Glory
Agamben analyzes the important practice and figure of the acclimation, drawing on research
by Peterson, Kantorowicz, and others in which they see a parallel between political ceremony
and ecclesiastical liturgy.42 Agamben says that Peterson, in his dissertation, had studied the
history of the ceremonial aspects of power and public right, ‛a sort of political archaeology of
liturgy and of protocol... ’archaeology of glory’.‛43 The acclimation is an exclamation of laud
or disapproval, and a performative utterance that could have juridical significance, as in the
Roman republican troops who accorded their victorious commander the title of Emperor. It
was accompanied by gestures such as raising the right hand.
Peterson argues that the acclamation carries power because it expresses the consensus
of the people, and a number of commentators write about the connection between people and
acclamation. Peterson holds that the acclamation and the doxological liturgies express the
juridical and public character of the people, while for Schmitt the acclamation is an immediate
expression of the people as constituent democratic power. Following Kantorowicz, Agamben
writes that the ‛imperial ceremony of pagan Rome was progressively ‘litanized’ and trans-
formed into a type of divine service, of which acclamations were an integral part.‛44
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Elena: This aspect of acclamation gives legitimacy and approval from the people to the authority whichever it might be. In cults and dictatorships as much as in artist’s “fans”, it has the ingredient of “fanatism”
Fanaticism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Fanatic" redirects here. For the television series, see FANatic. For the film, see Fanatic (1965 film).
"Fanatical" redirects here. For the TV documentary series, see FANatical.
This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations.
Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations where appropriate. (April 2009)
Fanaticism is a belief or behavior involving uncritical zeal, particularly for an extreme religious or political cause or in some cases sports, or with an obsessive enthusiasm for a pastime or hobby. Philosopher George Santayana defines fanaticism as "redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim"[1]; according to Winston Churchill, "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject". By either description the fanatic displays very strict standards and little tolerance for contrary ideas or opinions.
In his book "Crazy Talk, Stupid Talk", Neil Postman states that "the key to all fanatical beliefs is that they are self-confirming....(some beliefs are) fanatical not because they are 'false', but because they are expressed in such a way that they can never be shown to be false."[2]
The behavior of a fan with overwhelming enthusiasm for a given subject is differentiated from the behavior of a fanatic by the fanatic's violation of prevailing social norms. Though the fan's behavior may be judged as odd or eccentric, it does not violate such norms.[3] A fanatic differs from a crank, in that a crank is defined as a person who holds a position or opinion which is so far from the norm as to appear ludicrous and/or probably wrong, such as a belief in a Flat Earth. In contrast, the subject of the fanatic's obsession may be "normal", such as an interest in religion or politics, except that the scale of the person's involvement, devotion, or obsession with the activity or cause is abnormal or disproportionate.
0.Consumer fanaticism - the level of involvement or interest one has in the liking of a particular person, group, trend, artwork or idea.
0.Religious fanaticism - considered by some to be the most extreme form of religious fundamentalism. Entail promoting religious (theistic) views.
0.Ethnic or racial supremacist fanaticism.
0.Nationalistic or patriotic fanaticism.
0.Political, ideological fanaticism.
0.Emotional fanaticism.
0.Leisure fanaticism - high levels of intensity, enthusiasm, commitment and zeal shown for a particular leisure activity.
0.Sports fanaticism - high levels of intensity surrounding sporting events. This is either done based on the belief that extreme fanaticism can alter games for one's favorite team (Ex: Knight Krew)[4], or because the person uses sports activities as an ultra-masculine "proving ground" for brawls, as in the case of football hooliganism.
[edit]
See also
| | Look up fanaticism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
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Elena: I would also like to place the meaning of enthusiasm connected with that of acclamation, glory and fanatism as different aspects of the same emotional experience and connect it to the ego and its aspect of vanity and the self and its aspect of dignity.
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Enthusiasm
Enthusiasm originally meant inspiration or possession by a divine afflatus or by the presence of a god. Johnson's Dictionary, the first comprehensive dictionary of the English language, defines enthusiasm as "a vain belief of private revelation; a vain confidence of divine favour or communication." In current English vernacular the word simply means intense enjoyment, interest, or approval.
Contents [hide]
1 Historical usage
2 Modern usage
3 See also
4 References
5 Further reading
6 External links
[edit]Historical usage
Originally, an enthusiast was a person possessed by a god. Applied by the Greeks to manifestations of divine possession, by Apollo (as in the case of the Pythia), or by Dionysus (as in the case of the Bacchantes and Maenads), the term enthusiasm was also used in a transferred or figurative sense. Socrates taught that the inspiration of poets is a form of enthusiasm.
Its uses were confined to a belief in religious inspiration, or to intense religious fervour or emotion. Thus, a Syrian sect of the 4th century was known as the Enthusiasts. They believed that "by perpetual prayer, ascetic practices and contemplation, man could become inspired by the Holy Spirit, in spite of the ruling evil spirit, which the fall had given to him". From their belief in the efficacy of prayer, they were also known as Euchites.
Several Protestant sects of the 16th and 17th centuries were called enthusiastic. During the years that immediately followed the Glorious Revolution, "enthusiasm" was a British pejorative term for advocacy of any political or religious cause in public. Such "enthusiasm" was seen in the time around 1700 as the cause of the previous century's English Civil War and its attendant atrocities, and thus it was an absolute social sin to remind others of the war by engaging in enthusiasm. The Royal Society bylaws stipulated that any person discussing religion or politics at a Society meeting was to be summarily ejected for being an "enthusiast."[citation needed] During the 18th century, popular Methodists such as John Wesley or George Whitefield were accused of blind enthusiasm (i.e. fanaticism), a charge against which they defended themselves by distinguishing fanaticism from "religion of the heart."
[edit]Modern usage
In contemporary usage, enthusiasm has lost its meaning that someone is over excited and interrerible.
The Enthusiast also refers to the "Type Seven" personality type (not to be confused with the "Type Three"/"Type A" personality) (Daniels & Price 2000). Some who fall into this modern definition of "enthusiasts" are adventurous, constantly busy with many activities with all the energy and enthusiasm of the Puer Aeternus (Peter Pan Complex). At their best they grab life for its different joys and wonders and truly live in the moment but, at their worst, they dash trepidatiously from one new endeavor to another, too scared of disappointment to actually enjoy themselves. Enthusiasts fear being incapable to provide for themselves or to experience life fully.
The term is sometimes used to describe the demeanor of fans of various activities or organizations, ranging from hunting aficionados to wine lovers.
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Elena: I would also like to include here the meaning of entheogen which connects us to a whole other aspect of the emotion of glory but we must note the connectedness between “glory” “acclamation” “enthusiasm” and “entheogen” as “being in God” and the overall relation to the sphere of “being” or “the self”. The “being in God” or the “dimension of the divine” present in the “glorious”.
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Entheogen
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Chemical structure of mescaline, the primary psychoactive compound in peyote.
An entheogen ("God inside us,"[4] en εν- "in, within," theo θεος- "god, divine," -gen γενος "creates, generates"), in the strict sense, is a psychoactive substance used in a religious, psychotherapeutic, shamanic, or spiritual context. Historically, entheogens were mostly derived from plant sources and have been used in a variety of traditional religious contexts. With the advent of organic chemistry, there now exist many synthetic substances with similar psychoactive properties, many derived from these plants. Entheogens can supplement many diverse practices for healing, transcendence, and revelation, including: meditation, psychonautics, art projects, and psychedelic therapy.
Entheogens have been used in a ritualized context for thousands of years; their religious significance is well established in anthropological and modern evidences. Examples of traditional entheogens include: kykeon, ambrosia, iboga, soma, peyote, bufotenine, and ayahuasca. Other traditional entheogens include cannabis, ethanol, ergine, psilocybe mushrooms, and opium. Many pure active compounds with psychoactive properties have been isolated from organisms and chemically synthesized, including LSD, mescaline, psilocin/psilocybin, DMT, salvinorin A and ibogaine.[5] Entheogens may be compounded through the work of a shaman or apothecary in a tea, admixture, or potion like ayahuasca or bhang.
More broadly, the term entheogen is used to refer to any psychoactive substances when used for their religious or spiritual effects, whether or not in a formal religious or traditional structure. This terminology is often chosen to contrast with recreational use of the same substances. Studies such as the Marsh Chapel Experiment have documented reports of spiritual experiences from participants who were administered psychoactive substances in controlled trials.[6] Ongoing research is limited due to widespread drug prohibition, however some countries have legislation that allows for traditional entheogen use.
Contents [hide]
1 Etymology
2 Species
3 Archaeological record
4 Classical mythology and cults
5 Judaism and Christianity
6 Cultural use
6.1 Africa
6.2 Americas
6.3 Asia
6.4 Europe
6.5 Middle East
6.6 Oceania
7 Research
8 In literature
9 References
10 Further reading
11 External links
[edit]Etymology
The neologism entheogen was coined in 1979 by a group of ethnobotanists and scholars of mythology (Carl A. P. Ruck, Jeremy Bigwood, Danny Staples, Richard Evans Schultes, Jonathan Ott and R. Gordon Wasson). The literal meaning of the word is "that which causes God to be within an individual". The translation "creating the divine within" is sometimes given, but entheogen implies neither that something is created nor that that which is experienced is within the user.
The term is derived from two words of ancient Greek, ἔνθεος (entheos) and γενέσθαι (genesthai). The adjective entheos translates to English as "full of the god, inspired, possessed," and is the root of the English word "enthusiasm." The Greeks used it as a term of praise for poets and other artists. Genesthai means "to come into being." Thus, an entheogen is a substance that causes one to become inspired or to experience feelings of inspiration, often in a religious or "spiritual" manner.
Since the experience originates from an external source, the "divine within" can be illustrated as an absorption or collection of divine, rather than a creation that originates within the person. In other words, an entheogen is something that fills someone with god. Given the broad scope of this statement, it can be argued that the word should be inclusive of substances, objects, and/or experiences beyond psychoactives.
Entheogen was coined as a replacement for the terms hallucinogen and psychedelic. Hallucinogen was popularized by Aldous Huxley's experiences with mescaline, which were published as The Doors of Perception in 1954. Psychedelic, on the other hand, is a Greek neologism for "mind manifest", and was coined by psychiatrist Humphry Osmond; Aldous Huxley was a volunteer in experiments Osmond was conducting on mescaline.
Ruck et al. argued that the term hallucinogen was inappropriate due to its etymological relationship to words relating to delirium and insanity. The term psychedelic was also seen as problematic, due to the similarity in sound to words pertaining to psychosis and also due to the fact that it had become irreversibly associated with various connotations of 1960s pop culture. In modern usage entheogen may be used synonymously with these terms, or it may be chosen to contrast with recreational use of the same substances. The meanings of the term entheogen were formally defined by Ruck et al.:
In a strict sense, only those vision-producing drugs that can be shown to have figured in shamanic or religious rites would be designated entheogens, but in a looser sense, the term could also be applied to other drugs, both natural and artificial, that induce alterations of consciousness similar to those documented for ritual ingestion of traditional entheogens.[7]
[edit]Species
Main article: List of entheogens
Essentially all psychoactive drugs that are naturally occurring in plants, fungi, or animals, can be used in an entheogenic context or with enthogenic intent. Since non-psychoactive drugs can also be used in this type of context, the term "entheogen" refers primarily to substances that have been categorized based on their historical use. Toxicity does not affect a substance's inclusion (some can kill humans), nor does effectiveness or potency (if a substance is psychoactive, and it has been used in a historical context, then the required dose has also been found).
[edit]Archaeological record
See also: Entheogenic drugs and the archaeological record
R. Gordon Wasson and Giorgio Samorini have proposed several examples of the cultural use of entheogens that are found in the archaeological record.[8][9] Evidence for the first use of entheogens may come from Tassili, Algeria, with a cave painting of a mushroom-man, dating to 8000 BP. Hemp seeds discovered by archaeologists at Pazyryk suggest early ceremonial practices by the Scythians occurred during the 5th to 2nd century BC, confirming previous historical reports by Herodotus.
[edit]Classical mythology and cults
Although entheogens are taboo and most of them are officially prohibited in Christian and Islamic societies, their ubiquity and prominence in the spiritual traditions of various other cultures is unquestioned. The entheogen, "the spirit, for example, need not be chemical, as is the case with the ivy and the olive: and yet the god was felt to be within them; nor need its possession be considered something detrimental, like drugged, hallucinatory, or delusionary: but possibly instead an invitation to knowledge or whatever good the god's spirit had to offer." (Ruck and Staples)
Most of the well-known modern examples, such as peyote, psilocybe and other psychoactive mushrooms and ololiuhqui, are from the native cultures of the Americas. However, it has also been suggested that entheogens played an important role in ancient Indo-European culture, for example by inclusion in the ritual preparations of the Soma, the "pressed juice" that is the subject of Book 9 of the Rig Veda. Soma was ritually prepared and drunk by priests and initiates and elicited a paean in the Rig Veda that embodies the nature of an entheogen:
Splendid by Law! declaring Law, truth speaking, truthful in thy works, Enouncing faith, King Soma!... O [Soma] Pavāmana (mind clarifying), place me in that deathless, undecaying world wherein the light of heaven is set, and everlasting lustre shines.... Make me immortal in that realm where happiness and transports, where joy and felicities combine...
The Kykeon that preceded initiation into the Eleusinian Mysteries is another entheogen, which was investigated (before the word was coined) by Carl Kerényi, in Eleusis: Archetypal Image of Mother and Daughter. Other entheogens in the Ancient Near East and the Aegean include the poppy, Datura, and the unidentified "lotus" eaten by the Lotus-Eaters in the Odyssey and Narkissos.
According to Ruck, Eyan, and Staples, the familiar shamanic entheogen that the Indo-Europeans brought with them was knowledge of the wild Amanita mushroom. It could not be cultivated; thus it had to be found, which suited it to a nomadic lifestyle. When they reached the world of the Caucasus and the Aegean, the Indo-Europeans encountered wine, the entheogen of Dionysus, who brought it with him from his birthplace in the mythical Nysa, when he returned to claim his Olympian birthright. The Indo-European proto-Greeks "recognized it as the entheogen of Zeus, and their own traditions of shamanism, the Amanita and the 'pressed juice' of Soma — but better since no longer unpredictable and wild, the way it was found among the Hyperboreans: as befit their own assimilation of agrarian modes of life, the entheogen was now cultivable" (Ruck and Staples). Robert Graves, in his foreword to The Greek Myths, hypothesises that the Ambrosia of various pre-Hellenic tribes were amanita (which, based on the morphological similarity of the words amanita, amrita and ambrosia, is entirely plausible) and perhaps panaeolus mushrooms.
Amanita was divine food, according to Ruck and Staples, not something to be indulged in or sampled lightly, not something to be profaned. It was the food of the gods, their ambrosia, and it mediated between the two realms. It is said that Tantalus's crime was inviting commoners to share his ambrosia.
The entheogen is believed to offer godlike powers in many traditional tales, including immortality. The failure of Gilgamesh in retrieving the plant of immortality from beneath the waters teaches that the blissful state cannot be taken by force or guile: when Gilgamesh lay on the bank, exhausted from his heroic effort, the serpent came and ate the plant.
Another attempt at subverting the natural order is told in a (according to some) strangely metamorphosed myth, in which natural roles have been reversed to suit the Hellenic world-view. The Alexandrian Apollodorus relates how Gaia (spelled "Ge" in the following passage), Mother Earth herself, has supported the Titans in their battle with the Olympian intruders. The Giants have been defeated:
When Ge learned of this, she sought a drug that would prevent their destruction even by mortal hands. But Zeus barred the appearance of Eos (the Dawn), Selene (the Moon), and Helios (the Sun), and chopped up the drug himself before Ge could find it.
[edit]Judaism and Christianity
See also: Psychology of religion
According to The Living Torah, cannabis was an ingredient of holy anointing oil mentioned in various sacred Hebrew texts.[10] The herb of interest is most commonly known as kaneh-bosm (Hebrew: קְנֵה-בֹשֶׂם). This is mentioned several times in the Old Testament as a bartering material, incense, and an ingredient in holy anointing oil used by the high priest of the temple. Although Chris Bennett's research in this area focuses on cannabis, he mentions evidence suggesting use of additional visionary plants such as henbane, as well.[11]
The Septuagint translates kaneh-bosm as calamus, and this translation has been propagated unchanged to most later translations of the old testament. However, Polish anthropologist Sula Benet published etymological arguments that the Aramaic word for hemp can be read as kannabos and appears to be a cognate to the modern word 'cannabis',[12] with the root kan meaning reed or hemp and bosm meaning fragrant. Both cannabis and calamus are fragrant, reedlike plants containing psychotropic compounds.
In his research, Professor Dan Merkur points to significant evidence of an awareness within the Jewish mystical tradition recognizing manna as an entheogen, thereby substantiating with rabbinic texts theories advanced by the superficial biblical interpretations of Terence McKenna, R. Gordon Wasson and other ethnomycologists.
Although philologist John Marco Allegro has suggested that the self-revelation and healing abilities attributed to the figure of Jesus may have been associated with the effects of the plant medicines [from the Aramaic: "to heal"], this evidence is dependent on pre-Septuagint interpretation of Torah and Tenach. Allegro was the only non-Catholic appointed to the position of translating the Dead Sea scrolls. His extrapolations are often the object of scorn due to Allegro's non-mainstream theory of Jesus as a mythological personification of the essence of a "psychoactive sacrament". Furthermore they conflict with the position of the Catholic Church in regards to transubstantiation and the teaching involving valid matter, form, and substance — that of bread and wine (bread does not contain psychoactive substances, but wine contains ethanol). Allegro's book, The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross, relates the development of language to the development of myths, religions and cultic practices in world cultures. Allegro believed he could prove, through etymology, that the roots of Christianity, as of many other religions, lay in fertility cults; and that cult practices, such as ingesting visionary plants (or "psychedelics") to perceive the mind of God [Avestan: Vohu Mana], persisted into the early Christian era, and to some unspecified extent into the 13th century with reoccurrences in the 18th century and mid 20th century, as he interprets the Plaincourault chapel's fresco to be an accurate depiction of the ritual ingestion of Amanita muscaria as the Eucharist.
The historical picture portrayed by the Entheos journal is of fairly widespread use of visionary plants in early Christianity and the surrounding culture, with a gradual reduction of use of entheogens in Christianity.[13] R. Gordon Wasson's book Soma prints a letter from art historian Erwin Panofsky asserting that art scholars are aware of many 'mushroom trees' in Christian art.[14]
The question of the extent of visionary plant use throughout the history of Christian practice has barely been considered yet by academic or independent scholars. The question of whether visionary plants were used in pre-Theodosius Christianity is distinct from evidence that indicates the extent to which visionary plants were utilized or forgotten in later Christianity, including so-called "heretical" or "quasi-" Christian groups,[15] and the question of other groups such as elites or laity within "orthodox" Catholic practice.[16]
Daniel Merkur at the University of Toronto contends that a minority of Christian hermits and mystics could possibly have used entheogens, in conjunction with fasting, meditation and prayer.[citation needed]
[edit]Cultural use
Entheogens have been used in various ways, including as part of established religions, secularly for personal spiritual development as tools (or "plant teachers") to augment the mind,[17][18] secularly as recreational drugs, and for medical and therapeutic use. The use of entheogens in human cultures is nearly ubiquitous throughout recorded history.
Naturally occurring entheogens such as psilocybin and dimethyltryptamine, also known as N,N-dimethyltryptamine, or simply DMT (in the preparation ayahuasca) were, for the most part, discovered and used by older cultures, as part of their spiritual and religious life, as plants and agents which were respected, or in some cases revered for generations and may be a tradition which predates all modern religions as a sort of proto-religious rite.
One of the most widely used entheogens is cannabis, which has been used in regions such as China, Europe, and India; in some cases, for thousands of years. It has also appeared as a part of religions and cultures such as the Rastafari movement, the Sadhus of Hinduism, the Scythians, Sufi Islam, and others. For additional information, see Religious and spiritual use of cannabis.
[edit]Africa
The best-known entheogen-using culture of Africa is the Bwitists, who used a preparation of the root bark of Iboga (Tabernanthe iboga).[19] A famous entheogen of ancient Egypt is the blue lotus (Nymphaea caerulea). There is evidence for the use of entheogenic mushrooms in Côte d'Ivoire (Samorini 1995). Numerous other plants used in shamanic ritual in Africa, such as Silene capensis sacred to the Xhosa, are yet to be investigated by western science.
[edit]Americas
See also: Aztec use of entheogens
Entheogens have played a pivotal role in the spiritual practices of most American cultures for millennia. The first American entheogen to be subject to scientific analysis was the peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii). For his part, one of the founders of modern ethno-botany, the late Richard Evans Schultes of Harvard University documented the ritual use of peyote cactus among the Kiowa who live in what became Oklahoma. Used traditionally by many cultures of what is now Mexico, its use spread to throughout North America in the 19th century, replacing the toxic entheogen Sophora secundiflora (mescal bean). Other well-known entheogens used by Mexican cultures include psilocybin mushrooms (known to indigenous Mexicans under the Náhuatl name teonanácatl), the seeds of several morning glories (Náhuatl: tlitlíltzin and ololiúhqui) and Salvia divinorum (Mazateco: Ska Pastora; Náhuatl: pipiltzintzíntli).
Urarina shaman, 1988
Indigenous peoples of South America employ a wide variety of entheogens. Better-known examples include ayahuasca (Banisteriopsis caapi plus admixtures) among indigenous peoples (such as the Urarina) of Peruvian Amazonia. Other well-known entheogens include: borrachero (Brugmansia spp); San Pedro (Trichocereus spp); and various tryptamine-bearing snuffs, for example Epená (Virola spp), Vilca and Yopo (Anadananthera spp). The familiar tobacco plant, when used uncured in large doses in shamanic contexts, also serves as an entheogen in South America. Also, a tobacco that contains higher nicotine content, and therefore smaller doses required, called Nicotiana rustica was commonly used.[citation needed]
In addition to indigenous use of entheogens in the Americas, one should also note their important role in contemporary religious movements, such as the Rastafari movement and the Church of the Universe.
[edit]Asia
The indigenous peoples of Siberia (from whom the term shaman was appropriated) have used the fly agaric mushroom (Amanita muscaria) as an entheogen.
In Hinduism, Datura stramonium and Cannabis have been used in religious ceremonies, although the religious use of Datura is not very common, as the primary alkaloids are strong deliriants, which causes serious intoxication with unpredictable effects.
Also, the ancient inebriant Soma, mentioned often in the Vedas, appears to be consistent with the effects of an entheogen. (In his 1967 book, Wasson argues that Soma was fly agaric. The active ingredient of Soma is presumed by some to be ephedrine, an alkaloid with stimulant and (somewhat debatable) entheogenic properties derived from the soma plant, identified as Ephedra pachyclada.) However, there are also arguments to suggest that Soma could have also been Syrian Rue, Cannabis, Belladonna or some combination of any of the above plants.
[edit]Europe
An early entheogen in Aegean civilization, predating the introduction of wine, which was the more familiar entheogen of the reborn Dionysus and the maenads, was fermented honey, known in Northern Europe as mead; its cult uses in the Aegean world are bound up with the mythology of the bee.
The growth of Roman Christianity also saw the end of the two-thousand-year-old tradition of the Eleusinian Mysteries, the initiation ceremony for the cult of Demeter and Persephone involving the use of a substance consistent with an entheogenic known as kykeon (the term 'Ambrosia' is used in Greek mythology in a way that is remarkably similar to the Soma of the Hindus as well). Similarly, there is some evidence that nitrous oxide or ethylene or some other psychoactive may have been in part responsible for the visions of the equally long-lived Delphic oracle (Hale et al., 2003).
In ancient Germanic culture cannabis was associated with the Germanic love goddess Freya. The harvesting of the plant was connected with an erotic high festival. It was believed that Freya lived as a fertile force in the plant's feminine flowers and by ingesting them one became influenced by this divine force. Similarly, fly agaric was consecrated to Odin, the god of ecstasy, while henbane stood under the dominion of the thunder god - Thor in Germanic mythology - and Jupiter among the Romans (Rätsch 2003).
[edit]Middle East
It has been suggested that the ritual use of small amounts of Syrian Rue is an artifact of its ancient use in higher doses as an entheogen (possibly in conjunction with DMT containing acacia).[citation needed]
Philologist John Marco Allegro has argued in his book The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross that early Jewish and Christian cultic practice was based on the use of Amanita muscaria which was later forgotten by its adherents, and this hypothesis is gaining momentum with the advent of The Internet. Allegro's hypothesis that Amanita use was forgotten after primitive Christianity seems contradicted by his own view that the chapel in Plaincourault shows evidence of Christian Amanita use in the 13th century.[20]
[edit]Oceania
Indigenous Australians are generally thought not to have used entheogens, although there is a strong barrier of secrecy surrounding Aboriginal shamanism, which has likely limited what has been told to outsiders. A plant which the Australian Aboriginals used to ingest is called "Pitcheri", which is said to have a similar effect to that of coca. "Pitcheri" was made from the bark of the shrub Duboisia myoporoides. This plant is now grown commercially and is processed to manufacture an eye medication. There are no known uses of entheogens by the Māori of New Zealand aside from a variant species of Kava.[21] Natives of Papua New Guinea are known to use several species of entheogenic mushrooms (Psilocybe spp, Boletus manicus).[22]
Kava or Kava Kava (Piper Methysticum) has been cultivated for at least 3000 years by a number of Pacific island-dwelling peoples. Historically, most Polynesian, many Melanesian, and some Micronesian cultures have ingested the psychoactive pulverized root, typically taking it mixed with water. Much traditional usage of Kava, though somewhat suppressed by Christian missionaries in the 19th and 20th centuries, is thought to facilitate contact with the spirits of the dead, especially relatives and ancestors (Singh 2004).
[edit]Research
Mandala-like round window above the altar at Boston University's Marsh Chapel, site of Marsh Chapel Experiment
Notable early testing of the entheogenic experience includes the Marsh Chapel Experiment, conducted by physician and theology doctoral candidate, Walter Pahnke, under the supervision of Timothy Leary and the Harvard Psilocybin Project. In this double-blind experiment, volunteer graduate school divinity students from the Boston area almost all claimed to have had profound religious experiences subsequent to the ingestion of pure psilocybin. In 2006, a more rigorously controlled experiment was conducted at Johns Hopkins University, and yielded similar results.[6] To date there is little peer-reviewed research on this subject, due to ongoing drug prohibition and the difficulty of getting approval from institutional review boards.
[edit]In literature
Many works of literature have described entheogen use; some of those are:
The substance melange (spice) in Frank Herbert's Dune universe acts as both an entheogen (in large enough quantities) and an addictive geriatric medicine. Control of the supply of melange was crucial to the Empire, as it was necessary for, among other things, faster than light navigation.[citation needed]
Consumption of the imaginary mushroom anochi [enoki] as the entheogen underlying the creation of Christianity is the premise of Philip K. Dick's last novel, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer, a theme which seems to be inspired by John Allegro's book.[citation needed]
Aldous Huxley's final novel, Island (1962), depicted a fictional entheogenic mushroom — termed "moksha medicine" — used by the people of Pala in rites of passage, such as the transition to adulthood and at the end of life.[citation needed]
Bruce Sterling's Holy Fire novel refers to the religion in the future as a result of entheogens, used freely by the population.[citation needed]
In Stephen King's The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger, Book 1 of The Dark Tower series, the main character receives guidance after taking mescaline.[citation needed]
The Alastair Reynolds novel Absolution Gap features a moon under the control of a religious government which uses neurological viruses to induce religious faith.[citation needed]
[edit]References
^ El-Seedi HR, De Smet PA, Beck O, Possnert G, Bruhn JG (October 2005). "Prehistoric peyote use: alkaloid analysis and radiocarbon dating of archaeological specimens of Lophophora from Texas". J Ethnopharmacol 101 (1-3): 238–42. doi:10.1016/j.jep.2005.04.022. PMID 15990261.
^ Opler, Morris Edward (2008 [1938]). "The use of Peyote by the Carrizo and Lipan Apache tribes". American Ethnography Quasimonthly. Retrieved 19 January 2009.
^ Schultes, Richard Evans (2008 [1938]). "The appeal of peyote (Lophophora Williamsii) as a medicine". American Ethnography Quasimonthly. Retrieved 19 January 2009.
^ "Brazilian Archives of Biology and Technology - Jurema-Preta (Mimosa tenuiflora [Willd. Poir.): a review of its traditional use, phytochemistry and pharmacology"]. www.scielo.br. Retrieved 2009-01-14.
^ Entheogens.org
^ a b R. R. Griffiths; W. A. Richards, U. McCann, R. Jesse (2006-07-07). "Psilocybin can occasion mystical-type experiences having substantial and sustained personal meaning and spiritual significance" (PDF). Psychopharmacology 187 (3): 268-283. doi: 10.1007/s00213-006-0457-5. Retrieved 2011-02-03.
^ Carl A. P. Ruck; Jeremy Bigwood; Danny Staples; Jonathan Ott; R. Gordon Wasson (Jan-Jun, 1979). "Entheogens". Journal of Psychedelic Drugs 11 (1-2): 145–146. PMID 522165.
^ Giorgio Samorini, “The ‘Mushroom-Tree’ of Plaincourault”, Eleusis: Journal of Psychoactive Plants and Compounds, n. 8, 1997, pp. 29-37
^ Giorgio Samorini, “The ‘Mushroom-Trees’ in Christian Art”, Eleusis: Journal of Psychoactive Plants and Compounds, n. 1, 1998, pp. 87-108
^ Kaplan, Aryeh. (1981). The Living Torah New York. p. 442.
^ Sex, Drugs, Violence and the Bible, by Chris Bennett and Neil McQueen, 2001, Forbidden Fruit Publishing.
^ kanehbosm
^ Conjuring Eden: Art and the Entheogenic Vision of Paradise, by Mark Hoffman, Carl Ruck, and Blaise Staples. Entheos: The Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, Issue No. 1, Summer, 2001
^ Wasson and Allegro on the Tree of Knowledge as Amanita, Michael S. Hoffman, Journal of Higher Criticism, 2007
^ Daturas for the Virgin, José Celdrán and Carl Ruck, Entheos: The Journal of Psychedelic Spirituality, Vol. I, Issue 2, Winter, 2002
^ The Hidden World: Survival of Pagan Shamanic Themes in European Fairytales, by Carl Ruck, Blaise Staples, Jose Alfredo Celdran, Mark Hoffman, Carolina Academic Press, 2007
^ Tupper, K.W. (2003). Entheogens & education: Exploring the potential of psychoactives as educational tools. Journal of Drug Education and Awareness, 1(2), 145-161.
^ Tupper, K.W. (2002). Entheogens and existential intelligence: The use of plant teachers as cognitive tools. Canadian Journal of Education, 27(4), 499-516.
^ Bwiti: An Ethnography of the Religious Imagination in Africa by James W. Fernandez, Princeton University Press, 1982
^ Allegro, John Marco (1970). The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross: A Study of the Nature and Origins of Christianity within the Fertility Cults of the Ancient Near East. Hodder and Stoughton. ISBN 0-340-12875-5.
^ Entheology.org
^ Benjamin Thomas Ethnobotany & Anthropology Research Page
[edit]Further reading
Roberts, Thomas B. (editor) (2001). Psychoactive Sacramentals: Essays on Entheogens and Religion San Francisco: Council on Spiritual Practices.
Roberts, Thomas B. (2006) "Chemical Input, Religious Output—Entheogens" Chapter 10 in Where God and Science Meet: Vol. 3: The Psychology of Religious Experience Westport, CT: Praeger/Greenwood.
Roberts, Thomas, and Hruby, Paula J. (1995–2003). Religion and Psychoactive Sacraments: An Entheogen Chrestomathy http://www.csp.org/chrestomathy [Online archive]
Stafford, Peter. (2003). Psychedlics. Ronin Publishing, Oakland, California. ISBN 0-914171-18-6.
Carl Ruck and Danny Staples, The World of Classical Myth 1994. Introductory excerpts
Huston Smith, Cleansing the Doors of Perception: The Religious Significance of Entheogenic Plants and Chemicals, 2000, Tarcher/Putnam, ISBN 1-58542-034-4
Giorgio Samorini 1995 "Traditional use of psychoactive mushrooms in Ivory Coast (Côte d'Ivoire)?" in Eleusis 1 22-27 (no current url)
M. Bock 2000 "Māori kava (Macropiper excelsum)" in Eleusis n.s. vol 4 (no current url)
Plants of the Gods: Their Sacred, Healing and Hallucinogenic Powers by Richard Evans Schultes, Albert Hofmann, Christian Ratsch - ISBN 0-89281-979-0
John J. McGraw, Brain & Belief: An Exploration of the Human Soul, 2004, AEGIS PRESS, ISBN 0-9747645-0-7
J.R. Hale, J.Z. de Boer, J.P. Chanton and H.A. Spiller (2003) Questioning the Delphic Oracle, 2003, Scientific American, vol 289, no 2, 67-73.
The Sacred Plants of our Ancestors by Christian Rätsch, published in TYR: Myth—Culture—Tradition Vol. 2, 2003–2004 - ISBN 0-9720292-1-4
Yadhu N. Singh, editor, Kava: From Ethnology to Pharmacology, 2004, Taylor & Francis, ISBN 0-415-32327-4
[edit]External links
The Vaults of Erowid (Erowid)
Entheogenreview.com Quarterly publication serving as a clearinghouse for current data about the use of visionary plants and drugs.
Council on Spiritual Practices Entheogen Project
_____________________
_______________________
He main-
tains that the theology of glory is the secret point of contact through which theology and
politics incessantly communicate and change places, and identifies glory as a segnatura.
If glory has occupied such a special place, theologically and politically, Agamben
argues this is because it permits the holding together of the essence and action of god, Reign
and Government, and the father and the son.45 Noting a link between glory and the Sabbath,
he argues that the center of the governmental dispositive, where Reign and Government com-
41
Ibid., 157-8.
42
This study of the acclimation will find some parallel in his analysis of the oath in Il sacramento del
linguaggio.
43
Ibid., 188.
44
Ibid., 210.
45
Ibid., 253, 223.
Bussolini: review essay of recent works of Agamben
119
municate and are distinguished, is in fact void due to the inoperativity of glory, which must be
kept at the center of the machine. As such he calls oikonomia the ‛theological dispositive of the
government of the world,‛ and says that ordering is governmentality.46 He also explicitly
relates the acclamation, and therefore glory, to the contemporary realms of public opinion and
media, arguing via Schmitt that opinion polls are a modern version of acclamation, noting that
it is no coincidence that the Greek term for glory, doxa, means also ‛public opinion.‛47 He
maintains that ‛consensual democracy, also known as the society of the spectacle, is a glorious
democracy, in which oikonomia has resolved into glory and the doxological function, freeing
itself from liturgy and ceremonies, has absolutized itself to an undreamed of degree and
penetrated into every aspect of social life.‛48
_____________
_____________
Elena:
Because I am only taking here a summarized version of Agamben’s work it is possible that elsewhere he addresses other aspects of glory in modern society which are worth mentioning here. I am thinking about idolatry and the individual as an object of marketing such as in sports, film, art and music. It is interesting why it is precisely in these realms together with the dictator and the cult guru that idolatry takes its strongest hold of the people. Is it because in the arts the emotional life of the people extrovert themselves more than in science and history for example? Is it because while music, film and theater belong more to the emotional sphere while history and philosophy connect more strongly to the intellectual sphere, that people tend to “idolize” the figures in these areas more than the others? In the cult guru and the dictator the relationship is more clearly directed to the I itself. The guru and the dictator “incarnate” a divine dimension a super-human figure.
___________________
___________________
In two dense and suggestive appendices, Agamben develops concepts which are of
importance to the work as a whole: the relationship between law and miracle, and the in-
visible hand.
____________
____________
Elena:
This connection between law and miracle and the invisible hand is wonderful because it reveals the underlying power of authority and it certainly takes that character in today’s government especially in its unaccountability.
_________
_________
Rousseau and Schmitt had earlier cited the miracle as the theological paradigm
for the state of exception—a situation in which god decides to suspend or contravene the nor-
mally-operating laws of nature. Agamben draws on Foucault’s interpretation of Rousseau’s
political project from Sécurité, territoire, population to show that the problem of sovereignty did
not go away when the arts of government came to the fore in Europe, but instead became
more intense.49 The distinction and articulation of sovereignty and government becomes de-
cisive in Rousseau.
In the section on the invisible hand Agamben traces the reemergence of the term ‛eco-
nomy,‛ this time under the Latin form oeconomia in the 18th century, concerning the ‛manage-
ment and government of things and people‛.50 Although presented at the time as something
new, Agamben argues that this ‛re-presentation‛ of economy was heavily indebted to the
Greek and theological traditions studied in the book. Citing Linnaeus’ pursuit of an economy
of nature which would discern the aspects of natural beings put there by god, he indicates that
this new ‛economy‛ had plenty to do with the former one. He notes that a similar notion of
the economy of nature was pursued by the physiocrats, but with the crucial shift of object
from the natural order to the government of society.51 He writes that
the modern oikonomia
has assumed its own sovereignty separate from its divine origins, but that in doing so it
maintains the theological model of the government of the world.
In this sense, of the ongoing
ordering and administration of the world, he says that ‛modernity, while taking god from the
world, has brought the project of providential oikonomia to a completion.‛52
_________
__________
Elena: I wonder if this “taking god from the world” means in Agamben something similar to what I understand as the separation of state and religion, the illegitimacy of power, the lack of sovereignty of the authority today in each and all spheres of society.
Il sacramento del linguaggio: Archeologia del giuramento (Homo sacer II, 3)
The next book in the Homo Sacer series as they are numbered is Il sacramento del linguaggio:
archeologia del giuramento {The Sacrament of Language: Archeology of the Oath}. As noted pre-
46
Ibid., 275.
47
Ibid., 280.
48
Ibid., 283.
49
Ibid., 299.
50
Ibid., 305.
51
Ibid., 312.
52
Ibid., 314.
Foucault Studies, No. 10, pp. 108-143.
120
viously, Agamben’s analysis here clearly crosses over in important respects with that of the
acclamation in Il Regno e la Gloria. The primary Foucauldian concept that he draws upon here
is that of veridiction. This book is decisive, too, because, although he analyzes religious
usages and aspects of the concept, Agamben here points toward a more-primordial rela-
tionship of language and naming that undergirds even religion and politics in important
respects. This shifts some of the focus away from the notion that he grounds everything in
some kind of unavoidable theological regress.
He says that ‛Religion and law do not preexist
the performative experience of language which is in question in the oath, rather they were
invented to guarantee the truth and the trustworthiness of logos through a series of dis-
positives, among which the technicization of the oath in a specific ‘sacrament’—the ‘sacrament
of power’—occupies a central place‛.53
Agamben describes how the oath is at the intersection point between religion and
politics, and how it is the foundation of the political pact in the history of the West.54 High-
lighting the decline of the oath in our times, he sees this inquiry as opening up the possibility
for new forms of political association. He specifies that the method of this inquiry is ‛not an
inquiry into the origin, but a philosophical archeology of the oath.‛55 As such he says, fol-
lowing Foucault, that it cannot help but put the present into question. Building upon his ana-
lysis of oikonomia in Il Regno e la Gloria, he explains, via exegeses of Paolo Prodi and Hierocles,
that the oath does not create or originally set in place (drawing on the verb porre which is the
root for disporre and dispositivo), but that it is concerned with holding together, maintaining
unity, and conserving that which someone else has set into being.56
Citing Émile Benveniste he notes that the oath’s function consists in the relation that it
institutes between words and power, rather than in the affirmation it produces. Above all,
Agamben writes, ancient and modern commentators agree that the oath has the function of
guaranteeing the truth and the efficacy of language.57 Initially and for the most part, this
seems to be concerned with guaranteeing the trustworthiness of humans, who are notoriously
capable of deception and lack of faith.
_________
_________
Elena: Note the relationship between oath and trustworthiness, again an aspect of being.
________
As such, many emphasize the oath as an institution de-
signed to confirm this faith in the fallible word of one human or another.
Citing Samuel Pufendorf from 1672, Agamben points out another related line of inter-
pretation in terms of the reliability of language itself, which Pufendorf says undergirds (neces-
sarily) the oath.58 Confirmed in the oath are not only political pacts, but our simple language
and its fealty to ‛reality.‛ Citing Nicole Loraux and Plato, he notes that the oath is ill-suited as
a measure against lying (Plato advised against its use in trials as it would reveal half the citi-
zenry to be perjurers). This points to the likelihood that the oath is aimed more at a specific
weakness of language itself: ‛the ability of words to refer to things, and that of humans to take
cognizance of their condition as speaking beings.‛59 It is clear, in this respect, why the concept
53
Agamben, Sacramento, 80.
54
Ibid., 3.
55
Ibid., 4.
56
Ibid., 6.
57
Ibid., 7.
58
Ibid., 8.
59
Ibid., 12.
Bussolini: review essay of recent works of Agamben
121
of veridiction from Foucault is of importance to Agamben, as that which guarantees or main-
tains the truth and efficacy of language, or that which permits certain things to be seen or said.
The oath would seem to consist of three elements: an affirmation, an invocation of the
gods, and a curse against perjury (in the event that one should break the oath). It is this inclu-
sion of the threatened curse that has resulted in the interesting double-meaning to ‛oath‛
present in several languages considered, according to which it can mean either a solemn vow
or denunciation, profanity, and the like. Since they were part of the same performative decla-
ration, this association has persisted.
Elena: Again we see the two sides of the same coin depending on the being of the person expressing the oath as a blessing or as a curse. The oath itself being meaningless if it cannot be backed by the being of the person uttering it.
The oath has a crucial verbal dimension (even though, like the acclamation, it was often
accompanied by a gesture such as raising the right hand).
_________
Elena: The study of gesture in the human body should reveal its power when connected with language. Steiner of course has done a great deal on the subject with eurythmy but the actual impression one gets with it when looking at a performance is that it is not “alive” enough.
Agamben says that Georges Dumé-
zil noted three decisive realms or fundamental functions in his study of myth and epics:
religion (the sacred), war (the warriors), and economy (the farmers or shepherds). He analy-
zes the ‛plagues‛ or ‛scourges‛ which can befall each of these, noting that the pestilence
which can afflict religion (and obviously by association the other two) is the dissolution of oral
contracts, lying, and not keeping to the spoken word.60 This can in some respect be compared
to the plagues and afflictions, including plague itself, smallpox, and famine, which Foucault
analyzes in Sécurité, territoire, population in terms of their influence on the formation and
development of dispositives of security. Yet Foucault himself draws on a different text of Du-
mézil’s in Le courage de la vérité {The Courage of Truth} to discuss the ‛malady‛ which threatens
veridiction through false or inaccurate speaking.61 While it might appear, as Agamben notes,
that the fundamental problem is one of dishonesty and lying, in fact the issue is one that lies
deeper than that: ‛a weakness that afflicts language itself, the capacity of words to refer to
things and that of humans to take account of their condition as speaking beings.‛62 Echoing
Foucault’s descriptions of biopolitics in relation to Aristotle, he writes that the oath ‛contains
the memory of a more archaic stage, which had to do with the consistency of human language
itself and the nature of humans as ‘speaking animals’.‛
____________
____________
Elena: Interesting that he would say ‘speaking ‘animals’’. This whole area of language is of particular interest when we apply it to our times and the loss of credibility of power sold to the corporations but it is equally significant when we view the process of brainwashing in cults. The ‘management’ of language as the ‘dispositive’ used to overpower the member’s self with the alter ego of the guru is systematically achieved not only through invasion of the sphere of verbal language but the sphere of gesture and clothing, action and eating, that is the sphere of all four centers.
____________
63 He also notes that in the Metaphysics,
Aristotle ‛situates the oath among the ‘first principles’ of pre-Socratic philosophy, almost as if
the origins of the universe and of thinking it covers entail the oath in some way.‛64
Asking how the arché of this archaeology of the oath is to be understood, Agamben
draws upon a concept from linguistics and comparative grammar, that for certain questions
the only sources of information we have are based on the analysis of language, and that, like
the theoretical Indo-European word forms denoted with an asterisk like *deiwos, it would be
‛possible, through etymology and the analysis of signification, to go back to stages otherwise
inaccessible to the history of social institutions.‛65 He also draws in part upon Dumézil’s
characterization of his own work as history ‛of the oldest history and of the ultra-historical
Elena: Into the esoteric perhaps?
60
Ibid., 10.
61
Michel Foucault, Le courage de la vérité (Paris: Seuil, 2009), 87-105.
62
Ibid.
63
Ibid.
64
Ibid., 27.
65
Ibid., 13-4.
Foucault Studies, No. 10, pp. 108-143.
122
fringe.‛66 But, he notes that the ‛consistency‛ of this fringe is ‛only an algorithm that expres-
ses a system of correspondence between the existing forms in historical languages.‛67
On the basis of such concerns, Agamben says that this arché cannot be understood as a
chronological date: ‛it is clear that the arché towards which the archaeologist seeks to reach
can not be understood in any way as a date situated on a chronology‛ nor an ‛intemporal
metahistorical structure,‛ but a ‛force operating in history‛ like the Indo-European words, the
baby in psychoanalysis, or the big bang.68 As such it concerns not just ‘closed-off’ historical
events, but those which have a dynamic relation to the present. He describes it as ‛not a date,
a substance, or an event, but a field of historical currents held between anthropogenesis and
the present, ultra-history and history.‛69 The resonances with Foucault’s historical reflections
on the archaeological method are evident here. Although this is a method which can allow the
decipherment of historical phenomena, it is also and especially one which is about history of
the present. This is in part because these elements of ‛ultra-history‛ are not ‛finished once
and for all, but are still ongoing, as homo sapiens never ceases becoming human, is still not
finished acceding to language and swearing on its nature as a speaking being.‛
__________
___________
Elena: This is clearly a reference to time and beyond time, the present in eternity. The power of being in language. The verb!
70 Agamben’s
description of the dynamic historical relation and the ongoing performance of historical trans-
formations relates strongly to Foucault’s description and analytical use of the dispositive.
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