Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 3, Nos. 2 &3, 2004, Page 10
whose mental and emotional stabilities themselves may be questionable. Numerous
examples of these patterns come to mind.
The late yuppie guru, Dr. Frederick Lenz (also known as Zen Master Rama), took LSD
himself but also gave it to his students. One student among the ten or so to whom Lenz
provided the drug on one occasion subsequently recalled that several hours after their trips
began, Lenz
called us to the living room and began to talk. And talk. And talk. I tried to
understand how his words were affecting us. I thought in terms of computers.
I decided that he had rebooted us with LSD and now, as we were coming
down, he was downloading his wordy operating system to our unformatted,
receptive minds. ‗He‘s formatting us like floppy disks!‘ I thought (Laxer
1993:143).
On different occasions, apparently Lenz gave other members LSD and then harangued them
about being ―possessed by demons and entities‖ (Butler 1987: see Okerblom 1988:B8).
While on LSD himself (and dressed in yellow rain gear), Lenz spent an hour supposedly
cleansing water-like demons out of a follower‘s basement (Senders and Moloney 1988:24).
Eventually, however, Lenz‘s own paranoid demons overtook him, and in early 1998 he
convinced a female student and lover to commit suicide with him by drug overdose. (He
ingested 150 Valiums and drowned, but his lover survived despite having swallowed 50
Valiums and 45 Phenobarbitals [Konigsberg 1998:22]).
Lenz was notorious for sleeping with female followers (Motoyama 1992:12), but it is not
clear whether he combined sex with LSD. Charles Manson, of course, did. For a period of
time, he gave his followers the drug several times a week over several months (Faith
2001:111, 113), often amidst orgies (Bugliosi with Gentry 1974:236-237), and, at least in
one instance, a mock crucifixion ceremony in which he was Jesus (Sanders 1989:86-87).
Few of his followers likely knew that ―when Manson passed out the LSD, he always took a
smaller dose than the others.‖ Presumably he did so ―to retain control over his own mental
faculties‖ so that he could ―instill his philosophies, exploit weaknesses and fears, and extract
promises and agreements from his followers‖ (Bugliosi with Gentry 1974:237).
Manson did not limit the drugs that his he and his followers abused simply to LSD—he gave
them marijuana and peyote whenever they were available. Indeed, his abuse of
amphetamines may have contributed to the violent rampage that his followers undertook
(under his orders) in 1969 (Faith 2001:115). Although he introduced LSD to some of his
followers, others had taken it well before meeting him (Bugliosi with Gentry 1974:235,
483). Members of another group, Love Israel, also had psychedelic histories before joining,
but their leader introduced them to a drug that almost certainly was new to them all—a
solvent called toluene (or what the leader called ‗tell-u-all‘). Even after two of his followers
died from the fumes, Love and other leaders continued to advocate the sniffing practice as a
means of inducing visions (Balch 1988:192 Israel, Israel, and Israel n.d.).
Looking at yet another group leader, Shoko Asahara‘s visions during his first LSD trip were
so dramatic that, when he came down from it, he declared, ―This is excellent,‖ even though
he had wet his pants while on the acid (Brackett 1996:98 Kaplan and Marshall 1996:162-
163). Soon LSD was one of ―an illicit pharmacy of hallucinogens, stimulants, and other
psychoactive drugs‖ that his organization produced (Kaplan and Marshall 1996:163), and
members by the thousands experienced the mind alterations caused by LSD. He, of course,
benefited greatly from these trips, because the members misattributed the vivid colors and
perceptual distortions ―to the mystical power of Asahara‘s training‖ (Kaplan and Marshall
1996:164).
whose mental and emotional stabilities themselves may be questionable. Numerous
examples of these patterns come to mind.
The late yuppie guru, Dr. Frederick Lenz (also known as Zen Master Rama), took LSD
himself but also gave it to his students. One student among the ten or so to whom Lenz
provided the drug on one occasion subsequently recalled that several hours after their trips
began, Lenz
called us to the living room and began to talk. And talk. And talk. I tried to
understand how his words were affecting us. I thought in terms of computers.
I decided that he had rebooted us with LSD and now, as we were coming
down, he was downloading his wordy operating system to our unformatted,
receptive minds. ‗He‘s formatting us like floppy disks!‘ I thought (Laxer
1993:143).
On different occasions, apparently Lenz gave other members LSD and then harangued them
about being ―possessed by demons and entities‖ (Butler 1987: see Okerblom 1988:B8).
While on LSD himself (and dressed in yellow rain gear), Lenz spent an hour supposedly
cleansing water-like demons out of a follower‘s basement (Senders and Moloney 1988:24).
Eventually, however, Lenz‘s own paranoid demons overtook him, and in early 1998 he
convinced a female student and lover to commit suicide with him by drug overdose. (He
ingested 150 Valiums and drowned, but his lover survived despite having swallowed 50
Valiums and 45 Phenobarbitals [Konigsberg 1998:22]).
Lenz was notorious for sleeping with female followers (Motoyama 1992:12), but it is not
clear whether he combined sex with LSD. Charles Manson, of course, did. For a period of
time, he gave his followers the drug several times a week over several months (Faith
2001:111, 113), often amidst orgies (Bugliosi with Gentry 1974:236-237), and, at least in
one instance, a mock crucifixion ceremony in which he was Jesus (Sanders 1989:86-87).
Few of his followers likely knew that ―when Manson passed out the LSD, he always took a
smaller dose than the others.‖ Presumably he did so ―to retain control over his own mental
faculties‖ so that he could ―instill his philosophies, exploit weaknesses and fears, and extract
promises and agreements from his followers‖ (Bugliosi with Gentry 1974:237).
Manson did not limit the drugs that his he and his followers abused simply to LSD—he gave
them marijuana and peyote whenever they were available. Indeed, his abuse of
amphetamines may have contributed to the violent rampage that his followers undertook
(under his orders) in 1969 (Faith 2001:115). Although he introduced LSD to some of his
followers, others had taken it well before meeting him (Bugliosi with Gentry 1974:235,
483). Members of another group, Love Israel, also had psychedelic histories before joining,
but their leader introduced them to a drug that almost certainly was new to them all—a
solvent called toluene (or what the leader called ‗tell-u-all‘). Even after two of his followers
died from the fumes, Love and other leaders continued to advocate the sniffing practice as a
means of inducing visions (Balch 1988:192 Israel, Israel, and Israel n.d.).
Looking at yet another group leader, Shoko Asahara‘s visions during his first LSD trip were
so dramatic that, when he came down from it, he declared, ―This is excellent,‖ even though
he had wet his pants while on the acid (Brackett 1996:98 Kaplan and Marshall 1996:162-
163). Soon LSD was one of ―an illicit pharmacy of hallucinogens, stimulants, and other
psychoactive drugs‖ that his organization produced (Kaplan and Marshall 1996:163), and
members by the thousands experienced the mind alterations caused by LSD. He, of course,
benefited greatly from these trips, because the members misattributed the vivid colors and
perceptual distortions ―to the mystical power of Asahara‘s training‖ (Kaplan and Marshall
1996:164).
