Ploughing the Clouds: The Search for Irish Soma

by Peter Lamborn Wilson

The Rig Veda, written in India about 1500BC, praises a holy plant called Soma, which is sacrificed and consumed, granting the drinker an experience of enlightenment and ecstasy. The late Gordon Wasson identified Soma as a "magic mushroom," Amanita muscaria, and he and his followers discovered that such Indo-Europeans as the ancient Greeks, Iranians and Norse had also used a Soma-type plant. In Ploughing the Clouds Peter Lamborn Wilson investigates the probability of a Soma cult in ancient Ireland, tracing clues in Irish (and other Celtic) lore. By comparing Celtic folktales, romances, epics and topographic lore with the Rig Veda, he uncovers the Irish branch of the great Indo-European tradition of psychedelic (or "entheogenic") shamanism, and even reconstructs some of its secret rituals. He uses this comparative material to illuminate the deep meaning of the Soma-function in all the entheogenic origin of "poetic frenzy," the link between intoxication and inspiration.

Genres: Mythology

150 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Peter Lamborn Wilson also writes under the pseudonym Hakim Bey.

Reviews

[Adrian Colesberry · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first this may seem to be a facile, free-the-weed-motivated ennobling of drug use. But the book turns out to have an interesting thesis. Basically, the writer posits, with much historical support, that religious experiences from the past were assisted by drug-induced hallucinations. (We well know that many Christian saints got visions by fasting, which produces hallucinations.) Here's a quote:
"There was no essential difference between ecstasy achieved by plant hallucinogens and that obtained by other archaic techniques." (like fasting and sleeplessness)
He then goes on to theorize why such drugs (mushrooms, ergot, peyote, etc.) were driven out of corporate religions. Large religions don't need anyone to have visions, don't want anyone to have visions or to talk with god. They had a business to run and their business had no use for someone coming in with a vision that would change the groundrules. (I read somewhere that angels start appearing the in Old Testament as proxies for god because the priest class didn't want their flock thinking they had a chance to talk to god. So after Moses, any talking directly with god was changed to the safer talking with angels.)
Most religions are hostile to contemporary revelation. Christianity neatly closes the door on further prophecy by claiming that their prophet is the literal son of god. Beat that. In the Koran, Mohommad says "I am the Last Prophet; there is No Prophet after Me." (Abu Dawood Vol 2 p. 228; Tirmidhi Vol 2 p.45). The only exception I know is Mormonism, where they go to pains to say how everyone can talk to god. This causes various problems with sects, but what religion doesn't have crazy sects? I'm sure they have to fight a lot of fires over it.
Anyhow, great book. Good scholarship. Interesting read.

[SA · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gosh, this was a weird one, even for a random library self grab. I don't really understand why it's a book -- it should be an academic monograph. The cover is entirely accurate and yet so misleading simultaneously.

First of all, if you don't have recent working knowledge of The Rig Veda and more generally Vedic cosmology extending into the The Brahmanas of the Vedas you will be absolutely fucking lost. Similarly, you need a solid grounding in Irish myth and legend, because Wilson does outline some aspects of story but only the parts that are useful to his thesis. If you don't have both, seriously, don't even bother with this book. It was sheer luck that I happened to have read the Rig Veda and some of the Brahmanas in 2017, and of course my great familiarity with Irish/Celtic story is why I picked up the book in the first place.

Here's the whole concept: Indo-Europeans broadly had a cultural ritual involving the consumption of a psychotropic substance as an entheogen to get wicked high and connect with Deity/the Universe. Literary analysis of Irish story suggests the presence of a similar ritual that has been "masked" or hidden in legend and myth and folk tales based on significant elements of similarity to the "soma" psychotropic ritual as articulated in the Rig Veda.

It's definitely speculative, wildly broad in its analysis, ultimately inconclusive because there is no archaeological record nor, of course, a literate record. And it was originally published in 1996, so who knows if Wilson's thesis has since gained traction or generally been shrugged at.

Psychotropics hold little interest for me, academically and personally, so in all honesty, I found Wilson's footnotes and bibliography of more interest over the topic itself. I'm pretty solidly accepting of the idea that Celtic pre-history likely involved any number of shamanic ritual practices including entheogens and trance-induction and spiritual journeying, so I didn't really need a hard sell on the idea.

This really read more like it should have been in a journal, or a special academic publication, rather than a general publication -- by City Lights Books, no less.