2009 Cannabis Chassidis .pdf

Cannabis Chassidis
The Ancient and Emerging Torah of Drugs

(a memoir)
by Yoseph Leib ibn Mardachya

Atzmos Press
Jerusalem

Copyright © 2009
by Yoseph Leib
All rights reserved
Published in Jerusalem
by Atzmos Press
zakifkififim@gmail.com
Cover by Herman Wolfe

—This book is dedicated to the survivors, captives, and martyrs
of all terrible persecutions and cruel holocausts across history
and the universe. In the name of all hearts and memories, may
the clouds of darkness and hostility be allowed to open up
and the World made wise enough for all the captives of all
assumption to be set free, to live and serve the light—

To Dovid Hertzberg,
a.k.a. Mayim Chaim Dovid Hillel ben Rivka
and the hidden light that will be hidden no longer.

Author’s Note
This text is composed in the classic Jewish maximum scriptural
accessibility model, with potentially obscure or unfamiliar
words defined in footnotes on the bottom of a page, and with
references, quotations, and extended tangentials reserved for
endnotes at the end of the book. Please be patient with unfamiliar terms or concepts, they’re all very simple, ultimately, and
offer only to enhance your appreciation of living from now on.
What you are reading is the story of a particular journey into
the exploration of particular questions. Please respect the subjectivity of that experience, the good will and interest of the
author in engaging any of the concerns one might have had
with the ideas described herein, that they may have come up
in his process, and that they may come up in the course of this
book. His stated intention is only to clarify What’s Right before
man and G-d, and maybe get his friends high sometimes.

CONTENTS
Perek Aleph
Book I:
Personal Justifications, Guiding Questions,
Contextual Apologetics,
and the introduction to a Romantic Quest
for a Secret Tradition
Where is Torah of Weed?
And why bother looking for it?

3

Guidance for the indulgence of sweetness

12

Guidance for harmonious use of medicine

13

Drugs? Aren’t those Idolatry?
19
Possible Romantic apologetica for the officially sanctioned
abandonment of the Herbal Medical Tradition of Ancient Israel
"Anything that an Israelite is charmed by,
must have at it's essence something really good"

29

The Messiah gets High!

31

Marijuana is profoundly symbolic… of us!
50
Everybody knows that marijuana is mentioned in the Bible.
“Be Loose like the Reed”
R' Nachman of Breslov spoke very highly of surrender
to circumstance. On the other hand…

58

Marijuana is learned out from Shabbos
Only with great difficulty did our sages permit
speaking on Shabbos

60

"The whole world is drugs"
Says R' Shlomo Carlebach

72

Perek Bet
Book II
Secret Histoies, National Aspirations,
and the unspoken hopes and failures of The Law
Enough theology:
The story of Jerusalem’s first Million Marijuana March

83

The Law is a Drug

94

And the other reason no psak can prohibit marijuana… 102
"Torah from Mars"
What makes the Torah impotent (or toxic?)

111

"Why do they call us 'Rabbi'?
Because we're 'Ra' (evil) but we get 'by'"

115

Candy vs. Family:
What do you REALLY need?

131

Solstice Torah—
Caution against the blindness of the Sun-King

137

Idols and Ideals: Guide for Harmonious Use
(hint: let the tool do the work for you)

143

Perek Gimel
Book III:
Lineage
Profound Moments and Crucial Heroes
of Modern Jewish/Chassidish Drug History
Pop Music = Pot Music
How a Jew introduced the Beatles to reefer,
thus saving the world

151

Dare not to not do drugs
How Shlomo blew up his Torah, thus saving Judaism

159

The Taiva for Drugs is the Taiva for G-d
What Shlomo Noticed

165

Justifying Israel
179
The Central Problems, and hopes of a better way for dealing.
Truth vs. Peace
The Ishbitzer hates anger, the Kotsker hates liars

223

Perek Dalet
Book IV:
The Torah of Psychedelics—
What and How (models and memoria)
Medicinal Demonology

235

“Once, I found some weird wild stuff in my head”
What do policemen protect?

250

Levitzchak! Why do you need to smoke a pipe to daven 264
when R' Shneur Zalman across town is already finished?