Was Moses stoned on Sinai?
p2pnet news | Off Topic:- Was Moses stoned on Mount Sinai?
An Israeli researcher figures he may have been.
“Benny Shanon, a professor of cognitive psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has argued that the miraculous sights and sounds in the Exodus account of God’s giving of the Torah to Moses may have been drug induced,” says the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“Shanon, who published his theory in the scholarly journal Time and Mind, said the Mount Sinai spectacle recalled a ‘trip’ he experienced after drinking psychotropic drugs of a kind that can be found in some desert plants.”
“And all the people perceived the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the voice of the horn, and the mountain smoking.”
Thus the book of Exodus describes the impressive moment of the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai, notes Haaretz.com, going on:
“The “perceiving of the voices” has been interpreted endlessly since these words were first written. When Professor Benny Shanon, professor of cognitive psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, reads the verse, he recalls a powerful hallucinatory experience he had when he visited the Amazon and drank a potion made from a plant called ayahuasca.
“One of the things that happens when you drink the potion is a visual experience created via sounds,” he says in the story.
Former head of the Hebrew University psychology department, Shanon said his first experience with ayahuasca was in 1991 when he was invited to a religious ceremony in the northern Amazon in 1991 in Brazil.
“I experienced visions that had spiritual-religious connotations,” he says. Since that time, he has used it hundreds of times, and has published a book about the plant.
The acacia tree also has psychedelic properties, Shanon says, according to Haaretz, which adds:
“The acacia is mentioned frequently in the Bible, and was the type of wood of which the Ark of the Covenant was made. According to Shanon, he drank a potion prepared from a species of acacia while he was in South America, which caused similar experiences to those produced by the ayahuasca.
Shanon also sees signs of a hallucinogenic vision in the story of the burning bush
[NOTE - p2pnet is running a special reader’s survey. It only takes a minute - literally. Please click here. Cheers! And thanks … Jon]
Also See:
Jewish Telegraphic Agency – Was Moses high on Sinai?, March 4, 2008
Haaretz.com – Researcher: Moses was tripping at Mount Sinai, March 5, 2008
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March 5th, 2008 at 7:51 am
Good thing Moses wasn’t a Muslim
March 5th, 2008 at 9:22 am
Oh, GTFO with this anachronistic, biased nonsense.
As usual, tolerance is for everybody but Christians and Jews.
Anti-semitism FTL.
March 5th, 2008 at 9:57 am
must say this is an interesting article.
it could be possible but does not prove that there is no God.
one thing nature can prove is that there is always a bigger fish
in this case a higher power
March 5th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Like was he stoned? Or was he stoned? We need to know
March 5th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Well Jon, as an avid reader of your website I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you wouldn’t offer a balanced set of articles on every topic. Since most of this website is anti-RIAA (and rightly so) I suppose we can’t ask for you to run another article in this particular case about something POSITIVE related to Christianity, since you’ve now crossed that invisible line (religion) in your postings. It’s apparent you aren’t of the religious bent, or at a minimum you aren’t Christian. This *is* relevant because if you (anyone) have a belief system you must be true to it at all times, not only on Sunday (or Saturday, if that’s your thing).
As is typical of big media, controversial sensationalism for the win. Welcome to the big boys.
/sigh
March 5th, 2008 at 11:44 am
I do believe in a power greater than myself, and I try to live under principles you might call Christian. But Nope, I’m not a Christian.
Nor are most of the people who call themselves Christians
Cheers!
March 5th, 2008 at 11:48 am
Science right now can not even begin to address the issue of god or the meaning of what we experience. Science can not even begin to understand consciousness. I can not prove to you or to myself that I am sentient but I know I am. This is the only thing I know that I can not prove. Is it not a real miracle?
The only thing I can say by using the argument of similarities is that people arround me are probably sentient too just like dogs cats, Cattle, Horses. . . I don’t know where it’s stop or if it does.
I don’t recognize the so call “Superiority” of the Human species; nor should I.
Nobody understand what is going on so religions and beliefs are something personal and that should be respected.
Religions should not be used to divide people, trigger and justify persecutions, wars and Holocausts.
This beeing say we have the right to investigate the story of Moise Jesus Mohamad and overs and try to make sense out of it. All these is par of our comon culture. Judaism and Islamist is also par of our culture just like the antiques religions and Jews and Muslims don’t have a monopol on it. The problem with “miracles” is that they can be explained by science. The hypothesis that Mose might have been stoned is perfectly sound. If someone need miracles to believe in his religion it’s mean that he is unsecure in his beliefs.
This is ironical because while some are frenetically searching for miracles, they don’t realize that we are living in one:
The Universe!
March 5th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
“Nor are most of the people who call themselves Christians”
This is very true. Those that claim the most to be jews christians and Muslins are usualy the least.
Arial Sharon, George Bush and Ben Laden are just bigots! Overwise they will not do all the killing and persecuting they are doing because it is against their religions!
It turn out that the Bible, the Evangile and the Coran teach all the same things. One of them is peace and tolerance.
You know the “You Shall not Kill!” Sond familliar?
I have friends of several religions, Jews, Muslim, various flavor of christianity, Boudism and Indouism. They all have few things in coment.
They don’t brag about their religion, they tolerate and respect the beliefs of others, they want to live with everyone.
We know how to enjoy life together.
This is why they are my friends. I know that most people are like my friends. It is time for all of us to band together and get ride of the extremists whatever they claim to be!
March 5th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
If Moses was stoned, how does the scientists explain the miracles experience by the ancient Israelites? How does the author explain the evidence at the site of Jebel Al Lawz (the very possible site of the real “Mount Sinai”)? There is much evidence archeological, linguistic, historical, and otherwise colloberating events in the Bible. I could go into much detail, but there is no point in doing so, because no matter the volume of evidence presented, people have their minds already made up.
As Jon pointed out, “I do believe in a power greater than myself, and I try to live under principles you might call Christian. But Nope, I’m not a Christian. Nor are most of the people who call themselves Christians”
March 7th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
if it appeared at the foot of mount sinai after the dew has gone and was in small white flakes looking like snow it was not manner it was mushrooms.
March 8th, 2008 at 7:14 am
An Israeli researcher thinks Moses could have been stoned. Forgive me if I feel that lacks credibility. Jesus charged the Jewish leaders with making God’s Word invalid by their tradition, which is just what this does by purporting to invalidate God’s Word. Higher learning does nothing to facilitate what is already known by millions of Bible students, nor does it improve one’s mind. “Always learning but never able to come to an accurate knowledge” says a Bible verse, in relation to those in opposition.