Symbiosis

Indian yogis claim that a latent force, spirit, being, etc. known as the Kundalini dwells within humans in a type of sleeping state.

Through yogic meditative practices, the Kundalini can be aroused causing the practitioner to enter a state of entasy or meditative absorption and unity with the divine. The Kundalini is often portrayed as a serpent or serpent-like creature that dwells in the sacral region until awakened in a fiery conflagration when it ascends upward toward the head.

In Christianity, the Holy Spirit is thought of as a spirit that descends from Heaven and dwells within believers causing a state of ecstasy. The Holy Spirit is also a type of spirit guide that leads people to speak in tongues, prophesy, etc. This spirit is portrayed generally as bird, specifically a dove. In the New Testament, when Jesus is baptized at the Jordan, he is also anointed by the Holy Spirit from above in the form of a dove.

In Christian art and literature, the Holy Spirit is usually depicted as a dove hovering above, flying toward or around, or actually standing on a person's head. The New Testament also depicts the Holy Spirit as flames on the heads of the disciples.



The symbolism of bird and serpent would of course be familiar to those who have followed this blog, which is partly named after these creatures. The cosmic tree has been discussed here that is commonly depicted with a serpent at its roots and a bird resting in the topmost branches. Interestingly, in the yoga of Kundalini, the spinal column is also viewed as a type of cosmic tree in microcosm.

When aroused, the Kundalini serpent ascends the spine toward the top of the head. Like the Holy Spirit, the Kundalini is seen also as a form of the Divine, in this case of the female principle or Goddess known as Sakti. About its fiery awakening, it ascends to unite with male divine principle located at the top of the head bringing the subject into a state of divine union or entasy.

The Holy Spirit, instead descends from Heaven in dove form, as a part of the Trinity it is also one with Divine and communes with the subject by entering or resting upon the head causing here a state of ecstasy and union.


The Kundalini took the form of a coiled serpent.






Devaraja

In medieval Southeast Asia, the Devaraja royal cult made the king into a form of the Divinity. Not so much as an avatar though, but as a host for the Deity.

For example, an avatar is usually seen as god that incarnates at birth as a human. But in the Devaraja system, it is only the installed King who is identified with the god. Thus, the Crown Prince is not also seen in the same divine light as the King.

In the scholarly literature, the spirit of the Deity is known as the "royal ego." In Java and Cambodia, the royal ego was permanently located in a linga, a phallic symbol, placed atop the king's royal ziggurat.

When the king was installed, the royal ego, or part of it, descends upon the king giving him divine status. When the king dies, the royal ego returns to the linga. When the crown prince succeeds his father in ritual ceremonies, the royal ego then descends once more from the linga to commune with the new kingly host.

Again, readers of this blog will recognize the pyramidical temple of the king as a form of the holy mountain or volcano. The linga itself can be seen as the cosmic tree that usually is depicted as resting atop the sacred mount, a form of the fiery pillar associated with a volcanic eruption. It doesn't take much to see the royal ego as a bird perched in the branches of the cosmic tree that descends to anoint the new king. In the same sense, the linga has serpent or dragon connotations in this belief system.

In relation to this, we can note also the widespread concept in Insular Southeast Asia of the bird-double or bird-spirit. This is apparently a symbiotic form of the self that can leave the body on flights of spiritual exploration. In the primal Austronesian sphere, especially in those areas characterized by hydraulic engineering, the domains were centered around mountains, and the domain leaders were invariably linked with these central mountains.

While the Kundalini, Holy Spirit and Royal Ego are forms of symbionts that dwell within the body of the host, there are other forms of symbiosis that involve spirits that dwell instead in objects like amulets, fetishes, talimans and icons. The stories of the Holy Grail serve as one example.


Holy Grail

Grail scholars have long argued as to whether the spirit associated with the Holy Grail was in fact the Holy Spirit.

Robert de Boron, in his early Grail romance, claimed that the voice of the Grail was that of the Holy Ghost. Wolfram von Eschenbach states that every Good Friday, the Holy Spirit descended upon the Grail to renew its powers. The main objection to this among Christian apologists is that the Grail was said to be sent away to some island or to Heaven in the romantic literature.

However, this problem did not dissuade all later authors. Certain literature like The Count and the Quest, Didot-Modena Perceval, Perlesvaus and Titurel indeed claim that the Holy Ghost was carried away to some distant place.

What the Grail authors agree upon is that the Grail acts as a guide to the Grail Knights, Maidens and King, all of whom it personally chooses.

Far away to the East, the concept of objects invested with guiding spirits is linked in the study of the Austronesian world with the related terms anitu, anito, nitu, etc. The anitu is the spirit or soul that can be associated with any type of object from a rice plant to a volcanic mountain. In this blog, the anitus of the sacred jars, the pusaka heirlooms, and the anting-anting amulets have been examined in particular.

In the case of the sacred jar or the lusung rice mortar, we have seen these objects as forms or symbols of the sacred volcano of the Nusantao. Anitu are often related with deified ancestral spirits and in the belief systems around Mt. Pinatubo and Mt. Arayat, the Earth together with the Sky or Sun are the ultimate ancestors. The "tibuan" is the earth that acts as mother to all things, being derived from the root "tubo" as in Pina-tubo, the sacred volcano.

Therefore, the sacred jar is in a sense a form of the cosmos, the cosmic mountain, in microcosm. The "voice" from the sacred jar is linked with anitu, which in this case can be associated with the Divine or with Nature as the ultimate principle. In a similar sense, the Grail becomes a type of vessel or home for the Holy Spirit according to one interpretation.

In the Philippine region, the ancient idea of communion with the divine was rooted in concepts related to time. The pantheistic or monistic Deity is often identified with Sacred Time. The related sets of words niu, nio, nu, nuan and nunu; and calma, karma, karkarma are connected to these concepts of universality. These word sets use the same root source to convey the meanings of ancestors, especially deified or beatified ancestors; the soul of the individual; and one's destiny or fortune.

From the view of cyclical time, the ancestors represent the past; the soul stands for the present; and one's destiny or fortune is the future.


Cyclic Symbiosis

Buddhist and Indian religious texts outline the belief of a cyclic ruler known as the Cakkavatti or Chakravartin, who like the Buddha, appears rarely at the downside end of cyclic periods.

When the dharma or law has decaded to its lowest state, the Cakkavatti is born and there eventually arise certain treasures that are said to aid this new king in washing out the old and bringing in a new golden age.

The most important treasure is the Cakkaratana, an animated discus or wheel-like "being," that descends out of its place in Heaven known as the Cakkadaha. It has the appearance of three concentric wheels moving at once. Like the Grail, the Cakkaratana seems to have a spirit of its own. It travels to the Cakkavatti King, who then anoints it with water and talks to the Cakkaratana asking it to help him conquer the world.

When the Cakkavatti is about to die, the Cakkaratana knows this and eventually disappears only returning after his successor has lived righteously for seven days.

I have discussed previously how the treasures of the Cakkavatti resemble those that arose during the Churning of the Milky Ocean episode found in Hindu texts. This geologic event I interpreted as alluding to a volcanic eruption.

Now, volcanic eruptions in this blog are explained as occurring during the meeting of Heaven and Earth, or specifically the Sun and the Sacred Volcano. The fiery conflagration during this encounter produces the "milk" i.e. the volcanic ash that creates the Ocean of Milk. And from this ocean, arise the treasures of the New Age.

Kundalini yoga also envisions the Kundalini as a serpent creature dwelling in the sacrum covered with sulfur, one of the substances closely linked with natural volcanoes. Indeed, the fiery awakening of the Kundalini has been likened with both a volcanic eruption and the mythic Churning of the Milky Ocean. The arousal is even specifically described as "churning" in certain traditional texts. Rising up the spinal column the female Kundalini unites with the male principle at the top of the head, the Crown Chakra.

Interestingly, the Holy Spirit also has fiery association and is depicted as flames rising from the heads of the Apostles.






In the cyclic interpretation of symbiosis, there arises periodically a new spirit or anitu, a product of Heaven and Earth that unites with the destiny of humanity acting as a guide in the process of renewal.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Malalasekera, G. P. Dictionary of Pali Proper Names: Pali-English, Asian Educational Services, 2003, 1343-4.

Sharan, Mahesh Kumar and Mahesh Kumar Sharan Abhinav. Studies in Sanskrit Inscriptions of Ancient Cambodia, Abhinav Publications, 2003, 259-9.

Waite, Arthur Edward. The Holy Grail: The Galahad Quest in Arthurian Literature, Kessinger Publishing, 1993.

More on Tantric Influence in Grail Legend

Let's take a deeper look at the suggestion of "Tantric" influence on the Holy Grail legend.

Much research exists on the "Oriental" influences in Grail literature. German scholars have long supported the idea that the Grail epic was modeled on one or more Persian tales. Most of the theories involved pre-Islamic influences. One of the champions of direct Islamic influence was P. Ponsoye in his book L'Islam et le Graal.

Various etymologies were suggested, all open to question, for the unusual names in the Grail legend. The 19th century German writer Josef von Gorres suggested that Parzival was derived from Arabic Parsi-fal meaning "Pure Fool," a suggestion later followed by the composer Richard Wagner. Fridrich von Suhtshek explained the true form of the name as Parsi-wal meaning "Persian flower" or "pure, chaste flower."

Suhtshek also offered Persian prototypes for just about every other character in the Grail epic. Max Unger and Theodore Baker suggested that word "grail" was derived from Persian gohar "pearl" compounded with al "coruscating color." The latter also identify the location of the Grail Castle with the Persian fortress of Kou-i Kouadja. Swedish scholar Lars Ivar Ringbom suggested the Takht-i-Suleyman "Throne of Solomon" in Azerbaijan, which closely matched the descriptions given by Albert von Scharfenburg in Jüngere Titurel written around 1270.

Henry Corbin and Pierre Gallais have done an enormous amount of work equating the Grail with the Iranian Xvarenah jewel, and seeking roots of Grail concepts in Persian dervish-inspired Islamic mysticism.

Other Near Eastern influences have been suggested, but possibilities from further East are treated only more rarely. Alfred Nutt in the 19th century explored the possibility that the Holy Grail originates from the Patra, the Buddha's alms dish. Scholars though have generally avoided comparisons of Grail mysticism with Tantric beliefs except to mention such possibilities. There is however a fair amount written on this subject in popular and "New Age" literature.

One though can piece together two different areas of research to construct a framework for such influence. The area of origins and exchange between Islamic mysticism and Tantra is dealt with fairly thoroughly. In the same sense, the links between Shi'ite, Sufi, Ismaili and similar Muslim groups with European culture at the advent of Grail literature and the direct impact on the latter is equally well-studied.


Indian Influence on Dervishes

Many a scholar has suggested that the Persian dervish, rather strange to ancient Iranian religion, originates from the begging ascetic of India.

W. Ivanow suggested that the group known in Islamic literature as Zutt, originally from the Sind in India, helped spread these practices throughout the Middle East. The Zutt are thought to be related to the present-day Jats and are almost always mentioned in the literature together with the Sayabiga, a group thought to have originated in Zabag but to have domiciled in the Sind and along the Persian Gulf.

The Zutt have been linked both with the Islamic underworld group of entertainers, artisans and con artists known as the Banu Sasan, and with the origin of the Dom Gypsies. Ivanow found an element of Dervish jargon words used both among the Banu Sasan and all Middle Eastern Gypsy groups. The Qasida Sasaniyya of Abu Dulaf mentions that the Zutt were members of the Banu Sasan and we see a number of Indian words mixed in with this jargon speech.

Groups of Zutt and Sayabiga were relocated to the region of Antioch by the Islamic Caliphate, just north of the area that would later become the stronghold of the Syrian Assassins. This fact will become important when we examine the time frame of the first Grail stories.

Previously in this blog, it was suggested that the people of Zabag, or Suvarnadvipa as it was known in India, were deeply involved with groups in Tibet and India in the development of the Kalacakra Tantric doctrine. Thus, the Sayabiga along with the Zutt would have played a role in diffusion of Tantric-like ideas in the Middle East.

In India, where the Sind region was the early major stronghold for Islamic mysticism in South Asia, the mingling of Tantrism with both Sufi and Ismaili sects is historical and beyond doubt, but the early story in the Middle East is more fuzzy.

We find that one of the most important elements in Tantric doctrine in India is the importance of the feminine principle as compared to the situation in the previous brahmin-dominated system. In the Mahacinatantra, it states:

According to the Brahmayamalatantra, after meditating for a thousand years on the shore of the ocean Vasistha was visited by Devi who told him "he had adopted an altoghter wrong path; her worship was unknown in the Vedas; it was known only in the country of Mahacina; and that Vasistha would gain his object if he received instruction from Vishnu now residing there as Buddha.

The word "Devi" above refers to the female divinity, which in the Tantric view was not sufficiently recognized in Vedic religion. In Tantrism we also find a more important place for women in ritual, and just an overall better treatment of women in general.

We can see then that the most powerful male Tantric deities, including the supreme Kalacakra Deity, appear in icons embraced together with their female consorts. In addition, there are important independent female deities like Tara and Prajnaparamita, and a host of lesser goddesses like the Dakinis that are considered important for spiritual development. In many places in India associated with Tantrism, the worship of the goddess Sakti prevails especially among the royal families and in the villages.

While the place of women in Tantric religious ritual has declined, due probably to the "shocking" nature of some rites, a few more politically-correct remnants survive. For example, among the Newars of Kathmandu we find the ritual marriage of the specially-chosen goddess-child known as Kumari to the King of Nepal was practiced until very recently. Also found among the Newars is the symbolic marriage of young virgin girls known as Gauris to Suvarna-kumara of Suvarnabhumi (Golden Land), the latter represented by a bel tree fruit or a golden coin.

While there was no universal dictate against the disabilities that existed for women at the time, in many areas women achieved rights nearly equal to men in areas where Tantrism dominated. However, in some other areas, only marginal changes were made despite the increased stature of women in religious life in which all areas of initiation and worship were open to them.

Further to the West, we find that the Sufi mystics focused much more attention on the feminine principle in theology than was previously the case. Sufism produced great women saints like Rabia, a tradition that continued for centuries. The importance of marriage for both men and women was stressed less than in orthodox Islam. However, it was among the Ismaili sects that we witness some of the most marked developments in divine feminine thinking. Here we see the recognition of the dual principles -- the Kuni as the female and the Qadar as the male principle. Kuni was predominant and she is said to actually create Qadar from her own light. Ismaili women in many areas can lead prayers and religious ceremonies, and they pray and worship alongside their men.

Now even farther to the West, with the advent of the romance cycles we find that the Holy Grail, that was seen by some as a relic of Christ or as a manifestation of Divine Grace, was tended by Grail Maidens and borne in procession by a female Grail Bearer. Even the Grail itself as a cup, chalice, bowl, platter or stone had a decided female imagery. Even more important may be the identity of Cundrie, the woman from the East Indian kingdom of Tribalibot, as the Grail Messenger. Cundrie teaches, chastises, guides and even at times sustains not only the quester Parzival but also the entire Grail company.

Although this outlook as found in Grail literature had little impact on the role of women in the Catholic Church, the rise of "courtly love" and chivalry as present in medieval epics did signal a generally more favorable position and better treatment at least for women of the noble classes.


Human Body as Microcosm of Cosmos

Earlier in this blog, the Kalacakra belief that cosmic time cycles were mirrored in the human body was discussed. This is part of a strong Tantric belief that the human body represents the universe in microcosm.

We find the same sentiments in Islamic mystic tradition. Corbin discusses various beliefs that can be categorized as pantheistic, panentheistic, monist, etc. among the Dervish-inspired sects. Self-realization can be described as discovering one's own Oneness with the Cosmos and even with the Deity.

Among the Ismaili we find a belief in a pattern of history that is both cyclic and linear. There are seven Ismaili eras, each inaugurated by a prophet known as Natiq. Each era was further subdivided into periods related to a Samit "Silent One" and seven Imams, the last of which becomes the Natiq of the new Era. The seventh Imam of the seventh Era is the Mahdi or Qa'im who ushers in the Resurrection. The six previous Natiqs are Adam, Nuh, Ibrahim, Musa, 'Isa, and Muhammad.

In Kalacakra Tantrism, although there is an underlying belief in infinitely repeating time cycles as found in classic Buddhism and Hinduism, the predominant focus is in the progression of Kulika Kings each connected with a century long period. The final Kulika King or "Rigden" conquers the evil forces of the world bringing in a new Golden Age.

Both the Kalacakra and Ismaili cycles are rife with astrological linkages. In Kalacakra thinking, the planetary cycles are further mirrored within the human body. The Muslim astrologer Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi, known in Europe as Albumasar, developed a concept of world ages based on conjunctions of Saturn and Jupiter. These ideas were translated into European languages from Muslim Spain beginning in the mid-12th century with the works of John of Seville, not long before the first Grail stories appeared.

In Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, one of the most highly-lauded scenes occurs when Cundrie relates Parzival's destiny through the seven planets using Latino-Arabic nomenclature.

"Mark now, Parzival:
The highest of the planets, Zval,
And the swiftly moving Almustri,
Almaret, and the bright Samsi,
All show good fortune for you here.

The fifth is named Alligafir.
Under there the sixth is Alkiter,
And nearest us is Alkamer.

I do not speak this out of any dream. These are the bridle of the firmament and they check its speed; their opposition has ever contended against its sweep.

"For you, Care now is an orphan. Whatever the planets' orbits bound, upon whatever their light is shed, that is destined as your goal to reach and to achieve. Your sorrow must now perish. Insatiety alone will exclude you from that community, for the Grail and the Grail's power forbid false friendship. When young, you fostered Sorrow; but Joy, approaching, has robbed her of you. You have achieved the soul's peace and waited amid sorrow for the joys of the flesh.

These verses have been interpreted widely as applying to everything from the announcement of a new age marked by the World Year to the declaration of world dominion for the new Grail King. More to the point for this work, Cundrie's words are thought by some to imply that Parzival's destiny represents a microcosm of events in the greater cosmos. Whatever the case, given that Wolfram admits his use of an Oriental source from Toledo, it seems likely that at least there are some connections with the ideas of Albumasar if not with those of the Ismailis.

Now is a good time to return to the theory offered here for the transmission of the Grail legend, or at least the related source materials, from East to West.


Sources for the Grail Epics

Three authors are connected with the beginning of the Grail literature -- Chretien de Troyes, Robert de Boron and Wolfram von Eschenbach.

All three appear to have been contemporaries to some extent as they all wrote their works around the end of the 12th and the beginning of the 13th century. Chretien's work is generally thought to be the oldest, and Wolfram mentions it in his own book. However, some scholars have suggested that Boron had no knowledge of Chretien and he does not mention either of the other two authors.

All three attribute their works to external sources. Chretien states that he based his version on a book given to him by Philip, Count of Flanders. Boron states that he received a "great book" from "great clerics." Wolfram mentions the bard Kyot who obtained the story from Flegatanis, a "heathen" from Toledo. He also claims to have researched the archives of the House of Anjou.

There is some linkage between Chretien's source and Wolfram's research in Anjou. Earlier it was already suggested that von Eschenbach's tale contained veiled references to the House of Anjou with Gahmuret representing Geoffrey Plantagenet with Parzival as his son Henry II. Gahmuret was an Angevin not in the line of succession who becomes a king through his marriage to the emperor's widow.

There was of course one historical Angevin who fits this description -- Geoffrey Plantagenet.

As it turns out, Philip the Count of Flanders was the son of Sibylla de Anjou, Geoffrey's sister. Philip ventured to Jerusalem to visit his first cousin, Baldwin IV, the last King of Jerusalem from the House of Anjou, a leper with no male heir. He came with the express purpose of marrying his vassals to Baldwin IV's daughter but was rejected and insulted by competitors among the nobility of Jerusalem. He left the city to fight the Muslim enemy in the principality of Antioch instead.

When Philip returned to Europe, he employed Chretien to render his mysterious source book into verse. Using the hypothesis offered here, Wolfram's Anfortas, the Grail King of Montsalvat (Jerusalem) would be Baldwin IV's father, Amalric I of Jerusalem. Baldwin IV, the heir-less king and last Angevin to rule the city would then be represented symbolically by the wounded leg of Anfortas. Wolfram probably threw in some inconsistencies as to maintain a degree of deniability that his story applied to real people. Thus, it is Gahmuret rather than his wife who is a sibling of Anfortas.

Parzival states that the celibate knights who guarded the Grail are Templars and that the first Grail King Titurel established the order. Thus it would have been Baldwin II of Jerusalem, who first accepted the Knights Templar, who answers to Titurel. The latter's son Frimutel is Fulk V, who in reality was the son-in-law of Baldwin II becoming the Angevin King of Jerusalem through his marriage to Melisende.

When Chretien wrote his Grail work between 1180 and 1191, Baldwin IV may have already died and Jerusalem may have fallen to Saladin (1187), although the fall of the city is never hinted at in any of the three early Grail books. Instead we find the development of a cycle of literature that introduces a new concept -- that of the Holy Grail.

Grail kingship is linked originally with the title of King of Montsalvat-Jerusalem, and King of the Grail Temple/Palace in the same location. The Grail was guarded by Templars and previously in this blog it was noted that the object had some of the same characteristics of the pusaka or sacred heirlooms of Southeast Asia tied to the succession of royalty, chiefs and clan leaders. The Grail kingship had hereditary components but was not entirely linked to male primogeniture. One fascinating similarity is the animistic character of both the Grail and the pusaka heirlooms.

Like the talking jars of the sultans and datus of Insular Southeast Asia, the Grail communicated with and guided those in the Grail company. This is one facet that did take hold as much in South Asia or the Middle East. However, it may be that such ideas were retained by the Sayabiga who along with the Zutt were relocated to Antioch. These Sayabiga may have maintained some contact through the trade routes with their former home of Zabag. The Templars appear to have borrowed much in terms of their own organization and structure from the Ismaili Assassins of Syria located directly to the south of Antioch principality. They also maintained unusually close political relations with the Assassins. In 1165, emissaries from Prester John, who is linked here with the King of Zabag, delivered a letter from the latter king to the Pope and Christian emperors. Parzival and other Grail legend authors closely connect Prester John with the Holy Grail, albeit anachronistically.

Even Chretien seems to have borrowed from Prester John's letter, which mentions a table in the king's palace with legs of ivory. Parzival and Jüngere Titurel describe the table bearing the Holy Grail in the Grail Castle as having ivory legs. Chretien says the same table has ebony legs and an ivory top. The palace of Prester John, like that of the King of Shambhala and the Grail Castle, have strong mystical links.

The round churches of the Templars were said to have been modeled on the Dome of the Rock, the Al-Aqsa Mosque, sometimes referred to as the 'Temple of Solomon.' The Templar headquarters was originally located in or next to this mosque in Jerusalem. Ringbom has shown, quite conclusively I think, that the Grail Temple as described in Titurel was inspired by the Takht-i-Suleyman, the "Throne of Solomon" in Azerbaijan. In both cases, we find round, domed and lavish buildings with the stars, marked by rubies in the Takht and red jewels in Titurel, and heavens displayed on the domed ceiling. In both cases, the buildings have only three entrances, and the outer circle of the building is divided into 22 parts each marked by an ornamental tree. The temple described in Titurel was probably inspired by the Takht as partially rebuilt by the Shi'ite and heavily Sufi-influenced Ilkhanate dynasty in the 13th century.

Ringbom has also shown that both the Grail Temple and the Takht are types of mandalas. A mandala is a representation of the universe used in Tantric ritual. It usually consists of a circular design on the outside with usually a square design within, but also at times another circle. There usually is at least one instance in a mandala where an outer design is replicated in smaller form within the mandala, an example of the macrocosm-microcosm principle.



Grail Temple plan after Ringbom (A. A. Barb, 1956: 34) following descriptions in Titurel. Note mandala-like replica of building structure at central sanctum where Holy Grail was kept. The domed ceiling was said to display the celestial vault further giving the idea of a cosmic representation. Ringbom also found mandala-like features in the sanctuary of the Ismaili "Old Man of the Mountain," the leader of the Assassins at Alamut.

Now with the Grail acting as the token of the holy kingship, even the looming loss of Jerusalem would allow a 'sacred lineage' to prevail at least in the eyes of those closely connected with the House of Anjou. Thus, it may not be entirely by coincidence that Henry II's son and heir (by force) Richard I would lead the efforts of the Third Crusade to retake Jerusalem, although he was forced by election to accept Conrad of Montferrat as King of Jerusalem. When the latter was killed by Assassins before his coronation, Richard was widely suspected in the plot. He married his nephew Henry II of Champagne to the widow Isabella eight days after the death making Henry II the pretender King of Jerusalem. Angevin hopes for the Holy City though ended as they could not persevere against Saladin's forces.

Quite likely some type of Holy Grail really existed, maybe first among the Templars who had shown they were quite amenable toward Eastern mysticism. However, such ideas may not have been strange either to the House of Anjou.

Robert de Boron's "great clerics" who authored the source of his Grail book may very well have been Templar clerics. The Templar bond with the House of Anjou in Jerusalem was natural. The sources found by Wolfram at the county seat in Anjou may have consisted of the same or similar works as found with Boron. Philip, Count of Flanders, who gave Chretien his source book had obvious enough ties with Anjou through his mother Sibylla. He also helped mediate disputes between Henry II, on the one hand, and Louis VII of France and Thomas Beckett on the other. Henry II of course in addition to being the English king was also the Count of Anjou at the time.

Philip had shown keen interest in establishing marital ties with the Angevins in Jerusalem, at which time he could have easily come across the same source materials as Boron and Wolfram. It might be worth noting also that Henry II had close relations with the Templars and was the first to grant them land in England, and that Guy de Lusignan, the king who succeeded Baldwin IV in Jerusalem was Henry II's vassal.

From the Angevin and Templar connections, we can suggest that the eastern links of the Grail literature are quite likely. The Tantric influences would have come from the same sources that influenced Ismaili and other Islamic mystic traditions.




Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Barb, A. A. "Mensa Sacra: The Round Table and the Holy Grail," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 19, No. 1/2. (Jan. - Jun., 1956), pp. 40-67.

Bosworth, C. E. The Mediaeval Islamic Underworld: The Banu Sasan in Arabic Society and Literature, Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1976.

Corbin, Henry. Temple and Contemplation, translated by Philip Sherrad & Liadain Sherrad, London: KPI & Islamic Publications, 1986.

__, The Voyage and the Messenger, translated by Joseph Rowe, Berkeley, California: North Atlantic Books, 1998.

Daftary, F. The Ismailis. Their History and Doctrines, Cambridge, 1989.

Galais, Pierre. Perceval et l'Initiation, Paris: Editions Sirac, 1972.

Ivanow, Wladimir. "On the Language of the Gypsies of Qainat (in Eastern Persia)," J(R)ASB, N.S. 10/11, 1914, 439-55. Idem. "Further Notes on the Gypsies in Persia," J(R)ASB, N.S. 16, 1920, 281-91. Idem, "An Old Gypsy-Darwish Jargon," J(R)ASB, N.S. 18, 1922, 375-83. Idem, "Jargon of Persian Mendicant Darwishes," J(R)ASB, N.S. 23/1, 1927, 243-45.

Nutt, Alfred. "The Legend of the Buddha's Alms Dish and the Legend of the Holy Grail," Archaeological Review 3 (1889), 267-71.

Ponsoye, Pierre. L'Islam et le Graal étude sur l'ésotérisme du Parzival de Wolfram von Eschenbach, Éditions Arché, 1976

Ringbom, L. A. Graltempel und Paradies. Beziehungen zwischen Iran und Europa im Mittelalter, Stockholm, 1951.

Suhtshek, F. von. La Traduction du Parsiwalnama par Wolfram d'Eschenbach," Forschungen und Fortschritt, nr. 10, Berlin, 1931.

Woodroffe, John. Shakti and Shakta, Madras: Ganesh & Co., 1975.

Alchemy (Glossary)

The alchemy referred to here is that centered around the use of sulfur and mercury, and their compound, cinnabar, or mercury sulfide, to transmute base metals into gold, and to extend human life.

Many believe this form of alchemy has its basis in earlier spiritual alchemy and cosmology. Some suggest that the concept of "signatures" and cinnabar's similarity in color to human blood, the fluid of life, drives the philosophy of alchemy.

Humans have used red colored materials like red ochre since prehistoric times. The presence of ochre in burials may have had some link with concepts of immortality. In ancient Egypt, the practice of painting men in red color, and women in yellow color, when in the presence of deities, may have some ancient relationship to the contrasts of red and yellow ochre.

In ancient China, cinnabar appears as a burial item at least by the late Neolithic and possibly as early as the Yangshao period. In latter times, cinnabar was used to preserve the body of the dead. In Southeast Asia, the use of red ochre to cover bodies during burial dates back to the Mesolithic Hoabinhian culture. Oppenheimer states:

The main areas with the story of man made from red earth are Southeast Asia, Oceania and some Mundaic tribes in India. All these areas, except eastern Polyneisa, have abundant red and laterite soils.

Oppenheimer also notes the distribution of myths attributing the redness of the clay to tempering with divine blood and its close approximation with red clay-first man myths, and suggests that the red clays here were used as a surrogate for blood. In China, both red ochre and cinnabar could be used as substitutes for blood in rituals.

Also, in Southeast Asia, red clay was eaten during pregnancy and for health purposes. This may relate to the practice that arose in China of consuming collodial cinnabar.

The Elixir

Needham has accumulated evidence suggesting that by the Zhou (Chou) dynasty, the concept of cinnabar and mercury as contributing to immortality had become established. Also it was in this period that mercury was distilled from cinnabar, a process releasing the sulfur as gaseous sulfur dioxide (SO2).

In the Shiji, the Qin Emperor is advised to make gold from cinnabar which can be used in turn to make drinking and eating vessels to prolong life:

Li Shaojun then advised the emperor, "If you sacrifice to the fireplace you can call the spirits to you, and if the spirits come you can transform cinnabar into gold. Using this gold, you may make driking and eating vessels, which will prolong the years of your life. With prolonged life you may visit the immortals who live on the island of Penglai in the middle of the sea. If you visit them and perform the Feng and Shan sacrifices, you will never die."

The "gold" here was interpreted by later alchemists as an amalgam of gold with cinnabar. However, "gold" in this instance might also be a metaphor for something like the Philosopher's Stone in European alchemy. It was used to create vessels that prolonged life.

The mention of Penglai is also important. In the older Daoist cosmologies, the central mountain of Penglai was viewed as rising out of the sea. The summit, or "navel," of this mountain is hollow, and extends to the deepest parts of the ocean, where lies the "Cinnabar Field," the source of all living beings. This scene is depicted on the famed Boshanlu censers.

On Penglai, also are the mushrooms of immortality, that grow over deposits of cinnabar and gold. The Chinese recognized that gold often lies above cinnabar deposits in mountains, and believed that gold was naturally transmuted from cinnabar.


Tang dynasty bonshanlu depicting Penglai. The mushroom at the top represented the mushroom of immortality, or the central mountain. Quite easily it might also stand for the "tree of life," the mushroom cloud of an erupting volcano. Source: http://www.21ceramics.com/taoci%20history/baiciimage.htm


Undated bronze boshanlu. Source: http://www.weisbrodltd.com/createpg.cgi?ctlgcode=14&pagenum=13


Boshanlu from Western Han dynasty. Notice depiction of waves lapping on shores of Penglai. Source: http://www.weisbrodltd.com/createpg.cgi?ctlgcode=14&pagenum=13

The divine mushroom was seen as a product of the sublimation of gold and cinnabar that grew over these mineral deposits. The mushroom even glowed in the dark allowing the immortals to find the sought-after lodes of minerals in addition to the fungi. Here also in Penglai were cinnabar caves inhabited by the Phoenix of the South, which the Shanhaijing describes as looking like a cinnabar-red rooster, and probably where would one would also find the auspicious giant bats of Penglai.

Later, possibly under Buddhist influence, these aspects were partly transferred to, or mirrored in, Mount Kun-lun to the west of China.

Volcanic images

Chinese texts describe the hollow summit of Mount Penglai as reaching down into the subterranean or submarine depths matching common imagery of the volcano in many cultures.

Sources of cinnabar, and its separate elements, sulfur and mercury, are nearly always located near volcanoes, hot springs or fumaroles.

Mention of the Cinnabar Field under the hollow mountain of Penglai appears to express this reality. In latter European alchemy, volcanoes were seen as natural laboratories that produced all the base metals from differing combinations of sulfur and mercury, to which they added from Arabian alchemical influence, the neutralizing element of salt.

The "Philosopher's Stone" was described as a red, glassy powder that could transmute base metals to gold, improve health and extend the life of the aged. In the sense that it could convert other metals it stood as a synthetic agent by which the natural processes of the volcano could be reproduced.

Li Shaojun's statement above indicates that in the time of the Qin Emperor certain food and drink vessels existed that were thought capable of extending life.

These vessels may have had some component of cinnabar and/or gold, or possibly the term "gold" here was a symbolic one as often used in the art of alchemy.

If such vessels were made of clay with some degree of cinnabar, it would have impressed the Chinese for at least a few reasons. Firstly, cinnabar as mentioned above, appears to have mostly taken the place of red ochre as a substitute for life-giving blood. They used it in burials, rituals and as a pigment in divination and other sacred writing.

Secondly, cinnabar contains mercury and is considered by many to be toxic, although others feel that it is not so harmful when bound in a stable fashion with other metals. Vessels containing cinnabar which did not have the normal toxic properties but instead had tonic and therapeutic qualities would have deeply impressed the Chinese who had high cultural regard for cinnabar. Also, as cinnabar contained the two base ingredients believed mutable into any other base metal, a vessel containing cinnabar without the normal harmful effects would appear as quite a coup.

Thus, alchemy may have started as an attempt to synthetically produce the material of the life-extending food and drink vessels using cinnabar as a key ingredient.

In Southeast Asia, cinnabar, mercury and sulfur only appear to became important in most areas at a late period. The Dian kingdom of Yunnan probably used an amalgam of gold and mercury in gilding burial good objects dated from 600 BCE to 300 BCE. However, generally Southeast Asians used red clay as a substitute and significator of blood.

Some of the red clays though did contain natural cinnabar. For example, red clay tested at a cave near the Tubuoy River in Pangasinan, Philippines during 1913 contained 1 percent mercury that was believed to be present in cinnabar native to the clay. The cinnabar may contribute to the red color along with iron, and this clay tends to darken with exposure to the Sun and through oxidation.

Theorectically, cinnabar present in vessels made at least partly of volcanic clay would leak little if any mercury present in the sulfide because of the strong binding properties of montmorillonite and similar minerals.

Yin and Yang, Sulfur and Mercury

The Daoists and Tantrics classified sulfur as female and mercury as male. The Arabs and Europeans reversed this classification. Paracelsus and others used the "sulfurous" and "mercurial" categories to classify all things in nature.

A key Tantric text of the Western Transmission likens the Muladhara Cakra, representing the earth and the acting as the seat of the Kundalini as the body's equivalent of the Vadavanala, the latter's description matching that of a submarine volcano.

The uterine blood of the Goddess in Tantric practice is equated to sulfur which resides in the lower parts of the body dominated by that element.

Around the middle of the 7th century CE, Chinese alchemists began moving more toward the idea of liquid elixir rather than the elixir-based vessels mentioned in the Shiji. Using the principle of "like produces like," the alchemists believed that consuming minerals like gold and cinnabar would create in the body properties similar to those in the metals.

Some of these "elixirs" proved deadly as they contained pure mercury, and other toxic minerals like lead and arsenic.

Even centuries later though, an enlightened alchemist like Isaac Newton, would still write of how he regularly consumed such potions that appear to have adversely effected his health, and traces of which have been revealed through modern testing.

In Southeast Asia, the practice of drinking toxic tonics also caught on eventually. Pigafetta states upon encountering the Prince of Luzon in Brunei: "Those Moros go naked as do the other peoples. They drink quick-silver -- the sick man drinks it to cleanse himself, and the well man to preserve his health."

While the use of toxic metals eventually fell out of fashion in most places, spiritual alchemy, which evolved in parallel with the chemical variety, continues in many forms strongly to the present with practices like Kundalini Yoga and Daoist meditation.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Mahdihassan, S. "History of Cinnabar as Drug, the Natural Substance and the Synthetic Product," Indian Journal of History of Sciences 22(1): 63-70. 1987.

Schipper, Kristofer. The Taoist Body, University of California Press, 1994.

Glossary: Letters of Prester John

When analyzing the letters of Prester John, we should distinguish between those said to have been received by the Popes or kings of Europe, and those circulated for general public consumption.

Obviously some of the latter were designed more for entertainment purposes than anything else.

However, when we learn that the Pope sent his personal physician, Magister Philippus, on a mission to Prester John, the completely fictional character of the king becomes a more difficult proposition.

Although many copies of the original letters exist, there are numerous variations in the manuscripts.

Actual specimens of letters addressed to the "Emperor of Rome" and the "King of France" are stated to be preserved at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris (Beazely, p. 278).

Pope Alexander III in Indorum regi sacerdotum santissimo (1177) told of Philippus' encounters with the emissaries of Prester John in the East, and the eastern king's desire to learn about the Roman Catholic Church.

Interestingly, while traveler's reports claiming to have found Prester John's kingdom in Central Asia or Ethiopia are seen as authentic, the accounts of this kingdom in "further India" are viewed as completely fictional and/or fraudulent. This includes the original letter attributed to Prester John, the story of John Mandeville and even the account of Nicolo de Conti given centuries after the first letter.

However, as we have noted, two geographically vast trade empires existed in further India at the time that are certainly deserving of consideration. All the more so when we consider that evidence exists that at least one of these empires appears to have had a long-term strategic policy of courting new allies.

Requests for assistance from the Sung emperor by the king of Sanfotsi against his enemies to the south began in the late 10th century. During the same general period over several centuries, Suvarnadvipa engaged in what apparently was an effort to strengthen political ties with eastern and southern India and Tibet. The Srikalacakra Tantra, having links with Suvarnadvipa gurus, contains not only interesting hopeful prophecies of Buddhist victories against invading hordes, but even a manual of the "art of war" as part of its contents. The presence of Suvarnadvipa influence (Sanfotsi/Zabag) in South India and Sri Lanka is also confirmed by independent Chinese and Muslim sources during this period including Ma Tuan-lin and Chau Ju-Kua.

We know that prior to the initial Prester John letters there had been visits by an "archbishop of India" to Constantinople, and by a "Patriarch John" from the same country to Rome in 1122. These visits are confirmed by two apparently independent sources, one anonymous and the other from Odo of Reims who was in Rome during the event.

These accounts confirm that people at least claiming to be authorities from India were able to venture to the West some 50 years before the first Prester John letter. As we know that merchants and even kings from Suvarnadvipa were journeying to India during this period, the necessary linkage existed.

Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, published only about 35 years after the first letter, was the first in a series of Grail epics that sought to give European roots to the eastern king and to link him with a sacred relic known as the Holy Grail. In this literature, the Grail almost invariably returns to a mountain in far India.

If the letters had some hints of being penned by a Nestorian, this would not automatically effect its authenticity. Cosmas Indicopleustes refers to Nestorians from Siam as early as the 6th century CE. The Persian writer Abu Saliah mentions during the 7th century, a Nestorian church at Fansur (Sumatra or Borneo).

John of Marignolli says that he encounters "Christians" at Sabah during the 14th century, when travelling from China to India.

Even the letters themselves tend to imply they were written by someone in Prester John's service, which according to the king included 'Frankish' knights. We might relate this to Nicolo de Conti's claim much later of having served in the the court of Prester John during his 15th century travels to Asia.

After the Mongol conquests, as Europeans began traveling again to India, and particularly to South India, two advocates of the establishment of a Christian navy in the Indian Ocean arise in Europe. They were Jordanus of Columbum and Marino Sanuto, both of whom located Regnum Joannis Prebyteri in the far Indies. Their world maps though were still Ptolemaic in fashion showing the easternmost islands as part of the Asian continent.

Sanuto wrote an appeal to the Pope for a new crusade known as Secreta fidelium crucis "The Secrets of the Faithful of the Cross."

In this work, Sanuto included many maps, apparently the work of Pietro Vesconte, that were the first to show significant advances over earlier Christian maps. They were known as portolanos, discussed previously in this blog in relation to Austronesian wind compasses, and were valuable new additions to the navigational repetoire of European seafarers.

A pattern of contact, of which I have endeavored to lay out in this blog, continues up to the arrival of Portuguese fleets in the 1500s. The flow of knowledge from the East may be coded in von Eschenbach's account of the visitors Feirfez, Cundrie and Malcreatiure from the kingdom of Tribalibot "near the Ganges." The author even credits the tale of Parzival to a mysterious "pagan" from Toledo. The Grail itself may also allude partly to this new knowledge from the Far East.

It is impossible to say whether Luções "helpfulness" to the Portuguese had strategic rather than purely mercantile or mercenary motivations. However, the situation in Lusung certainly paints a picture of a kingdom in flux.

The land granted to Chinese migrants on the Pasig River, the first major foreign Chinese settlement in history, may have been a conscious policy to curry protectorate sentiments with Ming emperors.

Lusung at the arrival of the Spanish was divided between Islam and the indigenous religions. While the king in Tondo, Lakandula, appeared indigenous by his name, his close neighbor Soliman of Manila was a "Moro."

In the end, one can say that according to the thesis of this blog the lords of the dragon and bird clan succeeded in halting the Muslim juggernaut and the threat from the South, but only at great costs. The letters of "Prester John" worked. However, the land ended up colonized anyway and at one point the Lusung lords could not even conduct trade from village to village with each other under Spanish rule.

However, from the standpoint of the old trading clan the situation could be seen as profound according to their own worldview that I have attempted to reconstruct. Two conflicting exclusive ideologies, from the same root, meeting full circle back at the place where it all started, after nearly a millenium of intense warfare.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Beazely, C. Raymond (Editor). The Texts and Versions of John de Plano Carpini and William de Rubruquis, London: The Hakluyt Society, 1903.

Coedes, G. The Indianized States of Southeast Asia, University of Hawaii Press, 1975-06.

Manansala, Paul. The Kingdom of Prester John, http://asiapacificuniverse.com/pkm/presterjohn.htm, 2003.

Land of Sacred Jars III

Beginning at least by the 15th century, Lusung began trading its most sacred jars on the open market. I would submit this was no less than auctioning off the Amrita Kumbha or the Holy Grail. There were interested buyers and they were willing to pay great sums for these unassuming pots.

Jesuit Ludwig Froez wrote about the Philippine jar trade in 1595:

In the Philippines, jars called boioni which are esteemed low there but highly priced in Japan, for the delicious beverage Cie (Cha) is well preserved in them; hence what is counted as two crown by the Filipino; is much higher valued in Japan and is looked upon as the greatest wealth like a gem.

Hideyoshi the Taiko was said to have had a jar made for himself in Rusun (Lusung). He monopolized the commerce in Rusun pottery, seizing possessions from Japanese Christians returning from the Philippines and blocking any other trade of the items. When Carletti came to Japan from the Philippines in 1597, all passengers were searched for Rusun ware which the king wished to purchase.

The Tokiko, a Japanese historical text on early ceramic trade, mentions that Rusun pottery was already considered of the highest value more than a century before Hideyoshi's time.

Despite the pottery's high worth, Antonio de Morga, the governor of the Philippines, was far from impressed with its quality.

On this island, Luzon, particularly in the provinces of Manila, Pampánga, Pangasinán, and Ilócos, very ancient clay vessels of a dark brown color are found by the natives, of a sorry appearance; some of a middling size, and others smaller;
marked with characters and stamps. They are unable to say either when or where they obtained them; but they are no longer to be acquired, nor are they manufactured in the islands. The Japanese prize them highly, for they have found that the root of a herb which they call Tscha (tea), and which when drunk hot is considered as a great delicacy and of medicinal efficacy by the kings and lords in Japan, cannot be effectively preserved except in these vessels; which are so highly esteemed all over Japan that they form the most costly articles of their show-rooms and cabinets. Indeed, so highly do they value them that they overlay them externally with fine gold embossed with great skill, and enclose them in cases of brocade; and some of these vessels are valued at and fetch from two thousand tael to eleven reals. The natives of these islands purchase them from the Japanese at very high rates, and take much pains in the search for them on account of their value, though but few are now found on account of the eagerness with which they have been sought for.

Fedor Jagor and his associates traveling through the Philippines in the 19th century relay a similar account taken from Carletti:

In 1615 Carletti met with a Franciscan who was sent as ambassador from Japan to Rome, who assured him that he had seen one hundred and thirty thousand scudi paid by the King of Japan for such a vessel; and his companions confirmed the statement. Carletti also alleges, as the reason for the high price, "that the leaf cia or tea, the quality of which improves with age, is preserved better in those vessels than in all others. The Japanese besides know these vessels by certain characters and stamps. They are of great age and very rare, and come only from Cambodia, Siam, Cochin-China, the Philippines, and other neighboring islands. From their external appearance they would be estimated at three or four quatrini (two dreier).... It is perfectly true that the king and the princes of that kingdom possess a very large number of these vessels, and prize them as their most valuable treasure and above all other rarities .... and that they boast of their acquisitions, and from motives of vanity strive to outvie one another in the multitude of pretty vessels which they possess.

According to St. John writing in the 19th century, the Sultan of Brunei possessed a sacred "speaking jar." When asked if he would sell it for $100,000, he was said to have replied that he would not part with it for any sum of money. Likewise the Datu of Tamparuli was said to have paid $3,500 for one jar and to have had another of astronomical value. Here we find direct mention of the sacred and magical qualities of these high-priced pots. We should also note that Hideyoshi was known to have presented Rusun wares to temples throughout the country.

We will identify these precious pots in our next blog.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Jagor, Fedor, Comyn, Tomás de, Virchow, Rudolf Ludwig Karl, The former Philippines thru foreign eyes edited by Austin Craig, Manila: Philippine Education Co., 1916.

Land of Sacred Jars II

The animistic spirit of the Tinguian jars is something that is found, however carefully presented, in the stories of the Holy Grail, the relic from the farthest Indies.

The Grail is said to "call" knights to its service as in the case of Parzival and the Templars. Knights serve the Grail, just as the Grail itself serves as implied in the cyclic question "Whom does the Grail serve?" Other instances also give the impression of the Grail as an actor, albeit in a way that would not have offended medieval Christian sensibilities.

The animistic spirit is appears again in late Hermetic texts. In the early 17th century The Ancient War of the Knights written in German, we have an interesting instance of a debate between the Philosopher's Stone, Gold and Mercury. The text is not meant to be comical and one could certainly conclude that some elements of animism are present.

GOLD: I will convince you by the Authority of the Philosophers, that the Truth of the Art may be accomplished with me. Read Hermes, he says thus: "The Sun is its Father, and the Moon {14} its Mother; now I am the only one which they compare to the Sun...

The STONE: At this Discourse, the Stone begun to Laugh, and told them, in Truth you deserve both the one and the other of you, that they should jeer you, and your Demonstration; but it is you Gold that I still the more admire at, seeing that you are so much conceited of your self, for having the advantage which you have to be good for some certain Things. Can you be perswaded that the ancient Philosophers did write as they have done, in a Sense which should be understood in a common Way? And do you believe that one ought plainly to interpret their Words according to the Letter?

During the dialogue, the Stone and Gold even mention the spirit present in seemingly inanimate physical objects:

GOLD: What you have said is no sufficient Proof; for though the Philosophers speak of one only Thing, which encloses it is self the four Elements; and which [Thing] has a Body, a Soul, and Spirit; and that by this Thing they would give us to understand the (Physical) Tincture; at such time when the same has been carried on to its highest (Perfection) which is the Point they aim at; yet this Thing ought at its beginning to be composed of me, who am the Gold, and of my Brother Mercury, as being (both together) the Male Seed, and the Female Seed; as has been said before: For after we have been sufficiently cook'd, and transmuted into a Tincture, we are then both the one and the other (together) the one only Thing which the Philosophers speak of.

The STONE: That goes not as you fancy; I have already told you before, that no true Union can be made of you two; for you are not the only Body {31}, but two Bodies together; and consequently you are contrary, considering the Foundation of Nature: but as for me, I have an {32} imperfect Body, a steadfast Soul, a penetrating Tincture. I have, besides this, a clear, transparent, volatile, and moveable Mercury: And I can operate all those (great) Things, which you boast of with you both, and which however you are not able to perform: For 'tis I who carry the Philosophical Gold, and the Mercury of the Wise (Men) in my Body; wherefore the Philosophers (speaking of me) say, our Stone {33} is Invisible, and it is not possible to attain to the Possession of our Mercury, any other way than by Means of {34} two Bodies, whereof one cannot receive without the other the (requisite) Perfection...

The Grail from the East, like the Grail Castle, is imbued with a spirit that acts and shapes the events of the Grail cycle literature. Any beverage or food that comes from the Grail, or anyone that touches the Grail also links with the same spirit. In a similar way, the holy dip in the Krater or Ganges River brings one in touch with the elixir and in communion with the abiding spirit(s). This is the ultimate self-identification in which one merges with spirit of the sacred object.

Thus, everything around the great cosmic mountain which has been covered with its pyroclastic dust and ash -- the water, trees, fruits -- become agents of immortality. The ancient observer could not help but notice that after the destruction of an eruption, the land suddenly becomes fabulously fertile due to the new rich volcanic soil.

The sacred jars made with the clay released from the Mountain of the Sun and the Mountain of the Moon mixed together possesses truly unique qualities. The two dual principles complement one another and bring the elixir to perfection. These holy vessels, although not much to look at, continued to be sought by kings even after the people of the cosmic mountains had forsaken them.

In ancient times, the pot of elixir was jealously guarded. Indeed, the number who could partake of its mysterious powers was severely restricted by the "gods." Maybe those of the Dragon and Bird Clan who wandered far from home, brought instead of cumbersome jars, only small chunks of volcanic clay in the form of stones -- the Philosopher's Stone.

Modern study of hermetic principles reveal the obvious -- that the transmutation sought after was internal and spiritual in nature, and that any chemical transformation of base metals was at best a secondary consideration.

These ideas were shared with Tantra which saw the cancellation of the polarities through union of the same. We read again from The Ancient War of the Knights:

THE STONE: 'Tis for this Reason the there is no other but only my self, who possesses a Male and a Female Seed, and who is (at the same time) a Thing (entirely) Homogeneal; also am I call'd an Hermaphrodite. Richardus Anglicus witnesses of me, saying, the first Matter of our Stone is call'd Rebis (twice a Thing) that is to say, a Thing which has received from Nature a double occult property, which is the Reason that the name of Hermaphrodite is given to it, as if one would say, a Matter, whereof it is difficult to be able to distinguish the Sex (and to diccover) whether it be a Male, or a Female, it inclining equally to both Sides: The (Universal) Medicine is therefore made of a Thing which is {35} the Water, and the Spirit of the Body.

16th century alchemy lab in Austria

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Land of Sacred Jars

The pot of elixir was generally depicted as a globular vessel similar to the purna kalasa or "full pot" motif used in Hindu-Buddhist art, and often appearing in a reddish or brownish hue. Sometimes the pots used in ghata worship of the goddess as during the Devi and Durga puja rituals has the same shape. Similar pots occur in the early forms of the vessel of flowing water found in Mesopotamian art.

In the representations of this "merveilleux symbole qui etait comme le Saint-Graal de l'epopee chaldeenne," to quote the words of one of the greatest scholars of Sumerian antiquities, there can be recognized an "evolutionary" and more or less chronological sequence of types. At first there are plain globular vases, held by standing or seated personages, one hand below and the other on the vase.

-- Ananda Coomaraswamy, Yaksas

The amrita kumbha or "pot of elixir"

The sacred earthenware pots of Lusung were also generally of a globular shape and brownish or reddish color. They were of medium size that could be easily carried even when full of water.

In Japan, where we find the world's oldest known pottery, sacred jars are mentioned in the literature detailing the founding of the empire. The Japanese used these jars for storage and also for ritual sacrifice. In the Nihongi, the first emperor Jimmu Tenno meets a divine visitor during a war with his enemies and is told to make a great pot sacrifice to gain victory:

The Emperor, indignant at this, made prayer that night in person, and then fell asleep. The Heavenly Deity appeared to him in a dream, and instructed him, saying, "Take earth from within the shrine of the Heavenly Mount Kagu, and make from it eighty Heavenly platters. Also make sacred jars and sacrifice to the Gods of Heaven and Earth. More over pronounce a solemn prayer. If you do this, the enemy will render submission of their own accord."

In Southeast Asia, sacred jars were of several types. In addition to those used to store beverage and food, others were used for the practice of secondary burial. Both of these types of jars could also be handed down as sacred heirlooms known in Indonesia as pusaka. Jars were important status symbols and were used especially during marriage negotiations as one of the most coveted forms of bride wealth.

Pot worship was especially important in the Philippines, Borneo, Taiwan, among the Moi of Indochina and in certain other areas of Indonesia. Pottery is often the most important burial item in these regions where it is sometimes broken first, so the animistic spirit may accompany the deceased.

In latter times, Chinese celadons and large vessels known as dragon jars a type of stoneware, which, though of obvious Chinese influence, may have been of Southeast Asian manufacture. The simple earthenware pots became neglected and forgotten by the local people, but cherished by those abroad who had coveted them for ages.

Many fantastic traditions surround the sacred jars in insular Southeast Asia. In Borneo, the jars are said to be made of the gods from the same clay used to make the Sun and Moon (and sometimes also the Earth). Among the Tinguian of the Philippines, a certain jar named Magsawi was said to be able to converse, to take long journeys and even eventually got married to a female jar from a neighboring province. They eventually had a child jar with the same characteristics! According to the Tinguian, the sacred jars are the products of Kabonian, a deity with solar affinities.

Another tale of living jars comes from the tale of Gimbangonan:

Not long after he started, and when he arrived in the pasture, all the jars went to him, and all the jars stuck out their tongues; for they were very hungry and had not been fed for a long time. The jars were somadag, ginlasan, malayo and tadogan, and other kinds also. When Aponitolau thought that all the jars had arrived, he fed them all with betel-nut covered with lawed leaves. As soon as he fed, he gave them some salt. Not long after this they went to the pasture, and they rode on the back of a carabao [water buffalo].

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Amrita Kumbha

If the name "Lusung" comes from the native word meaning "mortar," we could see here a relationship with "Krater" which can mean "mixing bowl" or "volcanic crater."

The alchemical mixing or pounding together of dual materials ejected from the dual erupting volcanoes of Lusung produced a sort of Philosopher's Stone. According to legend, the Philosopher's Stone was used to transmute base metals into gold and to create the "water of life," which was envisioned as water with gold, or gold and silver (electrum), suspended in solution.

However, the gold and silver here may refer instead to the Gold and Silver mountains, also known as the mountains of the Sun and Moon. The "white powder of gold" associated with the Philosopher's Stone may be simply a type of volcanic clay.

The mixed clay formed into jars which were used to store water and other beverages constitutes the basis, in my view, for the "pot of elixir" motif found in the tale of the Churning of the Milky Ocean. This pot known as the amrita kumbha appears time and time again in tales where the Asuras (Demons) attempt to steal it from the Devas (Gods).

Pot worship of this type is rather rampant from India to Southeast Asia. In the Pacific, the gourd symbolically replaces the pot. In ancient Sumeria, we find the motif of jars containing the water of life, sometimes with the water flowing out from the mouth of the jar.

Indeed, the concept of the Holy Grail as a chalice, bowl or vessel from which to drink would derive from the same idea. The original clay vessel can be seen as a manifestation of the larger volcanic Krater, but holds drink rather than the holy bathing lake. The principle though is the same.

Water, wine, tea or other drinks stored in these simple earthenware jars supposedly took on special qualities that were considered nothing less than magical. They became the aqua vitae or elixir vitae, the water or elixir of life.

When the pot of elixir arose from the Milky Ocean, the Asuras immediately grabbed the jar and a chase ensured. It is said that each place the Asuras stopped they left a bit of amrita behind that dropped from the jar. These locations became places of pilgrimage and include the Ganges River, the site of the grand Kumbha Mela festival where pilgrims come to take a holy dip in the river.

Amrita is associated with a mountain to the East across the Milky Ocean, usually Mt. Mandara. The great mythical bird Garuda went to steal the elixir to gain the release of his mother, who had been captured by the Asuras. The amrita kumbha was said to be found off the shores of the Milky Ocean on the mountain where Indra creates the monsoons.

In Sumerian iconography, Enki is often shown with water flowing directly from his shoulders, but in the oldest forms of this motif we see instead a yoke placed on the back with a water-spouting jar on each side of the head. These waters are linked with the underworld Apsu, the royal domain of Enki. The traditional entrance to the Apsu, again, is at the twin gates of Mt. Mashu in the furthest East.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

The Holy Grail III

Many theories have been put forward on the origin of the Grail. Links to Manicheanism, Mandeanism and pre-Christian European religions among others have been suggested.

However, we must remember that Wolfram connects the Grail firmly with the Far East and "India." That is the region where it originated and returned, and from which those most knowing of the relic, particularly Cundrie, have come. Certainly other influences abound in the work.

Cundrie, for example, not only speaks the language of far-off Tribalibot, but is fluent in Arabic and knows the names of the stars in that language.

One interesting study by Henry and Renee Kahane, in collaboration with Angelina Pietrangeli, links the Grail with the Krater of the Corpus Hermeticum. The Hermetic texts are said to be ancient Egyptian works translated into Alexandrian Greek.

The word "krater" from which we get English crater can refer either to a stone mixing bowl, or to the mouth of a volcano. Kahane et al., stress the mixing bowl but the text they use from the Hermetic literature suggests something more like Plato's vulcanic krater which was said to contain the light of the Sun. The following is a conversation between Tat (Thoth) and Hermes taken from the Hermetic texts:

Tat: Tell me then, father, why did God not impart intellect to all men?

Hermes: It was his will, my son, that intellect should be placed in the midst as a prize that human souls may win.

Tat: And where did he place it?

Hermes: He filled a great Krater with intellect, and sent it down to earth; and he appointed a herald, and bade him make proclamation to the hearts of man: "Dip yourself in this Krater, you who are able; you who believe that you will ascend to Him who sent this Krater down; you who know for what purpose you have been born." Now they who have heed to the proclamation and were baptized in intellect, those men got a share of gnosis, and they became perfect men because they received intellect. But those who failed to heed the proclamation, those are they who possess the gift of communication and reasoning, to be sure, but not more, since they have not received intellect and know not for what purpose they have been made, nor by whom they have been made. The sensations of these men are very close to those of beasts without reason, and since their temper is in a state of passion and anger, they do not admire the things worthy of contemplation; they give heed only to bodily pleasures and desires, and believe that man has been born for such things as these. But as many as have partaken of the gift which God has sent, these, O Tat ... they see the Good ... Such, O Tat, is the science of the intellect, which provides an abundant possession of things divine and the comprehension of God, for the Krater is divine.

The Krater as something one would take a dip in reminds one of a lake formed in the caldera of a volcano. It is also obviously a location that one must strive to reach:

Hermes: "...Do you see, my son, through how many bodies we have to make our way, and through how many troops of demons, through which continuous succession, and through how many courses of stars, in order to press on to the One-and-Only?"

As on Heaven, so on Earth and within the Body. The Krater of the volcano represents the alchemical ideal as found on Earth where the elixir is created. To journey to the Krater, and to bathe in its waters, is to self-identify with the Earthly model of what one desires to create within. It is the same type of self-identification that the Tantric practitioner and shaman strive to achieve.

The same purpose would be served by the grail, cintamani, anting-anting or mutya (pearl) in that the object represents the acquisition of the inner goal or desire.

The herald appointed to proclaim the Krater, I would say, is none other than Prester John himself. He is descended from Manalastas "the herald" of rooster totem on his father's side. The way he proclaims it though may be a bit more subdued and subtle than a rooster announcing the rising Sun.

The sacred bath or dip in a lake, river or ocean is a common theme found in examples like the Kumbha Mela of India and the Bayung Danum of Apung Iru. The specific idea of a herald calling people to take a sacred dip reminds us of John the Baptist. We saw that two persons named John from the Indies appear after the start of the Crusades -- one named Patriarch John and the other Prester (Priest) John.

In addition to the explanation given by Mandeville, there were other ideas on how Prester John acquired his name. These include theories connecting him with John the Baptist or the St. John who wrote Revelations.

It's said that not long after the Crucifixion
a man who had never seen death made his way to Asia
where he founded a huge and puissant Christian kingdom.
Some people believe this man was John the Baptist
while others say he was Our Lord's favorite disciple.
All we know is that someplace in Asia he still reigns,
untouched by age, and calls himself Prester John;
and most of us would surrender everything we possess
for the priviledge of entering his settlement.

-- Evan S. Connell, Points for a Compass Rose

The idea of the ageless John may also be behind the name of the "Wandering Jew" - John Butta Deus. However, Prester John may have been like the Baptist in other ways. He mentions in his famous letter of 1165 some fantastic sacred water-spots connected with his kingdom:

Between the sandy sea and the said mountians, in a certain plain, is a fountain of singular virtue which purges Christians and would-be Christians from all transgressions. The water stands four inches high in a hollow stone shaped like a mussel-shell. Two saintly old men watch by it and ask the comers whether they are Christians or are about to become Christians, then whether they desire healing with all their hearts. If they have answered well, they are bidden to lay aside their clothes and to step into the mussel. If what they said be true, then the water begins to rise and gush over their heads. Thrice does the water thus lift itself, and everyone who has entered the mussel leaves it cured of every complaint.

Another location near "Mt. Olympus" is a fountain of youth, and stones that restore sight:

At the foot of Mount Olympus bubbles up a spring which changes its flavor hour by hour, night and day, and the spring is scarcely three days' journey from Paradise, out of which Adam was driven. If anyone has tasted thrice of the fountain, from that day he will feel no fatigue, but will, as long as he lives, be as a man of thirty years. Here are found the small stones called Nudiosi which, if borne about the body, prevent the sight from waxing feeble and restore it where it is lost. The more the stone is looked at, the keener becomes the sight.

And yet another site is linked with a mysterious underground cave system and also special precious stones:

Near the wilderness trickles between barren mountians a subterranean rill which can only by chance be reached, for only occassionally the earth gapes, and he who would descend must do it with precipitation, ere the earth closes again. All that is gathered under the ground there is gem and precious stone. The brook pours into another river and the inhabitants of the neighborhood obtain thence abundance of precious stones. Yet they never venture to sell them without having first offered them to us for our private use. Should we decline them, they are at liberty to dispose of them to strangers. Boys there are trained to remain three of four days under the water, diving after the stones.

The fantastic nature of the claims is rather common in writing of the times, however, we might deduce from Prester John's letter is that he is creating a great desire to visit his kingdom. All the classic temptations to venture to the East are included. Was this a strategic move on the part of the "King of the Three Indias?"

It is also worth noting that the Templars were accused of worshipping John the Baptist. Some claimed the skull known as Baphomet and allegedly revered by the Templars, was believed by them to be that of the Baptist.

The Johannites and Mandeans openly worshipped the Baptist placing him higher than Christ. These two groups have been linked by some with the Qumram community that existed a few centuries before Christ and practiced a ritual baptism of initiation. It may be that Prester John related his own position as priest-king of the holy Krater, as Apung Iru, with that of the Baptist.

The connection of the Christian baptism with the Biblical flood ((I Pet. 3:19-20) reminds us of the Bayung Danum festival celebrated during the yearly flood season. The flooding waters renew the earth for the New Year, and, through self-identification, the waters of the river renew the individual also.

The Krater

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento


References

Badia, Leonard F., The Qumran baptism and John the Baptist's baptism, Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1980.

Kahane, Henry and Renée. The Krater and the Grail: Hermetic Sources of the Parzival, University of Illinois Press, 1984.

The Holy Grail II

While the historicity of the romances is certainly open to question, a sober look at works like Parzival reveal an easy link to better-documented historical events.

For example, if Gahmuret is indeed Geoffrey "the Fair" Plantagenet, he is said not to have been heir to a throne, but to have risen to power only through marriage to a widowed emperor. This, of course, was true of Geoffrey who, although a count, claimed a throne only through his marriage to Maud of England, widow of the Holy Roman emperor.

The early romance literature tends to agree in stating that the Grail resided in the West only for a short time -- two or three generations depending on whether the Fisher King is the son or grandson of Titurel. Then it is returned back to the uttermost East. The duration was similar to that of the House of Anjou in Jeruslam, which has been interpreted by many as the Montsalvat or "Mount of Salvation" in Parzival.

That such stories about the Grail and Templars could have circulated so widely -- and the romances were very popular -- at a time when the Templars were still in existence is telling.

Whatever the form of the Holy Grail, in all cases it becomes the object of the quest. Wolfram describes it as a stone that has fallen from heaven -- lapis exilis -- reputedly the emerald that fell from Lucifer's crown during the war in Heaven.

In Kalacakra Buddhism, this reminds us of the Cintamani, the wish-fulfilling fire pearl. The Cintamani is mentioned in Hindu texts as arising out of sea during the Churning of the Milky Ocean. The word "mani" here means "pearl" while "cinta" is "desire, love."

In Tibetan, Mongolian and Korean tradition, the Cintamani is often thought of as a stone that falls or is dropped from Heaven. It is the state jewel of Shambhala in Kalacakra belief, and it is carried out of that realm on the back of a horse known as the "Wind Horse" or the "Best of Horses." The pearl is engulfed in flames representing the inner desires the stone fulfills.



The Tibetan story of 'Indrabhuti and the Wish-fulfilling Gem' has many similarities to the Grail story. Here the "wounded king" is blind and infertile. The infertility extends to the entire kingdom. As his doman sinks into poverty, Indrabhuti makes a decision:

Rather than adopt any policy not in accord with the precepts of the Dharma, the King decided to risk his own life for the good of his people and obtain from the Nagas, who dwelt beneath the waters of the ocean, a wondrous wish-granting gem.

The king sets sail for the "Isle of Jewels," apparently another reference to Shambhala, and after many hardships receives the Cintamani from the "Azure Lady." His infertility and blindness are cured and further yet he is able to see a divine child known as Padmasambhava hidden in a lotus, whom he adopts and makes heir to the throne.

Like the Cintamani, the Grail is credited with giving sight. Not everyone can see and touch the Grail, only those who have reached a certain spiritual level. The Cintamani and Grail fulfill the inner desire (cinta) of the quester but only after they have suffered the necessary trials and learned the important lessons. Simply reaching the destination is not enough.

However the sacred object and the sacred destination are important in their own right as they, like Tantra, provide a "shortcut" to enlightenment. By seeking them one burns through to the inner core to discover what is truly important, and the reality of one's inner desire. At a much earlier period, Gilgamesh also ventures to the bottom of the sea in Dilmun to obtain the flower of immortality but only after a long spiritually and physically ardous journey.

For the Dragon and Bird Clan, in crisis after having reached their pinnacle, the quest also offers a form of political propaganda to help with the geopolitical situation they faced. It was a way of attracting the military/religious elements eastward to head off the Islamic advance.

The relationship between the Grail and the Templars appears inextricably linked with the House of Anjou (Angevins) according to Wolfram. Kyot appears to have had no problem accessing an Angevin genealogy that conflicted with the "official" one and placed the family's origin in the fairy-land of Feimurgân.

The Angevins and the offshoot Plantagenet line were always considered a bit suspect among the high nobility of Europe. Legend says that one of the counts of Anjou had married a half-dragon woman known as Melusine. Bernard of Clairvaux, the founder of the rule of the Templars, was quoted as saying at the birth of Geoffrey the Fair "From the Devil he has come, to the Devil he'll return."

The existence of the heathen calf-worshipping Flegatanis in formerly Muslim Toledo is equally telling. It was from him that Kyot claimed to have learned about the Grail, but he had to confirm some things in the heathen manuscript by consulting the chronicles of Anjou and other kingdoms.

One is forced to conclude that the fairy descent of the Plantagenets is somehow linked to the their close relationship with the lineage of Prester John as found in the romances, and it is at least partly through Anjou that the Grail and other "treasures" come to the Templars.

If the Plantagenets were a bit offbeat, the Templars followed their example well. While the latter were undoubtedly subject to many false accusations, it's hard not to conclude that they absorbed many more "heresies" than other military orders.

In the 1120s, the order had no major sponsors in Europe until Fulk IV "the Rude" came to Jerusalem for pilgrimage. This was the start of the relationship between Anjou and the Templars. He promised to raise funds for them on an annual basis, and became an associate member. He may have also been responsible for the first major land grant -- the Castle of Baghras between Syria and Asia Minor, an important fortification near the city of Antioch.

In 1128, after the Council of Troyes granted papal approval for the order, the first grandmaster Hugh de Payens visited Fulk from April to May. The council's ruling was the beginning of the extraordinary growth of the Templars.

Recruits and donations poured in at an extraordinary rate. In 1131, Fulk became King of Jerusalem through his marriage with Melisende and was brought closer to the eastern Templar activities.

There is no agreement as to why Philipp IV of France and Pope Clement V decided to eventually destroy the Templars some 200 years after their birth. The other major orders -- the Hospitalers and the Teutonic Knights -- survived to present times. While the official explanation was that the Templars were heretics, other suggestions range from fear of their growing power to the debt owned the order by Philipp.

As noted earlier, the order was cleared of charges in Portugal and their name changed to the Knights of Christ. Here they became deeply involved in maritime exploration. Henry the Navigator became grandmaster of the order, and Vasco de Gama was an ordained knight.

When Columbus sailed to America his three ships displayed the red pattee cross of the Templars, which also could have been interpreted as an emblem of the Bird Clan.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento