Speaker: Jim Duke. The species listed in this lecture have been with us at for least 2 millennia, since all are mentioned in the Bible. Mankind would have encountered most of the climatically adapted herbs mentioned in the Bible during the evolutionary and Biblical Exodus through the Middle Eastern fertile crescent into Europe and Asia, and finally Australia, Polynesia and America. The Biblical herbs discussed here each contain hundreds of biologically active phytochemicals with which my genes have coevolved, for 2000 if not 2 million years. Synthetic pharmaceuticals have been known to my genes less than 200 years. Thus my genes have had 1-2 orders of magnitude more time to adapt to the phytochemicals. Medicinal foods present a menu of biologically active phytochemicals from which your body homeostatically mines those it needs, excluding those familiar phytochemicals it does not need. Thus your body, under the direction of your genes, has developed mechanisms for dealing with the usual phytochemicals, while the genes and hence the body are at first naive to new synthetic pharmaceuticals. For that reason, one can expect more dramatic effects and side effects from new pharmaceuticals.