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In his latest study of the near-death experience, Moody comes out of the closet and declares himself a survivalist, but as with a number of these books it is difficult to know just how literally the author interprets the experience. For instance, does Moody believe that out-of-the-body experiences involve quasi-ethereal etheric bodies which perceive the environment by means of photons falling on etheric retinas? If so he clearly does not realise that this would make it impossible for the ethereal body to be invisible!
Equally, it is not clear whether he regards the transcendental locations as being quasi-physical locations. A major point over looked in such studies is that they are not directly studying experiences, but are dealing with narratives which have been socially constructed. in which experiences which may not be describable in detail, are reconstructed using the idiom of popular culture and cliché in an effort to communicate something of the ineffable.
Moody follows in a long tradition of pietistic tracts in making healing and conversionary claims for his previous books, such as in the story of the crippled old lady who was given the strength to get out and about again after reading a copy of Life After Life given to her by a neighbour. Much of the book has a typical atmosphere of American 'newageism' as in the extraordinary claim that acceptance of an after life would put an end to war. Absolute religious faith in afterlife certainly did not deter the Iranians or the Crusaders.
Many of the claimed post-experience character changes seem to resemble those of members of encounter groups etc., and the “feelings of being enveloped in an ocean of love", “loving everybody" and going about with a fixed smile would be seen by many as classic denial symptoms. This does not of course invalidate the phenomenological character of the experiences which, even if subjective, are proudly meaningful to the experiencer.
- Peter Rogerson, from Magonia 34.1989.
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