Tripping Toward the Real: Inducing Liminal Sensory Experiences through Psychoactive Substances in Buddhist Contemplative Practice

Abstract

Abstract This article analyzes passages found in Tibetan writings from the early Great Perfection tradition that prescribe the cultivation and consumption of psychoactive fungi as an integral part of the Buddhist path. It identifies these passages as the first instances discovered in premodern Buddhist literature in which the use of psychedelics is unambiguously prescribed to hasten progress toward awakening. In so doing, it makes two central arguments: one, that mounting scholarly consensus claiming premodern Buddhists never used psychoactive substances as part of Buddhist contemplative practice is in need of correction; and two, that the early Tibetan Great Perfection tradition and others that integrate medicine and meditation can serve as resources for investigating how premodern Buddhists envisioned the role of psychedelics in developing contemplative experience. The article concludes with suggestions for how this and similarly focused text-historical research in Buddhist studies might contribute to scientific research on the possible relationships between contemplation and psychedelics.