Entheogen

Coined in 1979 by a group of scholars — including classicist Carl A. P. Ruck and ethnomycologist R. Gordon Wasson, along with Jeremy Bigwood, Danny Staples, Richard Evans Schultes, and Jonathan Ott, writing in the Journal of Psychedelic Drugs — the term entheogen combines two ancient Greek roots: entheos ("full of the god, inspired") and genesthai ("to come into being"). Together they yield the literal sense "that which generates the divine within."

The scholars proposed the word as a more accurate alternative to "psychedelic" or "hallucinogen" for plant sacraments used in sacred and religious contexts — like ayahuasca — where the intended purpose is direct spiritual experience, not recreation or medical treatment. ECC uses the term in this original, scholarly sense to describe the sacred role ayahuasca plays within its ceremonies.