Wartroll- ``Well, for one it is the extreme amount of speculation you do. 2nd for me is your lust for adulation. 3rd is your lack of any true evidence. In order to get to your conclusion it takes huge amounts of faith in the word "likely". Conjecture is not fact.``
Like the New testament is fact... hehe. OK, so you prefer a Jesus that performs actual miracles and Benny Hinn,and my challenge to this causes you untold amounts of anger and frustration. Thats cool with me!
Or are you saying jesus was like Benny Hinn? If so, did you OK that with any Chrisitans first?
References like the ones you site above, (glad to see you spent considerable time going through the Bible - interesting, does S.org. pay well these days?) were put together lifetimes after Jesus, and my opinion, unlike yours, is that they should be not be regarded as fact, but rather stories that developed around actual events, which were retold many times before being recorded. Clearly, in the oldest of the synoptic Gospels, Jesus sends out the apostles to heal with the holy oil, as well 1 John records the teaching capacity contained in this ointnment,more than any human teacher. these cases, along with Jesus`use of a clay poultice to heal a blind man, indicates that in many cases an actual physical preperation accompanied the miracle. Regardless of that, elements of faith healing, such as that perfomed by Hinn, may have also utilized the patients own beliefs, but then combined with something such as a plant that has actual medicinal qualities, hom much more so. It should also be noted that topical preperations of cananbis for such purposes, had by the time of Jesus, a long history in the ancient mid-east, and i am referring to Assyrian, Egyptian and Hebrew use. Further, it is well documented that the Catholic church was in conflict with other Christian groups, now known by the collective name of Gnostics, accussing them of using secret sacraments, and one of the main points of contention between these two groups was baptism, which the gnostics rejected, and annointing oil, which the Gnostics used in both healing and entheogenic ceremonies.
For actual textual references regarding that see
http://www.cannabisculture.com/backissues/cc11/christ.htmlhttp://hightimes.com/news/ht_admin/139As a result of conflict about what actually happened durring Jesus`short ministry, the Catholic Church held the Council of Nicea in 325 AD
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Council_of_NicaeaAll documents conflicting with the purely Catholic view, were banned. Luckily, certain Christians, now heretics, hid a cache of these equally and more ancient docuements and these were rediscovered in out own time
http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.htmlThe extensive suppression of conflicting views and cults to the Catholic Church, as the Catholic Church rose to political power, directly resulted in the Dark Ages, where all information but the Bible, was prohibited in the Christian world for centuries.
As for your petty personal attacks and assumptions, I can see where you are coming from!
Actual footage of Wartroll -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YersIyzsOpcPerhaps hold your face in a pillow next time....
Wartroll- ``Experience is where I get my authority to speak about weed and it's effects.``
Cool, with all that experience maybe you can get yourself quallified as an expert witness and testify against me!
Now lets look at what people who actually know what they are talking about, not forum trolls, say like University Professors, anthropologists, linguists and botanists, who unlike Wartroll, know the difference between good grounded research and BS,like that which the mighty Wartroll puts forth.
Anthropologist Sula Benet, who came up with the keneh bosem theory
http://books.google.ca/books?id=CBXxnaGk0hwC&pg=PA40&dq=exodus+30:23+cannabis&lr=#v=onepage&q=exodus%2030%3A23%20cannabis&f=false
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sula_BenetAnthropologist Vera Rubin (Jewish, so she knows the language)
http://www.thereedfoundation.org/rism/Rubin.htmlVera Rubin noted, that cannabis “appears in the OLD TESTAMENT because of the ritual and sacred aspect of it” (Rubin 1978).`
Botanist Immanuel Löw, a rabbi and Orientalist (born at Szeged, Hungary, 20 January 1854), was educated at his native town and at Berlin, where he studied at the Lehranstalt für die Wissenschaft des Judenthums and at the university, graduating as rabbi and as Ph.D. in 1878. The same year he became rabbi in Szeged.
Among his books may be mentioned: "Aramäische Pflanzennamen," Vienna, 1881; "A szegedi zsidók," Szeged, 1885; "A. Szegedi Chevra," ib. 1887; "Alkalmi beszédek," ib. 1891; "Az ezredév: Nyolc beszéd," ib. 1896; "Löw Immánuel Beszédei," ib. 1900; "Imádságok," 3d ed. ib. 1903; "Vörösmarty Mihály," ib. 1900; "Szilágyi Dezsö," ib. 1901; "Tisza Kálmán," ib. 1902; "Kossuth Lajos," ib. 1902; "Templomszentelő," ib. 1903; "Deák Ferenc," ib. 1903. He has furthermore contributed articles on Syriac lexicography to various volumes of the "Z. D. M. G.," and has edited the following works: "Schwab Löw, Emlékeztetés a vallásban nyert oktatásra," 5th ed. Szeged, 1887; "Löw Lipót, Bibliai Történet," 10th ed. Budapest, 1902; "Leopold Löw: Gesammelte Schriften," i.-v., Szeged, 1889-1900.
The German researcher Immanuel Low, in his DIE FLORA DER JUDEN (1926\1967) identified a number of ancient Hebrew references to cannabis, here as an incense, food source, as well as cloth. Interestingly, Immanuel Löw, referred to an ancient Jewish Passover recipe that called for wine to be mixed with ground up saffron and hasisat surur, which he saw as a “a kind of deck name for the resin the Cannabis sativa” (Low, 1924). Low suggests that this preparation was also made into a burnable and fragrant concoction by being combined with Saffron and Arabic Gum (Low, 1926\1967).
Botanist William Emboden the “shamanistic Ashera priestesses of pre-reformation Jerusalem… anointed their skins with… [a cannabis] mixture as well as burned it” (Emboden 1972).
http://www.google.ca/search?sourceid=nav...william+embodenProfessor Stanley Moore, chairman of the philosophy department of the University of Wisconsin-Olatteville,
http://jaar.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/pdf_extract/XXXVII/1/15has stated that Biblical references to “aromatic herbs” and “smoke” could mean psycho-active drugs used in religious observances that Moore said are as old as religion itself. “Western Jews and Christians, who shun psycho-active drugs in their faith practices, are the exception, not the norm.”
Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan
Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan (Hebrew: רבי אריה קפלן‎) (23 October 1934 – January 28, 1983[1]) was a noted American Orthodox rabbi and author with a background in both physics and Judaism. He was lauded as an original thinker and prolific writer, from studies of the Torah, Talmud and Kabbalah to introductory pamphlets on Jewish beliefs and philosophy aimed at non-religious and newly religious Jews. His works are often regarded as a significant factor in the growth of the baal teshuva movement
THE LIVING TORAH, by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, a popular gift at bar mitzvahs, which correctly notes that “On the basis of cognate pronunciation and a Septuagint reading, some identify Keneh bosem with English and Greek cannabis, the hemp plant” (Kaplan, 1981).
Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan has noted of early Kabalistic magical schools who used magic and other means of communion for mystic exploration, that “some practices include the use of ‘grasses,’ which were possibly psychedelic drugs” (Kaplan, 1993). As mentioned earlier, Kaplan’s THE LIVING TORAH includes cannabis as a possible candidate for the Hebrew keneh bosem, “due to cognate pronunciation” (Kaplan, 1981). The Kabalistic text the Zohar records:
“There is no grass or herb that grows in which G-d’s wisdom is not greatly manifested and which cannot exert great influence in heaven” and “If men but knew the wisdom of all the Holy One, blessed be He, has planted in the earth, and the power of all that is to be found in the world, they would proclaim the power of their L-rd in His great wisdom.” (Zohar.2,80B)
Like the Zoroastrian royalty and priesthood, there are indications that early Kabbalists enjoyed the use of the herb, but prevented its consumption by the common people. In the P'sachim, “Rav Yehudah says it is good to eat... the essence of hemp seed in Babylonian broth; but it is not lawful to mention this in the presence of an illiterate man, because he might derive a benefit from the knowledge not meant for him.- Nedarim, fol. 49, col. 1” (Harris, et al., 2004). Other sources have noted a Kabbalistic comparison to the effects of cannabis with divine perception, noting an “intriguing reference to cannabis in the context of a fleeting knowledge of God: Zohar Hadash, Bereshit, 16a (Midrash ha-Ne’elam)” (Gross, et al., 1983).
In 1980 the respected anthropologist Weston La Barre (1980)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weston_La_Barre referred to the Biblical references in an essay on cannabis, concurring with Benet’s earlier hypothesis. In that same year respected British Journal New Scientist also ran a story that referred to the Hebrew OLD TESTAMENT references: “Linguistic evidence indicates that in the original Hebrew and Aramaic texts of the Old Testament the ‘holy oil’ which God directed Moses to make (Exodus 30:23) was composed of myrrh, cinnamon, cannabis and cassia” (Malyon & Henman 1980).
As well, William McKim noted in DRUGS AND BEHAVIOUR, “It is likely that the Hebrews used cannabis... In the OLD TESTAMENT (Exodus 30:23), God tells Moses to make a holy oil of ‘myrrh, sweet cinnamon, kaneh bosem and kassia’” (McKim, 1986). A MINISTER’S HANDOOK OF MENTAL DISORDERS also records that “Some scholars believe that God’s command to Moses (Exodus 30:23) to make a holy oil included cannabis as one of the chosen ingredients” (Ciarrocchi, 1993).
These following references relate directly to my own research
It sounds like I would have got an A in University!
C. SCOTT LITTLETON, Ph.D., Professor of Anthropology, Emeritus, Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA 90041, U.S.A.
"I have read Mr. Bennett’s several books on this subject and am in general agreement with what he states, especially about the extent to which the Vedic hallucinogen Soma was probably made from cannabis. Indeed, his research has changed my own thinking about this ancient conundrum (heretofore, the majority of scholars have suggested that Soma was prepared from psychotropic mushrooms).
As Mr. Bennett has amply demonstrated, the ritual use of cannabis has a very long history, both in the Old and New Worlds. For example, in addition to its use at Delphi and in the ancient Indian Soma cult, as well as by shamans, both ancient and contemporary, in many parts of the world, we know from both Herodotus (Book Four) and archaeology that the ancient Scythians ritually inhaled cannabis fumes. Herodotus, who may have been an eye-witness, called it a ritual “smoke bath,” during which the participants “howled like wolves,” and burned hemp seeds have been found in braziers at several Scythian sites in Central Asia and Western Siberia, most notably at Pazyryk (near Novosibirsk).
In more recent times, and especially in the twentieth century, users of cannabis for spiritual purposes have often been persecuted, in the United States and elsewhere, by authorities enforcing laws against its possession. A good example can be seen in the ongoing attempts to suppress its use in the Rastafarian religion, in which cannabis plays a major albeit illicit ceremonial role.
In short, cannabis has indeed occupied an extremely important position in the history of human spirituality, one that has all too often been overlooked (or ignored) by those authorities who are adamantly opposed to its use, no matter what the context.
C. SCOTT LITTLETON
Littleton`s CV
Courses taught
Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (Anthropology 100)
History of Anthropological Theory (Anthropology 200)
Japanese Culture (Anthropology 300)
Magic and Religion (Anthropology 350)
Comparative Mythology and Folklore (Anthropology 351)
Cognitive Anthropology (Anthropology 354)
Japan and England: Two Island Empires (Cultural Studies 14)
The Occult and the Paranormal (Cultural Studies 8)
Books by
author/editor of several books and monographs, including:
An internationally recognized expert in comparative Indo-European mythology and folklore, as well as Japanese religion, Professor Littleton has published extensively on Japanese myth and religion, the origin and distribution of the Arthurian and Holy Grail legends, and the theories of the late French mythologist Georges Dumézil. He is the author of The New Comparative Mythology (3rd Edition, University of California Press, 1982) and, with Linda A. Malcor, co-author of From Scythia to Camelot: A Radical Reassessment of the Legends of King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table, and the Holy Grail (Garland, 1994; a revised, paperback edition appeared in 2000). He is the editor of Eastern Wisdom (Henry Holt, 1996), a book surveying the major Asian religions, as well as the author of the chapter on Shinto, the indigenous religion of Japan, and has contributed chapters on Japanese mythology and religion to several other anthologies, including Roy Willis, ed., World Mythology: The Illustrated Guide (Simon & Schuster, 1993), Michael Coogan, ed., World Religion: The Illustrated Guide (Oxford University Press, 1998), and Raymond Scupin, ed., Religion and Culture: An Anthropological Focus (Prentice Hall, 2000). A semi-popular book, Shinto: Origins, Rituals, Festivals, Spirits, Sacred Places, was recently published by Oxford University Press (2002). He is the general editor of Mythology: The Illustrated Anthology of World Myth & Storytelling by (Duncan Baird Publishers, 2002), as well as of Gods, Goddesses, and Mythology (Marshall-Cavendish, 2004).
Littleton has done extensive field work in a Tokyo neighborhood, focusing on its annual matsuri, or Shinto shrine festival, an account of which appeared in an article entitled “The Organization and Management of a Tokyo Shinto Shrine Festival” (Ethnology 25:195 202, 1986). He has also studied contemporary Japanese popular culture, focusing on the teenage dancers and rock bands that perform on Sunday afternoons in Tokyo's Yoyogi Park (e.g., “Rituals of Rebellion among Contemporary Japanese Youth: The Outdoor Disco at Tokyo's Yoyogi Park,” Religion 17:119 131, 1987), and is currently researching the possibility that elements of the Arthurian tradition diffused to China and Japan as well as to Europe from its point of origin in the Trans-Caucasian steppes (e.g., “Yamato-takeru: An ‘Arthurian’ Hero in Japanese Tradition,” Asian Folklore Studies 54:259-274, 1995). He has also researched the extent to which the hallucinogen cannabis sativa played a role at the Oracles of Delphi and Dodona (e.g., "The Pneuma Enthusiastikon: On the Possibility of Hallucinogenic 'Vapors' at Delphi and Dodona." Ethos 14:76-91, 1986).
Littleton’s other research interests include nineteenth-century travel accounts—with Horace L. Hotchkiss, he is co-editor of The Diaries of Blakely Wilson: An American Traveler in Europe, Egypt, and the Holy Land, 1874-1876 (Mellen Press, 1998)—and occult and paranormal phenomena. The latter interest is reflected in his science fiction novel, Phase Two (Red Pill Press, 2009). He is also the author of a memoir, 2500 Strand: Growing up in Hermosa Beach, California, During World War II (Red Pill Press, 2008).
Littleton’s articles and reviews have appeared in American Anthropologist, Ethnology, Ethos, Journal of American Folklore, Journal of Asian Studies, Monumenta Nipponica, Journal of Folklore Research, Western Folklore, Asian Folklore Studies, Religion, History of Religions, Natural History, Journal of the Classical Tradition, Cosmos, and The Journal of Indo-European Studies, where he also serves as mythology co-editor. In addition to major essays on Indo-European mythology and the theories of the late Georges Dumézil in Mircea Eliade, et al. eds., The Encyclopedia of Religion (Macmillan, 1987, 2004) and Simon Glendinning, ed., The Edinburgh Encyclopedia of Continental Philosophy (Edinburgh University Press, 1999) he has contributed articles on a variety of subjects to The Encyclopedia of Religion and War (Routledge, 2004), The New Dictionary of the History of Ideas (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2004), and several other scholarly encyclopedias and compendia. He is also the author of the basic article on “Mythology” in The World Book Encyclopedia (Scott Fetzer, 1991), as well as over fifty short articles on various mythological subjects in both The World Book Encyclopedia and the Academic American Encyclopedia.
He has received grants and fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies (twice), the American Philosophical Society, and the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, and has served as a Visiting Fulbright Lecturer at The University of Tokyo and Waseda University (1980-81), Tokyo, Japan, and as a Senior Fulbright Researcher at Waseda University (1994). In 1991 he received The Graham L. Sterling Memorial Award, given annually to a distinguished member of the Occidental College faculty.
Next
My name is Thomas B. Roberts, and I make this statutory declaration from personal knowledge of the matters and facts stated in it. I am a Professor Emeritus of Educational Psychology at Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL. USA, where I have been employed since 1970.
2. Area of Expertise. As evidenced by my vita and from my faculty website (attached exhibit), I would like to draw the court’s attention to my professional publications in religious studies and scholarly duties having to do wholly or in part with the spiritual uses of psychoactive plants and chemicals.
Note: the word entheogen refers to a psychoactive plant or chemical used in a spiritual or religious context.
Positions
a. 1970-2006. Professor of Educational Psychology, Northern Illinois University. Duties: teaching undergraduate and graduate courses, serving on and chairing master’s theses and doctoral dissertations
b. Fall 2006. Visiting Scientist, Behavioral Pharmacology Research Unit, Johns Hopkins Medical Institute, Baltimore, MD. Duties: lead weekly staff development session and consulted on psilocybin research project.
c. Spring 2007 – present. Professor Emeritus instructor for the Honors Program seminar Foundations of Psychedelic Studies, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL.
Publications
d. (2009 or 2010 in-press). Entheogenic Contributions to Self-Transcendence, Healing, Pastoral Counseling, and Evangelism. Chapter 11 in Harold Ellens (ed.) The Healing Power of Spirituality, Vol. 3. Westport, CT. and London: Praeger/Greenwood Publications.
e. (2008). Multistate and Entheogenic Contributions to the Study of Miracles and Experimental Religious Studies. Chapter 3 in Harold Ellens (ed.) Miracles: God, Science, and Psychology in the Paranormal. Westport, CT. and London: Praeger /Greenwood Publications.
f. (2007). Winkelman, M. & T. Roberts (eds.) Psychedelic Medicine: New Evidence for Hallucinogenic Substances as Treatments, 2 vols. Westport, CT. and London: Praeger/Greenwood. [Ten chapters are primarily about the religious and/or spiritual uses of these substances.]
g. (2006). Chemical Input, Religious Output—Entheogens: A Pharmatheology Sampler. Chapter10 in Patrick McNamara (ed.) Where God and Science Meet, Vol. 3. Westport, CT. and London: Praeger/Greenwood Publications.
h. (2004). Entheogens—Sacramentals or Sacrilege? Design for a University Course. [Originally presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, October 22-24, 2004, Kansas City, MO.] Retrieved Oct. 13, 2009, from
http://www.cedu.niu.edu/lepf/edpsych/faculty/roberts/index_roberts1.htmli. (2001). (ed.). Psychoactive Sacramentals: Essays on Entheogens and Religion. San Francisco: Council on Spiritual Practices.
j. (1999). Do Entheogen-induced Mystical Experiences Boost the Immune System? Psychedelics, Peak-experiences, and Wellness. Advances in Mind-Body Health, Vol. 15, pp. 139-147.
k. (1995-2003). with Hruby, P. J. (eds.) Religion and Psychoactive Sacraments: An Entheogen Chrestomathy. [An online archive of over 550 entries including excerpts and expanded bibliographic information.]
www.csp.org/chrestomathy. l. (1997). Academic and Religious Freedom in the Study of the Mind. Chapter 11 in Robert Forte (ed.). Entheogens and the Future of Religion. San Francisco: Council on Spiritual Practices.
m. (1995). Psychoactive Sacraments. Valombrosa Conference Retreat Center, Menlo Park, CA. [A conference-retreat jointly sponsored by the Chicago Theological Seminary and the Council on Spiritual Practices. Co-organizer, program chair, floor manager.]
n. Co-founder and former director of the Council on Spiritual Practices.
o. Additional items will be found in my vita 1970-2006 and at my faculty website 2006-present.
3. Does marijuana (cannabis) have religious use?
a. A search of the website of the Council on Spiritual Practices and its 550-entry archive Religion and Psychoactive Sacraments (item k above) discovers 70 citations, and this archive does not include journal, periodical, or press citations, which probably outnumber the books and dissertations of this archive. Some of these entries are against the spiritual use of marijuana, a few are neutral, but most recognize this practice as spiritually legitimate. Regardless of the positions taken, the existence of these entries as a whole indicates that the topic has recognized status within the religious community and in religious studies and is not to be dismissed lightly. Also, new entries to this source stopped in 2003; and as the compiler of that resource who has kept file folders of possible future additions, I expect additional books and academic dissertations on the religious uses of marijuana published since then would probably number several dozen.
b. In On Being Stoned: A Psychological Study of Marijuana Intoxication, written by Charles T. Tart, Ph.D. and published in 1971 (Science and Behavior Books, Palo Alto, Ca.), Chapter 19 is titled “Spiritual Experiences.” This chapter reports the results of four questions that were part of a 224-item survey of marijuana users.
Item 192: “I feel in touch with a Higher Power or Divine Being to some extent when stoned: I feel more in contact with the ‘spiritual’ side of things.”
22% responded “very often” or “usually”.
Item 193: I am able to meditate more effectively than when straight …”
13% reported “very often” or “frequently”
Item 194: “I have had spiritual experiences, discrete experiences, which have had a powerful long-term religious effect on me while stoned.”
33% answered “yes” to this item. When asked to elaborate on these experiences, their descriptions included feelings of unity, stimulation of long-term interest in religion, contact with divine beings, long-term positive changes in life-style, and deep peace and joy.
Item 195: “Getting stoned has acquired a religious significance for me.”
22 % answered “yes”
c. In my judgement, Understanding Marijuana: A New Look at the Scientific Evidence, (2002, Oxford University Press) by Mitch Earlywine, Ph.D., provides the most thorough and thoughtful compilation of information on this topic. On pages 112-113, he writes, “The Coptic and Rastafarian Churches smoke cannabis as part of their religious practice, too. Certain sects of Buddhism in Nepal use marijuana as a sacrament (Clark, 1998). … Many encourage pensive, meditative use of the drug and deride mindless consumption (Bello, 1996). This approach to use may minimize the potential for negative consequences related to the drug.”
To answer my question above, “Does marijuana (cannabis) have religious use?” My answer is, “Clearly, yes.” This is not to imply that all current marijuana use is religious; clearly it isn’t. But at the same time, some current use is religious and is spiritually significant to those using it that way.
4. Is Christopher Bennett’s use religious and/or spiritual?
Having exchanged emails with Christopher Bennett for several years, I met him personally at a conference in Vancouver in 2004. Since then we have continued to email. At that time, we discussed the spiritual-religious uses of cannabis, and I have read parts of his co-authored books Green Gold the Tree of Life, Marijuana in Magic & Religion and Sex, Drugs, Violence and the Bible. Having spent a large fraction of my professional work compiling information the entheogens (item k above), I am solidly impressed with the scholarship on Mr. Bennett’s two books., He and his co-authors present the religious and spiritual use of cannabis in what must have been the result of painstaking detailed research in archeology, anthropology, theology, and other contributory disciplines to religious studies.
To me this also indicates a sincere belief on his part in the spiritual benefits of his use of cannabis. A casual, let’s-get-high smoker would not spend such tedious labors as these books required, and just as scholars within accepted religious traditions express their dedication and beliefs in, say, detailed historical or linguistic research, Mr. Bennett’s work witnesses the credibility of his convictions.
In my judgment and considering the laborious process of writing a book, seeing it through its rewriting, editing, printing and publication, these activities are sufficient evidence of Mr. Bennett’s sincere dedication to his religious use of cannabis.
Someone could merely claim that he or she smoked cannabis as part of one’s religion in order to try to circumvent the law, but a person with this motivation would not dedicate the hours of tedious work to writing books without a sincere belief that doing so is part of his spiritual dedication. And if circumventing the law were one’s purpose, it would not serve to call attention to oneself and one’s use of marijuana by writing books about marijuana.
Summary: it is my opinion that Mr. Bennett’s practice of using cannabis is a sincere and significant part of his religious beliefs, and that prohibiting him from doing so is an interference with his religious freedom. In religious thought there exists a concept called “transgression in service of a higher good” (such as a doctor healing on the Sabbath); I hope the Court will recognize a similar exception for transgressing drug laws in Mr. Bennett’s spiritual use of cannabis.
Respectfully submitted,
Thomas B. Roberts
Next
Prof. Carl Ruck, Classical Mythology, Boston University for the case, who will also be submitting an affidavit
1. Have there been instances in history of religions and/or spiritual practices that used psychoactive substances in their worship? If so please cite examples.
Psychoactive Sacraments are the Probable Origin of Religions.
entheogen:
— Plant sacraments or shamanic inebriants evoking religious ecstasy or vision; commonly used in the archaic world in divination for shamanic healing, and in Holy Communion, for example during the Initiation to the Eleusinian Mysteries or the Vedic Soma sacrifice.
Literally: becoming divine within.
Evolutionary science has amassed much evidence that the ancestors of man were primate cousins living in the forests and grasslands of Africa. Religious origins certainly grew out of primitive man’s struggle to define and control his surroundings. Prehistoric man would have respected and hailed the elements such as lighting, thunder and fire for their frightening and destructive power; and he would also have had respect for powerful mind altering substances found in nature.
Anthropological, ethnopharmacological and historical research has shown that the traditional purpose of such psychoactive plant use was to attain direct spiritual experience, during which users made contact with different spirits and unseen realms in order to gain knowledge and wisdom for themselves and/or members of their social group. Scientists studying aboriginal cultures with shamanic traditions have conclusively demonstrated that hallucinogenic substances were frequently used as an adjunct to the shamans' inner quest for vision and the search for healing.
The oldest organized continual religious tradition was that of the Indo-European Indian/ Iranian Magi, which arguably became the first monotheist religion (the precedent for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) through the revisions of the prophet Zarathustra (known to the Greeks as Zoroaster), perhaps as early as 6000 BCE, who was also credited with the transition from a nomadic culture of hunter-gatherers to the settled manner of civilization in urban centers with the arts of agriculture. Common to the Magi and their Zoroastrian successors (as well as the similar traditions of the Indian Brahmans) was the admittedly intoxicating botanical sacrament called haoma/soma. The identity of this plant or combination of plants has been the subject of scholarly debate. Candidates include mushrooms (Amanitas, Psilocybes), Syrian rue (Peganum harmala) potentiated by acacia—producing an Old World equivalent of ayahuasca, Ephedra, and Cannabis. The actual ingredients probably differed over the long history of the religion’s continual existence, but archaeological evidence can document Cannabis used in a ritual haoma ceremony as early as 2000 BCE at the sanctuary at Gunur in eastern Turkmenistan.
Similar and apparently separate traditions of visionary sacraments are documented in Neolithic (ca. 6000 BCE) rock paintings, specifically from North African Tassili n’Ajjer and the southeastern Hispanic peninsula (Spanish Levantine) and from cave sites in southwestern France, as well as Siberia, South Africa, and Australia.
In early historical times, one might cite the religious use of psychoactive substances among the Egyptians, early Judaism, Mesopotamian and Anatolian peoples (such as the settlement at Çatal Hüyük), and Classical Greece.
Classical Greece (5th-century BCE) is of particular relevance since it is claimed as the ancestor and inspiration of the Western Tradition. The main Hellenic religion was the Eleusinian Mystery initiation, which grew out of earlier cults with their own traditions of psychoactive sacraments, including opium. The Eleusinian Mystery, celebrated in a village near Athens, began about 1500 BCE and lasted nearly two millennia, until supplanted by the conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity. The religion induced a communal visionary event that was experienced as a journey to the otherworld and return by means of a sacred potion whose active agent was LSD extracted from ergot, a common fungus on cultivated grains.
In addition, one of the principle deities of Classical Greece was the god Dionysus or Bacchus. He was a god of intoxication, music, and dance; and his sacred drink was wine, which was always correctly drunk diluted with water and fortified by varieties of psychoactive herbal additives. He is similar to deities of ecstatic rapture in other cultures, such as the Aztec Xochipili.
The Persian version of the Vedic Soma sacrament was assimilated in the Greco-Roman world in the 1st century BCE as the cult of Mithras, which became one of the dominant religions of the Roman Empire, along with Christianity and the Egyptian Mystery of Isis. The religion originally of nomadic peoples from the Steppes of central Asia assimilated various aspects of the agrarian cults of the ubiquitous Goddess as it progressed through Mesopotamia and Anatolia, and similar versions of the cult involved Cybele and her lover Attis, and had already established itself even before the Classical Age in Greece through frequent contact with the Persian nobility and is seen in the traditions about the mythical hero Perseus, who is claimed as the ancestor of the Persians and is often indistinguishable from Mithras.
Membership in the Mithraic cult was restricted exclusively to men, who met in small groups in confined subterranean sanctuaries, the remains of which are found throughout Europe, the Near East and Africa, where they celebrated their god and initiated new members with a seven-fold sequence of visionary psychoactive sacraments. The visionary experience was expressed through the philosophy of Stoicism and involved a liberating spiritual ascent to the rim of the Universe and the concept of Cosmic Renewal through the Final Conflagration at the End of Time.
These sanctuaries are totally unsuitable for banqueting upon ordinary foods. As is often the case, other drugs appear to have been accepted as substitutes or surrogates for the original fungal identity of Soma, including the extract from ergot, under the descriptive metaphor of ass’s ears. Nero was the first Emperor to be initiated by what is called a series of magical dinners, and most of his successors including Constantine before his Conversion espoused the cult, along with the army and bureaucrats who administered the Empire, so that the mushroom cult could safely be called the drug that ‘civilized’ Europe, or more correctly, imposed the Greco-Roman tradition, displacing the Druids, with their psychoactive mistletoe, and other indigenous cults.
Although officially banned after the Conversion, aspects of the religion were assimilated or co-opted by Christianity as the seven sacraments of the Church, and the warrior brotherhoods persisted as secret societies such as Freemasonry.
Early Christianity, itself, had psychoactive Communion rites, which were condemned as heretical, by the dominant Church established by Paul, but evidence indicates that the ecclesiastical elite as late as the Renaissance had reserved the psychoactive Eucharist for themselves, and vigorously prosecuted such sacraments by so-called heretical groups like the Cathars, as well as perpetuations of pre-Christian practices by persons accused of witchcraft.
The evidence for psychoactive sacraments among the pre-Conquest peoples of the New World is also relevant. In the 1950s R. Gordon Wasson's investigations of the Mexican pre-Columbian mushroom cult established beyond question the prominence of hallucinogens in the religious exercises of the whole Mayan-Aztec culture. In addition to mushrooms, the Mesoamerican peoples employed such plants as San Pedro cacti and peyote. In many cases, even after the conversion to Christianity they assimilated their indigenous rites to the new imposed religion.
2. Have there been instances in history of religions and/or spiritual practices that used cannabis in their worship? If so please cite examples.
Hemp played a prominent role in the development of the religions and civilizations of Asia, the Middle East, Europe and Africa. The insights gained from the marijuana high by the ancient worshippers were considered to be of divine origin and the plant itself an "angel" or messenger of the gods. The sacramental use of marijuana predates written history and this tradition continues with diverse tribes in Africa, certain Hindu sects, Moslem fakirs and Sufis, Rastafarians, as well as modern Occultists and Pagans.
The 5th-century BCE Greek Herodotus (4.73) documented the use of cannabis as a ritual sacrament by the Scythians for their funerals. Before that, the Greeks knew the plant by other names, such as ‘smoke.’ The comic dramatist Aristophanes parodied the Scythian rite in his Clouds (ca. 423), implying that philosophers like Socrates got their ideas by being ‘high.’ It was probably often an ingredient in the incenses burnt in holy sanctuaries.
More relevant is the use of cannabis by the Jews to produce a similar psychoactive atmosphere in the Temple, where it was burned in an enclosed space as incense and also employed for anointing the sacred vessels, as well as the high priest himself, so that he could speak to Yahweh. By the account of Philo (20 BCE—50 CE), who was himself a Jewish High Priest:
All inside is unseen, except by the High Priest alone, and indeed, he, though charged with the duty of entering once a year, gets no view of anything. For he takes with him a brazier full of lighted coals and incense, and the great quantity of vapor covers everything around it, beclouds the sight and prevents it from being able to penetrate to any distance. - Philo, De specialibus legibus, 1.13.72
3. Are there benefits to existence of such religious/spiritual practices?
Cicero said of the Eleusinian Mystery:
For among the many excellent and indeed divine institutions that Athens has brought forth and contributed to human life, none, in my opinion, is better than those mysteries. For by their means we have been brought out of our barbarous and savage mode of life and educated and refined to a state of civilization; and as the rites are called "initiations," so in very truth we have learned from them the beginnings of life, and have gained the power not only to live happily, but also to die with a better hope. - Laws, II, xiv, 36.
The god Dionysus as patron of the theater in Athens was largely responsible for the elevation of that city as the pinnacle of Classical culture. Further archaeological and literary studies of the use of psychotropic substances in ancient cult practices may well lead to the conclusion that the imaginary world of the stage would never have been possible without the use of psychotropic chemicals.
Plutarch, in Table Talk, a sort of mock philosophical dialogue, discussed how Jewish sacraments of the pre-Christian era reflected the union of religious practices surrounding the god of Abraham with the public worship of Dionysus, the god of intoxication and ecstasy. According to Plutarch both gods were associated with the same delirium–inducing plants, both used similar symbols and sacred implements, both used music in the same manner during worship, and the priests wore garments very similar to those used in the worship of Dionysus. Plutarch even clamed there was a direct linguistic connection between the Hebrew word for Sabbath and the Greek Sabi, which was used to denote the crazed, intoxicated followers of Dionysus.
The Native American Church, which is a Christian Church that assimilates pre-Christian traditions, has used its peyote sacrament as a treatment for alcoholic addiction. Similarly, the West African iboga plant, which is used in traditional religious initiations, has shown efficacy in treating heroine and cocaine addiction. Similar research with the visionary ayahuasca potion suggests its use in the treatment of addictions.
4. Do the intoxicating affects of cannabis lend themselves to a feeling of spiritual transcendence?
The classic experiment in this regard was conducted at Marsh Chapel at Boston University on Good Friday of 1962 with psilocybin (the active agent in Psilocybe mushrooms). The subjects were graduate degree divinity students and almost all reported experiencing profound religious experiences. The experiment was repeated with very similar results at Johns Hopkins University in 2006.
The classic description of such an experience with mescaline (the active agent in peyote and a few other cacti and plants) is Aldous Huxley’s The Doors of Perception (1954). Here are a few excerpts:
I was not looking now at an unusual flower arrangement. I was seeing what Adam had seen on the morning of his creation-the miracle, moment by moment, of naked existence.
Istigkeit - wasn't that the word Meister Eckhart liked to use? "Is-ness." The Being of Platonic philosophy - except that Plato seems to have made the enormous, the grotesque mistake of separating Being from becoming and identifying it with the mathematical abstraction of the Idea. He could never, poor fellow, have seen a bunch of flowers shining with their own inner light and all but quivering under the pressure of the significance with which they were charged; could never have perceived that what rose and iris and carnation so intensely signified was nothing more, and nothing less, than what they were - a transience that was yet eternal life, a perpetual perishing that was at the same time pure Being, a bundle of minute, unique particulars in which, by some unspeakable and yet self-evident paradox, was to be seen the divine source of all existence.
I continued to look at the flowers, and in their living light I seemed to detect the qualitative equivalent of breathing -but of a breathing without returns to a starting point, with no recurrent ebbs but only a repeated flow from beauty to heightened beauty, from deeper to ever deeper meaning. Words like "grace" and "transfiguration" came to my mind, and this, of course, was what, among other things, they stood for. My eyes traveled from the rose to the carnation, and from that feathery incandescence to the smooth scrolls of sentient amethyst which were the iris. The Beatific Vision, Sat Chit Ananda, Being-Awareness-Bliss-for the first time I understood, not on the verbal level, not by inchoate hints or at a distance, but precisely and completely what those prodigious syllables referred to. And then I remembered a passage I had read in one of Suzuki's essays. "What is the Dharma-Body of the Buddha?" ('"the Dharma-Body of the Buddha" is another way of saying Mind, Suchness, the Void, the Godhead.) The question is asked in a Zen monastery by an earnest and bewildered novice. And with the prompt irrelevance of one of the Marx Brothers, the Master answers, "The hedge at the bottom of the garden." "And the man who realizes this truth," the novice dubiously inquires, '"what, may I ask, is he?" Groucho gives him a whack over the shoulders with his staff and answers, "A golden-haired lion."
I recommended this book to a friend and colleague who has devoted many years to meditation under the guidance of a spiritual master. She said that this was exactly the goal that they were striving to attain.
With regard to cannabis, I quote the following from the Reverend Ernie Gordon, who is not himself a user, but has had similar experience from what he calls ‘contemplation’:
I was reasoning with a Rastafarian recently, and he told me that during his contemplative prayer sessions, he smokes marijuana and he has been discovering that he develops a wisdom that he cannot explain easily. Many Christian psychiatrists, who are experimenting with psychedelic drugs, request that it is better to take certain drugs within the sacramental rite, rather than looking to psychedelic drugs in terms of periodic recreational flirtations.
It is evident that there is urgent need for dialogue between the Christian and Rastafarian theologians to discuss at a deeper level the use of marijuana in the religious ritual in order to aid the transcendental experience. I would also like to ask the Rastafarian theologian if he/she has similar transcendental experiences, which are as follows:
a) There is a sense of oneness with God or the universe, combined with a transcendence of time and space.
b) There is insight, a sense of mystery, and ineffability.
c) There is a profound joy, peace, and a sense of rejoicing and there is a lasting effect on thinking and attitude, although sometimes the experience is transient.
About the ritual use of ganja (cannabis) by the Rastafarians, I quote the following:
Contrary to popular belief, pious Rastas do not smoke marijuana recreationally, and some (the canonical Ethiopian Orthodox and also the followers of certain classical Elders) do not use it at all. Most Rastafarian teachers, however, have advocated the controlled ritual smoking of "wisdomweed" both privately as an aid to meditation and communally from "chalice" pipes as an "incense pleasing to the Lord". The argument is that ganja is the "green herb" of the King James Bible and that its use is a kind of shortcut version of traditional ascetical practice.
5. Are you familiar with the Church of the Universe tenets?
I know a few Church members, but my knowledge of the Church’s beliefs derives from their publications. They are a syncretistic religion, founded in 1969, encompassing the scriptures of various groups, not necessarily Christian. Some of their members are well versed in such writings. They espouse personal freedom, which they express through nudity. They tend toward Gnosticism (which means knowledge though direct encounter or experience with the divine, without any specific anthropomorphized persona). They claim to be restoring the cannabis ritual of ancient Judaism. Although the organization is egalitarian, the members sometimes assume titles of a traditional ecclesiastical hierarchy. Their main goal is to cause no harm, and request the same from others. Although the Rastafarians have a cannabis sacrament, they are not allied with that Church.
6. Is there merit to the claims by Church of the Universe practitioners that cannabis is referred to in the bible and may have been used by Jesus Christ?
Cannabis is called kaneh bosem in Hebrew, which is now recognized as the Scythian word that Herodotus wrote as kannabis (or cannabis). The translators of the bible translate this usually as ‘fragrant cane,’ i.e., an aromatic grass. Once the word is correctly translated, the use of cannabis in the bible is clear. Large amounts of it were compounded into the ointment for the ordination of the priest. This ointment was also used to anoint the holy vessels in the Inner Sanctum or Tabernacle (‘tent’). It was also used to fumigate the holy enclosed space. The ointment (absorbed through the skin) and the fragrance of the vessels (both absorbed by handling and inhaled as perfume) and the smoke of the incense in the confined space would have been a very effective means of administering the psychoactive properties of the plant. Since it was only the High Priest who entered the Tabernacle, it was an experience reserved for him, although as the chrism of priestly ordination it was probably also something experienced in a different way by the whole priesthood. This same psychoactive chrism was later used for the coronation of the kings.
The democratized use of a psychoactive sacrament, however, is the magical food called manna. When one ate it, one’s eyes were opened and one saw God. Moses was said to have sustained his people on this magical food for their long sojourn in the desert. Various candidates for it have been proposed, and the most likely identity is something like LSD, derived from ergot, a common fungus on grains.
Jesus was probably trained as an Essene before the years of his proselytizing. The Essenes were known as healers and had extensive knowledge of drug plants. It is highly likely that Jesus experienced psychoactive sacraments. Since healing medicines were commonly compounded as oils, it is quite probable that the healing performed by Jesus involved administering the traditional Essene herbal pharmaceuticals, which would have, and in fact did on the basis of archaeological remains, included cannabis. One must remember also that the gospel account of his ministry is partly mythologized and certainly reworked from earlier documents. Healings recorded as miracles may well have involved skills of a physician.
Additionally, Jesus was called the ‘Christ,’ which means that he was ‘anointed.’ The chrism of his anointment would have been the one described above for the Jewish ordination, which is to say, Jesus would have to have experienced the effect of cannabis. The biblical account of this chrismation is the encounter with John the Baptist at the River Jordan. It is the effective cause of the ensuing vision of the opened heavens, which can only be termed a mystical experience. The bible also seems to state that Jesus did not abide by the traditional reservation of this ointment for the priests and the elite, but that he shared it with the commonality of his followers.
You have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know the truth. The anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things, as that anointing is real, not counterfeit—just as it has taught you, remain in him. —I John 2:27.
It is the common Gnostic pattern that the experience of the psychoactive sacrament confers Knowledge.
As for the use of psychoactive sacraments by the early converts to Christianity, there were various forms of the communal meal or Eucharist, and archaeological evidence indicates that at least some of the meeting halls were intended for rituals of chemically altered consciousness. As Christians or followers of the Anointed One, the chrism prescribed in the bible would be an obvious choice, although other ‘drugs’ borrowed from other competing religions would also be involved.
7. Do you agree with the following: When people migrate to a new country they bring their belief systems. Sometimes, initially, there is conflict between their belief systems and the prevailing culture/belief system in the new country. But over time, it is not uncommon for elements of the migrant’s belief systems to be poached by new belief systems in the new country.
It is common for new religions to assimilate traditions from the religions they supplant. They often in previous times did this by building their new places of worship in the same place as the former, even using remnants of the previous structures in their new temple.
Thus, above the desecrated sanctuary of Eleusis sits the little Christian chapel where the Blessed Virgin is worshipped as the Panaghia Mesoporitisa, the ‘Holy Lady who resides within the seed of grain.’ It is a common epithet elsewhere throughout Greece, perpetuated with little thought of the more ancient Goddess it perpetuates. In Athens, the Byzantine church that stands beside the looming modern cathedral was constructed from stones purloined from ancient temples and the Panaghia here, as elsewhere, bears the title of Gorgoepikoös, not the ‘All-hearing Lady,’ as it is claimed, but the ancient ‘Gorgon Queen, who harkens to our prayers.’ In some places, an actual Gorgon head is found buried beneath the Christian altar. Similarly, throughout the British Isles, the old Celtic goddess known as Sheila-na-gig as the entrance into sacred space was used as an ornament above the doorways of Christian churches.
1965 Ph.D. Harvard University
1959 M.A. University of Michigan
1955 B.A. Yale University
Books
Mushrooms, Myth and Mithras: The Drug Cult that Civilized Europe (with Mark Alwin Hoffman and Jose Alfredo Gonzalez Celdran). San Fransisco, CA: City Lights Books, 2008.
The Road to Eleusis: Unveiling the Secret of the Mysteries (with R. Gordon Wasson, Albert Hofmann, B.D. Staples, and Peter Webster). Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 2008.
Publications (selected)
"Daturas and the Virgin" (with José Alfredo González Celdrán), Entheos: Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, vol. 1, no. 2, 2001 (Winter), 49-74.
"The Miskwedo of the Ahnisinaubeg," (CAPR editor, unpublished manuscript of R. Gordon Wasson, Harvard Botanical Archives), Entheos: Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, vol. 1, no. 2, (Winter) 2001, 3-12.
"The Entheogenci Eucharist of Mithras," (with Mark Hoffman and B.D. Staple), Entheos: Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, vol. 2, no. 1, (Summer), 2002. Website gallery of additional images cued to the text at
www.entheomedia.com/mitras1."De rebus Mithraicis POSTSCRIPTM," (translated by CAPR from the Spanish of José Alfredo González), Entheos: Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, vol. 2, no.1, (Summer), 2002. Website gallery of additional images cued to the text at
www.entheomedia.com/postscriptum."An Entheobotanical Interpretation of Two Paintings by J.M. Turner," (translated by CAPR from the French of Vincent Wattiaux), Entheos: Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, vol. 2, no. 1, (Summer), 2002. Website gallery of additional images cued to the text at
www.entheomedia.com/turner1."Ad Turneriana ADDENDUM," (with Mark Hoffman), Entheos: Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, vol. 2, no. 1 (Summer), 2002. Website gallery of additional images cued to the text at
www.entheomedia.com/addendum1.The List of Victors in Comedy at the Dionysia (Leiden 1967).
Pindar: Selected Odes (Michigan 1967).
The Road to Eleusis: Unveiling the Secret of the Mysteries (Harcourt Brace 1978; Hermes 1998).
Persephone's Quest: Entheogens and the Origins of Religion (Yale 1988).
Ancient Greek: A New Approach (MIT 1968, 1972; 2nd rev. ed. 1979).
Latin: A Concise Structural Course (UPA 1987).
The World of Classical Myth: Gods and Goddesses, Heroines and Heroes (Carolina Academic Press 1994).
Intensive Latin: First Year and Review (Carolina Academic Press 1997), with computer tutorial Vade Mecum.
The Apples of Apollo: Pagan and Christian Mysteries of the Eucharist, with C. Heinrich and B.D. Staples (Durham 2000).
....and there is more where that came from.
PS - Neil knows he was an assistant, that is why he gets 2% authors share and I get 8% , thanks for thinking of him though. Its nice to know you want him to get credit for his excellent ground-breaking historical work about the Biblical references to cannabis, your support does not go un-noted, and we can be sure history well remember him for his part in bringing the light of the Biblical cannabis references to humanity through solid, University level, research.
All the Best
-ficance outside of symbolic use, and obedience to God by the Hebrews in preparing the anointing oil set aside for commissioning Kings and priests.
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