pagan continuity hypothesis

It was one of the early write-ups of the psilocybin studies coming out of Johns Hopkins. With more than 35 years of experience in the field of Education dedicated to help students, teachers and administrators in both public and private institutions at school, undergraduate and graduate level. And I don't know if it's a genuine mystical experience or mystical mimetic or some kind of psychological breakthrough. So. Do the drugs, Dr. Stang? But I realized that in 1977, when he wrote that in German, this was the height of scholarship, at least going out on a limb to speculate about the prospect of psychedelics at the very heart of the Greek mysteries, which I refer to as something like the real religion of the ancient Greeks, by the way, in speaking about the Eleusinian mysteries. I've no doubt that Brian has unearthed and collected a remarkable body of evidence, but evidence of what, exactly? "@BrianMuraresku with @DocMarkPlotkin The Eleusinian Mysteries, Discovering the Divine, The Immortality Key, The Pagan Continuity Hypothesis, Lessons from Scholar Karen Armstrong, and Much More" Please enjoy! And I started reading the studies from Pat McGovern at the University of Pennsylvania. According to Muraresku, this work, BOOK REVIEW which "presents the pagan continuity hypothesis with a psychedelic twist," addresses two fundamental questions: "Before the rise of Christianity, did the Ancient Greeks consume a secret psychedelic sacrament during their most famous and well-attended religious rituals? Now that doesn't mean, as Brian was saying, that then suggests that that's the norm Eucharist. And I'll just list them out quickly. Here is how I propose we are to proceed. #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 I want to thank you for your candor. 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? I mean, in the absence of the actual data, that's my biggest question. Because again, when I read the clinical literature, I'm reading things that look like mystical experiences, or that at least at least sound like them. There was an absence of continuity in the direction of the colony as Newport made his frequent voyages to and . And why, if you're right that the church has succeeded in suppressing a psychedelic sacrament and has been peddling instead, what you call a placebo, and that it has exercised a monstrous campaign of persecution against plant medicine and the women who have kept its knowledge alive, why are you still attached to this tradition? It's really quite simple, Charlie. So those are all possibly different questions to ask and answer. He's been featured in Forbes, the Daily Beast, Big Think, and Vice. So in my mind, it was the first real hard scientific data to support this hypothesis, which, as you alluded to at the beginning, only raises more questions. And so with a revised ancient history, in place Brian tacks back to the title of our series, Psychedelics and the Future of Religion. Maybe I'm afraid I'll take the psychedelic and I won't have what is reported in the literature from Hopkins and NYU. 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. So, you know, I specifically wanted to avoid heavily relying on the 52 books of the [INAUDIBLE] corpus or heavily relying too much on the Gospel of Mary Magdalene and the evidence that's come from Egypt. And you find terracotta heads that could or could not be representative of Demeter and Persephone, the two goddesses to whom the mysteries of Eleusis were dedicated. Like in Israel. And again, it survives, I think, because of that state support for the better part of 2,000 years. So we not only didn't have the engineering know-how-- we used to think-- we didn't have even settled life to construct something like this. So why refrain? And I, for one, look forward to a time when I can see him in person for a beer, ergotized beer or not, if he ever leaves Uruguay. It's a big question for me. But maybe you could just say something about this community in Catalonia. I'm currently reading The Immortality Key by Brian Muraresku and find this 2nd/3rd/4th century AD time period very interesting, particularly with regards to the adoptions of pagan rituals and practices by early Christianity. Rather, Christian beliefs were gradually incorporated into the pagan customs that already existed there. That was the question for me. Despite its popular appeal as a New York Times Bestseller, TIK fails to make a compelling case for its grand theory of the "pagan continuity hypothesis with a psychedelic twist" due to. Now that the pagan continuity hypothesis is defended, the next task is to show that the pagan and proto-Christian ritual sacraments were, in fact, psychedelicbrews. But it's not an ingested psychedelic. From about 1500 BC to the fourth century AD, it calls to the best and brightest of not just Athens but also Rome. I mean, this is what I want to do with some of my remaining days on this planet, is take a look at all these different theories. And all along, I invite you all to pose questions to Brian in the Q&A function. So I don't write this to antagonize them or the church, the people who, again, ushered me into this discipline and into these questions. And so I don't know what a really authentic, a really historic-looking ritual that is equal parts sacred, but also, again, medically sound, scientifically rigorous, would look like. So the mysteries of Dionysus are a bit more of a free-for-all than the mysteries of Eleusis. . Yeah. Nage ?] So first of all, please tell us how it is you came to pursue this research to write this book, and highlight briefly what you think are its principal conclusions and their significance for our present and future. Maybe for those facing the end of life. And all we know-- I mean, we can't decipher sequence by sequence what was happening. Others find it in different ways, but the common denominator seems to be one of these really well-curated near-death experiences. Where you find the grain, you may have found ergot. 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. In May of last year, researchers published what they believe is the first archaeochemical data for the use of psychoactive drugs in some form of early Judaism. What is it about that formula that captures for you the wisdom, the insight that is on offer in this ancient ritual, psychedelic or otherwise? The answer seems to be connected to psychedelic drugs. [2] 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. Now, Brian managed to write this book while holding down a full time practice in international law based in Washington DC. CHARLES STANG: Right. That's our next event, and will be at least two more events to follow. And I want to ask you about specifically the Eleusinian mysteries, centered around the goddesses Demeter and Persephone. You can see that inscribed on a plaque in Saint Paul's monastery at Mount Athos in Greece. There have been really dramatic studies from Hopkins and NYU about the ability of psilocybin at the end of life to curb things like depression, anxiety, and end of life distress. You know, it's an atheist using theological language to describe what happened to her. Here's the proof of concept. And that's where oversight comes in handy. They minimized or completely removed the Jewish debates found in the New Testament, and they took on a style that was more palatable to the wider pagan world. So it wasn't just a random place to find one of these spiked wines. What was the real religion of the ancient Greeks? The same Rome that circumstantially shows up, and south of Rome, where Constantine would build his basilicas in Naples and Capua later on. 25:15 Dionysus and the "pagan continuity hypothesis" 30:54 Gnosticism and Early Christianity . So we're going down parallel paths here, and I feel we're caught between FDA-approved therapeutics and RFRA-protected sacraments, RFRA, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, or what becomes of these kinds of substances in any kind of legal format-- which they're not legal at the moment, some would argue. Liked by Samuel Zuschlag. But I do want to push back a little bit on the elevation of this particular real estate in southern Italy. Mark and Brian cover the Eleusinian Mysteries, the pagan continuity hypothesis, early Christianity, lessons from famed religious scholar Karen Armstrong, overlooked aspects of influential philosopher William James's career, ancient wine and ancient beer, experiencing the divine within us, the importance of "tikkun olam"repairing and . 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? The question is, what will happen in the future. And so if there is a place for psychedelics, I would think it would be in one of those sacred containers within monastic life, or pilgrims who visit one of these monastic centers, for example. To be a Catholic is to believe that you are literally consuming the blood of Christ to become Christ. So if you were a mystic and you were into Demeter and Persephone and Dionysus and you were into these strange Greek mystery cults, you'd be hard-pressed to find a better place to spend your time than [SPEAKING GREEK], southern Italy, which in some cases was more Greek than Greek. Why don't we turn the tables and ask you what questions you think need to be posed? Which, again, what I see are small groups of people getting together to commune with the dead. The most influential religious historian of the twentieth century, Huston Smith, once referred to it as the "best-kept secret" in history. Amongst all the mystery religions, Eleusis survives. And I want to-- just like you have this hard evidence from Catalonia, then the question is how to interpret it. Several theories address the issue of the origin of the Romanians.The Romanian language descends from the Vulgar Latin dialects spoken in the Roman provinces north of the "Jireek Line" (a proposed notional line separating the predominantly Latin-speaking territories from the Greek-speaking lands in Southeastern Europe) in Late Antiquity.The theory of Daco-Roman continuity argues that the . And I asked her openly if we could test some of the many, many containers that they have, some on display, and many more in repository there. And very famous passages, by the way, that should be familiar to most New Testament readers. Find ratings and reviews for the newest movie and TV shows. The continuity between pagan and Christian cult nearby the archaeological area of Naquane in Capo di Ponte. There is evidence that has been either overlooked or perhaps intentionally suppressed. What does it mean to die before dying? So I was obsessed with this stuff from the moment I picked up an article in The Economist called the God Pill back in 2007. CHARLES STANG: OK. I mean, something of symbolic significance, something monumental. There he is. 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. Despite its popular appeal as a New York Times Bestseller, TIK fails to make a compelling case for its grand theory of the "pagan continuity hypothesis with a psychedelic twist" due to recurring overreach and historical distortion, failure to consider relevant research on shamanism and Christianity, and presentation of speculation as fact Now, it's just an early indication and there's more testing to be done. 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. I have a deep interest in mysticism, and I've had mystical experiences, which I don't think are very relevant. 474, ?] So I went fully down the rabbit hole. So Pompeii and its environs at the time were called [SPEAKING GREEK], which means great Greece. Maybe there's some residual fear that's been built up in me. I think psychedelics are just one piece of the puzzle. Show Plants of the Gods: Hallucinogens, Healing, Culture and Conservation podcast, Ep Plants of the Gods: S4E2. Lots of Greek artifacts, lots of Greek signifiers. I am so fortunate to have been selected to present my thesis, "Mythology and Psychedelics: Taking the Pagan Continuity Hypothesis a Step Further" at. Not in every single case, obviously. We have an hour and a half together and I hope there will be time for Q&A and discussion. But things that sound intensely powerful. So how exactly is this evidence of something relevant to Christianity in Rome or southern Italy more widely? So I have my concerns about what's about to happen in Oregon and the regulation of psilocybin for therapeutic purposes. And for some reason, I mean, I'd read that two or three times as an undergrad and just glossed over that line. But what we do know about the wine of the time is that it was routinely mixed with plants and herbs and potentially fungi. And the second act, the same, but for what you call paleo-Christianity, the evidence for your suspicion that the Eucharist was originally a psychedelic sacrament. he goes out on a limb and says that black nightshade actually causes [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH], which is not unpleasant visions, i.e. But I don't hold-- I don't hang my hat on that claim. 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. But let me say at the outset that it is remarkably learned, full of great historical and philological detail. In this hypothesis, both widely accepted and widely criticized,11 'American' was synonymous with 'North American'. CHARLES STANG: Thank you, Brian. You won't find it in many places other than that. 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 anyone who drinks this, [SPEAKING GREEK], Jesus says in Greek, you remain in me and I in you. I go out of my way, in both parts of the book, which, it's divided into the history of beer and the history of wine, essentially. The continuity hypothesis of dreams suggests that the content of dreams are largely continuous with waking concepts and concerns of the dreamer. CHARLES STANG: Brian, I wonder if you could end by reflecting on the meaning of dying before you die. Copyright 2023 The President and Fellows of Harvard College, The Immortality Key: The Secret History of the Religion with No Name. You take a board corporate finance attorney, you add in lots of childhood hours watching Indiana Jones, lots of law school hours reading Dan Brown, you put it all together and out pops The Immortality Key. He draws on the theory of "pagan continuity," which holds that early Christianity adopted . And did the earliest Christians inherit the same secret tradition? Please materialize. And when you speak in that way, what I hear you saying is there is something going on. First, I will provide definitions for the terms "pagan", "Christian", Now the archaeologist of that site says-- I'm quoting from your book-- "For me, the Villa Vesuvio was a small farm that was specifically designed for the production of drugs." So why do you think psychedelics are so significant that they might usher in a new Reformation? Before I set forth the outline of this thesis, three topics must be discussed in order to establish a basic understanding of the religious terminology, Constantine's reign, and the contemporary sources. To become truly immortal, Campbell talks about entering into a sense of eternity, which is the infinite present here and now. But the next event in this series will happen sooner than that. And I feel like I accomplished that in the afterword to my book. OK-- maybe one of those ancient beers. And to be quite honest, I'd never studied the ancient Greeks in Spain. 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 If you die before you die, you won't die when you die. Tim Ferriss is a self-experimenter and bestselling author, best known for The 4-Hour Workweek, which has been translated into 40+ languages. Thank you all for joining us, and I hope to see many of you later this month for our next event. And that's not how it works today, and I don't think that's how it works in antiquity. And I got to say, there's not a heck of a lot of eye rolling, assuming people read my afterword and try to see how careful I am about delineating what is knowable and what is not and what this means for the future of religion. 8 "The winds, the sea . First, the continuity of the offices must be seen in light of the change of institutional charges; they had lost their religious connotations and had become secular. What does ergotized beer in Catalonia have anything to do with the Greek mysteries at Eleusis? So can you reflect for us where you really are and how you chose to write this book? And I think it's proof of concept-- just proof of concept-- for investing serious funding, and attention into the actual search for these kinds of potions. And so I cite a Pew poll, for example, that says something like 69% of American Catholics do not believe in transubstantiation, which is the defining dogma of the church, the idea that the bread and wine literally becomes the flesh and blood. This two-part discussion between Muraresku and Dr. Plotkin examines the role psychedelics have played in the development of Western civilization. Little attempt has been made, however, to bridge the gap between \"pagan\" and \"Christian\" or to examine late antique, Christian attitudes toward sexuality and marriage from the viewpoint of the \"average\" Christian. In this way, the two traditions coexisted in a syncretic form for some time before . would certainly appreciate. That event is already up on our website and open for registration. But we at least have, again, the indicia of evidence that something was happening there. And apparently, the book is on order, so I can't speak to this directly, but the ancient Greek text that preserves this liturgy also preserves the formula, the ingredients of the eye ointment. Again, if you're attracted to psychedelics, it's kind of an extreme thing, right? I took this to Greg [? I see a huge need and a demand for young religious clergy to begin taking a look at this stuff. I mean, I think the book makes it clear. So you were unable to test the vessels on site in Eleusis, which is what led you to, if I have this argument right, to Greek colonies around the Mediterranean. "The Jews" are not after Ye. 283. An actual spiked wine. And so for me, this was a hunt through the catacombs and archives and libraries, doing my sweet-talking, and trying to figure out what was behind some of those locked doors. And besides that, young Brian, let's keep the mysteries mysteries. I can't imagine that there were no Christians that availed themselves of this biotechnology, and I can't imagine-- it's entirely plausible to me that they would mix this biotechnology with the Eucharist. 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. BRIAN MURARESKU: Now we're cooking with grease, Dr. Stang. The continuity theory proposes that older adults maintain the same activities, behaviors, personalities, and relationships of the past. I mean, this really goes to my deep skepticism. We see lots of descriptions of this in the mystical literature with which you're very familiar. And I'm trying to reconcile that. And I answer it differently every single time. IMDb is the world's most popular and authoritative source for movie, TV and celebrity content. It's this 22-acre site of free-standing limestone, some rising 20 feet in the air, some weighing 50 tons. So let's talk about the future of religion, and specifically the future of Roman Catholicism. 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. I do the same thing in the afterword at the very end of the book, where it's lots of, here's what we know. According to Muraresku, this work, which "presents the pagan continuity hypothesis with a psychedelic twist," addresses two fundamental questions: "Before the rise of Christianity, did the Ancient Greeks consume a secret psychedelic sacrament during their most famous and well-attended religious rituals? Now, the great scholar of Greek religion, Walter Burkert, you quote him as musing, once-- and I'm going to quote him-- he says, "it may rather be asked, even without the prospect of a certain answer, whether the basis of the mysteries, they were prehistoric drug rituals, some festival imp of immortality which, through the expansion of consciousness, seemed to guarantee some psychedelic beyond." It's interesting that Saint Ignatius of Antioch, in the beginning of the second century AD, refers to the wine of the Eucharist as the [SPEAKING GREEK], the drug of immortality. What's significant about these features for our piecing together the ancient religion with no name?

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