Today, hypnosis is emerging both as a science and an art; however, the fact that it has slowly become considered a science by the scientific community is because many proponents have become more scientific in their approaches. There are thousands of people who have contributed to the advancement of hypnotism. Those who are recognized by the scientific community are the ones who took a more scientific approach. However, there are others whose contributions also deserve places in history.

The hypnosis pioneers have been categorized by some historical researchers into four groups.

1. The Early Unscientific Group

This group includes most of those who experimented with hypnosis without knowing it under that name. They have in common the fact that they generally misunderstood the things that they were accomplishing and laid their achievements to magic, or magnetism, divine power and so on.

They include Genghis Kahn, who used group suggestion to create hallucinations. Also included are Roger Bacon, Raymond Lully, Pico della Mirandola and many other names that never found their way into the history books.

They also include the seers and sages of Greece, who seem to have been the ancient leaders of self hypnosis, as well as the ancient Egyptians, and perhaps tribal “witch doctors” dating back to prehistoric times. Also, there are some hypnotherapists who believe that Jesus used hypnosis with many whom He healed.

2. The Semi-Scientific Group

This group started experimenting and researching hypnosis as a science, although some of the people in this group never heard the term hypnosis during their lifetimes. An example of this was Anton Mesmer, whom most people call “Father of Hypnosis”. Others were Father Gassner and James Martin Charcot, a famous man to even modern hypnotists, but who was still years behind his own time in the study of hypnosis, yet belongs to this group despite his identification of the depth levels of hypnosis.

3. The Scientific Group

The scientific group includes those who first removed hypnosis from the realms of “mysticism” started experimenting with what hypnosis could actually do. Elliotson, Braide and Esdaile made much progress towards establishing its use in medicine- ending the first dark age of hypnosis. And while they did make a few mistakes, they were still many years ahead of their time; so they deserve their place in fame as scientific investigators of hypnosis.

4. The Modern Group

The modern group should include both those who teach and promote hypnotherapy as an art and/or a profession of its own as well as those who research it as a science. But there seems to be a division or gulf today between the scientific community and those many thousands of dedicated fulltime hypnotherapists who are and have been successful with helping their clients change their lives. So, you could say we have the modern scientific group and the modern artistic group.