Exodus Ch 30 v 22-25
| כב וַיְדַבֵּר יְהוָה, אֶל-מֹשֶׁה לֵּאמֹר. | 22 Moreover the LORD spoke unto Moses, saying: |
| כג וְאַתָּה קַח-לְךָ, בְּשָׂמִים רֹאשׁ, מָר-דְּרוֹר חֲמֵשׁ מֵאוֹת, וְקִנְּמָן-בֶּשֶׂם מַחֲצִיתוֹ חֲמִשִּׁים וּמָאתָיִם; וּקְנֵה-בֹשֶׂם, חֲמִשִּׁים וּמָאתָיִם. | 23 ‘Take thou also unto thee the chief spices, of flowing myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even two hundred and fifty, and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty, |
| כד וְקִדָּה, חֲמֵשׁ מֵאוֹת בְּשֶׁקֶל הַקֹּדֶשׁ; וְשֶׁמֶן זַיִת, הִין. | 24 and of cassia five hundred, after the shekel of the sanctuary, and of olive oil a hin. |
| כה וְעָשִׂיתָ אֹתוֹ, שֶׁמֶן מִשְׁחַת-קֹדֶשׁ–רֹקַח מִרְקַחַת, מַעֲשֵׂה רֹקֵחַ; שֶׁמֶן מִשְׁחַת-קֹדֶשׁ, יִהְיֶה. | 25 And thou shalt make it a holy anointing oil, a perfume compounded after the art of the perfumer; it shall be a holy anointing oil. |
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The Miracle of Healing
This article originally posted on Peter Reynolds blog, written for CLEAR Cannabis law reform, 2014
Whatever your religious belief, if any, the stories of Christ’s miraculous healing have persisted for more than 2,000 years. Such legends develop from oral history and we can never be certain how much is truth, how much is myth and what is a combination of both. Those of faith carry their own certainty in their soul. What is remarkable is the coincidence of several factors that together strongly suggest that the Holy anointing oil used by Christ, his disciples and other healers of the time may have contained cannabis as one of its major active ingredients.
The recipe for Holy anointing oil appeared in ancient Hebrew texts and, unsurprisingly, there are conflicting views about translation.
‘Kaneh-bosm’ ‘qneh-bism’, etc, etc are variants on a word used in ancient Hebrew texts which can be interpreted, credibly, as cannabis. So can ‘calamus’ or ‘sweet calamus’. Different sources seem to use the words interchangeably. However, if you add in the other factors, the healing, the region, its flora, the archaeological evidence and the well established use of cannabis in the region at the time then there is a very, very strong hypothesis. To anyone who understands the miraculous healing properties of cannabis, now explained by modern science it seems common sense.
One CLEAR member, David Boylan, wrote these beautiful words about his faith and cannabis:
“God must have spent a lot of time and effort to produce your endocannabinoid system.
An incredibly complex neurological system in everyone, with the sole purpose of being a receptor for cannabinoids. That must have taken our creator a lot of thought and effort to design…
Trillions of cells devoted to receiving THC and other compounds found ONLY in cannabis. God also ensured that this plant shows up all over the world and grows all around man where ever he looked… So God took all that care for what?
Did God say – “Let there be cannabis”? Then said “Let man have an endocannabinoid system which is stimulated only by cannabis”?
Then did he say…”And now let man get an £80 fixed penalty ticket if man uses it?? Did he say that? NO! Makes no sense, and there is nowhere in the bible I can find that.
I can’t see why Christians don’t have a problem with the government making Gods work illegal? Who are the government to ban God’s work?
It must have been God’s intent for us to at least experiment with cannabis.
That is my only logical conclusion, knowing the facts about the endocannabinoid system. The only conclusion I can make on a creator and pot.”
References:
Patients for Medical Cannabis
Canna Central
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Kaneh Bosm The Hidden Story of Cannabis in the Old Testament
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Kaneh Bosem: Hemp and the Hebrews
From The Cannigma – Where the word cannabis comes from
As it turns out, cannabis—or kaneh bosem as the ancient Hebrews would have called it—may be a hidden ingredient in the holy anointing oil of Hebraic priests.
Let’s take a look at a passage from the Torah, Exodus 30:22-25:
Moreover, YHWH spoke to Moses, saying, “Take also for yourself the finest of spices: of flowing myrrh five hundred shekels, and of fragrant cinnamon half as much, two hundred and fifty, and of fragrant cane two hundred and fifty, and of cassia five hundred, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, and of olive oil a hin. You shall make of these a holy anointing oil, a perfume mixture, the work of a perfumer; it shall be a holy anointing oil.”
For centuries, one of these ingredients confounded translators: “fragrant cane.” Like much of the scriptures, the initial Greek to English translations of this particular segment were done on behalf of King James VI and I in the early 1600s.
Though skilled in linguistics, these early translators weren’t quite as skilled in botany, and consequently they assumed that fragrant cane referred to a plant called calamus. But we now know that calamus contains a chemical called asarone that makes it mildly toxic, especially if ingested.
For obvious reasons, it wouldn’t make sense for the Hebrew priests to include a toxic plant in their holy oil. So it follows that somewhere along the line, the translation went off course. It’s also possible that even earlier translations like the Hebrew-to-Greek Septuagint were the first to get it wrong.
So…if not calamus, what could “fragrant cane” be referring to?
In 1936, a Polish etymologist named Sula Benet proposed that it was actually “קנבוס” or “KaNaBoS”, which itself comes from the even older Hebrew term “קנה בשם” or kaneh bosem.
Her argument was logical enough: קנה, or kaneh means a strong reed or stalk, while bosem means fragrant or aromatic. Kaneh bosem—cane that’s fragrant.
With that discovery, it makes much more sense. Though once thought to be derived from the Scythian language, it turned out that the term cannabis probably goes back further than that: all the way back to ancient Hebrew!
It was as if an elusive puzzle piece had been found. Once Benet knew the correct term to look for, she noticed it popping up throughout the rest of the Bible. As Chris Bennett’s 2001 book “Sex, Drugs, and the Bible” notes, “this word appears five times in the Old Testament; in the books of Exodus, the Song of Songs, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.”
What could such a powerful cannabis-infused oil have been used for? We can look again to Exodus Chapter 30, beginning with verse 26, to answer that.
“With it you shall anoint the tent of meeting and the ark of the testimony (…) You shall also consecrate them, that they may be most holy; whatever touches them shall be holy. (…)You shall anoint Aaron and his sons, and consecrate them, that they may minister as priests to Me.
Interpreting this through the lens of modern science is surprisingly insightful. Cannabis is a known antimicrobial and antibacterial agent, as are some of the other ingredients in the anointing oil, like cinnamon. That could help explain why the Hebrews took to applying their oil to all sorts of inanimate objects. And one couldn’t be blamed for assuming this practice would also make things smell good.
Yet the anointing oil was clearly used on the priesthood, too. Might it have provided its users with any psychotropic effects? Possibly.
While we can’t determine what the oil’s exact cannabinoid ratios would’ve been, we doknow that cannabis from ancient times was generally rich in CBD. And modern research shows that this cannabinoid penetrates the skin much better than THC does. Levitical priests would have at least been getting their daily dose of aromatherapy according to the biblical description.
Some people today are actually replicating the anointing oil’s recipe. With a blend of bioavailability-boosting terpenes, partially decarbed cannabinoids, and pure carrier oils, science is now able to validate this sampling of ancient wisdom.
Back to the Spiritual and Ritual uses of cannabis