Magic Mushrooms May Explain Santa & His 'Flying' Reindeer

[babsbunny]

http://news.yahoo.com/magic-mushrooms-may-explain-santa-flying-reindeer-210334389.html

By Douglas Main, LiveScience Contributor | LiveScience.com – Thu, Dec 20, 2012

This Christmas, like many before it and many yet to come, the story of Santa and his flying reindeer will be told, including how the "jolly old elf" flies on his sleigh throughout the entire world in one night, giving gifts to all the good children.

But according to one theory, the story of Santa and his flying reindeer can be traced to an unlikely source: hallucinogenic or "magic" mushrooms.

"Santa is a modern counterpart of a shaman, who consumed mind-altering plants and fungi to commune with the spirit world," said John Rush, an anthropologist and instructor at Sierra College in Rocklin, Calif.

[In_The_Wind]

1. Ya just never know about that jolly old elf.

[IMG][/IMG]

[meow2u3]

2. Puullleeeease! The Santa story was told by someone tripping on shrooms? WTH?

ISN'T ANYTHING SACRED ANYMORE? (Yes, I am yelling.)

Can't youse leave anything alone? What next? Matthew, Mark, Luke and John rolling on esctasy when they wrote the Gospel?

[LiberalEsto]

5. "The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross"by John M. Allegro

This book, published in 1970, contends among other things that Jesus was the personification of a religious cult centered around the use of Amanita muscaria for hallucinogenic visions of God.
Fascinating book. I read it back when it came out; still have it on the bookshelf.

[niyad]

3. come one, I thought everybody knew that story came from odin's eight-legged horse Sleipnir

Sleipnir

In Norse mythology, Sleipnir (Old Norse "slippy"[1] or "the slipper"[2]) is an eight-legged horse. Sleipnir is attested in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources, and the Prose Edda, written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson. In both sources, Sleipnir is Odin's steed, is the child of Loki and Svaðilfari, is described as the best of all horses, and is sometimes ridden to the location of Hel. The Prose Edda contains extended information regarding the circumstances of Sleipnir's birth, and details that he is grey in color.

Additionally, Sleipnir is mentioned in a riddle found in the 13th century legendary saga Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks, in the 13th century legendary saga Völsunga saga as the ancestor of the horse Grani, and book I of Gesta Danorum, written in the 12th century by Saxo Grammaticus, contains an episode considered by many scholars to involve Sleipnir. Sleipnir is generally accepted as depicted on two 8th century Gotlandic image stones; the Tjängvide image stone and the Ardre VIII image stone.

Scholarly theories have been proposed regarding Sleipnir's potential connection to shamanic practices among the Norse pagans. In modern times, Sleipnir appears in Icelandic folklore as the creator of Ásbyrgi, in works of art, literature, software, and in the names of ships.

. . . .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleipnir

[riverwalker]

4. Terrence McKenna used to talk about that too

Remember him on the radio.

[SomethingFishy]

6. Santa and his magic dust man...

A little for the Reindeer.. A little for Santa Claus... A little for the Reindeer.. A little more for Santa Claus...

[liberal_at_heart]

7. I thought Santa flying came from Odin mythology