I bet you are as shocked as I was when I read that title. I found
this when I was looking through the news today. It's not long, so I pasted it below:
Quote:JERUSALEM (AFP) - High on Mount Sinai, Moses was on psychedelic drugs when he heard God deliver the Ten Commandments, an Israeli researcher claimed in a study published this week.
Such mind-altering substances formed an integral part of the religious rites of Israelites in biblical times, Benny Shanon, a professor of cognitive psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem wrote in the Time and Mind journal of philosophy.
"As far Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics," Shanon told Israeli public radio on Tuesday.
Moses was probably also on drugs when he saw the "burning bush," suggested Shanon, who said he himself has dabbled with such substances.
"The Bible says people see sounds, and that is a clasic phenomenon," he said citing the example of religious ceremonies in the Amazon in which drugs are used that induce people to "see music."
He mentioned his own experience when he used ayahuasca, a powerful psychotropic plant, during a religious ceremony in Brazil's Amazon forest in 1991. "I experienced visions that had spiritual-religious connotations," Shanon said.
He said the psychedelic effects of ayahuasca were comparable to those produced by concoctions based on bark of the acacia tree, that is frequently mentioned in the Bible.
Of course there is no actual evidence at all here other than, "only someone high on drugs could 'see god.'" And it would figure that the guy himself has "experimented" with drugs, so he's intamately familier. It is sad that this guy actually things all of his ancestors were high on drugs in some mass narcotic effect.
As for the "seeing sounds" portion, there is an actual phenomenon that explains that besides drugs (other than coming from Yahuweh). It is called
synesthesia.
Synesthesia is a mixing of of sensations in the brain, so that you may see sounds, hear colors, feel tastes, taste music, or whatever other combination of sense mixing you can think of. There are even cases of it causing people to personify letters, numbers, and words. It is actually a relatively common phenomenon, with 1 in 23 people experiancing it (which means there is a good chance at least one person reading this has it). The thing is, though, it's normal for those people, so they don't realize that they have it.
Do I think Moshe was high? Not at all. What scripture says is the way it is. This is just one more scheme of the advasary to cause people to turn away from Yahuweh.
