The Egodeath theory

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Contents:

• Reasons Why the Maximal Psilocybe Theory of Greek & Christian Mixed-Wine Banqueting Tradition

• Quadrants Diagram: {king steering in tree} -> {wine} -> {snake frozen in rock}

• Psilocybe Is the Ideal Entheogen for the Banqueting Tradition

• Key Questions for Any Entheogen Scholar, and My Answers
  • What was “Mixed-Wine”, “Holy Bread”, “Ambrosia”, “Nectar”, and “Kykeon”, Throughout the Ancient Banqueting Tradition (Greek & Christian)?
  • Did mystic-state religious experiences happen, in the history of religion?
  • Were many of the mystic-state religious experiences induced by mushrooms (in terms of numbers and percentage)?
  • If they weren’t induced by mushrooms, then how did they come about?
  • Are religious myths metaphorical descriptions of the mystic altered state?

• Evidence Type: Stylized Description, in Texts

• Lyrics – Little Dolls (Bob Daisley)

• Does Dionysus Have a Doll/Puppet, as the Egodeath theory Predicts?

• Golden Apples of Immortality in the Garden of the Hesperides Guarded by a Serpent-Dragon Monster of Looking

• Mythemes: Trapped in the Underworld for Eternity, Can’t Come Back

Reasons Why the Maximal Psilocybe Theory of Greek & Christian Mixed-Wine Banqueting Tradition

No one has looked for mushrooms in texts or art yet. The best lens is the Egodeath theory. Various types of evidence have been forthcoming.

It’s a necessary piece of the puzzle to make everything fit together.

Entheogen scholarship is only one of many fields I repair and incorporate together.

Mushrooms are a mainstay in Christianity & myth.

The meta-theory best incorporates the maximal mushroom theory, modelled on Psilocybe. I’m willing to sacrifice historical certainty, to construct a simple, clear-cut model, based on the relatively well-known and well-evidenced mushroom as the eucharist — not the speculative and counter-indicated cannabis.

Psilocybe is the most optimal entheogen to reproduce the depicted effects.

Were I initiator, Psilocybe is the most desirable to produce the sought effects.

All indicators are, Psilocybe is the normal reference Christian entheogen.

Not cannabis, scopolamine, opium, or ergot.

Text and art and myth indicates Psilocybe form & effects — not cannabis etc.

Psilocybe mushrooms are the most ergonomic, the most focused in their entheogenic effect.

Mushrooms were manifestly the preferred entheogen.

Mushrooms are the norm for Christian art.

Psilocybe = Cubensis; Liberty Caps; & Amanita representing Psilocybe.

Psilocybe is a primary entheogen.

Psilocybe is definitive of psychedelic effects.

Psilocybe is short-lasting; lends well to redosing.

Psilocybe is reliable.

Psilocybe is ergonomic.

Psilocybe is flexible. Eat raw, eat dried, mix into buns marked X which obv refers to celestial 23-degree cross of Heimarmene-transcendence; like Mithraism, be busted out of heimarmene-prison — at the cost of:

• Your childhood kingthink.
• The simple autonomous egoic locus of control.
• The false, illusory egoic foundation and source of control.
• A false-primary control source.
• {evil king}
• {usurper of throne of the true king}

Psilocybe is safe biologically; non-toxic.

Psilocybe gives classic entheogen effects.

Psilocybe is flexible for dosage mixing into bread or wine.

Psilocybe is depicted in countless Christian art works, and we’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg, in my Christian mushroom gallery, because people have been brainwashed into closing their eyes and not looking for mushrooms; clear-thinking people ought to open their eyes and be actively looking for mushrooms.

There is no shortage of evidence; it is easy to find and photograph and upload many more instances of mushtoomrs in Christian art.

We haven’t even gotten started rounding up Pope Wasson’s crews’ censored collection of the alleged “hundreds of instances” they’ve been censorting to withhold as Pope Wasson censored Brinckmann.

[todo: quote the Vatican-Puppet Art Expert Panofsky.

1. Pope Brinckmann
2. Pope Panofsky
3. Pope Wasson
4. Jester Letcher
5. Jester Hatsis

The Expert Popes of Proclamation and their Court Jesters agree:

For you people, there are no mushrooms in Christian art.
— and that’s Ex Cathedra, dammit!

There is a glut of evidence; images of literal mushrooms, stylized msurhooms, and depictions of effects.

There is no cannabis depicted in Christian art, but tons of mushrooms.

Mushrooms are commonplace in Greek & Christian art.

Church Fathers write about the Eucharist in psychedelic ways, fitting the mind’s built-in, innate, psychedelics response; transformation caused by ingesting the flesh of the gods.

I only treat “mushrooms in Christian art” as one part of a much more widely scoped, entire explanatory framework, that includes:

• The Egodeath theory, which has two parts:
  • The Cybernetic theory; the Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence (psychedelic eternalism)
  • The Mytheme theory (the “analogical psychedelic eternalism (pre-existence)” theory of religious myth).
• Decoding Rock lyrics as description of the intense mystic altered state.
• The maximal entheogen theory of religion and culture.
• The maximal mushroom theory of Christianity.

It is *not* the case that my views on mushrooms in Christian art is an isolated theory, that I arrived at in isolation.

I came to the field of entheogen scholarship and mythology in 1998, bringing to it, an already fully formed theory, Core theory, the Cybernetic theory, psychedelic eternalism; loose cognitive association binding.

How the mind changes and transcends egoic thinking, in the loosecog state.

I merely had to realize, see, and confirm, by reading World Mythology, and by playing “spot the entheogen”, that mythology confirms my core theory’s eternalism (eg snake = worldline, rock = block universe, king in tree = ego steering), and also that mythology corroborates the “loosecog” aspect of my core theory, that is, mushrooms are shown in myth.

I was NOT merely playing “spot the mushroom” as an isolated game/activity, like the emphasis in the field of entheogen scholarship.

I was as interested in finding correlation/corroboration for non-psychedelics aspects of my Core theory, in myth.

Not that surprisingly, my entire set of views (including the maximal mushroom theory of Christianity) had a clear match with:

• The entire set of views depicted in world religious mythology (including Greek & Christian religious myth).
• The whole integrated coherent set of views held by Freke & Gandy (Freke’s sprirituality book’s section on no-free-will); their book on Jesus’ ahistoricity; (Freke’s spriituality book’s section on entheogens).
• Valentinian Gnostics as described by Ealine Pagels, extreacted/summarized by me around 2002.

I got that confirmation, including of mushrooms in normal mainstream Christianity, around 2002.

History of the Egodeath theory & specifically of the Mytheme theory, which includes the maximal mushroom theory of Christianity:

1988: I discovered the Core theory; the Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence. I started trying to write an adequate, compelling, non-arbitrary, non-random article about the technical, scientific, modern, directly described Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence.

1997: I published Core theory outline-spec, as a fallback, since it was hard to write a good, appropriate article about the Core theory; the Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence.

1998: I started working on Mystery Religions & mythology.

1999: I read Clark Heinrich’s book Strange Fruit (1995). I read all the entheogen scholarship books.

Clark Heinrich, Carl Ruck, and Mark Hoffman connected mythology & mushrooms.

2001-2002: I posted announcements that mythology corroborates my Core theory (the Cybernetic theory; the Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence). I posted announcements proposing & introducing the maximal entheogen theory of religion and culture.

2006: I finally wrote a proper (excellent, worthy, readable, appealing) article about the Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence, as I had intended since discovering the Core theory in January 1988 — but, now, including the Mytheme theory:

Religious mythology is description-by-analogy of repeatedly taking psychedelics, producing transformation of the experiential mental worldmodel from literalist ordinary-state possibility-branching to analogical psychedelic pre-existence.

It’s as if, to accomplish my 1988 goal of writing an adequate, compelling, non-arbitrary, non-random article about the technical, scientific, modern, directly described Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence, I had to add colorful, descriptive Mytheme decoding, per the Mytheme theory.

2010-2013: Further intensive work on decoding mythemes, including in Western Esotericism & Mystery-Religions; decoding “scenes” eg Tauroctony & Western Esotericism diagrammatic images.

Quadrants Diagram: {king steering in tree} -> {wine} -> {snake frozen in rock}

Branching, rock; quadrants for my book cover art diagram to express something like:

• Upper left: egoic agent
• Lower left: branching world in the ordinary state of consciousness.
• Upper right: transcendent agent
• Lower right: non-branching, monopossibility, block universe frozen rock world.

find “quadrant” in the Egodeath Yahoo Group digests. found it! easy!

https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/12/13/egodeath-yahoo-group-digest-124/#message6344 — excerpt from my December 2, 2013 post:

Must-read posts; or, important powerful useful touchstone ideas I’ve kept appreciating:

Idea/post 1.

My description of a 4-quadrant diagram, ~Feb. 2013 posting:

We change from a mental model of

[upper left:] Autonomy (King) steering in a

[lower left:] possibility-branching tree (Tree; bush; reinforced by motif of Antlers behind & plant-branch in front of Eve’s branching legs — a phallus in contrast is non-branching, snake-shaped; worldline-isomorphic.)

to a mental model of

[upper right] puppet/slave

caught motionlessly in

[lower right] a worldline-tube (of subjective experiences including control-intention thoughts) frozen into the changeless rock universe (Eternalism; Rock motif, snake/serpent/worm)

/ end of excerpt from post-breakthough post, December 2, 2013 posting

Psilocybe Is the Ideal Entheogen for the Banqueting Tradition

The words ‘Gnosticism’ and ‘Esotericism’ mean entheogen, especially Psilocybe, causing transformation from possibilism to eternalism from literalist ordinary-state possibilism to analogical psychedelic eternalism.

That transformation didn’t originate from Cannabis, Opium, Scopolamine, or Amanita; that primary original source of transformation from possibilism to eternalism came from skilled use of Psilocybin such as in cultivated banqueting parties with re-dose rounds of Psilocybe mixed-wine.

The main typifying archetypal correct original definition of ‘Gnosticism‘ and ‘Esotericism‘ and Mystery Religions, is the use of Psilocybe to cause transformation from possibilism to eternalism; from literalist ordinary-state possibilism to analogical psychedelic eternalism.

the branching-possibilities mental worldmodel of time and control

the frozen block universe pre-existing control thoughts, {snake frozen in rock} worldline; a puppet rail of pseudo freewill based the personal control system, steering so as to create the future from a range of possibilities. From {king steering in a tree}, to {snake-puppet frozen in rock}. Dionysus doll toys top I need a puppet mytheme dammit! The Little Doll Is You yeah, no where to run (Major-scale upbeat light-hearted uplifting music mood) inappropriate affect

lyrics here for Dionysian scholarly study Symposium with the horses bouncers for those rowdy academics at the Symposium Conference party but they were tied to the rock benches by snakes and when Herakles pulled them he could only… sigh don’t type, just quote my article.

ok I wrote about virgin maiden Kore turning into Queen Persephone Queen Ruler of the Underworld Married to Hades the King of the Underworld who abducts virgin maidens and transforms their thinking about the uncontrollable source of control-thoughts so they are no longer virgins but have gotten impregnated with the new replacement model of life, local agency exposed and tripped-up and disproved, by an overpowering message that is sent by the Creator of control-thoughts.

The uncontrollable source of control-thoughts made the virgin vanish in power and the mind transformed into the adult mental worldmodel, the Eternalism mental worldmodel of the mental worldmodel of time, self, possibility, and control — pre-existence of personal control-thoughts from possibility-branching to the pre-existing block universe.

winnow thresher and Queen of the Underworld, wife of King Hades

Key Questions for Any Entheogen Scholar, and My Answers

A key, differentiating set of questions to separate the esoteric men from the exoteric boys:

What was “Mixed-Wine”, “Holy Bread”, “Ambrosia”, “Nectar”, and “Kykeon”, Throughout the Ancient Banqueting Tradition (Greek & Christian)?

Psilocybe.

Did mystic-state religious experiences happen, in the history of religion?

yes

Were many of the mystic-state religious experiences induced by mushrooms (in terms of numbers and percentage)?

yes, large, 100%

All of the mystic-state religious experiences were induced by entheogens, typically Psilocybin mushrooms.

If they weren’t induced by mushrooms, then how did they come about?

n/a

All mystic-state religious experiences were induced by entheogens, typically Psilocybin mushrooms.

Are religious myths metaphorical descriptions of the mystic altered state?

yes

The primary referent of myth is:

things that are observed and experienced in the entheogen-induced, loose-cognitive, altered state;

particularly, centered around the climactic peak-state transformation of the mental worldmodel from possibilism to eternalism.

Evidence Type: Stylized Description, in Texts

I read just enough of the Church Fathers to confirm, as the Theory predicts, they talk about bread and wine entheogenically, in a way which is most ideally fulfilled by Psilocybe.

As the “History of Esotericism” portion of the Egodeath theory predicts.

Lyrics – Little Dolls (Bob Daisley)

Ozzy Osbourne – Selected lyrics for Dionysian scholarly study

He’ll show you no mercy
Your image in his hands
It’s useless to try
Escaping his curses

Tortured and flaming
You give birth to hell
Living a nightmare
It’s a pity
You’ll pray for your death

No where to run
Your fate is in his hands
Your time has come
You’ll live to his command
I’m warning you
The worst is yet to come
The killer who
Remains a mystery

I that believe in the stories of old
Would never fight it
Demons and curses that play on our soul
Like something ignited

You never imagined such a fate could follow you
You never thought it was true
And when it’s your time
I wonder how you’ll do
Your kind of trouble’s
Running deeper than the sea
But whatcha gonna do about it?
You broke the rule
You’ve been a fool
The little doll is you, yeah!

Wrything and screaming
He’ll show you no mercy
Your image in his hands
It’s useless to try
Escaping his curses

Companion song:
The Twilight Zone, by Rush
http://www.egodeath.com/rushlyrics.htm#xtocid22939

Does Dionysus Have a Doll/Puppet, as the Egodeath theory Predicts?

Article:
THE TOYS OF DIÓNYSOS
Site:
HellenicGods.org
https://sites.google.com/a/hellenicgods.org/www/the-toys-of-dionysos

[9:16 p.m. December 17, 2020] Decoding, I have the feeling of something tugging on the line, I have a catch: ‘knucklebones’ = ‘jointed doll’ – of bones? then from there, read about …

I need to read more myths and myth references, such as following links in Wikipedia Greek Myth entries, which pays off richly.

My lookups always turn up interesting fruit full connections on something or other.

Golden Apples of Immortality in the Garden of the Hesperides Guarded by a Serpent-Dragon Monster of Looking

{golden apples guarded by the serpent dragon fire monster blasting too much light, too much perception, it breaks and bursts and flips the {childhood} {perishable} temporary mental worldmodel of mind into its adult configuration, resulting in {IMMORTALITY, becoming IMPERISHABLE};

changing from the DIE-ABLE state to the NON-DIE-ABLE state} including from literalism to analogical thinking; immortality meant esoteric mystic sense, not literal sense.

Recognized consciously as being embedded in the block universe, powerless to change, only able to manifest the future and worldline of now’s, early ones filled with mental images of possibilism, the mental world shaped as a king steering in a tree; transformation of the mental world model from model of agent-in-world, from a:

{king steering in a tree, wine transforms, snake frozen in rock}

In one tauroctony, or rather a banqueting scene, is shown a snake basket – helpful for solution!!

cista mystica; a lid-lifted snake-basket: the torch man brings a horn of wine to king sol at banquet with Mithras representative of god Lion outside the orbs of the cosmos in Emperium with God Creator,

Cautes and Cautopates – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cautes_and_Cautopates

About the apple like Eden, Hesperides garden apple fruit of the tree and snake is IMMORTALITY, live forever — MORE PROOF OF DECODING PARALLELS IS THE WAY TO GO… TWO BOTH Christian GREEK – ADD TO list of independent co-proving systems: break out “religious mythsm” into two sources of cross-proof/support:

Why don’t scholars treat these together? Why does a book either talk about Hesperides’ golden apple snake guarded, and the Eden alt config of same. Lest they eat of the golden apple and live forever it grants IMMORTALITY the golden apple (good match for choosing to depict Amanita rather than Cubensis or Liberty Caps, tho Eve has both. that is (obv Amanita strong candidate for artistic rep’n)

Greek myth; hellenistic, “pagan”, Ancient Mediterranean

Christian myth; Christendom

Historians need to take my lessons on the Mythemese language required to be fluent at .

Get better at reading texts by learning Mythemese, as Cyberdisciple demonstrates.

Religious mythology is description-by-analogy of repeatedly taking psychedelics, producing transformation of the experiential mental worldmodel from literalist ordinary-state possibility-branching to analogical psychedelic pre-existence.

Mythemes: Trapped in the Underworld for Eternity, Can’t Come Back

so if you can please understand
you might not come back

You, the personal egoic control agent, are not supposed to come back as Kore the virgin maiden, but as Queen Persephone who has known God thorugh seeing his will inside her, making her childhood thinking die, disproved, as a passive reflection, a projected mask-image depicting a substantial locus-of-control, but the false king is mocked in his caught in the tree. [8:55 pm Dec 16 2020] check if they are mocking the king in the tree.

Alchemy Woodcuts, Western Esotericism Mytheme Images
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/12/11/alchemy-woodcuts-western-esotericism-mytheme-images/

THEORY CONFIRMED BY EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE RESULTS, AGAIN.

• There is a fool/dunce head at bottom of tree.
• Woman on left is alarmed, apprehending the fool/dunce at the base of the tree.
• Woman on right is wagging finger smiling at king caught up in his tree.

Article:
The Entheogen Theory of Religion and Ego Death
Section:
The Physical Fastening of All Thoughts and Actions
http://www.egodeath.com/EntheogenTheoryOfReligion.htm#_Toc177337625 —

“King Hades imprisoned Persephone’s would-be suitors (and abductors) by fusing them to a magical bench and binding them to it with snakes while bringing them ‘mixed wine’.

It was possible for Heracles to free the divine hero Theseus, but Heracles had to leave king Pirithous behind, fused into the banqueting bench in Hades for eternity, because the whole world shook when Heracles pulled him.

This myth describes the dissociative-state sensation of physical embeddedness in the timeless block-universe, followed by abandoning the former pseudo-sovereign model of one’s personal control agency.” – mh2006

Going to abduct and marry Persephone, Queen of the Underworld, wife of Hades, King of the Underworld.

At banquet with King Hades on a magical rock bench, the snakes bring mixed wine Psilocybe wine.

Body is bound to the magical stone bench by snakes.

Hero Theseus was freed from the Heimarmene Trap, but the false king Pirithous had to be left in Hades for eternity, because when Heracles tried to pull king Pirithous, the whole world of rock shock, everyone fastened embedded in the rock world, all those types of false king egos.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirithous

“Pirithous was set to marry Hippodamia, their offspring being Polypoetes. The centaurs were guests at the party, but they got drunk and tried to abduct the women, including Hippodamia who was carried off by the intoxicated centaur Eurytion or Eurytus.

“The Lapiths won the ensuing battle, the Centauromachy, a favorite motif of Greek art.

___

“Pirithous and Theseus pledged to carry off daughters of Zeus; Theseus chose Helen of Sparta and together they kidnapped her when she was 13 years of age and decided to hold on to her until she was old enough to marry.

“Pirithous chose a more dangerous prize: Persephone herself. They … traveled to the underworld. When they stopped to rest, they found themselves unable to stand up from the rock as they saw the Furies appear before them.”

Mytheme: {rescue}

“Heracles freed Theseus from the stone, but the earth shook when he attempted to free Pirithous. He had committed too great a crime for wanting the wife of one of the great gods as his own bride. …

“The rescue of Theseus and Pirithous …in Attic comedy:

“Heracles attempted to free them from the rock to which they had been bound [by snakes, at banquet – this article is mystically weak, told by outsider] in the Underworld (for having tried to carry off Persephone). He succeeded in freeing only Theseus and left behind his buttocks attached to the rocks.”

attempted to free them from the rock to which they had been bound … succeeded in freeing only __, and left behind __, attached to the rocks.

“Due to this, Theseus came to be called hypolispos, meaning “with hinder parts rubbed smooth.”

“Pirithous was worshiped at Athens, along with Theseus, as a hero.”

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Contents:

• 3 Corroborating Domains: the Cybernetic Theory; Rock Lyrics; Religious Mythology
• Shock Wave (Black Sabbath)
• No One at the Bridge (Rush)

3 Corroborating Domains: the Cybernetic Theory; Rock Lyrics; Religious Mythology

Acid-inspired Rock lyrics corroborate:

• The Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence (psychedelic eternalism).
• The Mytheme theory (the “analogical psychedelic eternalism/pre-existence” theory of religious mythology).
• The Entheogen Theory of Religious Mythology, including mushrooms in Christian art.

History of the Egodeath Theory

1985-1997 – Core theory; the Cybernetic theory

• Heyday of lyrics decoding.
• Relatively little myth-decoding activity.
  • ~1986, started decoding “eaten scrolls” in Revelation.
  • ~1987, read book Up from Eden by Wilber. Has a poor attempt to use mythology (no psychedelic eternalism).
  • ~1995, read Gnosis magazine set, ~1995 (to the final issue around 1999).

1988-1994 – early decoding of lyrics

1998-2006-2013-2020 – Mytheme decoding in religious mythology

Shock Wave (Black Sabbath)

Key Words in Black Sabbath – Shock Wave Lyrics

for non-commercial use; scholarly analysis of mystic sh!t

can’t escape fate
chosen
rising in sky
you’re going to die

Drink blood brew
cheat this master
You’re on your own
going through

has taken over your mind
you think you’re on your own
Don’t believe you are the only one here
Look around, you’re not alone — god controller phallus injecting control thoughts

Feel the forces from another world
Ghostly shadows fill your mind
power over you
freeze, your life in time
Look behind you

Somebody’s calling
Someone is near
there is nothing you can do

Ghostly shadows from the other world
forces in your mind — god controller phallus injecting control thoughts
Trapped between the worlds of life and death
Frozen in the realms of time — eternalism
Look behind you

You feel yourself falling, you’re at the end of the line
Your body is crawling — crawling on floor to get low to avoid having the high view of the personal control system , to try to avoid seeing control-loss vortex
running through your brain

copied the above from
Record of Discovery: mythemes {Saturn, virgin, phallus, speared, 2 goddesses, epiphany, many more}
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/12/07/record-of-discovery-mythemes-saturn-virgin-phallus-speared-2-goddesses-epiphany-many-more/

No One at the Bridge (Rush)

Before I cracked the code, decoding religious mythology elements successfully (which gained traction around 2002), my warm-up exercise (which gained traction around 1991-1992) was to explain acid-rock lyrics that describe altered-state experiencing.

These are extremely relevant, highly descriptive poetic lyrics, which describe the peak experiencing of the altered state, by use of analogies.  This is the song “No One at the Bridge”, lyrics by Neil Peart.

Lyrics are shown here for academic analysis and commentary.

“The sky is pitching violently [perceptual distortion in the altered state: visual undulation]
Drawn by shrieking winds [the egoic control system doesn’t propel its thoughts, in the altered state; thoughts are driven forward by mystic {wind} without egoic control]
Seaspray blurs my vision [perceptual distortion in the altered state: blurring of vision]
The waves roll by so fast [perceptual distortion in the altered state: visual undulation]
Save my ship of freedom [the experience of freewill-premised control power vanishes, but is desperately needed, as control increasingly seizes and is cancelled in the loss of the experience of having personal control; a “deus ex machina”, artificial transcendent rescue from outside the entire egoic control system and alien to it, is required]
I’m lashed helpless to the mast [the altered-state experience of non-control; suspension of the familiar experience of wielding control-power; an allusion to the myth of Ulysses]

Remembering when first I held [when first discovered the altered state]
The wheel in my own hands [the illusion of egoic control power, supported in the ordinary state but not in the altered state]
I took the helm so eagerly [naively expected to be able to control the experience]
And sailed for distant lands
But now the sea’s too heavy
And I just… I just don’t understand
Why must my crew desert me? [vanishing of the accustomed experience & perspective of being a control agent wielding personal control power]
When I need… I need a guiding hand… [the power of the egoic control hand vanishes]

Call out for direction
And there’s no one there to steer [the egoic control agent illusion vanishes in the altered state]
Shout out for salvation [a good time-tested idea; to rescue viable control and return control-stability, the mind has to learn to consciously place trust its own uncontrollable source of control thoughts, which was secretly always the case anyway]
But there’s no one there to hear [not that God doesn’t respond to prayer; the meaning here is “there’s no egoic control agent here”]
Cry out supplication [pleading, begging for control-stability earnestly & humbly]
For the maelstrom is near [cybernetic control seizure and nullity, cancellation]
Scream out desperation [continuing to rely on the premise or presumption of egoic control power, is futile and leads to increasing panic and seizure and instability until changing the mental worldmodel from Possibilism to Eternalism per Mystery Religion initiation]But no one cares to hear [not that there’s no God or rescuer; that would contradict all mystic tradition and experience; the emphasis here has to be on “no one”; no egoic control agent.  The survival-protecting sense of caring and values and self-preservation is suspended and transcended, in the altered state] 

— song No One at the Bridge, album Caress of Steel, Rush / Neil Peart, 1975

My Version 1 analysis, at the Egodeath site:
http://www.egodeath.com/rushlyrics.htm#xtocid22921

copied the above section from
About the Egodeath Theory, Including the Cybernetic Theory & the Mytheme Theory
Subsection:
No One at the Bridge – Acid-Rock Lyrics Decoded
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/11/29/about-the-egodeath-theory-the-cybernetic-theory-the-mytheme-theory/#noatba

_{Site Map}

Contents:

quick links, might only work on desktop Edge/Chrome:

• Book review: The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy (Hatsis)
• Update: Found Table of Contents of Hatsis’ Forthcoming Book
• Book Link
• My Book Review (December 16, 2020)
• Cyberdisciple’s Critique Showing Allegro’s Book Is Irrelevant to Entheogen Scholarship
• Andy Letcher’s Book, Shroom
• My Review of Hatsis’ Recent 2022 Book, Continued
• Hatsis Cancelled His Book “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy”
• See Also

Update: Found Table of Contents of Hatsis’ Forthcoming Book

“My attack article at Graham Hancock’s site went so well, I decided to just use the same outline for my book. – Thomas Hatsis”

• Chapter 1: My Exemplary Historiographical Methodology
• Chapter 2: Plaincourault
• Chapter 3: Plaincourault
• Chapter 4: Plaincourault
• Chapter 5: Plaincourault
• Chapter 6: Plaincourault
• Chapter 7: Plaincourault
• Chapter 8: Plaincourault
• Chapter 9: Plaincourault
• Chapter 10: Plaincourault
• Chapter 11: Plaincourault
• Chapter 11: Reading Allegro Again: Why Allegro’s Book Is One of My Top-10 Favorites
• Chapter 12: Conclusion: My Exemplary Historiographical Methodology

Book Link

The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy
Thomas Hatsis, 2022
http://amzn.com/B08KQMY3J9
Park Street Press

Evidence that Hatsis had that book ID & title:

Search “Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” Hatsis book
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Sacred+Mushroom+Conspiracy%22+Hatsis+book
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LVmXZXdU5Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G7yiTwLr6o –

“Hatsis is the author of “The Witches Ointment,” “Psychedelic Mystery … 2021) and “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” (spring, 2022).“

“Microdosing Magic,” and the forthcoming books “LSD The Wonderchild” (summer, 2021) and “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” (spring, 2022).

Search Hatsis’ publisher for “Hatsis”: https://www.innertraditions.com/search/hatsis

My Book Review (December 16, 2020)

Right out the gate, it is immediately evident from the title alone, and from this author’s past work, following in the vein of Andy Letcher, that this book — in the name of debunking Allegro — just reifies and further entrenches the misguided idea that John Allegro is of central, definitive relevance to the field of Western mushroom scholarship; that is, the mushroom theory of Greek & Christian religion & art.

The audience for this book is not professional-level scholars in the field of mushrooms in Greek & Christian religion, but rather, is purely a popular audience.

This book does not engage with the actual field of leading-edge scholarship, but limits itself to a negative, debunking an ill-founded popular idea that somehow John Allegro created the idea of “mushrooms throughout Christian history”. Allegro neither held that idea, nor asserted that idea, of “mushrooms throughout Christian history”.

Who was the first person to assert mushrooms at the start of Christianity?

Who was the first person to assert mushrooms prominently throughout Christianity?

[Critique of McKenna’s curiosity-killing presupposition “the Big Bad Catholic Church totally stomped out entheogens”, Hatsis largely agrees with me here]

The popular misconception, which this book exclusively focuses on debunking, is that Sacred Mushroom & The Cross is an entheogen scholarship book (it’s not), that Allegro is an entheogen scholar (he’s isn’t), and that Allegro knows about entheogens (he doesn’t).

Allegro is self-contradictory about whether mushrooms were forgotten at the start of Christianity after the first generation of primitive Christians. [link to my “allegro partly self-contradictory” article]

Cyberdisciple’s Critique Showing Allegro’s Book Is Irrelevant to Entheogen Scholarship

Influence of early anthropological theorizing on ‘entheogen’ scholarship: John Allegro, The Sacred Mushroom
Cyberdisciple, December 14, 2020
https://cyberdisciple.wordpress.com/2020/12/14/influence-of-early-anthropological-theorizing-on-entheogen-scholarship-john-allegro-the-sacred-mushroom/

Hatsis expended his research skills and time on the easy target, the less-important target — merely debunking the flimsy, ill-conceived pop misunderstanding of Allegro — the unread masses’ wishful projection onto Allegro — when he ought to at least acknowledge the need for someone to do the HARD WORK of actual positive, leading-edge research on processing the various types of evidence for mushrooms in Greek & Christian art.

The negative scholarship around Allegro is necessary (it could be a small % of a good book) but is not sufficient.

Hatsis has a long way to go, though, starting as he is, from no awareness of Greek mythemes. A good start would be reading Ruck’s books and the issues of Entheos journal. And the main article at Egodeath.com. And the Proof article, and the Criteria article at present site.

Debunking the popular view of Allegro is needed, is mandatory, is important. But it is not the whole of what’s needed.

A correct replacement theory is even more important.

Hatsis’ recent 2022 book wrongly acts as if the only thing needed in the field of Western mushroom scholarship, is to debunk pop misconceptions involving Allegro, and then the whole topic of Western mushroom scholarship supposedly would vanish.

The Great Conflation built into his mind is, mistakenly thinking that the entire broad field of Western mushroom scholarship has the same scope and focus as the particular narrow theory of spread of secret Amanita cult.

I add the words “spread of”, because Letcher seemed to particularly take issue with the alleged mechanism of spreading of the secretAmanita cult. I read Letcher’s book one time, when it came out — and I critiqued it (links below).

Andy Letcher’s Book, Shroom

Competing Views about Entheogens in Religious History
April 12, 2007, Michael Hoffman
Subsection:
Minimal Entheogen Theory per Psychedelics Advocates
http://www.egodeath.com/ViewsOnEntheogensInReligiousHistory.htm#_Toc164518584 — excerpt from top of section:

Shroom: A Cultural History of the Magic Mushroom
by Andy Letcher
http://amazon.co.uk/o/asin/0571227708 — June 15, 2006
http://amazon.com/o/asin/0060828285 — February 27, 2007

Author’s websites: [2006]
http://andyletcher.co.uk
http://myspace.com/shroomthebook

Shroom is essentially a reaction against the extreme mushroom theory of religion as extracted from Wasson/Allegro/McKenna (the “Mushroom Origin of Religion” Theory [MORT]).  Shroom cannot perceive or address the entheogen theory of religion because Shroom is fully busy reacting against the isolated narrow mushroom theory of religion.

_____

Letcher’s view doesn’t engage with some clearly relevant alternative views; for example, per the maximal entheogen theory, entheogenic mushroom use was common (agrees with “the MORT”, disagrees with Letcher), and entheogenic mushroom use was not in the form of a single secret official cult (agrees with Letcher, disagrees with his particular chosen monolithic variant of “MORT”).

_____

The book amounts to
a limited refutation of
one subtype of
the maximal theory,
while
among religion scholars, and faux-“hip” esotericism scholars (Gnosis mag) and even among many entheogen scholars, today’s predominant scholarly view is the minimal entheogen theory.  

Among a pop audience (not widely read in entheogen scholarship), a kind of “maximal mushroom theory of religion” may indeed be predominant.

_____

The minimal entheogen theory uses the “divide, isolate, and diminish” strategy: it

separates into isolation
each instance of
possible
historical or literary
evidence

for psychoactive use, then

states that
for each isolated instance, there’s not compelling evidence to support
this instance being evidence of religious psychoactive use.

_____

A key, differentiating set of questions to ask Letcher (as representative of a certain anti-MORT paradigm):

·         Did mystic-state religious experiences happen, in the history of religion?

·         Were many of them induced by mushrooms (in terms of numbers and percentage)?

·         If they weren’t induced by mushrooms, then how did they come about?

·         Are religious myths metaphorical descriptions of the mystic altered state?

/ end of excerpt from my 2007 critique of Shroom

My Review of Hatsis’ Recent 2022 Book, Continued

What this book provides is merely negative; showing that the popular mind wrongly fantasizes what Allegro thought and wrote. This book is in error, in that it accomplishes that goal (showing that the pop conception of Allegro poorly describes his actual position & book), but then this book halts there and congratulates itself, “Job finished; job done; job well done.”

The field — on the lower, pop tier, — got headed down the wrong onramp. This book puts it in reverse, to back out from that wrong onramp.

But then, the car needs to get headed forward again, on the right onramp (the higher tier, the scholarly sound tier of theorizing plus historical evidence).

This book informs people that their use of Allegro is wrong, and that Allegro is not what the pop mind thinks he is. That is all merely prerequisites, to undo the wrong path that the Wasson-Allegro non-debate led us down.

This book ought to continue on forward in the right direction, to show:

• Show how Allegro is dead weight interfering with constructive productive scholarship.
• Show how to throw off this dead weight. eg replace one’s John Allegro framed portrait, by a Robert Graves framed portrait.
• Show how to rightly conceptualize the role of mushrooms in Christianity, building on the sound direction which Graves figured out.
• The only way to be able to proceed, is to co-decode Greek and Christian religion together. This has been proved repeatedly. Armed with the pair, Greek and Christian religion, you can solve any problem in decoding World Mythology. If armed only with mushrooms in Christianity — or if armed only with mushrooms in Greek religion, you can figure out neither Christianity, nor Greek, nor World religious mythology.

Hatsis Cancelled His Book “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy”

Early in this website (2016?) I wrote something naively expectantly hopeful and wrong, that Hatsis retracted his insane denial of mushrooms in Christianity.

Here is an equally venturesome conjecture. Hatsis lists his sites in the Description of these YouTube videos.

https://www.innertraditions.com/search/hatsis

The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy
Thomas Hatsis, 2022
http://amzn.com/B08KQMY3J9
Park Street Press

Evidence that Hatsis had that book ID & title:

Search “Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” Hatsis book
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Sacred+Mushroom+Conspiracy%22+Hatsis+book
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LVmXZXdU5Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G7yiTwLr6o –

“Hatsis is the author of “The Witches Ointment,” “Psychedelic Mystery … 2021) and “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” (spring, 2022).“

“Microdosing Magic,” and the forthcoming books “LSD The Wonderchild” (summer, 2021) and “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” (spring, 2022).

Search Hatsis’ publisher for “Hatsis”: https://www.innertraditions.com/search/hatsis

https://psanctum.org –

“Psanctum Psychedelia is a non-profit psychedelics research, educational, and harm reduction organization located in Portland, Oregon.

Since forming in 2018, Psanctum Psychedelia has hosted a variety of speakers knowledgeable in the latest, cutting-edge advances in psychedelic science, history, anthropology, and spirituality. We threw the Gaian Mind Psychedelic Conference in 2019, and host the Psanctum Open Mic every Monday.

Our mission is to respect the deep traditions of various peoples all over the world, while coupling those insights with the latest breakthroughs in psychedelic science and technologies.”

One of Hatsis’ articles argues: “If you assert that Christians used mushrooms, then you are DEFINITELY doing culturecide. If you assert that Christians did not use mushrooms, then you are definitely NOT doing culturecide.” This prejudice is what the (failed, esotericism-illiterate) Psychedelic Witch calls “respecting the traditions of peoples all over the world.”

“We value the wild, the weird, and the wonderful—and see viable connections between the scientific and the spiritual, the traditional and the innovative, and the magical and the measurable aspects of the psychedelic experience.

Please enjoy our videos and blog, and don’t forget to visit the Psanctum Psychedelic library!”

The YouTube vid lists: https://www.facebook.com/groups/psanctum.org

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G7yiTwLr6o –

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LVmXZXdU5Q – 5Q has more contacts/sites than other vid:

Thomas Hatsis is the author of “The Witches Ointment,” “Psychedelic Mystery Traditions,” “Microdosing Magic,” and the forthcoming books “LSD The Wonderchild” (summer, 2021) and “The Sacred Mushroom Conspiracy” (spring, 2022).

Go ahead Hatsis make it official, publish your official folly book, carved in stone.

The anti-mushroom “psychedelic witch”, self-contradiction incarnate, #1 follower of Allegro, “Allegro’s book is really great”.

Closer to the truth is: Allegro’s book is irrelevant for entheogen scholarship, except in some negative sense.

See Also

Hatsis the #1 Follower of Allegro:
Reading Allegro Again (Hatsis 2015)
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2023/02/18/reading-allegro-again-hatsis-2015/

My links to Hatsis’ articles: https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/10/31/psychedelic-mystery-traditions-hatsis/#Hatsis

Irvin’s Salamander article (original PDF title, with appendixes including questions for Ruck & Irvin):
Roasting the Salamander: Mushroom Cult Theorists Vs. Critical Historical Inquiry
August 18, 2013 (the earliest home page archived on that date has this article)
https://web.archive.org/web/20160218214557/http://arspsychedelia.com/uploads/3/2/1/4/3214063/roasting_the_salamander.pdf

I’ve explained the esoteric mystic-state analogies in the right-foot “dancing man”/salamander image:
Salamander Mushroom Tree Right Side Cut (Dancing Man; Roasting Salamander Bestiary Image)
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2022/04/13/salamander-mushroom-tree-right-side-cut/

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Contents:

• Cognitive Science of Religion, Loose Cognitive Science

Cognitive Science of Religion, Loose Cognitive Science

The main, paradigmatic instance of paradigm conversion is not in hard science, but in Cognitive Science of Religion. 

Paradigm conversion is inspired by Religion, rather than Science, where Science is taken to mean hard sciences. 

Cognitive Science is not exactly one of the hard sciences. 

CogSci can cover loose cognitive phenomenology. 

Loose Cognitive Science is the foundation and kind of science that the Egodeath theory is. 

The Egodeath theory is multi-state Science per Charles Tart. 

Is Egodeath theory advocating Religion, or Science? 

Loose Cognitive Science and 2-state Cybernetics straddles Religion and Science, informs both, is informed by both.

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Contents:

• Differentiate Between the Field of Study, Personalities, and Theories
• Define the Field in Terms of the Topic, Not in Terms of Personalities and Their Particular Narrow Theories
• What’s Not Acceptable
• Prerequisites to contribute in this field
• Who Speaks for this Field, and Who Doesn’t
• Principles Guiding this Field
• Relevance of World Religious Mythology
• Relevance of Non-Mushroom Psychoactives

Differentiate Between the Field of Study, Personalities, and Theories

There’s a terrible conflation effort going on, to try to conflate and over-identify:

• The field of “mushrooms in Christian history“.
• Particular personalities (such as referring to the whole field and its questions as “the Allegro theory”).
• Particular theories in the field (such as “the Holy Mushroom”).

The field, personalities, and particular theories, are conflated together, reductionistically, as if debunking Allegro, or debunking Irvin’s Holy Mushroom theory, is the same thing as “debunking the field of scholarship on mushrooms in Christian history”.

I always expect Hatsis to say “mushrooms”, and instead, he reaches for the bizarrely specific term “Amanita”.

I always expect Hatsis to discuss research in the field, and instead, he reaches for the bizarrely specific word “Allegro” or “the Holy Mushroom”.

Hatsis might be doing good work within a strange other alien field, the field of “Allegro-Amanita Studies“, but what is harmful, is that he then conflates that strange, less-important speciality field, Allegro-Amanita Studies, with the other field, that’s most important: the field of Western mushroom scholarship — identifying and interpreting Psilocybe references in Hellenistic & Christendom art & texts.

I would rather say “mushroom references”, but with all these people around who are HELL-BENT on conflating the whole field with their fantasized narrow “Allegro-Amanita Studies” field that they confabulated, I have to defensively pro-actively Shut Down that misreading, explicitly countersignalling by broadcasting “Psilocybe”, where they are intent on strawmanning as “Amanita”.

I’m not very anti-Amanita, but I have to sound like I am anti-Amanita, by aggressively pushing “Psilocybe”, exactly where the Allegro-orbiters would try to strawman-misrepresent the entire field reduced down to their little miniaturized thought-world of some imagined “Allegro-Amanita studies”.

Define the Field in Terms of the Topic, Not in Terms of Personalities and Their Particular Narrow Theories

http://csp.org
Council for Spiritual Practices

The Entheogen Chrestomathy (passage excerpts) has excerpts from 4 Robert Graves’ books.

Graves is weak, understated; not forceful, punchy, outspoken, and explicit, re: mushrooms in Christianity.

Graves tiptoes around the outer periphery of the field of “Western mushroom scholarship”, under the watchful guidance of Pope Wasson.

Allegro’s 1st Edition dust jacket fold text is punchy, is largely spot-on, and that front cover has the diagrammatic (thus powerful) symbol of the Plaincourault mushroom tree.

Irvin’s reissue preserves that original powerful cover diagram art.

These Allegro-centered Irvin/ Letcher/ Hastsis books sell quite well and get high ratings from reviews. There is significant interest in the topic or scholarly research-field of mushrooms in Christian history.

Don’t allow Hatsis & the other followers of Allegro to name the field “The Holy Mushroom theory” – cringe! what is one signing-up for, employing that overly charged Irvinism? That makes the mistake of labelling an entire field, as one particular theory in the field.

I’d like more information about Wasson dissuading Graves from writing more, about Western mushroom scholarship.

“Western mushroom scholarship” is a subfield within the field of “entheogen scholarship”. Notice it’s not “the Allegro theory”, “The Holy Mushroom theory”, or other such personality-centric labels.

The field name “Western mushroom scholarship” integrates Greek & Christian; Hellenism & Christendom.

Heading

The field of Western mushroom scholarship should be topic-centered, not personality-centric.

Wasson, Allegro, Irvin, Letcher, & Hatsis all try to make the field of Western mushroom scholarship personality-centric; positively or negatively orbiting around Allegro.

Irvin, Letcher, & Hatsis all place Wasson & Allegro at the center of “the field” (as they conceptualize it) and thus they make Allegro (or “the Wasson/Allegro debate”[sic]) also set the outer boundaries that delimit and circumscribe the field, and everyone’s thought.

Regarding the field and questions of Western mushroom scholarship, everyone who orbits their thinking around Wasson, Allegro, or Irvin (whether positively or negatively) is pushing and re-entrenching The Allegro Paradigm, as if rejecting that paradigm they’ve defined and selected, is the same as rejecting the field of Western mushroom scholarship.

Heading

There is no one good to represent the field of Western mushroom scholarship.
Brinckmann, Panofsky, Wasson, Letcher, Hatsis;
Rolfe, Ramsbottom, Brightman, Graves, Allegro, Heinrich, Irvin, Ruck

— not one of them represents what the field is, and needs to be:

Psilocybe in Greek & Christian art & texts; Hellenism & Christendom.

What’s Not Acceptable

Equating pop articles about “Allegro’s theory shows that Amanita magic mushrooms are the real origin of Christianity”, with professional-level scholarship within the field.

Required Evidence Exhibits You Must Be Aware Of, to Earn a Voice/ the Podium/ a Platform/ the Mic

Like in the form of a Course Syllabus, this rulebook define the kind of field this needs to be.
Professional credentials required; a bozo filter.

Gallery: What pictorial evidence you must be aware of, to have the right to be listened to.A standard body of images to discuss, like the “curated collection” idea.  You must be aware of these 200 images, before there’s any reason why anyone in this field should pay any attention to you.

What the commitments are, who the point-of-reference authors are (and are not).  

To counter this awful pattern of books like Letcher’s and then Hatsis’ recent book and his planned “Conspiracy” book which sounds like an awful book concept, an exercise in debunking Allegro and thereby reaffirming that Allegro is the be-all and end-off who is definitive of the entire subject.

CANCEL YOUR GOD-FORSAKEN BOOK, IT’S GOING TO BE HORRIBLE AND HARMFUL, AN EXERCISE IN REIFYING FOLLY. I AM ALREADY WRITING A SCATHING, PANNING, CONDEMNATORY BOOK REVIEW FOR THIS BOOK THAT WON’T EXIST FOR ANOTHER TWO YEARS, BASED PURELY ON ITS TITLE.

Prerequisites to contribute in this field

Read 3 of 4 issues of Mark Hoffman’s Entheos Journal.

Read some Ruck – ideally w/ my caveats in my review of his overview book mistitled as “Consciousness”.

Be aware of the long list of books about ahistoricity of religious founder figures. Don’t make statements about whether Jesus existed, if you aren’t even aware of these book titles — you’d just demonstrate your ignorance and lack of credibility. Any ignorant, unread fool can proclaim on the matter, while oblivious to the existence of these books. You have to earn your right to be listened to on this topic. Otherwise “you won’t be taken seriously” [define that phrase].

Who Speaks for this Field, and Who Doesn’t

Anyone who uses phrases such as “the Allegro theory” (equating & grossly mis-crediting Allegro with the topic of Western mushroom scholarship) has no credibility and is an outsider and cannot, does not, represent this field.

Anyone whose thinking places Amanita & Allegro in the center of this field is an imposter and should be treated as a rank member of the public, regardless of how much research they’ve done on other psychoactives history.

Wasson might be an authority on something — I don’t know what — but he has nothing to contribute, except confusion and ambiguous, evasive doubletalk, regarding mushrooms in Christianity.

Principles Guiding this Field

Relevance of World Religious Mythology

Relevance of Non-Mushroom Psychoactives

• policy for % emphasis:

• Samorini re: Strains of Ergot at Eleusis in Kykeon
• Peripheral; out of scope; can be brought in but with uinderstanding they are outside the domain of explanation — like fantastical non-psychedelic mushrooms may figure into the art.
• We hold that they did use cannabis products like Chris Bennett asserts; but, that’s not our focus. We are dedicated to Psilocybe and its specific effects and how those classic psychedelic effects are described by mythemes.
• Assume that users (through the Early Modern era) had full control of dosage and redosing.
• The great benefits of these simplifying, enabling, foundational assumptions outweigh the minor, incidental costs/inaccuracy.

Heading

John Allegro is irrelevant. The only articles this field needs about Allegro, are about how Allegro is irrelevant. Take down his portrait.

Take down the framed portrait of Pope Wasson.

For mushrooms in Greek & Christian religion, Wasson is irrelevant; is extremely compromised by his close relationship with the Pope; is purely harmful; and stole credit and limelight from Graves.

Robert Graves is the real brains behind the operation, when it comes to mushrooms in religion, including mushrooms in Greek religion.

The best starting point — put up his framed portrait — is Robert Graves.

Religion and Psychoactive Sacraments : An Entheogen Chrestomathy
Tom Roberts & Paula Jo Hruby
https://csp.org/docs/index
http://www.csp.org/chrestomathy/
https://archive.org/search.php?query=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.csp.org%2Fchrestomathy%2F
Search the Chrestomathy for Robert Graves to read some of Graves’ 83 pages on the topic.

Religion and psychoactive sacraments: A bibliographic guide
January 1, 1995
http://amzn.com/1889725005

search Robert Graves entheogen kykeon

Psychoactive Sacramentals: Essays on Entheogens and Religion
Thomas Roberts (Editor), 2001
The CSP Entheogen Project Series, 3
by Stanislav Grof (Author), Huston Smith (Author), Albert Hofmann (Author), Charles T. Tart (Author), Alexander T. Shulgin (Author), Mike Young (Author), & 4 more
http://amzn.com/1889725021

The Pharsalus Bas-Relief and the Eleusinian Mysteries
Samorini
https://www.samorini.it/doc1/sam/pharsal.htm
https://www.samorini.it/doc1/sam/sam-1998-ter-pharsalus.pdf

https://www.amazon.com.au/Entheogens-Myth-Human-Consciousness-Carl-ebook/dp/B00BSEQOPW “This book reviews the 20th Century history of the reception of the Entheogen theory of religion. Ruck shows how Wasson told Robert Graves to self-censor Graves’ 1950s discovery of mushrooms as the foundation of Greek myth and initiation religion. Ruck’s work, if extrapolated to the maximum, shows that religion comes strictly through visionary …” <– who wrote???

Book:
Entheogens, Myth, and Human Consciousness
Carl Ruck, Mark Hoffman
http://amzn.com/1579511414
January 8, 2013
My review:
Entheogens, Myth, and Human Consciousness (Ruck & Hoffman)
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/12/22/entheogens-myth-and-human-consciousness/

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Contents:

• The Egodeath theory & Gnosis on a Post-It Note
• Coffeehouse Guestbook Entry Summarizing the 2013 Breakthrough: {tree vs. snake} = possibilism vs. eternalism
  • Religious Myth Deciphered
  • The Two Mental Worldmodels: {king steering in tree} -> {wine} -> {snake frozen in rock}
• Post-It Note: {rod of Aesclepius} Decoded
• 1988 Article Drafts and 1989 Artist’s Blank Book
• August 12, 1988 Handwritten First Draft of the Theory of Ego Transcendence
• Article Drafts and Per-Semester Writing Binders 1986-1989
• Final Draft of Main Article, September 24, 2006
• Pre-Mytheme-Decoding, Snake Frozen in Block Universe, ~1994
• Dried Amanita
• Ink Brush Michael the Archangel
• etc.

The Egodeath theory & Gnosis on a Post-It Note

Coffeehouse Guestbook Entry Summarizing the 2013 Breakthrough: {tree vs. snake} = possibilism vs. eternalism

Religious Myth Deciphered

The Two Mental Worldmodels: {king steering in tree} -> {wine} -> {snake frozen in rock}

Post-It Note: {rod of Aesclepius} Decoded

1988 Article Drafts and 1989 Artist’s Blank Book

August 12, 1988 Handwritten First Draft of the Theory of Ego Transcendence

Discussed in the Egodeath Yahoo Group post of September 24, 2011, 2 months before my preliminary November 23, 2011 proto-breakthrough work toward “{tree vs. snake} = possibilism vs. eternalism”:
Subject:
1988 first drafts of Egodeath article
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/12/19/egodeath-yahoo-group-digest-101/#message5144

“The first draft of what would become my main article was written August 12, 1988. It begins:

“Here are compiled and resolved the principles of Special Knowledge, inspired by all the major fields which have studied it, but rigorously thought through and resolved logically. With sufficient study, the reader will find that Transcendent Knowledge resolves Egoic thinking in much the same way that Relativity resolved Newtonian physics.”

Title: “The Theory of Ego Transcendence”, on the typed-up article.

Article Drafts and Per-Semester Writing Binders 1986-1989

Final Draft of Main Article, September 24, 2006

Pre-Mytheme-Decoding, Snake Frozen in Block Universe, ~1994

Dried Amanita

See also gallery of Amanita photos.

Ink Brush Michael the Archangel

April 1987 – January 1988 Idea Development with P205 Pencil on Binder Filler Paper

Blank Book Like Used During the Initial Phase of Idea Development, October 1985-March 1987

Idea Development Notes During Engineering Class, ~August 1986-March 1987

Spiritual self-help, no acronyms, dates it to apparently before mid-April 1987.

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Contents:

• Who Needs to Change What
• The Distinct Questions to Differentiate and Specifically Address
• See Also

Who Needs to Change What

What the individuals must to do rectify the situation for the field:

• Ruck must stop employing his malformed concept “secret”. Stop using the word ‘secret’, FFS! PLEASE STOP, for the love of God, and to save the field of mushroom scholarship!

• Irvin must stop uncritically affirming Allegro monolithically. Do like I do: list the pros and cons of any writer; what aspects they get right, and what they get wrong.

• Outside the field, everyone must stop treating “Allegro” as synonymous with mushroom scholarship, or the theory that Christianity involves mushrooms.

• Letcher-Hatsis must stop thinking that the Pop-spreading of “Allegro says”; and Irvin’s uncritical wholesale affirmation of Allegro; and Ruck’s obsession/fixation on “secret”, define the productive potential field of mushroom scholarship.

• Letcher-Hatsis must stop conflating a particular hypothesis with the entire field; stop covertly flipping back and forth between the extremely narrow, particular premise/hypothesis of “spreading via secret Amanita cult” vs. the completely broad, general question, “the extent of use of various psychoactive mushrooms in Western culture”.

• Letcher-Hatsis must dis-entangle their discussion of what are actually distinct questions; some 5-7 distinct debate-issues. List extracted from
  Article title:
  Defining “Compelling Evidence” & “Criteria of Proof” for Mushrooms in Christian Art
  Subsection title:
  Conflating the Distinct Questions: Sloppy Scholars’ Game of Slip-and-Slide
  https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/11/13/compelling-evidence-criteria-of-proof-for-greek-bible-mushrooms/#Conflating-the-Distinct-Questions-Sloppy-Scholars-Game-of-Slip-and-Slide

The Distinct Questions to Differentiate and Specifically Address

Section copied from “Criteria” article:

Careless entheogen scholars slip and slide among vague, shifting position on exactly what they are denying and affirming; constantly, silently changing their mind about what subject they are centrally debating about:

• The Secret Amanita Christian Cult theory?
  • How knowledge & tradition spread?
• Which mushrooms?
  • Just Amanita?
  • All mushrooms (including Cubensis, Liberty Caps, & Amanita)?
• Mushrooms in which aspect of Christianity:
  • Mushrooms in Christian art?
  • Mushrooms in Christian practice?
  • Mushrooms in Christian culture?
  • Mushrooms in Western culture, including Ancient Near East & Mediterranean Antiquity; Hellenistic Mystery Religions & Greek mythology?
• Which genre?
  • Strictly explicitly religious art?
  • Broad esotericism art within Christendom?
  • Strictly Biblical, or equivalent Hellenistic content as well?

The Minimalist school (“there’s never mushrooms, there’s never evidence”) is vague about:

• On what basis each of those questions is to be explained away.
• Why their sometimes-chosen scope of question is the key issue to deal with and center all discussion around (silently, as it suits them from moment to moment).
• Why some types of evidence and readings of that evidence count, but others are to be ignored and discounted: texts & art; literal depictions, stylized depictions, and depictions of effects.
• Which form-family of mushrooms to discuss: Amanita? Cubensis? Liberty Caps? This most-basic, elementary level of differentiation and discussion is completely missing from the Minimalist explainers-away; these fervent, shallow, and inarticulate wavers-of-arms.

/ end of section copied from “Criteria” article

• Letcher-Hatsis must stop writing unthinking phrases like “I find the idea totally ridiculous” – that’s the problem with Letcher-Hatsis’ approach to writing about the field’s questions, right there: *WHAT* idea; *WHICH* IDEA? You HAVE to be specific and articulate! Or else you are failing as a scholar, and even failing as a thinker.

It is *not* “the”, single, one, idea, which Letcher-Hatsis flips between identifying as “spread of secret Amanita cult”, and “use of mushrooms in Western culture”.

Like good scholars in the field of mushroom scholarship, I reject the hypothesis “spread of secret Amanita cult”, and I assert “significant use of mushrooms in Western culture.”

According to Letcher-Hatsis, no such compound position is possible, because they are one and the same question; in their Pop-shaped, overly Pop-guided thinking, “spread secret Amanita cult” is the same identical position as “mushrooms in Western culture”.

That’s why Letcher-Hatsis consistently — and PROVABLY — demonstrates ZERO SELF-AWARENESS about his continual flipping back-and-forth, silently conflating the (incorrect) “spread secret Amanita cult” position with the (correct) “mushrooms in Western culture” position.

In his sloppy, undifferentiated, Pop-guided, Pop-level thinking, — Letcher-Hatsis argues this way consistently — he assumes and takes it as granted, that if you reject the “spread secret Amanita cult” hypothesis, that’s the same thing as rejecting “mushrooms in Western culture”.

They think and reason that, because the idea of “spread secret Amanita cult” is totally ridiculous, that’s the same thing as the idea of “mushrooms in Western culture” being totally ridiculous.

According to the malformed assumption that’s latched onto (and promoted) by Letcher-Hatsis, if you assert mushrooms in Western culture, that necessarily means that you assert “spread of secret Amanita cult” — in his inchoate thinking, these two positions are the same identical position — that’s why Letcher-Hatsis never discusses or acknowledges the distinction between the two question-scopes (“spread secret Amanita cult”, vs. “mushrooms in Western Culture”).

Thus (as proof and evidence supporting my seemingly unbelievable assertions about his total lack of self-awareness of conflating the two extreme opposite-scoped questions) you have Hatsis within his video disproving Amanita, and then titling the video “I disproved mushrooms.”

Video title:
Mushroom Trees Debunked
YouTube channel:
Psychedelic Historian
Nov. 12, 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrfeNp1FSUY

The clear implication in this video is that he is unaware of Liberty Cap mushrooms, and he is only aware of Amanita!

Throughout the video, I was repeatedly startled because I expected him to say ‘mushrooms’ — but instead, out of the blue, for no clear reason, he instead reached all the way, going out of his way, for the specific word ‘Amanita’ — which is, of course, a different issue!

• Issue 1: Does the image generally represent mushrooms (of any type)?
• Issue 2: If so, which specific mushrooms: eg Liberty Caps; Cubensis; or Amanita?

Who the f*ck ever asserted, that the question of “Amanita” is the same question as “mushrooms” — other than bad, sloppy, Pop thinkers? — including Letcher-Hatsis.

Letcher-Hatisis is letting sloppy Pop-thinking guide, steer, shape, and constrain his would-be scholarly analysis.

Those are two opposite extreme scopes of “the” idea, but Letcher-Hatsis conflates the two totally differently scoped questions into this single monstrous construct of his own creation, “the” idea.

This way, Letcher-Hatisis can strawman-misrepresent the entire field of “Western mushroom scholarship”, and struttingly self-promote as if he has proved something significant and contributed something significant, when in fact, the only thing Letcher-Hatsis has contributed to the field of Western mushroom scholarship, is his own confused conflation of the narrow, incorrect hypothesis “spread secret Amanita cult”, and the broad, correct hypothesis, “significant mushrooms in Western culture”.

See Also

A new see-also article just published, same day:
Influence of early anthropological theorizing on ‘entheogen’ scholarship: John Allegro, The Sacred Mushroom
https://cyberdisciple.wordpress.com/2020/12/14/influence-of-early-anthropological-theorizing-on-entheogen-scholarship-john-allegro-the-sacred-mushroom/
— Great article, much-needed assessment. My comments on this article are at:
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/12/06/idea-development-page-5/#Article-About-Allegros-Undue-Influence

Scholars’ Failure to Debate Mushrooms in Christian Art
https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/11/20/scholars-failure-to-debate-mushrooms-in-christian-art/

Proof that the Canterbury Psalter’s Leg-Hanging Mushroom Tree Is Psilocybe

Defining “Compelling Evidence” & “Criteria of Proof” for Mushrooms in Christian Art

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Photos of Fantastical Mushrooms, to Identify Fantastical Mushrooms in Christian Art

When mystics are looking for Cubensis and Liberty Caps, and the prized-for-looks Amanita, here is also what they find, and what they draw in illuminated manuscripts.

My productive period decoding {non-branching} mythemes around 2010-2011 was while walking paths in a seasonal mushroom patch 1-square-block natural preserve, looking at the branching paths, branching trees, and annually changing collection of mushrooms, and photographing them.

I photographed groups of hundreds of manna-balls; shaggies, orange plastic curls, hundreds of little spears — maybe 20 different types of fungi, in a 1-block forest patch.

A common art pattern is to start by drawing a Cubensis cluster mushroom tree, with branching added and some non-branching added, and then for each cap, for every cap, vary the filling-in of the cap, to represent a particular, fantastical looking mushroom type, or a fictitious fanatical mushroom type.

Search Links

strange mushrooms affect art
https://www.pinterest.com/psupress/edible-wild-mushrooms-of-pennsylvania-and-the-mid-/

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=strange+mushrooms

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=mushrooms+poster

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=mushroom+poster

Photos

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Book:
Greek Mythology: An Introduction
Fritz Graf
1987; 1993 English hardcover; 1996 English paperback
http://amzn.com/0801853958

Above is essentially a photograph of a Maximum Breakthrough in intellectual history, the Late-Modern era re-decoding of the most archaic formula:

{tree vs. snake} = possibilism vs. eternalism

From Egodeath Yahoo Group, my post some time later recounting/recording, history. Contains book cite re: cover art.
Art on a mixed-wine mushroom-wine kylix “cup” (saucer).
Shows:

• Jason spewed dead from the giant Heimarmene-snake.
• Athena (with snake-fringes and death-face) and owl looks on.
• The rock-sacrificed Ram’s golden fleece of ram of zeus sent by cloud goddess married to king A. The fleece hung in nonbranching ivy-strand quasi-tree. Evil king sent hero Jason to retrieve the dragon-guarded treasure, the ram that saved Prixis but when ram rose, of necessity, sister Helle looked down below the flying ram, she lost her balance and she fell and she drowned in the sea. Prixis sacrificed the ram to Zeus for saving him from [soap opera] being sacrificed to the cloud goddess.. to get rain.
  Jealous cloud goddess wanted her children w/ king A sacrificed by the reluctant king A, then cloud goddess sent Zeus’ ram to rescue the children she wanted sacrificed to provide rain? Fishy story. Research the facts of the matter.

Campbell’s Book with Eve Multi-branching Eden Tree

Book:
The Power of Myth
Joseph Campbell / Bill Moyers
http://amzn.com/0385247737
The Eve image on left half of left page
Image caption:
Eve tempted by the Serpent, Lucas Cranach, ca. 1530.

Friday, November 29, 2013, 7:42 pm (the day after Thanksgiving): I discovered that tree vs. snake means Possibilism vs. Eternalism, upon seeing the right half of this painting in black & white, together with the cover of Fritz Graf’s book Greek Mythology: An Introduction, which shows the kylix/mushroom-wine saucer showing Jason spewed dead from the giant Heimarmene-snake, while Athena (with snake-fringes and death-face) and owl looks on, with ram golden fleece hung in nonbranching ivy-strand quasi-tree. This was one of my top 3 all-time breakthroughs.
img_6414.jpg photo of page of a large Joseph Campbell / Bill Moyers book “A. Eve tempted by the Serpent, Lucas Cranach, ca. 1530.”

The Cover Image of Fritz Graf’s book Greek Mythology: An Introduction

Shows the kylix/mushroom-wine saucer showing Jason spewed dead from the giant Heimarmene-snake, while Athena (with snake-fringes and death-face) and owl looks on, with ram golden fleece hung in nonbranching ivy-strand quasi-tree.

This was one of my top 3 all-time breakthroughs.

The Eve image on left half of left page, combined with Jason image, for completing/ recognizing/ decoding {tree vs. snake}, as a way to further condense my book cover image design around 2012 with
quadrants:

• egoic left, transcendent right;
• upper left quadrant image: king in tree?
  upper = world model?
  lower = control-agent model?
  2011: quadrants: from king steering in tree to snake frozen in rock.
  2013: simple contrast of 2: {tree vs. snake}. eliminate {king} and {rock}, it is sufficient to abbr instead of
  {king steering} in {tree} to
  {snake} frozen in {rock}
  or whatever my quadrants were, you can make-do with abbr into 2 items insetad of 4:
• {tree} to
• {snake}

math’ly you could do:

{tree} to
{rock}
ie change mental worldmodel from {tree} to {rock}. the contrast {tree vs. rock}. <– symm world-vs-world model compar’n.
gnosis = change your model of world from A to B

{king steering} to
{snake}
ie gnosis = change mental worldmodel from {king steering} to {snake}. <– symm agent-vs-agent compar’n
gnosis = change your model of ctrl-agent from A to B

{king steering}
{rock}
ie gnosis = change mental worldmodel from {king steering} to {rock}.

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This proves that my recent caduceus decoding and explanation of the tauroctony in Nov/Dec 2020 was repeat of discoveries Nov 2013.

My Nov 2011 Egodeath Yahoo Group posts show these same types of solutions, earlier work on the same decoding.

I’m re-describing, re-discovering, re-announcing, re-decoding, re-explaining. I’m not just re-writing; I’m re-discovering and re-decoding.

This is a 55-minute lecture packed into 17 minutes. No time for fluff.

This is 100% gold; solid substance, of Mystery-Religion takeaway summary.

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B8qHZAfuY9KxclRzMzJPUjRwRVk/edit

I probably explained to a friend my decoding-breakthrough of {female}/{rap’d by the god}/{married to the true ruler partner}/{bridal chamber} ~2012 – wished I captured that great clear explanation. I’ll have to mockup that talk in an article.