Who Are the Entities? Shouldn't We Find Out?
The Danger Behind the Use of Drugs for Spiritual Purposes
[Note: This is a slightly edited post I published on my own website about a year ago. It is also the subject of my recently published book, The Return of the Dragon]
Joe Rogan, with his insanely popular podcast, has brought the use of psychedelic drugs out of the hippie subculture and the obscure corners of society into the mainstream. He regularly talks about DMT (the synthesized version of ayahuasca) and Psilocybin (the synthesized version of 'Magic Mushrooms') and the spiritual and mental benefits he attributes to them. Other influential podcasters such as Lex Fridman have made similar statements (with Fridman recently dedicating a whole episode to the benefits of psychedelics). And there has long been use of psychedelics in the tech world with many tech leaders employing psychedelics as tools for innovation. There is a growing voice in American culture suggesting that psychedelics - far from being unhealthy - are good and helpful for body and soul.
And this is not limited to the social or political left as it was in the 1960s. Right-leaning filmmaker, author, and Twitter celebrity, Mike Cernovich, recently wrote, "I’m not interested in the political insights of people who haven’t journeyed on ayahuasca."
Elsewhere he wrote, "Ayahuasca heals minds."
Cernovich claims to be a Christian. So perhaps it would be good to look at what the bible says about the use of drugs for spiritual purposes.
The interesting thing about Christianity is how absent mind-altering drugs are in its normal spiritual practices and religion. It could be argued that most religions in history have utilized drugs as a way of encountering the gods.
There is evidence that opium (and possibly marijuana) was used for religious purposes in Ancient Egypt (they are also a rare example of a culture that used drunkenness for religious purposes). (1)(2) The Hindu religion speaks of the use of "Soma" and while scholars argue over specifically what drug it might have been, it is thought to have brought hallucinogenic effects (still today Hindu sannyasins and aghoris consume a drug called Ganja). (3) We know that various nations in the Ancient Near East like the Philistines likely used psychedelics to meet the gods. (8) Some scholars have suggested that Ancient Greek mystery religions employed entheogens to foretell the future. (4) Buddhism generally abstains from any use of drugs but some denominations of tantric or esoteric Buddhism allow it. Rastafarians are known for their use of marijuana (that they call ganja) for spiritual purposes.
But the examples that come most readily to mind are the ritual use of drugs in Mesoamerica. Many of the ancient indigenous nations and tribes of both North and South America utilized psychedelic drugs as central parts of their religious observance. Inca priests are known to have used ayahuasca to learn about healing, the heavens, the future, and solutions to problems. Aztecs used a variety of entheogenic substances including mushrooms and peyotl. And tribes in the North American plains used peyote as a religious sacrament for thousands of years. (5)
But drugs as a way to encounter God are conspicuously absent from the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. Here I am just going to focus on Christianity and the teachings of the bible to show why historically drug use and spiritual practices have not been mixed.
Many, upon reading the above paragraph will point out an apparent flaw in my argument. Christianity absolutely does command the use of alcohol in perhaps their most spiritual practice of all: the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. Wine is taken every Sunday across the world as part of worshiping God. But this is misleading. Christians only take a tiny drink of wine during the sacrament - never enough to alter consciousness - and the bible explicitly condemns any drunkenness as part of the service.
"So then, when you come together...one person remains hungry and another gets drunk. Don’t you have homes to eat and drink in? ... What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? Certainly not in this matter!" (1 Corinthians 11:20-22)
What about other drugs? What does the bible say about using drugs like those employed by so many other religions to see the gods? What about learning spiritual insights as Mike Cernovich has suggested? What about healing our minds?
At first glance, in our English translations of the biblical text, we find scant references to drugs. Google "what the bible says about drugs" and you will find websites pointing to some basic biblical warnings about not getting too drunk from wine. Taken at face value, these would suggest that the bible has more warnings about wine than it does about Ayahuasca or Peyote. Perhaps the Rastafarians are right and Christians should sit around smoking ganja in a worshipful way rather than drinking beer at the church picnic. Given this truth, why do most people think of it as so "unchristian" to sit around having ecstatic visions on Ayahuasca?
The answer is that there is something giant missing from the English translations. The New Testament was written in an ancient form of Greek called 'Koine Greek' and the Old Testament was written in Hebrew. But in the first-century world of Jesus and his Apostles, there was a Koine Greek translation of the Old Testament that was widely used called the Septuagint. When the New Testament quotes the Old Testament it is more often than not the Septuagint that is quoted. So Koine Greek is the language of the New Testament and the language of the Bible that Jesus and his apostles would have read.
And what is the word for "drugs" in Koine Greek? φαρμακεία : in English letters, pharmakeia. If the word pharmakeia sounds familiar, it is where we get our English word pharmacy.
And this word (in its various forms and conjugations) is found many times in the New Testament and Septuagint. The reason that it is not translated simply as "drugs" is that the word has another rendering often used by scholars. Because of context, in most biblical instances, scholars translate the various forms of pharmakeia to one of the following: witch, wizard, witchcraft, sorcerer, sorcery, divination.
Yes. The word for witchcraft and the word for drugs are the same in the language of the bible. Let's briefly review the lexicons.
The Friberg Lexicon defines witchcraft (pharmakeia) as, "one who prepares and uses drugs for magical purposes or ritual witchcraft sorcerer, poisoner, magician," and "the use of drugs of any kind for magical effect sorcery, magic." The Louw- Nida Lexicon defines it as "the use of drugs of any kind for magical effect sorcery, magic." Liddell-Scott Lexicon defines it, "the use of drugs, potions, spells..."
You can see that this is not a case where the same word has two different meanings like where "bark" can mean either the sound a dog makes or the outer layer of a tree. No. This is a case where the two words have a common element and overlap in meaning.
Witchcraft in the bible always involved drug use for spiritual and magical purposes.
With this in mind, let's review some of what the bible says (Old Testament references will be from the Koine Greek of the Septuagint).
Let's start with Exodus 22:18. The English translation is:
"You shall not allow a sorceress to live."
The word sorceress is pharmakous in the Koine Greek. The translation using the Friberg would be something like:
"Do not allow one who prepares drugs for ritual purposes to live."
That seems pretty rough. The bible is saying that the mixing of drugs and religion is so bad that the Israelites should not even let someone live who does it?
Now let's go to Deuteronomy 18:10,
Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in pharmakous.
Notice that statement about human sacrifice. The bible has several linkages between human sacrifice (widely practiced by ancient religions that did use drugs as part of their worship) and pharmakeia.
Now consider 2 Chronicles 33:6 a verse talking about the evil King Manasseh,
"He sacrificed his sons in the fire in the Valley of Ben Hinnom, practiced sorcery, divination, and witchcraft (epharmakeueto), and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the eyes of the LORD, provoking him to anger."
This conjugation of pharmakeia is rendered by the the Liddell Scott Lexicon, "1- to administer a drug or 2 - to use enchantments." So the king got so evil that he sacrificed his children in the fire and started administering drugs (with the implication of spiritual or ritualistic usage).
Moving on, we see in 2 Kings 9:22 that,
"When Joram saw Jehu he asked, "Have you come in peace, Jehu?" "How can there be peace," Jehu replied, "as long as all the idolatry and witchcraft of your mother Jezebel abound?"
Jezebel is the notoriously evil queen in the bible. When Jehu lists her evils he lists two things, "idolatry and witchcraft (pharmaka)." Yes, one of the evilest people in the bible's two most evil actions included using drugs for spiritual purposes.
And in Nahum 3:4 the prophet says that the city of Ninevah, "enslaved nations by her prostitution and peoples by her witchcraft (pharmaka)."
Many other references in the Old Testament carry on this theme. In Exodus 9, the men who prevent Egypt from listening to the warnings of Moses (and ultimately bringing on the plagues) were sorcerers (pharmakous). And in Micah 5:12, God promises that when he acts he will act to destroy pharmakeia.
To summarize the Old Testament (as found in the Koine Greek Septuagint) states that those who practice pharmakeia (the ritual/spiritual/magical use of drugs) are not worthy to live. They are the worst sorts of people that deceive whole nations and lead to human sacrifice and blood lust.
Before we go to the New Testament, I wanted to quote a line from the Septuagint that is not in the Protestant Bible but is in the Catholic Deuterocanonical text of Wisdom. Wisdom 12:4, says God hated the Canaanites because of two things: their wicked sacrifices (likely human) and their pharmakeia. I wanted to bring this text up just because it is another example of the tying together of human sacrifice and pharmakeia in the thought of the Ancient Hebrews.
Let's go to the New Testament. Things do not get any rosier for those who practice φαρμακεία. The Apostle Paul, in Galatians 5:19-20, lists pharmakeia as one of the things that are signs of having a sinful nature and that those who practice such things "will not enter the kingdom of heaven." The Book of Revelation has several condemnations of pharmakeia including Revelation 9:21 where a church is condemned for failing to set aside their 'witchcraft.' One wonders if this early church hoped to learn about God as Cernovich does using some ancient Near East version of ayahuasca. Revelation 21:8 and Revelation 22:15 list those who practice pharmacia as the people who will be cast out of the Kingdom at the Day of Judgement.
Interestingly, Revelation 18:23 says that "all nations were deceived" by the pharmacia of Babylon. This echoes Nahum 3:4 where Nineveh enslaved whole nations by her pharmakeia.
I could list many other biblical verses but I want to stop here. The biblical indictment against pharmakeia seems almost unhinged at this point. Here are some things the bible says about pharmakeia:
1- Those who practice it are not worthy of life (Exodus 22:18).
2 - That there is a close association between it and human sacrifice (Deuteronomy 18:10, 2 Chronicles 33:6, Wisdom 12:4).
3 - That it deceives/enslaves whole nations (Revelation 18:23 and Nahum 3:4).
4 - That those who practice it will be cast out of God's presence (Galatians 5:20 and Revelation 22:15).
What is going on here? Why is this practice of utilizing drugs for spiritual purposes that was so common in so many other cultures so harshly condemned?
From an atheistic standpoint, it makes no sense. We all know people who have done LSD, Magic Mushrooms, or Ayahuasca. I personally tried LSD when I was in high school. The effects of the trip are often not all bad. Many people seem to benefit. There is some data to suggest that LSD might help people quit an addiction. Tech gurus swear that psilocybin helps them with creativity. Mike Cernovich waxes eloquent about all the benefits it has given him.
But let us not look at this like atheists for a moment (after all, who cares about the bible if atheism is true). What if the people who take psychedelic drugs and report spiritual experiences really are experiencing spiritual things?
People who take large amounts of Ayahuasca (or the synthesized version, DMT) report interacting with entities (it is a strange common theme that large percentages of people taking the drug report). When they come down from their highs, they state that they are convinced that what they saw was real. They really did see these entities (some call them elves or spirits). Atheists would say, "what a weird brain phenomenon." But we are not atheists. Isn't it fair to ask who the entities are? Shouldn't we ask?
The interesting thing about the bible is that it never says false gods are fake. In fact, in 1 Corinthians 10:20 St Paul says, "...the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God..." Pagan gods and spirits are not just the imagination Paul says. They are demons.
When we have spiritual experiences, many think that is always a good thing. But shouldn't we ask, "which spirits?" Because the bible tells us that not all spirits are good. And if the spirits are not from God, they are certainly not good spirits. This means.... they are bad spirits. And what is a bad spirit? A demon. Now, if you are getting spiritual experiences using a method that God strongly condemns (pharmakeia), what sort of spirits do you think you are interacting with?
Now, does the fact that the spirits you experience feel good, nice, wise, thoughtful, and enlightening prove that they are not evil spirits but good ones? No. The whole point of temptation is that it always seems good, nice, wise, thoughtful, and enlightening. Think of the serpent in the garden. He thoughtfully challenged Eve. He used logic. He even opened her mind to try new experiences. Think about the Devil tempting Christ. He quoted scripture. He used logic. He offered to help. He provided new ways to get the things people wanted. Real demons rarely are scary. In fact, angels tend to be scarier than demons in the bible. When people from the bible encounter angels they tend to fall down in fear.
People who take ayahuasca, LSD, and psilocybin report real benefits. Creative people report better art, better tech inventions, and new ways of looking at life. People report healings from various ills (mental, emotional, and even physical). How could all these good things come from something bad?
But isn't that the whole point of the "dark arts"? Would anyone practice magic if there was no upside? Isn't healing, knowledge, and power what it was always about?
No. Neither warm feelings nor quantifiable benefits are proof that the spirits you encounter are good.
Okay. So let's just think about the bible in the light of the possibility that these are bad spirits. Maybe the bible is warning with the strongest possible language that when you practice pharmakeia (the use of drugs for magical or spiritual purposes) you are meeting demons?
Suddenly the extreme reaction makes sense. 'Don't use drugs for spiritual purposes because the spirits are demons.'
But what danger is there really? Let's go back to the Bible. For many sins, the damage is at the personal level. You steal, and one person is hurt. You murder, and the person and their family are hurt. These are personal sins that can be handled by a criminal code and don't destroy society unless they are permitted or ignored on a larger scale. But some sins are at the corporate level. The country seeks a ruthless leader, and you get Hitler. A country wants power, and you get a giant over-active military. These sins result from the collective sins of many and often have broader (and more destructive) effects than individual sins.
From what the bible says about pharmakeia, the sin fits more neatly in the second category. The bible says that it "leads nations astray" and that it brings about terrible views of humanity and life.
And this brings me to my final point. If Cernovich or Rogan or Fridman are right, you would think that nations broadly using drugs and experiencing the spiritual realm would be enlightened. They would be superior to the other nations and lead the way in advancing the world.
So is this true? Did the nations that made deep use of ayahuasca, peyote, and magic mushrooms behave in more enlightened ways than those that did not?
The Inca Empire utilized ayahuasca to learn about the stars, building an empire, and construct amazing temples and cities. They built pyramids and wondrous cities in the mountains. They tracked the movement of the stars with astonishing precision. They also sacrificed thousands of children. They also enslaved millions. They practiced infanticide. They also practiced constant war.
The Maya Empire utilized various mushrooms to talk to the gods. They built beautiful buildings, henges to track the stars, and an amazing empire. They also ripped hearts out of living slaves and tossed them down the stairs of pyramids. They enslaved millions. Constant war.
The Aztec Empire utilized various mushrooms, talked to gods, and learned all sorts of great things about healing, astronomy, and technology. And once again built pyramids, tracked the stars, practiced human sacrifice, widespread slavery, and widespread oppression and war.
What about the North American indigenous peoples? They utilized peyote and various plants to meet the gods. And did you ever hear of Monks Mound? Built by the Mississippi cultures in what is today Illinois. It is a giant mound of earth.
It looks amazingly like a dirt version of the Mayan and Aztec pyramids. They also tracked the stars with henges. They also sacrificed humans and enslaved many and engaged in almost constant war.
And these themes are present not only in Mesoamerica but also in ancient Northern Europe. The pre-Christian Vikings are thought to have used a plant called 'stinking henbane' as a hallucinogen. (6) They also sacrificed humans. (7) They also built dirt mounds that sort of look like pyramids.
Viking mounds - Old Uppsala
For many ancient cultures, we don't know exactly what drugs they used or what precisely their practices were but given how common it was for ancient people to use drugs for spiritual or ritual purposes we can surmise that many of them did. And it is shocking how common it was for so many of these cultures to build large mounds or pyramids (high places), and sacrifice humans. We see mounds, pyramids, and Ziggurats in almost every region of the ancient world.
And if you know your bible well, you will be familiar with the term, 'high places.' The Old Testament rails against 'high places' repeatedly.
For example, Numbers 33: 51-53 says,
“Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When you cross the Jordan into Canaan, drive out all the inhabitants of the land before you. Destroy all their carved images and their cast idols, and demolish all their high places. Take possession of the land and settle in it, for I have given you the land to possess."
Israel's enemy, the Canaanites, had high places, they sacrificed their children (see Jeremiah 19:5), and they also practiced 'pharmakeia.'
The use of ayahuasca, mushrooms, and other psychedelics has not produced the enlightenment promised by Rogan and Cernovich. It has produced the opposite. Horrors at the national scale. Massive piles of bodies. As Nahum 3:2-4 says in the passage cited above condemning pharmakeia, "piles of dead, bodies without number, people stumbling over the corpses" all because the nations were enslaved by "her pharmakeia." (8)
Whatever goes on in that spiritual world of pharmakeia, it appears that the worst results come as it reaches societal acceptance. As more and more people encounter the entities, the thirst for blood at the national level seems to take hold. Is it any surprise that as the psychedelic craze of the 1960s and 1970s took hold we legalized abortion leading to the deaths of millions of babies?
Fortunately, at that moment, there was giant pushback from the broader culture and psychedelics never gained popular acceptance or use.
But here we are again. Some of the most influential people in our country are asking us to examine pharmakeia again. But now you know. To do so is to open a box of nightmares and terrors.
Let's pray we turn back.
Sources:
(1) Chasing Immorality in Religion pg 77
(2) A Short History of Drunkenness by Mark Forsyth
(3) Chasing Immorality in Religion pg 78
(4) Broad, William J. (2002-03-19). "For Delphic Oracle, Fumes and Visions". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2016-03-08.
(5) Prince, M. A., O'Donnell, M. B., Stanley, L. R., & Swaim, R. C. (2019). Examination of Recreational and Spiritual Peyote Use Among American Indian Youth. Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 80(3), 366–370. https://doi.org/10.15288/jsad.2019.80.366
(6) https://www.thesun.co.uk/tech/10991499/viking-warriors-fuelled-hallucinogenic-herbal-tea-naked-frenzy-violence-scientist/
(7) https://cjadrien.com/2020/04/03/human-sacrifice-vikings/
(8) Interestingly, Nineveh at times ruled over the Philistines who were known for using LSD like drugs. https://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/583018/ancient-Philistines-WASTED-LSD-drugs-3-000-years-ago
I really enjoyed reading this, it was very interesting.
Josephine McCarthy, a well known occultist, wrote about hallucinogens in her book Magical Healing. Here is a relevant quote:
"There are no shortcuts to developing visionary skills, and the
use of these substances bypasses all structures, guardians and
boundaries that are in place not only to guide you through the
inner realms wisely, but also to protect you as you move deeper
and deeper into them.
Hallucinogenic substances are capable of
catapulting you deep into inner spaces where powerful beings
who guard life, death and the Abyss reside. Your mind has no
interface with which to communicate properly with such beings;
you are there without proper context, with no guardians, no
guides, and often for no good reason. The chances that things
can go badly wrong are huge indeed."
So, there you go, some more proof related to the ideas in your article. These drugs allow us to contact beings not of this world!
Amazing article. Should be read by anyone contemplating the use of psychedelic drugs.