No, mediumistic phenomena have always existed. Mediumship is an inherent faculty of the human species, communication between the two planes of life has always been known since time immemorial. However, it had to undergo a slow and gradual process of evolution, whose history accompanies the very evolution of the Spirit.
The first inhabitants of the planet called god anything that presented any supernatural characteristic, anything that escaped their understanding, such as phenomena of nature and even perceived abilities in another individual that distinguished him from others. As a result, they worshiped them, and because they did not possess the developed moral and intellectual sense, the primitive peoples offered to the gods human and animal sacrifices, as well as offerings of the fruits of the earth. Such cults were marked by psychic and magical practices that lasted for millennia.
Through the reincarnation experiences, man learns to use his spiritual energy, extracting elements of the universal cosmic fluid, which will be studied in a later question, elaborating and perfecting its mechanisms of expression and communication, among themselves and with the inhabitants of the spiritual world.
The civilization process itself begins, which has the power to modify the face of the Planet. The evolutionary process was not, of course, performed exclusively by the individual, always supported by higher intelligences, allowing the spiritual body (perispirit) to improve itself as well, and as a result produced a physical vehicle capable of raising higher flights.
As the Spirit evolves through innumerable reincarnations, naturally his perceptive faculties are enlarged, he learns to refine the waves of thought, for the human psyche is better structured. Through the attunement, it emits vibrations that attract the thoughts and ideas of similar spirits, incarnate and disincarnated.
Intuition was the initial system of interchange and, over time, the spiritual being realizes that the mind is the key to everything, and it is to guide all the evolutionary needs of the spirit. Thought, a creative force, involves the minds within their range of action, but also, by the mechanisms of reciprocity, is influenced by spirits, incarnate and discarnate, superior and inferior.
In order to make a historical synthesis of the Mediumship, we bring the sequence mentioned in the Mediunidade: Study and Practice, program 1, organizer Marta Antunes de Oliveira, edited by the Brazilian Spiritist Federation, whose content was inspired by three works of Spiritism: Evolution in Two Worlds, André Luiz Spirit, psychography by Francisco Cândido Xavier, FEB; On the way to the light, of the Spirit Emmanuel, psychography of Francisco Cândido Xavier, FEB; and Spirit and Time - Anthropological Introduction of Spiritism, by Herculano Pires. Editora Edicel. Secondly, it brings the primitive mediumship, where intuition appears as the initial mediumship. It is observed the idolatrous medium who adores or fears the forces of nature, designated as "gods": sun, sky, moon, stars, rain, trees, rivers, fire, human being that stands out in the community. Then we have the tribal mediumship, in which a collective psychic mentality develops, with the group belief in spirits or gods. The conceptions of the parent heaven arise, as the Creator or the fecundator, and mother earth, as the generatrix, which was fertilized by the creator.
Fetishism was already a more refined form of tribal mediumship, with a strong psychic coloring, characterized by the cult of fetishes or material objects, representing Divinity or Spirits. It appears the figure of the healer or sorcerer, always very respected and revered and at the same time loved and feared by the other members of the tribe or clan. As time went by, the practices unfolded in others, now known as voodoo and black magic.
We also have mythological mediumship, characterized by the mediumistic practice of the presence of myths, with a symbolism of the creation of the universe and beings, as well as magic, through mediumistic and psychic practices with a strong ritualistic connotation. The oracular mediumunismo was that arisen in the period of the human history considered like beginning of the civilization, being polytheistic and religious. The gods, the Spirits, were worshiped by society, were part of a hierarchical society, where there is a greater god, Zeus, living in a determined place, like Olympus. Such gods are immortal, powerful, but possess passions typical of mortal men, such as hatred, love, rancor, compassion.
Each god is responsible for the government of a part of the earth or terrestrial beings, the oracles constituting the core of all human activity, nothing being done without consulting them previously, Greece being considered the center of the oracular mediumship, with the oracle of Delphi being the most famous and representing divinity. Spirits and gods spoke through a medium called the Pythoness, or temporarily occupied their bodies to manifest themselves, and they used objects from the temple, such as a statue, or elements of nature.
In antiquity, according to Emmanuel, mediumship has the following characteristics: an external or exoteric face, polytheistic, theatrical, superstitious, full of magic, destined for public manifestations and an inner or esoteric face, of monotheistic essence, involving degrees of arduous initiation that were practiced inside the temples by mediums, magicians, pythonesses, etc., generically called "initiates", who were kept under the supervision of priests.
In fact, the mediumistic practice of the beginning of time came more prominently not only among the Greeks but also among other Greek, Egyptian, Hindu and Jewish peoples. When we look at the Bible, we see mediumship as something natural and exuberant, prophetism was the mediumship that stood out most and was important for the emergence of the first known religion, Judaism.
Let us also remember the unique figure of Moses, possessor of great mediumship and powerful spiritual resources, having God given him the mission to bring to the material world the Ten Commandments of the Divine Law. The very day of Pentecost, constant in Acts 2: 1-13, is characterized as the greatest known mediumistic feat, marking the beginning of the mediumship practice itself.
Everything happens in the proper time and according to the understanding of humanity. Spiritism did not create the mediumistic phenomena, but came to explain them, to remove the veil over what until then was unknown. Considering that things are gradually being defined, over time, not showing up in its completeness, we can say that the whole past was as a preparation for the future advent of Spiritism.
We conclude the theme, as appropriate, with The Gospel According to Spiritism, stating that all knowledge must be proportional to the intelligence of the one to whom it is addressed, for we know there are people whom a very strong light dazzles without clarifying, so that prudence he has to hide until, when man has reached a certain degree of development, he may seek out the light, weighing the obscurity upon him. This time all that is hidden will be revealed one day, and what man can not yet understand on earth will be revealed successively in the more advanced worlds when he is more purified and purified.