Theoretic Explanation of the Nature of Sensation in Spirits

We present in this issue the topic #70 from the Systematized Study of the Spiritist Doctrine, that is being presented weekly, according to the programme elaborated by the Brazilian Spiritist Federation (FEB), structured in 6 modules and 147 topics.

If the reader uses this program for a study group, we suggest that questions proposed be discussed freely before the reading of the text that follows. If you would like to study alone, we ask you to try to answer the questions at first and only then read the text that follows. The answer key can be found at the end of the lesson. 

Questions

1. Is it correct to say that spirits are immaterial?

2. Do the sensations and perceptions of Spirits vary from individual to individual?

3. Does the state of incarnation increase or reduce the perceptions of the Spirit?

4. Why does the disincarnated Spirit have sensations, such as pain and cold, typical of incarnated ones?

5. Can the sufferings that we go through be avoided?   

Text

Spirits are not immaterial, but incorporeal

1. Answering the question 82 of The Spirits’ Book, the immortals said, about the nature of the Spirit: 'Immaterial' is not the right word; 'incorporeal' would be nearer the truth, for you must understand that a spirit, being a creation, must be something real. Spirit is quintessentialized matter, but matter existing in a state which has no analogue within the circle of your comprehension, and so ethereal that it could not be perceived by your senses.  

2. In face of that, we suppose that sensations and perceptions of the Spirits are different, according to their level of evolution and state they are. It is needed, then, for better understand the details of such a fact, to remember the conditions in which the Spirits live on Earth and the spiritual world, as it follows. 

3. There are three elements in the man: 1^st. Soul or Spirit, intelligent principle, of the moral sense; 2^nd. Material body, in which the Spirit is covered temporarily, because of some commitments; 3^rd. Perispirit, semi material envelope, which connects the soul and the body.  

4. During earthly life, the body receives the exterior impressions and transmits to the Spirit through the perispirit. Perceptions and sensations get, because of that, sensibly reduced, because, isolated in the body, the Spirit is reduced in its perceptions to the limits that are necessary. For example, no one, only rare cases, has easy access to the memories of their past existences. 

5. According to Emmanuel the sensorial sphere works, for the Spirit, like a chamber. Sight, hearing, tactition are reduced. The physical body is like a dark cabinet, providing opportunity to learn. Acquired knowledge and habits lie in the form of intuitions and tendencies.

Right after disincarnating, many are unaware of it

6. In the spiritual plan, the situation is entirely modified. Spiritism teaches that, because of death, the perispirit is disengaged slower or faster from the body and, because of that, the first minutes after disincarnating, the Spirit does not find explanation for the situation he is in. He knows he is not dead, because he feels alive. He sees his material body and knows that it belongs to him, but he cannot understand why he is not in it. This situation lasts while there is connection between the body and the perispirit.  

7. This fact leads many times the Spirit feel pain, cold, heat and some times, worms eating his decomposing body. Well, we know the worms do not eat his perispirit, the same way that he is not subjected to physical sensations of cold, heat and pain. It is that, not complete the separation between body and perispirit, there is a moral repercussion that transmits to the Spirit such occurrences.  

8. Many times there is no connection between the body and the perispirit, because the first is decomposed already, however remembrance and sensation of the occurred fact last for years, keeping the impression that such fact is occurring now.  

9. On the other hand, there are Spirits who achieved a level of evolution not to feel such things. Its perispirit less dense and its perceptions more accured do not allow this repercussion to happen.

Many sufferings are caused by us

10. The sufferings of our present existence are sometimes independent of us; but they are often the consequences of our own volition. If we trace our sufferings back to their source, we see that the greater number of them is due to causes which we might have avoided.

11. How many ills, how many infirmities, does man owe to his excesses, his ambition-in a word, to the indulgence of his various passions! He who should live soberly in all respects, who should never run into excesses of any kind, who should be always simple in his tastes, modest in his desires, would escape a large proportion of the tribulations of human life. It is the same with regard to spirit-life, the sufferings of which are always the consequence of the manner in which a spirit has lived upon the earth.  

12. In that life undoubtedly he will no longer suffer from gout or rheumatism; but his wrong-doing down here will cause him to experience other sufferings no less painful. hose sufferings are the result of the links which exist between a spirit and matter; that the more completely he is freed from the influence of matter-in other words, the more dematerialized he is-the fewer are the painful sensations experienced by him. It depends, therefore, on each of us to free ourselves from the influence of matter by our action in this present life.

13. Let him conquer his animal passions; let him rid himself of hatred, envy, jealousy, pride; let him throw off the yoke of selfishness; let him purify his soul by cultivating noble sentiments; let him do good; let him attach to the things of this world only the degree of importance which they deserve,-and he will, even under his present corporeal envelope, have affected his purification, and achieved his deliverance the influence of matter, which will cease for him on his quitting that envelope.

Answer Key