The First Supper: Entheogens and the Origin of Religion
Source: realitysandwich.com
[...]Generally speaking, however, the study of entheogens is a comparatively recent phenomenon, as is their recognition as a formative influence on the shaping of both shamanic and so-called developed cultures. It is now widely accepted among specialists that entheogens and the ethnopharmacology of their plant sources represent one of the most direct, powerful, reliable, and indeed ancient means of inducing "authentic" shamanic states of consciousness. Entheogens may, in fact, be the most reliable way of inducing a profound and sustained alteration of consciousness commonly associated with ecstatic, shamanic states. Hence they are at the heart of such dependable and repeatable ceremonies as initiation rituals and other religious Mysteries.
When entheogens are taken in the context of a society’s sacred shamanic ceremonies, the culture’s mythopoetic traditions are often relived and reinfused with profound immediacy and power, heightening their spiritual sense of connection.
Entheogenic epiphany is commonly described as a state in which people experience their individual distinctions dissolve in a mystical, consubstantial communion with a force of profound sacred meaning. This ecstatic experience is interpreted as a pure and primal consciousness and sometimes described as the direct contact with the unobscured root of being. Since shamanic spirituality is inherently practical, it ascribes the highest importance to the regular access to such transcendental states; this point of contact ensures the undisturbed continuation of natural cycles and helps perpetually maintain a society’s underlying sense of centeredness, equilibrium, and balance. From a shamanic perspective, ecstatic contact also protects against the potential dangers of unappeased or neglected gods or spirits. The entheogenic experience, though entirely strange, dissimilar, and inexplicable in mundane language, is often described as feeling more real and vibrant than ordinary consciousness.
Some of the plants used for shamanic rituals have yielded important medicines, for shamans are traditional healers, often called "wise ones." Other substances open up pathways to otherwise unseen worlds, with the spirit of the plant as guide to repair the invisible imbalance that is the cause of disease and plague. The word medicine has cognates in all the Indo-European languages and is related to meditate and middle, implying the doctor’s original role as an entranced mediator.
Most probably derived from the Middle Dutch term droge vate ("dry vat"), the plants and substances employed were eventually called "drogues" in Middle English because they were usually dry when found in the apothecaries, which were also shops for poisons. The word was applied to narcotics and opiates toward the end of the nineteenth century. This has given "drug" an unfortunate pejorative connotation that dominant religious groups often use to describe substances used by other spiritual communities. Similarly pejorative is the reference to entheogenic experience as "hallucinatory," which once meant "dreamlike wandering," but it has come to imply delusion and disconnection from reality rather than a heightened access to it.
Fossils show that approximately 1.5 million years ago, a sudden and scientifically baffling development in the proto-human neocortex emerged. It has been speculated that the explosion in brain size, the prerequisite for the evolution of modern humans, occurred when our hominid ancestors began to intentionally and regularly consume consciousness-altering foods. Such an important adaptive aid would have been well suited to our "trickster" disposition for creative thinking. Thus, in keeping with the myths of old, we suggest that perhaps our species did indeed first become truly human when we first ate of those sacred Eucharistic foods-initially by individuals, and then ritualistically in groups, in what can be seen as First Suppers.
Early humanity has left compelling testimonies of its entheogenic traditions in the archaeological record. In the Shanidar cave in Iraq, there is evidence that approximately 60,000 years ago Neanderthal culture had specialized knowledge of medicinal plants and incorporated them in the burial of an apparent shaman leader.
Today shamanism is recognized as the primal and universal belief system reaching back to deepest antiquity, a practice that survives intact in many cultures around the world. Its influence on the historical emergence of Western civilization, however, has been all but ignored.
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Read the full article at: realitysandwich.com
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