The Magic of Plato
How the Experience of Ego Death Inspired Greek Philosophy, Drama & Democracy
The major theme of this essay is ego death—an experience induced pharmacologically in ancient times that heavily influenced both Greek philosophy and the rise of Christianity.
Key Takeaways:
Psychedelic compounds that induce “ego death” anchored pre-Christian religion in ancient Greece and Rome.
The invention of drama came directly out of the cult of Dionysus, while the advent of democracy was influenced by the cult of Demeter.
Plato’s experiences with ego death led him to conclude that the world we perceive with our senses is an illusion.
1. Ego Death
For centuries, the goddess Demeter’s grain and the god Dionysus’s wine were centerpieces of the two most significant pre-Christian religions in the Greco-Roman world. These were eaten and drunk during rituals of immense religious importance. Christianity later adapted the bread and wine used in pagan rites into the Eucharist we still recognize today.
Mounting evidence strongly suggests that the secret at the heart of these so-called “mystery schools” was the use of psychedelic substances. Artifacts used in the rites of Demeter test positive for ergot, while Dionysian wine casks from the “Villa of the Mysteries” in Pompeii contained opium and cannabis.
These substances induce a mystical experience called “ego death”, where the mental conception of the self is temporarily dissolved. A mental reflection of the physical body is an indispensable evolutionary tool: it‘s how we know which mouth to feed at the dinner table.
Most of us remain convinced that we are our egos because we spend all our waking hours identifying as such. However, the experience of ego death reveals that a point of view still remains once ego has been disintegrated. It shows us that our egos aren’t essential to our existence, but masks that can be temporarily removed through pharmacological means.
2. Drama & Democracy
The cult of Dionysus was central to the invention of drama in ancient Greece. Dionysian worship involved ecstatic celebrations, music, dance, and choral performances called dithyrambs. These hymns were sung by a chorus to honor the Greco-Roman god of wine.
According to legend, Thespis was the first actor ever to step out of the dithyrambic chorus and perform individual dialogue. His name gives us the term “thespian.” The Athenian Dionysia became a city-wide festival where playwrights like Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides vied to stage superior dramas. The Theater of Dionysus—where history’s first plays were staged—can still be visited on the south slope of the Acropolis in Athens.
The psychedelic compounds used in the Dionysia gave rise to these stage dramas. Ego death reveals the possibility of existence beyond the narrow confines of self-identity. Once the ego is perceived as a costume that can be discarded, the next logical step is an actor who adopts a persona other than their own.
Democracy, too, has obvious parallels to the experience of ego death. The political theory behind democracy is that collective decision-making cancels out the influence of any one person’s ego. The idea is to make decisions that are beneficial for all, instead of decisions that benefit only tiny minorities wielding disproportionate political power.
History credits Cleisthenes for bringing democracy to Athens in 508 BC. He came from the Alcmaeonid family, who had strong ties to the cult of Demeter at Eleusis. As archon, or chief magistrate, his grandfather oversaw the elevation of the Eleusinian Mysteries into a state-sponsored festival. The architects of democracy in Athens were well-acquainted with the experience of ego death, as reflected by the political philosophy they created.
3. Platonism
In addition to drama and democracy, the substances consumed during the rites of Demeter and Dionysus also impacted Greek philosophy. Ego death feels like a transformation or a journey, which is why modern psychedelic users refer to the experience as a “trip”. As the ego is revealed to be an illusion, the reality we perceive from the vantage point of ego also dissolves.
In the 3rd century AD, the Greek historian Diogenes Laertius recorded the life of the Greek philosopher Plato. According to him, Plato traveled to Egypt with the playwright Euripides to be initiated into the Cult of Isis. The story shows a keen interest on the part of both men in the mystery religions of the broader Mediterranean basin, and in the mystical experiences associated with them.
Euripides went on to write The Bacchae, an iconic play about Dionysian worship. Meanwhile, Plato became history’s most famous philosopher. In Phaedo, Symposium, and Phaedrus, he directly references mystery religions and initiatory experiences.
But Plato is most famous for the psychedelic idea that the reality we perceive with our senses is an illusion. In the Republic, he described prisoners bound inside a cave, while unseen puppeteers cast shadows on the only cave wall visible to them. His allegory remains the single most famous rhetorical device in all of philosophy.
Plato’s prisoners mistake the shadow puppet show for reality itself. His point was that we tend to make a similar mistake. Plato believed in two realms: a mental realm where we decide to make a fist, and a physical realm where our hand actually clenches. He suggested that the physical realm is a transitory illusion we regard as bedrock reality, just like shadows on the wall of his cave.
Plato’s Allegory of the Cave describes an individual breaking free from the bonds that hold him, and ascending out of the cave into the light of true reality. It’s a perfect analog to the psychedelic experience of ego death that Plato would have had in the local cults of Demeter and Dionysus, or in the Egyptian cult of Isis where Diogenes Laertius placed him.
Conclusion
Pharmacologically-induced experiences of ego death were central to the pre-Christian religious landscape. These experiences directly informed the rise of drama and democracy in Classical Greece. Furthermore, the Greek philosophy of Plato reflected a transformative journey typical of the ego death experience. The twin realms of Platonism later informed the Christian conception of heaven and earth. In addition, his idea that sensory illusions are commonly mistaken for bedrock reality also laid the groundwork for Renaissance magic, where a transient reality admits of manipulation by the mind. From drama and democracy to Christianity and magic, the use of psychedelic substances impacted the history of faith and philosophy in ways we’re only just beginning to understand.
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Further Materials
From that time onward, having reached his twentieth year (so it is said), [Plato] was the pupil of Socrates. When Socrates was gone, he attached himself to Cratylus the Heraclitean, and to Hermogenes who professed the philosophy of Parmenides. Then at the age of twenty-eight, according to Hermodorus, he withdrew to Megara to Euclides, with certain other disciples of Socrates. Next he proceeded to Cyrene on a visit to Theodorus the mathematician, thence to Italy to see the Pythagorean philosophers Philolaus and Eurytus, and thence to Egypt to see those who interpreted the will of the gods; and Euripides is said to have accompanied him thither. There he fell sick and was cured by the priests, who treated him with sea-water, and for this reason he cited the line:
The sea doth wash away all human ills.
Furthermore he said that, according to Homer, beyond all men the Egyptians were skilled in healing. Plato also intended to make the acquaintance of the Magians, but was prevented by the wars in Asia. Having returned to Athens, he lived in the Academy, which is a gymnasium outside the walls, in a grove named after a certain hero, Hecademus, as is stated by Eupolis in his play entitled Shirkers.
Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Book III
When I was in high school, I was on the cross country team. As a result, on one meet day I experienced the "runner's high", an experience of endorphin that uses the same receptors as opium. I felt like I was riding in my body as though it were a carriage, and that I could run all the way home. Since then I have suspected that the ancient Greek philosophers had similar experiences from their physical exercises, and that is the source of their ideas about the soul surviving the body.