Reincarnation: The Case of Imad Elawar
In 1977 the prestigious Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases published two papers on the subject of reincarnation by Dr Ian Stevenson, a researcher based at the University of Virginia. That such a journal should publish on such an unusual topic is a clear indication of the esteem in which Stevenson's work is held, even by sceptics.
There are two good reasons why Stevenson's evidence is simpler to evaluate than hypnotic regression evidence. First, Stevenson's cases concern very young children, whereas regressions involve adults. The hypothesis of reconstruction from mostly forgotten memories of papers, books, magazines and radio and TV programmes is important with respect to adults (with many years' exposure to such sources of information) but not to children of two or three years of age. Second, Stevenson's cases mostly come from relatively underdeveloped countries where sources of communication of this, kind are hardly plentiful. In short, a regression from a literate and observant Western adult will pose many more problems than cases involving very young children from semi-literate societies.
The most characteristic quality of Stevenson's work is its sheer professionalism. Through one of his many contacts, he hears first details of a case of possible reincarnation. Almost without exception, the case concerns a very young child (in around half the cases he investigates, two years or younger) whose utterances and behaviour suggest reincarnation. Stevenson will travel to study the case at first hand: in Alaska, Lebanon, India, Brazil, Ceylon ... literally all over the globe. Stevenson himself speaks fluent French and German, and in other cases uses trusted interpreters to interrogate witnesses. Witnesses are almost always interviewed more than once to check for reliability. For any given case, Stevenson uses at least two interpreters, and sometimes three or four, to check testimony and the accuracy of interpretation. Stevenson possesses a vast library of tapes from these interviews. Documents, registries, archives are meticulously checked for corroboration of testimonies. The care and attention to detail are remarkable.
First we may look in depth at a case of unusual evidential value, which Stevenson was able to investigate before the two families concerned (the family of the child and that of the deceased person of whom the child appeared to be a reincarnation) had met. Obviously, such cases offer the researcher the chance to check testimony unaffected by confused memory after meeting the other family.
Stevenson arrived in Lebanon in 1964 after being told by a young Lebanese, who had assisted him in a Brazilian investigation two years before, that many cases of reincarnation occurred in his home country. Among the Druse people, who belong to an unusual Islamic sect, belief in reincarnation is common: indeed, it is a fundamental tenet of their religion. However, many Druses express considerable scepticism about particular cases of reincarnation: they are not a gullible people. As Stevenson set out among these people to find his Lebanese contact, he learned of a case in the village he had come to visit, Kornayel, some ten miles cast of Beirut. It transpired that the. father of the child concerned was a cousin of the man he had come to meet. On his first evening, Stevenson made complete written notes of his interview with this man, Mohammed Elawar, and his wife. On this occasion only an untrained interpreter was on hand: for a further four days, Stevenson used two other, trained, interpreters. Stevenson rechecked much of his material, and added new information, on a second visit five months later (with another interpreter)
On his first visit, Stevenson was told how Mohammed's son Imad had been born in December 1958. One might have suspected that something strange was going on when the first word he spoke was ‘Jamilch', had one known that this was the name of the mistress of Ibrahim Bouhamzy, the man whose reincarnation Imad appears to have been. As soon as he could string sentences together, Imad was speaking of his past life. His father scolded him for telling lies, but Imad persisted. At the age of two years he had spontaneously recognised a neighbour of Bouhamzy's in the street. He had given many details of his (i.e. Bouhamzy's) house, his relatives, his own life. Nonetheless his family did not feel moved to do any checking. Mohammed, the father, had once attended a funeral in the town of Khriby, where Bouhamzy had lived, but had not met any member of the Bouhamzy family.
The two villages were separated by some 20 miles, but the people of Lebanon in this region tended not to travel very much, and members of the Elawar and Bouhamzy families were adamant that they had not met. After collecting all the information he could about Imad, Stevenson set out for Khriby to collect as much information as possible from the Bouhamzy family itself.
Finally Imad and his father were taken to Khriby, where Imad was introduced to the Bouhamzy family. He recognised many of them spontaneously, addressing them in the correct manner. The Bouhamzies were astonished at the way Imad behaved, which is not the. least important aspect of such cases. This five-year-old child behaved, the family said, just as Ibrahim had.
The sum total of correct statements made by Imad about his past life, involving intimate details, precise statements about his home and his relatives, is summarised overleaf. The sheer wealth of information seems to rule out coincidence completely as an explanation of the correspondences. Of 57 statements checked by Stevenson, no less than 51 were correct..............
He verified his memories as if he was researching a case for the police department. A wonderful video.