pagan continuity hypothesis

And yet I talked to an atheist who has one experience with psilocybin and is immediately bathed in God's love. So. I'm going to stop asking my questions, although I have a million more, as you well know, and instead try to ventriloquist the questions that are coming through at quite a clip through the Q&A. But it was just a process of putting these pieces together that I eventually found this data from the site Mas Castellar des Pontos in Spain. Liked by Samuel Zuschlag. CHARLES STANG: Yeah. And we know the mysteries were there. That there is no hard archaeobotanical, archaeochemical data for spiked beer, spiked wine. BRIAN MURARESKU: Great question. . And I-- in my profession, we call this circumstantial, and I get it. That's just everlasting. 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. In the same place in and around Pompeii, this is where Christianity is really finding its roots. So why refrain? But the point being, the religion of brewing seems to pop up at the very beginning of civilization itself, or the very beginning of monumental engineering at this world's first sanctuary. 55 This is very likely as it seems that the process had already started in the 4th century. So listening right now, there's at least one orthodox priest, there's at least one Catholic priest, an Episcopalian, an Anglican, and several others with whom I've been talking in recent months. So here's a question for you. In my previous posts on the continuity hypothesis . I'm happy to be proven wrong. So throughout the book, you make the point that ancient beer and wine are not like our beer and wine. So what have you learned about the Eleusinian mysteries in particular since Ruck took this up, and what has convinced you that Ruck's hypothesis holds water? Others find it in different ways, but the common denominator seems to be one of these really well-curated near-death experiences. I was satisfied with I give Brian Muraresku an "A" for enthusiasm, but I gave his book 2 stars. And I wonder and I question how we can keep that and retain that for today. Is this only Marcus? The Immortality Key, The Secret History of the Religion With No Name. It's funny to see that some of the first basilicas outside Rome are popping up here, and in and around Pompeii. And the big question is, what is this thing doing there in the middle of nowhere? That to live on forever and ever, to live an everlasting life is not immortality. I would have been happy to find a spiked wine anywhere. OK, Brian, I invite you to join us now. So the Greek god of wine, intoxication. And Hofmann famously discovers-- or synthesizes LSD from ergot in 1938. It was-- Eleusis was state-administered, a somewhat formal affair. So I spent 12 years looking for that data, eventually found it, of all places, in Catalonia in Spain in this 635-page monograph that was published in 2002 and for one reason or another-- probably because it was written in Catalan-- was not widely reported to the academic community and went largely ignored. I took this to Greg [? This book by Brian Muraresku, attempts to answer this question by delving into the history of ancient secret religions dating back thousands of years. And her best guess is that it was like this open access sanctuary. But you go further still, suggesting that Jesus himself at the Last Supper might have administered psychedelic sacrament, that the original Eucharist was psychedelic. And what, if any, was the relationship between those ancient Greeks and the real religion of the earliest Christians, who might call the paleo-Christians. 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. And then that's the word that Euripides uses, by the way. I include that line for a reason. 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. I don't know why it's happening now, but we're finally taking a look. CHARLES STANG: All right. Thank you, sir. No, I think you-- this is why we're friends, Charlie. 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. Love potions, love charms, they're very common in the ancient. So I went fully down the rabbit hole. You obviously think these are powerful substances with profound effects that track with reality. So Plato, Pindar, Sophocles, all the way into Cicero, Marcus Aurelius, it's an important thing. He's joining us from Uruguay, where he has wisely chosen to spend his pandemic isolation. Joe Campbell puts it best that what we're after is an experience of being alive. So your presentation of early Christianity inclines heavily toward the Greek world. I might forward the proposition that I don't think the early church fathers were the best botanists. And when we know so much about ancient wine and how very different it was from the wine of today, I mean, what can we say about the Eucharist if we're only looking at the texts? Did the ancient Greeks use drugs to find God? The book proposes a history of religious ritualistic psychedelic use at least as old as the ancient Greek mystery religions, especially those starting in Eleusis and dating to roughly 2,000 BC. In fact, he found beer, wine, and mead all mixed together in a couple of different places. I'm not sure where it falls. It was the Jesuits who taught me Latin and Greek. He's talking about kind of psychedelic wine. He co-writes that with Gordon Wasson and Albert Hofmann, who famously-- there it is, the three authors. Now, I mentioned that Brian and I had become friends. This two-part discussion between Muraresku and Dr. Plotkin examines the role psychedelics have played in the development of Western civilization. The continuity hypothesis of dreams suggests that the content of dreams are largely continuous with waking concepts and concerns of the dreamer. 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 improving I also sense another narrative in your book, and one you've flagged for us, maybe about 10 minutes ago, when you said that the book is a proof of concept. What was discovered, as far as I can tell, from your treatment of it, is essentially an ancient pharmacy in this house. 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. The universality of frontiers, however, made the hypothesis readily extendable to other parts of the globe. Now, that date is obviously very suggestive because that's precisely the time the Christians were establishing a beachhead in Rome. I think the wine certainly does. And I want to-- just like you have this hard evidence from Catalonia, then the question is how to interpret it. A profound knowledge of visionary plants, herbs, and fungi passed from one generation to the next, ever since the Stone Age? 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. These were Greek-- I've seen them referred to as Greek Vikings by Peter Kingsley, Vikings who came from Ionia. It seems entirely believable to me that we have a potion maker active near Pompeii. I mean, so it was Greek. But I think the broader question of what's the reception to this among explicitly religious folk and religious leaders? And as a lawyer, I know what is probative and what's circumstantial evidence, and I just-- I don't see it there. Interesting. Which turns out, it may be they were. There's a moment in the book where you are excited about some hard evidence. So the big question is, what kind of drug was this, if it was a drug? And I think that that's the real question here. And what we find at this farmhouse is a sanctuary that Enriqueta Pons herself, the archaeologist who's been on site since 1990, she calls it some kind of sanctuary dedicated to the goddesses of the mysteries. #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 The most colorful theory of psychedelics in religion portrays the original Santa Claus as a shaman. CHARLES STANG: Brian, I wonder if you could end by reflecting on the meaning of dying before you die. Here's the proof of concept. Because every time I think about ancient wine, I am now immediately thinking about wine that is spiked. So I think this was a minority of early Christians. But they charge Marcus specifically, not with a psychedelic Eucharist, but the use of a love potion. 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? CHARLES STANG: All right. That would require an entirely different kind of evidence. 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. BRIAN MURARESKU: Right. 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. The Continuity Hypothesis was put forward by John Bowlby (1953) as a critical effect of attachments in his development of Attachment Theory. What the Greeks were actually saying there is that it was barley infected with ergot, which is this natural fungus that infects cereal crops. But what I hear from people, including atheists, like Dina Bazer, who participated in these Hopkins NYU trials is that she felt like on her one and only dose of psilocybin that she was bathed in God's love. And according to Wasson, Hofmann, and Ruck, that barley was really a code word. And we had a great chat, a very spirited chat about the mysteries and the psychedelic hypothesis. BRIAN MURARESKU: I'm bringing more illumination. CHARLES STANG: I do, too. Just imagine, I have to live with me. Certainly these early churchmen used whatever they could against the forms of Christian practice they disapproved of, especially those they categorized as Gnostic. That's the promise in John's gospel, in John 6:54-55, that I quote in the book. 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? 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 . 25:15 Dionysus and the "pagan continuity hypothesis" 30:54 Gnosticism and Early Christianity . CHARLES STANG: Thank you, Brian. 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. 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. Psychedelics are a lens to investigate this stuff. I see it as-- well, OK, I'd see it as within a minority. 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. 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. The fact that the Vatican sits in Rome today is not an accident, I think, is the shortest way to answer that. 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 . McGovern also finds wine from Egypt, for example, in 3150 BC, wine that is mixed with a number of interesting ingredients. Where are the drugs? Do you think that the Christians as a nascent cult adapted a highly effective psycho technology that was rattling . So, I mean, my biggest question behind all of this is, as a good Catholic boy, is the Eucharist. So I see-- you're moving back and forth between these two. So there's lots of interesting details here that filter through. But the point being, if the Dionysian wine was psychedelic-- which I know is a big if-- I think the more important thing to show here in this pagan continuity hypothesis is that it's at least plausible that the earliest Christians would have at the very least read the Gospel of John and interpreted that paleo-Christian Eucharistic wine, in some communities, as a kind of Dionysian wine. I would love to see these licensed, regulated, retreat centers be done in a way that is medically sound and scientifically rigorous. First act is your evidence for psychedelics among the so-called pagan religions in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East. So after the whole first half of the book-- well, wait a minute, Dr. Stang. He draws on the theory of "pagan continuity," which holds that early Christianity adopted . So somewhere between 1% and 49%. You know, it's an atheist using theological language to describe what happened to her. So the Eastern Aegean. But I do want to push back a little bit on the elevation of this particular real estate in southern Italy. Although she's open to testing, there was nothing there. So at the very-- after the first half of the book is over, there's an epilogue, and I say, OK, here's the evidence. We're going to get there very soon. Up until that point I really had very little knowledge of psychedelics, personal or literary or otherwise. And again, it survives, I think, because of that state support for the better part of 2,000 years. Now, I don't put too much weight into that. And so how far should this investigation go? And I describe that as somehow finding that key to immortality. And Dennis, amongst others, calls that a signature Dionysian miracle. I'm not. And when you speak in that way, what I hear you saying is there is something going on. But it survives. He was greatly influenced by Sigmund Freud (1940) who viewed an infant's first relationship - usually with the mother - as "the prototype of all later love-relations". And Brian, once again, thank you so much. So I have my concerns about what's about to happen in Oregon and the regulation of psilocybin for therapeutic purposes. And at some point in my narrative, I do include mention of Gobekli Tepe, for example, which is essentially twice the age of Stonehenge. And there are legitimate scholars out there who say, because John wanted to paint Jesus in the light of Dionysus, present him as the second coming of this pagan God. CHARLES STANG: We've really read Jesus through the lens of his Greek inheritors. So how exactly is this evidence of something relevant to Christianity in Rome or southern Italy more widely? 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. But with what were they mixed, and to what effect? 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. BRIAN MURARESKU: Now we're cooking with grease, Dr. Stang. If beer was there that long ago, what kind of beer was it? BRIAN MURARESKU: Right. And part of me really wants to put all these pieces together before I dive in. He decides to get people even more drunk. That's how we get to Catalonia. General Stanley McChrystal Mastering Risk: A User's Guide | Brought to you by Kettle & Fire high quality, tasty, and conveniently packaged bone broths; Eight Sleep. They were mixed or fortified. Reviewed in the United States on January 29, 2023 Throughout his five books he talks about wine being mixed with all kinds of stuff, like frankincense and myrrh, relatively innocuous stuff, but also less innocuous things like henbane and mandrake, these solanaceous plants which he specifically says is fatal. So now it's true that these heresy hunters show an interest in this love potion. 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 performers from eclectic areas (investing, chess, pro sports, etc . Just from reading Dioscorides and reading all the different texts, the past 12 years have absolutely transformed the way I think about wine. 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. That they were what you call extreme beverages. And the one thing that unites both of those worlds in this research called the pagan continuity hypothesis, the one thing we can bet on is the sacred language of Greek. 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. What about all these early Christians themselves as essentially Jews? CHARLES STANG: OK, great. And I think sites like this have tended to be neglected in scholarship, or published in languages like Catalan, maybe Ukrainian, where it just doesn't filter through the academic community. So Pompeii and its environs at the time were called [SPEAKING GREEK], which means great Greece. So there's a whole slew of sites I want to test there. Let me just pull up my notes here. And this is at a time when we're still hunting and gathering. 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. On Monday, February 22, we will be hosting a panel discussion taking up the question what is psychedelic chaplaincy. I mean, this really goes to my deep skepticism. They did not. But I'm pressing you because that's my job. I was not going to put a book out there that was sensationalist. What does it mean to die before dying? So if Eleusis is the Fight Club of the ancient world, right, the first rule is you don't talk about it. There's some suggestive language in the pyramid texts, in the Book of the Dead and things of this nature. And did the earliest Christians inherit the same secret tradition? So I point to that evidence as illustrative of the possibility that the Christians could, in fact, have gotten their hands on an actual wine. 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. Thank you all for joining us, and I hope to see many of you later this month for our next event. And very famous passages, by the way, that should be familiar to most New Testament readers. And that's what I get into in detail in the book. There's no mistake in her mind that it was Greek. What does ergotized beer in Catalonia have anything to do with the Greek mysteries at Eleusis? 8 "The winds, the sea . I understand the appeal of that. 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.

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