MUSHROOMS

Mushrooms: translation

Whileentheogenuse is often perceived to be prevalent in shamanism worldwide, few indigenous shamans have made mushroom use an important part of their practice. Most of these are located inCentral AmericaandSouth America. Ob-Ugrian and Finno-Ugrian shamans are most noted for their ingestion ofAmanitamuscariaor fly agaric mushrooms, but while this practice continues today among Khanty shamans of WesternSiberia, fly agaric use in thelocus classicusofCentral Asiaand Siberia is mainly recreational. One major reason for the overemphasis on mushrooms is that the mycologistGordon Wassonsuggested fly agaric was the Vedic “Soma” and that “magic mushrooms” more generally produced the religious impulse in humans.Wasson “discovered” theMazatecIndiancuranderaMaria Sabinain the 1950s and held Sabina’shealingceremonies involving thepsilocybinmushrooms to be the archetypical residue of a prehistoric mushroom cult. These ideas were picked up byTimothy Leary, who described eating a number of psilocybin mushrooms in 1960 as “the deepest religious experience of my life,” leading to his countercultural mantra “tune in, turn on, drop out.”Terence McKennahas since echoed both Wasson’s and Leary’s views, adding his belief that mushrooms and other entheogens facilitate communication with extraterrestrial entities (space aliens) crucial to the transcendence of the human race. Overemphasis on mushrooms also lead toJohnAllegro’s suggestion, based on his reading of the Dead Sea Scrolls, that “Jesus was a mushroom” and to interpretations of earliestChristianityas a mushroom and shamanic cult.

In his volumeShroom:A Cultural History of the Magic Mushroom(2006),Andy Letcherargues that the discourses of these thinkers tell us more about their own predilections than about indigenous shamans or entheogens. He also discusses the significant role played by magic mushrooms inCyberianshamanism andPagan animismand amongpsychonauts. As with the adoption ofayahuascaby manyneo-shamanic tourists, it is notable that it is thevision-inducing or hallucinogenic effects of mushrooms and other entheogens that are the chief focus of enthusiasm rather than theirpurgative vomitingeffects. In contrast, Sabina emphasized that the need to induce vomiting forpurificationas central to shamanic and healingrituals.