Articles from the Religious Research Journal
2008
The Quest for the Holy Grail
by Tom Hemphill
Remember how you felt the first time you read or heard the story of the quest for the Holy Grail? It is an exciting and powerful tale – both as a classic adventure story and also as a metaphor for the sacred, inner journey that each of us must take in order to find our true selves.
The search for the Holy Grail is one of the great myths of western civilization; and the knight of that story is the archetype of a seeker – one who is steadfast in his commitment to his quest, who endures hardship and overcomes seemingly insurmountable challenges, and finally is successful. The archetype holds true whether the journey is external – to a place, or internal – to our deepest truth.
There have been many different tellings of the story of the quest for the Holy Grail; there are likewise many theories about what “the grail” really was or is. Shrouded in legend and mysticism, symbols and allusions, the grail remains just beyond our reach. Yet, the power of the grail story to catch our imagination – some 800 years after it was first written - is remarkable.
And “catch our imagination” is just what the grail story does. Dan Brown’s 2003 novel, The DaVinci Code - a modern-day thriller of mystery, intrigue, murder and mysticism – builds directly on one of the strands of the grail myth - namely, that Mary Magdalene was the wife of Jesus and bore him a son (and thus she is the “holy grail” that carried Jesus’ blood). The DaVinci Code was outsold only by the Harry Potter books, and is among the 20 best-selling books of all time. (I am neither supporting nor critiquing Brown’s thesis here; in any event it is a theory that is hardly new to the grail mystique.)
That this book has sold more than 60 million copies in some 44 languages should tell us something about the fascination deep in the human psyche for the quest of the sacred. And yet, why does this particular story speak to us so powerfully? And how does it happen that this book has become such a global best-seller in just the past few years? Could it be that we – the human race – are ready to “hear” the grail story not just as an ancient legend but as an articulation of our own truth?
The quest for the Holy Grail - a pre-Christian Celtic myth
I believe the answer to that enigma lies in the earliest stories about a quest for a grail – a cup or vessel with magical and transformative properties. It is generally accepted that the origins of the grail myth are Celtic and very old. That is, long before the time of Christ, there were Celtic legends of a great knight or knights who undertook such a quest. Although the grail story today is widely accepted as heavy with Christian symbolism and meaning, its actual origins are pre-Christian, among the ancient Celts who evolved into the Irish, Scots, Welsh, Bretons and other modern Celtic groups across Europe and the Mediterranean.
More than 2000 years ago, the leaders of various tribes of northern and western Europe were Druids. Druids performed both a social and a religious function and passed on by oral tradition the religious and spiritual beliefs of those societies. Both men and women were Druids, and women had extensive rights and authority in Druidic cultures.
(Julius Caesar wrote about the Druids in Gaul - modern-day France, plus portions of neighboring countries - in his famous Commentarii de Bello Gallico: "The principal point of their doctrine is that the soul does not die and that after death it passes from one body into another." How fascinating, that thousands of years ago, Druids – the spiritual leaders of the European ancestors of many modern-day Americans - believed in reincarnation!)
Many historians believe that the ancient Celtic quest stories were used by later writers – English, French and others – who adapted and modified the earlier legend in order to make it acceptable to their time and their culture. (Bear in mind that the first poems that led to later written versions of the grail story were published in 1180, when the Church of Rome was all-powerful. Putting the correct political spin on a story is hardly unique to our generation!)
So what is all this about? Simply this: the grail story as most of us have learned it over the years is the grail story written from roughly 1200 AD on – a “Christianized” version of an older Celtic myth. Not surprisingly, the later authors imbued the telling with aspects of their own respective cultures and societies.
But in doing so, I believe they lost some of the inherent truth in the original myth. For example, in the best-known versions, the bold knight achieves his quest alone or aided by a fellow knight. But in the original Celtic version, this is not what happened!
A woman joins our hero: the plot thickens.
In the original stories, the knight is accompanied and aided, not by another knight, but by a woman. Given that the legend grew out of a Druidic society, it is not surprising that a woman plays a key role in the hero’s success. And, given the powerfully male-dominated nature of the Catholic Church and of European societies during and after the medieval period, it is not surprising that this detail was changed to fit the audience.
In the “Christianized” version, instead of the man and the woman needing and aiding each other, only the man is present – and is self-sufficient. Does this sound familiar? The American cultural ideal is the tough guy – the “real man” – who does it all on his own. It is time to re-visit this flawed definition of the ideal man.
In one of the earlier versions of the legend, the young hero begins his quest accompanied by a woman – not a servant, but a strong, brave and honorable companion. Later, he finds it necessary to proceed without her. She is not pleased with his decision but accepts that he must do this thing.
Relying on his own strength and wits, the hero perseveres through trial after trial, hardship, loss and battle until he finally is very close to the goal. Then he is able to go no further. Unless the journey is completed, all is lost. Now the woman comes back to his side; only with her help and energy and wisdom is he able to complete his quest. After it is completed, they then rule the kingdom together; the final reward of their effort is not exclusively to him or to her but to their togetherness.
The role of the woman is critical to the hero’s success. In some versions of the story, she is captured by the enemy and must be rescued by the hero. Later in the story she comes to his rescue. When he has done all that he can – and fallen short of the goal – it is through her nurturing, wisdom, strength and clarity that they are able to complete what they must do. (Andrew Greeley’s 1975 novel, The Magic Cup, retells the story of the old Celtic myth which later became the quest for the Holy Grail.)
Only then do they live out the fullness of all that they share. They are still a man and a woman, but they are united as they were in the beginning; neither now struggles alone.
When we consider the grail story not as it was popularized by popes and kings during the Middle Ages, but back as it was originally voiced, we see a remarkable story of the human race. More importantly, we understand where we are now in humanity’s quest for our Holy Grail.
Who are human beings?
Dr. John taught that the human soul was originally evolved (by those we call the Christ Team) as a Child of God – “an individuated portion of God’s own beingness” - who would learn and grow through incarnations in the physical world, and in so doing would also serve as a means of redemption for evil. As Barbara Marx Hubbard puts it so charmingly, “We are ‘godlings’.”
When the human experiment was in the early design stage, it was thought that souls might incarnate not as male and female but as whole beings. Souls are – like their Creator – whole spiritual beings. However, it was seen that the work of surviving and evolving in the physical world and the wisdom of keeping aware of one’s higher nature were two very different assignments.
It seemed unlikely that one type of incarnate being could do well at everything that would be necessary in order for humanity to achieve its full potential. So each soul was designed to concentrate into one part of itself those skills and attributes which enable effective living in the physical, and into another part of itself those attributes and energy that would keep it aware that its true nature is spiritual – a part of the divine presence and process of all Life.
Into one half of the soul was concentrated such things as physical strength, courage, the ability to focus thinking and action on a single task, strategizing, competition and direct action. These are the skills that enable an incarnate soul not only to live in the physical but for the human race to survive and grow and become powerful in the physical world. When this half of a whole soul incarnates, it more typically does so in a male body; we call that human being a man.
Into the other half of the soul were concentrated the attributes of intuition, nurturing, bearing and caring for the young, the ability to do several tasks at once, cooperation and patience. These are the skills that raise the human from being “just another animal” and ensure that, even as humanity evolves and matures, it never loses its anchor in spiritual awareness. This half of a whole soul more frequently incarnates in a female body, and we call that human being a woman.
Each whole soul separates into these two groups of qualities – strength in earthliving and strength in spiritual awareness and growth. Each half of the whole soul incarnates in both genders. As Dr. John said, if the male half of the soul only incarnated as male and the female half only incarnated as female, the soul itself would become split apart, unable to meld all its aspects together, and no longer whole. Each half must experience physical life in both genders in order for the soul to be able to integrate this learning and grow by it.
It takes some 60 to 100 human lifetimes for each of the halves of the whole soul to experience, grow and mature so that the two portions of the soul can be reunited. The whole soul then progresses to higher levels of spiritual growth, no longer requiring incarnate experiences in order to do so.
To be clear, each incarnate human has aspects of both masculine and feminine natures. But the masculine (Earth survival, the energy of “doing”) skills are usually more pronounced in men, and the feminine (spiritual attunement, the quality of “being”) attributes more concentrated in women. Today, of course, more and more men and women are discovering and claiming their full heritage, and are celebrating the richness of integrated masculine-plus-feminine energy. It is no longer necessary for us to be as sharply divided as we previously were.
There is no preference in God’s plan for masculinity or femininity. Neither is more valued or more sacred than the other. Each has it strengths and limitations; neither is capable of doing all that is necessary for spiritual life to incarnate successfully in physical expression. Each is ultimately incomplete without the other. For fulfillment, each needs what the other has.
The masculine needed to be emphasized . . . for a time.
Dr. John explained that it was foreseen that the early days of humanity’s presence on the Earth would be very difficult. There was a real concern among the Christ Team that the rigors of Earth-living would be so strenuous that the human race would not be able to take hold and survive to achieve its divine purpose as a race of God-children.
It was feared that the human race would die out before it could fulfill its destiny as a species – a species of spiritual beings incarnating in material bodies. Therefore, Dr. John said, it was decided to emphasize the role of the masculine, so that the survival and eventual maturing of humanity might be better assured.
Is this a preference for masculinity? Hardly! Like feminine energy, masculine energy is essential to the whole but incomplete within itself. The true beauty of Life is found where masculinity and femininity are in full and enthusiastic interaction. The best visual representation of this is the taijitu, the yang-yin symbol found in Taoism:
The taijitu represents an ancient Chinese understanding of how the material world works. The outer circle represents the entirety of perceivable phenomena, while the black and white shapes within the circle represent the interaction of two principles or aspects, called "yin" (black, representing feminine) and "yang" (white, representing masculine), which cause the phenomena to appear in their peculiar way. Each of them contains an element or seed of the other, and they cannot exist without each other. The interrelatedness of masculine and feminine is well represented by the dark and light aspects of the taijitu.
Dr. John’s explanation of the importance of human survival in the harsh nature of the material world does explain why masculinity has appeared to be so very dominant throughout human cultures, throughout recorded history. With a few cultural exceptions, the domination (including abuse in many cases) of women by men has been seen not only to be acceptable but also necessary and the way that God wanted it. There was some truth in that, but only on a temporary basis (and without the abuse). For after humanity is well-established in Earth-living, as we 6.7 billion humans are today, then it is time for the balancing of masculinity and femininity to be accomplished.
And so we come to 2008.
The time of the Divine Feminine
Many of us in spiritual circles are aware of the increase in feminine energy among us – within ourselves and in society - in the past two or three decades. This change has not always been well understood.
Over the past 20 to 30 years, much has been written heralding this change as the time when feminine energy would take its rightful place as superior to masculine energy. All the problems of the world were blamed on masculine energy – and often on men (as though souls currently incarnate as women were never men themselves). It was implied that if only women had been in charge all these years, humankind would not have any problems. The rule of the feminine was seen as the panacea that would solve all of humanity’s problems. In essence, the Goddess was taking the place of God.
We were correct, I believe, to see the rise of divine feminine energy as timely (some might say long-overdue), appropriate and urgently needed. However, as I have written in previous issues of the Religious Research Journal, what is happening now is not that the masculine energy that has long been dominant is now being replaced by dominant feminine energy. The whole concept of one “dominating” the other is itself an expression of masculine energy. This is “old paradigm” thinking and misses the point. I believe the feminine nature of God seeks not to dominate so much as to heal, to love, to bond together and to bring abundant life to all of us.
She is not about domination. What is happening is about integration. Remember, masculinity and femininity are both expressions of God’s (or Goddess’s) nature. Neither is wrong or bad. As they are of God, they are both truly Good. But true Wholeness is only possible when they are united, balanced and integrated into each other.
Masculine energy is often equated with thinking and the rational mind. Feminine energy is often equated with feeling and the intuitive heart. Dr. Carol Parrish teaches that, “Mind without heart becomes cruel. Heart without mind becomes foolish.” Masculinity and femininity need each other for wholeness. And every one of us needs to accept and embrace our own wholeness – the blend of masculine and feminine that makes up our unique personality.
Masculine energy has brought humanity from the stone age to now. We have progressed from primitive beings to highly sophisticated, technologically capable beings. We have the power to destroy the Earth (beginning with atomic bombs in 1945) or to leave the Earth (the first moon walk in 1969). We could not have made this progress without strong masculine energy pushing us forward. Those who loathe masculinity forget that we are here – ready for the next step in our evolution as a species - precisely because of the strengths of masculinity over the past ten thousand years or more.
Integrating feminine and masculine –the quest for the divine
Nevertheless, it is time – right now - to seek healing, balance and integration. As Albert Einstein pointed out, humanity’s scientific knowledge has far surpassed our spiritual wisdom to use that knowledge wisely.
Masculinity alone can take us no further. Indeed, the dark side of masculinity has encouraged the vast greed that has created poverty, inequality, fear, war, and environmental destruction worldwide. Masculinity has done all it can; by itself, it cannot take us further. For humanity to advance now into all that has been prepared for us, the feminine in each of us must now lead. It is time.
Regular readers of this journal know that since the early 1990s I have been speaking and writing about the coming “Great Event.” It is known by many terms – the Second Coming of Christ, the conscious evolution of humanity, the Age of Aquarius, the New Paradigm. I believe that the evolution of humankind into the fullness of Life that was always intended for us is now about to be fulfilled. Today, humanity is essentially still in the womb of God – prepared, potentialled, and formed – but not evolved or fully alive. It is time for us to be born!
So what does this have to do with the story of the quest for the Holy Grail?
The grail story is about finding something so wonderful that it is almost beyond belief. In the pre-Christian Celtic version, the grail was a cup or bowl or plate with magical properties. In the later, most familiar version, the grail is the wine cup used by Christ at the Last Supper and/or the cup used to catch his holy blood (the sangreal) when he was on the cross. But what if the grail is in fact a metaphor – not a literal, physical cup?
You and I are seeking the Holy Grail.
I think the grail story is not really - or not merely - about finding the cup of Christ, or his distant secret descendants, or any of the other various literal explanations given to it. I think the grail story is about you and me, here and now, today. I believe the Holy Grail is the birth of humanity into its divine wholeness. The Holy Grail is the New Paradigm.
At the beginning of the Celtic grail story, the heroes – a man and a woman – begin together. At the beginning of the development of the race of spiritual being we call souls, masculine and feminine energy were together. They were one; each soul was (and is) a single whole spiritual being.
As the grail story continues, the man (representing the masculine energy of God) must take the lead. It is his task to face the dangers, fight the battles, endure the hardships, always reaching toward the goal of the journey, the fulfillment of the quest. The woman (representing the Goddess or the feminine energy of God) is still present, but she is in the background. For now, the man must lead, and often do so in great loneliness.
This is how Dr. John describes the early phase of incarnate humanity. From the beginning until fairly recently it has been necessary for the ability to survive physical life to be established before the wholeness of spiritual awareness could be added. Masculinity had to be in the foreground; feminine energy needed to be present but in the background.
Ah, but here’s the interesting bit. In the original grail story, the hero – having given the quest his very all – finally cannot make it on his own. When he is almost to achieve success, he faces defeat. All of his masculine skill and power is no longer enough. He is unable to complete the task. The quest may be lost.
Masculinity has brought to humanity the gifts of technology, science, modern living, creature comfort, etc. But masculinity alone does not have the ability to take us the whole way to our fulfillment as a species. It falls short.
At this point in the original grail story, the woman returns to the man’s side. They are again together as they were in the beginning of their journey. The challenges they now face require her leadership, her spiritual nature. The skills now needed are the skills of the feminine.
The masculine is now in a role of supporting or assisting the feminine. The emphasis shifts from doing (masculine) what is necessary to live in the physical, and expands to being (feminine) true to our nature as divine beings. The role of protagonist in the Celtic grail story shifts from the man (divine masculine energy) to the woman (divine feminine energy).
Is she thus finishing his task? No. It was never his task; it was always their task even if he was leading – and even if he sometimes lost the plot and thought he had to do it all himself! It is now her job to guide them to accomplish what they began together. If she does not do so, neither of them achieves the goal, the completion of the quest. Neither masculine nor feminine obtains the Holy Grail except together.
I believe the true importance of the grail story is that it is humanity’s story. It is our story of our struggle to come from primitive beginnings through millennia of hardship, difficulty and slow growth to this very moment in time.
Until now, we have been led by the masculine so powerfully that the importance and blessing of the feminine often became obscured and sometimes almost lost. Masculine energy has brought great goodness as well as great pain and loss to the human effort. The brilliance we possess as a species, as well as the mess our world is in - both are the result of strong masculine accomplishment.
(There are those who suggest that, had women been in charge for the past 10,000 years, we would not have this mess. It is true that if women had been in charge – and had humanity survived at all – we would not have this particular mess nor these particular technological marvels. Rather, we would have today a different set of high accomplishments and huge problems. Feminine energy by itself is no more capable than masculine energy by itself to “get it all right.”)
Masculine and feminine energy – fulfilled by each other.
There are two important concepts here. First, it was essential that masculinity lead the human effort in order that we would get to this point, that we would come today to where we are. We could not have got to this point with a preponderance of feminine energy. Feminine energy could not bring us here.
However, today we cannot go further without a huge infusion of divine feminine energy and leadership into the human race. Without the woman rejoining the man in the old grail story, all is lost. Masculine energy alone cannot take us the rest of the way.
To all the old paradigm men who see their manliness as superior to womanliness, and have put down women (and continue to do so), I say: “You miss the point.” Masculinity needed to lead for a time, yes, but only for a time. “If we keep doing what we have always done, we will keep getting what we have always gotten” – something far less than a wonderful, magical, spiritual new beginning for the human race!
To all the New Age women who see men as failures, and Woman as naturally, morally, spiritually superior to Man, I say: “You miss the point.” Masculinity needed to lead humanity for a time. Now femininity needs to lead – and She must do so, not as Maleness leads with force, but as Femaleness leads with compassion for all concerned.
Dr. John said that in the New Paradigm we will live in accordance with the will of God and the values of God. The world we now live in is not at all in accordance with God’s values or God’s Will. Merely exchanging masculine imbalance for feminine imbalance does not bring us closer to spiritual wholeness.
I have often asserted that the New Paradigm, the Kingdom of Love and Light, is not about the failure of masculine energy to be perfect and whole, nor about failed masculine energy to be replaced by perfect, whole feminine energy. Rather, the coming time of our wholeness is a time of the interconnectedness and cooperation of masculine and feminine energy within each of us so that Spirit may more completely and truly live in each of us and express through us.
I still believe that. But it seems there is an intermediate step. If we accept that the grail story is our story – that the hero’s quest for the magical or sacred is truly our quest to find our own sacredness, our own wholeness, our own divinity – then right now is the time for the feminine to step in and add her energy and loving-wisdom to the best that the masculine could do. It is not her place to fault him for being incomplete; she knows they are both incomplete without the other. In the story she honors him – indeed, she’s a bit amazed at how he could endure such hardships and overcome such huge obstacles.
But that which lies before them now is in her purview. He must follow her lead as they traverse these last challenges and together reach their shared fulfillment.
As Dr. Carol Parrish teaches, the challenge for us is not to reject the Christ as we have known him (as a male deity) and replace him with another – often called Feminine Wisdom, or Sophia (a female deity). Rather, now is the time to recognize the Wholeness of this Divine Being and to know that this One has been Whole all along. We have worshipped or honored Christ and Sophia separately; yet, this was always one and the same: a whole divine being, Christ-Sophia. We just didn’t see it.
Now is the time of transition.
Perhaps that is the whole point of this transition time we are in. Now is the time of the feminine coming to complete the shared work. According to the Mayan calendar, the “old world” ended in August of 1987; the next cycle of time will not begin until December of 2012. Whether these dates are precise or indicative, I do not know. But it seems most likely that right now is the time when the woman in the grail story joins the man; if she does not, both will surely die. Together they complete all that must be done so that together they enter into the high honor and blessing that has awaited them from the beginning of the story.
Let us therefore welcome the wholeness – the integration of divine masculine and divine feminine within each of us. Let us embrace all that is sacred, spiritual, loving and enlightening, while being watchful for that excitement which may simply be foolishness. And let us honor the masculine within each of us, knowing that our very existence today is gifted to us by masculine strength, courage, steadfastness and logic - and yet stay watchful for those excesses that may become cruelty.
We do not need masculine insecurity to deny or suppress our feminine truth. Nor do we need feminine shallowness that sees the masculine as nothing more than cruelty or suppression. Each of us needs to claim the wholeness that we truly are – light/dark, yang/yin, divine beings. Each of us needs to reach out in wholeness to nurture all that is good in each other.
In truth, we are each both masculine and feminine, for we are created “in the image and likeness of God.” Therefore let us be blessed by both and limited by neither. Our destiny as a living species is to know and live our full truth. That is what awaits us in the New Paradigm.
This is not new.
In February of 1962 there was a rare astrological formation in the heavens that was said to portend great things to come for humanity. In light of this, Dr. Franklin Loehr wrote the following comments in January, 1962 - nearly fifty years ago - to the Religious Research membership of that day:
“We bring you this month an Editorial which I hope is sane and sensible concerning the Feb. 5 astrological oddity. We are in the early days of a ‘New Age,’ yes - and this 25,000-year-rare conjunction of planets may well, as Dr. Robert De Luca says, foreshadow it. The N.Y. Sunday News (12-31-61) says ‘...it will be apparent to most of us that a new way of life is definitely on the way,’ and most of us would agree. But I'd like to mention very practical earthly movements which I think foreshadow the New Day perhaps more clearly than do the stars, for most of us.”
Dr. Loehr went on to write of the nascent Religious Research Foundation, describing it much as we do today: “Religious Research is an early but irrevocable step in the scientific revolution in religion, putting the spiritual nature of man and the spiritual laws of life on a factual basis and in understandable terms.” He also wrote of another organization describing it as , “ . . . a new movement devoted to bringing the masculine and feminine elements within individuals and within cultures and civilizations into a truer Oneness of Humanity.”
He concluded: “These are grassroots movements, coming not from the top down, but from the minds and hearts of men and women right where we live. This, I believe, is real reason for believing the New Age - a better age for us and our children - is on its way.”
For half a century, curious seekers have been building their awareness as well as their hunger for the great Goodness that lies ahead for humanity. Nearly fifty years ago, the Religious Research Journal was presenting such radical ideas as:
- A New Age is indeed on its way – not so much because the stars foretell it but because men and women are taking concrete steps to bring this into being.
- Religion and science are beginning to find common ground and inform each other rather than remaining unnecessary opponents.
- Masculine and feminine elements of society will find and establish a true “Oneness of Humanity.”
- This is not happening “top-down” – as from governments, corporations, churches, or other grand organizations - but quietly and simply, arising from the grass roots, from “ . . . the minds and hearts of men and women right where we live.”
I could not have said any of that any better than Dr. Loehr did back then. This is not news. All that I have written about the New Paradigm didn’t just happen yesterday. This movement, this tide, this energy of Love-in-action has been going on throughout our lifetimes.
There are jokes about the performing artist who struggles for years in small, out-of-the-way venues and bit parts, then is finally appreciated and discovered, and “suddenly” is a star, an “overnight sensation.” Likewise, the movement of those of us who glimpse and believe in the New Paradigm has been going on for a long time, in out-of-the-way venues, with little media attention or social respect. Suddenly we are mainstream.
An excellent example of the new public awareness is the recent movie, “What the Bleep Do We Know?” which presented a known reality mutually recognized by leaders of science and spirituality. A central theme of the movie was: religion and science do not see different things; rather, they see things differently; as each begins to listen to and grasp the viewpoint of the other, they see more and more clearly that their differences arise not from what they view but from where they view it.
Movies, books, periodicals, documentaries, television shows, retreat centers, public speakers of all kinds are now presenting what we in the spiritual community have quietly sought and known and taught. Using scientific terminology or religious concepts or fanciful imagination or media blather, they project various facets of a common vision – the one I call the New Paradigm.
And that is, I believe, what the ancient Druidic/Celtic story of the quest for the Holy Grail is all about. From where we are, we can begin to glimpse it. Standing in 2008, we can almost taste it. After fifty years of seeking, we already can understand some truths about it.
This is not wishful thinking. The New Paradigm is real. Led by God, we souls who are incarnate as human beings - we ourselves - have helped to make it so, to bring it about, to ensure that it will indeed be the future of humanity and Planet Earth.
It is time for humanity to complete the quest we began so many thousands of years ago. It is time for masculine and feminine humanity together to fulfill our divine purpose. It is time for us to finish the journey we have been on.
It is time to complete the quest for the Holy Grail.