Maternity
Sacred Medicines
Entheogens or hallucinogens, have been utilized by humans throughout recorded history in a variety of settings. Recent scholarship has linked psychedelics to early Christianity, and archaeology has found evidence of their use in early Judaism. Some current practitioners of both faiths are reviving those practices. Globally, including in the United States, indigenous peoples have been continually utilizing plant medicines, including ayahuasca and peyote, as part of community‐based healing, tradition, ceremony, culture, and agriculture practices.
Cannabis
Cannabis was first documented in Kemet (ancient Egypt) around 2000 B.C.E. to treat sore eyes and cataracts. According to Diodorus Siculus (a Sicilian Greek historian who lived from 90 to 21 B.C.E.) Egyptian women used cannabis as a medication to relieve sorrow and bad humor. An example is found in the oldest known apothecary jar. It contained traces of hashish. The face is of the Pygmy god Bes (who became an Egyptian god of medicine).
Cannabis is mentioned as a medication in the following ancient Egyptian medical texts: Ramesseum III Papyrus (1700 B.C.E.), Eber’s Papyrus (1600 B.C.E.), the Berlin Papyrus (1300 B.C.E.), and the Chester Beatty VI Papyrus (1300 B.C.E.). The Eber’s Papyrus is the oldest known complete medical textbook in existence. Most scholars believe that it is copy of a much earlier text, probably from around 3100 B.C.E.
Formula No. 821 translation: “Cannabis is pounded [ground] in honey and administered into her vagina. This is a contraction.” The 1907 Merck Index (page 132) lists emulsions of cannabis seeds to treat the effects of gonorrhea. The 1909 King’s American Dispensatory lists hemp seed infusion for use in after-pains and in the bearing down sensation accompanying prolapsus uteri. The 1927 U.S. Dispensatory lists hemp seed oil for inflammations of the mucous membrane.
Cannabis pollen was found on the mummy of Ramses II (nineteenth dynasty). Initially scholars debated as to whether the cannabis pollen was ancient or modern contamination. Additional research showed cannabis pollen in all known royal mummies. No known ancient Egyptian mummies were wrapped in hemp cloth.
The intoxicating properties of cannabis were virtually unknown among Europeans (other than among witches) until the eighteenth century (1700s) when travelers to Egypt discovered the drug. European witches knew of cannabis from antiquity, when cannabis was one of the most commonly used medications among Celts and Norse.
The Smoke Eaters at the temple at Thebes used cannabis incense for mortality rituals.