Ancient European and Middle Eastern Psychedelic Drug Use – an Interview With Alan Piper (Excerpt)
Ancient European and Middle Eastern Psychedelic drug use – An Interview with Alan Piper (excerpt) – What evidence is there of Amanita muscaria mushroom and other drug use in Afghanistan? Did the Sufi employ psychoactive substances? What are the Moroccan goat men? Is there a possible link between intoxicating sacramental use of milk and Mohammed’s landmark visionary experience through the seven heavens? How does the new evidence of prehistoric mushroom use in Europe affect current academic arguments against such use? Is there a link to the word ‘marihuana’ and the Chinese language? My guest is the British independent scholar Alan Piper – an expert on psychoactive substances in ancient religions. In this two part series we’ll be discussing Zoroastrianism, Sufism, Amanita muscaria – the fly-agaric mushroom, intoxicating milk and meat, new evidence of prehistoric mushroom use in Europe, the origins of the word “marihuana,” and much more. [Photo of Alan Piper and Prof. Carl AP Ruck at Cuenca, Spain, 2008] Alan Piper was born in 1953 and like many others of his generation encountered psychedelic culture in his teenage years. His father undertook psychloytic therapy in the 1950s and so Alan grew up with the likes of Aldous Huxley and Henri Michaux on the family bookshelves, which were a point of reference for him in his own encounters with the psychedelic experience. Again, like many others of his generation, he moved away from psychedelics and into an exploration of eastern religions and hermetic philosophies, looking for a context for his entheogenic experiences. Laid off …
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Filed under: Indiana Drug Abuse
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Filed under: Indiana Drug Abuse
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