recorded in the Jewish sources. Some elements in the pattern leading up to the vision may be interpreted as parts of a method for inducing the final ecstasy; i.e. fasting and prayer. The Iranian material shows clearly the importance of ecstasy in the activity of the seer. The ecstatic seeing also means that the visionary shares with Ahura Mazda a divine quality, the "wisdom of omniscience". The granting of the "wisdom of omniscience" appears as a temporary and it conveys to the visionary a supernatural seeing. There is evidence to suggest that chanting was an important method of inducing ecstasy within the early Zoroastrian community.  We do not find in the Jewish material a clear correspondence to the Iranian notion of "omniscient wisdom".