Considering how fragile the threads by which your composure hangs are – danger Will Robinson – warning warning: Beware Allegro’s END OF A ROAD (1970) his infamous sequel to SACRED MUSHROOM AND THE CROSS. You best be careful to steer the hell clear of that thing if you value your ‘blissful ignorance’– so riled by the informed perspective I speak from. The point for me is to just SEE and get that not only the Judean and Christian myths personified psychedelic mushrooms as gods, and other characters in their stories, but also did myths from the East. So we have 'Indra''Krishna', 'Siva' and so on, all sharing attributes cryptically referring to psychedelic mushrooms! Same is so for other myths, and also including the 'New World' myths of Quetzalcoatl. Conspiracy theories are a bit like Greek gods and goddesses. No matter who you are, there’s one tailor-made to appeal to all your vices.

Allegro was indeed an agnostic scholar of philology who worked on the Dead Sea Scrolls. He was not, however, the unique and trailblazing rebel Rogan presents him to be. Rather, it would be more accurate to say Allegro was fairly standard as far as eccentric, unbelieving, Bible, or Bible-adjacent scholars go, meaning he a priori ruled out divine inspiration as an explanation for the foundations of Christianity and, in an effort to make a name for himself, offered a more “rational” explanation for the story of Jesus Christ by inventing an explanation that is approximately eleventy billion times more improbable than “this stuff is in the Bible because it actually happened.” This Jesus Christ has freed us from the hopeless exercise of trying to bless our sins and hide our vices under the worship of false gods or the embrace of foolish conspiracy theories. This Jesus Christ has given us the right to know that these vices and sins no longer have any power over us. They are forgiven, dead, lifeless, washed away in the flood of Christ’s blood. Considering that Allegro’s conspiracy theory starts off at guano-level idiotic and only gets more ridiculous the more you look into it, it’s a bit odd that Rogan pushes it. If all you know of Rogan is his stint encouraging contestants to snort rancid pig entrails on “Fear Factor,” don’t let that fool you. The Sacred Mushroom and The Cross: A study of the nature and origins of Christianity within the fertility cults of the ancient Near East Hall, Mark. "Foreword", in Allegro, John M. The Dead Sea Scrolls & the Christian Myth. Prometheus 1992, first published 1979, p. ix.The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross. A Study of the Nature and Origins of Christianity Within the Frtility Cults of the Ancient Near East The Essenes, the Scrolls, and the Dead Sea by Joan E. Taylor (Dec 14, 2012) ISBN 019955448X Oxford University Press p. 305

But since I have had my own Psychedelic experience, I can imagine how it might have worked out for ancient people tripping on Mushrooms and actually experiencing God like entities and forming a religion out of it. Allegro asserts that it’s not such a controversial idea that religions could be based on the use of psychedelic plants. It’s been said that other ancient cultures might have used psychedelic plants as well in their religious rituals. In Book 9 of the classic Hindu text, the Rig Veda, a “pressed juice” called Soma is mentioned as something drunk by priests. Some sort of visionary state is reported: “Make me immortal in that realm where happiness and transports, where joys and felicities combine, and longing wishes are fulfilled.” That “Allegro never said anything about Christians being hippies or being dirty. He said nothing at all on the topic” isn’t quite accurate; nor even true. But it’s only wrong by a long shot. You’re off by only about, oh – a mere 180 degrees or so. No more.

Read a Book While You’re Not Doing Drugs

Allegro argued that Jesus in the Gospels was in fact a code for a type of hallucinogen, the Amanita muscaria, and that Christianity was the product of an ancient "sex-and-mushroom" cult. [29] [30] Critical reaction was swift and harsh: fourteen British scholars (including Allegro's mentor at Oxford, Godfrey Driver) denounced it. [29] Sidnie White Crawford wrote of the publication of Sacred Mushroom, "Rightly or wrongly, Allegro would never be taken seriously as a scholar again." [31] Santa as he looks today (also the loving figure he now is) was designed by Coca Cola through a huge marketing campaign starting in 1931. Before that Santa Claus was depicted quite differently and apperance would also vary a lot from place to place, different clothes in different colors (often blue, green, tan ect), but rarely red until around 1900. He was also sometimes depicted as a elf or a gnome besides a human. Very compelling hypothesis about Mushrooms in Sumer supported by linguistic evidences, but to me it felt like too much at some point. There are so many linguistic references and at the end most of them are either a Penis, a Vulva or something related to them or fertility.