Advertisement
<h3>Gnostic Media to Reprint John Allegro's famous <strong><em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em></strong>: A study of the nature and origins of Christianity within the fertility cults of the ancient Near East. </strong></h3>
The debate was never over. In fact, it hasn't yet begun...
After being out of print for more than a quarter of a century Gnostic Media is extremely excited to announce the upcoming 40th anniversary edition of John Marco Allegro's <em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em>.
Universally reviled on its first publication in May 1970, <em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> ruined John Allegro’s career. The book claimed that Christianity, like other Western religions, was rooted in an ancient fertility cult whose phallic god seeded the earth with life. The rites and symbols of this cult, passed on through generations of priests and kings, were still live and potent at the supposed time of Jesus – so potent that they were kept secret by cult members and suppressed by the rulers of church and state. Distorted, disguised, lost in translation, they were nevertheless still there, and surfaced from time to time in the traditions and iconography of the developing church.
The sacred mushroom, <em>Amanita muscaria</em>, was at once the symbol and embodiment of fertility, and the means to understand it. It is one of the entheogens (psychoactive substances derived from plants) that have been used over thousands of years and across continents to reach a higher state of consciousness, a sense of communion with the gods. Allegro maintained this was as true for Judaism and Christianity as it had been for the religions of ancient Greece, Rome, Scandinavia, India and Mexico.
The evidence is in language – Indo-European languages as they have developed and diversified since the first cuneiform inscriptions were written down some 6,000 years ago in ancient Sumer. Words and ideas that were sacred to the Sumerians recur in phrases and myths that became sacred to the Phoenicians, Greeks, Arabs, Hebrews and other nations. <em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> sets out Allegro's quest through a family tree of languages to find the truth about where Christianity came from.
The book caused an outcry in 1970. Forty years on, new evidence demands a reexamination of the work and a fairer appraisal from more open-minded readers. That is why Gnostic Media is pleased to present in full this 40th anniversary edition of Allegro's original work, with an addendum, Fungus Redivivus, by Professor Carl A. P. Ruck.
John Marco Allegro (1923-1988) was appointed the first British representative on the international editing team formed in the 1950s to start preparing the Dead Sea Scrolls for publication. His first book, The Dead Sea Scrolls, sold over 250,000 copies. As a writer and broadcaster and a lecturer on Old Testament and Intertestamental Studies at the University of Manchester, Allegro was at the centre of research and debate on the Scrolls.
<em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> was a result of 20 years' study in the languages of the Middle East.
www.JohnAllegro.org
Gnostic Media has teamed up with the Allegro estate and Judith Anne Brown, and Professor Carl A. P. Ruck of Boston University for this special 40th anniversary edition of John Allegro's The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross.
<strong>Contributors</strong>:
<strong>Preface by Jan Irvin</strong> , author of <em>The Holy Mushroom, Evidence of Mushrooms In Judeo-Christianity</em>, and co-author of <em>Astrotheology & Shamanism.</em></strong>
<strong>Foreword by Judith Anne Brown</strong>, author of <em>John Marco Allegro: The Maverick of the Dead Sea Scrolls</em>, and daughter to John Allegro.
<strong>Addendum - Fungus Redivivus by Professor Carl A. P. Ruck</strong>, co-author of:
<em>Persephone's Quest, The Hidden World, The Road to Eleusis, Sacred Mushrooms of the Goddess, The Apples of Apollo</em>, and the upcoming <em>Mushrooms, Myth and
Mithras: The Drug Cult that Civilized Europe</em>.
<em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> is available in:
Hardcover - $35.00
Softcover - $24.00
Preordering is now available through the Gnostic Media website at www.gnosticmedia.com
<strong>Shipping starts in late November to early December. </strong>
Please spread the news!
Jan Irvin
Gnostic Media Research & Publishing
contact@gnosticmedia.com
www.gnosticmedia.com
www.johnallegro.org
The debate was never over. In fact, it hasn't yet begun...
After being out of print for more than a quarter of a century Gnostic Media is extremely excited to announce the upcoming 40th anniversary edition of John Marco Allegro's <em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em>.
Universally reviled on its first publication in May 1970, <em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> ruined John Allegro’s career. The book claimed that Christianity, like other Western religions, was rooted in an ancient fertility cult whose phallic god seeded the earth with life. The rites and symbols of this cult, passed on through generations of priests and kings, were still live and potent at the supposed time of Jesus – so potent that they were kept secret by cult members and suppressed by the rulers of church and state. Distorted, disguised, lost in translation, they were nevertheless still there, and surfaced from time to time in the traditions and iconography of the developing church.
The sacred mushroom, <em>Amanita muscaria</em>, was at once the symbol and embodiment of fertility, and the means to understand it. It is one of the entheogens (psychoactive substances derived from plants) that have been used over thousands of years and across continents to reach a higher state of consciousness, a sense of communion with the gods. Allegro maintained this was as true for Judaism and Christianity as it had been for the religions of ancient Greece, Rome, Scandinavia, India and Mexico.
The evidence is in language – Indo-European languages as they have developed and diversified since the first cuneiform inscriptions were written down some 6,000 years ago in ancient Sumer. Words and ideas that were sacred to the Sumerians recur in phrases and myths that became sacred to the Phoenicians, Greeks, Arabs, Hebrews and other nations. <em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> sets out Allegro's quest through a family tree of languages to find the truth about where Christianity came from.
The book caused an outcry in 1970. Forty years on, new evidence demands a reexamination of the work and a fairer appraisal from more open-minded readers. That is why Gnostic Media is pleased to present in full this 40th anniversary edition of Allegro's original work, with an addendum, Fungus Redivivus, by Professor Carl A. P. Ruck.
John Marco Allegro (1923-1988) was appointed the first British representative on the international editing team formed in the 1950s to start preparing the Dead Sea Scrolls for publication. His first book, The Dead Sea Scrolls, sold over 250,000 copies. As a writer and broadcaster and a lecturer on Old Testament and Intertestamental Studies at the University of Manchester, Allegro was at the centre of research and debate on the Scrolls.
<em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> was a result of 20 years' study in the languages of the Middle East.
www.JohnAllegro.org
Gnostic Media has teamed up with the Allegro estate and Judith Anne Brown, and Professor Carl A. P. Ruck of Boston University for this special 40th anniversary edition of John Allegro's The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross.
<strong>Contributors</strong>:
<strong>Preface by Jan Irvin</strong> , author of <em>The Holy Mushroom, Evidence of Mushrooms In Judeo-Christianity</em>, and co-author of <em>Astrotheology & Shamanism.</em></strong>
<strong>Foreword by Judith Anne Brown</strong>, author of <em>John Marco Allegro: The Maverick of the Dead Sea Scrolls</em>, and daughter to John Allegro.
<strong>Addendum - Fungus Redivivus by Professor Carl A. P. Ruck</strong>, co-author of:
<em>Persephone's Quest, The Hidden World, The Road to Eleusis, Sacred Mushrooms of the Goddess, The Apples of Apollo</em>, and the upcoming <em>Mushrooms, Myth and
Mithras: The Drug Cult that Civilized Europe</em>.
<em>The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross</em> is available in:
Hardcover - $35.00
Softcover - $24.00
Preordering is now available through the Gnostic Media website at www.gnosticmedia.com
<strong>Shipping starts in late November to early December. </strong>
Please spread the news!
Jan Irvin
Gnostic Media Research & Publishing
contact@gnosticmedia.com
www.gnosticmedia.com
www.johnallegro.org
posted by:
|
Los Angeles
|
Advertisement
Advertisement
