In ancient Egypt, artists portrayed the ba, or body double, as a bird with a human face. In later cultures, the body double took on a clearly human form. The English writer D. H. Lawrence claimed to see his body double as he lay dying. The double, he said, had emerged from his physical body. As it stood in the corner of the room, it stared back at him.1
Astral travelers report that their body doubles cannot pick up a glass or open a book. But doors and walls cannot stop them. They fly to distant places by willing themselves to go there. Living people may see or sense their ghost-like presence. A few astral travelers find they can mind-speak to their friends and loved ones.
Writers seem to run into more OBEs than most people do. Some famous names appear on the list of astral travelers: Edgar Allan Poe, Jack London, Emily Brontë, Mark Twain, Leo Tolstoy. In the late 1800s, Tolstoy was waiting at a train station in St. Petersburg, Russia, to greet D. D. Home, a famous psychic. He watched his friend step off the train—but then Home walked away. Annoyed at the snub, Tolstoy and his wife left the station. Three hours later, the real Home stepped off his train and found the platform empty. When the men compared notes, both were amazed. Tolstoy became convinced that he had seen Home’s body double.2
An American writer went through his own NDE in Italy during World War I. At the time, Ernest Hemingway was an ambulance driver. He was handing out candy to some soldiers on the day a shell burst nearby. Shrapnel tore into his legs. “I felt my soul … was coming right out of my body,” Hemingway said. It was “like you’d pull a silk handkerchief out of a pocket by one corner…. It flew around and then came back and went in again and I wasn’t dead anymore.” In A Farewell to Arms, Hemingway describes his hero’s encounter with a similar NDE.3
A British author, William Gerhardie, claimed he could induce astral travel at will. Some of his journeys appear in his 1934 novel, Resurrection. Gerhardie writes that in one OBE he was pushed forward and placed on his feet. He staggered to the bedroom door, but could not turn the handle. His hand, he found, could not grip the knob. Looking back, he saw he was tied to his sleeping body by a glowing silver cord. When he floated through the front door, he felt he could fly anywhere he wished. But would his lifeline break? The question sent him flying back to his sleeping form, but all was well. Happy with his new freedom, he flew off again. The cord stretched to a frail thread but held firm. In the next instant, his eyes snapped open. Gerhardie was back in bed, but he was certain his OBE had not been a dream.4
Writers seem to have OBEs more often than most people do. Could it be their vibrant imaginations? A number of famous authors have reported out-of-body experiences, including (clockwise from top left) Leo Tolstoy, Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, and Edgar Allan Poe.
British author William Gerhardie claimed that he could go on an OBE whenever he wished. He said that during an OBE, he was always tied to his body by a glowing silver cord. Most people who report OBEs also describe being attached to their bodies by a similar cord.
Gerhardie was not the first to describe a “silver cord” linking astral and physical bodies. The term appears in the Bible. The twelfth chapter of Ecclesiastes says, “…the mourners go about the streets … before the silver cord is loosed.” An American expert, Sylvan Muldoon, has tried to describe the cord. He believes it is one and one-half inches thick at the moment the astral and human bodies divide. As the astral body roams, the cord stretches as thin as a thread. Energy appears to pass through the cord from the astral body to the human body. Some writers report that it is attached to the forehead. Others say it is hooked to the body’s navel or the back of the head.5
Those who glimpse astral travelers do not always see the thin, silver cord. Mark Twain, author of Tom Sawyer, wrote about such an event. Twain happened to see a stranger approach his house one day. As he watched, the man walked to within twenty feet of where he stood. Then, in the blink of an eye, he was gone! Twain, a big fan of psychic events, was delighted. “I had seen a [ghost] at last, with my own eyes,” he told himself. But more surprises lay ahead. When Twain entered the house, the stranger was waiting for him. A servant had welcomed the man into the house some time earlier.7
Author Mark Twain believed he had seen a ghost! But most OBE experts think Twain actually saw a man’s body double.
OBE experts believe that Twain saw the man’s double, not a ghost. The man was already seated inside when his double retraced his steps to the door. Why would a body double repeat such a simple act? No one knows.
Strange as it seems, many people say they have had an OBE. In 1890, a British survey asked 17,000 people if they had been in touch with an astral body. Ten percent answered yes. Of these, one in three claimed to have seen doubles of living people. Almost a century later, a new survey turned up similar numbers. The 1975 study asked a thousand Americans if they had traveled out of body. Fourteen percent of the adults and 25 percent of the students said yes.8 It appears that OBEs and NDEs are still going strong.
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky