"Jesus Was In A Secret Occult Group!" -Top Researcher Brian Muraresku

civilization and Christianity. Maybe you already know that Moses' burning bush actually could have been a DMT-rich acacia tree, or John Allegro's theory that the Eucharist was actually an Amanita muscaria mushroom. But this week's American Alchemist, Brian Muraresku, takes this line of inquiry to the next level with his New York Times best-selling book, The Immortality Key. Was Dionysus the god of wine, or was Dionysus the god of [music] The book focuses on Eleusis, a little place 13 mi northwest of Athens. The most important Greeks at the time,

Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, basically the founders of Western civilization, would all go there on a pilgrimage and engage in a secret hermetically sealed ritual, possibly involving psychedelics and ritual sacrifice. [music] People went to Eleusis as human beings, they walked away thinking they were Eleusis was punishable by death. This is the fight club of the ancient There's even a lot of evidence that early Christian cults practiced these ancient mystery rituals. [music]

National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. This in many ways is kind of the heart of the mystery of my book, trying to figure out the roots of Christianity and how we got to these these beautiful cathedrals. It didn't start this way. early Greek-speaking Christians at some point in history, anywhere between 33 and 300 AD, may have availed themselves of what I think is the kind of

toxins? I think that that that is a really interesting question not only because there's data in the sources, but because for the first time Uh, unearthing hard scientific organic data to actually support what was in those ancient chalices. Carl Ruck thinks that the Kykeon drink consumed at the Eleusinian Mystery rituals contained ergot, a fungus that grows on wheat and contains LSD. Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. wrote a lot about the influence of the mystery religions on Christianity

as far back as 1950. You can't ignore the similarities from the pagan world to the Christian world and he attributes it to um an unconscious process of ceremonies and rites from antiquity making their way into Christianity. a lot of this is centered around this specific spiritual capital. If Athens was sort of the political capital, you had 13 mi northwest of Athens this center called Eleusis where these mystery rituals went on. What exactly happened there? I wish I knew, Jesse.

That's what I've been trying to figure out for 25 years. It's Nobody knows. It's This is the fight club of the ancient world. Whatever happened there, no one talked about it under penalty of death. So, it was taken quite seriously, but what we're essentially talking about are very elaborate rites of death and rebirth. And not as some footnote, not as an afterthought. This was in some senses the spiritual epicenter of the ancient Mediterranean. It called to Plato and Sophocles and Pindar. It called to Cicero in the 1st century BC

who called Eleusis the most divine and exceptional thing Athens ever produced. And a lot of this was somewhat pre-Socratic. So, you have a favorite author, uh, Peter Kingsley. I do. And yeah, this this famous quote, "If you die before you die, you will not die when you die." Which kind of touches on, you know, what you were just talking about with with Plato. So, what is this element of of simulating death? You know, what does it what does it do to an individual person? Do you have any sort of sense? Well, that that's the that's

the mystery. What whatever it does to somebody is is transformative. I mean, people went to Eleusis as human beings and from what little testimony survived, again, because it's secret under penalty of death, they they walked away thinking they were immortal. you won't die when you die. And I do think it hearkens back to this ancient tradition of confronting our mortality in order to achieve immortality.

Something happens in that dissolving of the ego, right? The the self that we normally identify with, our passions, emotions, our experiences, our psyche, our psychology, something happens when that is under threat and when it disappears. And so, to Plato's point, the way that they saw these mysteries was not so much a learning process. Although there were things to learn, there were rituals to perform, it was almost an unlearning process of kind of shedding back, you know, peeling back the layers [music] of the onion. you start writing the book 12 years ago.

Mhm. Is that right? Mhm. And what's the purpose of the book? Like why do you Why do you think it's important that people realize this? What are the implications for today? Because we're suffering from an identity crisis. It's It's It's partly why we're sitting here. There's There's There's this narrative that, you know, the ancient Greeks essentially draft the blueprints for Western civilization and in comes Christianity to save our soul. And And there is the divide. There's the big divide between reason and faith, right? Or between science and religion. And

it's still here today. And Huxley predicts that there might be a religion around psychedelics, possibly a new Eleusis, which Albert Hofmann talks about as well. Um do you think that happens? And if so, what form does it take? Is it state-sanctioned? Is it outside of the To I mean, that's a good question. To I I over the next 10 years, I think you're going to see a bit of everything. Uh so, the state-sanctioned Eleusinian kind of ordered mysteries, I see I see the FDA,

you know, like what's happening in Oregon, for example. It's crazy to think about like a um a regulated um ecosystem for therapeutic psilocybin. I mean, that was unthinkable a few years ago. So, there's the state intervening to to produce, again, these set and settings where these irrational states of mind seem to have incredible medicinal um a purpose, right? For everything from anxiety, depression, end-of-life distress, PTSD, et cetera. There is a place for that kind of of sanctioned

medicine. You're going to have the underground, the Dionysian wild kind of, you know, from Woodstock to to Burning Man, it never really went anywhere, and Grateful Dead helped it along the way. So, you're you're always going to have a part of that, and then just maybe um in kind of a harmony between the two is the First Amendment, which, again, um there seems to be a compelling argument for the responsible, sincere, very sacred use of things like psychedelics within religious exercise, right? It's

It's It's kind of guaranteed by the First Amendment before the right to free speech and assembly is that right to religion. What else is America known for but for that? And so, we don't have a clear path yet. I mean, there's some use of psychedelics in the Native American Church, some Brazilian spawn churches, but uh I think the next 10 years you're going to see things like maybe LSD, DMT, and others begin to to float their way into either new churches or maybe even organized religion. What do you say to the person who reads Plato and says, "Well, that's just

a guardian creating kind of a noble myth. And in fact, this is all just a lie to make me believe, you know, in the afterlife, and it's sort of, you know, as Nietzsche would say, uh some sort of slave morality to deemphasize the material life, which is all there is. That's That's a great explanation. That could very well be the case. Or maybe we're just all inventing it so we can feel better as we pass on to death. I mean, there there are folks who look at near death literature like that. Why do we see the white light? Why Why would we be equipped for this experience as we're dying? Does it help us die? Does

it help those around us experience our death better? I don't know why this these near death phenomena occur. Is there a biological evolutionary basis for it? What would that be there for? Why would our death be facilitated in that way for purely physiological purposes? I don't know. And these myths and Plato, I've no idea. But I would say again about Plato that his philosophy was the exper- the practicing of death and being dead. And I would invite in someone who's interested in Plato to look to his guru, right? Like Parmenides

or Empedocles or Pythagoras or the pre-Socratics. What were they doing? What were these rites of incubation that they were practicing? Like going into underground temples, essentially, to to meet a goddess, to go into altered states of consciousness, um where they could barely feel the pulse, you know, uh treading somewhere between life and death, waking um and and the dream state. Uh this I mean, this this was part and parcel of ancient Greek And you've never had a psychedelic experience, is that right? I'm having one right now, Jesse.

You never had a psychedelic experience, but have you had any experiences any near death experiences or any experiences that might be here we go. Right. I had uh a near death experience when I was five, which I wasn't prepared for at five. My older brother, God bless his heart, accidentally hit me in the head with a golf club right here. I still have a hole in my head. I guess I was hit with like so much adrenaline that um I didn't feel any pain. And I actually remember being in the car,

bleeding to death, my mother holding me, um and asking her why she was crying. Because uh I couldn't I couldn't feel anything and I thought everything was fine and I felt bliss. Mhm. I felt enormous bliss and comfort. And we get to the hospital and I'm rushed into surgery and as the anesthesia kicks in, I feel like I leave my body. And what happens is what I describe as a dream. And maybe it was a dream. I don't know what the hell it was. But I remember waking up with this vivid

imagery of meeting people and discussing things and being told things and I wake up at 5:00 not knowing what what to do with all that. Until like 10 years later or 20 years later and I'm reading near death literature and I'm reading about mystical experiences. And it seems to me that this whole dying before dying process is an actual thing that I wasn't looking for but when I read the literature on psychedelics, I see like a technology, right? That that's how Aldous Huxley described it. Like a technology, a biochemical

that under very controlled conditions seems to produce sometimes like a very vivid near death experience which is kind of worth exploring. I think so, too. So, you had your own mystery ritual. So, it's the same. Maybe so. Maybe. We don't know. And I'll and I'll let you leave the contents hermetically sealed for fear of punishment. But But um yeah, I mean the thing about Huxley, he was he was very interested in and a fan of William James's transmission theory of

consciousness. If you think about what psilocybin does to the brain, is it silences activity in the default mode network which is the anterior and posterior cingulate of the brain which is really where if you were to house the ego in any part of the brain, it would be there. All of your fears about the future, you know, worries about the past are in that sort of region. And so, maybe if you quell or subdue that part of the brain, you are increasing your ability to like

to elsewhere or something. You're receiving more kind of wisdom or information from elsewhere. It's It's the hard problem of consciousness um that no one has solved and maybe we never will. But does the brain generate everything that we experience or does it transceive? Does it modulate consciousness? Does consciousness exist with or without us, right? With or without the this physical body? Um I mean, it's it's hard to answer that phenomenologically. But again, these near-death states, whether at the end of physical life or through

some traumatic event or maybe in the purposeful induction of them, I think these are great kind of like border areas for research. weirder in some sense. So like if I'm a again, straw manning all of this and I'm going to say apparently aliens exist now and that's the consensus. There's a whole fleet of them. Look at the NSA. Like what's happening generally in the ethos? Why are Why are things moving in a strange direction? The The alien stuff. So we've been

think, you know, uh we're just widening the doors of perception to quote Huxley. And, you know, Diana Pasulka, who's a religious studies professor at UNC Wilmington, she got access to the Vatican archives, which I want to talk to you about as well. But, uh and then sort of came out with this theory that uh 1947 was essentially this dividing line. And, uh pre-47 in Roswell, people were seeing angels, demons, or whatever contemporary lore, you know, gen, leprechauns, you

know, [laughter] whatever. leprechauns. Yeah, leprechauns. And then and then now, uh people kind of see aliens. That is the mythos [snorts] of today. Mhm. And so, uh yeah, do you agree with that? Or we don't know? I love her book. American Cosmic. I I love I love I love her work. Yeah. The weirdest thing about all of that is even before the '40s, if you go back to the late 19th century, are you familiar with with the airships? Uh no. So, people um it's kind of like the the the the precursor to um

visitation events, alien visitation. Before Betty and Barney Hill, before all this stuff, there were a bunch of sightings of what they were were were called airships, which kind of like I'm not sure if it's a hot air balloon or some strange configuration in the sky, um but they'd be piloted by by humanoid-looking beings. And, they'd pop off their airships, sometimes on a ladder, sometimes otherwise, and kind of just settle down on a farm and have a conversation with somebody. And, [music] they'd they'd they'd fly off in the technology that was then cognizable at

the time. You know, these visitations, in a way, are kind of like a modern mystery event. People don't just walk away traumatized, in some cases they do, uh but in other cases, I mean, transformed for the better. Again, not too different from some of the clinical literature on psychedelics and other breakthrough moments. Very weird stuff. So, yeah, how do we make sense of this? Some Some people, you know, have radiation burns and are very scared and fearful, you know, after their experience. Other people feel an overwhelming sense of love.

Almost sort of It's almost like a gnostic hierophany or revelation where they uh seem to come out transformed in a positive way. Is there any sort of explanation for this? I wish I knew. I mean, if if there is some kind of ambassadorial program happening between this invisible world and our own, I can only say that uh and that's giant speculation, but this I mean, this This whole conversation is just Well, wonderful. Then there's a great footnote to the whole thing. So, I'm safe to speculate. Yes. Um it's been around for forever is

is all I can say. Um and you know, it comes in in different forms and guises at different periods in history. And you sort of implied that maybe the supper itself was a mystery ritual. Maybe the kykeon is what Jesus actually drank. Is that [laughter] Is that right? Is that Is that a hypothetical possibility? It's It's great fodder for speculation, and it's not my idea, so I'm happy to Right. When Jesus is asked why he talks in parables, right? Jesus isn't always a straight shooter. He tells stories about the mustard seed and the prodigal son

and all the rest of it. And when he's asked why he speaks in parables, he says that it's a mysterion. And he uses that word in Greek to his to his followers, um which is defined by the Greek lexicon as uh religious secret. A religious secret um to be confided only to the initiated and not to be communicated by them to ordinary mortals. That's in the actual Greek lexicon. So, Jesus is saying that Christianity by definition is born with secrets. Not necessarily

drugs, but secrets and visions, absolutely. So, putting Jesus almost through a neo-platonic lens, maybe he's one of a few people to have reached anamnesis. Jesus takes Judas aside and he sort of says something like, you know, I am you or you are me or some some something, you know, of that nature. Is the implication here others can sort of reach that level or Well, I mean, that that's the promise in John's gospel. And so, I spend a lot of time in my book

looking at the Gospel of John. I cite like the the key to the Christian mysteries, I call it, in the sixth chapter of John. And it's John's strange version of of the Eucharist, which is in beautiful Greek, and drinks my blood has eternal life. So, not will have an afterlife, but has verses later, he says, "And that person, again, who eats my flesh

and drinks my blood remains in me and I in them." In other words, we become one. This is the whole point of communion is to become not just Christ-like, but one with Christ. And and that's a motif that you can trace directly back to the mystery rites of Dionysus and other mystery initiations. And it's funny. As Eleusis was about to be destroyed in the 4th century AD, there was a notion that they were talking about this, you know, like what what is this interplay of democracy and the

survival of our species and the mysteries? Are these all platitudes? Does this really mean anything in real life? Well, in 364, when the Roman emperor Valentinian outlawed nocturnal rites and tried to shut down the mysteries, Praetextatus was this Roman hierophant, an initiate in the Eleusinian mysteries, and he tells Valentinian that to kill the mysteries of Eleusis is to kill us. That the human species would be in peril if you shut down the mysteries, which means not just democracy, but like life itself would

become disastrous. Life would be abiotos in Greek, unlivable. In other words, keep Christianity around, but to kill the mystery that is somehow related to it is just possibly to put the human species in peril. Well, if that's the case, are mystery rituals still going on now? Yes. They happen here every Sunday. Got it. So, they sort of communion with the I think a modern mystery. I think so. We talked about the creation of sacred space of sacred spaces for the irrational to come

into our life. Um, this is prayer, right? And this is this is almsgiving, and this is basic service. Well, thank you, Brian. I really [music] appreciate this. This was awesome. It was a very, as I expected, wide-ranging discussion about all sorts of things. Hey, man. Thank you. Thank you, brother.