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Title: The Life Changing Effects of Magic Mushrooms and Why the Government Keeps this from You
Source:
Free Thought Project
URL Source: http://thefreethoughtproject.com/li ... ts-magic-mushrooms-government/
Published: Jun 21, 2015
Author: Justin Gardner
Post Date: 2015-06-21 13:05:19 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 9476
Comments: 52
The pursuit of knowledge and advancement of medical research are among the many victims of the War on Drugs. Just as marijuana prohibition is now being dismantled under the juggernaut of reason, so too will the prohibition of psychedelics. For thousands of years, cultures around the world have explored the mystical experience provided by psychedelic substances, using mescaline, ayahuasca, and magic mushrooms for religious ceremony and healing purposes. In the 1940s, western medicine began realizing the potential for psychedelics to treat addiction and psychiatric disorders. Tens of thousands of people were treated effectively, and psychedelic drugs were on the fast track to becoming mainstream medicine. But the beast of oppression reared its ugly head. In 1967 and 1970, the UK and US governments cast all psychedelic substances into the pit of prohibition. People were waking up to the fact that governments intended to keep the world in a state of war, and that governments were working to keep the populace sedated under a cloak of consumerism. The collective mind expansion of that era came to a screeching halt under the boot and truncheon. Now, as people share information globally, instantaneously, on a scale unstoppable by the state, we are resuming the advancement of medical research on psychedelic substances. Scientists are challenging the irrational classification of psychedelics as “class A” (UK) or “schedule 1” (US) substances, characterized as having no medical use and high potential for addiction. “But no evidence indicates that psychedelic drugs are habit forming; little evidence indicates that they are harmful in controlled settings; and much historical evidence shows that they could have use in common psychiatric disorders,” says James Rucker, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Neuroscience The hurdles created from the baseless Schedule 1, Class A prohibition make research extremely difficult. It can take two years to get the necessary license for trials, and everyone involved—the manufacturer, the hospital, the researcher—has to have this license. The drug must be locked in a safe and bolted to a wall in a locked room within another locked room, as if it’s some kind of dangerously toxic material. Prohibition also makes procurement ten times more expensive, making funding more difficult and pharmaceutical companies uninterested in making the precise products needed for study. Despite all this, modern research is showing once again that psychedelics can treat disorders such as depression, anxiety, and addiction. The drug of choice for clinical studies is psilocybin—the active ingredient in “magic mushrooms”—which is not as strong and long-lasting as LSD or mescaline. A clinical trial carried out by Tony Bossis and Stephen Ross at New York University in 2014 showed astounding results for advanced cancer patients suffering from anxiety. “According to Ross, cancer patients receiving just a single dose of psilocybin experienced immediate and dramatic reductions in anxiety and depression, improvements that were sustained for at least six months. {The patients} were saying things like ‘I understand love is the most powerful force on the planet,’ or ‘I had an encounter with my cancer, this black cloud of smoke.’ People who had been palpably scared of death—they lost their fear. The fact that a drug given once can have such an effect for so long is an unprecedented finding. We have never had anything like it in the psychiatric field.” Roland Griffiths and Katherine MacLean at Johns Hopkins carried out studies prior to this, finding that psilocybin brought about mystical experiences in subjects. The “completeness” of this experience (according to the Pahnke-Richards Mystical Experience Questionnaire) closely tracked improvements in personal well-being, life satisfaction, openness, and positive behavior change for up to 14 months after the experience. Griffiths also conducted a study using psilocybin to treat smoking addiction, with striking results. 80% of the subjects remained abstinent for six months after treatment, a far better success rate than any other existing nicotine-replacement therapy. One subject said, “Smoking seemed irrelevant, so I stopped.” An analysis of trials from the 60s and 70s showed that LSD helped people overcome alcohol addiction as successfully as any treatment to date. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is helping to understand the mechanisms of how psychedelics can treat addiction and depression. Stimulation of serotonin 2A receptors by psychedelics decreases activity in certain areas of the brain, especially the “default mode network” (DMN) which is involved in our ingrained thought patterns and behaviors. Decreasing DMN stimulation can allow people to break free from destructive brain patterns. An exhaustive survey carried out by Johns Hopkins Medicine supports the conclusions of clinical research, finding that “A history of psychedelic drug use is associated with less psychological distress and fewer suicidal thoughts, planning and attempts…” Fascinating research using fMRI shows that, under the influence of psilocybin, the brain enters a pattern of activity similar to the dream state. Primitive areas of the brain linked to emotions, memory and arousal become more synchronized, while higher-level thinking and the “sense of self” become unsynchronized. After 40 years, it appears that another brick in the wall of prohibition is beginning to crumble in the face of science and logic. Eminent schools of medicine, along with organizations like the Heffter Research Institute and the Beckley Foundation, are challenging oppression and bringing psychedelics back into mainstream medicine. 
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#12. To: Deckard, redleghunter (#9)
What's your next article on? The benefits of pure opiates? Deckard, you have represented yourself to be a Christian who holds strong Christian beliefs, at least that is the way I have read what you have to say numerous times in your posts. I have absolutely no reason to believe you are not the Christian you profess to be. Consequently, I can think of no better person to answer a question than you. The question is: As a Christian do not approve the taking of illegal drugs, including most recreational drugs....all those which can alter the mind? I may have a follow up question …
Because their detiorated condition due to drug usage demands it and we are a nice loving society who will reward people for being stupid and incompetent.
So was prefrontal lobotomy for years until physicians were finally forced to admit it produced vegetables.
If your sheeple peers were strong enough to just let you die... then I agree. However your sheeple peers are too weak, too sympathetic, too empathetic and too self important to stand by and leave you alone with your addiction or failed health. If we had a social system here in the U.S., where we didn't have welfare, social care, Obamacare and huge tax burdens funding needle programs, Narcan & Naloxone shots... then I'd agree with your statement and probably gift you, for Christmas, enough heroin to OD with. Cause I'm a nice guy. Unfortunately, the libtards of society force me to help fund the idiots that do hazardous things to their body. Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
I have read that more deaths, illnesses and disabilities stem from substance abuse than from any other preventable health condition and one in four deaths today is attributable to illicit drug use. Doesn’t what those who take illegal drugs become their neighbors’ business when those neighbors have to pay the $181 billion a year illegal drug users cost the public in health care, injury to others, productivity loss and crime?
Using those yardsticks, there is literally no limit to what the government can't ban or regulate to death.
Using those yardsticks, there is literally no limit to what the government can't ban or regulate to death. I did not say that and I did not imply that. I merely asked a question. Do you care to answer the question?
I have answered that previously. Should Christians Support the ‘War on Drugs’? You guys really don't get it, do you? It is NOT the government's business what a FREE citizen decides to put into his OWN body. Take this thread for example. The article is about the medicinal use of magic mushrooms, but you statists are pissing your pants at the thought of any "unapproved by fed.gov" substance that has shown promising effects in treating disorders. Same thing with marijuana - you've been fed government propaganda all your life and you just can't think on your own to see that these substances have real use in medicine. I have answered that previously. Can you please answer it again? As to your the rest of your post, I am not interested in what the government does or does not do right now. I only want to know: As a Christian do not approve the taking of illegal drugs, including most recreational drugs....all those which can alter the mind?
No. As to your the rest of your post, I am not interested in what the government does or does not do right now. What a crock! You're one of the most strident advocates on this forum for government control of our lives and a vocal cheerleader for the police state. I did not say that and I did not imply that. I merely asked a question. Do you care to answer the question? Ok, I can play childish games like you. I never said you said that. Nor did I imply that, I merely made a statement. Care to refute it?
Nope. I will tell you I care to do though. I care to ignore it....and you.
Omg, I'm shocked and crushed, how shall I go on?
Did Jesus change water into wine? Or was it grape juice, like those teetotalers believe?
Is magic mushrooms wine? I took some mushrooms one time in 1988. With some chick names Suzy after an Ohio State football game. I spent the night. That was fun.
I think you mean - Are magic mushrooms wine? I didn't realize that you were a drug addict. Is Suzy still alive?
I don't talk like that. who knows about Suzy.
Did Jesus change water into wine? Or was it grape juice, like those teetotalers believe? John chapter 2 records Jesus performing a miracle at a wedding in Cana of Galilee. At the wedding, the hosts ran out of wine. Jesus' mother, Mary, asks Jesus to intervene, and He does so, reluctantly. Jesus has the servants bring six jars filled with water and then instructs the servants to give it to the overseer of the celebration. The water miraculously turns into wine, and the overseer declares that it was the best wine he had ever tasted. In this account, Jesus performed an amazing miracle, actually altering the molecular composition of the water, changing it into wine. The point of the account is summarized in John 2:11, "He thus revealed His glory, and His disciples put their faith in Him." Usually, though, when this passage is studied, a side issue becomes the main issue. Did Jesus transform the water into wine (fermented, alcoholic) or into grape juice (non-alcoholic)?
No he made real wine. Not grape juice.
That is what the article said also.
What Kind of Wine Did Jesus Drink?
OH that part stuck out. I misread it as the kind of wind that doesn't get you drunk.
I've had wine in my day; I even got tipsy on it once or twice.
I've never drank enough wine to get drunk off of it. That isn't true of other substances.
Jesus created is also the same word that is used in Ephesians 5:18, "...do not get drunk on wine... OH that part stuck out. I misread it as the kind of wind that doesn't get you drunk. Read this one: Have many presumed the lyrics go “Cause I heard Jesus, He drank wine” that Jesus drank alcoholic wine? Did Jesus drink intoxicating amounts of wine? What kind of wine did Jesus drink? By the reading of Scripture in the original language, scholarship presents that Jesus did not drink or make wine like today’s more alcoholic wine. What kind of wine did Jesus drink? Many also assume that the word “wine” in the Bible is always alcoholic or equivalent to modern wine. The Bible affirms that “wine” could mean alcoholic wine or non-alcoholic grape juice (1 Tim 3:8; Titus 2:3). Remember the Bible was originally written in other languages, so the meaning and nuances of words are slightly or very different from the corresponding English word. Biblical “wine” is grape juice that may or may not have fermented. Both in Hebrew and Greek, the words translated “wine” can refer to non-alcoholic juice or fermented wine. The Hebrew word is yayin, and the Greek is oinos. There are a number of examples of unfermented “wine.” Note the passages and references to non-alcoholic wine throughout the Bible: These references clearly show that “wine” can simply refer to grape juice. In reading the Old Testament, many would are surprised that the Bible versions represent six different Hebrew words “wine” for which two words exclude alcohol. These are asis means “sweet grape juice” or “new grape juice,” and another word hemer simply means “grape juice.” Both words have no reference to alcohol, and yet translators interpret these words as “wine” to avoid interpreting the contexts with its nuances and ambiguity. Therefore, one must remain careful not to assume that the word “wine” means alcoholic wine. [1] [2] With an honest heart, may God’s grace encourage all believers to reconsider biblical wine. With the previous knowledge, a study of the Scriptures reveal that there is not one positive statement about intoxicating wine or any such drink throughout the Bible. There are positive words about non-alcoholic “wine” that many people presume to encourage the use of intoxicating wine. However, these positive passages of grape juice do not necessitate a reference to alcohol in any way (Gen 14:18, Num 15:5–10, Deut 14:26, Psa 104:15, Isa 55:1, Amos 9:14, John 2:1–11, 1 Tim 5:23). Some other references to “strong drink” and “liquor” simply refer to cider as translated in Wycliffe’s Bible (i.e. Deut 14:26). There are many today professing a faith in Jesus who look to His drinking of wine to support their excessive drinking. By God’s grace, God has saved Christians from excessive drinking (1 Pet 4:3). Therefore, may every Christian remain very careful. Our brothers and sisters in Christ who struggle with alcohol are receiving many destructive reasons to justify giving into excessive drinking. The consequences may be disastrous and extensive even to the death of innocents. In the Bible, alcoholic wine is not like wine today. The sugar of grape juice can only ferment to 3 or 4% alcohol with wild yeast. For grape juice to exceed 4% alcohol, then the winemaker can add yeast. The yeast added to ancient wines produced between 4–10% alcohol. Alcohol kills these yeast cells and prevents levels of alcohol from exceeding 10%. Today, wines average 12– 18% alcohol due to modern fermentation by adding sulfur dioxide and Saccharomyces (a cultured GMO yeast) to a late harvest of ripened grapes with higher fructose (Winemaker Magazine, UC Davis, International Biblical Encyclopedia, “Bible Study Guide“, “Alcohol in the Church“, Bible Wine). Today’s wine is not like biblical wine in regards to alcoholic content. Due to the later invention of distilling, strong drinks like liquor exceed 20% alcohol. When we read the word “wine” in the Bible, the word may simply refer to grape juice or intoxicating wine never exceeding 10% alcohol. However, biblical wine is certainly not like wine today. Because of the use of the word “wine” in English Bibles, many presume that Jesus drank alcoholic wine. Again, grape juice is either alcoholic or nonalcoholic wine throughout the Bible depending on the context. Jesus also never drunk modern wine. The methods for fermenting highly-alcoholic wine had not yet been invented. Actually, Jesus’s opponents accused Him of being a “wine- drinker” from the Greek oinopoteis, because He came freely eating and also drinking grape juice unlike John the Baptist who restricted his eating and drinking (Matt 11:18–19, Luke 7:33–34). However, when we consider the wedding that Jesus attended in Cana, Jesus’s institution of the Lord’s Supper, and Jesus’s life, then His drinking of wine is not what many think. What about Jesus turning water to wine? Many are mistaken to think that Jesus turned water into intoxicating wine at the wedding in Cana, a small town in Galilee (John 2). One must assume this “wine”, oinos, was alcoholic when oinos generally means grape juice referring to either alcoholic or nonalcoholic wine. The Scripture infers that the wedding guests “have well drunk” a large amount of oinos, which the Greek word translated “well drunk” is methuo meaning literally to fill or make full. This word is also translated “drunk” referring to drunkenness by drinking intoxicating wine or filling oneself with nonalcoholic wine (Thayer’s Lexicon). Which more likely: that Jesus created intoxicating wine for those who were drunk or that He made fresh “new wine” who had filled themselves with the previous supply? If the attendees were drinking wine with less than 4% alcohol, their drinking would mean “well drunk” as in becoming full rather than getting drunk. Jesus would have filled with them with “new wine” that is from the presses although this was before the harvest. This wedding feast would have occurred in a short amount of time if the guests drank intoxicating wine although wedding feasts usually last a day and sometimes more (The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah). If Jesus intentionally made fermented wine consisting of about 10% alcohol, then the attendees would have become drunk because John 2:10 uses the word methuo that scholars translate as “drunk” or “filled.” Supposing intoxicating wine, Jesus would have made more intoxicating wine amounting to between 120 to 180 gallons of “the good wine.” If there were three hundred people there to drink another 150 gallons, these would have already each had much alcoholic wine considering that “the guests have well drunk.” Jesus would have given each guest an additional 64 ounces of alcoholic wine. The average person would have drunk another 4–6 drinks of alcoholic wine. Jesus would have poisoned a wedding party of three hundred attendants from the toxin of ethyl alcohol, and the guests would had been vomiting and passing out. Now, let us consider a wedding party of a thousand guests. If one thousand people drank one hundred and fifty gallons of fermented wine that Jesus supposedly made, then the average amount of wine consumed by each person would have been 19.2 ounces of wine having previously well drunk. Presuming that this wine contained 10% alcohol, Jesus would have aided a thousand people in binge drinking having intoxicated the guests with three additional drinks after already been intoxicated — “have well drunk.” For each guest to have had simply two more drinks, then the wedding would have had at least 2,400 attendees. Despite the number of the attendees, Jesus would have presumably contributed a considerable and consumable amount alcohol to those who were already drunk. If Jesus did make a great amount of fermented wine, He would had aided the sin of drunkenness, excessive drinking, and participate in a drinking party, which are all condemned by His Spirit in the Scriptures (1 Pet 4:3). To assume that Jesus made intoxicating wine is to assume that after everyone had drunk all the other intoxicating wine, then they needed more of the better intoxicating wine and Jesus was the divine person to do it. For those proposing that Jesus made highly intoxicating wine like today’s wine, 16–24 oz. of today’s wine would intoxicate anyone at an alcoholic level of 12–15% according to the CDC. Such intoxicating wine would have been an absurdity at this wedding as much as simply fermented wine. Jesus could not have made intoxicating wine at the wedding feast in Cana. The reference to Jesus’s wine as good wine indicates fresh grape juice, because this was late in the year just before Passover when old wine remained (John 2:13). Did Jesus use alcoholic wine in the Lord’s Supper? Many have justified excessive drinking and drunkenness by how many churches have made alcoholic wine a part of the “Eucharist,” the Lord’s Supper. Did Jesus use highly alcoholic wine when He instituted the Lord’s Supper? No, the Scriptures never use the word “wine” in any of the four accounts of Christ instituting the Lord’s Supper. Alcoholic wine has no reference in Scripture to the Lord’s Supper. The Greek word for “wine” is never used in Scripture to describe any part of the Lord’s Supper. Many have again presumed that Jesus used alcoholic wine in the Lord’s Supper for their own purposes. Jesus mentioned the specific content of the cup containing “the fruit of the grapevine.” On top of all of this, Jesus used unleavened bread because it was the time of the Passover, which is the Feast of Unleavened Bread. They threw out all leaven by God’s command including the leavened bread. God did not mean that Israel throw out the yeast and the bread with yeast, but leave the grape juice fermented by yeast (Exo 13:6–7). When Jesus used “fruit of the grapevine” in the Lord’s Supper, the only possible fermentation would be between 0–4%. If one assumed this was alcoholic wine, then the highest level of alcohol could reach 4%. When Jesus used “the fruit of the grapevine,” then this cup would have been nonalcoholic or never exceeded 4% alcohol. The intent of the cup of the Lord was not to intoxicate. The misuse of the word “wine” has become the means for many to presume that the excessive drinking of alcohol to some level of intoxication is permissible behavior with God. By the word “wine,” many try to justify the sins of drunkenness and excessive drinking. The Bible warns about the temptations of wine. Solomon wrote by the wisdom of God, Do not look on the wine when it is red, When it sparkles in the cup, When it swirls around smoothly; At the last it bites like a serpent, And stings like a viper. Your eyes will see strange things, And your heart will utter perverse things. (Prov 23:31–33) Therefore, “Wine is a mocker, Strong drink is a brawler, And whoever is led astray by it is not wise” (Prov 20:1). The Scriptures are clear about drinking intoxicating drinks. There is not one positive statement about alcohol in the Bible. The New Testament teaches that Christians are not to walk in drunkenness filling themselves with alcohol. The Greek word translated “drunkenness” literally means “filling oneself” in Scripture (Eph 5:18–19, cf. Rom 13:13). Christ’s Spirit in Galatians 5:19–21 teaches that such “drunkenness” is a “work of the flesh” and “those who are doing such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” Galatians 5 also condemned “wild parties” or “revelries” where any of the list of sins like drunkenness would constitute a party as sinful and carnal. Christ also reveals in 1 Corinthians 6:10 that drunkards “will not inherit the kingdom of God”. Drunkenness and filling one’s body with intoxicants is a sin. Filling oneself with alcohol is evil and compromises the sobriety of the Christian conscience — one’s heart (Rom 2:14–15; 1 John 3:19–21). Christ’s words and those of His Apostles and prophets urge us to reconsider. First Peter 4:3 warns, “For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Nations want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness [lit. excessive drinking], orgies, drinking parties [lit. drinkings], and lawless idolatry.” The word for “drunkenness” here is not the usually word for drunkenness in Greek, but this word is oinophlugia made of two words oinos meaning wine and phlugia is to do something in excess. Excessive drinking is a sin. Do not overlook the reference here to drinking parties translated from the Greek word potos, which denotes occasions for drinking. This is when hosts permit any occasion to excessive drinking. Christians being followers of Christ must remain sober and make no provision to become drunk on any level (1 Thess 5:8). Christians cannot participate in events that meet and center around drinking. Christ had no part with drunkenness and drinking parties, so His followers must not. The wine that Jesus drank cannot be assumed as intoxicating or any more than grape juice with no more than 5% alcohol. Jesus neither encouraged drunkenness nor is He recorded to have used intoxicating wine. Many need to reconsider their position on drinking alcohol based upon Jesus. If anyone uses Jesus to justify excessive drinking, drunkenness, and drinking events, then let that person hear this plea to rethink their views according to the words and life of Christ. The reality is that the Bible does not support the drinking of intoxicants. By God’s grace, Christians are forgiven to no longer continue doing what they have been forgiven for doing. Abstain from drunkenness.
Are you a pothead too? I stick to beer and get a buzz on occasion.
Are you in favor of the socialist state?
Thanks for the offer, but I don't even smoke pot. I am just consistent, you own your body, you own the effects your actions cause. If you go mountain climbing and fall, pay for your rescue. If you get sick and can't afford medical care, get well or die. It is not my fault that there is a socialist government in charge.
I'm in 100% agreement... but that ideal is a fantasy now. We spend millions rescuing dipshit mountain climbers. We spend millions on medical bills associated with uninsured addictions. We spend millions on court ordered rehabs. I see a lot of posters here talk about freedom and liberty... but few sell the idea of allowing the overdosed addict to just DIE. Few post about how willingly lazy should starve... just how they should get high. Why is that? Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
You never answered my question. Do you favor getting rid of all the government support programs for drug users I mentioned before we start discussing drug legalization?
LOL. Bailout Bush. Burning Bush - or...
Progressives have learned there's a shyteload of money to be made from "caring" for the sheeples once they've been mentally neutered.
Libtards have learned there's a shyteload of tax to be collected from "caring" for the sheeples once they've been mentally neutered. I fixed it for you. Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Progressives are Libtards are Progressives. Taxation is secondary to manufacturing jobs for their social-serviced/servicing base.
No I don't favor getting rid of government support for drug users before laws are repealed. For one, this is a back door way of law enforcement. Two, all people must be treated the same, be they tobacco users, fatties, water skiers, even astronauts. The policy should be that the Federal government does not spend any money not specifically within the confines of strict interpretation of the Constitution. The States can do what they please. When the spigot of "free federal money" is cut off, they will find out that they are not so liberal.
But you said it's not the government's business. I guess you meant the decision to use drugs is not the government's business, but taking care of the drug user when he f**ks up is. If that's your proposal, then I, as a taxpayer, reject it. Why should I vote for legalization when it's going to cost me money?
The point is, socialism is never going away. Your way is a back door to total control. Since it costs the taxpayer money, the government can require control over tobacco, food, education, land usage, religion, water, agriculture, health care, automobile manufacture................EVERYTHING. You either support freedom within the constructs of a Constitutional Republic, or you fight a battle on every single front for your and my rights every day. That is not Liberty, it is an ever tightening vise on our personal freedoms every day. It empowers the political class, because we need them. Because we need them, they will pander to the people with the most power. THAT is the complete opposite of the very basis of our founding. Government should be practically invisible on the Federal level. It exists for specific functions. To set rules equally for all, collect taxes, regulate import exports, run a defense/war and set up courts. Fabian socialism, which is what we have gives a "gift" of welfare, then uses the need to control the cost as a reason to control US.
What is? The taxes I pay to support everyone else's freedom? I agree. If the government is spending taxpayer dollars, I EXPECT them to regulate and control the conditions under which that money is available. You don't want to be controlled? You want freedom? Then don't suck on the government's teat.
It makes no difference what I do. The only way to quit paying is to QUIT PAYING. THAT will make a difference. If you and I do not draw from the "mothers milk" of state socialism, it leaves more for those that do, and the government beast grows still.
whiteys logic means there is NOTHING the government cannot do to its serfs. They just need to frame it correctly so his fellow sheep can understand why the shaft is at the ready.
For thousands of years, cultures around the world have explored the mystical experience provided by psychedelic substances, using mescaline, ayahuasca, and magic mushrooms for religious ceremony and healing purposes.
#13. To: misterwhite (#7)
(Edited)
Then why is the government involved in treating and rehabilitating drug users, along with providing medical care, housing, food and other benefits to them?
#14. To: misterwhite (#6)
(Edited)
Psychedelics were to be used during therapy under doctor supervision.
#15. To: jeremiad (#2)
I own my body, you own yours. What we do to ourselves is not my neighbors business, even less so the business of government at any level. That applies to starving yourself to death, living in a tent, putting a bullet in your brain, or taking a drug for pleasure of curative effect.
#16. To: jeremiad (#2)
I own my body, you own yours. What we do to ourselves is not my neighbors business, even less so the business of government at any level. That applies to starving yourself to death, living in a tent, putting a bullet in your brain, or taking a drug for pleasure of curative effect.
#17. To: Gatlin (#16)
Doesn’t what those who take illegal drugs become their neighbors’ business when those neighbors have to pay the $181 billion a year illegal drug users cost the public in health care, injury to others, productivity loss and crime?
#18. To: Dead Culture Watch (#17)
Doesn’t what those who take illegal drugs become their neighbors’ business when those neighbors have to pay the $181 billion a year illegal drug users cost the public in health care, injury to others, productivity loss and crime?
#19. To: Gatlin (#12)
(Edited)
As a Christian do not approve the taking of illegal drugs, including most recreational drugs....all those which can alter the mind?
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.
Paul Craig Roberts
#20. To: Deckard (#19)
As a Christian do not approve the taking of illegal drugs, including most recreational drugs....all those which can alter the mind?
#21. To: Gatlin (#20)
Can you please answer it again?
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.
Paul Craig Roberts
#22. To: Gatlin (#18)
#23. To: Dead Culture Watch (#22)
Care to refute it?
#24. To: Gatlin (#23)
#25. To: Gatlin (#20)
As a Christian do not [sic] approve the taking of illegal drugs, including most recreational drugs....all those which can alter the mind?
#26. To: Fred Mertz (#25)
Did Jesus change water into wine?
#27. To: Dead Culture Watch (#24)
...how shall I go on?
#28. To: A K A Stone (#26)
Is magic mushrooms wine?
#29. To: Fred Mertz (#28)
#30. To: Fred Mertz (#25)
Throughout the passage, the Greek word translated "wine" is oinos, which was the common Greek word for normal wine, wine that was fermented/alcoholic. The Greek word for the wine Jesus created is the same word for the wine the wedding feast ran out of. The Greek word for the wine Jesus created is also the same word that is used in Ephesians 5:18, "...do not get drunk on wine..." Obviously, getting drunk from drinking wine requires the presence of alcohol. Everything, from the context of a wedding feast, to the usage of oinos in 1st century Greek literature (in the New Testament and outside the New Testament), argues for the wine that Jesus created to be normal, ordinary wine, containing alcohol. There is simply no solid historical, cultural, exegetical, contextual, or lexical reason to understand it to have been grape juice.
Those who oppose the drinking of alcohol, in any quantity, argue that Jesus would not have turned the water into wine, as He would have been promoting the consumption of a substance that is tainted by sin. In this understanding, alcohol itself is inherently sinful, and consumption of alcohol in any quantity is sin. That is not a biblical understanding, however. Some Scriptures discuss alcohol in positive terms. Ecclesiastes 9:7 instructs, “Drink your wine with a merry heart.” Psalm 104:14-15 states that God gives wine “that makes glad the heart of men.” Amos 9:14 discusses drinking wine from your own vineyard as a sign of God’s blessing. Isaiah 55:1 encourages, “Yes, come buy wine and milk…” From these and other Scriptures, it is clear that alcohol itself is not inherently sinful. Rather, it is the abuse of alcohol, drunkenness and/or addiction, that is sinful (Ephesians 5:18; Proverbs 23:29-35; 1 Corinthians 6:12; 2 Peter 2:19). Therefore, it would not have been a sin for Jesus to create a drink that contained alcohol.
A second, related argument is that by creating alcoholic wine, Jesus would have been promoting drunkenness, which the Bible clearly identifies as sinful. This is not a valid argument. Was Jesus promoting gluttony when He multiplied the fishes and loaves far beyond what the people needed? Of course not. Creating a substance that can be abused does not make one responsible when another person foolishly chooses to abuse it. Jesus creating alcoholic wine was in no sense encouraging drunkenness.
The belief that Jesus created alcoholic wine is definitely more in agreement with the context and the definition/usage of oinos. The primary reasons for interpreting it as grape juice, that alcohol is inherently sinful or that the creation of alcohol would have been encouraging drunkenness, are unbiblical and invalid. There is simply no good biblical reason to understand John 2 as anything other than Jesus performing an amazing miracle by turning water into real wine. Is drunkenness sinful? Absolutely! Is addiction sinful? Definitely. Would Jesus turning the water into alcoholic wine in any way violate God's standards regarding the consumption of alcohol? Absolutely not!
#31. To: Gatlin (#30)
#32. To: A K A Stone (#31)
No he made real wine. Not grape juice.
#33. To: Fred Mertz (#25)
#34. To: Gatlin (#32)
Jesus created is also the same word that is used in Ephesians 5:18, "...do not get drunk on wine...
#35. To: A K A Stone (#34)
I misread it as the kind of wind [sic] that doesn't get you drunk.
#36. To: Fred Mertz (#35)
#37. To: A K A Stone, Fred Mertz (#34)
#38. To: A K A Stone (#36)
#39. To: misterwhite (#7)
#40. To: GrandIsland (#15)
#41. To: jeremiad (#40)
(Edited)
If you go mountain climbing and fall, pay for your rescue. If you get sick and can't afford medical care, get well or die. It is not my fault that there is a socialist government in charge.
#42. To: jeremiad (#39)
"Are you in favor of the socialist state?"
#43. To: hondo68 (#8)
Synchronized with Jeb!
#44. To: GrandIsland, jeremiad (#15)
However your sheeple peers are too weak, too sympathetic, too empathetic and too self important to stand by and leave you alone with your addiction or failed health.
#45. To: VxH (#44)
Progressives have learned there's a shyteload of money to be made from "caring" for the sheeples once they've been mentally neutered.
#46. To: GrandIsland (#45)
(Edited)
#47. To: misterwhite (#42)
#48. To: jeremiad (#47)
"No I don't favor getting rid of government support for drug users before laws are repealed."
#49. To: misterwhite (#48)
#50. To: jeremiad (#49)
"it is an ever tightening vise on our personal freedoms every day."
#51. To: misterwhite (#50)
You want freedom? Then don't suck on the government's teat.
#52. To: jeremiad, misterwhite (#51)
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