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The Shamanic Wisdom Traditions of Controlled Use by Wayne Martin Mellinger, Ph.D.
Shamanic Wisdom Traditions of Controlled Use Wayne Martin Mellinger, Ph.D. Dedicated to my new student David on 3 June 2026 In this essay I advance a sweeping argument that cuts against the grain of contemporary prohibitionist culture. At its heart lies a deceptively simple claim: that human beings once possessed elaborate, socially transmitted knowledge of how to consume powerful psychotropic plants safely, purposefully, and with profound spiritual benefit, and that the destruction of those traditions is the deepest root of the modern drug crisis. This is not primarily a pharmacological or policy document. It is a work of critical social theory and emerging theology, written from within the framework of Religious Naturalism, specifically my own constructive theological project, Dionysian Naturalism — a nature religion grounded in scientific naturalism that refuses to suppress the ecstatic, embodied, and wild dimensions of human spiritual life. The Problem Stated I open with a pr...