As you know, there are many amazing people on earth whose superhuman abilities amaze the imagination of everyone: both scientists and ordinary people. But among these many abilities, it is especially difficult for our minds to cope with such a human phenomenon as fire resistance.
But in this case, we are not talking about pyrokinesis - the ability of some individuals to set fire to objects at a distance, but about not being exposed to fire. In other words, about those cases when a person, as they say, does not take fire.
Ancient sources claim that the practice of walking on fire (later called fire-dancing) was something quite legalized in many parts of Central and South Asia a long time ago - in the 5th century BC. In the following centuries, nestinarism spread to the Mediterranean countries, and in the tribal cults of America and the Pacific Islands, nestinar rituals developed by themselves, as if in parallel with other parts of the world.
For Western "official" scholars who first hear about such ceremonies, it takes a certain amount of credulity to admit that men, women and even children can painlessly walk on burning stones and searing heat, but the cases that occurred with the first white settlers and missionaries, those who have seen this are so numerous that it is difficult to ignore them even for skeptics. And so, in this century, academics and doctors have to work desperately to find a reasonable explanation for this bizarre phenomenon.
In 1901, Professor of the Smithsonian Institution S. P. Langley was fortunate enough to personally observe how the priests on the island of Tahiti were engaged in walking on fire. When one of the stones was rolled out of the brazier to check how hot it was, it turned out that it could boil water for more than twenty minutes. From this fact, the professor concluded that the temperature of the stone was over 1200 degrees Fahrenheit (400 degrees Celsius).
In 1922, a French bishop in the Indian city of Mysore was present at the nestinar walks of the Islamic mystic at the palace of the local maharajah. What shocked him the most was the fakir's ability not only not to suffer from the fire himself, but also to transfer his “incombustible” power to others, for in his eyes the entire orchestra of the Maharaja, led by the fakir, marched in columns of three through the flame - barefoot, without receiving any damage …
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Moreover, after passing the nestinar over the coals, they lower their temperature! This can literally be seen: behind those walking there are darkening traces. Probably, this phenomenon was meant by Virgil in the "Aeneid": "The heat devours, and we go, strong in faith, / Through fire and traces we leave on smoldering coals!"
Max Freedom Langer described in detail how his mentor, British Museum employee Dr. W. T. Brigham, accompanied by three kahunas - local magicians - walked on hot lava on Mount Kone. The mages told him to take off his shoes, for the protection of the god Kahuna did not extend to his boots, but he refused. Brigham watched as one of his companions slowly walked along the lava flow, while the other two suddenly pushed him, and he, being on the hot lava, was forced to run to the opposite edge of the stream. While he ran about 45 meters on it, his boots and socks were burnt. The three kahunas, who continued to walk barefoot on the lava, burst out laughing, pointing to the pieces of burning leather trailing behind him.
In the book Wild Women, Rosita Forbes described how in Suriname the descendants of African slaves, mingled with the local population, danced in flames under the guidance of a virgin priestess. During the dance, the priestess was in a trance state. If she suddenly left him, then the dancers would lose their immunity to fire.
However, many who have never seen anything like it themselves refuse to believe that such a thing is in principle possible, and instead believe that the root of the whole mystery lies in mass hallucinations. Or in charlatanism, at best - in focustism, in creating an illusion like the one when the audience sees a supposedly cut off living head lying on a dish resting on a table, under which there is only air. Therefore, in the summer of 1935, when British psychologist Harry Price announced that he intended to personally conduct extensive research on this phenomenon, the news aroused increased interest. They wrote about her in the press, gossiped in salons … At the beginning of September of the same year, a giant brazier was built in the garden of a member of the Society for Psychical Research Alex Dribell, made up of seven tons of oak logs, a ton of firewood, ten gallons of paraffin,a fair amount of coal and fifty copies of The Times. (The Times was, apparently, something symbolic …)
The object of Harry Price's research was a young Indian from the province of Kashmir named Kuda Books, who, according to rumors, regularly performed similar feats in his country without any fanfare and excitement. Filmed on film for posterity, under the gaze of a whole crowd of respectable pundits from the University of London, the barefoot Kuda Books calmly and fearlessly walked along the entire length of the site, bursting with heat and flames, several times.
The physicist present confirmed that the temperature in the center of the flame was 1400 degrees Celsius - that is, higher than that at which steel melts - and a thoughtful examination of the Indian's legs by three doctors showed no signs of burn blisters. When two researchers dared for the purity of the experiment - what if this is an illusion! - to stick their feet to the very edge of the brazier, where it is colder, then they were forced to withdraw them immediately, instantly acquiring bleeding blisters. Your own blisters are no longer an illusion. I had to believe.
The British scientists who attended this demonstration in Carshalton, Surrey, where the garden itself was located, were amazed and stunned by the logical contradictions that arose from the entire experiment. Of course, the young Kashmiri who was tested was not a trickster and deceiver, he did not use oil or lotion to protect his feet. On the contrary, they were personally washed and dried by the doctor just before the experiment. However, human skin cannot perceive such a temperature without damage to itself - this is contrary to the laws of physics! And biology too.
The researchers were also keenly interested in the fact that, despite all the many previous fire walks, the Kuda Buks' feet were not particularly rough or covered with unusually thick skin to protect them from the heat. Although, scientists have calculated, the skin in this case would have to be much thicker than elephant and have the texture of a tortoise shell. In addition, in the case of Kuda Books, there were no signs of divine ecstasy or any other special mental state that is usually so noticeable among participants in religious ceremonies around the world. Although ecstasy does not help much from the fire: you do not feel pain, but defeat by a high temperature - burns in other words - is still always present.
Since that autumn day in Surrey, scientists have put forward an impressive number of theories explaining the phenomenon in a natural way, so to speak. Some have concluded that the show is a gymnastic trick, not something supernatural. Proponents of this theory believe that the soles of coal walkers simply never come into contact with fire long enough to damage them.
The version, you see, is funny. For if this is so, a person must touch the coals for an insignificant fraction of a second, and this is physically unrealistic. Yes, and these amazing people walk over the fire calmly and unhurriedly, not pulling their feet away from the hot surface at every step. Even if we assume that they have the gift of levitation and hover in some millimeters from the surface, creating the illusion of standing on it, all the same, the heat from the coals rises not by millimeters, but by centimeters - confirmation of this by the blisters of daring experimenters.
Other skeptics believed that it was all about the sweat on the feet - allegedly it produces cooling itself, creating a protective layer between the nestinar's skin and the surface on which it walks. This is also a funny version, because no scientist has ever heard of any such magic sweat and has never seen it in his eyes. If I saw it, it would be a sensation. The same Buks was carefully examined for discharge from the feet of any kind of fluids. Found nothing. Regular feet …
Still others believed that it was all about … oxygen. After all, it is known that fire appears only when there is a necessary condition for it - an oxygen atmosphere. That is why it is categorically not recommended to open the windows in case of a fire - so as not to create an influx of oxygen. Open it up - and the fire breaks out with renewed vigor, as if it had received a powerful recharge.
The same is the case with nestinars: they allegedly put their feet so tightly on the coals that an airless space is created between it and the hot surface, and fire simply does not appear. And, accordingly, it does not burn. At first glance, this is the most reasonable version. If not for one but . The fire, perhaps, does not appear, but nobody canceled the temperature from the already heated coals - even when the feet are in close contact with them. So this version is also untenable.
The fourth talk about some kind of threshold of insensitivity. Like, there are people who are insensitive to pain, who have this threshold lowered. The threshold is the threshold, but, as in the case of ecstasy, you may not feel pain, but you will still have burns.
So all these theories, no matter how good they are in an abstract form, remain completely unproven in practice. Moreover - specifically refuted by her. For example, when a group of German scientists from the University of Tübingen tried to join the Greek nestinaries in their walk on fire at the annual festival in honor of St. Constantine in Indian Landgadhas, they had to quickly leave the line with third-degree burns. They were treated for a long time, but they no longer spoke nonsense …
So it turns out that walking on fire stubbornly keeps out of the understanding of scientists of our time. And although it contradicts all known medical laws and seems to occur in the area beyond the threshold of pain sensitivity and the like, it still remains the fact that every year many people, armed with a strange faith for us, put their feet on red coals and travel hot surface.
Such demonstrations of superhuman ability are quite common among Buddhists, Hindus, Christians and Muslims and regularly occur in China (mainly in Tibet), Japan, the Philippines, Fiji, Mauritania, Polynesia, North America and several European countries. Remaining a mystery for all time.
True, there is also a version of Harry Price. In his opinion, the only possible conclusion was that firewalkers have some personal mystical power to subdue the fire and its effects with their calm attitude towards it, which gives him the confidence to take a leisurely stroll through the fire of unimaginable heat. The nature of this force is a huge mystery, and it is not possible to say anything intelligible on this topic. However, it is, and this is what is called an indisputable fact.