One of the few surviving books of the Zend-Avesta , ancient holy book of the Zoroastrians, Vendidad , translated as the “Law Against Demons,” calls bhanga a “good narcotic” that may allow some of the highest mysteries to be revealed. Chinese priest-doctors used marijuana stalks engraved with snake-like figures in their demon-ridding rites (Abel, 1980). The Talmud , a holy book in Jewish culture, also refers to marijuana (The Forward & Davidson, 2013). Among other uses, Cannabis may have been employed as incense and to ease the pains of childbirth (The Forward & Davidson, 2013). A Mexican slang term for marijuana is “mota.” A hangover-free intoxicant, mota serves as a “social lubricant and an antidote to drudgery and fatigue” (Lee, 2012, p. 39). Marijuana leaf, or resin from the leaf and stem (hashish), is typically smoked. The resin and seed of the plant can also be eaten. Eating hashish was the preferred method of ingestion for centuries. Smoking of Cannabis was introduced to Europe only after Columbus returned with tobacco from his second trip to the New World (McKenna, 1992). Traditionally, the effects of smoking are thought to be more immediate. A variety of apparatuses and techniques are available. The favorite device for smoking marijuana in India is a chelum , a wooden, ceramic, or soapstone tube that is packed with the herb. The Scythians, a nomadic Central Asian people, are credited with bringing marijuana to Eastern Europe around 700 B.C. (McKenna, 1992) and discovering that inhalation was the most effective way to appreciate the effects of the plant. Centuries later, Dr. William B. O’Shaughnessy, scientist, and physician, is said to have introduced marijuana to England in 1842 in his Bengal Dispensatory and Pharmacopoeia (Block et al., 1998). Marijuana seed has been employed in traditional Chinese medicine. The ancient emperor Shen Nung (circa 2700 B.C.), patron of agriculture, is credited with the discovery of marijuana as a medicine. Marijuana seed, or “huo ma ren,” is classified as “moist laxative” in the Chinese materia medica (Bensky & Gamble, 1993). It is also used in patterns of yin (heat) deficiency with constipation, such as may occur in older adults after illness with fever and in women postpartum. Poultices of the pounded seed are used on wounds to reduce inflammation and promote healing. The ground seed is also known to be effective in lowering blood pressure in animals and humans (Bensky & Gamble, 1993). It is typically used with other herbs in formulation. The Chinese have historically used marijuana with wine to create an anesthetic called ma-yo when performing difficult surgical operations. According to Abel (1980), “The Chinese were well aware of marijuana’s unusual properties … many did not approve. Because of the growing spirit of Taoism which began to permeate China around 600 BC, marijuana intoxication was viewed with special disdain” (p. 13). By the first century of the Common Era, the Taoists had relented and, going along with their interest in magic and “seeing spirits,” people were once again adding marijuana seeds to their incense burners.
The Ohio State Medical Society conducted the first official U.S. government study of marijuana in 1860. They catalogued conditions that doctors had successfully treated with marijuana, from “bronchitis and rheumatism, to venereal disease and postpartum depression. The use of marijuana as an analgesic was so common that medical textbooks and journals identified several types of pain for which it should be administered” (Lee, 2012, p. 26). In Great Britain, “Sir William Osler, often called the founder of modern medicine , endorsed marijuana as the best treatment for migraine headaches” and Sir John Russell Reynolds, the personal physician to Britain’s Queen Victoria, prescribed hemp to the queen to relieve her menstrual cramps, calling it “one of the most valuable medicines we possess” (Lee, 2012, p. 26). Marijuana was used for such conditions as “delirium tremens, neuralgia, gout, rheumatism, infantile convulsions, low mental conditions, insanity, etc., and in inflammatory conditions in cases where opium disagrees and is often preferable to opium” (Felter & Lloyd, 1898/1983, p. 426). Felter and Lloyd go on to say: Acute mania and dementia, epilepsy … are among the nervous disorders in which it exerts a positively beneficial and soothing action … The drug is a useful hypnotic for the insane. As a remedy for pain, it ranks among the first; the more spasmodic the pain the better it acts (1898/1983, p. 425). An alcohol tincture of marijuana leaf in sweetened water has been used medicinally to increase the strength of uterine contractions without adverse effects, as well as for menorrhagia and chronic cystitis. Herbalists use marijuana tincture in combination with lady’s mantle ( Alchemilla vulgaris ) and witch hazel ( Hamamelis virginiana ) to slow postpartum hemorrhage caused by uterine atrophy (Weed, 1986). According to Felter & Lloyd, 1898/1983), “Impotence is said to have been cured by it. Cannabis has some reputation as a remedy for chronic alcoholism, and for the cure of the opium habit” (p. 426). The Iroquois have used marijuana as a psychological aid for people who are recovering from illness but somehow do not think that they are getting well (Moerman, 1998). In Ayurveda, a traditional medicine of India, marijuana is referred to as vijaya, siddhapatri, ganjika, bhanga , and hursini (Nadkarni, 1976). Bhang was a symbol of hospitality and given to guests. Sushruta, a renowned physician of ancient India, recommended marijuana to relieve congestion and regulate body fluids, and as a sleep and digestive aid, analgesic, and aphrodisiac. At the start of the 18th century, Gobind Singh, the Tenth Guru of the Sikh religion, gave bhang to soldiers facing dangerous missions (Abel, 1980). In Ayurveda, marijuana has been used in treating numerous infectious diseases (Touw, 1981). Some Indians regard marijuana as “sattvik nasha” or “peaceful intoxication.” To make thandi , an intoxicating drink whose effect lasts 3 hours without hangover, marijuana powder is mixed with equal parts black pepper, dried rose petals, poppy seeds, almonds, cardamom, cucumber and melon seeds, sugar, milk, and water (Nadkarni, 1976).
SUBSTANCE MISUSE AND MARIJUANA
The marijuana “high,” or intoxication, is described in different ways. Some people report feeling inebriated, while others are simply relaxed. Some people use plants such as marijuana in the pursuit of religious, spiritual, or ecstatic experience. Humans tend to be fascinated with altered states of consciousness, be it through prayer, meditation, music and the arts, drugs, or plants. Traditional shamans regard plants as more than sources of foods and drugs, seeing them as sentient life forms that are interdependent and communicate with each other and humans. Tompkins and Bird (1973), in their classic book The Secret Life of Plants, conducted clinical research on the spiritual as well as physical and emotional relationships between plants and people. McKenna (1992) states that:
Analysis of the existential incompleteness within us that drives us to form relationships of dependency and addiction with plants as drugs will show that at the dawn of history, we lost something precious, the absence of which has made us ill with narcissism. Only a recovery of the relationship that we evolved with nature through use of psychoactive plants before the fall into history can offer us hope of a humane and open-ended future (p. xvii). In the late nineteenth century, Cannabis was being sold in U.S. pharmacies as a remedy for stomach problems (History.com, 2017). At that time, Americans and Europeans preferred to ingest marijuana baked into pastry or as a tincture in tea or wine, until people began to realize that they could achieve a milder, quicker, and more manageable high by inhaling marijuana
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