The notion of an underlying religious experience common to all traditions is not true. One need only look at the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) tradition of prophetic experience. There are no examples of a mystical-unitive state in this entire collection of twenty-four books. Rather, the prophetic experience is solely interactive and relational. Take a look at Chapter 1 of Ezekiel, where the heavens open and the prophet witnesses a host of celestial beings, spinning wheels, rotating spheres, fire, and ice. Stunned, he falls to the ground, and an angel lifts him, thus beginning a verbal dialogue between human and the divine.
Nevertheless, there is a widespread notion of a universal spiritual experience—“hardwired” into the human species—that psychedelics activate. This idea dominates discussions of the spiritual effects of psychedelics within and outside academics.
This has had two unfortunate effects. One is that it establishes a goal for any particular psychedelic session. That is, if someone taking a psychedelic—and those administering it—values the attainment of a mystical-unitive state, a sense of disappointment results on both sides if they fail to do so. A more pernicious result is the belief that interactive-relational spiritual experiences are inferior to mystical-unitive ones. This is an opinion, a theological stance, and lacks supporting evidence.
Comparing unfavorably the interactive-relational experience with the mystical-unitive one results in regarding unfavorably religious traditions for whom the interactive-relational experience is fundamental; that is, the basis of their tradition. As Judaism is the most well-known religion basing itself on the interactive-relational—that is, prophetic—experience, this has resulted in Jewish beliefs sitting in the crosshairs of psychedelicists—academic and lay—who promote the universal mystical-unitive state.
Rick Strassman – The Psychedelic Handbook: A Practical Guide to Psilocybin, LSD, Ketamine, MDMA, And DMT/Ayahuasca p.33
The Sea Is Not Full 