Entheogenic Healing in Rastafari: Decolonization through Cannabis, Consciousness, and Collective Ritual
Anna Waldstein, Caley Cannon
June 16, 2025 DOI: 10.1163/9789004729759_015 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Interventions | reasoning Nyahbinghi drumming chanting dancing |
| Topics | Cannabis Shamanism |
| Keywords | Consciousness Decolonization Psychoanalysis Aesthetics Psychotherapist Politics Law |
| Key points | Argues that Rastafari uses Cannabis as an entheogenic agent within rituals of reasoning and Nyahbinghi drumming to cultivate InI-consciousness, a decolonial mindset that counters historical oppression and promotes healing. |
Abstract
Rastafari is a Pan-African spiritual, socio-political, and ecological movement that uses the Herb (Cannabis spp.) as an entheogenic agent for decolonizing consciousness to promote well-being. The movement counters the centuries of injustice and oppression perpetrated through the trans-Atlantic slave trade with a power derived from links to African livity, a core spiritual lifestyle that challenges the global system of Black oppression. In Rastafari, smoking the Herb is a spiritual practice of knowing, healing, and decolonizing, which counters the historical effects of colonialism and its legacy of oppression. The healing powers of the Herb are enhanced by “reasoning,” a discursive process that can identify the root causes of illness, disease, injustice, etc.; and through participation in Nyahbinghi drumming, chanting, and dancing. In these rituals, participants smoke the Herb together to regulate their emotions and enter a collective state of InI-consciousness, an entheogenic connection between individuals and the divine. Features of Rastafari language shift consciousness towards positivity, a decolonial mindset that is the basis of healing. This cultivation of InI-consciousness combines the effects of the Herb with those of music as a powerful complement for entering altered states of consciousness that produce healing and facilitate the transmission of Rastafari knowledge and social ethos.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on cannabis, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Delta-8, Delta-10, HHC, THC-O, THCP, and THCV: What Should We Call These Products? | 2023 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Model Psychoses Induced by LSD-25 in Normals | 1956 | Historical analysis | |
| Is there a specific ‘cannabis psychosis’? | 2004 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Peak-experience and the entheogenic use of cannabis in world religions | 2021 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Out of Harm's Way?: Illicit Drug Use, Medicalization and the Law | 2003 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |