Most people smoke tobacco for recreation, but did you know tobacco has been used in magic and spirituality for a long time? Find out how to use tobacco in your own spirituality for ritual and magical use.
Tobacco is known for causing disease and death, and a lot of people abhor the smell of it. However, it’s been used throughout history in ritual and magical practice, and it’s been a big crop in wealth building agriculture worldwide. It’s more than a bad smelling thing we burn for tranquility. Join Mysticsense to learn the spiritual side of tobacco. Find out some of the historic uses of tobacco and how it can be harmful. You don’t have to just smoke it, though. Learn some surprising ways you can incorporate tobacco into your own sacred rituals and magic without jeopardizing your health or compromising your wallet.
What is Tobacco?
Tobacco is a plant and today, there are about 70 different species of it. Tobacco originated in the Americas. The leaves from tobacco are dried and are mainly used to smoke. It contains the addictive substance called nicotine and archaeology indicates that it's been used for at least 12,300 years by humans. The Iroquois nation says that Sky Woman also known as Atahensic Is where it came from. She lived in a place called the Upper World but dug up a tree one day and fell through the hole in the ground that it created. She fell to earth and gave birth to twin sons. Other stories say that she was the twins' grandmother and when her daughter died, she planted a seed that she had with her when she fell from the Upper World. Many things grew from her daughter's remains including the tobacco plant.
Before Europeans came to America, First Nations people prolifically grew tobacco. Some carried it in pouches to use for trade. Medicinally, it can be used for earaches and toothaches and can be used to treat colds. Some people even say that folk remedies can be made from it to treat tuberculosis or asthma. The Spanish took tobacco back to Europe sometime in the 1520s and by the 1530s it had become a part of the trade route in Europe. By the mid 1500s it had made it to France and to the king of France, who said that it helped to relieve his headaches. Interestingly, some early Europeans used it as a garden plant, marveling at the beauty of its blossoms. Not everybody loved tobacco though. King James I hated the way it smelled and said it was dangerous to the lungs. It was even banned in Russia in the mid 1600s.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) shared some startling statistics about tobacco. They said that in the United States alone there were about 3000 tobacco farms and the US is a leading producer of tobacco. As a matter of fact in 2021 the US was the 5th largest producer of tobacco in the world. Kentucky and North Carolina produce about 77% of the United sSates tobacco crops. In 2018 smoking cigarettes cost the United States about $600 billion. Some of that included health care spending and some of it included lost productivity from smoking created illness or smoking related death. Read more from the CDC here: Economic Trends in Tobacco | Smoking and Tobacco Use | CDC
Historic Tobacco Use
From ancient America to modern times , tobacco has been used by many people in many ways. Read on.
Pre Columban America
By the time Christopher Columbus made it to America, indigenous people had already learned to roll cigars, make snuff, and smoked tobacco and pipes. Columbus’ group of visitors saw the local indigenous people smoking through tubes that they inserted through their noses and they smoked until they passed out. It was used to help with burns, insect bites, bowel issues, and problems such as eye soreness, and depression. Medicine wasn’t the only thing tobacco was used for, and uses varied by tribe. Some tribal people smoked tobacco recreationally, and others used it only for sacred purposes.
It was used for trade by some people, and others used it in sacred pipes when councils came together to decide important community matters. Sometimes, it was smoked during rituals, so the smoke could carry the prayers of the faithful to the Creator. It was given as gifts to the earth in thanks for the game that hunters were anticipating killing. It could be used to achieve altered states of consciousness and even used for luck at gambling. People have used things they smoked or ingested for many generations, even psychoactive substances. Read about the sacred use of psychedelics here: Psilocybin & Other Psychedelics: Holy or Toxic?
The American Colonies
By the mid 1700s, European American settlers and their descendants were prolifically using tobacco, but it was back in 1612 when Jamestown colonists got a new kind of tobacco from a man named John Rolfe. The tobacco they had wasn’t doing very well, but his seeds did. This type of tobacco did so well, in 1639, colonists were able to send 750 tons of tobacco to England. The real secret to the success of American settlers’ tobacco industry is horrible- indentured servitude and slavery. Before the “slave boom” of the 1700’s, owners worked more equally side by side with servants and slaves. After this boom, exploitation of African slaves and their descendants accounted for most of the people who produced tobacco. Slavery was absolutely toxic. Are you experiencing a toxic relationship? Find out here: Are You In A Toxic Relationship? | 10 Signs of Toxic People
While tobacco was a booming business with exports making tobacco sellers rich, the crop severely depleted the soil, and profitability plunged after the Revolutionary War. Interestingly, however, tobacco was one of the uniting topics that made American colonists want to break away from England, and establish their own nation. After the Revolutionary War, cotton would overtake tobacco as the main crop and tobacco profitability dropped, although to this day, plenty of the world’s tobacco is grown throughout the Americas. Some people think of tobacco as a magical plant. Read about another magical plant, the rose, here: The Meaning and Magic of the Rose
Today
Today, some indigenous people still use tobacco for sacred purposes, but most people use tobacco recreationally. The American Lung Association shares some striking statistics about tobacco. From 1965 to 2022 smoking rates have fallen 73% in adults. They say that since 2002 more than half of people who smoked cigarettes have quit. And in 2022 there were about twice as many adults who had successfully quit smoking as there were current adult smokers. So as of 2022 over 28 million American adults smoke, but the numbers are dropping. Read more from the American lung Association here: Tobacco Trends Brief: Overall Tobacco Trends Brief | American Lung Association
Worldwide less than 25 percent of the population smokes, but tobacco kills after half of the people who use it and don't quit. About 8 million people each year die from tobacco, with 1.3 million of those being people who don't smoke but are exposed to it second hand. China is the number one producer of tobacco in the world and the global tobacco industry is quite lucrative. They are projected to earn about $303 billion for it in 2025. Worldwide in 2022 tobacco earned about $912 billion. People don't just smoke cigarettes and cigars. They chew tobacco, but also use electronic cigarettes and vape pens. Although a lot of people try smoking for the first time at the average age of 13, the average age people start regularly smoking is 17 years old.
How is Tobacco Harmful?
When smoked, tobacco can cause a lot of problems both physically and financially. Early death isn't the only problem that tobacco causes. Financially, not only is tobacco expensive, but it's very costly when your health suffers and you have to pay for medical care and you're too sick to work from tobacco use.
Physically
Smoking can cause long term issues such as cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. Within 10 seconds of taking the first puff of tobacco, the chemicals from tobacco reach some of the organs of your body and your brain. It causes damage to every part of your body. You don't even have to inhale the tobacco, because you will absorb the chemicals from it through the lining of your own mouth. You get an immediate dopamine rush from the tobacco, but it quickly fades and your body craves more of it. The longer you smoke, the more of it you need to get those high levels of dopamine. So, as you become addicted you may want to smoke more and more. Did you ever want to quit smoking or anything else? Find out how here: Calling it Quits/ Know When to Give Up the Ghost
The nicotine in tobacco will narrow your arteries and veins which causes damage to your heart by making it work faster and harder. It reduces the oxygen to your hands and feet and slows down your blood. Over time your airways will swell and allow less air to enter your lungs, and it puts carbon monoxide, tar, phenols, formaldehyde, ammonia, and tiny particles into your body. These things will do things including paralyzing things in your airways, irritate your throat and lungs, damage lung tissue, and coat the inside of your lungs like soot coats a chimney. This all increases your risk of lung disease, heart disease, and cancer. Smoking can reduce your life expectancy by ten years or more, and make your quality of life decrease because you will be living with disease for the years that you are alive. Read about spells and prayers for healing here: Your Spell and Prayer for Healing Guide
Financially
Tobacco doesn't just cost you your health. It hurts your pocketbook. Not only does tobacco cost money that you could be spending on something else, you will be spending money on ashtrays, lighters, and other paraphernalia to support smoking. Some health insurance companies charge smokers a higher insurance premium and that's not just for health insurance. They charge more for property and life insurance as well. It's not unusual for a smoker to fall asleep while smoking and start a fire, but even if you don't burn your house down there is a permanent odor that settles into your property that costs a lot of money to remove. Smoking related illness will make you miss time from work and paying for medical care from the things that smoking does to you isn’t cheap.
An average pack of 20 cigarettes costs about $8.10 in the American state of Kentucky. If you smoke one pack per day, that will cost $2,978.40 per year. It is estimated that most American smokers are lower or lower-middle income earners, so nearly $3,000 a year is costly. This doesn’t take into account the amount of time smokers take away from work while they are on the clock smoking. Nocikick found that most people take up to 4.6 smoke breaks per day, and each smoke break averages about 7.2 minutes. If these breaks are taken while the employee is on the clock, the company loses hours of productivity. Read more from that article here: Smoke Breaks Add Up to 3 Weeks Paid Time Off for Employees
Magic Spells and Rituals with Tobacco
Tobacco might cause a lot of health problems and financial issues, but it’s not all bad. It can be used sacredly and magically without it breaking your budget or hurting your health. It can be used in its natural form to smudge and as a magical garden plant. It has also been used traditionally as offerings for the dead.
Smudging
A plant of protection and cleansing, tobacco can be used for smudging. Anytime you decide to smudge, make sure to use a high grade, all natural material to burn, and make sure to provide proper ventilation if you are smudging indoors. Tobacco can both cleanse and protect your space all at once. Starting at the East, take your burning tobacco, and move clockwise in your space to be purified. Say “ I use this sacred tobacco to cleanse this space of all negativity, and to this place with protection.” Walk in a complete circle, ending right where you started to seal the circle of protection. Read about the magic of incense here: Your Best Incenses
Planting Tobacco
Instead of burning tobacco, you can plant tobacco in the garden to protect your land, your home, and the people and pets you love. To plant your own sacred tobacco, start with seeds. Do a prayer over your seeds before planting like “Sacred seed, I place you into the blessed earth. Grow strong as I nurture you, and protect us from all harm and heartbreak.” Here is an example of some seeds you can buy here: Mohawk Tobacco - Victory Seed Company
Tobacco for the Dead
Some people consider tobacco to be a gift from a deity, and it is considered a good gift to honor the dead with. It can be offered to the dead in remembrance of them. If an ancestor loved to smoke, place their favorite tobacco on your personal altar as a gift to them. You can also burn tobacco as a way to facilitate communication. It is believed the smoke carries prayers and messages. It can be lit and placed on your altar, or cast into a sacred fire for the dead.
Tobacco has a bad reputation because it can lead to financial issues, health problems, and historically, slave labor has been used to produce it. However, tobacco is a plant that has been used in traditional medicine, rituals, and can be used magically. You can use it for protection and cleansing, as a magical garden plant to protect your home, and as offerings for the dead. May the magical powers of the tobacco plant protect you and enhance your sacred traditions. So Be It.
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