Verification of the Rataraju Case - 8 -

Huge linguistic distance between Neapli and Japanese

Japanese and Nepali belong to different language families and it can be stated that there is a huge linguistic distance between these two languages.

For instance, regarding the two cases of responsive xenoglossy under hypnosis presented by Dr. Ian Stevenson, one of them, ”the Case of Jensen” where the subject, whose native language was English, made conversations in Swedish and the other one, ”the Case of Gretchen” where the subject, who also had English as her native language, made conversations in German. These languages belong to the same language family, i.e. the Germanic group. They are, therefore, related closely linguistically and have many similarities in vocabulary and grammar. That is to say that these are easy to be learned for those who have any of these as their native language.

Also, there was another case of responsive xenoglossy, “the Case of Sharada”, where a woman whose native language was Marathi spoke in fluent Bengali when her personality suddenly became transformed to another one in the awake state. These two languages belong to the same language family, i.e. the Indic group.

In conclusion, these three cases discovered by Dr. Ian Stevenson can be stated as being responsive xenoglossy occurred between the languages relatively close to each other.

Nepali is a very rare foreign language not familiar to Japanese people. There are extremely few Japanese people who know Nepali words and furthermore, when it comes to conversational skills in Nepali, common Japanese people do not normally have any opportunity of learning it except for those very limited groups of people such as diplomats, trading company employees and researchers on Nepal.

Besides, it can be stated that there is hardly any conversational school in Nepali other than in big cities. In the local city with its population of 500,000 where Risa lives, there is no facility where Nepali can be learned.

If Risa had learned Nepali, it can be assumed that there is no other means to learn it than by a several-years´ acquaintanceship with a friend who speaks Nepali.

In previous times, it is said that NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation) Educational TV broadcasted a course in Nepali, but the suspicion of Risa having learned Nepali through this program can be excluded by her family´s testimony.

Taking all these into consideration, the value of this Rataraju Case can be highly recognized in the point that the subject Risa could make a conversation in Nepali, which linguistically has a huge distance from her native language Japanese and is a “highly difficult language to learn” for the subject compared to the other cases of responsive xenoglossy.

It is, of course, clarified that Risa has never been to Nepal, never met any Nepalese or most of all, never learned Nepali in her life by her testimony.

 

<To be continue>

Verification of the Rataraju Case - 7 -

Responding to the word ”swasni” (wife); an informal and provincial word

In the page “Rataraju speaking in Nepali 1”, there is a dialog between Rataraju and Ms. Paudel as follows:

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(KA stands for Ms. Paudel and CL for the subject, Risa)

KA: ①Tapaiko srimatiko nam ke re?　
　　　 (What is the name of your wife?)

CL: Oh jirali 　　　
        (*Unknown words.)

KA: ② Srimati, swasniko nam? 　
　　　 (Wife, wife’s name?)

CL: Ah ... ah ... mero swasni Ramel...Rameli. 　　　
        (Ah… ah… my wife’s name is Ramel… Rameli.)

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This part of the dialogue requires a careful attention to notice that Rataraju answered ”Oh jirali”, which is not an understable reply, when Ms. Paudel used the word “srimati” (wife) at ① above.Thereafter, Ms. Paudel repeated the same question by adding another word for wife ”swasni” to the already used word ”srimati”.

As a result, Rataraju responded ”…mero swasni Ramel...Rameli.” (my wife’s name is Ramel… Rameli.)

This means that Rataraju understood the meaning of the word ”swasni” (wife) used at the later part ② correctly and answered ” mero swasni Ramel..” while he showed an reaction that can be construed as if he did not understand the question when the word ”srimati”, also meaning wife, used at the first part showen as ① above. It seems that Rataraju can understand the word “swasni” but not “srimati”.

What does this imply?

According to Dr. Chandra Kishor Khanal, a Nepalese guest researcher at Chubu University, the word “srimati” is a formal and common word in Nepali while the world “swasni” an informal and provincial one.

And concerning the situation that someone can understand the word ”swasni” but not the word ”srimati”, this can happen with someone who spoke old Nepali or a Nepalese living in Nepal but whose mother language is other than Nepali, such as Tamang tribe. (Masayuki Ohkado, “Research on Sprituality”, p.68)

Based on the above mentioned, it can be regarded as natural that Rataraju, the personality of Risa´s previous life, can understand only the informal and provincial word “swasni” meaning wife and not the formal one “srimati” considering the fact that he lived in Nallu Village where Tamang tribe accounted for 97 % of the population (as of 2010) and that he existed about 100 years ago.

As a conclusion, the fact that Rataraju can understand the word “swasni” but not “srimati” can be considerd as a supportive circumstantial evidence that he existed as a Tamang in the quite old days.

At the same time, since it is almost impossible for Risa to learn the informal and provincial Nepali word “swasni”, the suspicion of Risa having learned Nepali somewhere in secret can be cleared. It can be also mentioned that the result of polygraph test shows that there is no trace found that she had learned Nepali.

By analyzing in detail, several evidence of Rataraju´s existence can be found. It is amazing that Rataraju left those evidence in such a short conversation as this one lasted for 24 minutes.

＜To be continued＞

Verification of the Rataraju Case - 6 -

Use of the expression “8 and 70” for indicating age


Prof. Ohkado at Chubu University, who is a member of the Xenoglossy Research Team, has published a book titled “Research on Spirituality” (Fubaisha, Inc.). In the latter half of this book, an analysis of Nepali in the Rataraju Case is presented from his point of view as a co-researcher observing the session. As a complementation to the analysis of the same conversation part mentioned in Mr. Inagaki’s book “Reincarnation is proved scientifically!” (p. 107, Natural Spirit Inc.), Prof. Ohkado stated as follows:


・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・

We have found evidence indicating that the Nepali Rataraju’s personality speaks is the one spoken by those who speak Tamang language, and furthermore, that it is a very old form of Nepali. That evidence consists of how to count numbers.

When Rataraju was asked about his age of death, he answered “aath sattariri (8 and 70)”. Since you do not say the digit in the first place before the digit in the ten’s place in modern Nepali, Ms. Paudel (who spoke with Rataraju in Nepali at the session) became confused and asked “Do you mean 70?”

To prove Ms. Paudel’s response, all the Nepalese people who listened to this part found it “unnatural as Nepali”.

However, when verifying this issue on site, Mr. Prithivi Galan, age 78, told that people counted as “8 and 70” in Nallu Village in the old days. According to him, after education has been spread, this way of counting has vanished and consequently, there is hardly anyone who knows how to count in this way today.

Masayuki Ohkado, “Research on Spirituality”, 2011, p.81

・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・

The reason why the Reserach Team considered it significant that Rataraju’s personality answered “8 and 70”, i.e. “78 years old” to the question when he died is that this answer in Nepali is consistent with his answer that he “died at the age of 78” clearly made in Japanese at the first session 4 years ago. This utterance is consistent with what he answered in Nepali 4 years later, i.e. that he died at the age of 8 and 70, i.e. 78.

That is to say that this was acknowledged as significant in proving that Rataraju’s personality that had appeared at the session 4 years ago and the one appeared 4 years later were the one and same personality. It is because it could be considered as a circumstantial evidence that Rataraju’s personality was not a fictive one Risa had created arbitrarily.

The fact that the way of expressing as “7 and 80” for indicating an age has been confirmed as the way that actually had been used in the quite old Nepali according to the field investigation conducted by Prof. Ohkado this time can be, in addition to the fact that the name “Rataraju” is a name used in the old days in Nepal, considered to be a supportive circumstantial evidence that Rataraju existed more than about 100 years ago.

This is because it can be estimated that the period of 78 years that Rataraju existed lies somewhere between 1784 and 1933.

The expression “8 and 70” that Rataraju used is rather a natural way of expression as a native speaker of the old Nepali, which can be considered to be a supportive circumstantial evidence of his existence.

Furthermore, this expression “8 and 70” for indicating an age, which is not used in modern Nepali, is something that cannot be learned normally even if Risa had learned Nepali in secret. Therefore, this can be considered to be a proof (of xenoglossy) that Risa had not learned Nepali in her present life.

Aside from the field investigation by Prof. Ohkado, there was another investigation in Nallu Village conducted by Dr. Shobana Bajracharya, a Nepalese cultural anthropologist living in Nepal. In this investigation, Dr. Bajracharya searched for an official family register and other documents and conducted hearings with 34 patriarchs in Nallu Village of what they could recall, but there was nothing that could confirm Rataraju’s existence.

However, including foremost the expression “8 and 70” for indicating an age, there are several utterances made by Rataraju which all turned out to be compatible with the facts, such as eating habit of “kodo”, a sort of millet which is scarcely eaten in Kathmandu these days, existence of many leeches in the village, cremation at the mountain and the flashback image of the village scenery that Risa had, which can be considered as supportive circumstantial evidence of Rataraju’s existence.

It is hard to believe that the subject Risa did wild guess during the sessions and that all of the utterances happened to be compatible with the facts by coincidence.

Therefore, it should be regarded that the reason of Rataraju’s utterances turned out to be compatible with the facts was that it indeed was Rataraju’s personality that appeared and uttered about the nature and living environment in Nallu Village.

<To be continued>