Home (theory of the ego death and rebirth experience)
Books and Resources Relevant for Egodeath Theory
Contents
My book lists ranked by popularity
Humanities university courses on
audio CD
Existing books are destined for the
rubbish bin
All authors have gross errors &
insights; must pick-&-choose w/ all authors
How to buy new or used books at
lowest cost
My 45 book
lists
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/cm/member-fil/-/A1YFCQT60M4XAJ
ranked by
number of views; the most popular are at the top:
1386 --
Mary "John" Magdalene, The Beloved Disciple
943 --
Picture story Bibles
927 --
Gnosticism
838 --
The entheogen theory of religion
730 --
Historical Jesus, or Christ Myth?
503 --
Mystery Religion, Myth, and the Mystical State
474 --
Mythic-only Christ theory
393 -- Ecstatic
Alchemy
376 --
Ancient Near Eastern religion
365 --
Reformed/Calvinist theology and determinism
364 --
Original, experiential, mystical Christianity
287 --
Picture story Bibles 3: Baby Bibles
277 --
Rock as gnosis-initiation mystery religion
260 --
The active eucharist that reveals the kingdom of God
240 --
The Swoon/Shroud/India theory of Jesus' death
240 --
Christianity as political rebellion against "divine" Caesar
238 --
Earliest Christianity
236 --
Rush books (Rock group)
219 --
Hermeticism and Ancient Mystic Astrology
215 --
Holy Spirit and Christian Spirituality
203 --
Religious Experiencing
191 --
Western Esotericism
184 --
Philosophy of Mother of God
179 --
Block-universe determinism, Necessity, divine predestination
169 --
Sophia, religious comprehension
164 --
Lord's Supper (Prot., E. Orth, Ecum.)
160 --
Eucharist (Catholic authors)
160 --
Tenseless time, eternity, and timelessness
156 --
How did Christianity catch on?
156 --
How did Christianity catch on? Martyrdom as dissidence
154 -- Religious
myth: allegorical metaphor of mystic experiencing
143 --
Picture story Bibles 2
138 --
Theology of Religious Pluralism
120 --
Ancient wine as visionary plant beverage
118 --
Lives of the Apostles
109 --
Eucharist (Catholic authors II)
99 --
The kingdom of God is at hand
41 --
Ancient wine as visionary plant beverage (2)
38 --
Word and Power (doctrine and spiritual experience)
38 --
Jewish Mysticism
24 --
Holy Spirit and Christian Spirituality 2
10 --
Reformed/Calvinist theology and determinism 2
I once
posted a list of some top 5 or 10 books that would be most relevant. Today's books aren't good enough, according
to my way of thinking; I can only recommend them with reservations. The problem is, I'd have to recommend
reading 100 books, because each one covers too few key topics, too weakly. I need to write a great bibliography of 100
books that support my theory. It's more
important to know about the books than reading them. See my book lists at the website first, rather than trying to
read these thick, half-clueful books.
Mysticism
in World Religions (not Geoffrey Parrindar's; the out of print one)
Rebirth
for Christianity - Huhn (no Historical Jesus; it's all psychological metaphor)
Myth &
Ritual in Christianity - Alan Watts
Ken Wilber
-- Up From Eden is a readable early book, and has just enough coverage of
Hellenistic religion for me to show how utterly clueless Wilber is there,
omitting entheogens and supposing that Mr. Historical Jesus was, inexplicably,
far more advanced than his culture
Jonathan
Ott: Entheogenic Reformation
Richard
Double's book showing the moralistic motives of freewillists and the
philosophical/scientific motives of determinists
Surely one
of the very best is Elaine Pagels' Gnostic Gospels -- profound, paradigm-changing,
readable.
The Jesus
Mysteries is also a real landmark -- effectively simultaneously disproves
literalist religion and proves mystic religion.
An example
of a book that is essential but only for establishing a couple pieces of the
puzzle: Dan Merkur's Psychedelic Sacrament (entheogens in Jewish mysticism)
I'd even
have difficulty listing any books that show something *so basic* and obvious as
that the fundamental role of myth is to express the intense entheogenic mystic
altered state, not mundane default-state psychology, much less how the external
world works.
Books go
out of print all the time, it's terrible, including the very best books. Even the very best books have just bits and
pieces of the theory I've pulled together, trivially simple though it may
be. Knowing what topics and
interpretations to be alert for when reading is more important than which books
you read.
________________________
Transcendence
has been proven to reliably happen quickly, easily, and ergnomically by
combining the most effective techniques of study and meditation. First try 30 years of sitting mediation to
empty the mind. Then read any ten
postings here and reflect on them in the mystic altered state -- test for
yourself the ergonomic efficiency of the technology of silencing the mind. See you in 30 years and a week.
If you
want to save 30 years, don't try silence before you have tried a week of the
cybernetic transcendence approach. It's
all down to ergonomics, and the system I am designing is *optimized* for
ergonomics."
>I am
blown away by the information that is offered by way of this yahoogroup. I
would like to learn more and delve deeper into the ideas of egodeath. I am on a
limited budget and will be returning to college September of this year, in other
words I don't have much money. Can you please suggest 2-3 good books that you
feel offer an indepth understanding of egodeath concepts and ideas? Thank you.
That's a
hard question. 3? Give me at least 5 -- or really more to the
point is, what's your budget?
This is
way leading-edge research. It's not
like picking out a book on mainstream History of Christianity, where the
subject is so old the summary books are all alike, written to a formula. Ask me something easy like what is
enlightenment, or about perseverance of the saints, or how the eucharist saves,
or whether the canonical Christian scriptures say the will is free, or what are
the true Christian scriptures.
I can
easily recommend 100 books. But 3? For practical understanding of egodeath?
Consider
the 3 pillars:
timeless
block-universe determinism
mythic-only
Christ
entheogen
theory of the origin of religions
Political
allegory is far more important in Christian origins and scriptures than has
been acknowledged, but it still remains outside the core of enlightenment.
Possible
set A:
Rudy
Rucker: The Fourth Dimension
Freke
& Gandy: Lost Goddess
Dan
Russell: Shamanism and Drug Propaganda (entheogens in Western history from
prehistory to Constantine/313 CE).
The book
Tripping is not in my online lists, but it's the kind of book that may possibly
describe some of the phenomena.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0140195742
Hellenistic
mythic allegory of mystery-religion initiation is also important. The book that looms large for me on that subject,
from an entheogen perspective, is The Apples of Apollo: Pagan and Christian
Mysteries of the Eucharist, by Clark Heinrich, Carl Ruck, and Blaise
Staples. However, it lacks Christ-myth
theory, and lacks timeless determinism.
Therefore,
buy the book that was a real find and a vindication for me: Luther Martin:
Hellenistic Religions. It lacks
entheogens, it lacks Christ-myth theory, but it provides a concise,
to-the-point theory that all the mystery-religions were centrally about
encountering and, in various ways, somehow "transcending"
determinism/Fate/Necessity/heimarmene.
That's all you really need to know about the mystery-religions except
for the entheogen connection, covered in Apples of Apollo.
I *have*
already prepared a list of 25 books, and another list of 50 books, at Amazon.
Listmania
list: Ego death as deterministic self-control cancellation
Guide: So
you'd like to ... Experience ego death and understand it rationally
Have you
skimmed my book lists at Amazon?
See the
links at my home page, currently at the top of the home page.
http://www.egodeath.com
April 12,
2002 - Created egodeath resources at Amazon.com. My main About You area -- My full description area
50-book
guide -- So you'd like to ... Experience ego death and understand it rationally
Listmania
book lists:
Ego death
as deterministic self-control cancellation
Original,
experiential, mystical Christianity
Christianity
as political rebellion against "divine" Caesar
Mythic-only
Christ theory
Entheogen
theory of the origin of religions
Block-universe
determinism, Necessity, divine predestination
Historical
Jesus, or Christ Myth?
Reformed/Calvinist
theology and determinism
Tenseless
time, eternity, and timelessness
Reading
scripture allegorically and metaphorically
The
kingdom of God is at hand
The
active eucharist that reveals the kingdom of God
>Periodicals
with a heavy focus on Western esotericism include:
To help me
keep track of issues and periodicals, I'm adding a "periodicals" link
at the bottom of the home page, http://www.egodeath.com. For example:
____________________
Periodicals
Gnosis -
full tables of contents. These 51
issues are available for a limited time.
Excellent coverage of Western esotericism, aside from the usual
"ordinary state of consciousness" fallacy and the
"nonentheogenic meditation" fallacy.
Special issue on psychedelics shows that Western spirituality can be as
trendy and clueless as Eastern (Tricycle special issue/Zig Zag Zen book).
The Quest
- Theosophical society. Western
esotericism -- combination of newagey spirituality and turn-of-the-century
theosophy, some solid articles on Western esotericism. All articles are online back to 1999, but
the decades of previous issues aren't listed, and the page doesn't say if back
issues are available.
Parabola -
Myth, tradition, meaning. Full tables
of contents.
Bible
Review - provides critical, accessible coverage of Bible stories and
history. Main articles are listed for
back issues. Selections from current
issue are online.
Entheos -
journal on entheogens in religious history
TRIP - was
TRP, was Psychedelic Illuminations
Eleusis
journal - tables of contents online, some articles online.
Salvia
Divinorum magazine. table of contents online, articles are online for
subscribers.
Erowid
Extracts - newsletter online
Entheogen
Review - tables of contents online
Cannabis
Culture -- back issues, many articles online.
Occasional entheogen articles, activist emphasis on drug policy reform.
MAPS
issues - many articles online
Psychedelic
Island Views - tables of contents online
Eric
Davis' http://www.techgnosis.com. Online articles about gnosis and technology
Erowid's
list of periodicals on entheogens
Mind Books
- Cached copy of main pages of the defunct site which was the main place to
find entheogen books and journal issues.
Books
sorted by topic
Books
sorted by title
New books
up to July 18, 2002
To find
these books at a live site, check Drugwar.com or Amazon.
http://www.teach12.com
- The Teaching Company
An unusual
resource. Bookstore offerings of books
on CD are comparatively limited and lightweight.
The
following university-level full lecture courses on audio CD (or videotape) may
be of interest for a theory of ego death.
These lecture courses are delivered by scholars who are reported to be
good presenters. As with reading book
information at Amazon.com, reading about these lecture courses is enlightening
in itself.
Alexander
The Great and the Hellenistic Age
Great
Ancient Civilizations of Asia Minor
Terror
of History: Mystics, Heretics, and Witches in the Western Tradition
Classical
Mythology
Jewish
Intellectual History: 16th to 20th Century
Will to
Power: The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche
Early
Christianity: The Experience of the Divine
Historical
Jesus
Foundations
of Western Civilization
Great
Ideas of Philosophy
Great
Minds of the Western Intellectual Tradition, 3rd Edition
Ancient
Greek Civilization
High
Middle Ages
Other
1492: Ferdinand, Isabella, and the Making of an Empire
World of
Byzantium
Dante's
Divine Comedy
Odyssey
of Homer
Birth of
the Modern Mind: An Intellectual History of the 17th and 18th Centuries
World
Philosophy
Buddhism
Great
Figures of the New Testament
Great
Figures of the Old Testament
New
Testament
Famous
Greeks
History
of Ancient Rome
American
Religious History
Bible
and Western Culture
History
of Christianity in the Reformation Era
I uploaded
a page that's a guide to relevant courses.
http://www.egodeath.com/TeachingCompanyLectures.htm
In
reviewing Francesco Carotta's book Was Jesus Caesar? ( http://www.carotta.de ) http://www.amazon.com/o/ASIN/9059113969,
Thomas von der Dunk comments (translation: Susan): "There are a number of
hot topics concerning antiquity about which historians and enthusiastic lay
people have been squabbling for years: ... and the historicity of Jesus Christ.
When it concerns these topics scholars have barricaded themselves “everyone for
themselves mode” in their own trenches from where no real intellectual contact
with other positions is possible. In the heat of the battle, by defending
certain views (opinions, conceptions) entire academic reputations are subject
to ruin. ... If the book contains only a kernel of truth then it will ignite a
bomb under the 2000 year history of Christianity. ... what remains is enough
discussion material for serious classical philologists, historians and
theologians to fundamentally disagree with each other as they have ever since
Ernest Renan doubted the divinity of Christ ... If an outsider turns up with an
even wilder sounding theory then ... all the academics who never considered
this idea themselves, frantically close ranks. If this theory is true, then
decades of studies are destined to end up in the wastepaper basket."
That is
how I feel when reading the typical books today about mysticism, myth,
psychology, and religion -- reading them is a necessary evil; most of them need
to be drastically rewritten and are destined to end up in the trash (for
example, Freud's explanation of the meaning of the Oedipus myth). If scholarship progresses as it should, 20th
Century books on these subjects will look as hopelessly off-base and
wrong-paradigm as phlogiston studies or pre-Copernican physics writings.
Reading
these books feels like reading fundamentalist essays written by high-schoolers
-- like the book Evidence that Demands a Verdict, the "phlogiston
theory" of religion books. Today's
books are like looking through a series of clouded, distorting mirrors -- the
result has only the faintest distorted traces of what actually happened -- like
reading a propagandized version of another propagandized version of an event,
or a freewheeling docudrama based on another freewheeling docudrama of an
event.
Consider
the difference between the official portrayal of what the War on Drugs is all
about and the reality of what's really behind it all, then multiply that total
distortion two or three times -- that is how garbled the 20th Century
scholarship about mystic experiencing and religious history is. No wonder Feminist scholars developed a
hermeneutic of suspicion.
Whatever
really happened, you can be sure that it is entirely different than the
official story; the official story is a cover-up of a cover-up, aimed at
obscuring and completely distorting, as much as possible, what actually
happened. We who thrive on setting
error straight are living at a good time, because there is so much error to be
corrected, so much that must be scrapped and fundamentally reconstructed.
So many
scholarly careers have been based on such totally incorrect assumptions -- so
many famous phlogiston researchers who may rightly end up as footnotes like
some alchemist -- it may be that the alchemists tell the story more straight
than the official scholars of religion.
How could the "critical" and "sober" Modern era
achieve so much, yet be so deeply deluded and *gullible*? The 20th Century was good at technology --
but scholarship and higher knowledge?
An incredibly mixed bag.
>I just
stumbled across your site and i've only been reading through the ego-death
stuff as it applies to the Rush lyrics, but damn it's genius :) i don't necessarily agree with everything
you wrote, but its brilliant nonetheless.
not to mention the strange syncronicity with which it is resonating in
my life....
Thanks for
the encouragement. My project I'm
starting -- instead of polishing the site more: survey some 500+ (?) books I've
purchased, cover to cover, spending at least 15 minutes per book. It's terrible how many books I bought
without reading, or, I read them but have only a muddled picture of structure
and scope of each book.
The good
thing is that there is a correlation with my quantity of buying and my
awareness of cool books; Amazon has been essential and is getting better and
better for sweeping across and swooping down on whole areas of interest, such
as books about religion underlying Greek myth, and about Sophia/ Mary
Magdalene/ Virgin Mary/ Beloved Disciple/ feminist Christianity.
Icke is
exactly the same as every author.
Acharya totally botches "mystic" astrology, reducing it to
literal planets -- but she provides some essential insights. The entire spiritual Establishment today
botches spirituality, assuming that meditation is more effective and original
than entheogens. Yet one should read some
of this spirituality.
The vast
majority of commentators and interpreters of Christianity completely botch it,
literalizing everything -- yet to discover the mystic aspect, one must read
many clueless books that contribute tangentially something of value. Campbell and Jung mistook myth as describing
regular dreaming and ordinary state-of-consciousness life passages -- utterly
missing the real action. Yet one must
read Campbell and Jung.
Watts
drastically erred in covering and acknowledging no-free-will merely in a
footnote, when every book of his should have had a chapter on the subject. But Watts is one of the best religious
writers in the modern era. Wilber has
several problems which I've listed and commented on before, yet one must read
Wilber. Icke is no better and no worse
-- at least he's not essentially different than these other authors, who are
all full of it even as they provide something of value.
One must
pick and choose from Icke the same as with any supposedly "sober"
author; they are all actually inebriated and a mixture of distortion and
insight. Even the entheogenists are
often literalists and grossly underestimate the extent to which visionary
plants have been the main source and ongoing perennial wellspring of mystic
experiencing in all eras, all religions, all regions. The name of the game with *all* authors is to pick and choose to
piece together the puzzle pieces.
Doherty,
for example, for all his sobriety about no-Jesus, still takes for granted
uncritically that of course Saint Paul the Apostle existed. That is just as wack, a weed to be uprooted,
as Icke's lizards.
If one
ignored Doherty because of his Historical Paul gross mistake, ignored Jung
because of his gross confusion between dreaming and tripping, ignored Watts
because of his gross failure to recognize no-free-will as *central* rather than
peripheral "by the way", ignored Acharya because of her gross
reductionism of "mysticism" to allegorical reference to mere literal
planets... one would be left with vanishingly few books to read, and
vanishingly few sources of insight.
rialcnis
wrote:
>Finished
going through David Icke's new book "Tales from the Time Loop"....He
recounts his recent expedition to South America to try Ayuhuasca, with a number
of his fans.
>I
still wonder if his infamous
"Psychotic break" at the "mound" in Peru in 1990 was because someone had
sliped him some LSD?
>As
always, his new book is entertaiing even if his illuminati conspiracy
conclusions about Shape Shifting Naga Reptilians, seems like a case of
over-literalizing with history. He
seems completley unable to look at things symbolicly---but looking at his
writing symbolically, rather then
literally then he makes perfect sense.
>There
is a certain entheogenic naivite that David Icke has...but apparently that is
changing. He and many of his fans are
Naive enough for Icke to become a new
Tim Leary. Can you imagine millions of
borderline, conspiracy buffs taking Ayuhuasca?
Might be a good thing, or it may just turn into a real mess.
>Although
I have read his books I had never heard him speak until three weeks ago on the
radio. He didn't sound as I expected. I
sounded comp0letley normal and likeable. I picked up no trace of psychosis in
his voice---and I had 18 years of experience listening to Mentally ill talk
about conspiracies and how illuminati/Alien dentists had implanted radio
transmitters in their teeth and was issuing them orders etc.
>The
stuff he wrote about Princess Diana in "The Biggest Secret" and the
World Trade Center in "Alice in Wonderland and the World Trade Center
Disaster" seems totally far
fetched---but is still fascinating and detailed, entertaining reading. He
gathers and associates info in a very hypersuggestible way which makes him seem
like a manic....but much of his histories have so much validity it is hard to
fault him when he comes up with the Reptilian shape- shifter conclusions.
Read
reviews at Amazon.com http://www.amazon.com and click the "New &
Used" link. Also click the All
Editions link if available.
Read more
at bn.com, for Barnes & Noble. http://www.bn.com
Then to
find lowest prices, search at Abebooks.com.
http://www.abebooks.com
Also
Powell's - http://www.powells.com.
Also check
online library catalogs, and examine books there.
I don't
bookmark the home page; I bookmark the Advanced Search pages of the above
sites:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ats-query-page
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/search.asp
http://dogbert.abebooks.com/servlet/BookSearchPL
http://www.powells.com/search/DTSearch/search.cgi
Aside from
the usual sort of book gifts from family and friends, this is the first penny
I've received for my work that started in October 1985. It will enable me to carefully study a
significant number of additional books, to contribute more to this research
area, for the benefit of everyone.
Thank you
for the moral and tangible support. I
will continue to strive for clarity and determinate results in building a
basic, straightforward model of transcendent knowledge that can be usefully and
helpfully taken up by anyone, quickly and easily.
>A site
called www.bluehoney.org discusses many of these same mysteries wich include
primarily the Amanita Muscaria.
I added
that to this links page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/egodeath/links
>James
Arthur is the author of a book called 'Mushrooms and Mankind' and helps keep
that site running as well.
>Anyway,
I hope you find some further information for your studies and theory work.
I will see
the latest, including information about Christ’s Mass.
http://www.bluehoney.org/Xmas.htm
http://www.bluehoney.org/ChristmasGallery.htm
-- It’s interesting that no underside-halos are shown.
Ideally,
my site would have better links to resources in bluehoney.org. But time is extremely limited so I don’t
know when I may consider working on my links pages."
Lesa
Bellevie -- Website about Mary Magdalene
http://www.magdalene.org/contents.htm
Clark
Heinrich -- Books and articles about entheogens in religion and in esotericism
Magic
Mushrooms in Religion and Alchemy / Strange Fruit: Alchemy and Religion -- The
Hidden Truth
Clark
Heinrich
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0892819979
Sep.
2002 / 1995
Mark
Hoffman -- Editor of the Entheos journal about the history of entheogens in
religion and in esotericism
http://www.entheomedia.org
Earl
Doherty -- Nonmystical books demonstrating the ahistoricity of Jesus
http://www.jesuspuzzle.com
The Jesus
Puzzle: Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ? Challenging the
Existence of an Historical Jesus
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0968601405
Challenging
the Verdict: A Cross-Examination of Lee Strobel's "The Case for
Christ"
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0968925901
Timothy
Freke -- Mystical books demonstrating the ahistoricity of Jesus, Gnostic
substantial mystic meaning of Jesus, spirituality including no-free-will and
entheogens
http://www.egodeath.com/jesusmysterieschapsumm.htm
The Jesus
Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0609807986
Jesus and
the Goddess: The Secret Teachings of the Original Christians
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0007145454
/ http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400045940
Spiritual
Traditions/Encyclopedia of Spirituality: Essential Teachings to Transform Your
Life
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/080699844X
Peter
Gandy -- Mystical books (with Timothy Freke) demonstrating the ahistoricity of
Jesus, Gnostic substantial mystic meaning of Jesus
Clarice
O'Callaghan -- A moderator of the JesusMysteries discussion group, which
nonmystically studies the ahistoricity of Jesus and the construction of early Christianity
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jesusMysteries
James
Arthur -- Researcher into the primacy of entheogens in religion and culture,
popularizer of the entheogen theory of religion, author of book Mushrooms &
Mankind
http://www.jamesarthur.net/ja.html
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1585091510
Ramon
Jusino -- Website about Mary Magdalene as the Beloved Disciple
http://www.beloveddisciple.org
Andy at
Bluehoney.Org -- Website about entheogens, especially mushrooms in mysticism
http://www.bluehoney.org/bluehoney.htm
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