pagan continuity hypothesis pagan continuity hypothesis

That is, by giving, by even floating the possibility of this kind of-- at times, what seems like a Dan Brown sort of story, like, oh my god, there's a whole history of Christianity that's been suppressed-- draws attention, but the real point is actually that you're not really certain about the story, but you're certain is that we need to be more attentive to this evidence and to assess it soberly. In fact, something I'm following up on now is the prospect of similar sites in the Crimea around the Black Sea, because there was also a Greek presence there. Is taking all these disciplines, whether it's your discipline or archaeochemistry or hard core botany, biology, even psychopharmacology, putting it all together and taking a look at this mystery, this puzzle, using the lens of psychedelics as a lens, really, to investigate not just the past but the future and the mystery of human consciousness. And you suspect, therefore, that it might be a placebo, and you want the real thing. Up until that point I really had very little knowledge of psychedelics, personal or literary or otherwise. Then there's what were the earliest Christians doing with the Eucharist. So I'm trying to build the case-- and for some reason in my research, it kept coming back to Italy and Rome, which is why I focus on Hippolytus. So it is already happening. BRIAN MURARESKU: But you're spot on. And it was their claim that when the hymn to Demeter, one of these ancient records that records, in some form, the proto-recipe for this kykeon potion, which I call like a primitive beer, in the hymn to Demeter, they talk about ingredients like barley, water, and mint. It pushes back the archaeology on some of this material a full 12,000 years. Maybe I'm afraid I'll take the psychedelic and I won't have what is reported in the literature from Hopkins and NYU. But things that sound intensely powerful. You mentioned, too, early churchmen, experts in heresies by the name of Irenaeus of Lyons and Hippolytus of Rome. And when I read psychedelic literature or I read the literature on near-death experiences, I see experiences similar to what I experienced as a young boy. And nor do I think that you can characterize southern Italy as ground zero for the spirit of Greek mysticism, or however you put it. Now, that date is obviously very suggestive because that's precisely the time the Christians were establishing a beachhead in Rome. One attendee has asked, "How have religious leaders reacted so far to your book? Then I'll ask a series of questions that follow the course of his book, focusing on the different ancient religious traditions, the evidence for their psychedelic sacraments, and most importantly, whether and how the assembled evidence yields a coherent picture of the past. The (Mistaken) Conspiracy Theory: In the Late Middle Ages, religious elites created a new, and mistaken, intellectual framework out of Christian heresy and theology concerning demons. In 1950, Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote " The Influence of the Mystery Religions on Christianity " which describes the continuity from the Pagan, pre-Christian world to what would become early Christianity in the decades and centuries before Jesus Religion & Mystical Experiences, Wine The divine personage in whom this cult centered was the Magna Mater Deum who was conceived as the source of all life as well as the personification of all the powers of nature.\[Footnote:] Willoughby, Pagan Regeneration, p. 114.\ 7 She was the "Great Mother" not only "of all the gods," but of all men" as well. 1,672. Those religions featured psychedelic beer and ceremonies lead by women . In the afterword, you champion the fact that we stand on the cusp of a new era of psychedelics precisely because they can be synthesized and administered safely in pill form, back to The Economist article "The God Pill". What the Greeks were actually saying there is that it was barley infected with ergot, which is this natural fungus that infects cereal crops. That was the question for me. You're not confident that the pope is suddenly going to issue an encyclical. And then at some point they go inland. I mean, if Burkert was happy to speculate about psychedelics, I'm not sure why Ruck got the reception that he did in 1978 with their book The Road to Eleusis. And please just call me Charlie. And anyone who drinks this, [SPEAKING GREEK], Jesus says in Greek, you remain in me and I in you. So now it's true that these heresy hunters show an interest in this love potion. So this is the tradition, I can say with a straight face, that saved my life. It would have parts of Greek mysticism in it, the same Greek mysteries I've spent all these years investigating, and it would have some elements of what I see in paleo-Christianity. The Immortality Key has its shortcomings. CHARLES STANG: Brian, I want to thank you for your time. If beer was there that long ago, what kind of beer was it? That's all just fancy wordplay. CHARLES STANG: All right. I'm not sure many have. We know from the literature hundreds of years beforehand that in Elis, for example, in the Western Peloponnese, on the same Epiphany-type timeline, January 5, January 6, the priests would walk into the temple of Dionysus, leave three basins of water, the next morning they're miraculously transformed into wine. As a matter of fact, I think it's much more promising and much more fertile for scholarship to suggest that some of the earliest Christians may have availed themselves of a psychedelic sacrament and may have interpreted the Last Supper as some kind of invitation to open psychedelia, that mystical supper as the orthodox call it, [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]. Listen to #646: Brian C. Muraresku with Dr. Mark Plotkin The Eleusinian Mysteries, Discovering the Divine, The Immortality Key, The Pagan Continuity Hypothesis, Lessons from Scholar Karen Armstrong, and Much More, an episode of The Tim Ferriss Show, easily on Podbay - the best podcast player on the web. They followed Platonic (and other Greeks) philosophy. If you look at Dioscorides, for example, his Materia Medica, that's written in the first century AD around the same time that the Gospels themselves are being written. They linked the idea of witches to an imagined organized sect which was a danger to the Christian commonwealth. So after the whole first half of the book-- well, wait a minute, Dr. Stang. Rupert Sheldrake, PhD, is a biologist and author best known for his hypothesis of morphic resonance. But it survives. Get personalized recommendations, and learn where to watch across hundreds of streaming providers. CHARLES STANG: You know, Valentinus was almost elected bishop of Rome. There was an absence of continuity in the direction of the colony as Newport made his frequent voyages to and . 48:01 Brian's psychedelic experiences . It seems to me, though, that the intensity and the potency of the psychedelic experience is of an order of magnitude different than what I may have experienced through the Eucharist. Now that doesn't mean, as Brian was saying, that then suggests that that's the norm Eucharist. Then what was the Gospel of John, how did it interpret the Eucharist and market it, and so on. And considering the common background of modern religions (the Pagan Continuity hypothesis), any religious group who thinks they are chosen or correct are promoting a simplistic and ignorant view of our past. Now, I think you answered that last part. Oh, I hope I haven't offended you, Brian. It was a pilgrimage site. Newsweek calls him "the world's best human guinea pig," and The New York Times calls him "a cross between Jack Welch and a Buddhist monk." In this show, he deconstructs world-class . Now I want to get to the questions, but one last question before we move to the discussion portion. And I'll just list them out quickly. CHARLES STANG: Thank you, Brian. OK. Now let's pan back because, we have-- I want to wrap up my interrogation of you, which I've been pressing you, but I feel as if perhaps people joining me think I'm hostile to this hypothesis. Now, Brian managed to write this book while holding down a full time practice in international law based in Washington DC. But I think there's a decent scientific foothold to begin that work. difficult to arrive at any conclusive hypothesis. And so how far should this investigation go? Like savory, wormwood, blue tansy, balm, senna, coriander, germander, mint, sage, and thyme. And this is at a time when we're still hunting and gathering. What Brian labels the religion with no name. Even a little bit before Gobekli Tepe, there was another site unearthed relatively recently in Israel, at the Rakefet cave. Amongst all the mystery religions, Eleusis survives. And then that's the word that Euripides uses, by the way. I know that's another loaded phrase. He decides to get people even more drunk. Now, here's-- let's tack away from hard, scientific, archaeobotanical evidence for a moment. You may have already noticed one such question-- not too hard. She joins me for most events and meetings. #646: Brian C. Muraresku with Dr. Mark Plotkin The Eleusinian Mysteries, Discovering the Divine, The Immortality Key, The Pagan Continuity Hypothesis, Lessons from Scholar Karen Armstrong, and Much More by The Tim Ferriss Show Church of the Saints Faustina and Liberata, view from the outside with the entrance enclosure, at "Sante" place, Capo di Ponte (Italy). But I want to ask you to reflect on the broader narrative that you're painting, because I've heard you speak in two ways about the significance of this work. I would expect we'd have ample evidence. And part of me really wants to put all these pieces together before I dive in. It's funny to see that some of the first basilicas outside Rome are popping up here, and in and around Pompeii. Wise not least because it is summer there, as he reminds me every time we have a Zoom meeting, which has been quite often in these past several months. And so even within the New Testament you see little hints and clues that there was no such thing as only ordinary table wine. You see an altar of Pentelic marble that could only have come from the Mount Pentelicus quarry in mainland Greece. Psychedelics are a lens to investigate this stuff. And at the same time, when I see a thirst, especially in young people, for real experience, and I see so many Catholics who do not believe in transubstantiation, obviously, what comes to my mind is how, if at all, can psychedelics enhance faith or reinvent Christianity. . And I think there are lots of reasons to believe that. And if there's historical precedent for it, all the more so. And I wonder and I question how we can keep that and retain that for today. And I just happened to fall into that at the age of 14 thanks to the Jesuits, and just never left it behind. But it just happens to show up at the right place at the right time, when the earliest Christians could have availed themselves of this kind of sacrament. Part 1 Brian C. Muraresku: The Eleusinian Mysteries, Discovering the Divine, The Immortality Key, The Pagan Continuity Hypothesis and the Hallucinogenic Origins of Religion - Feb 22, 2023 I wish that an ancient pharmacy had been preserved by Mount Vesuvius somewhere near Alexandria or even in upper Egypt or in Antioch or parts of Turkey. Because my biggest question is, and the obvious question of the book is, if this was happening in antiquity, what does that mean for today? That's our next event, and will be at least two more events to follow. So you lean on the good work of Harvard's own Arthur Darby Nock, and more recently, the work of Dennis McDonald at Claremont School of Theology, to suggest that the author of the Gospel of John deliberately paints Jesus and his Eucharist in the colors of Dionysus. Part 1 Brian C. Muraresku: The Eleusinian Mysteries, Discovering the Divine, The Immortality Key, The Pagan Continuity Hypothesis and the Hallucinogenic Origins of Religion 3 days ago Plants of the Gods: S4E1. CHARLES STANG: Brian, I wonder if you could end by reflecting on the meaning of dying before you die. To sum up the most exciting parts of the book: the bloody wine of Dionysius became the bloody wine of Jesus - the pagan continuity hypothesis - the link between the Ancient Greeks of the final centuries BC and the paleo-Christians of the early centuries AD - in short, the default psychedelic of universal world history - the cult of . "The Jews" are not after Ye. That's only after Constantine. let's take up your invitation and move from Dionysus to early Christianity. And what the FDA can do is make sure that they're doing it in a way that it's absolutely safe and efficacious. He dared to ask this very question before the hypothesis that this Eleusinian sacrament was indeed a psychedelic, and am I right that it was Ruck's hypothesis that set you down this path all those many years ago at Brown? And if you're a good Christian or a good Catholic, and you're consuming that wine on any given Sunday, why are you doing that? So Brian, I wonder, maybe we should give the floor to you and ask you to speak about, what are the questions you think both ancient historians such as myself should be asking that we're not, and maybe what are the sorts of questions that people who aren't ancient historians but who are drawn to this evidence, to your narrative, and to the present and the future of religion, what sort of questions should they be asking regarding psychedelics? You mentioned there were lots of dead ends, and there certainly were. The pagan continuity hypothesis theorizes that when Christianity arrived in Greece around AD 49, it didn't suddenly replace the existing religion. Because at my heart, I still consider myself a good Catholic boy. Did the ancient Greeks use drugs to find God? CHARLES STANG: I have one more question about the pre-Christian story, and that has to do with that the other mystery religion you give such attention to. There have been breakthroughs, too, which no doubt kept Brian going despite some skepticism from the academy, to say the least. There aren't any churches or basilicas, right, in the first three centuries, in this era we're calling paleo-Christianity. He has talked about the potential evidence for psychedelics in a Mithras liturgy. And I write, at the very end of the book, I hope that they'd be proud of this investigation. Do the drugs, Dr. Stang? Let me just pull up my notes here. As much as we know about the mysteries of Eleusis. We have other textual evidence. It's something that goes from Homer all the way until the fall of the Roman Empire, over the course of well more than 1,000 years. OK, Brian, I invite you to join us now. [2] Find ratings and reviews for the newest movie and TV shows. And so that's what motivated my search here. Now, I don't put too much weight into that. Like in Israel. We're going to get there very soon. Maybe for those facing the end of life. I'm paraphrasing this one. It's only in John that Jesus is described as being born in the lap of the Father, the [SPEAKING GREEK] in 1:18, very similar to the way that Dionysus sprung miraculously from the thigh of Zeus, and on and on and on-- which I'm not going to bore you and the audience. And there you also found mortars that were tested and also tested positive for evidence of brewing. And maybe in these near-death experiences we begin to actually experience that at a visceral level. So my biggest question is, what kind of wine was it? We have an hour and a half together and I hope there will be time for Q&A and discussion. I am excited . So the basic point being, as far as we can tell, beer and wine are routinely mixed with things that we don't do today. The Gnostics did have continuity with paganism. I know that that's a loaded phrase. CHARLES STANG: OK, that is the big question. First, I will provide definitions for the terms "pagan", "Christian", [1] According to this theory, older adults try to maintain this continuity of lifestyle by adapting strategies that are connected to their past experiences. I'm sure he knows this well, by this point. I mean, I asked lots of big questions in the book, and I fully acknowledge that. But we do know that something was happening. Just imagine, I have to live with me. The answer seems to be connected to psychedelic drugs. And I think that that's the real question here. So I have my concerns about what's about to happen in Oregon and the regulation of psilocybin for therapeutic purposes. So how exactly is this evidence of something relevant to Christianity in Rome or southern Italy more widely? First I'll give the floor to Brian to walk us into this remarkable book of his and the years of hard work that went into it, what drove him to do this. And that kind of invisible religion with no name, although brutally suppressed, managed to survive in Europe for many centuries and could potentially be revived today. If your history is even remotely correct, that would have ushered in a very different church, if Valentinus's own student Marcus and the Marcosians were involved in psychedelic rituals, then that was an early road not taken, let's say. So what do we know about those rituals? And I think it does hearken back to a genuinely ancient Greek principle, which is that only by fully experiencing some kind of death, a death that feels real, where you, or at least the you you used to identify with, actually slips away, dissolves. So the Eastern Aegean. This is all secret. So if we can test Eucharistic vessels, I wouldn't be surprised at all that we find one. I mean, I wish it were easier. So let's start with one that is more contemporary. Not because it was brand new data. If we're being honest with ourselves, when you've drunk-- and I've drunk that wine-- I didn't necessarily feel that I'd become one with Jesus. CHARLES STANG: So that actually helps answer a question that's in the Q&A that was posed to me, which is why did I say I fully expect that we will find evidence for this? I mean, what-- my big question is, what can we say about the Eucharist-- and maybe it's just my weird lens, but what can we say about it definitively in the absence of the archaeochemstry or the archaeobotany? And she talks about the visions that transformed the way she thinks about herself. But unfortunately, it doesn't connect it to Christianity. And did the earliest Christians inherit the same secret tradition? It was one of the early write-ups of the psilocybin studies coming out of Johns Hopkins. I opened the speculation, Dr. Stang, that the Holy Grail itself could have been some kind of spiked concoction. And another: in defending the pagan continuity hypothesis, Muraresku presumes a somewhat non-Jewish, pagan-like Jesus, while ignoring the growing body of psychedelic literature, including works by . The actual key that I found time and again in looking at this literature and the data is what seems to be happening here is the cultivation of a near-death experience. It was it was barley, water, and something else. This 'pagan continuity hypothesis' with a psychedelic twist is now backed up by biochemistry and agrochemistry and tons of historical research, exposing our forgotten history. And the big question for me was what was that something else? And he found some beer and wine-- that was a bit surprising. I would have been happy to find a spiked wine anywhere. And what it has to do with Eleusis or the Greek presence in general, I mean, again, just to say it briefly, is that this was a farmhouse of sorts that was inland, this sanctuary site. And they found this site, along with others around the Mediterranean. I mean, shouldn't everybody, shouldn't every Christian be wondering what kind of wine was on that table, or the tables of the earliest Christians? Psychedelics Today: Mark Plotkin - Bio-Cultural Conservation of the Amazon. All rights reserved. Like the wedding at Cana, which my synopsis of that event is a drunkard getting a bunch of drunk people even more drunk. Eusebius, third into the fourth century, is also talking about them-- it's a great Greek word, [SPEAKING GREEK]. The Tim Ferriss Show Transcripts: Brian C. Muraresku with Dr. Mark Plotkin The Eleusinian Mysteries, Discovering the Divine, The Immortality Key, The Pagan Continuity Hypothesis, Lessons from Scholar Karen Armstrong, and Much More (#646) - The Blog of Author Tim Ferriss 3 Annual "Best of" Apple Podcasts 900+ Million episodes downloaded