Plants Of The Gods

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Plants of the Gods

Richard Evans Schultes,Albert Hofmann,Christian Rätsch
Plants of the Gods Book PDF

Author : Richard Evans Schultes,Albert Hofmann,Christian Rätsch
Publisher : Healing Arts Press
Page : 208 pages
File Size : 47,8 Mb
Release : 2001-11-01
Category : Health & Fitness
ISBN : 0892819790

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Plants of the Gods by Richard Evans Schultes,Albert Hofmann,Christian Rätsch Pdf

World-renowned anthropologist and ethnopharmacologist Christian Ratsch provides the latest scientific updates to this classic work on psychoactive flora by two eminent researchers. • Numerous new and rare color photographs complement the completely revised and updated text. • Explores the uses of hallucinogenic plants in shamanic rituals throughout the world. • Cross-referenced by plant, illness, preparation, season of collection, and chemical constituents. Three scientific titans join forces to completely revise the classic text on the ritual uses of psychoactive plants. They provide a fascinating testimony of these "plants of the gods," tracing their uses throughout the world and their significance in shaping culture and history. In the traditions of every culture, plants have been highly valued for their nourishing, healing, and transformative properties. The most powerful of those plants, which are known to transport the human mind into other dimensions of consciousness, have always been regarded as sacred. The authors detail the uses of hallucinogens in sacred shamanic rites while providing lucid explanations of the biochemistry of these plants and the cultural prayers, songs, and dances associated with them. The text is lavishly illustrated with 400 rare photographs of plants, people, ceremonies, and art related to the ritual use of the world's sacred psychoactive flora.

Messages from the Gods

Michael J. Balick,Rosita Arvigo
Messages from the Gods Book PDF

Author : Michael J. Balick,Rosita Arvigo
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
Page : 554 pages
File Size : 54,6 Mb
Release : 2015
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780199965762

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Messages from the Gods by Michael J. Balick,Rosita Arvigo Pdf

Despite its small size, Belize is one of the most ecologically diverse nations in Central America. Over 3,400 species of plants can be found here, within six different ecological life zones. Because of this, Belize is paradise for ecotourists, hosting over 300,000 visitors annually, who enjoy the natural habitat and friendly people of this nation. Many of the plants of Belize have a long history of being "useful," with properties that have served traditional herbal healers of the region as well as modern medicinal applications. With Messages from the Gods: A Guide to the Useful Plants of Belize, Drs. Michael Balick and Rosita Arvigo give us the definitive resource on the many species of plants in Belize and their folklore, as well as the natural history of the region and a detailed discussion of "bush" uses of plants, including for traditional healing. Both Balick and Arvigo bring important perspectives to the project, Balick as ethnobotanical scientist from The New York Botanical Garden, and Arvigo as a former apprentice to a Belizean healer and an experienced physician. The book has been decades in the making, a culmination of a biodiversity research project that The New York Botanical Garden has had in motion since 1987. Drs. Balick, Arvigo and their colleagues have collected and identified thousands of plants from the region, and have worked extensively with hundreds of Belizean people, many of them herbal healers and bushmasters, to record uses for many of the species. This collaboration with local plant experts has produced a fascinating discussion of the intersection of herbal medicine and religion in the area, and these interviews are used to compliment and contextualize the numerous species accounts presented. The book is both a cultural study and a specialized field guide; information is provided on plants used as food, medicine, fiber, in spiritual practices and for many other purposes. Richly illustrated with over 600 images and photographs, Messages from the Gods: A Guide to The Useful Plants of Belize will serve as the primary reference and guide to the ethnobotany of Belize for many years to come.

Heavenly Highs

Peter Stafford
Heavenly Highs Book PDF

Author : Peter Stafford
Publisher : Ronin Publishing
Page : 188 pages
File Size : 40,8 Mb
Release : 2001-07-15
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 1579511236

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Heavenly Highs by Peter Stafford Pdf

HEAVENLY HIGHS introduces the reader to a world of enthobotanicals (plants which release the god within) used by Shaman and psychedelic explorers. Includes DMT, which is found in psychedelic snuff; Amazonian ayahuasca, which is a bitter tasting beverage that triggers visionary experiences with plant gods; Ibogain, which is a yellowish root ingested by indigenous peoples to achieve visionary experiences; and Belladona, Yohimbe and Kava-Kava. For each group Stafford provides the history, botany, chemistry, mental and physical effects, preparation and use, and legal considerations.

Where the Gods Reign

Richard Evans Schultes
Where the Gods Reign Book PDF

Author : Richard Evans Schultes
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 324 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 1988
Category : History
ISBN : STANFORD:36105008597705

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Where the Gods Reign by Richard Evans Schultes Pdf

While the core of VINE OF THE SOUL (the companion book to WHERE THE GODS REIGN), is the Amazonian plant life and the indigenous people's uses for it, WHERE THE GODS REIGN focuses primarily on the people themselves-though of course, Schultz (who was dubbed the father of ethnobotany by Prince Philip himself) is first and foremost a botanist and plants do figure into the mix: Schultes describes devil's gardens-empty patches in the otherwise thick forests where, for no apparent (or scientific) reason, nothing will grow-with the same precision and wonderment with which he discusses the many plants that grow upon other plants in their effort to get their share of the sun...and much more. But in this fine volume he begins with information about the histories of the various tribes and the lay of the lands on which they live; savannahs, dense forests, quartzite cliffs, sandstone mountains and caves and thunderous waterfalls are all accounted for; and all of his lyrical essays are accompanied by stunning black and white photographs. (There are over 140 photos in the book.) Schultes is often poetic here as well, describing not only the geography but, often, the exquisite emotions one experiences observing it in different seasons or different times of the day. Likewise, Schultes describes the people lovingly. He delights in their ability to be happy in spite of poverty, sickness, and, particularly in the case of the women, very hard work. He marvels at their relationships with animals, many of which they tame, so that their homes are surrounded by birds, monkeys, deer, and even boa constrictors (which live in the rafters and keep the mice and rat populations at bay). He marvels that while the children are almost never punished and enjoy a high degree of freedom (especially the boys), they show great respect for their elders as well as a great curiosity and appreciation for their surroundings. Schultes' pleasure-in the land and its people-is our pleasure. He is a remarkable scientist and a most eloquent guide. Reading WHERE THE GODS REIGN is probably as close as most of us will ever get to the kind of experience Schultes had staying in Amazon basin and learning about the many very different alternatives to living a life. But one can't help but long for that experience too. The book threatens to make explorers out of all of us-and a reader can't help but be disheartened upon remembering that there is not much left to explore.

Gods and Goddesses in the Garden

Peter Bernhardt
Gods and Goddesses in the Garden Book PDF

Author : Peter Bernhardt
Publisher : Rutgers University Press
Page : 265 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 2008-03-11
Category : Gardening
ISBN : 9780813544724

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Gods and Goddesses in the Garden by Peter Bernhardt Pdf

Zeus, Medusa, Hercules, Aphrodite. Did you know that these and other dynamic deities, heroes, and monsters of Greek and Roman mythology live on in the names of trees and flowers? Some grow in your local woodlands or right in your own backyard garden. In this delightful book, botanist Peter Bernhardt reveals the rich history and mythology that underlie the origins of many scientific plant names. Unlike other books about botanical taxonomy that take the form of heavy and intimidating lexicons, Bernhardt's account comes together in a series of interlocking stories. Each chapter opens with a short version of a classical myth, then links the tale to plant names, showing how each plant "resembles" its mythological counterpart with regard to its history, anatomy, life cycle, and conservation. You will learn, for example, that as our garden acanthus wears nasty spines along its leaf margins, it is named for the nymph who scratched the face of Apollo. The shape-shifting god, Proteus, gives his name to a whole family of shrubs and trees that produce colorful flowering branches in an astonishing number of sizes and shapes. Amateur and professional gardeners, high school teachers and professors of biology, botanists and conservationists alike will appreciate this book's entertaining and informative entry to the otherwise daunting field of botanical names. Engaging, witty, and memorable, Gods and Goddesses in the Garden transcends the genre of natural history and makes taxonomy a topic equally at home in the classroom and at cocktail parties.

Hallucinogenic Plants

Richard Evans Schultes
Hallucinogenic Plants Book PDF

Author : Richard Evans Schultes
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 160 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2021-04-25
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 1667135805

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Hallucinogenic Plants by Richard Evans Schultes Pdf

What are hallucinogenic plants? How do they affect mind and body? Who uses them - and why? This unique Golden Guide surveys the role of psychoactive plants in primitive and civilized societies from early times to the present. The first nontechnical guide to both the cultural significance and physiological effects of hallucinogens, HALLUCINOGENIC PLANTS will fascinate general readers and students of anthropology and history as well as botanists and other specialists. All of the wild and cultivated species considered are illustrated in brilliant full color. A Brilliant accompaniment to R G Wasson's Soma Divine Mushroom of Immortality and R G Wasson's Wondrous Mushroom.

Food of the Gods

Terence McKenna
Food of the Gods Book PDF

Author : Terence McKenna
Publisher : Random House
Page : 338 pages
File Size : 45,8 Mb
Release : 1999
Category : Drug abuse
ISBN : 9780712670388

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Food of the Gods by Terence McKenna Pdf

Reissued because of the current interest in Ecstasy, this is McKenna's extraordinary quest to discover the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. He wonders why we are so fascinated by altered states of consciousness, do they reveal something about our origins as human beings and our place in nature?

From the Bodies of the Gods

Earl Lee
From the Bodies of the Gods Book PDF

Author : Earl Lee
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 52,7 Mb
Release : 2012-05-16
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN : 9781594777011

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From the Bodies of the Gods by Earl Lee Pdf

The origins of modern religion in human sacrifice, ritual cannibalism, visionary intoxication, and the Cult of the Dead • Explores ancient practices of producing sacred hallucinogenic foods and oils from the bodies of the dead for ritual consumption and religious anointing • Explains how these practices are deeply embedded in the symbolism, theology, and sacraments of modern religion, specifically Christianity and the Eucharist • Documents the rites of Cults of the Dead from the prehistoric Minoans on Crete to the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Hebrews to early and medieval Christian sects such as the Cathars Long before the beginnings of civilization, humans have been sacrificed and their flesh used to produce sacred foods and oils for use in religious rites. Originating with the sacred harvest of hallucinogenic mushrooms from the corpses of shamans and other holy men, these acts of ritual cannibalism and visionary intoxication are part of the history of all cultures, including Judeo-Christian ones, and provided a way to commune with the dead. These practices continued openly into the Dark Ages, when they were suppressed and adapted into the worship of saintly bones--or continued in secret by a few “heretical” sects, such as the Cathars and the Knights Templar. While little known today, these rites remain deeply embedded in the symbolism, theology, and sacraments of modern religion and bring a much more literal meaning to the church’s “Holy Communion” or symbolic consumption of the body and blood of Christ. Documenting the sacrificial, cannibalistic, and psychoactive sacramental practices associated with the Cult of the Dead from the prehistoric Minoans on Crete to the ancient Egyptians and Hebrews and onward to early and medieval Christian sects, Earl Lee shows how these religious rites influenced the development of Western religion. In particular, he reveals how Christianity originated with Jesus’s effort to restore the sacred rites of Moses, including the Marzeah, or Feast for the Dead. Examining the connections between these rites and the mysterious funeral of Father Sauniere in Rennes-le-Château, the author explains why the prehistoric Cult of the Dead has held such power over Western civilization, so much so that its echoes are still heard today in our literature, film, and arts.

One River

Wade Davis
One River Book PDF

Author : Wade Davis
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 544 pages
File Size : 43,8 Mb
Release : 2010-05-11
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781439126837

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One River by Wade Davis Pdf

The story of two generations of scientific explorers in South America—Richard Evans Schultes and his protégé Wade Davis—an epic tale of adventure and a compelling work of natural history. In 1941, Professor Richard Evan Schultes took a leave from Harvard and disappeared into the Amazon, where he spent the next twelve years mapping uncharted rivers and living among dozens of Indian tribes. In the 1970s, he sent two prize students, Tim Plowman and Wade Davis, to follow in his footsteps and unveil the botanical secrets of coca, the notorious source of cocaine, a sacred plant known to the Inca as the Divine Leaf of Immortality. A stunning account of adventure and discovery, betrayal and destruction, One River is a story of two generations of explorers drawn together by the transcendent knowledge of Indian peoples, the visionary realms of the shaman, and the extraordinary plants that sustain all life in a forest that once stood immense and inviolable.

Plants of Life, Plants of Death

Frederick J. Simoons
Plants of Life Plants of Death Book PDF

Author : Frederick J. Simoons
Publisher : Univ of Wisconsin Press
Page : 596 pages
File Size : 52,7 Mb
Release : 1998
Category : Folklore
ISBN : 0299159043

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Plants of Life, Plants of Death by Frederick J. Simoons Pdf

This study examines plants associated with ritual purity, fertility, prosperity and life, and plants associated with ritual impurity, sickness, ill fate and death. It provides detail from history, ethnography, religious studies, classics, folklore, ethnobotany and medicine.

Plants of Love

Christian Rätsch
Plants of Love Book PDF

Author : Christian Rätsch
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 40,5 Mb
Release : 1997
Category : Aphrodisiacs
ISBN : 0898159288

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Plants of Love by Christian Rätsch Pdf

For centuries humans have searched for plants and potions to enhance both love and lovemaking. PLANTS OF LOVE looks at aphrodisiacs throughout history. This sensational coffee-table conversation starter offers information on over 100 plants thought to have aphrodisiacal powers, along with historical details, intriguing stories, and beautiful full-color art.

Witchcraft Medicine

Claudia Müller-Ebeling,Christian Rätsch,Wolf-Dieter Storl
Witchcraft Medicine Book PDF

Author : Claudia Müller-Ebeling,Christian Rätsch,Wolf-Dieter Storl
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 272 pages
File Size : 45,7 Mb
Release : 2003-10-01
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN : 9781594776618

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Witchcraft Medicine by Claudia Müller-Ebeling,Christian Rätsch,Wolf-Dieter Storl Pdf

An in-depth investigation of traditional European folk medicine and the healing arts of witches • Explores the outlawed “alternative” medicine of witches suppressed by the state and the Church and how these plants can be used today • Reveals that female shamanic medicine can be found in cultures all over the world • Illustrated with color and black-and-white art reproductions dating back to the 16th century Witch medicine is wild medicine. It does more than make one healthy, it creates lust and knowledge, ecstasy and mythological insight. In Witchcraft Medicine the authors take the reader on a journey that examines the women who mix the potions and become the healers; the legacy of Hecate; the demonization of nature’s healing powers and sensuousness; the sorceress as shaman; and the plants associated with witches and devils. They explore important seasonal festivals and the plants associated with them, such as wolf’s claw and calendula as herbs of the solstice and alder as an herb of the time of the dead--Samhain or Halloween. They also look at the history of forbidden medicine from the Inquisition to current drug laws, with an eye toward how the sacred plants of our forebears can be used once again.

The Food of the Gods

H. G. Wells
The Food of the Gods Book PDF

Author : H. G. Wells
Publisher : Hesperus Press
Page : 222 pages
File Size : 52,7 Mb
Release : 2013-12-01
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 9781780941974

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The Food of the Gods by H. G. Wells Pdf

Published in 1904, this forgotten classic is sci-fi and dystopia at its best, written by the creator and master of the genre Following extensive research in the field of "growth," Mr. Bensington and Professor Redwood light upon a new mysterious element, a food that causes greatly accelerated development. Initially christening their discovery "The Food of the Gods," the two scientists are overwhelmed by the possible ramifications of their creation. Needing room for experiments, Mr. Besington chooses a farm that offers him the chance to test on chickens, which duly grow monstrous, six or seven times their usual size. With the farmer, Mr. Skinner, failing to contain the spread of the Food, chaos soon reigns as reports come in of local encounters with monstrous wasps, earwigs, and rats. The chickens escape, leaving carnage in their wake. The Skinners and Redwoods have both been feeding their children the compound illicitly—their eventual offspring will constitute a new age of giants. Public opinion rapidly turns against the scientists and society rebels against the world's new flora and fauna. Daily life has changed shockingly and now politicians are involved, trying to stamp out the Food of the Gods and the giant race. Comic and at times surprisingly touching and tragic, Wells' story is a cautionary tale warning against the rampant advances of science but also of the dangers of greed, political infighting, and shameless vote-seeking.

The God of the Garden

Andrew Peterson
The God of the Garden Book PDF

Author : Andrew Peterson
Publisher : B&H Publishing Group
Page : 157 pages
File Size : 46,5 Mb
Release : 2021-10-26
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781087736969

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The God of the Garden by Andrew Peterson Pdf

There’s a strong biblical connection between people and trees. They both come from dirt. They’re both told to bear fruit. In fact, arboreal language is so often applied to humans that it’s easy to miss, whether we're talking about family trees, passing along our seed, cutting someone off like a branch, being rooted to a place, or bearing the fruit of the Spirit. It’s hard to deny that trees mean something, theologically speaking. This book is in many ways a memoir, but it’s also an attempt to wake up the reader to the glory of God shining through his creation. One of the first commands to Adam and Eve was to “work and keep” the garden. Award-winning author and songwriter Andrew Peterson, being as honest as possible, shares a story of childhood, grief, redemption, and peace, by walking through a forest of memories: “I trust that by telling my story, you’ll encounter yours. Hopefully, like me, you’ll see that the God of the Garden is and has always been present, working and keeping what he loves.” Sometimes he plants, sometimes he prunes, but in his goodness he intends to reap a harvest of righteousness.

This Is Your Mind on Plants

Michael Pollan
This Is Your Mind on Plants Book PDF

Author : Michael Pollan
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 289 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2021-07-06
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN : 9780593296912

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This Is Your Mind on Plants by Michael Pollan Pdf

The instant New York Times bestseller | A Washington Post Notable Book | One of NPR's Best Books of the Year “Expert storytelling . . . [Pollan] masterfully elevates a series of big questions about drugs, plants and humans that are likely to leave readers thinking in new ways.” —New York Times Book Review From #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Pollan, a radical challenge to how we think about drugs, and an exploration into the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants—and the equally powerful taboos. Of all the things humans rely on plants for—sustenance, beauty, medicine, fragrance, flavor, fiber—surely the most curious is our use of them to change consciousness: to stimulate or calm, fiddle with or completely alter, the qualities of our mental experience. Take coffee and tea: People around the world rely on caffeine to sharpen their minds. But we do not usually think of caffeine as a drug, or our daily use as an addiction, because it is legal and socially acceptable. So, then, what is a “drug”? And why, for example, is making tea from the leaves of a tea plant acceptable, but making tea from a seed head of an opium poppy a federal crime? In This Is Your Mind on Plants, Michael Pollan dives deep into three plant drugs—opium, caffeine, and mescaline—and throws the fundamental strangeness, and arbitrariness, of our thinking about them into sharp relief. Exploring and participating in the cultures that have grown up around these drugs while consuming (or, in the case of caffeine, trying not to consume) them, Pollan reckons with the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants. Why do we go to such great lengths to seek these shifts in consciousness, and then why do we fence that universal desire with laws and customs and fraught feelings? In this unique blend of history, science, and memoir, as well as participatory journalism, Pollan examines and experiences these plants from several very different angles and contexts, and shines a fresh light on a subject that is all too often treated reductively—as a drug, whether licit or illicit. But that is one of the least interesting things you can say about these plants, Pollan shows, for when we take them into our bodies and let them change our minds, we are engaging with nature in one of the most profound ways we can. Based in part on an essay published almost twenty-five years ago, this groundbreaking and singular consideration of psychoactive plants, and our attraction to them through time, holds up a mirror to our fundamental human needs and aspirations, the operations of our minds, and our entanglement with the natural world.