The subject of someone going into a trance intrigued me when I came to the Siddha path. As a young lad I saw my neighbour "invite" by invoking deities who would give solutions to problems of people gathered around followed by an animal sacrifice and a feast. I used to stay at a safe distance and watch the proceedings not understanding it but revered the act as a form of worship by certain portions of the community.
Then my brother-in-law spearheaded and led the local manual group of workers under his supervision renovate and build new shrines and temples in the many places where he was transferred for work. Here too the deities were summoned. These practice went one in several other smaller temples and shrines and certain individual's homes too.
As an infant when I succumbed to diarrhea, my parents rushed me to my neighbour of Chinese origin who was known to go into a trance and cure the sick. Since they had lost two children earlier for the same reason this time around my parents chose this alternative. I was saved but with a condition that I was given away in adoption to the Chinese Gods. Since then my mother always reminded me to drop in at Chinese temples and pay my respect to the deities. Later when I joined work, I asked to see my future at a Chinese temple near my place of work. I had to shake a can of sticks on which was written numbers. The stick that dropped out of the can was picked up and its number referred to a large book of prediction. The priest told me in the little Malay language that he knew that I had lots of friends in the divine plane who were looking over my shoulder. That was pleasant news to me. Today the Siddhas have reassured the same.
Then when I came to know Jnana Jhothiamma, I was again reminded of the deities and how they stood by their devotees. She was in communion with "Mother" and "Ayya", funding to build a seven foot statue of "Ayya" in Chennai city and came over to India to officiate it. She used to share the mysterious ways of these deities and spoke often about their invisible but assured presence. When she returned from the USA the same year, to visit the old Kallar Ashram, wanting to know more about Agathiyar, the deities accompanied her but told her that henceforth although they would be present, they had now handed her over to Agathiyar. She soon became a very devoted follower of Agathiyar. When she visited our home twice, she mentioned to us the presence of the Siddhas. On her first visit Agathiyar gifted all of us with a miracle by opening both his eyes in the bronze image of his at AVM. She used to share many miraculous moments with Agathiyar and the Siddhas till she was asked to drop all means of communion with the outside world.
If earlier I stayed away from places where the deities were invoked and people went into trances, now I was brought closer to this mysterious phenomena and had to bear witness to many mysterious happenings, when they chose to make themselves visible to a rare few, and began to frequent the abodes of the Siddhas. The Siddhas too showed their presence in mysterious ways. The Gurus who had shed their mortal frame too made their presence known. The thin veil between both worlds, dimension, sphere, space and plane, was dropped.
How do we explain this phenomena of going into a trance?
Swami Vivekananda who was groomed by his master Sri Ramakrishna, explains this phenomena in Swami Prabhavananda's book "Patanjali Yoga Sutras", Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai.
The yogi can enter a living body and hold that man's mind and organs in check, and for the time being act through the body of that man.
When one goes through the Tiruarutpa of Ramalinga Adigal, one never fails to notice that he repeatedly mentions a line in numerous songs of his that the dead shall arise, hence his command to his followers that the dead should not be burnt in the funeral pyre but buried for they shall arise.
How is that possible? How does he revive the dead? I once asked Tavayogi but he quite honestly told me he did not know.
Swami Vivekananda too points out to this peculiar possibility, where the dead arise.
The yogi can enter a dead body and make it get up and move, even while he himself is working in another body.
How is that possible? But there are such instances. An atheist, for the sake of his son accompanied him to a cave temple in Sungai Siput. While waiting for his son to pray, he chose not to enter the cave but instead picked up a broom and started to sweep the dried and fallen leaves at the stairs to the entrance of the cave temple. Soon he came back to carry out this chore willingly but never stepped into the cave nor prayed from a distance. One day he collapsed and the doctors pronounced him dead. While waiting for the body to be taken to the mortuary, the temple priest rushed to the hospital. He began chanting Lord Muruga's hymns at the bedside of the dead man. The man woke up alive! Dr Janar of AVM who was attached to the hospital at that time could vouch for this miracle. We were privileged to meet Krishnan during one of our visits to the cave temple. He is now an ardent devotee of Lord Muruga and continues sweeping the floor of the cave temple.
CS Murugesan in his book, "Siddhargalin Saagaakalai", Azhagu Pathipagam, 1998, gives us a small inkling and hint into this miraculous possibility.
The Siddhas have the ability to breath into the Tananjayan nerve the essential and life saving Prana, something that Agathiyar often says that he has given his breath to revive and save his devotees.
மரணம் ஏற்பட்டும் மூன்று நாள் வரை தங்கியிருக்கும் தனஞ்செயன் வாயுவில் பிராண வாயுவை உண்டாக்கும் அந்தரியாமி என்ற கூறுபாடு இருப்பதால் ஆற்றல் வல்ல சித்தர்கள் அதன் வாயிலாக பிராண வாயுவை அதிகரிக்கச் செய்து திரும்ப உயிர் பெற்றெலுதலும் சாத்தியமான காரியம்.
Life's answers lie with the Siddhas, and the deities from the other side of the realm. We are indebted to all the Gods and Goddesses and deities from all faiths for their compassion and love and in sharing all these amazing and miraculous information, although only minute pieces of the puzzle, but it helps answer our needs of the moment.