42 Spirituality Studies 10-1 Spring 2024 For the Kaliyuga… only a drastic medicine… is effective. – Rā makrishna (1977, 464) For the same medicine is not suited for all, even when the illness is the same. – St. Peter of Damaskos (1995, 185) When your body is sick, it is sometimes necessary to take a strong drug. But when you are healthy, you don’t take drugs. So this special medicine [note: entheogens] cures some sickness… – Seung Sahn (1976, 97) [P]art of a remedy contains poison… In all things there is a poison, and there is nothing without a poison. It depends only upon the dose whether a poison is poison or not… – Paracelsus (1988, 95) 1 Introduction Central to any discussion of entheogens are the circumstances in which we currently find ourselves. We live in a time of extremes, a great variety of which are visible all around us. Things not only appear to be out of place, but they are altogether abysmally wrong. The emergence of the psychedelic renaissance needs to be situated in light of the spiritual crisis that afflicts the modern world. As Albert Hofmann (1906–2008) said, “[t]he assertion that there is no truth, that everything is relative… is a demoralizing worldview that has had devastating consequences” (2013, 45). Without acknowledging the momentous developments that led to this eclipse of the sacred – principally scientism and materialism – is difficult to make sense of the explosion of interest in psychedelics, and their perceived capacity to heal the maladies of our time. To be sure, the Western world is experiencing a resurgence of interest in the therapeutic potential of sacred plants with a long history of ceremonial use by the First Peoples. There is a search for more holistic forms of mental health treatment that go beyond the mere management of symptoms and, instead, pursue authentic healing and wholeness. The vacuum created by the loss of religion in the world today is often unrecognized in this discussion because of the hegemonic dominance of modern science and its empirical epistemology that rules out alternative modes of knowing reality. The wide-ranging consequence of this outlook is paramount, as Antonin Artaud (1896–1948) asserted when he wrote: “That sense of the sacred which European consciousness has lost [note: is] the root of all our misfortunes” (Artaud 1976, 22). For many, this void has been filled with modern psychology and science. Therefore, the psychedelic renaissance is situated at a critical juncture, in which the mental health treatments of a totalitarian modern science will either continue, or a return to the metaphysical frameworks and methodologies of sacred psychologies will allow for a multivalent approach to epistemological pluralism. A case will be made that bringing the insights of humanity’s spiritual traditions to the discipline of psychology will greatly enhance therapeutic outcomes in the use of entheogens. In other words, a study of psychotherapy and the human psyche is proposed according to a perspective that is both metaphysical and transcendent in its assumptions. This is consistent with how a “science of the soul” was understood by the traditional cultures of the world prior to the emergence of modernity. While phenomenology – as informed by the epistemological pluralism of the sacred – is conducive to such an undertaking, our approach to this philosophical framework will differ from conventional applications. Some further qualifications are needed here because we must differentiate between several levels when considering the therapeutic use of entheogens in traditional cultures: (1) general healing; (2) religious salvation; and (3) spiritual realization or enlightenment. If the general goal of entheogenic therapy is simply rehabilitation for the average person, this may not require adherence to a religio-spiritual framework for such treatment to be partially effective. With that said, PAT offered in a secular context can achieve predictably controllable protocols of treatment in a relatively safe context. So while it may not be necessary to observe the strict requirements of a spiritual tradition when having recourse to such treatment, we will nonetheless present the optimal conditions under which entheogenic therapy is likely to be most efficacious. While much can be said about entheogens, we need to be clear about the scope of this study. Its aim is to situate Psychedelic-Assisted Psychotherapy (PAT) within the ontology and metaphysics at the heart of humanity’s spiritual traditions. What it will not focus on are the following: 1. The idea that entheogens can produce religious-mystical experiences equivalent to those of the saints and sages of the world’s spiritual traditions. [1] 2. The thesis that the nature and origin of all religions derive from entheogenic use. [2]
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