2. Nostradamus Methods of Prophecy
Nostradamus was essentially a trance channeller. Trance channellers, which have been around from before the days of John The Baptist and are still around today, communicate with supernatural entities and spirits in order to predict the future. Usually the method is to first conjure a spirit (or spirit guide as they are called today) and then host the entity inside your body and ask them to provide you with a vision.
Examples of modern day trance channellers include Elizabeth Clare Prophet (who channels the angels) and Derek Acorah (an English channeller who communicates with dead spirits.) Another very famous trance channeller is the healer Edgar Cayce, who went into a trance in order to communicate with his spirits who gave him divine remedies for certain physical disorders.
Two of the methods that Nostradamus used for inducing his prophetic visions are from ancient pagan traditions. He used scrying – staring into a flame or staring into a bowl of water to send him into a trance. He also followed the ritualistic practice associated with the Delphic priestess Branchus who was a famous soothsayer who attended at the Oracle of Delphi. He would sit, feet flat on the floor with a straight spine on a brass stool (called a tripod in his own writings) whose legs were angled at the exact same degrees as the Egyptian pyramids. The dimensions of the stool were thought to create an electromagnetic energy that weakened the veil between this world and the supernatural world.
He explains his divinatory process exactly in the very first two quatrains of Century 1
Sitting alone at night in secret study;
it is placed on the brass tripod.
A slight flame comes out of the emptiness and
makes successful that which should not be believed in vain.
The wand in the hand is placed in the middle of the tripod’s legs.
With water he sprinkles both the hem of his garment and his foot.
A voice, fear: he trembles in his robes.
Divine splendor; the God sits nearby.
Pythia of Delphi (a high priestess of the Oracle of Delphi) sitting on top of a copper tripod much like the one Nostradamus used.
Nostradamus would also sometimes place a bowl of steaming water and pungent oils and spices on a tripod also made with the same dimensions. He may have also ingested nutmeg, which is slightly hallucinogenic in order to put him in a trance.
As tripods were mainly used in the temples of Athena and Apollo he was likely working with the deceased spirits of human attendees at these alters (such as Branchus or Pythia) or summoning the energies of a God like Apollo. The reason I say this is that this simply isn’t a Christian ritual and it is not monotheistic in nature. In no way was Nostradamus contacting the God that he so devoutly appeared to worship during the day.
An image of Nostradamus Using a Divining Wand
Here again, in a very famous letter he wrote to Henry II, the King of France he describes in detail his divination process.
“I emptied my soul, brain and heart of all care and attained a state of tranquility and stillness of mind which are prerequisites for predicting by means of the brass tripod. Although the everlasting God alone knows the eternity of light proceeding from himself, I say frankly to all to whom he wishes to reveal his immense magnitude—infinite and unknowable as it is—after long and meditative inspiration, that it is a hidden thing divinely manifested to the prophet by two means: One comes by infusion which clarifies the supernatural light in the one who predicts by the stars, making possible divine revelation; the other comes by means of participation with the divine eternity, by which means the prophet can judge what is given from his (her) own divine spirit through God the Creator and natural intuition.”
As he was writing to the King, Nostradamus would naturally imply that he was channeling God the creator when it was more likely he we would be channeling Apollo. This pretense towards connecting toward God The Creator through a manner other than prayer, was in fact a form of heresy in his day that seemed to be overlooked in his case as he so often would prove to be accurate.
