Śiva's Blue Throat: An Excerpt from 'Secret Drugs of Buddhism'

Watercolor image from a Bhagavata Purana manuscript: the Churning of the Cosmic Ocean. Maharashtra, circa 1800.

“Simply put, the Hindu god Śiva is the apotheosis of a psilocin-rich psychedelic mushroom, probably Ps. cubensis.” The following excerpt from Mike Crowley’s Secrets Drugs of Buddhism has been used with permission by the author.

The Churning of the Ocean

Though the Vedas themselves are revered to this day, the great Vedic gods are no longer worshiped. Around 500 BCE, a new kind of literature began to appear, in which storytellers celebrated the deeds of a quite different set of gods and heroes. These texts are the vast epics, the Mahābharata and the Ramayana, and also collections of myths known as puraṇa (Sanskrit for “ancient [tales]”). Due to the proliferation of this particular religious format, this stage of Indian literature is known as the Puranic Era. Unlike the priestly Vedas, these works of were an expression of the non-Aryan majority and these “new” deities probably had a long, yet undocumented, history in the indigenous religious traditions.

One of the pivotal events in Hindu mythology is known as The Churning of the Ocean (Skt., samudra-manthanam). It is referred to time and again throughout Hindu literature and there are three sources which give the entire myth: the Viṣnu Purana, the Mahābharata and the Ramāyana. Though all were composed much later than the Vedas, each of these tells its own version of the origin of soma, the Vedic sacrament.

Whether the amṛita spoken of in this era was identical to the Vedic soma-amṛita remains a matter of conjecture. It is quite conceivable that the words soma and amṛita eventually became applied to all psychoactive potions, much as in modern usage “dope” may signify a wide variety of drugs, deriving its specific meaning from context.

The versions of the myth vary a little in their details but, briefly, the story is as follows:

In the most ancient times, the gods were engaged in constant warfare with their eternal adversaries: the asuras, the daityas and the danavas, and on one occasion the gods had been soundly defeated by the danavas. They were extremely dejected and appealed to the wise god Viṣnu for his advice. He counseled them to unite with their enemies and make peace by collaborating with the danavas on a joint project. The ocean, he pointed out, contained several fabulous treasures which would be revealed if it were churned, a feat which the gods, working alone, could never accomplish.

First they scattered various herbs in the ocean and then, taking Mt. Mandara as their churning-stick, they turned it upside-down and balanced it on the back of a giant turtle who was resting on the seabed (actually this was Viṣnu in one of his many disguises). As a churning-rope, they used the serpent-king Vāsuki, winding him three and a half times around the mountain. The gods and danavas took opposite ends of the great serpent and hauled him back and forth, causing the mountain to spin this way and that on its turtle-pivot. They kept up this to-and-fro motion for over a thousand years and, just as butter emerges from milk, many wonderful treasures floated to the surface of the ocean.

Though there were several other wonders, the greatest of all was amṛita. All three versions of the story tell of a noxious by-product, a virulent poison called kalakhuta (“mass of blackness”), hālāhala or simply viśa (“poison”). In some accounts, this is simply the final product to emerge from the ocean. Others say that Vasuki, unaccustomed to being used as the rope in a cosmic tug-of-war, vomited up the kalakhuta. This latter explanation presumes that nāgā-vomit, like snake venom, is virulently toxic.

Whatever the origin of the kalakhuta/hālāhala, Śiva saved the world from its perils by drinking it himself. Due to the extreme toxicity of the kalakhuta/hālāhala even Śiva dare not swallow it all the way. Instead, by yogic control and unwavering attention he holds the poison safely in his throat. The constant presence of this poison has caused his throat to change color and this, we are told, explains Śiva’s blue throat.

The original agreement had been that the asuras, daityas and danavas would share the amṛita with the gods but at the last moment the gods changed their minds. Viṣnu took the form of a beautiful woman known as “the enchantress” (Skt., mohinī) and distracted the asuras while the gods took all the amṛita.

One of the asuras, Rāhu by name, managed to get in line with the gods as the amṛita was being doled out and drank his share before being discovered. As soon as Rāhu was found out, Viṣnu hurled his magic discus (Skt., cakra) and decapitated him. But Rāhu had already drunk amṛita, the drink which confers immortality, so both his head and body continue to live. It is Rāhu’s head which causes eclipses as he tries to eat the sun and moon. In astronomical terms, Rāhu represents the “ascending node” of the moon. That is, he is one of two points at which the orbit of the moon crosses the plane of the ecliptic, the other being the moon’s “descending node”. Known in Sanskrit as Ketu, this is said to be Rāhu’s body.

Uploaded by Touching Heart on 2018-08-02.

From our vantage point in the 21st century, few of us believe in the churning of the ocean as an historical event nor in a physical Śiva with an actual throat. There must have been a time, however, when the story of how a god acquired a blue throat was a meaningful detail or it would not appear in so many variant versions of the myth. It must be admitted, however, that the Bhagavan Purana omits this episode. It briefly mentions that a poison was created but says that the nāgās took it.

The Churning of the Ocean myth presents us with a tale resembling one of Kipling’s Just So Stories. Such fables which offer fanciful accounts of, for instance, why the sea is salty, how the elephant got its long trunk or the robin its red breast, are known to folklorists as “pourquoi tales” (from French pourquoi, “why”). In its tone, the story of How Śiva Got His Blue Throat is a “pourquoi tale”. It is as if Siva’s blue throat were a natural, but intriguing, phenomenon (like the briny sea, elephant’s trunk or robin’s breast) which required explanation. After all, the White Yajur Veda tells us that the god Rudra reveals himself to cowherds who recognize him by his blue throat.

In order to understand this myth we have to discard our customary understanding of a “god.” Correctly interpreted, this story of Śiva’s blue-stained throat reveals his secret identity. Our first clue lies in this term “blue throat”—in Sanskrit, nīlakāṇṭha.

Throat and Stem

The Sanskrit word kāṇṭha means a narrow place or constriction. It does, certainly, mean “throat” or “neck,” but it may also be used figuratively for a narrow part of any object—just as we refer to the “neck” of a bottle. In the context of a plant, the kāṇṭha would be its stem. A related word, kāṇḍa, does indeed mean “stem” or “branch” and puns are not exactly unknown in Sanskrit literature. Thus, while nīlakāṇṭha is invariably translated as “blue-throat,” it could also be construed as “blue-stem” or “blue-stalk,” a name be fitting certain species of psychedelic mushroom. Specifically, this implies any species of mushroom which contains a appreciable quantity of the psychedelic alkaloid psilocin. Psilocin (4,hydroxy-n,n,dimethyl-tryptamine) is a somewhat fragile compound which easily degrades into a deep blue, inactive catabolite.

Psilocybe subaeruginosa, a psychoactive mushroom common to Australia and New Zealand.

There are a few mushroom species native to India which are known to contain psilocin, the commonest being Psilocybe cubensis. There are others, including Panaeolus camboginiensis, Panaeolus campanulatus (also known as P. papilionaceus), and Copelandia cyanescens. Unless extreme care is taken when picking these mushrooms, some of the delicate stem tissue stem is sure to become bruised. This damage initiates the enzymatic degradation of psilocin, causing the mushroom to turn dark blue at the place where it was touched. Typically, the mushroom is picked with thumb and forefinger so that, after 20 minutes or so, a characteristic blue mark appears on the base of the stem. (And also on the tips of your thumb and forefinger if you pick enough.)

I put it to you, dear reader, that at the most fundamental level, the real reason Śiva is called Blue-throat lies not in any mythological scenario but in a biochemical reaction. Simply put, the Hindu god Śiva is the apotheosis of a psilocin-rich psychedelic mushroom, probably Ps. cubensis. I admit that, on the face of it, this may seem an outrageous assertion, but consider Śiva’s characteristics:

• By tradition, Śiva is associated with drugs in various ways: he is called “a medicine for kine and horses, a medicine for men, a [source of] ease for rams and ewes”.

• He is “the first divine physician”.

• He is an avid consumer of psychoactive drugs. Various psychoactive drugs, including datura (Datura metel; Skt., dhattura), gañja (English, “marijuana”, Cannabis indica) and bhang, are considered sacred to Śiva.

• A legend describes Śiva consuming huge quantities of cannabis, datura and Nux vomica (the major plant source of strychnine, a powerful stimulant) before engaging in battle.

• Offerings of datura flowers and bhang are made to Śiva.

• Śiva has a blue throat because he swallowed the poisonous by-product of soma, the drug of the gods.

• Śiva is often shown poised on one leg in the tāṇḍava dance.

• Śiva’s companion is a bull, called Nandi (“joyous”).

• Śiva carries the “cup of soma” (i.e. the crescent moon) on the crown of his head.

• A common alternative name for Śiva was Soma.

• Some Śiva temples are mushroom-shaped and are even called “mushrooms” (Skt., chattraka).

Considered individually, these divine attributes may seem inexplicable, even bizarre, but once they all are seen to allude to the same referent they are readily understood. It is Psilocybe cubensis which is simultaneously the powerful DRUG and the perfect DOCTOR. Psilocybe is the fungus-god who dances ON ONE LEG (the mushroom stem), NEAR CATTLE (Ps. cubensis grows on cow dung), and has a THROAT (stem) that turns BLUE (when picked).

Though details vary, in every version of the myth, Śiva acquires his blue throat as a consequence of the production of soma-amṛita, the sacred inebriant. In this context, the identification of a god with a psychedelic mushroom should not be out of the question. Indeed, the parallels between Śiva and this blue-staining mushroom which grows on cow-dung may not only explain Śiva’s blue throat but may go a very long way to elucidating many other characteristics of this god.

The popularity of the Śiva cults may be inferred by their influence on Buddhism. It its later phases, Buddhism not only borrowed many deities from Hinduism, but it imported Śiva several times over, though each time with a different name.

“The Thousand-Armed Avalokiteśvara is a metamorphosis of Maheśvara [i.e. Śiva].” (Mike Crowley, quoting Lokesh Chandra’s Dictionary of Buddhist Iconography, Vol. 2.)

Mike L. Crowley was born February 26th, 1948 in Cardiff, Wales. He began studying Buddhism with a Tibetan lama in 1966, becoming an upasaka of the Kagyud lineage in 1970. In order to augment his Buddhist studies, he acquainted himself with Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Mandarin Chinese. Mike has lectured at the Museum of Asia and the Pacific, Warsaw, the Jagiellonian University, Cracow, the California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, and at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His work has been published in: Fortean Times; Time and Mind: The Journal of Archaeology, Consciousness, and Culture; Psychedelic American; and Psychedelic Press UK. In January 2016, Mike received the R. Gordon Wasson Award for outstanding contributions to the field of entheobotany. He currently serves on the advisory board of Psychedelic Sangha, and teaches at the Dharma Collective in San Francisco.

ψ संघ