Sky Shamans of Mongolia: Meetings with Remarkable Healers

by Kevin B. Turner

Overview

Part travelogue, part experiential spiritual memoir, Kevin Turner takes us to visit with authentic shamans in the steppes and urban centers of modern-day Mongolia. Along the way, the author, a practicing shaman himself, tells of spontaneous medical diagnoses, all-night shamanic ceremonies, and miraculous healings, all welling from a rich culture in which divination, soul-retrieval, and spirit depossession are a part of everyday life.
 
Shamanism, described in the 1950s by Mircea Eliade as "archaic techniques of ecstasy," is alive and well in Mongolia as a means of accessing "nonordinary realities" and the spirit world. After centuries of suppression by Buddhist and then Communist political powers, it is exploding in popularity in Mongolia. Turner gives compelling accounts of healings and rituals he witnesses among Darkhad, Buryat, and Khalkh shamans, and goes on to provide us with his insights into a universal shamanism, principles that lie at the heart of shamanic traditions worldwide. This astounding, inspiring book will appeal to shamans and shamanic therapists, students of Mongolian culture and comparative religion, and fans of off-grid travel memoirs.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781583946343
Publisher:	North Atlantic Books
Publication date:	04/12/2016
Pages:	248
Sales rank:	722,272
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Kevin B. Turner is the director for Asia and faculty member of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies founded by Michael Harner. After years of study with yogis, monks, and lamas in India, Nepal, Southeast Asia, Taiwan, and Japan, Kevin met Michael Harner in 1997 and trained in core shamanism, an integrative, nontraditional approach to shamanism. He teaches Core Shamanism internationally, offering several workshops a year. Turner is also a full trainer at the Monroe Institute, which offers programs and training in the out-of-body experience, clairvoyance, remote viewing, psychokinesis, and psychopomp work.

Table of Contents

Introduction 3

Chapter 1 The Deep End First 13

Initial Interviews with Mongolian Shamans 17

Narantsetseg 17

Ariyunaa 20

Munkhbat 21

The Artful Dodger 22

Otgonbar 23

Damdinsuren 23

Journey to Khuvsgul Province 24

Chapter 2 Entering the Circle 37

A Convocation of Shamans-The Khentii Gathering 43

Chapter 3 The Many Lives of Mongolian Shamanism 59

Earliest Sources of Inner Asian Shamanism 59

Shamanism in the Era of the Great Khans 64

Mongolian Shamanism and the Reincarnated

Lama System in Tibet 68

Shamanism in the Communist Era 74

Chapter 4 Darkhad Shamans: Touching

Primordial Roots 77

Calling On The Constellation Of Destiny 77

A Shamanic Test 82

Darkhad Shamanic Cosmology 87

Munkhjargal Böö: A Darkhad Healing Ceremony 93

Chapter 5 Khalkh Shamans: Resurrection and Revival 99

Shona: A Khalkh Healing Session 101

Munkhbat: The Shaman Who Journeys 105

The Three Souls 109

Narantsetseg: Interview with a Khalkh Shamaness 110

Chapter 6 Buryat Shamans: Spiritual Warriors Of The North 123

Altantsetseg: Interview with a Buryat Shamaness 123

Delgernandjil: Russian Spies, Television Shows, and another Test 128

Ariyunaa: Shamanic Healing and Black Magic 130

Buryat Cosmology 136

Chapter 7 The Buryat Shanar: An Initiation of Death, Ascension, and Rebirth 139

The Buryat Shanar Initiation Ceremony 140

Sacred Space 140

Offerings to the Spirits 141

Circumambulating the Tree 144

The Ascent 145

The Return 146

Comparison to World-Ascension Initiations 148

Serpents of Knowledge 149

The Sacred Tree 150

The Ascension 151

Transcendence 154

The Sacred Return 154

Chapter 8 Mongolian Shamanism Meets The World: Challenges Ahead 157

Chapter 9 Shamanism As A

Personal Evolution 173

Shamanism as a Path to Awakening 173

The Universality of Shamanism 175

Tengerism: A Closer Look 177

Personal Myth 179

Shamanism and Science 180

Neuroscience 181

Studying With a Mongolian Shaman 182

The Future of Shamanism 182

Glossary 187

Notes 191

Bibliography 197

Index 203

Acknowledgments 211

About The Author 213

Editorial Reviews

Sky Shamans of Mongolia is a fascinating and serious work that is an important contribution to shamanic knowledge. A must–read for anyone wishing to learn about Mongolian shamanism and to understand its place in the world.”—Michael Harner, PhD, author of The Way of the Shaman and Cave and Cosmos: Shamanic Encounters with Another Reality

“As one who has worked and taught alongside Mongolian shamans, I find this book by Kevin Turner has illuminated much about this stunningly powerful and mysterious form of shamanism. He shares what he has learned firsthand, and he frames it in a rich context of multiple dimensions of shamanism, including neuroscience, and rolls it into a vision of shamanism as personal evolution with a vision of the future. Read this book!”—C. Michael Smith, PhD, clinical psychologist and author of Jung and Shamanism in Dialogue and Psychotherapy and the Sacred

“Kevin Turner’s marvelous fieldwork describes shamanism and shamanic knowledge as it really is in Mongolia.”—L. Chuluunbaatar, PhD, professor of linguistics at National University of Mongolia

“Kevin Turner’s Sky Shamans of Mongolia covers a subject few authors have investigated in depth. In this wonderful and well-written text, Turner explores shamanism in the kind of detail only an initiate could communicate.  Not only does Turner speak to the cultural role of shamans, but he reveals the experiential cosmos in which they journey for the benefit of community.  I recommend this book for anyone interested in Asian shamanism.”—Larry Peters, PhD, author of Tibetan Shamanism: Ecstasy and Healing

“Turner’s unique qualifications make this book an immensely valuable resource for Westerners interested in Mongolian shamanism, or shamanism wherever practiced. An American living in Asia, speaking several Asian tongues, himself a shamanic practitioner, Turner possesses not only the gift of understanding but the gift of putting that understanding into clear, readable language. Unlike academics attempting to describe shamanism from the outside, Turner knows it from the inside, and the same familiarity that gained him the confidence of the shamans enables him to be a sure-footed interpreter for the reader.”—Frank DeMarco, author of The Sphere and the Hologram

“A fascinating and compelling account of contemporary shamanic practice, based on firsthand experience and simultaneously an exercise in religious anthropology and cultural ethnography, this work explores a sacred tradition whose deep impact on the West is gradually being rediscovered and interpreted anew.”—Paul Bishop, PhD, author of The Archaic: The Past in the Present

“Kevin Turner is an explorer of the inner worlds, a researcher of the deep meaning of life. His book, in addition to being an anthropological text, is also a travel story, full of surprises, between blue skies and green landscapes without boundaries, the songs and costumes of the shamans, their miraculous healings and visions, and the sterile discussions among academic scholars described with fine irony. [A] trip to real but extraordinary experiences.”—Guido Ferrari, journalist and director of Tao: The Watercourse Way at Wu Yi Mountain

“Sky Shamans of Mongolia is an invaluable guide for anyone interested in understanding one of the world’s oldest shamanic traditions with an abundance of detail to satisfy a curious reader or a serious student of global shamanism.”—Robert Thé, medical anthropologist

“Kevin Turner brings a rare combination of skills and tools to the table, which in Mongolia opened doors and hearts normally closed to Western researchers of shamanism. He is a linguist, a teacher, and a practicing shaman. As a Western shaman, he had to endure much skeptical probing before being accepted by the Mongolian shamanic community and invited to their gatherings and healing ceremonies. Writing Sky Shamans of Mongolia from the perspective of a shamanic practitioner himself, Kevin Turner offers his readers a rare in-depth overview of the history and current practices of Mongolian shamanism, which after a period of persecution and decline is experiencing a revival of astonishing proportions.”—Sabine Lucas, PhD, Jungian analyst, and author of Past Life Dreamwork

“Sky Shamans of Mongolia provides authoritative and extensive coverage of a little-known tradition. The writer’s personal encounters enliven the account, furthered by his position as a practitioner of ‘universal shamanism’ which enables him to enjoy privileged access. There are moments when the reader is so drawn in by the firsthand descriptions that it feels as if one were actually there.”—John Dougill, author of Shinto Shrines: A Guide to the Sacred Sites of Japan’s Ancient Religion

“The dramatic resurgence of shamanism in Mongolia, as detailed in this beautifully written study, is testament to the indomitable nature of the soul’s healing powers. Kevin Turner gives us both a window into shamanism as a worldwide phenomenon and a detailed account of ancestral Mongolian shamanic practices. Most interesting of all, Sky Shamans is that rare glimpse into the shamanic psyche, transmitted through these accounts.”—Jeremiah Abrams, author of Meeting the Shadow: The Hidden Power of the Dark Side of Human Nature

“An enjoyably written introduction to Mongolian and Inner Asian shamanisms that is based in experience and filled with knowledge. Recommended.”—Jeremy Narby, author of Shamans through Time and The Cosmic Serpent

“Author Kevin Turner has brought something of great importance to those seeking to understand and practice shamanism: a valuable contribution to the understanding and practice of shamanism in the West and a richly rewarding, fascinating study of Mongolian shamanism. The author’s adventures in the land of the shamans brings much food for thought and great insight.”—Nicholas Breeze Wood, editor of Sacred Hoop magazine

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