Edgar Cayce: An American Prophet

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Summary: I just love this book
Review: Edgar Cayce was an absolutely amazing person and I can't believe the life of sacrifice he led. What a blessing for us--and so many of us are blind to it--to have this prophet live in our country--in our state--in our times. It is almost like having Jesus Christ return but nobody recognize it. He led an extraordinary life--a fascinating life--as did the people around him. A true legend to be told and Sidney Kirkpatrick does a superb job of telling it. I can't wait to see the movie!!

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Summary: I Do Not Bear A Message: I Am The Message
Review: Sidney R. Kirkpatrick's Edgar Cayce: An American Prophet methodically considers the facts in the life of a man whose story may be the best documented Fortean case study in modern history. Kirkpatrick writes well, and has clearly immersed himself in his subject.

Considering that Cayce's personal history ostensibly involved dowsing, ancestors with unusual powers, a lifelong relationship with fairies ("little folk"), visitations from message - bearing, heaven - sent angels, mysterious turbaned men who disappear after uttering cryptic warnings, devastating, unexplainable fires, remarkable medical diagnoses given while in a trance state, accurate prophesies about the future, unaccountable knowledge of past events in the lives of strangers, ghosts, and shadowy government conspiracies, Cayce's abilities, encounters, and experiences were extraordinary indeed. Kirkpatrick takes the reader on a cautious, careful trip through the first half of Cayce's life in the American South and Midwest, supporting his case with persuasive evidence gathered from a variety of respected sources over a period of decades. However, Kirkpatrick occasionally seems too willing to accept Cayce's more unusual experiences at face value, and offers little in the way of skepticism, disbelief, or alternative explanations; for instance, the role that multiple family tragedies and serious head injuries may have played in Cayce's childhood experiences and later development go almost completely unexamined. Therefore, the book has Cayce's stamp upon it rather than Kirkpatrick's: from time to time Kirkpatrick seems more like a mild - mannered Cayce apologist than he does an unbiased, objective biographer.

For discriminating readers, the real problem with both Cayce's story and Kirkpatrick's biography comes in the later half of Cayce's life, when people began asking 'the Source' - the voice which responded to questions put to Cayce while in trance - about astrology, reincarnation, and death. As in most of the 'New Age' channeling cases of the eighties, suddenly Edgar, his family, and seemingly everyone they know has been a notorious historical figure at some point in their karmic cycle, a Helen of Troy, a Hector, an Achilles, or a Queen of England, a Pharaoh, or an apostle of Jesus Christ: no fishwives or shoemakers here. Cayce's young son, according to the Source, has been both a Pharaoh and one of Christ's apostles; Cayce's attractive, hard working young assistant, Gladys Davis, has been not only a British queen, but, as such, was also Cayce's own royal mother. With this lengthy series of revelations, Cayce's and Kirkpatrick's credibility quickly wilts, as the Source's claims become increasingly overextended, outlandish, and absurd. Readers may find themselves listlessly awaiting their own favorite historical figure to mthe, be it Diana of Nemi, Bishop Pontopippidan, Genghis Khan, Ponce de Leon, Cromwell, Major Andre, or Catherine the Great.

Sadly, Cayce, his family, and his followers whole - heartedly embraced the Source's pronouncements concerning their past lives, love affairs, and relationships. As Cayce and many of those around him were financially destitute, barely educated, and often hungry, Kirkpatrick should have thoroughly considered what needs these attractive grandiosities may have filled, and how these compensatory beliefs affected their individual and collective psyches. Cayce and his friends and followers were almost all fervent Christians -- Cayce was a biblical scholar and lecturer -- but clearly they all desperately needed something greater and closer to home to believe in. It's not difficult to understand why Cayce had so many followers: not only did he medically heal hundreds of people during his lifetime, but the Source's metaphysical doctrine continually emphasized the universe as a wholly benevolent place, one composed of a rich, intricate fabric of meaning, spiritual guidance, and continuous second chances. In the Source's cosmology, there is no such thing as genuine evil, but only pathology, vulnerability, misunderstanding, guilt, and a world of imperfect souls struggling towards the Godhead.

Ultimately, there is enough hard evidence to make a case for the validity of much of the otherwise inexplicable anomalous phenomena in the first half of Cayce's existence. Due to the substantial documentation, many of the events in Cayce's life can be used as Fortean test cases to establish standards by which the other paranormal phenomena can be judged and weighted. As the lives of Carl Jung, Hilda Doolitle, and William Butler Yeats attest, subjective experience -- especially concerning paranormal phenomena -- should never be mocked or dismissed out of hand. However, some Fortean phenomena, such as the notorious events believed to have occurred throughout the life of science fiction writer Philip K. Dick, appear to be the product of delusion, mental illness, or any number of other psychological factors, many of which are presently little understood, when compared to the Cayce evidence.

Edgar Cayce: An American Prophet will make an interesting object lesson for Forteans, including as it does detailed, well - supported information about the wide range of paranormal phenomena which dominated Cayce's life. Harry Houdini, Nicolas Telsa, Thomas Edison, and an American president also make brief appearances. Readers who credit all of Cayce's metaphysical divinations may also want to read the late Joe Fisher's harrowing The Siren Call of Hungry Ghosts (2001) for another perspective on the validity and dangers of surrendering the human will to 'channeled' 'spirit guides' and the presumed souls of the dead.

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Summary: Edgar Cayce : An American Prophet
Review: This book is an exceptional telling of a remarkable true story. In the 57 years that I have been active in working with the ideas and data that flowed through Edgar Cayce, I value this book as the deepest examination of the real person and history of Cayce and his contributions to: growth in saving one's soul and one's body and one's world. Kirkpatrick's skill and energy as an investigative journalist make solid and tangible the history and faith of a man possessed by a profound talent lived out in a life of faith and human struggle. This book is both an introduction and summary of much of that which is central in what Cayce taught. It serves this role by depicting in detail how Cayce lived in his own life the spiritual laws he presented. This telling does not canonize Cayce; nor does it psychoanalyse him. The credibility of this book that particularly touched me is based on detailed, explicit, documented investigative journalism.