|
the secret teachings of all ages
Mystic
Christianity
CHAPTER xxxvI
manly p. hall
THE true story of the life of
Jesus of Nazareth has never been unfolded to the world, either in the
accepted Gospels or in the Apocrypha, although a few stray hints may be
found in some of the commentaries written by the ante-Nicene Fathers.
The facts concerning His identity and mission are among the priceless
mysteries preserved to this day in the secret vaults beneath the "Houses
of the Brethren." To a few of the Knights Templars, who were initiated
into the arcana of the Druses, Nazarenes, Essenes, Johannites, and other
sects still inhabiting the remote and inaccessible fastnesses of the
Holy Land, part of the strange story was told. The knowledge of the
Templars concerning the early history of Christianity was undoubtedly
one of the main reasons for their persecution and final annihilation.
The discrepancies in the writings of the early Church Fathers not only
are irreconcilable, but demonstrate beyond question that even during the
first five centuries after Christ these learned men had for the basis of
their writings little more substantial than folklore and hearsay. To the
easy believer everything is possible and there are no problems. The
unemotional person in search of facts, however, is confronted by a host
of problems with uncertain factors, of which the following are
typical:
According to popular
conception, Jesus was crucified during the thirty-third year of His life
and in the third year of His ministry following His baptism. About A.D.
180, St. Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons, one of the most eminent of the
ante-Nicene theologians, wrote Against Heresies, an attack on the
doctrines of the Gnostics. In this work Irenæus declared upon the
authority of the Apostles themselves that Jesus lived to old age. To
quote: "They, however, that they may establish their false opinion
regarding that which is written, 'to proclaim the acceptable year of the
Lord,' maintain that He preached for one year only, and then suffered in
the twelfth month. [In speaking thus], they are forgetful of their own
disadvantage, destroying His whole work, and robbing Him of that age
which is both more necessary and more honourable than any other; that
more advanced age, I mean, during which also as a teacher He excelled
all others. For how could He have had His disciples, if He did not
teach? And how could He have taught, unless He had reached the age of a
Master? For when He came to be baptised, He had not yet completed His
thirtieth year, but was beginning to be about thirty years of age (for
thus Luke, who has mentioned His years, has expressed it: 'Now Jesus
was, as it were, beginning to be thirty years old,' when He came to
receive baptism); and, (according to these men,) He preached only one
year reckoning from His baptism. On completing His thirtieth year He
suffered, being in fact still a young man, and who had by no means
attained to advanced age. Now, that the first stage of early life
embraces thirty years, and that this extends onward to the fortieth
year, every one will admit; but from the fortieth and fiftieth year a
man begins to decline towards old age, which Our Lord possessed while
He still fulfilled the office of a Teacher, even as the Gospel and
all the elders testify; those who were conversant in Asia with John, the
disciple of the Lord, (affirming) that John conveyed to them that
information. And he remained among them up to the time of Trajan. Some
of them, moreover, saw not only John, but the other apostles also, and
heard the very same account from them, and bear testimony as to
the'(validity of) the statement. Whom then should we rather believe?
Whether such men as these, or Ptolemæus, who never saw the apostles, and
who never even in his dreams attained to the slightest trace of an
apostle?"
Commenting on the foregoing
passage, Godfrey Higgins remarks that it has fortunately escaped the
hands of those destroyers who have attempted to render the Gospel
narratives consistent by deleting all such statements. He also notes
that the doctrine of the crucifixion was a vexata questio among
Christians even during the second century. "The evidence of Irenæus," he
says, "cannot be touched. On every principle of sound criticism, and of
the doctrine of probabilities, it is unimpeachable."
It should further be noted that
Irenæus prepared this statement to contradict another apparently current
in his time to the effect that the ministry of Jesus lasted but
one year. Of all the early Fathers, Irenæus, writing within
eighty years after the death of St. John the Evangelist, should have had
reasonably accurate information. If the disciples themselves related
that Jesus lived to advanced age in the body, why has the mysterious
number 33 been arbitrarily chosen to symbolize the duration of His life?
Were the incidents in the life of Jesus purposely altered so that His
actions would fit more closely into the pattern established by the
numerous Savior-Gods who preceded Him? That these analogies were
recognized and used as a leverage in converting the Greeks and Romans is
evident from a perusal of the writings of Justin Martyr, another
second-century authority. In his Apology, Justin addresses the
pagans thus:
"And when we say also that the
Word, who is the first-birth of God, was produced without sexual union,
and that He, Jesus Christ, Our Teacher, was crucified and died, and rose
again, and ascended into heaven, we propound nothing different from what
you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter. * * * And
if we assert that the Word of God was born of God in a peculiar manner,
different from ordinary generation, let this, as said above, be no
extraordinary thing to you, who say that Mercury is the angelic word of
God. But if any one objects that He was crucified, in this also He is on
a par with those reputed sons of Jupiter of yours, who suffered as we
have now enumerated."
From this it is evident that
the first missionaries of the Christian Church were far more willing to
admit the similarities between their faith and the faiths of the pagans
than were their successors in later centuries.
In an effort to solve some of
the problems arising from any attempt to chronicle accurately the life
of Jesus, it has been suggested that there may have lived in Syria at
that time two or more religious teachers bearing the name Jesus,
Jehoshua or Joshua, and that the lives of these men may
have been confused in the Gospel stories. In his Secret Sects of
Syria and the Lebanon, Bernard H. Springett, a Masonic author,
quotes from an early book, the name of which he was not at liberty to
disclose because of its connection with the ritual of a sect. The last
part of his quotation is germane to the subject at hand:
"But Jehovah prospered the seed
of the Essenians, in holiness and love, for many generations. Then came
the chief of the angels, according to the commandment of GOD, to raise
up an heir to the Voice of Jehovah. And, in four generations more, an
heir was born, and named Joshua, and he was the child of Joseph and
Mara, devout worshippers of Jehovah, who stood aloof from all other
people save the Essenians. And this Joshua, in Nazareth, reestablished
Jehovah, and restored many of the lost rites and ceremonies. In the
thirty-sixth year of his age he was stoned to death in Jerusalem * *
*"
THE ROUND TABLE OF KING
ARTHUR.
From Jennings' The
Rosicrucians, Their Rites and Mysteries.
According to tradition, Arthur, when a
boy of fifteen, was crowned King of Britain, in A.D. 516. Soon after his
ascension to the throne he founded the Order of the Knights of the Round
Table at Windsor. Thereafter the Knights met annually at Carleon,
Winchester, or at Camelot, to celebrate Pentecost. From all parts of
Europe came the brave and the bold, seeking admission into this noble
order of British knighthood. Nobility, virtue, and valor were its
requirements, and those possessing these qualities to a marked degree
were welcomed to King Arthur's court at Camelot. Having gathered the
bravest and noblest Knights of Europe about him, King Arthur chose
twenty-four who excelled all the others in daring and integrity and
formed of them his Circle of the Round Table. According to legend, each
of these Knights was so great in dignity and power that none could
occupy a more exalted seat than another, so when they gathered at the
table to celebrate the anniversary of their foundation it was necessary
to use a round table that all might occupy chairs of equal
importance.
While it is probable that the Order of
the Round Table had its distinctive rituals and symbols, the knowledge
of them has not survived the ages. Elias Ashmole, in his volume on the
Order of the Garter, inserted a double-page plate showing the insignia
of all the orders of knighthood, the block set aside for the symbol of
the Round Table being left blank. The chief reason for the loss of the
symbolism of the Round Table was the untimely death of King Arthur upon
the field of Kamblan (A.D. 542) in the forty-first year of his life.
While he destroyed his bitter enemy, Mordred, in this famous battle, it
cast him not only his own life but the lives of nearly all his Knights
of the Round Table, who died defending their
commander.
Within the last century several
books have been published to supplement the meager descriptions in the
Gospels of Jesus and His ministry. In some instances these narratives
claim to be founded upon early manuscripts recently discovered; in
others, upon direct spiritual revelation. Some of these writings are
highly plausible, while others are incredible. There are persistent
rumors that Jesus visited and studied in both Greece and India, and that
a coin struck in His honor in India during the first century has been
discovered. Early Christian records are known to exist in Tibet, and the
monks of a Buddhist monastery in Ceylon still preserve a record which
indicates that Jesus sojourned with them and became conversant with
their philosophy.
Although early Christianity
shows every evidence of Oriental influence, this is a subject the modern
church declines to discuss. If it is ever established beyond question
that Jesus was an initiate of the pagan Greek or Asiatic Mysteries, the
effect upon the more conservative members of the Christian faith is
likely to be cataclysmic. If Jesus was God incarnate, as the solemn
councils of the church discovered, why is He referred to in the New
Testament as "called of God an high prim after the order of
Melchizedek"? The words "after the order" make Jesus one of a line or
order of which there must have been others of equal or even superior
dignity. If the "Melchizedeks" were the divine or priestly rulers of the
nations of the earth before the inauguration of the system of temporal
rulers, then the statements attributed to St. Paul would indicate that
Jesus either was one of these "philosophic elect" or was attempting to
reestablish their system of government. It will be remembered that
Melchizedek also performed the same ceremony of the drinking of wine and
the breaking of bread as did Jesus at the Last Supper.
George Faber declares the
original name of Jesus was Jescua Hammassiah. Godfrey Higgins has
discovered two references, one in the Midrashjoholeth and the
other in the Abodazara (early Jewish commentaries on the
Scriptures), to the effect that the surname of Joseph's family was
Panther, for in both of these works it is stated that a man was
healed "in the name of Jesus ben Panther." The name Panther
establishes a direct connection between Jesus and Bacchus--who was
nursed by panthers and is sometimes depicted riding either on one of
these animals or in a chariot drawn by them. The skin of the panther was
also sacred in certain of the Egyptian initiatory ceremonials. The
monogram IHS, now interpreted to mean Iesus Hominum Salvator
(Jesus Savior of Men), is another direct link between the Christian and
the Bacchic rites. IHS is derived from the Greek ΥΗΣ, which, as its
numerical value (608) signifies, is emblematic of the sun and
constituted the sacred and concealed name of Bacchus. (See The Celtic
Druids by Godfrey Higgins.) The question arises, Was early Roman
Christianity confused with the worship of Bacchus because of the
numerous parallelisms in the two faiths? If the affirmative can be
proved, many hitherto incomprehensible enigmas of the New Testament will
be solved.
It is by no means improbable
that Jesus Himself originally propounded as allegories the cosmic
activities which were later con fused with His own life. That the
Χριστός, Christos, represents the solar power reverenced by every
nation of antiquity cannot be controverted. If Jesus revealed the nature
and purpose of this solar power under the name and personality of
Christos, thereby giving to this abstract power the attributes of
a god-man, He but followed a precedent set by all previous
World-Teachers. This god-man, thus endowed with all the qualities of
Deity, signifies the latent divinity in every man. Mortal man achieves
deification only through at-one-ment with this divine Self. Union with
the immortal Self constitutes immortality, and he who finds his true
Self is therefore "saved." This Christos, or divine man in man,
is man's real hope of salvation--the living Mediator between abstract
Deity and mortal humankind. As Atys, Adonis, Bacchus, and Orpheus in all
likelihood were originally illumined men who later were confused with
the symbolic personages whom they created as personifications of this
divine power, so Jesus has been confused with the Christos, or
god-man, whose wonders He preached. Since the Christos was the
god-man imprisoned in every creature, it was the first duty of the
initiate to liberate, or "resurrect, " this Eternal One within himself.
He who attained reunion with his Christos was consequently termed
a Christian, or Christened, man.
One of the most profound
doctrines of the pagan philosophers concerned the Universal Savior-God
who lifted the souls of regenerated men to heaven through His own
nature. This concept was unquestionably the inspiration for the words
attributed to Jesus: "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man
cometh unto the Father but by me." In an effort to make a single person
out of Jesus and His Christos, Christian writers have patched together a
doctrine which must be resolved back into its original constituents if
the true meaning of Christianity is to be rediscovered. In the Gospel
narratives the Christos represents the perfect man who, having passed
through the various stages of the "World Mystery" symbolized by the
thirty-three years, ascends to the heaven sphere where he is reunited
with his Eternal Father. The story of Jesus as now preserved is--like
the Masonic story of Hiram Abiff--part of a secret initiatory ritualism
belonging to the early Christian and pagan Mysteries.
During the centuries just prior
to the Christian Era, the secrets of the pagan Mysteries had gradually
fallen into the hands of the profane. To the student of comparative
religion it is evident that these secrets, gathered by a small group of
faithful philosophers and mystics, were reclothed in new symbolical
garments and thus preserved for several centuries under the name of
Mystic Christianity. It is generally supposed that the Essenes
were the custodians of this knowledge and also the initiators and
educators of Jesus. If so, Jesus was undoubtedly initiated in the same
temple of Melchizedek where Pythagoras had studied six centuries
before.
The Essenes--the most prominent
of the early Syrian sects--were an order of pious men and women who
lived lives of asceticism, spending their days in simple labor and their
evenings in prayer. Josephus, the great Jewish historian, speaks of them
in the highest terms. "They teach the immortality of the soul," he says,
"and esteem that the rewards of righteousness are to be earnestly
striven for." In another place he adds, "Yet is their course of life
better than that of other men and they entirely addict themselves to
husbandry. " The name Essenes is supposed to be derived from an
ancient Syrian word meaning "physician," and these kindly folk are
believed to have held as their purpose of existence the healing of the
sick in mind, soul, and body. According to Edouard Schuré, they had two
principal communities, or centers, one in Egypt on the banks of Lake
Maoris, the other in Palestine at Engaddi, near the Dead Sea. Some
authorities trace the Essenes back to the schools of Samuel the Prophet,
but most agree on either an Egyptian or Oriental origin. Their methods
of prayer, meditation, and fasting were not unlike those of the holy men
of the Far East. Membership in the Essene Order was possible only after
a year of probation. This Mystery school, like so many others, had three
degrees, and only a few candidates passed successfully through all. The
Essenes were divided into two distinct communities, one consisting of
celibates and the other of members who were married.
The Essenes never became
merchants or entered into the commercial life of cities, but maintained
themselves by agriculture and the raising of sheep for wool; also by
such crafts as pottery and carpentry. In the Gospels and Apocrypha,
Joseph, the father of Jesus, is referred to as both a carpenter and a
potter. In the Apocryphal Gospel of Thomas and also that of
Pseudo-Matthew, the child Jesus is described as making sparrows out of
clay which came to life and flew away when he clapped his hands. The
Essenes were regarded as among the better educated class of Jews and
there are accounts of their having been chosen as tutors for the
children of Roman officers stationed in Syria. The fact that so many
artificers were listed among their number is responsible for the order's
being considered as a progenitor of modern Freemasonry. The symbols of
the Essenes include a number of builders' tools, and they were secretly
engaged in the erection of a spiritual
and philosophical temple to serve as a dwelling place for the living
God.
THE GREAT GEORGE AND COLLAR OF
THE GARTER.
From Ashmole's Order of the
Garter.
The Order of the Garter was
probably formed by Edward III in imitation of King Arthur's Knights of
the Round Table, which institution was hopelessly scattered after the
battle of Kamblan. The popular story to the effect that the Countess of
Salisbury's garter was the original inspiration for the foundation of
the order is untenable. The motto of the Order of the Carter is "Honi
soit qui mal y pense" (Shamed be he who thinks evil of it). St. George
is looked upon as the Patron of the order, for he typifies the higher
nature of man overcoming the dragon of his own lower nature. While St.
George is supposed to have lived during the third century, it is
probable that he was a mythological personage borrowed from pagan
mythology.
Like the Gnostics, the Essenes
were emanationists. One of their chief objects was the reinterpretation
of the Mosaic Law according to certain secret spiritual keys preserved
by them from the time of the founding of their order. It would thus
follow that the Essenes were Qabbalists and, like several other
contemporary sects flourishing in Syria, were awaiting the advent of the
Messiah promised in the early Biblical writings. Joseph and Mary,
the parents of Jesus, are believed to have been members of the Essene
Order. Joseph was many years the senior of Mary. According to The
Protevangelium, he was a widower with grown sons, and in the
Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew he refers to Mary as a little child less
in age than his own grandchildren. In her infancy Mary was dedicated to
the Lord, and the Apocryphal writings contain many accounts of miracles
associated with her early childhood. When she was twelve years old, the
priests held counsel as to the future of this child who had dedicated
herself to the Lord, and the Jewish high priest, bearing the
breastplate, entered into the Holy of Holies, where an angel appeared to
him, saying, "Zacharias, go forth and summon the widowers of the people
and let them take a rod apiece and she shall be the wife of him to whom
the Lord shall show a sign." Going forth to meet the priests at the head
of the widowers, Joseph collected the rods of all the other men and gave
them into the keeping of the priests. Now Joseph's rod was but half as
long as the others, and the priests on returning the rods to the
widowers paid no attention to Joseph's but left it behind in the Holy of
Holies. When all the other widowers had received back their wands, the
priests awaited a sign from heaven, but none came. Joseph, because of
his advanced age, did not: ask for the return of his rod, for to him it
was inconceivable that he should be chosen. But an angel appeared to the
high priest, ordering him to give back the short rod which lay unnoticed
in the Holy of Holies. As the high priest handed the rod to Joseph, a
white dove flew from the end of it and rested upon the head of the aged
carpenter, and to him was given the child.
The editor of The Sacred
Books and Early Literature of the East calls attention to the
peculiar spirit with which the childhood of Jesus is treated in most of
the Apocryphal books of the New Testament, particularly in one work
attributed to the doubting Thomas, the earliest known Greek version of
which dates from about A.D. 200: "The child Christ is represented almost
as an imp, cursing and destroying those who annoy him." This Apocryphal
work, calculated to inspire its readers with fear and trembling, was
popular during the Middle Ages because it was in full accord with the
cruel and persecuting spirit of mediæval Christianity. Like many other
early sacred books, the book of Thomas was fabricated for two closely
allied purposes: first, to outshine the pagans in miracle working;
second, to inspire all unbelievers with the "fear of the Lord."
Apocryphal writings of this sort have no possible basis in fact. At one
time an asset, the "miracles" of Christianity have become its greatest
liability. Supernatural phenomena, in a credulous age interpolated to
impress the ignorant, in this century have only achieved the alienation
of the intelligent.
In The Greek Gospel of
Nicodemus it is declared that when Jesus was brought into the
presence of Pilate the standards borne by the Roman guards bowed their
tops in homage to him in spite of every effort made by the soldiers to
prevent it. In The Letters of Pilate the statement also appears
that Cæsar, being wroth at Pilate for executing a just man, ordered him
to be decapitated. Praying for forgiveness, Pilate was visited by an
angel of the Lord, who reassured the Roman governor by promising him
that all Christendom should remember his name and that when Christ came
the second time to judge His people he (Pilate) should come before Him
as His witness.
Stories like the foregoing
represent the incrustations that have attached themselves to the body of
Christianity during the centuries. The popular mind itself has been the
self-appointed guardian and perpetuator of these legends, bitterly
opposing every effort to divest the faith of these questionable
accumulations. While popular tradition often contains certain basic
elements of truth, these elements are usually distorted out of all
proportion. Thus, while the generalities of the story may be
fundamentally true, the details are hopelessly erroneous. Of truth as of
beauty it may be said that it is most adorned when unadorned. Through
the mist of fantastic accounts which obscure the true foundation of the
Christian faith is faintly visible to the discerning few a great and
noble doctrine communicated to the world by a great and noble soul.
Joseph and Mary, two devout and holy-minded souls, consecrated to the
service of God and dreaming of the coming of a Messiah to serve Israel,
obeyed the injunctions of the high priest of the Essenes to prepare a
body for the coming of a great soul. Thus of an immaculate conception
Jesus was born. By immaculate is meant clean, rather than
supernatural.
Jesus was reared and educated
by the Essenes and later initiated into the most profound of their
Mysteries. Like all great initiates, He must travel in an easterly
direction, and the silent years of His life no doubt were spent in
familiarizing Himself with that secret teaching later to be communicated
by Him to the world. Having consummated the ascetic practices of His
order, He attained to the Christening. Having thus reunited
Himself with His own spiritual source, He then went forth in the name of
the One who has been crucified since before the worlds were and,
gathering about Him disciples and apostles, He instructed them in that
secret teaching which had been lost--in part, at least--from the
doctrines of Israel. His fate is unknown, but in all probability He
suffered that persecution which is the lot of those who seek to
reconstruct the ethical, philosophical, or religious systems of their
day.
To the multitudes Jesus spoke
in parables; to His disciples He also spoke in parables, though of a
more exalted and philosophic nature. Voltaire said that Plato should
have been canonized by the Christian Church, for, being the first
propounder of the Christos mystery, he contributed more to its
fundamental doctrines than any other single individual. Jesus disclosed
to His disciples that the lower world is under the control of a great
spiritual being which had fashioned it according to the will of the
Eternal Father. The mind of this great angel was both the mind of the
world and also the worldly mind. So that men should not die of
worldliness the Eternal Father sent unto creation the eldest and most
exalted of His powers--the Divine Mind. This Divine Mind offered Itself
as a living sacrifice and was broken up and eaten by the world. Having
given Its spirit and Its body at a secret and sacred supper to the
twelve manners of rational creatures, this Divine Mind became a part of
every living thing. Man was thereby enabled to use this power as a
bridge across which he might pass and attain immortality. He who lifted
up his soul to this Divine Mind and served It was righteous and, having
attained righteousness, liberated this Divine Mind, which thereupon
returned again in glory to Its own divine source. And because He had
brought to them this knowledge, the disciples said one to another: "Lo,
He is Himself this Mind personified!"
THE ARTHURIAN CYCLE AND
LEGEND OF THE HOLY GRAIL
JAKOB BÖHME, THE TEUTONIC
THEOSOPHER.
From William Law's Translation
of The Works of Jakob Böhme.
Jakob Böhme was born in the year 1575
in a village near Gorlitz, and died in Silesia in 1624. He had but
little schooling and was apprenticed at an early age to a shoemaker. He
later became a journeyman shoemaker, married and had four children One
day while tending his master's shoe shop, a mysterious stranger entered
who while he seemed to possess but little of this world's goods,
appeared to be most wise and noble in spiritual attainment. The stranger
asked the price of a pair of shoes, but young Böhme did not dare to name
a figure, for fear that he would displease his master. The stranger
insisted and Böhme finally placed a valuation which he was all that his
master possibly could hope to secure for the shoes. The stranger
immediately bought them and departed. A short distance down the street
the mysterious stranger stopped and cried out in a loud voice, "Jakob,
Jakob come forth." In amazement and fright, Böhme ran out of the house.
The strange man fixed his yes upon the youth--great eyes which sparkled
and seemed filled with divine light. He took the boy's right hand and
addressed him as follows--"Jakob, thou art little, but shalt be great,
and become another Man, such a one as at whom the World shall wonder.
Therefore be pious, fear God, and reverence His Word. Read diligently
the Holy Scriptures, wherein you have Comfort and Instruction. For thou
ust endure much Misery and Poverty, and suffer Persecution, but be
courageous and persevere, far God loves, and is gracious to thee."
Deeply impressed by the prediction, Böhme became ever more intense in
his search for truth. At last his labors were reworded. For seven days
he remained in a mysterious condition during which time the mysteries of
the invisible world were revealed to him. It has been said of Jakob
Böhme that he revealed to all mankind the deepest secrets of alchemy. He
died surrounded by his family, his last words being "Now I go hence into
Paradise."
According to legend, the body
of the Christos (the Spiritual Law) was given into the keeping of two
men, of whom the Gospels make but brief mention. These were
Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, both devout men who, though not
listed among the disciples or apostles of the Christos, were of all men
chosen to be custodians of His sacred remains. Joseph of Arimathea was
one of the initiated brethren and is called by A. E. Waite, in his A
New Encyclopædia of Freemasonry, "the first bishop of Christendom."
just as the temporal (or visible) power of the Holy See was established
by St. Peter(?), so the spiritual (or invisible) body of the faith was
entrusted to the "Secret Church of the Holy Grail" through apostolic
succession from Joseph of Arimathea, into whose keeping had been given
the perpetual symbols of the covenant--the ever-flowing cup and the
bleeding spear.
Presumably obeying instructions
of St. Philip, Joseph of Arimathea, carrying the sacred relics, reached
Britain after passing through many and varied hardships. Here a site was
allotted to him for the erection of a church, and in this manner
Glastonbury Abbey was founded. Joseph planted his staff in the earth and
it took root, becoming a miraculous thorn bush which blossomed twice a
year and which is now called the Glastonbury thorn. The end of the life
of Joseph of Arimathea is unknown. By some it is believed that, like
Enoch, he was translated; by others, that he was buried in Glastonbury
Abbey. Repeated attempts have been made to find the Holy Grail, which
many believe to have been hidden in a crypt beneath the ancient abbey.
The Glastonbury chalice recently discovered and by the devout supposed
to be the original Sangreal can scarcely be accepted as genuine by the
critical investigator. Beyond its inherent interest as a relic, like the
famous Antioch chalice it actually proves nothing when it is realized
that practically little more was known about the Christian Mysteries
eighteen centuries ago than can be discovered today.
The origin of the Grail myth,
as of nearly every other element in the great drama, is curiously
elusive. Sufficient foundation for it may be found in the folklore of
the British Isles, which contains many accounts of magic cauldrons,
kettles, cups, and drinking horns. The earliest Grail legends describe
the cup as a veritable horn of plenty. Its contents were inexhaustible
and those who served it never hungered or thirsted. One account states
that no matter how desperately ill a person might be he could not die
within eight days of beholding the cup. Some authorities believe the
Holy Grail to be the perpetuation of the holy cup used in the rites of
Adonis and Atys. A communion cup or chalice was used in several of the
ancient Mysteries, and the god Bacchus is frequently symbolized in the
form of a vase, cup, or urn. In Nature worship the ever-flowing Grail
signifies the bounty of the harvest by which the life of man is
sustained; like Mercury's bottomless pitcher, it is the inexhaustible
fountain of natural re source. From the evidence at hand it would indeed
be erroneous to ascribe a purely Christian origin to the Grail
symbolism.
In the Arthurian Cycle appears
a strange and mysterious figure--Merlin, the magician. In one of the
legends concerning him it is declared that when Jesus was sent to
liberate the world from the bondage of evil, the Adversary determined to
send an Antichrist to undo His labors. The Devil therefore in the form
of a horrible dragon overshadowed a young woman who had taken refuge in
sanctuary to escape the evil which had dcstroyed her family. When
Merlin, her child, was born he partook of the characteristics of his
human mother and demon father. Merlin, however, did not serve the powers
of darkness but, being converted to the true light, retained only two of
the supernatural powers inherited from his father: prophecy and miracle
working. The story of Merlin's infernal father must really be considered
as an allegorical allusion to the fact that he was a "philosophical son"
of the serpent or dragon, a title applied to all initiates of the
Mysteries, who thus acknowledge Nature as their mortal mother and wisdom
in the form of the serpent or dragon as their immortal Father. Confusion
of the dragon and serpent with the powers of evil has resulted as an
inevitable consequence from misinterpretation of the early chapters of
Genesis.
Arthur while an infant was
given into the keeping of Merlin, the Mage, and in his youth instructed
by him in the secret doctrine and probably initiated into the deepest
secrets of natural magic. With Merlin's assistance, Arthur became the
leading general of Britain, a degree of dignity which has been confused
with kingship. After Arthur had drawn the sword of Branstock from the
anvil and thus established his divine right to leadership, Merlin
further assisted him to secure from the Lady of the Lake the sacred
sword Excalibur. After the establishment of the Round Table, having
fulfilled his duty, Merlin disappeared, according to one account
vanishing into the air, where he still exists as a shadow communicating
at will with mortals; according to another, retiring of his own accord
into a great stone vault which he sealed from within.
It is reasonably certain that
many legends regarding Charlemagne were later associated with Arthur,
who is most famous for establishing the Order of the Round Table at
Winchester. Reliable information is not to be had concerning the
ceremonies and initiatory rituals of the "Table Round." In one story the
Table was endowed with the powers of expansion and contraction so that
fifteen or fifteen hundred could be seated around it, according to
whatever need might arise. The most common accounts fix the number of
knights who could be seated at one time at the Round Table at either
twelve or twenty-four. The twelve signified the signs of the zodiac and
also the apostles of Jesus. The knights' names and also their heraldic
arms were emblazoned upon their chairs. When twenty-four are shown
seated at the Table, each of the twelve signs of the zodiac is divided
into two parts--a light and a dark half--to signify the nocturnal and
diurnal phases of each sign. As each sign of the zodiac is ascending for
two hours every day, so the twenty-four knights represent the hours, the
twenty-four elders before the throne in Revelation, and
twenty-four Persian deities who represent the spirits of the divisions
of the day. In the center of the Table was the symbolic rose of the
Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the symbol of resurrection in that He
"rose" from the dead. There was also a mysterious empty seat called the
Siege Perilous in which none might sit except he who was
successful in his quest for the Holy Grad.
In the personality of Arthur is
to be found a new form of the ever-recurrent cosmic myth. The prince of
Britain is the sun, his knights are the zodiac, and his flashing sword
may be the sun's ray with which he fights and vanquishes the dragons of
darkness or it may represent the earth's axis. Arthur's Round Table is
the universe; the Siege Perilous the throne of the perfect man.
In its terrestrial sense, Arthur was the Grand Master of a secret
Christian-Masonic brotherhood of philosophic mystics who termed
themselves Knights. Arthur received the exalted position of Grand
Master of these Knights because he had faithfully accomplished the
withdrawal of the sword (spirit) from the anvil of the base metals (his
lower nature). As invariably happens, the historical Arthur soon was
confused with the allegories and myths of his order until now the two
are inseparable. After Arthur's death on the field of Kamblan his
Mysteries ceased, and esoterically he was borne away on a black barge,
as is so beautifully described by Tennyson in his Morte d'Arthur.
The great sword Excalibur was also cast back into the waters of
eternity--all of which is a vivid portrayal of the descent of cosmic
night at the end of the Day of Universal Manifestation. The body of the
historical Arthur was probably interred at Glastonbury Abbey, a building
closely identified with the mystic rites of both the Grail and the
Arthurian Cycle.
The mediæval Rosicrucians were
undoubtedly in possession of the true secret of the Arthurian Cycle and
the Grail legend, much of their symbolism having been incorporated into
that order. Though the most obvious of all keys to the Christos mystery,
the Grail legend has received the least consideration.
THE NIMBUS AND AUREOLE IN
SYMBOLISM.
From Audsley's Handbook of
Christian Symbolism.
The golden halos around the
heads of pagan gods and Christian saints refer both to their being
bathed in the glory of the sun and also to the fact that a spiritual sun
within their own natures is radiating its glow-ray and
surrounding them with celestial splendor. Whenever the nimbus is
composed of straight radiant lines, it is solar in significance;
whenever curved lines are used for beams, it partakes lunar nature;
whenever they are united, it symbolizes a, harmonious blending of both
principles. The circular nimbus is solar and masculine, while the
lozenge-shaped nimbus, or vesica piscis, is lunar and feminine.
The same symbolism is preserved in the circular and lozenge-shaped
windows of cathedrals. There is a complete science contained in the
shape, color, and adornments of the halos of saints and martyrs. A plain
golden ring usually surrounds the head of a canonized saint, while God
the Father and God the Son have a far more ornate aureole, usually
adorned with a St. George Cross, a flowered cross, or a lilied cross,
with only three of the arms visible.
back to top |
