Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Ethno-Mycology: Anthropology of Mushrooms


Note mushrooms in stained glass beneath Christ figure.

TOPIC: esoteric Eastern philosophy -- the mysteries of Soma and Amrita, the magical, sacramental, transformational foods and drinks of Hinduism and Buddhism. The hidden keys to enlightenment.
Many religions have used this mushroom in their sacraments, initiations, and rituals. Revealing this knowledge could perhaps achieve what many throughout the world have desired, a common ground that all religions share at their very roots, a common denominator which might bring them together.

Amanita muscaria: the mushrooms that shaped mankind. The Mushroom itself has very interesting features that resemble or relate to gold, flesh, blood (and blood vessels), phallus, vulva, fire, saucer, cup, as well as a disc or orb. The mushroom has been, anthropomorphically, personified as a man, a god, something of extraterrestrial origin, and a plant god (in Buddhist lore a bhumi-deva), soma, who was mediator between man and the demigods (devas), in the ancient Hindu religious texts known as the Vedas.


Mycological roots of Christianity

R. Gordon Wasson's insightful and inspired work identifying the ancient Vedic and Hindu plant god, Soma, as the Amanita muscaria mushroom was the pioneering work in a field that would be come to be known as ethnomycology....

In Angkor, Cambodia, holy temples mix Hindu and Buddhist theology. Note the appearance of this beautiful structure, a pine forest created in stone. [See David Wilcock, the reborn "Edgar Cayce," for the significance of the pine symbol throughout the world]. The pine (coniferous) tree is the host for the mushroom mycellium, as we have seen, this intricate relationship with the trees and the mushrooms was obviously understood, and revered in ancient times all over the world. This structure is a monument to the trees and the fruit that grows underneath them. The most sacred of all things is the elixir of immortality, which is Soma/Amrita, produced from the mushroom, also sacred are the host trees themselves.
This is why this incredible structure must have been created in the image of a great stone Pine forest, fortified by walls covered with Bas reliefs, depicting the stories of the sacred acts pertaining to enlightenment. The temple holds the history of great learning, the culmination of which is the knowledge of the elixir and its consumption. At the base of the pine tree towers, inside the courtyard, is where the testing of the aspirants would occur, as in nature, where at the base of the pines the Soma can be found. Mix the discovery with the understanding, and the testing begins. The knowledge of astronomy/astro-theology was of great importance to many ancient cultures, and may remain so, especially if one is to travel out of body, or multidimensionally into the heavens. The alignemets and positioning of the stars, holding such deep importance, demands that we search out all possible explanation....

The demons pull the Naga serpent in one direction turning the tide of humanity towards evil. Hindu and Buddhist myths take on great form in Bas reliefs, Statues, and Architecture. The Angkor Wat temple holds one of the most profound and important of Hindu mysteries. The manifestation of the "Elixir of Immortality." The churning-of-the-milky-ocean is a myth which allegorically depicts the spiraling (churning) of our milky way galaxy, and the precession of the equinoxes. The ocean is that on which the entire universe was thought to rest. This churning is the act which produces the Amrita (elixir of immortality). A high knowledge of mathematics involved in the calculation on the precession of the equinoxes and the understanding of the spiraling of our galaxy, encoded within the structure of the temple, defies the idea that these were primitive peoples.
The universe is called the "milky ocean." It is the churning of this ocean in a ageless battle between the forces of good and evil, which produces the Amrita (Soma). Vasouki, a giant naga serpent, is wrapped around the great holy mountain, Mandera, and is pulled back and forth to churn the ocean. Vishnu attempts to steady the mountan by holding the serpent at the middle, gyrating with the tides of battle, the mountain is steadied to a slight wobble (which represents the earthe rotation through precession). The mountain rests upon a great tortoise, which is another incarnation of Vishnu. The serpent is stretched around the mountain in a great tug-of-war in which two teams (fifty-four devas, and fifty-four nagas) pull the serpent back and forth. This great pulling between the forces of good and evil, turns the mountain like the rotor in a washing machine. This is the great battle between in which good and evil actually work together to produce the elixir of immortality, Soma, Amrita.

Text by James Arthur (ethnomycologist, lecturer)

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