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The Ouija Board: A Dangerous Game
Also, My Personal Experience With It.
“The best trick the Devil ever did was convince people he didn’t exist.”
The average person has heard about the Ouija board, and all the controversy surrounding it.
Some people think that we who play the game are moving the pointer across the board ourselves, but most of the time that is not the case.
One reason is, if we moved the pointer ourselves, it just wouldn’t be any fun, because part of the excitement of using the Ouija, is that every time, we ask ourselves, “Is it really real?”
THERE ARE 8 TYPES OF PEOPLE CONCERNING THE OUIJA BOARD
1. Skeptics who think that all the hocus pocus about the Ouija board is pure nonsense.
2. Those who don’t think the Ouija is dangerous and use it for innocent fun.
3. Religious people who preach against it, and claim it is pure evil.
4. Those who are obsessed with it for answers and use it every day.
5. Spiritualists who know its powers and use it for white or black magic.
6. Experts that investigate it.
7. Those who have had bad experiences and have sworn off it.
8. People who are no longer here to tell their stories.
No matter what category you fit in, rest assured; if you choose to talk back to the devil, you are still no match for him.
- Origin of the Ouija board
1. THE OUIJA’S BOARD INVENTOR
There are discrepancies regarding the Ouija board’s inventor, and the dates it was invented.
Some say the origin of the Ouija Board can be traced back to E.C. Reiche, who was a coffin maker in Maryland.
He had an interest in “table tapping,” where a cumbersome table was used to get answers from the spirit world, but he thought there must be an easier way to accomplish the task.
He got together with two of his friends, Elijah J.Bond, and Charles Kennard, and they created the final design of the “Ouija Board” in 1891 (Cornelius, 19).
The other people who are thought to be its creators are the Mystic, M. Planchette, or Thomas Welton in 1890 (Cornelius, (11,16) It was also thought that William Fuld developed the Ouija board in 1892.
2. MARKETERS OF THE OUIJA
According to the book “Ouija” by Stoker Hun, Fuld actually bought the rights to Bond’s patent.
He then started a company that later became the “Baltimore Talking Board Company” (from the advice of the Ouija board, of course).
He claims to have never used the board since because he was afraid, he would jinx his company’s success.
In 1966, Parker Brothers of Salem bought the rights to the board, and sold two million copies in the first year, which beat the sales of their most popular Monopoly game (Cornelius, 24).
3. HOW THE OUIJA BOARD GOT ITS NAME
According to Kennard, the Ouija board named itself (Cornelius, 20). Some experts claim that the word “Ouija” is an Egyptian word that means “good luck,”, but according to Egyptian language consultants there is no such a word that exists.
Other experts’ state that it comes from the French word “oui” and the German word “ja”; both meaning yes (Cornelius, 20,21).
3. HOW THE BOARD WAS CREATED
Similar methods to the Ouija board, such as spirit writing, were used by the Chinese even before Confucius to communicate with the dead and are still being used in the En Chu temples in Taiwan (Cornelius ,11).
In 540 BC, Pythagoras, who was an Ionian Greek philosopher and mathematician, had a talking table on wheels, but the table was cumbersome and impractical (Cornelius, 12).
In 1853, the Mystic, M. Planchette developed a device that was heart shaped and made of wood with a pencil attached that was used for automatic writing (Buckland, Inro, 310),
Later, the pencil was removed, a circular window was added, and the shape was changed to a triangle because it made it easier to slide across the board (Cornelius, 17).
The triangular object is usually referred to as a pointer, planchette, or traveler (Cornelius, 15). The idea of painting the alphabet on a board came from the earlier dial-plate machines (Cornelius, 17).
4. WHERE THE ANSWERS COME FROM
Some experts say that the answers from the Ouija board come from the unconscious mind of the user.
They believe that the state of mind a person is in when using the board allows memories to be released from their unconscious mind to form answers on the board.
Therefore, the board gives them information that they think they do not know, but that they just forgot.
In contrast, many people believe that the answers they receive from the Ouija board come from deceased individuals.
Initially, people become involved with the Ouija board while trying to contact their dead loved ones. But in all the experiments that have been done by experts, there is no proof that leads to that conclusion.
The spirits from the Ouija board may say that they are a dead loved one or another person that once lived, but they may more likely be a familiar spirit, also called a demonic spirit, that just has access to their information.
5. HOW IT WORKS
Other than serious experimentation, many people start out using the Ouija board innocently. Although they don’t understand how it works, they believe it is harmless fun.
They ignore the rumors they have heard, and the news stories that were told about people who committed suicide after its use. Impending danger is the furthest thing from their minds.
At first, simple questions and answers immerge that could very well have been from the user’s subconscious, but later it is obvious that the information retrieved is foreign to the user.
After the spirit that is speaking through the Ouija board has developed a person’s trust, the user is prone to give up any past ideas of religion and find a new religion that supports communication with the spirit world.
The spirit of the Ouija board infects their thinking, discourages morals, and confuses the person’s sense of right and wrong.
6. SKEPTICS
The Skeptics usually think that the people using the Ouija are moving the pointer themselves.
Even Ouija board users who believe their fellow users are not moving the pointer can still be skeptics because they think that the Ouija board is harmless, and that it is just a game.
One of the reasons people may think that the Ouija is all just a big joke is due to the many psychics who are frauds and have no real psychic skills but use their trickery to make money.
Also, because it is a well-known fact that magicians’ do not use real magic, and they only use props to make their magic appear real.
Therefore, the skeptics reason that if psychics are frauds, and magicians just use tricks to fool people, why should the Ouija be any different?
7. EXPERIMENTS
Experiments were performed in investigations of the brain, and the conclusion was that our brain can remember every person and experience we have had since we were born.
The enormous amount of information that we have stored in our subconscious can be sporadically released to our conscience mind at any time, including in our dreams, and under hypnosis.
All those memories are stored in our subconscious. Possibly, a spirit may obtain access to our information, also, rather than giving us new information that is not in our subconscious.
Although this view may explain a possibility of the Ouija board being controlled by our subconscious or a spirit, it does not explain other factors, such as how our subconscious can physically move the Ouija without us being aware of it.
A good way to test the Ouija board for accuracy is by asking it a question about another person who does not have their hands on the pointer of the Ouija board at the time.
The question that is asked should be something that the Ouija board users do not know the answer to.
It also must be a question that does not have more than one possible answer.
The test subject must be a trustworthy person who will tell the truth concerning the answer to the question, and the answer must be verifiable with physical proof by looking it up or by the person writing the answer before the Ouija is asked the question.
8. MOVIES
The first movie that linked the Ouija board to something evil was a cartoon called, “Ouija Board, Koko the Clown”, released by Max Fleischer in 1920 (Cornelius, 9).
“The Exorcist”, written by William Peter Blatty in 1971 was based on a true story. However, instead of a girl being possessed, it was a boy.
The incident happened on Jan 1949, after the child used the Ouija board. The boy’s aunt was a practicing spiritualist who was dying of multiple sclerosis.
She had fond affection for the boy and gave him the board, so he could keep in contact with her after she died.
She died a month later, and the boy tried to reach her through the Ouija board, but instead he became possessed.
He was exorcised several times, and he was freed from the demon, and went on to live a normal life. The boy’s possession was written about in the New York Times, and the Washington post (Cornelius, 7).
9. PEOPLE WHO WROTE BOOKS AFTER THEIR DEATH
Katherine Mardon Davis claims in her book, “Light from Beyond” that when a Mrs. X was using the Ouija board, she contacted a spirit, and asked it if it would write a book for her.
The spirit obliged, and Davis claims the book was written completely by the spirit, and nothing was changed. The book is about God, among other things. Davis asserted that the book took Mrs. X three weeks to write.
In 1915, Emily Grant Hutchings claimed she was using the Ouija board, and to her surprise, Mark Twain came through as a spirit.
She stated that Twain then compelled her to write a book in which he was the author.
In 1917, the book, “Jap Herron” was published by Mitchell Kennerley who was a book dealer.
When Mark Twain’s daughter, Clara Clemens, caught wind of it, she and his editor (Harper and Brothers) determined themselves to put a halt to the publication.
Hutchings and Kennerley agreed out of court to stop publication and distribution. Only a few books were left in the hands of the public.
9. Interesting Facts
The Ouija first gained popularity in World War 1, when people were desperate to contact their loved ones who were fighting in Europe. The Ouija board’s sales continued to climb in times of disaster.
Mediums did not like the idea that the “Spirit Board” was released to the public because it was cutting in on their businesses.
The internal revenue service declared the Ouija board a game in 1920, so it could be taxed.
Fuld of the “The Baltimore Talking Board Company” fought it, claiming that it was a tool to use between this world and the next, but lost. Then he tried to take it to the Supreme Court, but he was turned down (Cornelius, 25).
The one film that depicted the Ouija board in a positive light was, “Awakenings”, where Robin Williams places the hand of a comatose patient on the pointer of a Ouija board to prove that the patient was still functioning on a sub-conscience level.
10. Dangers
The experts reasoned that if a layman can accidently discharge an entity from the Ouija board, then one should be able to do it methodically and scientifically.
J.G. Raupert has conducted numerous experiments and talked to experts from all over the world who had also been studying the phenomenon of the Ouija board.
Together they concluded that the Ouija Board is dangerous, and no one should consider trying it for themselves to prove it is or isn’t true.
Aleister Edward Crowley 1875–1947, was an occultist, and a magician who used ceremonial magic, and the Ouija board, and was an authority on such.
His ambition was to open a dimension to the spirit world, and he claimed he succeeded. He believed that two people together could contact non-living unseen beings.
His wife Rose Edith Kelly, Mary d’Este, Sturges, and the poet Victor Neuberg, helped him with his communication with the Ouija.
One of Crowley’s students, Grady Louis McMurtry, who was the leader of Crowley’s fraternity, attested to the board’s amazing abilities.
All of these experts agreed that the Ouija was a dangerous instrument. Crowley determined “that the Ouija is probably one of the most dangerous devices ever placed in the hands of humanity!”
MY PERSONAL STORY
I was introduced to the Ouija Board by my grandmother when I was a child. I used the Ouija through-out my life with my friends, without incident.
I thought it was just fun, and I did not believe any strange stories I heard about it.
When I was 39 years old, I had some friends over and we used the Ouija board, only this time I asked it an unusual question, which I am not going to say what it is because I don’t want anyone to use it.
We all joked around about the Ouija board, and had a good time, but at 4 am I was awoken by my body and my husband’s body bouncing uncontrollably on the bed. While this transpired,
I shook my husband and told him to wake up, but he didn’t wake up until it was over. We were only bouncing a couple of inches off the bed,but the bed or nothing else in the room was shaking.
The incident probably only lasted a few minutes, but it made a believer out of me. I immediately got rid of the Ouija board, and I haven’t used it since.
Works Cited.
Cornelius, Edward Aleister Crowley and the Ouija Board. Feral House, 2005. Web. Port townsend,washigton 98368
The Spirit Book: The Encyclopedia of Clairvoyance, Channelling, and Spirit … Raymond Buckland
Aleister Crowley and the Ouija Board
By J. Edward Cornelius
Emily Grant Hutchings, Varla- Ventura Jap Herron, A Novel Written from the Ouija Board: Paranormal Parlor, A … https://books.google.com/books?id=NMIndkqs1AgC&pg=PT2&dq=Ouija+board&hl=en&sa=X&ei=-1mnVPTyKI2yyASM2YCoAw&ved=0CEcQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=Ouija%20b
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