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

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

Never be fools my Christianity

A great book, a lot to take in , the aspects about language and entomology of language was very enlightening. I’ll never be a Christian again with the true knowledge . Christianity is /was for controlling the masses .

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.

Hear that?

A sound from the Underground! Follow me, I know the way! The mushroom is calling… Follow me, I know the way… the mushroom calls… 🍄

Mind altering

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

fertility cults

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

Intriguing.

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

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.

12 Tribes Issue

While this book is though provoking, the idea that the naming of the 12 Tribes was a post facto linguistic game contracts the explicit reasons giving by the biblical Leah and Rachel for the naming. If the author got this wrong...