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From Citizendium, the Citizens' Compendium

Spiritism is a scientific and philosophical doctrine established in France in the 19th Century by the French educator Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail.

In the mid 1800s, Mr. Rivail became interested in the wildly popular phenomenon of spirit-tapping, a strange phenomenon, at that time attributed to the action of spirits, reported in many different places, most notably in the U.S. and France.

Mr. Rivail studied the phenomenon, searching for his causes. Initially he didn´t believe in any spiritual hypothesis, but he observed that the supposed spirits answered correctly and rationally several questions formulated by him. Soon he started to believe that he was talking to incorporeal and intelligent beings. These beings revealed they were the souls of the deceased.

As the pseudonym Allan Kardec Mr. Rivail compiled and organized a vast amount of information in the form of five books: The Spirit´s Book, The Book on Mediums, The Gospel According to Spiritism, Heaven and Hell and The Genesis According to Spiritism. These books are considered to be the basis of the Spiritism.