Arigo Case Study: 'A Mystery and a Challenge for Science'

After publishing two books with UFOlogy-related subjects in 1966—Incident at Exeter and The Interrupted Journey—John G. Fuller (1913-1990) researched the 'Brazilian surgeon-healer' known as Arigo after consulting with scientist/investigator of psychic phenomena Dr. Andrija Puharich.  Arigo: Surgeon of the Rusty Knife was published in 1974.  Another paranormal investigation ensued for John and two years later his book The Ghost of Flight 401 became a bestseller.  The stewardess who helped him research the case, Elizabeth, became his wife and an author herself with My Search for the Ghost of Flight 401 (1978).  A variety of transcendental communication forms are recounted in two of John's following books: The Airmen Who Would Not Die (1979) and The Ghost of 29 Megacycles (1985).  Elizabeth's other books include Poor Elizabeth's Almanac (1980), Nima: A Sherpa in Connecticut (1984), The Touch of Grace (1986), Me and Jezebel (1992) and Nannies (1993). 

An Author's Note introduces Arigo: Surgeon of the Rusty Knife with a declaration that the subject of the case study while "so strange, so incredible, there are undisputed facts, facts that cannot be denied . . ."  These facts include that numerous people including doctors witnessed Arigo conduct miraculously effective surgeries with no requirement for hemostasis (the tying off of blood vessels) or stitches without ensuing infection although no antiseptic was used.   

 

It is a fact that both Brazilian and American doctors have verified Arigo's healings and have taken explicit color motion pictures of his work and operations.  It is a fact that Arigo treated over three hundred patients a day for nearly two decades and never charged for his services.  

 

The Author's Note concludes with John commenting about the case of Arigo posing "a mystery and a challenge for science."  One cautionary societal imbroglio offered by this case study book is that closed-minded conformity to rigid social institutions has motivated individuals to persecute in tandem anyone challenging customary practices.  Many of the individuals who showed themselves to feel threatened by Arigo's success were accustomed to subordination in relation to protocols of the regional healthcare system or a religious hierarchy.

 

The official position of the medical societies was clearly defined: Arigo was a curandeiro and a charlatan, if not a practitioner of witchcraft.  It was an open-and-shut case, and the medical society of Minas Gerais was champing at the bit at the slowness of the police Division of Robbery and Falsification for not expediting the legal proceedings and bringing the whole thing to an end.  They surmised, probably correctly, that there were high government officials whose lives or those of their relatives had been inexplicably saved by Arigo, and thus were not at all interested in pushing for the incarceration of a man they owed so much to.

And perhaps these people of influence were responsible for the pilgrimage of many more doctors to Congonhas do Campo who were willing to take the risk of professional censure.

The first chapter of Arigo recounts the expedition by Dr. Andrija ('Henry') K. Puharich and his associate Henry Belk to the small clinic in Congonhas do Campo—a village around ninety kilometers distant of the nearest large city, Belo Horizonte—where what was taking place presented stark evidence of paranormal implications.  

 

Fuller related that Puharich and Belk had been drawn together "in an exploration of the unusual faculties of Peter Hurkos, the medium whose ESP prowess had engendered considerable attention among both scientists and law enforcement agencies when he located missing persons and solved some knotty problems by clairvoyance."  The Dutch-born Hurkos (1911-1988) began displaying his unusually pervasive abilities after his recuperation from a thirty-foot fall that caused a brain injury.  In his 1961 autobiography, Hurkos wrote: "I realized that I, more than any other man, must believe in God — for I, of all men, had the least excuse to doubt His existence."  

 

Fuller described Arigo as appearing like "a cross between a congenial truck driver and a local politician" who "spoke Portuguese in a rough, peasant accent" when Puharich first met Arigo in the summer of 1963.  As Fuller hadn't been able to personally observe Arigo, his attempt to articulate the changes in personality manifested during the medical work doesn't fully convey the separate aspect of the 'Dr. Fritz' entity.  There is mentioned "a thick German accent" heard coming from Arigo while he "seemed to be in a trance state."  Countless people today as then might react with the response to what was being witnessed in the way Fuller described as "too incredible even to consider."  Fuller reported:

By eleven that morning, Arigo had treated some two hundred patients.  A dozen or so he sent away, summarily, gruffly telling them that any ordinary doctor could handle their complaints.  Others he scolded or chided.  There had already been about ten eye and ear surgery cases.  Each operation averaged only half a minute.

 

Within days, Puharich offered himself as a patient to Arigo for treatment of "a large and rather annoying but benign tumor on the inside of his right elbow, known as a lipoma" that had been checked by his own doctor (Sidney Krebs, M.D.) over the course of the preceding two years.  The lipoma was painlessly extracted with the Brazilian version of a Swiss army knife in five seconds by Arigo with an 8mm camera rolling.

Fuller mentioned reports about other 'spirits' involved with 'Arigo's prowess as a miracle healer' including thirteenth-century monk Fre Fabiano de Christo.  Today more data is commonly available about 'channelers' as many documentary books and recordings about these case chronologies have been published during recent decades.  A 'channeled entity' may manifest through channelers who themselves might not be in a state of conscious awareness during the intervals.  One of these entities has been quoted: "The channeling process, which has been going on for thousands of years without much publicity, is now again being used, and it provides an opportunity for people to augment their growth because you, as a civilization, are ready to grow.  You are seeking answers that traditional spiritual venues are simply not providing — that traditional Eastern or traditional Western methods are not providing — and therefore you are seeking new, different and innovative answers to the questions that you have been asking for so very long." (article)

Earlier in Arigo's life, after having become a husband and father he was owner of a tavern-restaurant when he began having 'dreams' where "the same guttural voice kept talking to him, in a language that sounded like German . . . his dreams were sometimes accompanied by blinding headaches, which woke him up and from which he could find no relief."  One of these dreams was followed by Arigo waking to see a man who identified himself as Dr. Adolpho Fritz.  "He had chosen Arigo as the living vessel to carry on his work, with the help of other spirits who were doctors before they died."

Fuller chronicled the following succession of events: "Occasionally, during the day, he would have a brief fainting spell, blacking out and remembering nothing afterward."  There were miraculous surgeries performed that "he never remembered doing."  A local spiritist group recognized Arigo as a medium and at their traditional Kardic mediumistic sessions "Dr. Adolpho Fritz had made himself known to them.  He told them that he had spent sixteen years preparing Arigo . . ."  Many of these circumstances correlate with testimonials by contemporary channelers and the personalities making use of their bodies.  (article)

 

In spite of the growing reverence he inspired, Arigo was no saint and never pretended to be.

He would announce at the beginning of each session that no one would be allowed to pay anything, not even the smallest gift.  "Jesus never charged for what he did," he would tell the gathering.

Of the constant stream of journalists that  came into Congonhas do Campo, several were inspired to write books about him.  Among them were Reinaldo  Comenale, who flatly called Arigo the eighth wonder of the world.  Geraldo Serrano wrote that Arigo was far from a saint, but that scientists would be afraid of the challenge presented by Arigo, since they would be quickly convinced that they would lose the battle with rationality.  Jorge Rizzini eventually published a book about Arigo, recounting his own direct experiences with him, and backed up by his documentary footage.  A highly regarded professor of philosophy named J. Herculano Pires produced a carefully documented book, perhaps the most profound one written about the phenomenon.  The problem that all the authors faced was one of restraint.  After observing Arigo over weeks or months or years, they simply could not refrain from going overboard in adulation and wonderment.

Under the circumstances, this was understandable.  As Arigo's fame grew, a large segment of the medical profession began to get interested, both favorable and unfavorable in attitude.  They would soon be facing the same problem: maintaining  objectivity in the face of utterly incredible empirical facts.  The problem would be in separating the subjective from the objective.

Concerning Congonhas do Campo, people from all over the world visited the vicinity to look upon firsthand the collection to be found in the town of life-size wooden and stone statues of Biblical characters carved by Aleijadinho in the eighteenth century.  Although crippled with leprosy, the artist "had chipped away at the stone with tools strapped to his withered stumps of arms.  Yet the precision of his works is magnificent and emotionally overpowering."

Arigo didn’t charge for his medical practice and simultaneously worked part-time in a job with the government and social-security office.  A weekend hobby was growing roses.  Fuller noted that with the financial help of his wealthy aunt, he sent carton loads of roses to hospitals throughout the state of Minas Gerais and elsewhere.

Fuller chronicled in the book how in 1957 Arigo was brought to trial for practicing illegal medicine.  As summarized by Fuller, an addendum filed by Arigo's attorney in his defense stated, "The ability of a healer, even if illegal, has to be taken into account . . . Arigo was obviously more than able, he was super-able.  Arigo accomplishes what he does without even knowing he is doing it . . . Arigo helps only those that the medical world cannot help . . . He acts through an invisible element that is possessing him . . . In Arigo's case, this is benight possession . . . Arigo believes that the spirit of Dr. Fritz is the spirit of Christ . . ."

 

 

Although Arigo was sentenced to one year and three months in jail, a presidential pardon from Brazilian President Juscelino Kubitschek was granted prior to any incarceration in 1958.  Previously having been a physician himself, Kubitschek knew about Arigo because the president’s own daughter had been successfully treated by him.  

 

After the president’s term ended in 1960: "Again, the opposition went into action."  The legal process to stop Arigo’s work began again, this time in accord with a charge of witchcraft that could bring a longer prison term.  Fuller estimated: "The second trial was really a charade for both sides as they strained to conduct the proceedings on the level of legal reality though the phenomenon actually was unclassifiable, undefendable, and unassailable, all at the same time."

 

In 1964 Arigo was sentenced to sixteen months in jail for the practice of witchcraft.  Seven months later, on June 24, 1965, he was temporarily freed while the chief justice of the region reviewed the case.  During this interval, Judge Felippe Immesi was able to observe Arigo in his clinic and upon considering the evidence found no indication that anyone had ever been harmed.  The sentence was reduced to two months more of incarceration and Arigo returned to prison on August 20.  

The Federal Supreme Court continued to review the case as urged by Judge Immesi.  Fuller observed, "There had been many irregularities in the prosecution, many oversights.  In a strange about-face, Prosecutor da Paula recommended that the sentence be canceled.  The court finally voted unanimously that the charges against Arigo should be dropped.  He was freed from prison on November 8, 1965."

 
This turn of events prompted Puharich amongst a group of American scientists to conduct further research with Arigo.  After Puharich returned to the clinic in Congonhas do Campo, one day Arigo guided him to take hold of a surgical knife and plunge it behind a patient's eye to experience for himself one of Arigo's characteristic probing maneuvers.  Fuller wrote: "Puharich was horrified.  But he noticed one thing: there seemed to be some kind of repellent force that inexplicably worked for Arigo but for no one else when it came to this maneuver — except when Arigo guided his hand."

A larger expedition assembled in 1968 and included Puharich among six doctors heading a research team with many other specialists utilizing a wide range of audio-visual equipment.   Fuller stated rhetorically: "The research problem to be considered eventually would be trying to identify the nature of the 'Dr. Fritz' intelligence.  Was it a creative process, similar to a composer hearing the music he is about to create and score?  Was it simply a form of articulating Arigo's unconscious thoughts?  Or was it a paranormal manifestation of a source of intelligence outside Arigo's personal memory and experience, which he called Dr. Fritz?"

Fuller reported that the research group closed down the large scale study of Arigo when the Brazilian media found out about the project.  Arigo: Surgeon of the Rusty Knife features an afterword by Henry K. Puharich, M.D. who wrote about his reaction upon learning that Arigo had been killed in an auto accident at the age of 49:

 

The shock was so deep to me that I decided to go on a fourteen-day fast and reexamine all my life, to weigh the meaning of Arigo, in life and in death.

I now realized that I should have dropped my other work in 1963 and concentrate all my efforts on him.

 

 

. . . I wanted to get into the full-time study of the powers of the human mind.  One day I made my decision: I would resign from all my duties and jobs with foundations, companies, and laboratories, and give myself two years to find a place in full-time psychical research.

 

 

The probe for the source and nature of these powers has been fully covered in my book Uri (1974).  [blog articles about Uri: 1, 2, 3]

Since the passing of Arigo, there have been reports of 'Dr. Fritz' being incorporated by other psychic surgeons.  A chapter in The Flying Cow: Research into Paranormal Phenomena In the World’s Most Psychic County (1975) by Guy Lyon Playfair provides the author’s account of two operations performed on him by the psychic surgeon 'Edivaldo' (Edivaldo Oliveira Silva) to treat a recurring digestive ailment.  Playfair also observed other operations and wrote about conversing with Edivaldo.  During one visit, the following greeting for the people assembled was heard by Playfair:

 

"Bonsoir, mes amis!"  It was the voice of Dr. Pierre, the French member of the team of spirits who work through the mediumship of Edivaldo.  Speaking correct but very elementary French, he wished everybody well and gave way to an Italian voice, which was followed in turn by another voice saying "good evening" in English with an atrocious Bahian accent.  Finally, after a few Germanic noises from the legendary Dr. Fritz, we were greeted in the fluent Spanish of Dr. Calazans.