The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross

A Study of the Nature and Origins of Christianity Within the Fertility Cults of the Ancient Near East

By: John M. Allegro

Narrated by: Martyn Swain

Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

Where did God come from? What do the bible stories really tell us? Who or what was Jesus Christ? This audiobook challenges everything we think we know about the nature of religion:

• The ancient fertility cult at the heart of Christianity.
• The living power of cultic rites and symbols.
• The sacred mushroom as the emblem and embodiment of divinity.
• The secret meaning of biblical myths.
• The language of religion that links us to our ancestors.

The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross sets out John Allegro's quest through a family tree of languages to find the truth about where Christianity came from.

©1970 John M. Allegro (P)2022 Dreamscape Media

Great book

This book was something I kinda always just assumed they did. Even as a kid I knew ancient history is A LOT of guess work. Plus i believe people have been using psychedelics for literally 1000s of years for many different purposes.

Incredibly Fascinating

This book is incredibly extensive; diving into the history of the words of The Bible. Revealing in it the hidden works of a religious cult. Highly recommend! A+

Doesn't live up to the hype.

In certain circles there is quite a bit of hype about this book - or more specifically the theory it espouses. I am just over halfway and it seems to me that a lot of the enthusiasts who push this book haven't read it.

I'm not a linguist nor do I play one on TV so I cannot challenge the author's theory. And I stress this is merely a theory (a rather titillating one but a theory nonetheless) that makes far too many assumptions based on how words are adopted into different languages.

The narration is excruciating. It sounds like a bored British Civil Servant reading a dry economics report. I find myself unable pay attention for long stretches only to find that I didn't really miss anything. Just another long list of sumerian words that really mean penis.

And wow those Sumerians were sure obsessed with the penis.

Look, I don't want to demean the work of a noted (and now dead) scholar who seemed to be really excellent at deciphering dead languages. It's just that there seems to be too much of a leap of logic here.

We used to be told that we shouldn't take the Bible literally.. now we are supposed to believe it's full of hidden dick jokes??

I am going to return this one. I might read the actual book format because I don't feel I have given it a fair chance but for now I am going to shelve this one under the category "life's too short to listen to bad audio books.

Mind altering

Fantastical believable story. It’s a logical take on the “greatest story ever told”. I highly recommend it!

Intriguing.

I'm going to have to do a lot of research, and then reread this. It definitely begs many questions.

fertility cults

interesting perspective on religion and psychedelics. would also recommend immortality key to follow up with.

Important Context From the Ancient World

This is a deeply fascinating study of translations, word plays, puns, and etymologies from ancient writings, both in and out of the Biblical Canon.

Well thought out technical breakdown...

Definitely a heavy read. There is a lot of language description and breakdown, which is needed for such a topic. It is a great insight into how little we actually know about historical writings.

Probably a better read than listen.

Difficult book to listen to for me. Much of the book used translations that were difficult to follow audibly. Premise of the book was interesting though.

I was hoping for more.

I don't know about the ancient languages so I accept the claims at face value. I don't see much value in spelling out the words as it doesn't add anything for a non expert. I expected the author to provide more on what the hidden meaning of the text is supposed to be. if he has uncovered that mushroom was somehow encoded into the story, what was the story telling the cult members that understood the code. As a reader all I get is blah, blah, mushroom, mushroom, blah blah. The book would have much more value if some sort of explanation was included.