AuthorLinda Nathan “Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons,” Delusions from the Sixties
Haight-Ashbury District San Francisco The stained-glass window in our Victorian tower turned the glory of the late afternoon sun into an unearthly light as seemingly divine intelligences gathered from a higher plane to lead us in our Calling. Through the centuries, seekers had used such drugs as LSD to penetrate spiritual realms, and now I, too, reached out to grasp the promised power. As I moved into the drug’s deeps, my surroundings seemed to yield before a mysterious power that transformed before my inner eyes into a portal to ancient, secret knowledge. But terrors came with the knowledge too. Sometimes I thought I sensed weird vibes from great UFOs sending out their telepathic signals to any soul unlucky enough to heed them. At such times, great terror engulfed me—terror that I would lose my sanity and be controlled by something ‘out there,’ and I tried to hide my naked soul from the contact they were initiating. But despite such experiences, nothing deterred us from our search—now religious in nature—and we continued to avidly soak up the psycho-spiritual views and techniques pouring in from both West and East. Sadly, we thought we were on the cutting edge of new revelation for the human race. _________________ Deceptive experiences and deceiving spirits go together in the psychedelic realm, as my account above reveals. So, while last month, I explored the mystical experience as central to the psychedelic experience, this month we’re looking at another common element of that experience—what’s referred to by some professionals as the “entity encounter,” but which we know better as simply a demon encounter. If you have trouble believing that’s what it is, please make up your mind after examining the evidence. Individuals vary greatly in their responses to psychedelic drugs, but it’s well known that a large number of people who take them encounter beings or “entities” and experience everything from supposedly “higher” teachings to manipulation to outright assault from them. Some even consider meeting these entities a main benefit of taking psychedelics. That’s the position of a 2020 article in the Journal of Psychedelic Studies, which suggests that psychedelics are therapeutic not only because of their ability to create a mystical experience but because of what it refers to as the “entity encounter.” [1] Research suggests that the clinical and therapeutic effects of psychedelics are related to their ability to induce a mystical-type experience. One particularly interesting feature of the psychedelic mystical experience is the entity encounter. Revelation with a Pill? That they exist and do appear to many who take psychedelics such as LSD, DMT, psilocybin, etc. is well established. The real questions are who are these beings, what do they teach, and what is so “therapeutic” about what they do in an encounter—if it is? Dozens of descriptions of such entities exist online and in the literature. They range from ’’‘beings,’ ‘guides,’ ‘spirits,’ ‘aliens,’ ‘helpers,’ ‘angels,’ ‘elves,’ and ‘plant spirits’…” to “prankish elves, ultra-dimensional teachers and guardians, reptiles, bees, robots, and extraterrestrials, to Buddha, Jesus Christ, Krishna, deceased loved ones, and ascended masters,” as well as “sci-fi aliens fitting descriptions of greys, blues, reptilians, Pleidins sic, Arcturians and more, employing the use of probes, implants, or surgeries usually for ‘research or ‘healing purposes.’” Some view these encounters as among their most meaningful, while others are terrorized by alien abduction scenarios and visions of an eternity in Hell. Here are a few examples: “…emotionless entities with a mechanical quality…began…‘deconstructing’ my reality.” “…a giant mantis-like entity descended from the ceiling…” Psychedelic therapist Daniel McQueen calls all these beings ”aliens and god-like entities,” and he says that, “Your nervous system [on psychedelics]is super activated. It isn’t just floating around the earth—it’s having direct encounters with entities.” Three main theories exist about the nature of these entities. They are: 1. Manifestations of ourselves, 1.1 Drug-induced hallucinations, or 1.2 Real spiritual beings. One clue to their real nature is the fact that shamans and witches have contacted them using psychedelic/hallucinatory drugs for centuries. The Bible makes their nature explicit: they are demons, and to conjure them is sorcery, which a holy God calls detestable. Deuteronomy 18:9-20 reveals God’s condemnation of such practices. “When you come into the land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord. Note that the New Testament word for sorcery is the Greek term pharmakeia, which is the root of our word pharmacy—a dispensary of drugs. The connection between psychedelics and sorcery is all too obvious. But in our Bible-illiterate age, the importance of this connection is easily overlooked or ignored. But the article from the Journal of Psychedelic Studies goes on to assure us: While there has been little empirical research into psychedelic entity phenomena, qualitative studies and anecdotal reports suggest that entity encounters can have profound and lasting positive after-effects. That’s good news, isn’t it? We don’t have to worry whether some mantis-shaped entity hanging from our ceiling is a threat or whether an Arcturian will chase us with an implant because of the possibiilty of “profound and lasting positive after-effects” to such encounters. So, let’s look at what the article calls “profound and lasting positive after-effects.” (Would you want them?) For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Matthew 24:24 (ESV). 1. They can alter our fundamental conception of reality. It’s widely accepted that psychedelics can radically transform one’s view of reality, including initiating psychosis. One survey study (2020) of 1,561 entity encounter experiences reported that 80% believed that the experience altered their fundamental conception of reality. So, whatever you may think of their variety or reality, their presence can substantially alter your beliefs about reality. Therefore, it’s vital to understand what they teach and where they lead. And that’s why we should look at the increasingly popular claims that such encounters can be “therapeutic.” …but test everything; hold fast what is good. 1 Thessalonians 5:21 (ESV). 2. The most terrible deception these “entities” often bring is a false peace about dying without Jesus Christ. Sadly, psychedelics are being used today in therapy sessions with those facing death. In one recent survey study of 168 people, the people reported that the message received from their entity encounter included themes about death, the afterlife, the pre-birth state, or reincarnation. Their comments included, “There was insight that death is not the end” and “Death is just the beginning of another greater universe.” This deception is widespread in entity encounters for they preach a New Age Jesus who isn’t Jesus Christ Crucified and Risen at all. Here’s an example from the article that shows how subtle this transformative process can be. “I then was given the understanding that all life, all we know, all I am, is energy, this energy is timeless and will continue on. I knew now the reality of this time and space is just something my energy has chosen to reside in for now.” In other words, the entities' teaching is that reality is only impersonal energy; after death you just continue on infinitely; there is no Father God, no personal relationship, no fallenness and sin, and no need for a Savior. 3. “Entities are frequently felt to be supremely powerful, wise and loving and encounters are often accompanied by positive emotions such as joy, trust, surprise, love, kindness and friendship (although fear is also a common emotion associated with entity encounters)…” I certainly experienced some of those positive feelings only to find later how cruelly deceptive they were. 4. Entities often give information, assign tasks, reveal purpose, insight, etc., which can make them seem beneficial. We encountered this often on psychedelics as well as in the spiritualist church. Demons will help you at one point in order to draw you into deeper bondage, and they delight in taking over your life. 5. Sometimes seekers attain psychological insight on psychedelics. While you may get enough bits of truth to want more, you will certainly not receive the divine truth and guidance that only God and the Bible can give, and far more likely (speaking from experience), dependence upon this source will draw you far astray from real truth. What secular therapists deem “therapeutic” can be way off from what the Bible calls truth and healing. Author Carl Teichrib sums up the demonic counterfeit message of these beings well: “We can become as gods. It’s the same messaging all the way through, isn’t it? Doesn’t matter if you read the writings of channeled UFO entities, if you take a look at what the New Age teaches, what Eastern spirituality gives us, or what the messages that come through the psychedelic experience show us. It always points back to Genesis 3: ‘We will be as gods.’ This is a gateway… a form of forbidden fruit.” [1] There’s no doubt psychedelic experiences are incredibly transforming of life and beliefs. They can promise healing and transformation and a package of other wonderful-sounding changes, but they are a doorway the Bible firmly commands remain closed for very good reasons. As someone once said, there’s no way the devil and his demons can spin Hell as looking good, but they sure can spin the way there. In conclusion, consider the following two quotes, the first by the discoverer of LSD himself, chemist Albert Hofmann; the second by psychiatrist Rick Strassman who extensively studied DMT research subjects and wrote a book about it. Hofmann writes: “A demon had invaded me, had taken possession of my body, mind and soul. I jumped up and screamed, trying to free myself from him, but then sank down again and lay helpless on the sofa. The substance, with which I had wanted to experiment, had vanquished me. It was the demon that scornfully triumphed over my will.” —Albert Hofmann, chemist founder of LSD, about his LSD experience. Psychiatrist Rick Strassman found at least half his research subjects had encountered an entity after taking DMT. He sums up his investigation like this: “I was neither intellectually nor emotionally prepared for the frequency with which contact with beings occurred in our studies, nor the often utterly bizarre nature of these experiences….Their business appeared to be testing, examining, probing, and even modifying the volunteer’s mind and body. One patient described it this way: ‘It’s more like being possessed. During the experience there is a sense of someone or something else there taking control. It’s like you have to defend yourself against them, whoever they are, but they certainly are there. I’m aware of them, and they’re aware of me. It’s like they have an agenda.’” Clearly, these “entities” that come through the psychedelic portal are not benign. They are not reliable, honest, or safe. They do not point us to the truth. On the contrary, they are emissaries of Satan’s kingdom sent to deceive and ultimately destroy us, and they are intent on fueling a false revival. Let us run from false teachers, whether on earth or in spiritual realms, and turn to the one pure source of truth and revelation that will never mislead us: the Holy Bible. _________________________ For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Hebrews 4:12 ESV But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 2 Corinthians 11:3 ESV Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Ephesians 6:10-13 ESV ________________ MAIN ARTICLE: “Entity Encounters and the Therapeutic Effect of the Psychedelic Mystical Experience,” by Anna Lutkajtis, the University of Sydney, Australia. November 11, 2020. Journal of Psychedelic Studies, (4), 2020, 3, 171-178. RE THE MISSING END NOTES: I'm having technical problems with the endnotes entering correctly. Hopefully, I can get it fixed, but if you need the information now, contact me at [email protected]. Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. 1 John 4:1 by Linda NathanThe mystical experience is said to be central to the LSD experience. What is it? Is it as healing as some say? Where does it lead? Our first experience with LSD in 1962 will give you a better feel for it than any amount of discussion. by Linda Nathan I have a B.A. in psychology and have done graduate work in the field--besides studying it for many years on my own. Just saying. “Religion will be transformed into an activity concerned mainly with experience and intuition.” —Aldous Huxley Despite the popular expression, “If you remember the sixties, you weren’t there,” we do remember the sixties, at least a lot of it, and Richard and I were there—right in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury District, the vortex of the whirlwind. We were also among the first to drink the Kool-Aid of the countercultural revolution—LSD.
At first, it seemed like a harmless ride on a merry-go-round or a weird dip into a strange religious landscape. It promised freedom, an uninhibited way of life, and eventually, we came to believe, even godhood. But all too soon, the insanity, corruption, and violence—the rootlessness, the lawlessness, the madness of the experiment—began to manifest, and we watched the dream degenerate around us. Finally, in desperation, we moved south to the hills around Palo Alto, where we got into witchcraft. Miraculously, Jesus Christ rescued us in 1976, and then we began to watch America’s changing landscape from another perspective—Christ’s—as the psychedelic delirium went mainstream in America and fueled the “Woke” Revolution. [1] It all began for me during my freshman year in a Christian college (1958-59), where I learned the basics of the new religion in my year-long psychology course. The Psychological Paradigm Shift “Religion will be transformed into an activity concerned mainly with experience and intuition.” —Aldous Huxley I set out on my fifteen-year odyssey through six different colleges and universities on the West Coast determined to eventually earn a degree in psychology. But long before I earned that B.A., the precepts drummed into me in my first psychology course transformed me. They went something like this: Real moral problems with real guilt needing real correction and punishment are not the real issue in society because “normal” is just a point on a bell-shaped curve—so probably, there isn’t even such a thing as normality or right or wrong anyway. My favorite professor often hinted at the great changes psychology was bringing to our society and how it was transforming traditional views. Of course, he had to be careful what he said, but the message was clear enough: Christians are deceived. The old boundaries were rigid, unscientific, authoritarian, and based on superstition, while real love is human-centered, based on acceptance, tolerance, and freedom. Tolerance! Acceptance! Love! Freedom! What magical words to a naïve eighteen-year-old. It was all music to my itching young ears, and I devoured the philosophy. I began conspicuously carrying Bertrand Russell’s Why I’m Not A Christian to meals in the dining hall and attending meetings of the local Humanist Association. When old high school friends visited one weekend and suggested we attend church, I pushed for the Unitarian service. I admit it was boring, but I was puzzled by one friend’s lament: “Where’s Jesus!” What did that matter? I thought. Obviously, she was hopelessly out of date with the times. One day, my professor asked the class: “Where do we find God?” After some of the usual “old man on a throne” responses, Duke spoke up. Duke was one of the most popular students on the campus; he was handsome, wealthy, and drove his own sports car. “I look in the mirror,” he said. The professor’s approval fell on Duke in silent waves of assent and set me wondering. I wanted that approval. The Third Force Prophets Unknowingly, I was plunging into a momentous new wave that was subtly transforming America’s colleges and universities during the mid-fifties and early sixties. The patron saint of this movement was theologian/psychologist Carl Rogers, and its prophets were everywhere—they certainly were at my college. In fact, a graduate student I knew had just won a fellowship as Rogers’ assistant and was leaving for that mysterious land “Back East” where “Things Happened.” And I was determined to follow in her footsteps. Known as the “Third Force” in psychology, Humanistic Psychology arrived like a gale wind promising unrestricted love and freedom and challenging the two previous giants in the field: the psychic determinism of Freud’s school of Psychoanalysis and the lifeless mechanics of Skinner’s Behaviorism. Rogers’ ideas were enormously attractive to many besides me. Originally, he sought training as a minister but rejected it in favor of psychology. His thinking lined up just enough with our then-Christianized culture to appear biblical for those who wanted to believe it was, while actually forming a bridge for those like myself who were seeking a way out of what appeared a dead orthodoxy. It was subtle indeed—far too subtle for someone like me. And apparently for those who had hired my professor as well. Eventually, he was fired not for his anti-Christian views but for acting on them too freely at the time. Rogers wasn’t the only voice then insisting that sexual permissiveness is essential to life and growth, but he was one of the most influential. While emphasizing such biblical virtues as personal values and individual uniqueness, he rejected the external authority of the Bible and exalted self instead. He divorced honesty, love, and the importance of listening from biblical authority and refocused them entirely within the human self, creating a morally relative counseling system of “acceptance” nearly without limits. Freedom of choice became rooted in the individual’s value system rather than the Bible or tradition and thus became disconnected from any stable anchor. While the effects at first felt liberating, in the long run they were morally and socially devastating. But Rogers influenced me the most when he said that “no self-experience can be discriminated as more or less worthy of positive regard than any other.” That’s it! I thought. I’d found my new direction—and it was right in tune with the new spirit of the age. With love redefined as tolerance and acceptance, and morality riding the fluctuations of inner experience rather than objective outer standards based on truth (and especially the Bible), Rogers and his prophets laid an important part of the philosophical groundwork for the moral and spiritual upheaval just breaking in the fifties and early sixties. For this radical break with biblical authority in the name of therapy was the perfect bridge to the huge wave of occult revival and paganism that was soon to break in the mid-sixties and seventies and become known as the New Age Movement. By 1974, Rogers was promoting a glowing picture of the “new man,” a counterculture figure that rejects modern “straight society” and has no problem with the use of drugs or the occult or with sexual perversion. This willingness to look "within" without guidelines or restraints led me and many of his followers into such areas as drug-induced states of altered consciousness, a focus on dreams and meditation, concern with psychic phenomena, and interest in esoteric religious views. And, since this “new man” is his own authority, he is also free to break the law—either moral or legal—if he wants to. By the end of my first year in college, the fragile filaments of my old disintegrating value system had been seared as with a white-hot knife, replaced with a love redefined as tolerance and a morality I could call both scientific and therapeutic. Huxley’s 1958 quote (above) had become reality in me as my spiritual search focused not on truth but on experience and intuition. I now had all the justification I needed to strike out at authority and “find myself.” The Fourth Force: The Merger of Western Psychology and Eastern Mysticism One of the first things Christ showed us after our salvation in 1976 was the deep paganism emerging in our previously Christianized culture and the way it was changing everything. At the same time that many were abandoning historical Christian beliefs, leaving the churches, and searching for meaning elsewhere, paganism and Eastern religious views were infiltrating the churches, watering down the Gospel, and perverting the biblical message. As quoted above, literary icon and psychedelic pioneer Aldous Huxley had already predicted this transformation, and I had already undergone the conversion, become an evangelist for it, and was preaching it. Clearly, one of the main doorways through which this transformation was entering was in the field of psychology. Another doorway to radical change was the burgeoning use of psychedelics. Sooner or later, I’m convinced, using psychedelics will initiate a pantheistic mystical experience focused on feelings and self. For although psychedelics are relatively new to our age, they have a long history among indigenous tribes and their medicine men as door-openers to the occult spiritual realms. [2] Since the 1960s, psychedelics have been changing America’s landscape in formerly unrecognizable ways. Their widespread use in the sixies and seventies greatly contributed to America's cultural shift Left and speeded today’s resulting social transitions. (The term psychedelic normally embraces LSD , Mescaline, Peyote, and high-THC concentrate marijuana, as well as “magic mushrooms” (psilocybin), Ayahuasca/DMT, and designer drugs like MDT and RAVE.) The use of psychedelics also paved the way for Alan Watts’s groundbreaking book in 1961, Psychotherapy East and West, in which Watts, an Episcopal minister and spiritual philosopher, celebrated the merging of Western psychology and Eastern mysticism.[3] (We had already been celebrating this merger on our LSD trips.) From Transpersonal Psychology to Big Pharma Before long, this focus on self and spiritual meaning became apparent in counseling practices as a new field of psychology was birthed: “transpersonal” psychology. Transpersonal psychology seeks meaning by focusing upon spiritual and metaphysical aspects of human personality.[4] Practices such as meditation, hypnotherapy, dream analysis, visualization, journaling, yoga, and mindfulness are all avenues of this approach. It rode in on the New Age Movement and became popularized through such avenues as the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California, the works of Gnostic psychiatrist Carl Jung,[5] Eastern meditative techniques and yoga, and especially in Christendom, aspects of the spiritual formation movement. Thus, the search for healing and spirituality in modern counseling psychology, untethered from the Bible, soon became intimately intertwined with pagan and Eastern religions, and psychedelic mysticism. Not surprisingly, these movements are now bringing sweeping changes to our established scientific medical and psychological professions—empowered by Big Pharma, Big Alcohol, and Big Tobacco—and other Big Money.[6]. The psychedelic pharma market is exploding, and it’s only beginning. It’s “currently a little over $2 billion and is expected to be valued at more than $6.8 billion by 2027 implying an annualized growth rate of a staggering 16.3%.”[7] “Psychedelics are a huge rising star in the drug therapy industry, and there’s almost no mental health condition right now that’s not being looked at.”[8] In 2019, the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine formed the first ever (in the US) Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research, where it is churning out dozens of research papers on psychedelics. Its opening just happened to “coincide” with a new classification by the Federal Drug and Food Administration for “breakthrough therapy” drugs—in this case, psilocybin, which is seen as a major promising pharmaceutical. In 2021, Francis Collins, Christian evangelical leader of the international Human Genome Project and former director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), praised the potential of psychedelic treatments and approved a massive grant for psilocybin research. [9] As you might imagine, mega-investors are lining up for the enormous profits expected from medicines utilizing psychedelic, and courses to teach professionals in the mental health professions how to “do” psychedelic counseling are springing up like mushrooms (no pun intended). In June 2023, a massive five-day conference in Denver called Psychedelic Science 2023,offered training in psychedelic counseling along with in-depth discussion about the future of psychedelic medicine. Such programs are appearing frequently along with \mountains of as yet unanswered questions and concerns. Each psychedelic is unique in its structure and its effect on individuals. They are, in our experience and even with tiny doses, unpredictable substances that may give you a smooth ride one day and fling you into the depths of hell the next. How will a doctor or a pharmacist or a company determine how much of a psychedelic may be helpful for any given individual? And then there are the effects of psychedelics on Christians. Psychedelics can corrupt the sanctification process and create spiritual turmoil in born-again Christians in whom the Holy Spirit is working. One of the main functions of psychedelics is unleashing powerful imagery that can blur or erase the lines between fantasy and reality, and imagination and biblical spirituality. Because the underlying spiritual nature and foundation of the psychedelic experience is paganism, it opens a Christian up again to an idolatrous belief system that rejects the Divine creator God and deifies creation. (See Romans 1:21–23.) They can inflame the fallen (pagan) mind and increase vulnerability to vain imaginations and doctrines of demons (Colossians 2:8, 1 Timothy 4:1). [10] * * * In conclusion, here are a few of the questions that deeply concern me: - Will psychedelics invade the Christian counseling office? And with it, the Christian Church? - How prepared are our churches and pastors to face what may be coming from our government and our medical and psychological establishments? Here in Washington State, the State has forbidden a Christian counselor to counsel a homosexual about coming out of that lifestyle. The case is currently making its way to the Supreme Court, but we can surely look forward to more of such persecution especially in the name of "Healing." - Will they have to be licensed in psychedelic therapy to do counseling? - What will happen to individual Christians if this shift occurs? Counseling has become big business in many parts of the Body of Christ today. In some places, it’s greatly supplanted biblical teaching and what used to be called the care of souls. - Is the Church prepared for the invasion of psychedelics? - Is it even aware of such a possibility? At the very least, we should be praying about these issues. * * * My next article will examine some psychological counseling practices using psychedelics and especially their focus on the supposedly “healing” mystical experience that is said to be central. * * * What do you think? Email us your thoughts at [email protected] FOOTNOTES [1] (You can read a slightly futuristic, sci-fi version of our own true story in The Glittering Web.) [2] For a full history of LSD, see https://bit.ly/3h1mJKQ [3] The original 1961 version is out of print. A 2007 version is now available here: bit.ly/3pSjdK7 [4] See the article, “What is Transpersonal Psychology? 9 Examples and Theories,” 13 Jun 2023 by Jo Nash, Ph.D. at bit.ly/3NXofgh [5] See our article, “Carl G. Jung: Man of Science or Modern Shaman?” (2008) at bit.ly/3Q0kw4k [6] See https://bit.ly/3xZSPg6 [7] See bit.ly/44SEget [8] See https://cnb.cx/3ix1Kz6- See also our booklet, Psychedelic Seduction (Lighthouse Trails Publishing, 2022, $1.95) (fn), [9] Seebit.ly/3K2VvkW [10] Taken from our booklet, Psychedelic Seduction, on sale at Lighthouse Trails Publishing for $1.95. bit.ly/3rziuLi |