Ayahuasca as Liquid Divinity An Ontological Approach

By André van der Braak

Ayahuasca often yields transformative experiences that merge such familiar categories as the sacred and the secular, transcendence and immanence, subject and object, and the human and the nonhuman. However, such experiences are interpreted differently by Western and indigenous discourses.

Using the work of French philosopher Bruno Latour, André van der Braak asks fundamental ontological questions in order to reimagine ayahuasca as liquid divinity, shifting the focus from ayahuasca experiences to ayahuasca-based ritual practices that aim to cultivate relationships with more-than-human powers, described by Latour as “beings of transformation and religion.”

Ayahuasca as Liquid Divinity describes Santo Daime practices as a contemporary form of “theurgy” (god-work), as defined by the third-century Platonic philosopher and mystagogue Iamblichus. Theurgical practices aim at drawing down divine action through ritual procedures, using the imagination as an active faculty. Van der Braak argues that ayahuasca religiosity is ultimately not about individual recreation or healing, or even personal visions, but rather about engaging in communal transformative ecodelic practices that let us work as companions of the gods in order to practice solidarity with all sentient beings.

André van der Braak is professor of comparative philosophy of religion at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Argues that ayahuasca religiosity lets us work as companions of the gods to practice solidarity with all sentient beings.

Lexington Books

May 2023

246 pages

Part of the Studies in Comparative Philosophy and Religion series

Hardback 978 1 6669 0644 8 eBook

978 1 6669 0645 5

Philosophy • Metaphysics

Relational Agency and Environmental Ethics

A Journey beyond Humanism as We Know It

By Suvielise Nurmi

Explores how the concept of moral agency embedded in modern humanist ethics prevents ethics from efficiently supporting a sustainability transition.

The book charts a new direction for environmental ethics—and ethics in general—by relationally revising the concept of moral agency in light of the current understanding of embodied mental processes and environmentally extended cognition. The book sketches the crucial implications of a relational theory of ethics for environmental ethics.

Suvielise Nurmi is postdoc researcher in ethics and environmental philosophy at the University of Helsinki.

Africa beyond Liberal Democracy

In Search of Context-Relevant Models of Democracy for the Twenty-First Century

Edited by Reginald M.J. Oduor

Calls for alternative trajectories of democratization that are responsive to the sociopolitical realities on the continent.

The contributors to this volume ask whether democracy is universal or culturally bound, how the adoption of Western liberal models of democracy has hindered democratisation in Africa, and how indigenous African political thought can be utilised to design models of democracy suitable for twentyfirst-century African countries.

Reginald M.J. Oduor is senior lecturer in philosophy at the University of Nairobi.

Lexington Books

May 2023 • 318 pages

Hardback 978 1 6669 0454 3 eBook 978 1 6669 0455 0

Philosophy • Ethics & Moral Philosophy

Lexington Books

July 2022 • 298 pages

Part of the African Philosophy: Critical Perspectives and Global Dialogue series

Hardback 978 1 6669 1381 1 eBook 978 1 6669 1382 8

Philosophy • Political