The Holy Mushroom
Page 9
I should also point out that Wasson, in letters and his interview with Forte, continued his erroneous and unfounded attacks against Allegro (below). If Wasson had actually changed his mind regarding Allegro and mushrooms beyond Genesis in Judeo-Christianity there would be no reason to continue his attacks.
Additionally, as has been repeated, Wasson in no way corrected Ramsbottom on the subject of the Plaincourault fresco because he himself was incorrect (Hoffman et al, 2006). Other scholars such as Samorini (Eleusis ns 1, 1998, pg. 87–108) and Ruck et al (Melusina of Plaincourault, 2005; Conjuring Eden, 2001; Fungus Redivivus), have presented evidence showing that Wasson’s Plaincourault fresco interpretation was wrong.
As partially quoted above, in Fungus Redivivus (unpublished), Ruck postulates that Wasson “was in the process of changing his opinion”. He also mentions the schism between Wasson and Allegro:
Wasson, himself, however, was in the process of changing his opinion. From his letters, we know that he was intrigued with the work of Allegro and frustrated by his unanswered attempt to initiate correspondence. Ruck independently was similarly unsuccessful, except for a polite reply from a man who had withdrawn from the world.
—footnote 45: In a letter to Allegro from his Danbury home dated 14 September, 1970, Wasson wrote: “Though we are utterly opposed to each other on the role played by the fly-agaric, we agree that it was important. I think we can correspond with each other on friendly terms, like opposing counsel after hammering each other all day in court who meet for a drink together in a bar before going home. I wish you would tell me one thing: when did the idea of the fly-agaric first come to you and from where?” (Wasson Collection, Harvard Botanical Library.) Wasson is responding to a letter by Allegro in The Times Literary Supplement (11.9.70) concerning the footnote IX. 20 in The Sacred Mushroom mentioned above, where it is not clear whether Allegro is referring to Wasson or to Ramsbottom, author of Mushrooms and Toadstools, on the subject of the Plaincourault fresco. Wasson had corrected Ramsbottom on the subject of the fresco, who had added the “rightly or wrongly,” etc. to a second edition of his book.
~ Carl Ruck
However, Ruck’s statement here is cloudy. He provides no evidence that Wasson was “frustrated.” He only refers back to this same September 14 missive to Allegro, while at the same time ignoring Wasson’s public attack on Allegro written only two days later to the TLS on September 16. In footnote 45 we also see some careless writing where it’s difficult to discern if Ruck is implying that Ramsbottom added or ‘tacked on’ the “‘rightly or wrongly,’ etc.” to Wasson’s letter before it was published in the second edition, or if he simply means the addendum to the second edition of his book as a whole. Clarification of Ruck’s position would be helpful. We’ll assume that he means to add the entire addendum, not the altering of Wasson’s letter. Wasson himself already clarified the issue in the same missive:
“…I had forgotten its text, which I have now looked up […] and find the words you quote in it.”
~ Wasson to Allegro, September 14, 1970
As already explained, we can hypothesize from these letters that Wasson knew that Allegro had gotten the better of him by using his own words, “rightly or wrongly,” against him. It could be out of resentment that Wasson wrote his attack on September 16, giving Allegro only two days to receive the September 14 letter from the United States and respond—which, of course, was impossible. Allegro, likely shocked over Wasson’s reaction, understandably distanced himself from further interaction. However, Ruck incorrectly states that “Wasson distanced himself from the Allegro controversy” (Ruck, Fungus Redivivus, pg. 10). In fact, it was Wasson who attempted all contact with Allegro, not the other way around. It was likewise Wasson, as has been, and will further be shown, who stirred much of the controversy over Allegro that Ruck claims he supposedly distanced himself from.
Wasson, never forgetting this potential damage to his reputation, did not forgive Allegro for his private letter to Ramsbottom being brought to light. At the end of Wasson’s life, he reiterated his position at least three times. The first was the February 1984 telephone conversation with Herer, previously mentioned, where Wasson stated: “there was not one single word of truth in the book whatsoever” (Irvin et al, 2006, pg. 57; Herer, unpublished, Appendix). The second was in a private letter to Mr. Alan Hamilton, dated July 6, 1985:
[Errors in bold]
Dear Mr. Hamilton:
[…]
you quote persons of various qualities and place them on the same footing. I will cite only two extreme cases. My first instance is Allegro on p. 32.
John Allegro was a brilliant linguist in the Oxford circle, so brilliant in fact that the English linguists elected him as the British member of the international team to examine the Dead Sea Scrolls. He wrote one of the early books on them, altogether commendable, and it sold, I am told, more than a million copies. Of course it was effective only as a first effort and is not read anymore nowadays. Undoubtedly he was elected to represent Great Britain partly because he came from a Jewish family (of Italian origin). Later he accepted a teaching post at Manchester University. In the 1960’s friends of mine in Sweden wrote me that one Allegro was in touch with them about the role of mushrooms in history. He was following the example of my wife and me, and they wondered about that. Our Mushrooms Russia & History by V.P. Wasson and R.G. Wasson, two large volumes, had appeared in May 1957, and all my friends had known we were working on it. It was accompanied by an article by me in LIFE, and they both had created considerable stir in the U.S,A. [sic] Allegro’s book appeared before my SOMA (1968). His book, unaccountably, propounded some theses that all linguists reject on sight: he seemed determined to think that Hebrew and Greek languages were vitally influenced by Sumerian. He intimated that Egyptian civilization was affected by the sacred mushroom, although no one knew what “mushroom” was called in ancient Egyptian. No one could prove that he was wrong, but there was no evidence, none at all, that he was right. He mentioned me in his book, but only once or twice, obscurely, in his notes gathered together at the end. So much for his book. He committed the impossible breach of scholarship by selling it first to The News of the World, a scandalous, disreputable newspaper of huge circulation, for which it is said he was paid either £20,000 or £30,000, worth then far more than today. Every week for weeks on end there were 8 column headlines on the front page in The News of the World that Christianity had been proved to be a mask for a phallic religion with Jesus standing for the sacred mushroom. Manchester University dismissed him on the spot and he retired to a disused Manse on the Isle of Man. No one looks at his book (except as a curiousity) any more. I wrote to Allegro after his book came out in an amicable tone, but he never acknowledged my letter. Poor man! What had happened to him? He must have had a mental breakdown.
~ R. Gordon Wasson
The third was in his interview with Forte of October 1985 just fourteen months before his death. This interview, which is full of errors, further counters Ruck and Mark Hoffman’s contention that Wasson had a shift in opinion with regards to the extent of Amanita use in Judeo-Christianity, and his displeasure with Allegro.
A Conversation with R. Gordon Wasson by Robert Forte
[Errors in bold]
Pg. 82-3
RF: Would you comment on John Allegro’s work (1970) regarding the origins of Christianity?
Wasson: I think John Allegro was a brilliant man. He was of Jewish origin, an Italian Jew. Then he went up to live in England. At Oxford, he was leader in the linguistic circle, and was a most promising linguist, and the result was that he was appointed to the panel that investigated the Dead Sea scrolls as England’s representative – or as Great Britain’s representative. That was a great big honor, and a deserved honor. He wrote one of the first books on the Dead Sea Scrolls (Allegro 1956). It sold more than a million copies but is already outdated by other books. It is solid work and is to be esteemed. Then he took a post at Manchester University.
/> I heard of him first through friends in Sweden who wrote me asking, “Who is this man, Allegro, writing about mushrooms? He never mentions you, but he is writing about mushrooms, and he is asking us questions about mushrooms.” And I didn’t know it at that time, but he was someone who was working, Allegro, his name was, and he hadn’t had any publicity at all [as if Allegro wasn’t famous via the Dead Sea Scrolls]. Then along came his book, The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross, and he made the unforgivable blunder of selling the manuscript to The News of the World! The News of the World is the disreputable sheet that comes out only on Sunday in Britain. It is like the National Enquirer is here – a disreputable sheet! He sold it to them for thirty thousand pounds, when pounds were worth more than they are today. He sold it to them and they came out week after week, with extracts from this manuscript, eight column headlines on the front page, “Jesus Only A Penis!”
Wasson: His colleagues at Manchester they just… Although they have the security of tenure in England at the universities, this they could not bear. They had to get rid of him. So he retired to the Isle of Man, a rural island. It is a very lovely island. I would love to spend the rest of my days there. It is just as lovely as this is here. They speak Manx. Manx is a Gaelic language, as is Irish, Welsh, and Gaelic in Scotland. There are only a few hundred people there. Anyway, I had his address, and wrote him a letter after he had gone out there, and said, “I should like to correspond with you, if you will correspond.” I never heard from him.
RF: Could you comment on his book?
Wasson: Well, of course, I think he jumped to unwarranted conclusions on scanty evidence. And when you make such blunders as attributing the Hebrew language, the Greek language, to Sumerian, that is unacceptable to any linguist. The Sumerian language is parent to no language and no one knows where it came from. It was spoken at the mouth of the Euphrates around the gulf of Persia. It was spoken there, and it became an official language of record, documents were kept in that language, written in cuneiform for a long time. In the Akkadian culture for some centuries it was like writing Latin in England during the middle ages as the official language. But as far as being a parent to Hebrew and Greek, that is incredible.
RF: And didn’t he speak about the record of the mushroom in Egypt?
Wasson: I think he did. But no one knows what word was used in Egypt for the mushroom. There are lots of botanical words in ancient Egyptian that have never been identified and perhaps it is in among those words. It probably is among those words, because there are mushrooms in the Nile delta, in season, many mushrooms.
Pg. 85
RF: This is from the first chapter of Persephone’s Quest, section sixteen, “The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.” You write:
“I once said that there was no mushroom in the Bible. I was wrong. It plays a major hidden role (that is, hidden from us until now) in the best-known episode of the Old Testament, tale of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden.
I suppose that few at first, or perhaps none, will agree with me. To propose a novel reading of this celebrated story is a daring thing: it is exhilarating and intimidating. I am confident, ready for the storm. I hold that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was soma, was the calkuhla was Amanita muscaria, the Nameless Mushroom of the English speaking people. The tree was probably conifer, in Mesopotamia. The serpent, being underground, was the faithful attendant on the fruit. (See my Soma, p 214). Please read the Biblical story [in Genesis] in light of all I have written on the awe and reverence that Amanita muscaria evokes, and how the knowing ones speak of it only when alone together, preferable by night. Gradually it will dawn on you that the ‘fruit’ can be no other than soma. Everyone mentions the tree but its fruit is nameless. […]”
Wasson: They became “self-conscious.” That is the thing that distinguishes humanity from all other species, “self-consciousness.
Commentary
Allegro was not Jewish, or Italian. He came from English and French stock. His father was born in France to an English mother and French father. Allegro himself was born and raised in England. At one point Allegro even studied for the Methodist Ministry.
No articles by Allegro were ever printed in The News of the World. The actual newspaper the series was printed in was The Sunday Mirror, which is as reputable as LIFE magazine (for a comparison, see ‘Seeking the Magic Mushroom’ by Wasson in LIFE, May 13, 1957). Not a single headline appeared on the front page, nor did any of the headlines state the outrageous claims made by Wasson, “Jesus Only A Penis!” The actual headlines read:
Part 1: BEGINNING THE MOST CHALLENGING BOOK FOR YEARS (April 5, 1970, pg. 9)
Part 2: JOHN ALLEGRO’s controversial theory that strikes at the very foundations of Christianity (April 12, 1970, pg. 10)
Part 3: WORSHIP BY ORGY TURNED THESE WOMEN INTO WITCHES (April 19, 1970, pg. 34)
Part 4: ABRACADABRA – the magic phrase hidden in the Lord’s Prayer (April 26, 1970, pg. 28)
In regard to Wasson’s false claim against the fictitious headline “Jesus Only a Penis!,” and his remark to Hamilton: “…that Christianity had been proved to be a mask for a phallic religion with Jesus standing for the sacred mushroom,” Wasson himself had dedicated 31 pages to mushrooms and their sexual associations in Mushrooms, Russia and History (Wasson, 1957, pgs. 153–184), coming to similar conclusions about other cultures (including Arab) as Allegro did with Judeo-Christianity.
There is no record Allegro was paid £30,000 for serialization rights. No evidence exists to back this claim, though this rumor, apparently started by Wasson, has been repeated many times, mainly by Jonathan Ott. The Allegro estate has searched the archives and found no hint of any such payment. I suggest Wasson was trying to blacken Allegro’s name using various untested allegations—why else would he throw in errors about Allegro’s background? Unless Wasson, once a powerful banker and vice president to J.P. Morgan, had access to otherwise unknown financial records, he invented his claims, or borrowed them from untrustworthy sources.
Allegro was paid the princely sum of ₤30,000 for first serialization rights (Wasson in Forte 1988) and at the time was apparently hard-pressed to pay some debts (Wasson, 1977).
~ Jonathan Ott, Pharmacotheon, pg. 352
Here we see Ott citing the above interview with Forte, but he goes on to cite “Wasson, 1977” which is listed as “Personal conversations, Danbury, CT.” The Allegro estate is not aware of any debts that he was hard pressed to pay. In Pharmacotheon (1996, pg. 334) Ott clumps Allegro with Puharich and then characterizes him as a “profit-minded writer [who] was to capitalize on Wasson’s ideas”:
…a more profit-minded writer was to capitalize on Wasson’s ideas, as Puharich had done more than a decade earlier. In this case, a philologist named John M. Allegro hastily published a book entitled The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross, which purported to demonstrate that Jesus was a mushroom, the fly-agaric, and that the New Testament had been written in an elaborate code designed to conceal the sacred mushroom cult from the Romans (Allegro 1970)! Shades of Puharich! […] It is probably significant that Allegro, a recognized Biblical scholar, did not present his theory in any scholarly publication, but only in a sensational mass-market book, clearly designed to appeal to the popular audience and not to scholars. I submit that Allegro, like Puharich, was simply trying to capitalize on Wasson’s revolutionary ideas. Like Puharich, Allegro contributed little or nothing of value to the field of ethnomycology…
~ Jonathan Ott
Ott ignores Wasson’s own statement (above) that Allegro’s “book does not show any influence by us,” and does not provide any evidence of exactly how he believes Allegro capitalized on Wasson’s ideas, or of his assertion that Allegro “contributed little or nothing”. He only makes the assertion, which, unfortunately, was taken as fact by other scholars for more than a decade; and is an opinion that, as of this writing, he still holds to (Ott, 2008). Allegro had to publish in mass-market book form because his thesis was too large and perh
aps too controversial for the academic journals he had been accustomed to use for his Dead Sea Scrolls translations. In The Sacred Mushroom Seeker (Riedlinger, 1997, pg. 190), Ott repeats the unfounded Wasson-Ott errors, and backs them up with name-calling:
Perhaps most unfortunate was the appearance of farceurs like Andrija Puharich and the late John Allegro, who spun absurd theories based on the Wassons’ research to make a fast buck.
~ Jonathan Ott
Here is a quote from a curious letter in the Wasson archives at Harvard written by Wasson to a Donald C. Webster at Helix Investments Limited, Toronto, February 25, 1970, discussing Allegro’s payment:
“10,000 for all the British rights, 20,000 the world rights, making 30,000 in all”
This citation provides us a solid history of Wasson discussing Allegro’s payment with others even before his series of articles went to print in April 1970. How Wasson would have such information and why he would be sending it to investment firms is not within the scope of this study. The £30,000 need be no more than a guess at what a tabloid paper might pay out, and the guess is as luridly sensational as the tabloid headlines he misquotes. Here Ruck also noticed Wasson’s hypocrisy and could not avoid commenting on it (Fungus Redivivus, Footnote 37):
Wasson was aghast at the financial profit Allegro stood to gain from the serialized rights by the publication of his book in the Sunday Mirror (London), although simultaneously boasting of the success of his Soma. (Letter dated 25 February 1970 to Donald Webster of Helix Investments Limited…)