Throughout human history, people have had the desire to alter their states of consciousness. The motivations for such an alteration can be spiritual, religious, or even secular. As an anthropologist examining religion, the key factor in examining altered states of consciousness through ethnographic fieldwork or other historical and modern examples is to suspend personal judgment. Ethnography, as a tool for data collection, has examined many different cultures and their perceived altered states of consciousness. A key part of ethnography is discovering what people do and the reasons they give for doing it (LeCompte & Schensul, 1999, pp. 1–2). In describing altered states of consciousness, Stein et al. (2025) note:

In interacting with the supernatural world, an individual may have experiences that transcend ordinary experiences, such as a trance or hallucination. These religious experiences are subjective; they manifest themselves on an emotional and psychological level. These emotions range from fear and anxiety to a generalized feeling of well-being or even a profound experience in which a person feels an association with supernatural power or a supernatural entity such as a spirit or a god. (p. 133)

My first experience with the word “trance” came from playing the classic video game Final Fantasy IX. Every playable character has the option to use a mode called Trance, during which the character changes color and becomes more powerful in battle. Trance can look different outside the video game world, but the similarity between Trance in Final Fantasy IX and other forms of trance lies in a changed state of being.

One example of people entering a trance-like state comes from Holiness churches. These churches are primarily found in West Virginia. At one time, many of these communities were isolated and economically depressed, although improvements have been made and the lives of many residents are improving (Stein et al., 2025, p. 144). These churches participate in rituals that are highly dependent on Mark 16:15–18, which states:

He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.” (New International Version, 2011, Mark 16:15–18)

It is important to note that textual scholars of the New Testament have observed that the ending of Mark 16:9–20 was not in the earliest manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark (Wallace, 2011, p. 21).

Nevertheless, this passage is important to these churches, and it is not uncommon for members to enter a focused, trance-like state while praying. Some individuals may speak in tongues at these churches. Stein et al. (2025) note:

In some Holiness churches participants practice snake-handling and drink poison (usually strychnine) to demonstrate their faith. Entrance into an altered state is a highly desired religious experience and is interpreted as being filled by the Holy Ghost. (p. 145)

Another example of trance activities relates to the shamanic trance séance. In this activity, the shaman makes contact with spirits and sends out his or her soul to heal, exorcise, mediate, divine, or perform acts of vengeance (Bowie, 2000, p. 202). I. M. Lewis, when examining the Tungus, noted, “Séances may be held to make contact with the spirits of the upper or lower worlds. For instance, the shaman may be consulted by his or her clansman to reveal the causes of an outbreak of disease or to discover the reason for a run of bad luck in hunting” (as cited in Bowie, 2000, p. 202).

Many skeptical missionaries cast doubt on some of the activities and effectiveness of shamanic trance. Waldemar Bogoras, a traveler in Siberia at the beginning of the 20th century, was another skeptic of shamanic activities, but he was nevertheless intrigued by the shamans’ skill. He recorded his admiration for that skill even though he was unconvinced of its magical origin (Bowie, 2000, p. 204). Bowie (2000) notes, “Whatever sleight of hand or other means used by the shaman to achieve dramatic effects, many observers like Shirokogoroff were convinced of a séance’s therapeutic effects. Sick individuals become for a while the focus of attention and their will to live is strengthened” (p. 204).

Robin M. Wright explored shamanic knowledge and power among the Baniwa, an Indigenous people in Brazil. Wright (2013) notes that his work focuses on Mandu da Silva of the village of Uapui on the Aiary River, the only living jaguar shaman among the Baniwa at the time, who had been a shaman for more than 64 years. The idea to write his biography came from his daughter, Ercilia, and Mandu gladly agreed (Kindle locs. 85–87). Wright also examined how shamans can sometimes use mind-altering substances for spiritual purposes. He notes:

Stories of the prophet jaguar shaman Uetsu mikuiri mention the mixture of caapi, or yaje, and niopo snuff (Piptadenia peregrina), a psychoactive related to parika. The special brew was called caapi ka yumpa, and its power enabled the “wise man” to have direct experiences with the souls of deceased kin, who showed him all around the Other World, even to the house of “our father” Nhiaperikuli. (Wright, 2013, Kindle locs. 948–949)

These shamans were using mind-altering substances for spiritual purposes. Indigenous peoples in North America also used peyote for spiritual purposes during the reservation era. Although peyote religion and the Ghost Dance were distinct religious movements, both responded in different ways to the spiritual and social conditions Indigenous communities experienced during this period. Warren (2017) notes that Apaches became familiar with peyote’s perceived powers to relieve pain and provide powerful visions and that peyote addressed spiritual needs brought on specifically by the reservation era (p. 167).

In virtual worlds, shamans can also be depicted for their ability to create altered states of consciousness. Despite their obvious fictional nature, the significance of what shamans are portrayed as doing is useful for studying the anthropology of religion. In my favorite video game, Chrono Cross, the shaman in the village of Guldove helps Serge regain his true form by giving him a special item. The shaman is thus able to change Serge’s appearance from the feline Lynx to his usual human form.

Many computer gamers still play Warcraft III: Reforged. The Orc race contains a playable unit called a shaman. The shaman can use an ability called Bloodlust, which makes units attack faster. Within the logic of the game, Bloodlust represents an altered state that helps players achieve their objective of defeating their opponents.

In relation to gaming, there is a concept called “flow” that can be described as an altered state of consciousness. The concept of flow was developed by Hungarian psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. It is a mental state in which humans lose themselves in an activity. Csikszentmihalyi described it as “the merging of action and awareness.” A person in flow has no dualistic perspective: The person is aware of his or her actions but not of the awareness itself. The steps involved in experiencing flow include delimiting reality, controlling some aspect of it, and responding to feedback with a concentration that excludes everything else as irrelevant (as cited in Laycock, 2015, p. 184).

Flow can be labeled a religious experience, but secular game players can also experience it. Steffen (2014) notes:

Such significance is given to flow in a series of transpersonal psychology studies by Jayne Gackenbach and colleagues. The authors investigate if and how digital games can be described as cultural amplifiers for the process of consciousness development. The results of their extensive surveys show that flow and lucid dreaming are the most frequently experienced altered states of consciousness in digital gaming that can be associated with “higher state of consciousness.” (pp. 217–218)

Sidney Greenfield examined the surgical procedures used by Brazilian spirit healer-mediums and the aspects of hypnosis and trance induction. Greenfield argues that patients enter an altered state of consciousness despite no obvious intention by the surgical provider to induce it (Greenfield, 1999, p. 212). One healer Greenfield examined was José Carlos Ribeiro, who treated a husband experiencing vision problems. Ribeiro asked the couple if they believed in God, but before they could answer, he plunged a scalpel into the man’s eye and then used tweezers while working on it. The patient reported feeling no pain. After the procedure, the healer gave him a prescription (Greenfield, 1999, p. 213). Greenfield notes:

According to Brazilian Spiritists, the surgeries described here were not performed by the healers but rather by the spirits of Ignatius of Loyola, Dr. Adolph Fritz, Dr. Ricardo Stams, and others. Spiritism teaches that there are two worlds, or planes of reality: the one in which we live and another inhabited by spirits, the assumed vital force in the universe. (Greenfield, 1999, p. 219)

Some scholars have speculated that prophets and religious figures could have been under the influence of altered states of consciousness. In The Quest of the Historical Muhammad, Stephen Shoemaker (2024) notes that a Christian counter-biography of Muhammad known as the Legend of Sergius Baḥīrā seems to have appeared in the later eighth century, around the same time as Muhammad’s first Islamic biographies. Shoemaker explains that this tradition of criticism continued and escalated during the Middle Ages and into the early modern period, when Muhammad was often portrayed as either a charlatan or a bewildered epileptic (p. 14). To be fair-minded, Muhammad is not the only religious figure who could potentially have experienced altered states of consciousness.

The anthropologist T. M. Luhrmann, when examining religious figures and Joan of Arc, writes:

There are other accounts of long and vivid hearings in our spiritual traditions. Moses took down the commandments. Muhammad received the entire Koran. The psychological state these men experienced at the time is long lost to us, if indeed the men even existed as men. The historian Ann Taves uses the experience of contemporary figures who hear long dictations to argue that the two men who received the Hebrew commandments and the Koran were probably in a trancelike state of intense absorption while receiving the material. Certainly they are described as being in a nonnormal frame of mind. Moses, off with God for forty days and forty nights, returns from a final encounter with a radiant face; Muhammad, in a desert cave, felt that his soul was being ripped away. Taves points out that JZ Knight, who channels a 35,000-year-old spiritual warrior named Ramtha, shifts in and out of altered states, much as the turn-of-the-last-century mediums delivered volumes of wisdom from sages dwelling beyond ordinary human life while they, the mediums, were deep in trance. Joan’s voices seem different from these accounts because there is no clear evidence that her voices visited her in special ways or at special times. But she does not seem to have had schizophrenia, even though she heard voices often throughout the day, and even though her voices seem to have had extended conversations with her. Her life was far from dysfunctional, even if it did end in an untimely death. (Luhrmann, 2012, p. 249)

Luhrmann (2012) makes an important methodological observation when she writes that “the psychological state these men experienced at the time is long lost to us, if indeed the men even existed as men” (p. 249). Researchers should therefore be cautious about making definitive judgments concerning the nature of these revelations because the psychological states of these historical figures are inaccessible to contemporary observers.

This essay is not an exhaustive examination of the phenomenon of altered states of consciousness. However, it offers a useful introduction to this essential topic in the anthropology of religion. Human beings will continue to experience altered states of consciousness in different ways. Despite the subjective nature of these experiences, it is crucial to withhold our own judgment about them while still allowing room for valid skepticism.

References

Bowie, F. (2000). The anthropology of religion: An introduction. Blackwell Publishers.

Eliade, M., Couliano, I. P., & Wiesner, H. S. (1991). The Eliade guide to world religions. HarperSanFrancisco.

Greenfield, S. M. (1999). Hypnosis and trance induction in the surgeries of Brazilian Spiritist healer-mediums. In M. Klass & M. K. Weisgrau (Eds.), Across the boundaries of belief: Contemporary issues in the anthropology of religion (pp. 209–225). Westview Press.

Klass, M., & Weisgrau, M. K. (Eds.). (1999). Across the boundaries of belief: Contemporary issues in the anthropology of religion. Westview Press.

Laycock, J. P. (2015). Dangerous games: What the moral panic over role-playing games says about play, religion, and imagined worlds. University of California Press.

LeCompte, M. D., & Schensul, J. J. (1999). Designing and conducting ethnographic research. AltaMira Press.

Luhrmann, T. M. (2012). When God talks back: Understanding the American evangelical relationship with God. Alfred A. Knopf.

New International Version Bible. (2011). Zondervan. (Original work published 1978)

Shoemaker, S. J. (2024). The quest of the historical Muhammad and other studies on formative Islam. Cascade Books.

Steffen, O. (2014). Religion in games: The illusion of immersion. In H. A. Campbell and G. P. Grieve (Eds.), Playing with religion in digital games (pp. 215–234). Indiana University Press.

Stein, R. L., Stein, P. L., Kracht, B. R., & Snipes, M. M. (2025). The anthropology of religion, magic, and witchcraft. Routledge.

Wallace, D. B. (2011). Lost in transmission: How badly did the scribes corrupt the New Testament text? In D. B. Wallace (Ed.), Revisiting the corruption of the New Testament: Manuscript, patristic, and apocryphal evidence (pp. 19–55). Kregel Academic.

Warren, L. S. (2017). God’s red son: The Ghost Dance religion and the making of modern America. Basic Books.

Wright, R. M. (2013). Mysteries of the jaguar shamans of the Northwest Amazon. University of Nebraska Press.