Shurooms — the first ethnomycological study of psilocybin ceremony written from inside the African initiatory tradition

What distinguishes this publication from prior psychedelic literature is the author's initiatory standing. No other living scholar-practitioner holds all three of the following credentials simultaneously.

Oluwo (Yoruba/Ifá tradition) — High priest of Osain, the Orisha of sacred plants, fungi and forest medicine. Received into the Osain high priest society through Awo Daweed by divination. The Osain priesthood is the pharmacological and healing branch of Yoruba spiritual science, governing all ceremonial use of plant and fungal medicine within the tradition.

Swamikal (Hindu/Dravidian tradition) — Authority in the Vedic soma tradition. The Tamil honorific 'Swamikal' is conferred upon completion of the tradition, not upon entry. Shumake completed his training under Aghori Shri Ganesh in India, qualifying him to speak with authority on the ancient soma sacrament described in the Rigveda.

Ajarn (Thai Buddhist tradition) — Master teacher trained in bardo navigation, the Tibetan Buddhist science of guiding consciousness through transitional states. This credential provides the framework for safely navigating the dissolution of ego and the encounter with death-and-rebirth experiences that characterise high-dose psilocybin ceremony.

The theoretical framework synthesises all three lineages into a single model: Osain provides the key (the medicine itself); Soma opens the door (divine communion with the transcendent); the Bardo guides the passage (safe navigation through altered states of consciousness).

Shumake is also the author of Detroit's Proposal E, the 2021 ballot measure that decriminalised entheogenic plants in the city of Detroit. The measure passed with 61.08 percent of the vote, making Detroit one of the first major American cities to decriminalise natural psychedelics including psilocybin mushrooms, ayahuasca, mescaline-containing cacti and ibogaine.

The publication of Shurooms represents the scholarly foundation underlying that legislative achievement — documenting the ceremonial, therapeutic and spiritual context in which these substances have been used safely and effectively within an African initiatory framework for generations.

Robert S. Shumake PhD — also known as Ajarn Shaman Shu, Oluwo Jolaoso Osainbola PhD and Shri Suryanarayana Swamikal — is the author of more than 140 published books and 86+ DOI-registered academic publications indexed on Zenodo (CERN), the Open Science Framework and ORCID.

He is the founder and chancellor of seven religious universities operating under Buddha Digital Temple, a 508(c)(1)(a) religious educational institution: Buddha University, Orisha University, Shiva University, Krishna University, Islam University, Enoch University and Egziabher University.

He holds an honorary doctorate from Lewis College of Business in Detroit and completed the Harvard Data Science Initiative Agentic AI Intensive in June 2026 (Certificate of Completion, Verification: UTHW-KVJS), applying artificial intelligence to spiritual education, automated publishing and economic development for underserved communities.