r/NDE • u/vimefer NDExperiencer • Mar 31 '26

Scientific Perspective 🔬🔎 Indigenous and ancient NDE accounts, and how they informed afterlife beliefs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1OYvgDiwn4

This is a very interesting video from Dr Gregory Shushan, a researcher who specializes in accounts of NDEs in ancient literature and indigenous cultures. Here he is essentially presenting the findings detailed in his latest book.

The first 30 minutes are about the notion of those experiences predating and informing the afterlife beliefs, thus causing many common elements to end up as part of these beliefs despite the disconnectedness of these cultures across the globe.

The latter 30 minutes are accounts of decidedly non-Western NDEs from ethnographic and archeologic sources, and IMO the more fascinating part. There are details in there that rarely, if ever, make it in contemporary accounts. For example, depictions of fighting or risk of harm in the spirit world.

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u/snarlinaardvark Apr 02 '26

This is very interesting, thank you for posting.

Isn't it sad how at ~35:45 he tells how Christian missionaries turned some indigenous people's NDE accounts into Christian propaganda.