Shadow Ghost: Human or Inhuman?

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Shadow Ghost: Human or Inhuman?
July 20, 2009
Elizabeth Costanzo
Examiner.com

Following the article I recently published regarding the question of whether or not Michael Jackson’s ghost appeared live on CNN, I have reflected on the real heart of the issue, at least for paranormal researchers: who are these shadowy ghosts that are so often reported by the haunted? Of course, theories abound as with any subject of the paranormal, from the scientific and skeptical, who claim these shadow beings are a mere trick of light caused by unreliable peripheral vision, to the conspiracy theorists, who believe that these beings are some sort of inter-dimensional aliens, accidentally crossing over into the human plane of existence. Still others, such as folklorists, believe them to be a type of ancient “watcher”, a benevolent spirit attempting to keep humankind on the right path for its own good and possible evolution toward peace and harmony.
First and foremost, it bears explanation that even though the “ghost” of Michael Jackson appeared as a shadow, the “apparition” was recognizable as a person, and more significantly, one whom we all, fans or not, could pick out of a crowd of people, dead or alive, quite easily. The shadowy ghost of Michael Jackson is not the subject of this article; sorry to disappoint those who were hoping to hear of another possible sighting. In reality, this was a clearly visible image of what appeared to be the late King of Pop, but this shadowy ghost is not what those who have actually witnessed a “shadow person” or “shadow being” report.

Shadow people are not transparent shadowy figures, but figures who appear as total blackness, and who are described as being darker than the darkness of night, blacker than any total eclipse the sun could ever render. They are usually reported in two distinct forms, either as a tall, featureless man wearing a fedora or top hat, or as the more inhuman form that is a short, usually between three and four feet tall, hooded and/or cloaked figure, which darts from floor to ceiling, in and out of walls and generally moves in an inhuman way.

As you can imagine, the former of the two is described as a “shadow person”, and is not usually associated with evil or the “demonic”. The same cannot be said of the latter. These beings are not as innocuous as their short stature might imply.
Shadow People
Long before the paranormal became the media production that it is today, I encountered one of these “shadow beings”, and it was not the more benign Abraham Lincoln type, but the strange and inhuman hooded and cloaked type. The story I am about to share is a personal experience, not only experienced by the sensitive medium in me, but by numerous individuals, most often completely unaware of its prior existence. Before the first incident wherein my own mother was the target of its attack, I had never heard of nor experienced anything of this nature in my entire life dealing with spirits and ghostly forms. Being a medium, I am not often frightened when I encounter a spirit or apparition, but this being was not a misplaced soul. It had malicious intent and in fact, strangled three people very close to me on separate occasions. The haunting by this “shadow demon” as we came to call it, went on for years and it was no trick of our peripheral vision, no alien accidentally entering human dimension, or a mass delusion. It was the only truly evil entity which I had to that point or since come across.

As I discussed in “The Nature of Negative Hauntings”, an inhuman or truly negative spirit or entity is quite rare, but when their course is set, it is not a manifestation that even a “non-sensitive” could ignore. Their appearance is quite alarming, and their continued presence is terrifying. Even today, after being rid of the “shadow demon” for several months, writing about it sparks a fear in me, that maybe it will find a doorway back into my home and torment my family once again.

Most that encounter these figures report that the facial features are obscured by the hood and cloak ensemble, and that they move quite quickly, disappearing into the walls, floors, etc., before any confrontation is possible. For me, this was not always the case. When I was 18 years old, it came to the side of my bed. It appeared to be approximately three feet tall and then suddenly grew to a towering eight feet. Its arm reached across my mother; its hand became visible at which point the bony and decrepit fingers slowly came down on her neck. We both experienced it. It slunk back into the floor in the instant that we reacted to it. Years later, it attacked my husband in much the same way. The attacks occurred quite frequently along with other unmistakable signs of its presence. It once kicked a vertical rail from my banister. It landed 15 feet from the stairwell at the front door and was broken completely in half. The “shadow demon” would cause cannon-like booms that shook our house, and once was so thunderous that we actually called the fire department as we were sure that the transformer behind our home had exploded; it had not. All of these major disruptions were in direct response to a threat posed against this monster.

For several years, it came into our bedroom every night and stood in the corner leering at us; it became unbearable to feel watched, to feel violated in a place that should have been sanctuary. Eventually, I challenged the “shadow demon”, demanding that it cease hiding beneath its cloak. I would not tolerate it putting my family through this hell any longer. Of course, I used some very harsh and obscene language when I made my threats. That very night, as I was lying in bed, I watched it as it began creeping down the hall toward my room. I backed into my husband who was spooning me, so much so that he complained that I was going to push him off the other side of the bed. I tried to relax and convince myself that it could do nothing other than to cause a commotion, hover in the corner as a perverted peeping Tom or dart to and fro like a child in Halloween costume. Showing my fear certainly would not help the situation. I closed my eyes tight and took a deep breath. As I opened my eyes once again, it was standing directly in front of me.

It pulled back the hood, showed me its true form and spit in my face!

Necromancer and Necromancy

My husband immediately inquired as to why I was spitting on the floor. Before he could lift his head to see what was happening on my side of the bed, it flew back down the hall. I was horrified at what had just taken place and the face I had just seen. It was the face of a hell-bound horror, but it was not what I would have imagined a “demon” to be. The face was so wrinkled that it seemed to be melted, two hollows existed where the eyes should have been, its hair was white and wild and I could only think of Einstein’s hair as an analog.

Eventually, the background was unveiled to me in a sickening vision that brought all of his actions and his sheer capacity for evil into perspective. During the late 1700s in France, this “shadow demon” had been a man, not a man of God, but a man dedicated to the dark one. He was a necromancer. He used corpses as a means of divination, and when he was hanged for his practices, his disciples followed in his footsteps. They removed his body from the dirt pit where it had been dumped after his hanging. His corpse was placed, noose still around his neck, in a brass bed at which time his followers called upon his spirit to return to this world. It was in fact the same antique brass bed that I had moved with me from home to home since I was 18 years old. After the bed was removed and placed in storage, the paranormal investigators at CVAPI sent pictures to several antique dealers in the states and abroad. The dealers all came to a consensus that the bed originated in France during the latter of half the 18th century (late 1700s). The application of necromancy in satanic ritual was also found to be in practice at that same time in French history. I should point out that until the night that the “shadow demon” exposed his uncloaked face to me, I had not known the word Necromancer; it was the name given to me psychically upon his unveiling. I never knew what a truly “damned” soul was until I met the Necromancer.

The research that I have done to date is admittedly from Internet sites, but information on the subject of shadow beings is obscure at the public library. When I read the various theories on the nature of shadow people and shadow beings and the casual descriptions of their fleeting nature, I cannot help but to be concerned with the lack of attention given to the negative element permeating many of these accounts. The intuition and fears reported are often glossed over or asserted by site owners and writers to be the witness’ misunderstandings of the entities.

This is not a ghost story. It is a real account of the shadow being that invaded mine and my family’s lives for many years. This is the abridged version as I am currently writing a book detailing more than a decade of fear and utter frustration with which we dealt. However, the most significant point I could ever make with regard to dealing with an inhuman or negative entity, in shadow form or otherwise, is that the worst attempt to abate the situation was the mistakes we made in provoking and prodding the entity to show itself and threatening it as if it were a human intruder. If you would like to hear a more detailed account of my experience, visit http://cvapi.com/Podcast.htm and click the “Listen” button under the April 9, 2009 radio broadcast. The drawings within this article are original sketches of the “Shadow Demon” and the “Necromancer” that I illustrated so that others could catch a glimpse of what I have seen. Elizabeth Costanzo, All Rights Reserved, 2009.