The Holy Grail

[daniel]

Book review from today's Times.

According to Evola (and others), The Holy Grail is a "jewel that fell from Lucifer's crown."

Also I was wondering if anyone had read or thought about The DaVinci Code. I haven't read it, but I am curious about its focus on a repressed tradition of sacred sexuality in Christianity.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

February 20, 2004
BOOKS OF THE TIMES | 'THE HOLY GRAIL'

A Cup at the End of the Rainbow
By MICHIKO KAKUTANI
THE HOLY GRAIL
Imagination and Belief
By Richard Barber
Illustrated. 464 pages. Harvard University Press. $27.95.

he Holy Grail has become a popular metaphor for elusive perfection, for the most exalted or unattainable object of one's desire.

Scientists talk of the possibility of finding a theory of everything — that would unify general relativity and quantum mechanics — as the holy grail of physics. Marketers talk of interactive, targeted commercials as the holy grail of advertising. And the digerati talk of the development of intelligent machines as one of technology's holy grails.

In his fascinating if long-winded new book, the British medieval scholar Richard Barber examines how the concept of the Holy Grail evolved: from a literary device to an explicitly Christian symbol to its present-day incarnation as an all-purpose object of a quest. He examines how generations of writers and scholars have reinvented the story of the grail, and what their disparate interpretations reveal about the religious and literary conventions of the day.

Some of Mr. Barber's digressions into matters like the history of the Eucharist and the development of the chivalric code are overly arcane. And the lay reader may well question some of his theories: his dismissal of Jessie Weston's influential argument that the Grail had roots in pagan fertility rites, for instance, sounds cursory and cavalier, as does his larger rejection of folkloric approaches to the origins of the Grail.

For the most part, however, this book avoids the pitfalls of pedantry and scholarly grandstanding. Indeed Mr. Barber, the author of "The Penguin Guide to Medieval Europe" and "The Knight and Chivalry," demonstrates a gift for lucid, lively prose and an ability to make highly complex developments — cutting across religion, literature and politics — both immediate and accessible. He notes that Grail romances written at the end of the 12th century and the beginning of the 13th were "for a new social class, the knights, warriors whose influence and wealth depend on the lands they hold in return for their military service," and that they articulated "a new set of ideals to create a knightly culture." As for the church, it saw "the opportunity to secure its influence over these powerful and potentially disruptive men" and began "to develop a religious version of these secular ideals."

After Chrétien de Troyes wrote "The Story of the Grail" (left incomplete at his death in 1190), several other authors tried their hand at finishing his story or creating variations on it, and in the process, Mr. Barber writes, they "virtually invented a new art form, the prose romance, which many centuries later became the modern novel."

Chrétien's tale recounted the moral education of Perceval, a child of nature who witnesses the spectacle of the Grail, fails to ask a crucial question and learns that his lack of compassion has condemned the ailing Fisher King to continued suffering. It was essentially a bildungsroman about a knight's progress to maturity. In this story, Mr. Barber suggests, the Grail is primarily "a narrative device" used by the author "to summon up the impact of something unbelievably rich and strange on a naïve young man."

Subsequent variations on Chrétien's romance placed the story firmly within the Christian tradition, changing the focus from Perceval to the Grail itself, identifying it as "part of the central drama of the Christian faith — the Crucifixion of Jesus." Readers of these later Grail tales learn, Mr. Barber points out, that "Joseph of Arimathea was the Grail's guardian, and that it was the dish from which Christ ate at the Last Supper." In Robert de Boron's version, the Grail is identified as "the dish in which Joseph of Arimathea gathers the blood that flows from Christ's wounds after the body is taken down from the Cross."

Mr. Barber does a dexterous job of conveying the mood and texture of these variations on the Grail story, while at the same time illuminating the religious and political dramas that informed their creation. He shows how Grail narratives went out of fashion with the coming of the Reformation in the 16th century, and how a 19th-century renewal of interest in the Grail and Arthurian legends was fed by the works of Tennyson, the pre-Raphaelites and Wagner.

Mr. Barber explicates debates over the actual nature of the Grail (was it a dish or a chalice, a jeweled object or a more mysterious apparition?) and its function (was it an agent of healing and a provider of food, a gateway to the spiritual world, or a generic symbol of fertility or of kingly power?).

Though the current best seller "The Da Vinci Code" didn't make it into these pages, Mr. Barber provides a sweeping if cursory index of allusions to the Grail, in works ranging from T. S. Eliot's "Waste Land" to Steven Spielberg's "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" to "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." And he notes some of the more eccentric beliefs about the Grail: that it was once a jewel in Lucifer's crown; that it was a kind of flying saucer; that it was "a kind of cross between an earthly paradise and limbo, in which knights remain alive until the Last Judgement, and indulge meanwhile in sensual pleasures."

Although Mr. Barber's effort to provide a comprehensive history of the Grail results in a highly discursive narrative, the book still makes for engaging reading as both literary criticism and cultural history, thanks largely to the author's fluency and aplomb as a writer.

[*J*]

You're gonna love this story, Daniel.

When I was having a disastrous trip to Paris last November, I was in the train station changing my ticket around because of a series of unfortunate lessons from the Goddess involving a stolen wallet and the onset of heavy sickness. I noticed an American woman and her tiny, dwarfish little daughter, who was noticably headstrong, running around talking to people and being rambunctious. I overheard the mother tell the daughter not to talk to anyone around but her, as strangers are untrustworthy.

I felt drawn towards these two, and wishing to prove her wrong anyway, I approached them outside the office where the mother was camped out with her bags having a cigarette. Through the course of conversation, it turned out that she had been receiving spontaneous visions of mandalas (which she had never before been familiar with) and had been so moved by the sudden visitations in her life that she'd left her husband in Tennessee, taken up recreating her manadala visions as an artistic pursuit, and was now touring Europe for the first time with both her daughter and mother, who joined us mid-conversation.

I brought up Breaking Open the Head as a possible source for her to understand the energy which had infiltrated and profoundly altered her life, and asked if her and her daughter (who it became apparent was indeed a very special, gifted child) had had the typical shamanic pattern in their lives, i.e. a debilitating illness in early childhood, an outsider's social role, etc. and for both of them it was precisely the case. We also discussed Burning Man, and she was already interested in attending with her daughter next year.

She wrote down the name of the book and then began proselytizing about The Da Vinci Code, telling me I must read it as soon as possible. I promised I'd check it out, took a funny photo with the whole family, and went on my way. Upon returning to Prague and the pension I'd taken a room with 2 others in, I found that one of my flatmates had picked up The Da Vinci Code somewhere along her own travels and was now in the midst of devouring it, and of course telling me how much I need to read it.

After being passed along to someone else before me and then shuffled around, it is only this week that it finally wound up on my bookshelf and awaits my long-awaited assault presently. And appropriately full-circle, you yourself have brought it up here, I would suspect also at the same time my Paris acquaintance has finally gotten around to picking up your book as well.

I'll let you know what I make of it.

Cheers,

*J*

[Buzz]

Maybe we each have a Holy Grail.

[Agent Smith]

"I told 'im we already got one" *snicker*

[kris ifans]

Been a while since i read the Grail stories but a lot of it stuck in my memory. The authors, conciously or unconciously, dug up some pretty potent stuff.

Basically, the Fisher King has recieved a wound in the thigh/groin and as a result the land is wasted and there are famines and droughts and so on. The knights go on quests in search of the holy grail which will restore fertility to the land and to the king. This would relate the king to Osiris, Adonis etc.

The adventures of the knights often read like straight accounts of shamanic flights. Gave me loads to think about when i was a kid.

The stories are a real treasure house of imagery, and whether they have origins in oral tradition, or were invented by troubadours or gnostics or whatever is probably beside the point.

There are also powerful female characters in the stories, and strong undercurrents of paganism and sexuality beneath the Christian surface. See Gawain and the Green Knight for example.

[Helter Skelter]

I've read 'The DaVinci Code'. It's an interesting book if you are into learning about esoterica and secret societies, but I have to say that there is nothing liberatory about the book's ideology. The 'holy grail' is defined as the bloodline of Christ, which is said to have survived to this day as the various European monarchies which presently exist. Of course, this idea is diametrically opposed to the teachings of Jesus as found in the Gospels, which are explicitly anti-authoritarian, and in my opinion anarchistic. But if you want to learn more about these ideas they have interesting articles on the subject at http://www.dagobertsrevenge.com

[Buzz]

I'm seeing mushroom imagery everywhere now.
Cut the cap off of a mushroom invert it back on the stem, what do you have? A goblet. Another encrypted image of the sacrament of the early church.
John Allegro, (currently teaching at Harvard) wrote a book, The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross over 30 years ago which largely explores the history of the early church by going to the linguistic roots of scripture. I have often wondered why that book is no longer in print. The other day I was listening to the Dec. 22, 2003 interview with Arthur (on the Jeff Rense show). Arthur claims that a publishing house owned by the Catholic Church bought the company who owned the publishing rights to the book. They told him (Allegro) that the book would never again be reprinted, though it is in great demand. Itappears they purchased the company JUST to bury the book. It can still be found at some libraries, and online at Amazon.com, but its expensive.
I've also written elsewhere on line about the Egyptian ANK being an encrypted image of a mushroom.
It seems the most likely candidate for the specific mushroom is Amanita Muscaria. I'm wondering if anyone has had any experience worth note on that shroom?

[*J*]

Finished reading Da Vinci Code...

Without any mention whatsoever of psychedelics, shamanism, or Mayan cosmology, it manages to completely make the same case as Daniel and others have for the inevitable return to the Divine Feminine, the imminent dawning of a new era of humanity, and for the illusory nature of religion.

A fun read, also. Thought-provoking, but ultimately incomplete as all 'ultimate truth' stories seem to be.

*J*

[*J*]

Finished reading Da Vinci Code...

Without any mention whatsoever of psychedelics, shamanism, or Mayan cosmology, it manages to completely make the same case as Daniel and others have for the inevitable return to the Divine Feminine, the imminent dawning of a new era of humanity, and for the illusory nature of religion.

A fun read, also. Thought-provoking, but ultimately incomplete as all 'ultimate truth' stories seem to be.

*J*

[Buzz]

I mistakenly stated that John M. Allegro taught at Harvard. He is at Oxford.

[daniel]

very interesting about Allegro and his book - thanks, Buzz.

Another interesting book about the Amanita is by Andrei Puharich, wellknown as a psychic investigator. I can't recall the name at the moment - it might be "The Mushroom of Immortality." He gave it to psychics and they reconstructed Egyptian divination rituals using it. One psychic said that he couldn't take it again because the places it took him were so beautiful he feared he would never return. The Egyptian ritual involved eating it and making it into a paste spread on the temples and forehead.

I have never tried Amanita.

[lichen]

Have you read the book Buzz?
After making it my "Holy Grail" for a while, I finally found a paperback copy in my favorite secondhand bookshop for nix.
I was disappointed to say the least. It's the driest, most inaccessible book I've ever read. You've got to be an expert in ancient languages and texts(especially Sumerian), to even understand it and make your own mind up. One of the reasons it was so controversial was because it's unverifyable, it depends on subjective interpretation. I think it was initially written for scholars but a few years later the paperback was put out for the "heads".
Also, Allegro sees phallic symbols everywhere, which are interchangable with mushrooms, seemingly at whim . Penis is everything, everything is penis. Hey, I know they're important but the man's obsessed!
Check it out at a library.

[ March 20, 2004, 10:11 PM: Message edited by: lichen ]

[Buzz]

Daniel,
I believe Andre Puharich's book is entitled The Sacred Mushroom. At least someone recently e-mailed that title to me. I have never read that book. Andre was once a good friend of Uri Geller and wrote a book about him.
Interesting about the paste and smearing it on the forehead. Isn't that at least part of what Castenada described with the Datura paste that DJ brewed up?
I ordered some Amanita Muscaria from one of those alternative herb/legal hallucinagens places I found on the internet. I smoked it several times, getting only a slight light headed feeling. Then once when I was at my cabin in the mountains I ate a significantly larger portion than I ever smoked. I can't say it was the most potent hallucinagen I've ever ingested, but it had definite effects. I have never before read a book while tripping but on this occasion I did. I became completely engrossed in book I was reading. Instead of having an out of the blue experience the trip was guided by what I was reading, which was a very strange book called Transformation of a Common Man. Its about 6 or 7 hundred pages and I just happened to be at the best part where the character and author were in Tiahunaco (Lake Titicaca). I know I was reading but it was much more like being with those two characters. At the time, a few months back, I thought I had just read the most important book of my life. But the memory has faded some now and blended with oh so many other trips and books. One thing I definitely took away from the experience was TIKI VIROCOCHA.
I think the best authority, state side, on this variety of mushrooms is James Arthur. He has a book and several videos at his website but I haven't, as yet, read or seen any of them.

lichen,
I read the book a little over 30 years ago and yes it was a difficult read. I have been reading at it piece-meal over the last couple of months. Your criticism is shared by many who have read or attempted to read the book, so you are in good company. You may be looking at the sexual content from a contemporary moral point of view, however. On a funny note, Bill Maher (HBO Real Time) questioned one of his panel members on a recent show (discussing Janet Jackson/Superbowl halftime show/censorship), "Is this the nipple that broke the camel's back?"

One of the most disturbing dreams I have ever had was about a year ago. I was standing, nude looking down at my penis, which suddenly turned into a mushroom, dried up and feel off. I have to say that really bugged me for a while.

[gone]

Originally posted by Buzz:
One of the most disturbing dreams I have ever had was about a year ago. I was standing, nude looking down at my penis, which suddenly turned into a mushroom, dried up and feel off. I have to say that really bugged me for a while.!

In dreams mine tends to be either an earth-shaking Shiva Lingam or non existent – never anything in between. Make of that what you will.

[lichen]

No, morality has nothing to do with it at all.
I just don't like his philology. It seems as though he's making the meaning of words fit his theory. For example, according to Allegro the name "Hercules",that great "club-bearer"(his words), REALLY means Hercules had a huge schlong(my words,his interpretation). The fact that the club of Hercules was but one of his weapons doesn't get a mention. But it does bring a whole new image to mind when thinking of Hercules knocking out the lion with his "club". :D
Hercules is generally taken to mean something like glory or fame.
If penis' were all important to ancient peoples, in regards to their believes e.g. Allegro's big penis in sky(i.e. god), I'm sure there'd be more pictorial evidence, not to mention legends. But there's not, it's generally "mother goddess" related. He just passes over this. When man begins writing, we're told that it's what they REALLY think about god and word meanings suddenly become related to the phallus or mushroom(according to Allegro). Basically he ignores the pictorial evidence, in favour of his word interpretations.
Another one, a biggy, according to Allegro, the word "cannabis" REALLY means "red and white speckled mushroom top", in other words Amanita Muscaria. The Assassins weren't toking up big time on hash,no way, they were REALLY killing in a MUSHROOM frenzy!
But probably the biggest gripe I have with it is that I'm sure Gordon Wasson's "Soma:Divine Mushroom of Immortality", released in 1968, MUST have been the MAJOR influence on Allegro's theory, which was released in 1970. But Wasson doesn't even get a mention, not even a credit - there's no bibliography in my copy at all. Soma gets only a passing mention.

Anyway, enough of my bitching.

James Arthur is someone I've got a bit more time for. His pictorial evidence definately gives food for thought and I'll certainly never think of Christmas in the same way again!

And Buzz, don't go exposing yourself in daylight or it might just happen and you definately wouldn't want to get fly-blown. ;)

[daniel]

just wanted to mention my idea that Janet Jackson's exposure of nip was an important noospheric event. It signified that Kali is beginning to unveil herself as her world age comes to an end.

The golden cup out of which the Whore of Babylon drinks the "disgusting filth of her fornication" is another Grail image. The Grail symbolizes the completion of the great work, the union of opposites, hierosgamos, the psychic event that brings the Apocalypse to a riproaring end.

[lichen]

Who would of thought that such a storm in a B-cup would have such significance? Or was that a C-cup?

[TT]

I have not read the DaVinci Code, but the storyline of the book is basicly appropriated from a non-fiction bestseller published over 20 years ago, HOLY BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL
by Michael Baigent, Henry Lincoln, and Richard Leigh. It was the first popular work that reported on the Prieure de Sion, the Merovingian pretenders to the French throne, and the concept of Grail as Christ Bloodline.

As much as I am facinated with the concepts laid out there, paricularly with the idea of the Knights Templar as a underground Gnostic Cell within the body of Crusader-Era Europe (complete with the disembodied head of John The Baptist giving them their orders!), my biggest problem with the whole thing is the paltry goals of the so-called decendants of the divine...restoring the monarchy in France is the best they could come up with? Perhaps Da Vinci Code ups the ante somewhat...

For me, the most interesting message coming from all of this is a return of focus to The Magdelene, sole witness to the resurrection. The church later conflated her story with a lot of unnammed women in the gospels...the woman who washed Jesus' feet with her hair was not identified with Maggles until the 500's. Some see the church as trying to pin her as a sensualist, even a whore, in able to muddy her power as Christ's most important witness (intially scoffed out by the other deciples when she reported the Ressurection), and reduce her central narrative to the simple salvation of a sinner. Others I talk too are rather disapointed that their sexy image of her could very well be Paulist fiction.

So there are two rehabilitation movements afoot...one that seeks to hold her up as a serious, chaste, proto-feminist apostle, the ultimate witness to Christ's divinity...and one that radically seeks to transform her carnal image into one of magical, earth shaking fertility as the mother of Christ' offspring.

All cool stuff, obviously.

I'll read DaVinci soon, and perhaps I'll have more on this then.

[Buzz]

Lichen and I brought up James Arthur, ethnomycologist and expert of Amanita Muscaria. Jeff Rense interviewed him on 12/22/03. if you would like to listen go to:

Jeff Rense (http://www.soundwaves2000.com/rense/pastarchives.html)

click on Dec. 2003, then scroll down to 12/22/03 show, choose windows or realplayer.

I believe the photos that Rense and Arthurs refer to (and lichen as well) are at the following page:

Jeff Rense (http://www.rense.com/mushr/images.htm)

[lichen]

Thanks for the links Buzz. There are a few new pics. there.
I was thinking of the one's from James Arthur's own site - jamesarthur.net, which you can get to from the bottom link you gave.
He used to have a lot of his book "Mushrooms and Mankind" up on it. A few pages are still there.
There is some fantastic stuff on it.
Well worth checking out if you haven't already.

[TT]

Just read "The Da Vinci Code." Has anyone else read it? What are y'alls thoughts?

for me, it was a nice antidote for "the passion".
it's rather badly written, but that hardly seems the point...

TT

[Anistara]

Hey all! 93's and what have you...

This is a topic I am very involved in personally (who isn't?). Where I live there are many sub-sect groups working for this cause in great stride, revealing sub rosa, ley lines and medicine wheels, star knowledge, portals and our natural way home to the Divine Mother.

I can suggest these for further investigation:

The Hiram Key (http://edgarcayce.com/cgi-bin/edgarcayce/hiramkey.html)

The Wingmakers (http://www.wingmakers.com)

Walk in Balance,
Anistara

[gone]

Somewhat similar, an expedition this summer to finally clear up the case of Noah’s Ark in Turkey. I heard the guy running the project on the radio this morning and he was not the Creationist Crackpot you might think. It actually sounded highly plausible.

Scientists to search for Noah's ark on Turkish mountain

Expedition will study 'man-made object' shown by satellite photos

Nick Paton Walsh in Moscow
Monday May 3, 2004
The Guardian

The CIA calls it the "Ararat anomaly". Mountaineers call it the peak of the unforgiving range on the Turkish-Armenian border. But some scientists think it might hold a far greater historical significance as the great archaeological mirage - the remains of Noah's ark.

Ten explorers and scientists from the US and Turkey will embark on an expedition on July 15 to scale Mount Ararat, 4,700 metres (15,000ft) above sea level, to determine what is behind the image that has been picked up by spy satellites in the past two decades.

New satellite pictures suggest a huge 14-metre-high structure that was exposed when the heatwave that hit Europe last summer melted the snowcap that had obscured it for years.

The expedition will be led by Ahmet Ali Arslan, an English professor at Seljuk University in Turkey. An experienced mountaineer, he has already scaled Mt Ararat 40 times and grew up around the mountain range.

"The slopes are very, very harsh and dangerous on the northern face - it is extremely challenging, mentally and physically," said Mr Arslan, who was once a prime-ministerial aide.

The expedition can only occur with the consent of the Turkish government, and Mr Arslan will meet the prime minister next week to discuss the proposed trip. The estimated cost is £500,000 and will be met by Daniel McGivern, a businessman and Christian activist from Hawaii.

At a press conference to announce the trip this week he said: "We are not excavating it. We're going to photograph it and, God willing, you're all going to see it."

"These new photos unequivocally show a man-made object," he added. "I am convinced that the excavation of the object and the results of tests run on any collected samples will prove that it is Noah's ark."

Mr McGivern's Trinity Corporation last year used Quick Bird, the world's highest resolution satellite, to photograph the anomaly.

He has said he is 98% sure that the object is the ark, because of beams of wood he said were visible in the images.

The Bible says that the ark, packed with either seven or two of each creature, male and female, on earth, came to rest on the mountains of Ararat after the great floods - thought to have occurred in 5,600BC, when the Mediterranean flooded into the basin where the Black Sea now sits.

Sceptics have pointed out that Noah would have had to load 460 organisms a second to fill the ark with two of each species in 24 hours as the Bible suggests.

The object on Mount Ararat was first noticed by the CIA in 1949 from a spy plane.

Turkish pilots saw it again 10 years later, and the pictures began to reinforce the myth around the vessel, giving Christians apparent archeological evidence that part of Genesis could be physically substantiated.

The region was off limits until 1982 because of Soviet complaints that explorers were spying. Since then, teams of explorers have tried to reach the ark, but failed to substantiate what the object is.

Geologists have discovered evidence of a flood in the region known as Mesopotamia in Sumerian times (6,000 years ago), yet have maintained that it is not possible for a ship to have made landfall at an altitude as high as that of Mt Ararat.

[willoweyes]

Well, my crap detector is blinking. Obviously, some creative fellows are getting a rich guy to finance an adventure. The story as it lies has inconsistencies--was the mysterious object uncovered by global warming, or spotted in the 40s? And they can see wood grain? We all know how tricky satellite photos can be--just ask Colin Powell. I hope the guys have fun.

Now, back to the Da Vinci Code. I just read it. I have to say that the writing style gave me hope that I, too, can someday publish a novel. However, the message was powerful, and well worth the assault on my taste. Humans must open their eyes and take responsibility for their lives--it is childhood's end. The message was sort of diluted by the whole damsel in distress trope, but hey, it sold books and got the thought out to millions.

[Buzz]

Haven't read the book (DaVinci Code) yet, but I understand that Ron Howard is already making a movie about it.

And as far as Noah's ark being way up on that mountain, there is not enuf water in the world to float it up there. The seas rose about 300 feet when the ice age ended 10,000 or so years ago. I've read that if every bit of ice in the world melted that the seas would rise about another 300 feet, so unless that mountain is still rising.......

[ May 24, 2004, 11:17 AM: Message edited by: Buzz ]

[Buzz]

Just occured to me, that perhaps a Hebrew temple in the shape of an ark was constructed up there at some point in the distant past.

[gone]

Such little faith! I want it to be real, not to prove any biblical agenda but just to mix it up a bit.

[Anistara]

davinci codes-
true, simple story, even an eighth grader might read it, and understand...

(btw, many damsels are in distress)

the arc? it's all very transcendental, imo.

[willoweyes]

Anistara, your reply made me realize what I really liked about the Da Vinci Code. After reading it (for awhile, anyway) I walked around thinking, "Hey, even I could be a descendant of Mary Magdeline!" While this revealed truth does not speak well for my fantasy life, it does point out an empowering notion presented by the novel. The spark--the royal blood of a savior--runs through all our veins. We do not eat the flesh, we are the flesh. The healing of the world is in our hands.

[Anistara]

Indeed.

You can chalk it all up Now. We're all us. Ever was. The idea that we are separate and apart from all the icons of lore is a ploy to keep us separated when we're not. The Jesus and Mary chain
is extended back and forth through time like Isis and Osiris, which according to codes, is where the Holy Grail can be found, in the Master/Queens Chamber, Mary and Isis, Venus too. And all the rest, outwardly, now we just go In and this whole plan it is quite some artsy business, lol.

I find all of this to be interesting,
I AM... LOL.

[Slow Dancer]

The Grail is the Throne of God.
It is the vessel that passed the blood, like seed into future eternity.

Isis & Osiris equal Magda/Christ

The Woman, The Female, is required to look after the slain god, even as Mary was at the crucifixion, throughout egpytology you find women playing the same role, even Nefertiti & Akhenaten.
Without the Goddess, the God has no vessel or harbor.

The Eternal Timeless Moment is called Utopia Rapture. Utopia is Nuit, Rapture Hadit.
This Eternal Timeless Moment is touched at by men, and prophets, but those who touch this moment often, and secure its operation in the Soul, these are the members of the Transcendental Sub Rosa.

The Grail lies beyond a place called The Golden Hall of the Secret Sun.
This mystery is also closely bound to the Native American Medicine Wheel.

This area is touching at sinlessness and genderlessness, and agelessness.
"unless ye become as little children again, ye will not pass into heaven"

[Morning*Star67]

Dan browns "Da Vinci code" is so full of errors and outright lies it is amazing it is even selling ... but p.t.barnum said "a fool was born every minute." IF one knows real history the book is very shallow indeed ...

First off: Scholars always believed Jesus was God/Man ... that was not a Constantine/Vatican made up story ..the first century Christians believed it to be true. You do not die for a man so he can open the goddess within.

Second: the Gnostics were very evident even in Pauls time ... the apostles fought against gnosticism all thru their ministries ...It was very prevalent to believe esoterically ..the new age is just the old age spruced up ...

Also the writings that Brown talks of [gospels of Thomas and MM] were always known about in the early church. They were judged by the time they were written [which was in the 2nd century] which was too far from Jesus' time ..
The books that became "canon" were written by the ones who were with our Lord [Matthew, John], or ones who were desciples of the apostles of our Lord [ Luke, Mark].
All the "canon" of the NT was written well before 100 AD.

Mary Magdalene was not a whore!
Nor was she Jesus' wife ...nor did Jesus appear to her [after the crucifixtion] because she was his wife.
He appeared to her to give women a new standing in the world of men. She became a desciple of Jesus, after she had "seven demons" cast out of her by Jesus; and then she gave to support His ministry out of her own money.
She would have had to be a wealthy woman to do that.
Some say she, and Susanna and Johanna also, were married to influential men of the time.
Some scholars even have suggested she MAY have been Jesus Aunt thru Mary his mother!

And also Art historians know who is in the Da Vinci painting .. they have LDV's notes and sketches and the early proofs ... and IT IS a very young JOHN ..And since Da Vinci was who is was [probably homosexual] ... his males look feminine.[Also John was about 17 at the time he followed Jesus.]

As to the "sacred feminine" lets be plain ... Brown is intimating that the "goddess within" is found by having sex ..
IN other words ... forget marriage ... they are intimating that Jesus had sex with magdalene to make the goddess within become evident in their lives ...to reach a higher plain of existance and to find "secret knowledge". Forget the Grail and the spurious bloodline.

BTW the bloodline story was a big fat HOAX ..all the documents of "holy blood holy grail" have been proven false!The head of the "priory of zion" admitted it was for power!
The French did something right!

The Jesus that BROWN and his laughable characters create; is a man not even worth anyones respect. Because Browns's Jesus USED Mary of Magdala for his higher attainment of occult power! :confused:
A lot of even obscure things like the dates of things being found ... brown is in error.
So if you want to read a "mystery story" filled with historic inaacuracies ..go ahead ..
Even the "liberal scholars" are starting to denounce the scholarship of Brown's Da Vinci code!

I read it BTW and liked the book ... but knew he was taking a lot of dramatic license with things to make the plot feasable. He also BELIEVES in the GODDESS thing!
As an aside ...I also will go and see the movie if Harrison Ford plays the lead ... then it would be worth $7 to $9. ;)

[daniel]

I think he meant it to be a novel, not a historical text. What is interesting is not the book so much but the incredible audience it has found. It is poorly written and undramatic, so it seems that it must be the subject that is grabbing people. And I think it is this underlying mystery surrounding sexuality and sacred sexuality that is causing a mass reaction, like a soft spot in the collective unconscious. Harry Potter is not so different. Because the mainstream will not allow for serious discussion of these areas, they are consumed as mass entertainments.

[Wio]

HOLY GRAIL or SAN GRAIL.. is the bloodline of the family of REPTILES.. mostly referring to this in the MEROVINGIAN LINES>> which were not the DAVID line..
the DAVID LINE was more the SIRIAN DOG TRIBE>> OF EA>.both SIRIAN MOTHER AND FATHER.. not REPTILIAN

the HUMAN DNA is OWL BIRD TRIBES.. it depends on which BLOODLINE they are talking about..

in the ENGLISH LANGUAGE DICTIONARIES.. there is a reference to the

VING = WINGED HOUSE

MEROVINGIAN and the MEROWIOVINGIAN
or MEROWIOWING

the two houses in EGYPT of the flying feathers where considered.. to be the REPTILIAN HOUSE ruled by the UREA.. which had a snake symbol .. but EA was dog.. rather a strange. word for that

however the two houses were the REP HOUSE and the OWL BIRD TRIBE HOUSE

WIOLA refers to OWL BIRD TRIBE BLOODLINE of the HU

and MER to the REP BLOODLINE..

Dan Winter has also written extensively about this.. but i do not agree with him necessarily.
in his books the san grayle.. etc.

ah ho WIOLAWA

[Anistara]

I agree, it's a novel, not to be confused with Holy Blood, Holy Grail. People have a difficult time reading between the lines, hence, sub rosa. i found it to be quite transcendent for a mainstream best seller. So do thousands of others.

I just received Angels and Demons today, hope its as fun as the other, I hear it is.
i am also reading Woman with the Alabaster Jar. I've heard a lot of people disgrunt it too. I am enjoying it thoroughly...

Wheres that grail??? Lol. Who hid the Covenent? Did they get married or not? Lol. Was it a trick or no?

Totally!!! Yea! All of thee above, hope we get to the bottom of things... !!! :D

[ July 15, 2004, 10:09 PM: Message edited by: Anistara ]

[Anistara]

May I suggest a video as well then, Secrets of the Bird Tribes, not to be confused with Return of the Bird Tribes, lol. Those darn Wingmakers! (http://www.wingmakers.com)

Reptilians and Starfire, we need an update on some old programs now... download.

Oh yea, hey there Phoenix from Arizona, hmmm... Phoenix. Coincidence? Thunderbirds... ;)

"As to the "sacred feminine" lets be plain ... Brown is intimating that the "goddess within" is found by having sex .."

This would be implying some sort of ritual tantra, ancient ritual that is pretty much, um, important when discussing union. It is the divine experience, union between the opposites. I think that was the point he was making. Sex magic.

[ July 15, 2004, 10:15 PM: Message edited by: Anistara ]

[Anistara]

"He also BELIEVES in the GODDESS thing!"

Could you elaborate? There are many holes in your statements, or atleast back them up. Are you pulling this stuff from deeper research or is it a personal matter? It is for me, very personal, not what you are saying but uniting the feminine with the masculine (per se, equalizing balance) which is not believing in the goddess thing, but restoring mother nature. What is the goddess thing? Lol. The holy grail maybe?

[Anistara]

I am fortunate to live in an area where various esoteric teachings present themsleves any night of the week.

I had the pleasure to meet Mark and Andrea Pinkham upon my return to the southwest, several times actually, meer coincidences I might add.
When I met them, they were just dining in a restaurant I wait table at a couple nights a week.
As we chatted about certain prophecy and so on Mark gave me his card:

Mark Amaru Pinkam: Co-Director International Order of Gnostic Templars. Hmmm... funny thing about that is I was making the "calls" just the other evening and how'd they end up here?! Lol.
(and i keep running into them, just passing by, lol!!)

Tonight Mark will be lecturing on his new book:
"Guardians of the Holy Grail: The Knights Templar, John the Baptist, and the Water of Life"
And I am very much looking forward to it!

I hope to share something new and interesting with you in a few days.

Thanks y'all!
Anistara

http://www.sedonacreativelife.com/pre0311.html

http://www.lauralee.com/index.cgi?search=%22Mark%20Amaru%20Pinkham%22]Audio ( [url) on demand, Laura Lee Show[/url]

[ August 10, 2004, 05:47 AM: Message edited by: Anistara ]

[gone]

The never-ending search
By Brendan O'Neill

Fascination with the Holy Grail has lasted for centuries, and now the Bletchley Park code-breakers have joined the hunt. But what is it that's made the grail the definition of something humans are always searching for but never actually finding?

Could an obscure inscription on a 250-year-old monument in a Staffordshire garden point the way to the Holy Grail - the jewelled chalice reportedly used by Jesus and his disciples at the Last Supper?

That is one theory entertained by Richard Kemp, the general manager of Lord Lichfield's Shugborough estate in Staffs.

Kemp has called in world-renowned code-breakers to try to decipher a cryptic message carved into the Shepherd's Monument on the Lichfield estate.

The monument, built around 1748, features an image of one of Nicholas Poussin's paintings, and beneath it the letters "D.O.U.O.S.V.A.V.V.M."

It has long been rumoured that these letters - which have baffled some of the greatest minds over the past 250 years, including Charles Darwin's and Josiah Wedgwood's - provide clues to the whereabouts of Christ's elusive cup.

Spot of bother

Poussin was said by some to have been a Grand Master of the Knights Templar, named after the order that captured Jerusalem during the Crusades and who were known as the "keepers of the Holy Grail".

Yet Oliver and Sheila Lawn, a couple in their 80s who were based at the code-breaking Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire during World War II, have had a spot of bother with the Shepherd's Monument.

Mr Lawn said yesterday that deciphering the letters was "much more difficult" than cracking the Enigma code in WWII. He thinks it's a message from an obscure Christian sect, declaring their belief that Jesus was an Earthly prophet, not a divinity - while his wife Sheila thinks it could be a coded tribute from a widowed earl to his wife.

So yet another trail to the Grail seems to have run dry. What is it about the Holy Grail that so excites the popular imagination? And why are so many willing to believe that such an item exists, when there is a dearth of evidence?

Renewed interest

The Holy Grail is believed by some to have been the chalice used at the Last Supper, by others to have been a cup used by Joseph of Arimathea to catch the blood of the crucified Christ, and by others still to have been both. Some claim that Joseph may have brought the cup to Britain in the first century CE.

Stories about the Grail have been told for centuries. There has been a renewed interest since the publication of The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail in 1982, which claims, in a nutshell, that Jesus survived the crucifixion and together with Mary Magdalene founded a bloodline in France, the Merovingians, who were protected by the Knights Templar and later by the Freemasons. (Perhaps unsurprisingly, that book has been denounced as mad conspiracy-mongering by some.)

The probability that the cup found its ways to Joseph and that he travelled with it to Britain is as near as nil as makes no difference
Eric Eve
The Holy Grail has even turned up in Hollywood. In Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the eponymous hero both fights off the Nazis and finds the Grail.

Now Ron Howard, the Happy Days actor turned film director, is making a big-screen version of The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown's novel about how clues in Da Vinci paintings could lead to the discovery of a religious mystery, including the Grail, and shake the foundations of Christianity. Brown's novel has become a publishing phenomenon over the past two years, feted and hated in equal measure.

Purely legendary

According to experts, this is precisely where the Grail belongs - in fiction and films. Eric Eve is a tutor in theology and a New Testament scholar at Oxford University. He says he is unaware of any evidence for the existence of a Holy Grail.

"In the version of the legend I know, the Grail is meant to be the chalice Jesus used at the Last Supper, subsequently brought to England by Joseph of Arimathea. But there is no 1st Century evidence about what happened either to the chalice or to Joseph - assuming he's even an historical character.

"The probability that the cup found its ways to Joseph and that he travelled with it to Britain is as near as nil as makes no difference. I would say it is purely legendary."

Richard Barber, author of The Holy Grail: The History of a Legend, published by Penguin next month, says the Grail legend came into being more than a thousand years after Christ's death.

"It is pure literature. It was imagined by a French writer, Chretien de Troyes, at the end of the 12th Century, in the romance of Perceval. His vision is at the root of all the Grail stories."

Conspiracy theories

Barber believes that 20th Century fascination with the Grail stems from "the revival of interest in medieval literature in the 19th Century, when Tennyson, Wagner and the Pre-Raphaelite artists were all enthusiasts for the Grail legends" - and that our fascination today has been boosted by the contemporary penchant for conspiracy theories and cover-ups.

"The Grail - because it is mysterious and has always belonged in the realms of the imagination - is a marvellous focus for the new genre of 'imagined history', the idea that all history as taught and recorded is a vast cover-up. Once this kind of idea becomes current, particularly with the internet, it acquires a life of its own - regardless of whether it has any basis in reality.

Even some of those who have written of the Grail as having some "basis in reality" admit that it is difficult to say what the Grail is, never mind where it is.

Erling Haagensen is co-author (with Henry Lincoln) of The Templars' Secret Island: The Knights, The Priest and The Treasure, which claims that "something" is hidden on the tiny island of Bornholm in the Baltic Sea.

"I do not know what the Holy Grail is," says Haagensen. "Something very important and with strong connections to the Holy Grail is hidden on the island of Bornholm. The Ark of the Covenant might theoretically be hidden there.

"But there is something even more important, which always followed the Ark of the Covenant, and which we can now prove is found at Bornholm. This will be revealed in our coming book," he adds, mysteriously.

Yet while some authors - and a host of conspiracy websites - believe that "something" will one day be found, even men of the cloth have little faith in the existence of the Holy Grail.

"It's all good fun but absolute nonsense", says Richard Holloway, former Bishop of Edinburgh. "The quest for the Holy Grail belongs with the quest for the ark Noah left on Mount Ararat or the fabled Ark of the Covenant Indiana Jones is always chasing. There ain't any objective truth in any of it - but of course it's a dream for publishers, who know the world is full of gullible people looking for miracles and they keep on promising that this time the miracle's going to come true.

"Only it isn't - but the money keeps rolling in."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/4044765.stm

Published: 2004/11/26 11:07:07 GMT

[Slow Dancer]

here is crowleys liber cheth
the book of the holy graal

1. This is the secret of the Holy Graal, that is the sacred vessel of our Lady the Scarlet Woman, Babalon the Mother of Abominations, the bride of Chaos, that rideth upon our Lord the Beast.
2. Thou shalt drain out thy blood that is thy life into the golden cup of her fornication.
3. Thou shalt mingle thy life with the universal life. Thou shalt keep not back one drop.
4. Then shall thy brain be dumb, and thy heart beat no more, and all thy life shall go from thee; and thou shalt be cast out upon the midden, and the birds of the air shall feast upon thy flesh, and thy bones shall whiten in the sun.
5. Then shall the winds gather themselves together, and bear thee up as it were a little heap of dust in a sheet that hath four corners, and they shall give it unto the guardians of the abyss.
6. And because there is no life therein, the guardians of the abyss shall bid the angels of the winds pass by. And the angels shall lay thy dust in the City of the Pyramids, and the name thereof shall be no more.
7. Now therefore that thou mayest achieve this ritual of the Holy Graal, do thou divest thyself of all thy goods.
8. Thou hast wealth; give it unto them that have need thereof, yet no desire toward it.
9. Thou hast health; slay thyself in the fervour of thine abandonment unto Our Lady. Let thy flesh hang loose upon thy bones, and thine eyes glare with thy quenchless lust unto the Infinite, with thy passion for the Unknown, for Her that is beyond Knowledge the accursed one.
10. Thou hast love; tear thy mother from thine heart, and spit in the face of thy father. Let thy foot trample the belly of thy wife, and let the babe at her breast be the prey of dogs and vultures.
11. For if thou dost not this with thy will, then shall We do this despite thy will. So that thou attain to the Sacrament of the Graal in the Chapel of Abominations.
12. And behold! if by stealth thou keep unto thyself one thought of thine, then shalt thou be cast out into the abyss for ever; and thou shalt be the lonely one, the eater of dung, the afflicted in the Day of Be-with-Us.
13. Yea! verily this is the Truth, this is the Truth, this is the Truth. Unto thee shall be granted joy and health and wealth and wisdom when thou art no longer thou.
14. Then shall every gain be a new sacrament, and it shall not defile thee; thou shalt revel with the wanton in the market-place, and the virgins shall fling roses upon thee, and the merchants bend their knees and bring thee gold and spices. Also young boys shall pour wonderful wines for thee, and the singers and the dancers shall sing and dance for thee.
15. Yet shalt thou not be therein, for thou shalt be forgotten, dust lost in dust.
16. Nor shall the aeon itself avail thee in this; for from the dust shall a white ash be prepared by Hermes the Invisible.
17. And this is the wrath of God, that these things should be thus.
18. And this is the grace of God, that these things should be thus.
19. Wherefore I charge you that ye come unto me in the Beginning; for if ye take but one step in this Path, ye must arrive inevitably at the end thereof.
20. This Path is beyond Life and Death; it is also beyond Love; but that ye know not, for ye know not Love.
21. And the end thereof is known not even unto Our Lady or to the Beast whereon She rideth; nor unto the Virgin her daughter nor unto Chaos her lawful Lord; but unto the Crowned Child is it known? It is not known if it be known.
22. Therefore unto Hadit and unto Nuit be the glory in the End and the Beginning; yea, in the End and the Beginning.