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  • 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
  • 4.1 out of 5 stars (192 ratings)

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The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross

By: John M. Allegro
Narrated by: Martyn Swain
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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
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: History

What listeners say about The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross

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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.

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1 person found this helpful

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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+

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Mind altering

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

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1 person found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

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.

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Intriguing.

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

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fertility cults

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

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    3 out of 5 stars
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written like a textbook

or perhaps it isn't necessarily written like a textbook but instead the reader is a retired philosophy teacher. I would not have chosen a dry, soulless, British accented, rigid, and boring narrator for this type of material. I would have chosen someone who was CAPABLE of reading very dry, spell out the words by letter, relative, and cross referenced material (sometimes sexual and fun) with a little tone and inflexion. the performance reminds me of that elderly teacher in high school who just stood up in front of the class reading the material for the 1000th time with no real desire to teach.

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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.

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    4 out of 5 stars
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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.

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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.

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