11 ms·

Does this medieval fresco show a hallucinogenic mushroom in the Garden of Eden?

95 points by prismatic 5y ago

andrewtbham 5y ago
It's possible that manna from heaven and the bread at communion are mushrooms. that many of the experiences seem to by psychadelic: the burning bush, the transfiguration, etc. And that it was all gotten rid of during the black death. https://psychedelictimes.com/the-secret-psychedelic-mushroom-initiations-of-early-christianity-interview-with-jerry-brown/ https://psychedelictimes.com/the-secret-psychedelic-mushroom...
- anthk 5y ago
  On communion, every baker knew that badly preserved cereal could grow up hallucinogenous funghi. https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm Another one: guess why Jesus rites on birth and resurrection are highly related in time to Winter and Spring which is seeding time and later harvesting time.
pram 5y ago
The premise doesn’t even make sense, the tree of knowledge is a Bad Thing in the Genesis story. Even if it was a magic mushroom, how could you possibly come to the conclusion that it’s being depicted in a positive light?
- tk75x 5y ago
  Knowledge of good and evil is a "Good Thing", and one interpretation of the reason God put the tree in reach of Adam and Eve is that he wanted them to eventually partake of its fruit, but they did it early and without whatever other prep was necessary. Think of it as a child slowly learning concepts instead of being immediately presented with complex knowledge and not having the necessary foundation to process it. Not sure about the positive light depiction, but I could see hallucinogenics being viewed as something that expands your knowledge/mind especially since people report out of body experiences when using them.
  - mandeville 5y ago
    Ditto. Also in traditional doctrine it was good because the fall led to jesus. Look up felix culpa on wikipedia. As for the mushrooms, it's not as if medieval clergy didn't have a good time.
    - iammisc 5y ago
      You can't mention Felix Culpa though without mentioning Original Sin. Like most things in traditional Catholicism, there is a duality and a paradox. You can't get one without the other. Mentioning the Fall as a strictly good thing is simply ridiculous. That does not find any ground in traditional Catholicism, which also believed (and still believes frankly) that all the bad things in life, including the pain of childbirth, disease, sin, and destruction, are directly attributable to the sin of Adam and Eve. Plus, there are several translations of it. The common rendition into English is 'happy fault', which may be too positive. The other translations include 'lucky mistake', 'happy mistake', blessed fall, etc. Note again the duality, the paradox, and that the fundamental noun (fault, mistake, fall) is negative. It's a paradox, a mystery, meant to get you to think deeper, not some stunning endorsement of listening to Satan.
- theli0nheart 5y ago
  > the tree of knowledge is a Bad Thing in the Genesis story Not at all. I'm certain that it differs between faiths, but in mine (Judaism), the tree of knowledge was not A Bad Thing. Eating the forbidden fruit / fruit of knowledge exposed Adam and Eve to evil things; tarnishing their purity. After they ate the fruit, they awakened. They desired to wear clothes, possess things, have children, etc. What we learn from this is that knowledge is not good or bad; it's how we use it that makes the difference. And from the standpoint of an "awakening" and mystical experience, the connection to psilocybin deserves further study.
  - iammisc 5y ago
    Except, this is a christian fresco, and this is not how Christianity interprets the Genesis story. I understand that Judaism was the source religion of Christianity, but the two religions are substantially different. Christianity has very different interpretations of the Old Testament compared to the Jews.
- takoid 5y ago
  The Tree of Knowledge is not the “bad thing” (sin is a better vocabulary choice) in the book of Genesis. The sin is the defiance of God’s instruction by Adam and Eve avoiding the fruit from the Tree of Life.
- amanaplanacanal 5y ago
  The gnostic view is that the tree opened people up to the knowledge that the creator of earth was a flawed god, and not the good one up at the top of the heirarchy. In my understanding.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  Something else to consider is that some early Christians (like the so-called Gnostics) believed that there was an esoteric (or secret) meaning or teaching in Christianity. The esoteric meanings were often mirror images of the exoteric (or plain/obvious/surface) meanings. So where eating of the Tree of Knowledge might be viewed as "bad" in the exoteric interpretation, in the esoteric interpretation it could be viewed as good. Similar inversions happen with the snake in the Garden of Eden, who is similarly viewed in a negative light in the exoteric interpretation, but as good in the esoteric interpretation. The same thing happens with Judas, and even the creator God himself. I'd encourage reading up on the Gnostics for more details on exactly what those views were.
  - 52-6F-62 5y ago
    True, and early Christian cults were often mixed up in offshoots of the mysteries traditions as well. So while the article mixes up which storied tree that image is supposed to represent, there's a real question of whether or not the similarities to the amanita mushroom were intentional or not. When placed in the context of esoteric traditions, it's a worthwhile question.
  - Natsu 5y ago
    The heyday of gnosticism was a thousand years or more prior to this fresco, though.
    - pmoriarty 5y ago
      But the gnostics weren't completely eradicated until much later. The Cathars[1], for instance, weren't defeated until about the time of this fresco. And, anyway, one need not be a gnostic in order to believe there is a hidden side to Christianity. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathars
  - jazzyjackson 5y ago
    The book "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn includes a retelling of genesis in this mirrored sense: the devil has adam and eve convinced that the garden is paradise and there's no need to leave. god has to sneak in to convince eve to eat the apple and become free. (paraphrase from 10 yrs ago, I should pick that book up again...)
- tokenpreneur 5y ago
  It's not the Tree of Knowledge that is a 'bad thing', but rather Adam and Eve did a bad thing by defying God's command not to eat from that tree.
elwell 5y ago
The serpent wrapped around the tree indicates that this is to represent the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, not the Tree of Life. So, even if this were depicting hallucinogenic mushrooms, if anything it would mean that Christians viewed them as forbidden.
- cratermoon 5y ago
  Yeah, the article mixes up the two trees, which doesn't bode well for the rest of it.
- hbosch 5y ago
  As soon as I saw the "snake", I made the assumption on my own that this was just a crudely drawn tree with the dots representing fruits/"apples" as the story is commonly known. Stretching this into an article about psychedelic mushrooms is quite a reach.
JohnJamesRambo 5y ago
I guess I've never given much credence to this theory. Why would they beat around the bush and use symbols and other words for it. Why wouldn't they just say "eat this mushroom"? Was there even a stigma against it back then?
- amanaplanacanal 5y ago
  The idea that there is secret knowledge that only the elect should know goes back to classical times, and probably to the time the old testament was put together. So it might not have to do with stigma per se.
  - iammisc 5y ago
    Catholicism has no concept of the elect, at least not in the way you describe it.
    - 52-6F-62 5y ago
      Of course they do: the priesthood. The Vatican itself restricts access to its own archives.
      - iammisc 5y ago
        That's not the elect as you described. Priests are no more deserving of heaven than any other baptised catholic. The 'knowledge' in the archives is not religious in nature. You don't need to have access to it to know God or achieve the ultimate goals of catholicism.
        anigbrowl 5y ago
        You are not even replying to the same person. I think you're being a little over-literal here.
        Natsu 5y ago
codetrotter 5y ago
I’ve long been thinking about how things like this are in the Bible: > They sparkled like topaz, and all four looked alike. Each appeared to be made like a wheel intersecting a wheel ... Their rims were high and awesome, and all four rims were full of eyes all around. — Ezekiel 1:15 And I’ve been thinking, that these kinds of things could have their explanation in people having ingested plants or been stung by insects or something, that altered their perceptions of reality. Or even maybe just hallucinating because of hunger, or from having been born with a brain that was producing these types of hallucinations on its own.
- cratermoon 5y ago
  You mean the Ophanim? Be not afraid, my child. https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/878/385/a57.jpg https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/878/385/a57...
  - codetrotter 5y ago
    Yup, that’s the one they talk about in Ezekiel 1:15 quoted above. And there are others too.
- runawaybottle 5y ago
  Dear friend, they were simply drinking. You don’t need hallucinogenics to ramble with ecstasy, just a few drinks.
- LargoLasskhyfv 5y ago
  Or they experienced an out-of-context problem. Saw something which didn't fit into what they knew. Yes, I really do mean ANCIENT ASTRONAUTS, or something like that. Imagine someone from pre-industrial society. No matter where. And then something is touching down from the heavens above. Like some big fucking rocket. Or some tilt-rotor thingy. Or something with Ion-drive. Unloading a remote controlled all terrain rover with really strange wheels. How to describe something for which you have no concept of understanding it at all?
  - 5y ago
cratermoon 5y ago
There are several problems with this article. To start with, it mixes up the Tree of Life[1] and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil[2]. Second, the Genesis story is Jewish, and predates Christianity by at least five if not ten centuries. And most importantly, early Christians were Jews first. Post-Pauline times, pagan or Gentiles in the Roman empire did join the growing movement that was soon to be called Christianity, but they were weren't dragging in any pagan rituals they may have had prior to their conversion. Three hundred years later, with the conversion of Constantine and the co-optation of Christianity for Roman imperial designs, certain pagan rituals and practices were papered over with Christian beliefs (cf Easter, Christmas), but not the other way around. 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life_(biblical) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life_(biblical) 2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_the_knowledge_of_good_and_evil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_the_knowledge_of_good_...
- piptastic 5y ago
  From your linked source on the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil: Alternatively, some scholars have argued that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is just another name for the tree of life.
  - xyzelement 5y ago
    There are probably "some scholars" that have argued for just about anything, but certainly the majority of knowledge on these treats them as different topics.
    - cratermoon 5y ago
      Exactly. Some "scholars" say that Genesis, along with the other four books of the pentateuch, was literally written by Moses and recounts actual facts as they happened. Wikipedia's NPOV utterly fails on topics like faith and belief.
      - bawolff 5y ago
        Note, it would be against wikipedia policies to say "Some scholars say X". You're not supposed to use weasel words, and npov does not mean you have to give equal weight to all. Case in point, wikipedia doesn't say that some scholars believe genisis was written by moses. Instead they say: "Tradition credits Moses as the author of Genesis, as well as the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and most of Deuteronomy, but modern scholars, especially from the 19th century onward, see them as being written hundreds of years after Moses is supposed to have lived, in the 6th and 5th centuries BC.[7][8] Based on scientific interpretation of archaeological, genetic, and linguistic evidence, most scholars consider Genesis to be primarily mythological rather than historical. Biblical literalists do interpret it as actual history, giving rise to beliefs such as Young Earth creationism." Which seems entirely fair to me.
b3morales 5y ago
> Eve’s ribs are bold slash marks, as if the artist wanted her to appear almost skeletal. The artist probably wanted to highlight the fact that there are an even number of them, in contrast to Adam's odd number, since the story is that one of his was taken (to make Eve).
- inreverse 5y ago
  Interesting that Adam appears with no ribs at all then.
  - brokenmachine 5y ago
    Everything religious has a reason until you point out why that doesn't make sense, and then the response is, "it's a metaphor, don't take it seriously". I'm going to extend that pattern to it's logical conclusion and conclude that none of it makes sense and nobody should take any of it seriously.
  - b3morales 5y ago
    I think they were there, just very faded with age. I can faintly see one or two if I zoom in on the picture. But I could be wrong, too.
pmoriarty 5y ago
There's an interesting talk[1] about this and other images that show evidence of psychedelic use in early Christianity. [1] - Starting at around 9'50" in "Psychedelics - In Spirituality and Religion (by Aware Project)" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEkF2ER0Zwc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEkF2ER0Zwc
iammisc 5y ago
The main problem of this article is that it uses modern cultural and artistic norms to interpret ancient art. Traditional Catholic and Christian iconography was not meant to be accurate, but rather to symbolize meaning. For example, in my church, the priest recently pointed out there is a dog in every single stained glass window depicting scenes of Jesus's life. In particular, the dog is a dalmation. If we were to apply this same line of reasoning in the article to these windows, we'd be forced to make ridiculous conclusions that Catholics of 20th century Portland believed Dalmations were holy holy dogs alive at the time of Christ. In reality, the dalmation is a symbol of St Dominic (it's a dominican church), whose mother had a dream she gave birth to a dalmation (St Dominic) with a torch in his mouth who lit the world on fire. The symbology is obvious, since Dominic, founder of the Order of Preachers, did indeed spread the gospel message throughout large portions of the world at the time. The dalmation symbolizes St Dominic's following of Jesus's example. At no point is any of the art intended to be realistic. So if that's true of 20th century Catholic art, made by people alive at a time when art is expected to portray reality, then even more so should we not interpret this fresco as realistic, since it was made at a time when people couldn't even paint realistically (perspective was an enlightenment / renaissance invention IIRC).
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "At no point is any of the art intended to be realistic." Well, except that, say, Jesus is supposed to be Jesus. Adam and Eve are supposed to be Adam and Eve. The garden in which Adam and Eve are depicted is supposed to be the Garden of Eden in the Bible. In the various depictions of the Last Supper, Jesus is depicted as having supper with his disciples, and that is supposed to depict exactly that. Jesus is shown as breaking bread in those paintings, just as he does in the Biblical story, etc, etc, etc... Not to say there isn't a lot of symbolism in Christian art, but it's not all symbolic.
  - iammisc 5y ago
    I suppose it's realistic in the sense that Christ is depicted as a human as are adam and eve, instead of something else, but there is no presumption that christ actually looked like the way he was drawn.
motohagiography 5y ago
If you want to go down a rabbit hole, look into biblical and other references to how important and common the acacia tree was, and then consider that it's thought to be a significant source of DMT. (The second fresco in the article has what appears to be an acacia tree in it). One can only speculate what someone could have imagined if they were around one while it was burning and they inhaled it. The analog feedback patterns one sees when their senses are impaired are by almost all accounts, geometric patterns like fractals, and so the discovery of geometry and association of it with mysticism could have a common chemical origin. If there was something to be known or learned from psychedelic experiences, a national security service would need to know and understand its boundaries. Given radio was only recently discovered, people new to the idea of communicating over long distances using invisible energy would have had to consider whether there was some chemical connection. I'm not saying it's aliens...but it may very well be all drugs.
oxymoran 5y ago
The notion that scholars have “debunked” the mushroom hypothesis is ludicrous given that they don’t postulate a hypothesis that is any more reasonable. The idea that it is a “stylized” tree seems preposterous to me given each branch ending in a cap. If it was just the top, ok. But every branch? It looks like a clump of mushrooms growing out of the ground, Occam’s razor and what not.That doesn’t mean it’s a magic mushroom, but maybe mushrooms had some sort of significance to the artist/church/region etc.
hospadar 5y ago
Wow mostly unrelated, I had no idea that _Amanita Muscara_ was considered to be psychoactive (usually is described as poisinous in field guides). Also frequently considered to be edible (after treatment) in some places. Fascinating! (for those unfamiliar, the amanita genus as a whole contains a variety of extremely toxic mushrooms and is often avoided by novice edible collectors for that reason) See also: https://www.bayareamushrooms.org/education/further_reflections_amanita_muscaria.html https://www.bayareamushrooms.org/education/further_reflectio...
- Trasmatta 5y ago
  FWIW, I wouldn't recommend trying to get high off of Amanita Muscaria. By all accounts it can be a rather unpleasant (and long) high. Best to stick with psilocybin.
- tmountain 5y ago
  It's been suggested (but not proven) that amanita muscara inspired portions of Christmas mythology (Santa, flying reindeer, etc). https://www.npr.org/2010/12/24/132260025/did-shrooms-send-santa-and-his-reindeer-flying https://www.npr.org/2010/12/24/132260025/did-shrooms-send-sa...
- __MatrixMan__ 5y ago
  This is a far cry from an evidence-grade source, but https://ambrosiasociety.org/ https://ambrosiasociety.org/ is a pretty wild site to explore. Someone has put quite a lot of work into mapping the phenotypic traits of Amanita Muscara onto Christian iconograhy (the lamb of god being the wooly mycelium, and the living cup having to do with the way it colonizes wooden containers, etc). They've also got instructions on preparing it for consumption.
mbesto 5y ago
If you're curious about the ties between religion, shamanism and psychedelics theres a great book by Terrence McKenna on this subject called Food of the Gods: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0553371304?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_product_details https://www.amazon.com/dp/0553371304?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_...
- anthk 5y ago
  https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm
XantosD 5y ago
There are several examples from Scandinavia of old Christian churches with art depicting psychedelic mushrooms. Not 13th century though
swayvil 5y ago
It makes sense. Mushrooms (and some other devices) are how you see God etc. I mean, it wasn't always just about reading old books. It had to start somewhere. With some kind of real observation. And studying that stuff without the shrooms etc. Well, that's like studying microbiology without a microscope.
newdude116 5y ago
This is a bad drawing of Silphium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium#/media/File:Silphium.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium#/media/File:Silphium....
buovjaga 5y ago
Arguments against Christian mushroom trees: The Fungi-Pareidola of The Psychedelic Gospels by Chris Bennett https://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2021/08/05/__trashed/ https://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2021/08/05/__trashed... Mushroom Trees Debunked by Thomas Hatsis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrfeNp1FSUY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrfeNp1FSUY I remember Hatsis elsewhere referring to a chemical study of the pigments used in the Plaincourault fresco revealing the red was originally green. I can't find the mention atm.
maxk42 5y ago
Amanita muscaria do not have three branches supporting the cap.
- swayvil 5y ago
  Good point. Also, it is not 6 feet tall.
da39a3ee 5y ago
I know people say Amanita muscaria is hallucinogenic, but my understanding is that it is pretty poisonous. Liberty Cap (Psilocybe semilanceata), on the other hand, is also common in Europe at least, and of course is well known to be very hallucinogenic and not poisonous. So if you were gonna depict a hallucinogenic mushroom wouldn't you choose Liberty Cap?
- inreverse 5y ago
  The liberty cap is not a distinctive mushroom (small, round cap, brown). The amanita muscaria is beautiful and distinct enough that we recognise it in paintings hundreds of years later. Perhaps the painter chose it for its beauty, or perhaps because it was both distinctive and psychedelic. No way to know. But the academics claiming that "the plant in this fresco has nothing whatever to do with mushrooms" are embarrassing.
roca 5y ago
No.

95 points by prismatic 5y ago

It's possible that manna from heaven and the bread at communion are mushrooms. that many of the experiences seem to by psychadelic: the burning bush, the transfiguration, etc. And that it was all gotten rid of during the black death. https://psychedelictimes.com/the-secret-psychedelic-mushroom-initiations-of-early-christianity-interview-with-jerry-brown/ https://psychedelictimes.com/the-secret-psychedelic-mushroom...

anthk 5y ago
On communion, every baker knew that badly preserved cereal could grow up hallucinogenous funghi. https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm Another one: guess why Jesus rites on birth and resurrection are highly related in time to Winter and Spring which is seeding time and later harvesting time.

pram 5y ago

The premise doesn’t even make sense, the tree of knowledge is a Bad Thing in the Genesis story. Even if it was a magic mushroom, how could you possibly come to the conclusion that it’s being depicted in a positive light?

tk75x 5y ago
Knowledge of good and evil is a "Good Thing", and one interpretation of the reason God put the tree in reach of Adam and Eve is that he wanted them to eventually partake of its fruit, but they did it early and without whatever other prep was necessary. Think of it as a child slowly learning concepts instead of being immediately presented with complex knowledge and not having the necessary foundation to process it. Not sure about the positive light depiction, but I could see hallucinogenics being viewed as something that expands your knowledge/mind especially since people report out of body experiences when using them.
- mandeville 5y ago
  Ditto. Also in traditional doctrine it was good because the fall led to jesus. Look up felix culpa on wikipedia. As for the mushrooms, it's not as if medieval clergy didn't have a good time.
  - iammisc 5y ago
    You can't mention Felix Culpa though without mentioning Original Sin. Like most things in traditional Catholicism, there is a duality and a paradox. You can't get one without the other. Mentioning the Fall as a strictly good thing is simply ridiculous. That does not find any ground in traditional Catholicism, which also believed (and still believes frankly) that all the bad things in life, including the pain of childbirth, disease, sin, and destruction, are directly attributable to the sin of Adam and Eve. Plus, there are several translations of it. The common rendition into English is 'happy fault', which may be too positive. The other translations include 'lucky mistake', 'happy mistake', blessed fall, etc. Note again the duality, the paradox, and that the fundamental noun (fault, mistake, fall) is negative. It's a paradox, a mystery, meant to get you to think deeper, not some stunning endorsement of listening to Satan.
theli0nheart 5y ago
> the tree of knowledge is a Bad Thing in the Genesis story Not at all. I'm certain that it differs between faiths, but in mine (Judaism), the tree of knowledge was not A Bad Thing. Eating the forbidden fruit / fruit of knowledge exposed Adam and Eve to evil things; tarnishing their purity. After they ate the fruit, they awakened. They desired to wear clothes, possess things, have children, etc. What we learn from this is that knowledge is not good or bad; it's how we use it that makes the difference. And from the standpoint of an "awakening" and mystical experience, the connection to psilocybin deserves further study.
- iammisc 5y ago
  Except, this is a christian fresco, and this is not how Christianity interprets the Genesis story. I understand that Judaism was the source religion of Christianity, but the two religions are substantially different. Christianity has very different interpretations of the Old Testament compared to the Jews.
takoid 5y ago
The Tree of Knowledge is not the “bad thing” (sin is a better vocabulary choice) in the book of Genesis. The sin is the defiance of God’s instruction by Adam and Eve avoiding the fruit from the Tree of Life.
amanaplanacanal 5y ago
The gnostic view is that the tree opened people up to the knowledge that the creator of earth was a flawed god, and not the good one up at the top of the heirarchy. In my understanding.
pmoriarty 5y ago
Something else to consider is that some early Christians (like the so-called Gnostics) believed that there was an esoteric (or secret) meaning or teaching in Christianity. The esoteric meanings were often mirror images of the exoteric (or plain/obvious/surface) meanings. So where eating of the Tree of Knowledge might be viewed as "bad" in the exoteric interpretation, in the esoteric interpretation it could be viewed as good. Similar inversions happen with the snake in the Garden of Eden, who is similarly viewed in a negative light in the exoteric interpretation, but as good in the esoteric interpretation. The same thing happens with Judas, and even the creator God himself. I'd encourage reading up on the Gnostics for more details on exactly what those views were.
- 52-6F-62 5y ago
  True, and early Christian cults were often mixed up in offshoots of the mysteries traditions as well. So while the article mixes up which storied tree that image is supposed to represent, there's a real question of whether or not the similarities to the amanita mushroom were intentional or not. When placed in the context of esoteric traditions, it's a worthwhile question.
- Natsu 5y ago
  The heyday of gnosticism was a thousand years or more prior to this fresco, though.
  - pmoriarty 5y ago
    But the gnostics weren't completely eradicated until much later. The Cathars[1], for instance, weren't defeated until about the time of this fresco. And, anyway, one need not be a gnostic in order to believe there is a hidden side to Christianity. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathars
- jazzyjackson 5y ago
  The book "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn includes a retelling of genesis in this mirrored sense: the devil has adam and eve convinced that the garden is paradise and there's no need to leave. god has to sneak in to convince eve to eat the apple and become free. (paraphrase from 10 yrs ago, I should pick that book up again...)
tokenpreneur 5y ago
It's not the Tree of Knowledge that is a 'bad thing', but rather Adam and Eve did a bad thing by defying God's command not to eat from that tree.

elwell 5y ago

The serpent wrapped around the tree indicates that this is to represent the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, not the Tree of Life. So, even if this were depicting hallucinogenic mushrooms, if anything it would mean that Christians viewed them as forbidden.

cratermoon 5y ago
Yeah, the article mixes up the two trees, which doesn't bode well for the rest of it.
hbosch 5y ago
As soon as I saw the "snake", I made the assumption on my own that this was just a crudely drawn tree with the dots representing fruits/"apples" as the story is commonly known. Stretching this into an article about psychedelic mushrooms is quite a reach.

JohnJamesRambo 5y ago

I guess I've never given much credence to this theory. Why would they beat around the bush and use symbols and other words for it. Why wouldn't they just say "eat this mushroom"? Was there even a stigma against it back then?

amanaplanacanal 5y ago
The idea that there is secret knowledge that only the elect should know goes back to classical times, and probably to the time the old testament was put together. So it might not have to do with stigma per se.
- iammisc 5y ago
  Catholicism has no concept of the elect, at least not in the way you describe it.
  - 52-6F-62 5y ago
    Of course they do: the priesthood. The Vatican itself restricts access to its own archives.
    - iammisc 5y ago
      That's not the elect as you described. Priests are no more deserving of heaven than any other baptised catholic. The 'knowledge' in the archives is not religious in nature. You don't need to have access to it to know God or achieve the ultimate goals of catholicism.
      - anigbrowl 5y ago
        You are not even replying to the same person. I think you're being a little over-literal here.
        Natsu 5y ago

codetrotter 5y ago

I’ve long been thinking about how things like this are in the Bible: > They sparkled like topaz, and all four looked alike. Each appeared to be made like a wheel intersecting a wheel ... Their rims were high and awesome, and all four rims were full of eyes all around. — Ezekiel 1:15 And I’ve been thinking, that these kinds of things could have their explanation in people having ingested plants or been stung by insects or something, that altered their perceptions of reality. Or even maybe just hallucinating because of hunger, or from having been born with a brain that was producing these types of hallucinations on its own.

cratermoon 5y ago
You mean the Ophanim? Be not afraid, my child. https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/878/385/a57.jpg https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/878/385/a57...
- codetrotter 5y ago
  Yup, that’s the one they talk about in Ezekiel 1:15 quoted above. And there are others too.
runawaybottle 5y ago
Dear friend, they were simply drinking. You don’t need hallucinogenics to ramble with ecstasy, just a few drinks.
LargoLasskhyfv 5y ago
Or they experienced an out-of-context problem. Saw something which didn't fit into what they knew. Yes, I really do mean ANCIENT ASTRONAUTS, or something like that. Imagine someone from pre-industrial society. No matter where. And then something is touching down from the heavens above. Like some big fucking rocket. Or some tilt-rotor thingy. Or something with Ion-drive. Unloading a remote controlled all terrain rover with really strange wheels. How to describe something for which you have no concept of understanding it at all?
- 5y ago

cratermoon 5y ago

There are several problems with this article. To start with, it mixes up the Tree of Life[1] and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil[2]. Second, the Genesis story is Jewish, and predates Christianity by at least five if not ten centuries. And most importantly, early Christians were Jews first. Post-Pauline times, pagan or Gentiles in the Roman empire did join the growing movement that was soon to be called Christianity, but they were weren't dragging in any pagan rituals they may have had prior to their conversion. Three hundred years later, with the conversion of Constantine and the co-optation of Christianity for Roman imperial designs, certain pagan rituals and practices were papered over with Christian beliefs (cf Easter, Christmas), but not the other way around. 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life_(biblical) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life_(biblical) 2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_the_knowledge_of_good_and_evil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_the_knowledge_of_good_...

piptastic 5y ago
From your linked source on the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil: Alternatively, some scholars have argued that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is just another name for the tree of life.
- xyzelement 5y ago
  There are probably "some scholars" that have argued for just about anything, but certainly the majority of knowledge on these treats them as different topics.
  - cratermoon 5y ago
    Exactly. Some "scholars" say that Genesis, along with the other four books of the pentateuch, was literally written by Moses and recounts actual facts as they happened. Wikipedia's NPOV utterly fails on topics like faith and belief.
    - bawolff 5y ago
      Note, it would be against wikipedia policies to say "Some scholars say X". You're not supposed to use weasel words, and npov does not mean you have to give equal weight to all. Case in point, wikipedia doesn't say that some scholars believe genisis was written by moses. Instead they say: "Tradition credits Moses as the author of Genesis, as well as the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and most of Deuteronomy, but modern scholars, especially from the 19th century onward, see them as being written hundreds of years after Moses is supposed to have lived, in the 6th and 5th centuries BC.[7][8] Based on scientific interpretation of archaeological, genetic, and linguistic evidence, most scholars consider Genesis to be primarily mythological rather than historical. Biblical literalists do interpret it as actual history, giving rise to beliefs such as Young Earth creationism." Which seems entirely fair to me.

b3morales 5y ago

> Eve’s ribs are bold slash marks, as if the artist wanted her to appear almost skeletal. The artist probably wanted to highlight the fact that there are an even number of them, in contrast to Adam's odd number, since the story is that one of his was taken (to make Eve).

inreverse 5y ago
Interesting that Adam appears with no ribs at all then.
- brokenmachine 5y ago
  Everything religious has a reason until you point out why that doesn't make sense, and then the response is, "it's a metaphor, don't take it seriously". I'm going to extend that pattern to it's logical conclusion and conclude that none of it makes sense and nobody should take any of it seriously.
- b3morales 5y ago
  I think they were there, just very faded with age. I can faintly see one or two if I zoom in on the picture. But I could be wrong, too.

pmoriarty 5y ago

There's an interesting talk[1] about this and other images that show evidence of psychedelic use in early Christianity. [1] - Starting at around 9'50" in "Psychedelics - In Spirituality and Religion (by Aware Project)" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEkF2ER0Zwc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEkF2ER0Zwc

iammisc 5y ago

The main problem of this article is that it uses modern cultural and artistic norms to interpret ancient art. Traditional Catholic and Christian iconography was not meant to be accurate, but rather to symbolize meaning. For example, in my church, the priest recently pointed out there is a dog in every single stained glass window depicting scenes of Jesus's life. In particular, the dog is a dalmation. If we were to apply this same line of reasoning in the article to these windows, we'd be forced to make ridiculous conclusions that Catholics of 20th century Portland believed Dalmations were holy holy dogs alive at the time of Christ. In reality, the dalmation is a symbol of St Dominic (it's a dominican church), whose mother had a dream she gave birth to a dalmation (St Dominic) with a torch in his mouth who lit the world on fire. The symbology is obvious, since Dominic, founder of the Order of Preachers, did indeed spread the gospel message throughout large portions of the world at the time. The dalmation symbolizes St Dominic's following of Jesus's example. At no point is any of the art intended to be realistic. So if that's true of 20th century Catholic art, made by people alive at a time when art is expected to portray reality, then even more so should we not interpret this fresco as realistic, since it was made at a time when people couldn't even paint realistically (perspective was an enlightenment / renaissance invention IIRC).

pmoriarty 5y ago
"At no point is any of the art intended to be realistic." Well, except that, say, Jesus is supposed to be Jesus. Adam and Eve are supposed to be Adam and Eve. The garden in which Adam and Eve are depicted is supposed to be the Garden of Eden in the Bible. In the various depictions of the Last Supper, Jesus is depicted as having supper with his disciples, and that is supposed to depict exactly that. Jesus is shown as breaking bread in those paintings, just as he does in the Biblical story, etc, etc, etc... Not to say there isn't a lot of symbolism in Christian art, but it's not all symbolic.
- iammisc 5y ago
  I suppose it's realistic in the sense that Christ is depicted as a human as are adam and eve, instead of something else, but there is no presumption that christ actually looked like the way he was drawn.

motohagiography 5y ago

If you want to go down a rabbit hole, look into biblical and other references to how important and common the acacia tree was, and then consider that it's thought to be a significant source of DMT. (The second fresco in the article has what appears to be an acacia tree in it). One can only speculate what someone could have imagined if they were around one while it was burning and they inhaled it. The analog feedback patterns one sees when their senses are impaired are by almost all accounts, geometric patterns like fractals, and so the discovery of geometry and association of it with mysticism could have a common chemical origin. If there was something to be known or learned from psychedelic experiences, a national security service would need to know and understand its boundaries. Given radio was only recently discovered, people new to the idea of communicating over long distances using invisible energy would have had to consider whether there was some chemical connection. I'm not saying it's aliens...but it may very well be all drugs.

oxymoran 5y ago

The notion that scholars have “debunked” the mushroom hypothesis is ludicrous given that they don’t postulate a hypothesis that is any more reasonable. The idea that it is a “stylized” tree seems preposterous to me given each branch ending in a cap. If it was just the top, ok. But every branch? It looks like a clump of mushrooms growing out of the ground, Occam’s razor and what not.That doesn’t mean it’s a magic mushroom, but maybe mushrooms had some sort of significance to the artist/church/region etc.

hospadar 5y ago

Wow mostly unrelated, I had no idea that _Amanita Muscara_ was considered to be psychoactive (usually is described as poisinous in field guides). Also frequently considered to be edible (after treatment) in some places. Fascinating! (for those unfamiliar, the amanita genus as a whole contains a variety of extremely toxic mushrooms and is often avoided by novice edible collectors for that reason) See also: https://www.bayareamushrooms.org/education/further_reflections_amanita_muscaria.html https://www.bayareamushrooms.org/education/further_reflectio...

Trasmatta 5y ago
FWIW, I wouldn't recommend trying to get high off of Amanita Muscaria. By all accounts it can be a rather unpleasant (and long) high. Best to stick with psilocybin.
tmountain 5y ago
It's been suggested (but not proven) that amanita muscara inspired portions of Christmas mythology (Santa, flying reindeer, etc). https://www.npr.org/2010/12/24/132260025/did-shrooms-send-santa-and-his-reindeer-flying https://www.npr.org/2010/12/24/132260025/did-shrooms-send-sa...
__MatrixMan__ 5y ago
This is a far cry from an evidence-grade source, but https://ambrosiasociety.org/ https://ambrosiasociety.org/ is a pretty wild site to explore. Someone has put quite a lot of work into mapping the phenotypic traits of Amanita Muscara onto Christian iconograhy (the lamb of god being the wooly mycelium, and the living cup having to do with the way it colonizes wooden containers, etc). They've also got instructions on preparing it for consumption.

mbesto 5y ago

If you're curious about the ties between religion, shamanism and psychedelics theres a great book by Terrence McKenna on this subject called Food of the Gods: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0553371304?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_product_details https://www.amazon.com/dp/0553371304?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_...

anthk 5y ago
https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm https://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1037.htm

XantosD 5y ago

There are several examples from Scandinavia of old Christian churches with art depicting psychedelic mushrooms. Not 13th century though

swayvil 5y ago

It makes sense. Mushrooms (and some other devices) are how you see God etc. I mean, it wasn't always just about reading old books. It had to start somewhere. With some kind of real observation. And studying that stuff without the shrooms etc. Well, that's like studying microbiology without a microscope.

newdude116 5y ago

This is a bad drawing of Silphium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium#/media/File:Silphium.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium#/media/File:Silphium....

buovjaga 5y ago

Arguments against Christian mushroom trees: The Fungi-Pareidola of The Psychedelic Gospels by Chris Bennett https://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2021/08/05/__trashed/ https://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2021/08/05/__trashed... Mushroom Trees Debunked by Thomas Hatsis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrfeNp1FSUY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrfeNp1FSUY I remember Hatsis elsewhere referring to a chemical study of the pigments used in the Plaincourault fresco revealing the red was originally green. I can't find the mention atm.

maxk42 5y ago

Amanita muscaria do not have three branches supporting the cap.

swayvil 5y ago
Good point. Also, it is not 6 feet tall.

da39a3ee 5y ago

I know people say Amanita muscaria is hallucinogenic, but my understanding is that it is pretty poisonous. Liberty Cap (Psilocybe semilanceata), on the other hand, is also common in Europe at least, and of course is well known to be very hallucinogenic and not poisonous. So if you were gonna depict a hallucinogenic mushroom wouldn't you choose Liberty Cap?

inreverse 5y ago
The liberty cap is not a distinctive mushroom (small, round cap, brown). The amanita muscaria is beautiful and distinct enough that we recognise it in paintings hundreds of years later. Perhaps the painter chose it for its beauty, or perhaps because it was both distinctive and psychedelic. No way to know. But the academics claiming that "the plant in this fresco has nothing whatever to do with mushrooms" are embarrassing.

roca 5y ago

No.