The Haoma plant identification

“The Farvahar, the soul of Zarathushtra, descended into the physical world in the form of the um. The haoma – In Middle Persian hum, and in Sanskrit soma – is a plant that was used for worship purposes in the ancient Indo-Iranian religion. Scholars differ in their opinions regarding its identification. The meaning is “squeezing”, and the properties of the plant the name , according to the hymn dedicated to him in the Vesta, are healing, sexual excitement, intellectual stimulation and intoxication. Today’s Zoroastrians worship an extract of Chinese ephedra (ephedra sinica), from which the drug ephedrine is also produced. In some Iranian languages, Chinese ephedra is still called hum. Other scholars have identified and identify the plant as cannabis or various types of hallucinogenic plants. However, according to Zoroastrian mythology, Zarathushtra’s soul came down to the world in the form of the haoma plant that was as tall as a man, and grew at the top of a particularly tall tree that grew in the area where Zarathushtra’s father grazed. Pourušaspa Spitāma, inspired by the gods of course, coveted the attractive nation. He thought he would have to cut down the tree in order to reach it, but miraculously, the haoma came down half way towards him, he climbed half way towards it and shortened it all.” From “The Good, the Bad and the World“, by Thamar Eilam Gindin , p. 25, Ministry of Defense, 2011

Chris Bennett argues in his books (” cannabis and the soma solution” etc.) that haoma and soma are cannabis, basing this on the work of several Indologists and Iranologists. For example, Elizabeth Wayland Barber suggests that the name “haoma” developed from the Chinese term “hu-ma”, meaning “fire-cannabis”, because in the rituals of the Indo-Europeans who lived there, cannabis was burned, then pressed, mixed with milk, and strained (they called this “bhang”). Since it is known that there are Chinese words of Indo-European origin, she does not rule out the possibility that the influences were bidirectional. Just as the word for “silk” originated from *s’eg”, she claims the same situation could take us from hu-ma to haoma.

The main proponent of the identification between soma and cannabis is Syed Mahdihassan. According to him, the Chinese confused it with ephedra, partly because their galls are yellow-red. Consequently, the words for cannabis and ephedra are similar and actually mirror images: cannabis is huang-ma, and ephedra is ma-huang. The origin was “hu-ma”, and in Sanskrit, the h turned into s and not the other way around. He claims that the Chinese became acquainted with this drink through contact with Aryan ascetics and adopted the practice. Thus, we find evidence of Taoist sages who burned cannabis in incense burners and traveled to the “land of the immortals”.

While Zoroaster preserved the use of ephedra, he abandoned the use of cannabis, but the Scythians retained it. He attacks them for this. It turns out that the name of the Scythians in Avestan was “Sakā haumavargā”, meaning “Scythians who prepare haoma.”

Ali Jafarey argues that although Zoroaster tried to eliminate the use of cannabis, he was not entirely successful, and “heretic” sects preserved its use. These sects were orthodox Persians who struggled to accept the reformist religious practices. We see that various Persian sects remained faithful to cannabis, such as the Manichaeans, the Mazdakites, and of course, the Sufis and Hashishin, who used it for what they called jihad—holy war meant to be both internal (Sufis) and external (Hashishin).