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Yehuda Isseroff's avatar

Re the indica vs sativa difference in effects - as far as I can tell, this has never been scientifically confirmed, and is probably not true. If you know of something that I don't, let me know... but here is an example of what has been published recently on the question:

CCR: Some users describe the psychoactive effects of Cannabis indica and sativa as being distinctive, even opposite. But are they really? Beyond self-reports from users, is there any hard evidence for pharmacologically different species of Cannabis?

Dr. Russo: There are biochemically distinct strains of Cannabis, but the sativa/indica distinction as commonly applied in the lay literature is total nonsense and an exercise in futility.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5576603/

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Yehuda Isseroff's avatar

Really great post! I think about this a lot, but don't really have anyone to discuss this practice with, so I was really happy to see you write about it. I've been enjoying cannabis use Friday night for the past couple of years on a somewhat regular basis since it was legalized in NJ. Thankfully, I haven't had any noticeable changes in tolerance over this period of time. I have found it to be a net-gain for my Shabbos experience overall, however, your arguments against it are definitely interesting. Part of my internal conversation on this topic inevitably goes to, "Well, alcohol consumption has been a more-or-less mandatory part of Shabbos since the very beginning, and that's a psychoactive substance, so how does the role of cannabis on Shabbos fit in within that perspective?" A fun thought experiment is always, what if THC somehow switched historical spots with ethanol - what effect would that have on our religious and halachic history?

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