ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE...the mark of a "junction" between two traditional forms two traditional forms, one ancient and the other new at the time, the Celtic and the Christian tradition

Arthur Edward Waite (October 2, 1857 - May 19, 1942) was an American-British occultist. A.E. Waite joined the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in 1891 and the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia in 1902. Waite joined the Outer Order of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in January 1891 after being introduced by E.W. Berridge.[5] In 1893 he withdrew from the Golden Dawn. In 1896 he rejoined the Outer Order of the Golden Dawn. In 1899 he entered the Second order of the Golden Dawn. He became a Freemason in 1901,and entered the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia in 1902. Waite was interested in the higher grades of Freemasonry and saw initiation into Craft Masonry as a way to gain access to these rites. After joining the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia and the Knights Templar, Waite traveled to Switzerland in 1903 to receive the Régime Ecossais Rectifié or the Rectified Scottish Rite and its grade of Chevalier Bienfaisant de la Cité Sainte (C.B.C.S.). Waite believed that the Rectified Scottish Rite, more than any other Masonic Rite, represented the "Secret Tradition" of mystical spiritual illumination.

In 1903 Waite founded the Independent and Rectified Order R. R. et A. C. This Order was disbanded in 1914. The Golden Dawn was torn by internal feuding until Waite's departure in 1914; in July 1915 he formed the Fellowship of the Rosy Cross,[7] not to be confused with the Societas Rosicruciana. By that time there existed some half-dozen offshoots from the original Golden Dawn, and as a whole it never recoveredWhen he became Grand Master of the Order in 1903, changing its name to the "Holy Order of the Golden Dawn", many members rejected his ideas on the primacy of mysticism over magic, and a rival group, the "Morning Star", seceded under the leadership of William Butler Yeats. The Golden Dawn was torn apart by numerous internal conflicts until Waite's departure in 1914. Arthur Edward Waite was a British poet and scholarly mystic who wrote extensively on occult and esoteric matters, and was the co-creator of the Rider–Waite tarot deck (also called the Rider–Waite–Smith or Waite–Smith deck). As his biographer R. A. Gilbert described him, "Waite's name has survived because he was the first to attempt a systematic study of the history of Western occultism—viewed as a spiritual tradition rather than as aspects of protoscience or as the pathology of religion."

He was a Freemason, as well as being a member of the SRIA and Golden Dawn.

He spent most of his life in or near London, connected to various publishing houses and editing a magazine, The Unknown World.

Waite was a prolific author of occult texts on divination, Rosicrucianism, Freemasonry, black and ceremonial magic (goétie and théurgie), Kabbalah and alchemy; he also translated and republished several mystical and alchemical works. His work on the Holy Grail, influenced by his friendship with Arthur Machen, is remarkable. Some of these books, such as the "Book of Ceremonial Magic", "The Holy Kabbalah", and the "New Encyclopedia of Freemasonry", have recently gone out of print.

René Guénon dissociates himself from this somewhat arranged Grail: "Mr. Arthur Edward Waite has published a work on the legends of the Holy Grail which is impressive in its scope and in the amount of research it represents, and in which all those interested in this question will find a very complete and methodical exposition of the content of the many texts that refer to it, as well as of the various theories that have been proposed to explain the origin and the meaning of these highly complex legends, which are sometimes even contradictory in some of their elements. It should be added that Mr. Waite did not intend his work to be purely scholarly, and he is to be commended for this, for we fully agree with him that any work that does not go beyond this point of view is of little value and can only be of "documentary" interest; his aim was to bring out the real, "inner" meaning of the symbolism of the Holy Grail and the "quest". Unfortunately, we have to say that this side of his work is the least satisfactory; in fact, the conclusions he reaches are rather disappointing, especially when we consider all the hard work that went into reaching them; and it is on this point that we'd like to make a few observations, which will naturally relate to questions we've already dealt with on other occasions". ...
"It's no insult to Mr. Waite, we believe, to say that his work is somewhat one-sighted. to say that his work is somewhat one-sighted. "partial"? That might not be strictly accurate, and in any case, we don't we don't mean that it's intentionally one-sided; rather, it's something of that...There would rather be something of the fault so common among those who, having "specialized" in a certain order of study, are inclined to reduce everything to it, or to neglect that which cannot be reduced to it. That the Grail legend is Christian is certainly not in dispute, and Mr. Waite is right to affirm it; but does this necessarily prevent it from being something else at the same time? Those who are aware of the fundamental unity of all traditions will see no incompatibility here; but Mr. Waite, for his part, only wants to see what is specifically Christian, thus locking himself into a particular traditional form whose relationship with the others, precisely because of its "inner" side, seems to escape him.It's not that he denies the existence of elements of another origin, probably pre-dating Christianity, for that would be to go against the evidence; but he accords them very little importance, and seems to regard them as "accidental", as having been added to the legend "from outside", and simply as a result of the environment in which it developed. These elements are therefore regarded by him as belonging to what is commonly called folk-lore, not always out of disdain as the word itself might suggest, but rather to satisfy a kind of contemporary "fashion", and without always realizing the intentions involved; and it's perhaps worth stressing this point a little."..."The very concept of folklore, as it is usually understood, is based on a radically false idea, the idea that there are "popular creations", spontaneous products of the mass of the people; and we can immediately see the close relationship of this way of seeing things with "democratic" prejudices. As has been rightly said, "the profound interest of all so-called popular traditions lies above all in the fact that they are not popular in origin"; and we would add that, if they are, as is almost always the case, traditional elements in the true sense of the word, however distorted, diminished or fragmentary they may sometimes be, and things of real symbolic value, all this, far from being of popular origin, is not even of human origin. What can be popular is only the fact of "survival and, in this respect, the term folk-lore takes on a meaning quite similar to that of "paganism", taking into account only the etymology of the latter, and with less "polemical" and insulting intent. The people thus retain, without understanding them, the remnants of ancient traditions, even
Sometimes, these traditions go back so far as to be impossible to determine, and for this reason, they are often considered to belong to the obscure realm of "prehistory"; in this way, they fulfil the function of a kind of more or less "subconscious" collective memory, the content of which has clearly come from elsewhere. What may seem the most astonishing is that, when we get to the bottom of things, we find that what is preserved in this way contains above all, in a more or less veiled form, a considerable amount of esoteric data, i.e. precisely everything that is inherently less popular; and this fact suggests an explanation that we will limit ourselves to indicating in a few words. When a traditional form is on the verge of extinction, its last representatives may well voluntarily entrust to this collective memory what would otherwise be lost without return; in short, this is the only way to save what can be saved to a certain extent; and, at the same time, the natural incomprehension of the mass is a sufficient guarantee that what once possessed an esoteric character will not be stripped of it for that reason, but will remain only, as a kind of testimony of the past, for those who, in other times, will be able to understand it. Having said this, we see no reason to attribute to folk-lore, without further examination, everything that belongs to traditions other than Christianity, the latter alone being an exception; such seems to be Mr. Waite's intention, when he accepts this denomination for the "pre-Christian", and particularly Celtic, elements found in the Grail legends. In this respect, there are no privileged traditional forms; the only distinction to be made is between those that have disappeared and those that are currently alive; and, consequently, the whole question would come down to knowing whether the Celtic tradition had really ceased to live when the legends in question were formed. This is at least questionable: on the one hand, this tradition may have been maintained for longer than is generally believed, with a more or less hidden organization, and, on the other hand, these legends themselves may be older than the "critics" think, not because there were necessarily texts now lost, in which we have little more faith than M. Waite, but because they may first have been the object of oral transmission, which may have lasted several centuries. Waite, but because they may first have been the subject of oral transmission, which may have lasted for several centuries, which is far from exceptional. For our part, we see here the mark of a "junction" between two traditional forms two traditional forms, one ancient and the other new at the time, the Celtic
and the Christian tradition, a junction by which what had to be preserved from the of the former was incorporated into the latter, albeit modified to some extent to a certain extent, in outward form, by adaptation and assimilation, but not by being transposed onto another plane, as Mr. Waite would have us believe, for there are equivalences between all regular traditions.
than a simple question of "sources" in the scholarly sense. It
It may be difficult to pinpoint exactly where and when this junction took place, but this is of secondary interest and almost exclusively historical; it's easy to see, moreover, that these are the sort of things that leave no trace in written "documents". Perhaps the "Celtic" or "Culdean" Church deserves more attention in this respect than Mr. Waite seems inclined to give it; its very name might suggest as much; and there's nothing implausible in the fact that behind it there was something of another order, no longer religious, but initiatory, for, like everything that relates to the links existing between different traditions, what we're dealing with here necessarily belongs to the initiatory or esoteric domain. Exotericism, religious or otherwise, never goes beyond the limits of the traditional form to which it properly belongs; what goes beyond these limits cannot belong to a "Church" as such, but the latter can only be its external "support"; and this is a remark to which we shall have occasion to return later. We should therefore do here exactly the opposite of what Mr. Waite does, who, stopping at external and superficial explanations, which he accepts with confidence as long as it is not a question of Christianity, sees meanings radically different and unrelated to each other where there are only more or less multiple aspects of the same symbol or its
various applications; no doubt it would have been different if he had not been hampered by his preconceived idea of a sort of heterogeneity of Christianity in relation to other traditions. Likewise, Mr. Waite rightly rejects, with regard to the legend of the Grail, theories which appeal to so-called “gods of vegetation”; but it is regrettable that it is much less clear with regard to ancient mysteries, which never had anything in common with this “naturalism” of completely modern invention; the “gods of vegetation” and other stories of the same kind only ever existed in the imagination of Frazer and his ilk, whose anti-traditional intentions are not in doubt."...? "There is no doubt that Arthur Edward Waite was a master at symbolic interpretation of ancient symbolism, both pre christian and christian. The book of "The Holy Grail: History, Legend And Symbolism" is to accent the research that Waite has compiled on the search for the Holy Grail. An excellent work, well worth the effort for study and like Indiana Jones father, you can undertake the pursuit from this point." :) It is at the core of all Western culture: the story of the Holy Grail, the secret history of Christianity and the grand quest to find it that informs everything from tales steeped in centuries, such as the legend of King Arthur, to the most modern popular fiction, like The Da Vinci Code. In this highly readable but densely informative work, Waite, a preeminent 19th-century expert in esoterica, explores all the literature dedicated to this "legend of the soul" from both an intellectual and a spiritual perspective, seeking out the elemental through-lines of this most fundamental of stories as well as a mystical essence of Christianity itself. Students of folklore, readers of fantasy-quest fiction, and seekers after religious truth will all find this a vital resource. American-born British occultist and author ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE.
"The true legitimacies are for the most part in exile, or otherwise with their rights in abeyance. The real canons of literature can be uttered only behind doors or in the secrecy of taverns. The secrets of the great orthodoxies are very seldom communicated, even to epopts on their advancement. The highest claims of all are not so much wanting in warrant as wanting those spokesmen who are willing to utter them. We shall not be surprised, therefore, to find that the custodians of the Holy Graal, which was a mystery of all secrecy, "there where no sinner can be," despite the kingly titles ascribed to them, sometimes abode in the utmost seclusion. Let us seek in the first instance to realise the nature and the place of that Castle or Temple which, according to the legend, was for a period of centuries the sanctuary of the Sacred Vessel and of the other hallowed objects connected therewith. It is in the several locations of the Hallows that we shall come at a later time into a fuller understanding of their offices and of the meanings which may lie behind them. They are not to be regarded exactly as part of the mystery of the Castle; but at least this is more than a casket, and between the container and the things contained, distinct though their significance may be, there are points of correlation, so that the one throws light on the other. We have seen that the Vessel itself was brought from Salem to Britain, and it follows from the historical texts that the transit had a special purpose, one explanation of which will be found ready to our hands when the time comes for its consideration. The Castle is described after several manners, the later romances being naturally the more specific, and we get in fine a geographical settlement and boundary. In the Chrétien portion of the
p. 129 [paragraph continues] Conte del Graal, Perceval discovers the Castle in a valley, wherein it is well and beautifully situated, having a four-square tower, with a principal hall and a bridge leading up to the chief entrance. In some of the other legends the asylum is so withdrawn that it is neither named nor described. The Early History of Merlin speaks of it not less simply as the place where they had the Holy Vessel in keeping. According to the Didot Perceval, it is the house of the Rich King Fisherman; it is situated in a valley; it has a tower, and is approached by a bridge. It might be a tower merely, for the description is not less vague than many accounts of the Cup. One of the late Merlin texts says merely that the Holy Vessel is in the West--that is, in the Land of Vortigern, or that it abides in Northumbria. Another says that the Castle is Corbenic; but though we hear a good deal concerning it, there is no description whatever. The section of the Conte del Graal which is referable to Gautier de Doulens says that it is situated on a causeway tormented by the sea. The building is of vast extent and is inhabited by a great folk. We hear of its ceiling, emblazoned with gold and embroidered with silver stars, of its tables of precious metal, its images and the rich gems which enlighten it. In a word, we are already in the region of imaginative development and adornment, but it is all mere decoration which carries with it no meaning beyond the heavy tokens of splendour. Manessier furnishes no special account, and Gerbert, who has other affairs at heart than solicitude about a material building or desire to exalt it into allegory, leaves it unsketched entirely. The Book of the Holy Graal is the only French text which contains in a methodical account the building of the Holy House. The first wardens have passed from the land of the living, and Alain le Gros is the keeper of the Blessed Vessel. The actual builder is a certain converted king of Terre Foraine, and there is a covenant between him and Alain, one condition of which p. 130
is that the Graal shall remain in his kingdom. The Castle on its completion is given the mystic name of Corbenic, in obedience to an inscription which is found blazoned on one of the entrance gates. The name is said to signify the Treasury of the Holy Vessel. The Graal is placed in a fair chamber of the Castle, as if on an altar of repose, but, all his munificence notwithstanding and all the sacramental visions which he sees in the Holy Place, beating of birds' wings and chanting of innumerable voices, the king is visited speedily for his mere presence and receives his death-wound at the very altar: it is the judgment of the sanctuary on those who desecrate the sanctuary by carrying, however unwittingly, an unhallowed past therein, and it recalls the traditional conclusion of the Cabiric Mysteries, wherein the candidate was destroyed by the gods. Setting aside an analogy on which I am by no means insisting, the event was the beginning of those wonders which earned for Castle Corbenic the name of the Palace Adventurous, because no one could enter therein, and no one could sleep, its lawful people excepted, without death overtaking them, or some other grievous penalty. The prose Lancelot is in near correspondence with Chrétien, representing the Castle as situated at the far end of a great valley, with water encircling it. On another occasion it is named rather than described, and visited but not expounded, but we learn that it is situated in a town which has many dwellers therein. In the Quest of Galahad it is a rich and fair building, with a postern opening towards the sea, and this was guarded by lions, between which a man might pass only if he carried the arms of faith, since the sword availed nothing and there was no protection in harness. For the visitor who was expected or tolerated, it would seem that all doors stood open, except the door of the sanctuary. But this would unclose of itself; the light would issue from within; the silver table would be seen; and thereon the Holy Vessel, covered with drapery of samite. There also on a day p. 131 might be celebrated, with becoming solemnity, the Great Mass of the Supersanctified, and this even in the presence of those who were not clean in their past, so only that they had put away their sin when they entered on the Quest. It was thus beheld by Lancelot, though he lay as one dead afterwards, because of his intrusion. So also the welcome guest had reason to know that the court of King Pelles held a great fellowship in the town of Corbenic. But there were other visitors at times and seasons who saw little of all this royalty, like Hector de Marys, who--brother as he was to my lord Sir Lancelot--found the doors all barred against him and no warden to open, long as he hailed thereat. The most decorative of all the accounts is, however, in the Longer Prose Perceval, where the Castle is reached by means of three bridges, which are horrible to cross. Three great waters run below them, the first bridge being a bow-shot in length and not more than a foot in width. This is the Bridge of the Eel; but it proves wide and a fair thorough-way in the act of crossing. The second bridge is of ice, feeble and thin, and it is arched high above the water. This is transformed on passing into the richest and strangest ever seen, and its abutments are full of images. The third and last bridge stands on columns of marble. Beyond it there is a sculptured gate, giving upon a flight of steps, which leads to a spacious hall painted with figures in gold. When Perceval visited the Castle a second time he found it encompassed by a river, which came from the Earthly Paradise and proceeded through the forest beyond as far as the hold of a hermit, where it found peace in the earth. To the Castle itself there were three names attributed: the Castle of Eden, the Castle of Joy and the Castle of Souls. In conclusion as to this matter, the location, in fine, is Corbenic--not as the unvaried name, but as that which may be called the accepted, representing the Temple at its highest, and corresponding in French romance to Montsalvatch, in p. 132
[paragraph continues] German--which our late redaction of the Book of the Holy Graal mentions specifically, and which, all doubtful clouds of mystic adventure notwithstanding, looms almost as a landmark in the Lancelot and the Quest of Galahad.
must speak very lightly of the German cycle, because, through all these branches, it is understood that I shall deal with it again. In the Parsifal and Titurel the Temple is completely spiritualised, so that it has ceased almost to be a house made with hands, though the descriptions on the external side are here and there almost severe in their simplicity. On that side it has the strength of a feudal fortress, turret by turret rising. In the master-hall of the palace there is something of Oriental splendour--carpets and couches and cushions, marble hearths burning strange fragrant woods, and a great blazing of lights. So far the Parsifal of Wolfram, but we must turn to other texts for the building of the Temple--which is after another manner than anything told of Corbenic in the Northern French cycle. The building was the work of Titurel, the first King of the Graal, and in answer to his prayers the High Powers of Heaven prepared the ground-plan of the Holy Place and furnished the raw material. Over the construction itself the powers of earth toiled by day and the Powers of Heaven by night. The floor was of pure onyx; at the summit of the tower there was a ruby surmounted by a cross of crystal, and carbuncles shone at the meeting-points of the great arches within. The roof was of sapphire, and a pictured starry heaven moved therein in true order. We are on a different level when we have recourse to the poem of Heinrich, which presents several anomalies in respect of the literature as a whole. The road leading to the Graal Castle was one of harsh and hazardous enterprise--world without end; but it brought the questing hero at some far point into a plenteous and gracious land, where rose the Palace of Desire, looking p. 133 beautiful exceedingly, with a meadow before it which was set apart for joust and tournament. A great concourse of knights and gentlewomen abode in the burg, and for the Castle itself we are told that there was none so fair. Though it will be seen that there is nothing distinctive in this account, as it is here reduced into summary, the design is among many things strange, for if it is not the Castle of Souls it is that of a Living Tomb, as the story concerning it will show at the proper time. So did the place of the mysteries, from a dim and vague allusion, become "A wilderness of building, sinking far
And self-withdrawn into a wondrous depth
Far sinking into splendour." [paragraph continues] We can scarcely say whether that which had begun on earth was assumed into the spiritual place, or whether the powers and virtues from above descended to brood thereon. I have left over from this consideration all reference to another spiritual place, in Sarras on the confines of Egypt, where the Graal, upon its outward journey, dwelt for a period, and whither, after generations and centuries, it also returned for a period. As this was not the point of its origin, so it was not that of its rest; it was a stage in the passage from Salem and a stage in the transit to heaven. What was meant by this infidel city, which was yet so strangely consecrated, is hard to determine, but its consideration belongs to a later stage. It is too early again to ask what are the implicits of the great prose Perceval when it identifies the Castle of the Graal with the Earthly Paradise and the Place of Souls; but we may note it as a sign of intention, and we shall meet with it in another connection where no one has thought to look for it.
THE INSTITUTION OF THE HALLOWS, AND, SECONDLY, THE VARIATIONS OF THE CUP LEGEND
We have seen that the secret of the Graal, signifying the super-substantial nourishment of man, was communicated by Christ to His chosen disciple Joseph of Arimathæa, who, by preserving the body of his Master after the Crucifixion, became an instrument of the Resurrection. He laid it in the sepulchre, and thus sowed the seed whence issued the arch-natural body. On Ascension Day this was removed from the world, but there remained the Holy Vessel, into which the blood of the natural body had been received by Joseph. Strangely endued with the virtues of the risen Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost, it sustained him spiritually, and by a kind of reflection physically, during forty years of imprisonment, through which period he was in that condition of ecstasy which is said by the Christian masters of contemplation to last for half-an-hour--being that time when there is silence in heaven. We find accordingly that Joseph had no sense of duration in respect of the years; he was already in that mystery of God into which the ages pass. After his release the Holy Vessel became a sign of saving grace, instruction and all wonder to that great company which he was elected to take westward. He committed it in fine to another keeper, by whom it was brought into Britain, and there, or otherwhere, certain lesser Hallows were added to the Hallow-in-chief, and were held with it in the places of concealment. Those which are met with most frequently, as we have p. 90 seen, are four in number, but the mystery is really one, since it is all assumed into that vessel which is known for the most part as the Cup of legend. It is understood that for us at least this Cup is a symbol, seeing that the most precious of all vessels are not made with hands. It is in such sense that the true soul of philosophy is a cup which contains the universe. We shall understand also the ministry of material sustenance, frequently attributed to the Holy Graal, after another manner than that which can be presumed within the offices of folk-lore. It is in this sense that the old fable concerning the Bowl of Plenty, when incorporated by the Graal Mystery, may prove to have a profound meaning. Some things are taken externally; some are received within; but the food of the body has analogies with that of the soul. So much may be said at the moment concerning certain aspects which encompass the literature of the Graal, as the hills stand round Jerusalem. The four Hallows are therefore the Cup, the Lance, the Sword and the Dish, Paten or Patella--these four, and the greatest of these is the Cup. As regards this Hallow-in-chief, of two things one: either the Graal Vessel contained the most sacred of all relics in Christendom, or it contained the Secret Mystery of the Eucharist. Now, the first question which arises is whether the general description which obtains concerning it--as I was almost about to say, in the popular mind--reposes on the authority of the texts. Here also will be found our first difficulty. I may not be pardoned such flippancy, but the Psalmist said: Calix meus quam inebrians est, and this has rather a bearing on the Graal chalice; for the variety of the accounts concerning it may produce in the mind a sense of having visited some inn of strange description where those who come to ask questions are served with strong measures, and full at that. There are three available sources of information concerning the Sacred Vessel, including those which are purely of the Eucharistic office. (1) The apocryphal p. 91 legends concerning Joseph of Arimathæa which are distinct from those that have been incorporated with the romances of chivalry and with the histories leading up to these. (2) The romances themselves and their prolegomena, which are the chief bases of our knowledge, but on the understanding that there is no criterion for the distinction between that which is traditional and that which is pure invention. (3) Some archæological aspects of sacramental practice. The apocryphal legends which connect Joseph with the cultus of the Precious Blood are late, and they lie under the suspicion of having been devised in the interests of Glastonbury, or through Glastonbury of ecclesiastical pretensions on the part of the British Church at or about the period of Henry II. Above these as a substratum of solid fact--I refer to the fact of the inventions--there has been of late years superposed an alleged dream of a pan-Britannic Church, which belongs, however, more particularly to the romance of history. The chivalrous romances themselves have so overlaid the Graal object with decorations and wonder-elements that the object itself has been obscured and its nature can, in some cases, be extricated scarcely. Eucharistic archæology remains as a source of information on which it is possible to rely implicitly, but while this can satisfy us as to the variations in the form and matter of the Sacred Vessel used in the Sacrifice of the Mass, it does not offer us, except indirectly, much or perhaps any assistance to determine the relic of legend.
The Evangelium Nicodemi, Acta [vel Gesta] Pilati, and some other oriental apocryphal documents are the authorities for the imprisonment of Joseph by the Jews because he had laid the body of Christ in the sepulchre. William of Malmesbury, John of Glastonbury and similar makers of chronicles are responsible for referring the first evangelisation of Britain to Joseph of Arimathæa. From these, however, we must except Geoffrey of Monmouth, and William of Malmesbury has nothing p. 92 to tell us of the Graal, though he has the story of two phials containing the Precious Blood. The reference to relics of any kind is also late in the chronicles. An English metrical life of Joseph, belonging to the first years of the sixteenth century, but drawing from previous sources, shows how the precious blood was collected by that saint and received into two cruets, which we find figuring at a later period in the arms of Glastonbury Abbey. One of these sources, though perhaps at a far distance, may have been the lost book attributed to Melkin or Mewyn, which gives an account of these cruets. The tradition supposes (1) that they were buried at Glastonbury, (2) that they will be discovered concurrently with the coffin of Joseph, and (3) that thereafter there will be no more drought in Britain. John of Glastonbury is one of the authorities for the existence of a book of Melkin--sometimes identified with the Chronicle of Nennius. The more immediate antecedent of the metrical story is, however, the Nova Legenda Angliæ of Capgrave, and it represents Joseph as living with twelve hermits at Glastonbury, where he also died and was buried. The Oxford Vernon MS., written in verse about 1350, shows that there was a sacred vessel containing blood. The Chronicle of Helinandus describes the Graal as a wide and shallow vessel, wherein meats in their juice are served to wealthy persons. The Historia Aurea, written by John of Tynemouth, connects Joseph with the Holy Vessel, which it describes as that large dish or platter in which the Lord supped with His disciples, with which concurs one entire cycle of the legend. It may be added, for what it is worth, that the Armorican Gauls seem to have had a sacred vessel used in certain rites from a very early period. An object of this kind is thought to be depicted on Armorican coins, being semicircular in shape, held by means of thongs and devoid of stem or base. Under Roman domination the vessel was figured with a pedestal.
We come now to the putative historical romances and p. 93 the poems and tales of chivalry which contain the developed legend of the Graal. The Conte del Graal, which is the first text for our consideration, has many decorative descriptions of the Sacred Vessel, but they present certain difficulties, as will be exhibited by their simple recitation in summary. (1) It was covered with the most precious stones that are found in the world, and it gave forth so great a light that the candles at the table were eclipsed, even as are the stars of heaven in the glory of the sun and moon (Chrétien de Troyes). (2) It passed to and fro quickly amidst the lights, but no hand appeared to hold it (Gautier de Doulens, or, as he is now termed, Wauchier de Denain). (3) It was borne uplifted by a beautiful maiden, who was discounselled and weeping (Montpellier MS.). (4) It was carried to and fro before the table by a maiden more beautiful than flowers in April (second account of Gautier, with which compare the similar recital of Gerbert). (5) It was carried amidst a great light by an angel, to heal Perceval (Manessier). (6) It was carried in the pageant by a maiden through the castle chamber (ibid.). (7) It was carried openly at the coronation of Perceval, also by a maiden (ibid.). (8) It was, in fine, ravished with the soul of Perceval, and has never since been seen so openly:-- "Ne jà mais nus hommes qui soit nés" Nel vera si apiertement." [paragraph continues] What follows from these citations will have occurred to the reader--that in all these several sections of the Conte del Graal there is no intelligible description of the sacred object; that the writers knew of it at a far distance only; that some of their references seem to indicate a brilliant lamp rather than a chalice; and, when they allocated it to Christian symbolism, that they may have wavered in their meaning between the idea of the Paschal Dish and the Cup in which Christ consecrated the wine of the first Eucharist; but we cannot tell. I should p. 94 add that the prologue, which is certainly the work of a later or at least of another hand, and embodies some curious material, mentions, but very briefly, the pageant of the Graal procession, saying that the Vessel appears at the Castle without sergeant or seneschal, but again there is no description of the Vessel. In conclusion of this account, the alternative ending of Gerbert retells with variations part of the story of Joseph, and although there is once again no intimation as to the form of the Graal, an account of the service performed at an altar over "the holy, spiritual thing"--the Vessel more beautiful than eye of man has seen--is there recounted, while it leaves no doubt in the mind that this service was a Mass of the Graal. It is the only suggestion of the kind which is afforded by the vast poem, though the origin and early history of the sacred object is in accordance with the received tradition. The fuller memorials of this tradition are embodied, as we have seen, in two cycles of literature, but the text which is first in time and chief in importance is the metrical Romance of the Graal, or Joseph of Arimathæa, by Robert de Borron. A French and a German critic have said that this is the earliest text of the Graal literature proper, and an English writer has concluded, on the contrary, that it is not: mais que m’importe? I will not even ask for the benefit of the doubt, so far as enumeration is concerned. The metrical Joseph says that the Graal was a passing fair vessel, wherein did Christ make His sacrament. This is vague admittedly, and assuming a certain confusion in the mind of the writer, it might have been that Dish mentioned by John of Tynemouth in which the Paschal Lamb was eaten by Christ and His disciples. In place of the words mout gent, which are given by the original French editor of the only text, Paulin Paris, following I know not what authority, or imagining a variant reading, substituted the words mout grant, which might well apply to the Paschal Dish. But Robert de Borron certifies to his own meaning when he
p. 95 recites an utterance of Christ in His discourse to Joseph, for it is there said that the vessel which has served as the reliquary shall be called henceforth a chalice:--

"Cist vaisseau où men sanc méis,
Quant de men cors le requeillis,
Calices apelez sera."
[paragraph continues] It is impossible to read the later verses in which the Eucharistic chalice is compared with the sepulchre of Christ, the mass corporal with the grave-clothes, and the paten with the stone at the mouth of the tomb, without concluding that by the Graal was intended the first Eucharistic chalice, and the presence of this symbolism in the mind of Robert de Borron suggests a symbolical intention on his part in the whole legend which he presented. If it is said that his idea of a chalice does not correspond to a vessel the content of which is sacramental wine, it should be remembered that the ciborium which contains consecrated Hosts is still at this day replaced on occasion by a chalice of the ordinary form. The idea of the devotional poet, supposing it to have been as purely mystical as he was himself deeply religious, might have embodied an attempt to shadow forth in the perpetuation of the most precious of all reliquaries the sacramental mystery of the Real Presence. It seems certain, in any case, that when Robert de Borron speaks of the Graal as that vessel in which Christ made his sacrament, this must not be understood as referring to the Paschal Dish, though one probable derivation of the word Graal would support the latter view. In the dialect of Languedoc, Grazal signified a large vessel, usually of clay; in the dialect of Provence, Grasal was a bowl or platter; in Anglo-Norman, or its connections, Graal was a dish made of some costly material for the purpose of great feasts, which, as we have seen, is the description of Helinandus. With all this some of the later romancers were dissatisfied, and, following Robert de Borron, they exalted the vessel into a chalice, so p. 96 that they might bring it into line with the Eucharistic side of the legend, with which side a paschal dish--whether that of Christ or another--offered little analogy. The material of such a chalice would have been probably glass. It follows from Tertullian that in Rome at the beginning of the third century they used glass chalices; so did the Bishop of Toulouse at the end of the fourth century; and about A.D. 550 the same custom prevailed, as appears by the life of Cesarius, Bishop of Arles. A council of Rheims in the days of Charlemagne is said to have forbidden glass chalices because they were brittle. The Lesser Holy Graal does not depart from the rendering which I have here given in respect of the metrical romance, but it seems to make the assurance of the poet more certain by elucidating further the application of the secret words to the consecration and administering of the Eucharist. Where the poem says that there is a great book in which has been written the great secret called the Graal, the Lesser Holy Graal says: This is the secret uttered at the great sacrament performed over the Graal--that is to say, over the chalice. The vessel is otherwise described as the one in which Christ sacrificed, as if He actually celebrated the first Mass, and from the Eucharistic standpoint this seems much stronger than the corresponding feisoit son sacrement, which are the words of Robert de Borron. The repetition of the experience of the sacred table which is enjoined by Joseph in both texts is in both termed the service of the Graal, but in the prose version alone is it adjudged to the hour of tierce, as if the Mass of the day were celebrated, and as if certain persons, evidently in a state of grace, were sustained in the body by the sacramental nutriment of the soul. The Early Merlin and the Didot Perceval neither reduce nor increase the evidence; but it may be hazarded, for what it is worth, that the original disclosure of the secret words may have had some office in preserving the content of the great relic. In the Early Merlin there is no allusion to the office p. 97 of secret words, and no Graal Hallows are mentioned excepting the Cup, as it is obvious that we cannot include the sword of Merlin, through which Arthur was chosen to be king. It does not appear that this weapon had any antecedent history. In the Didot Perceval the rumour and the wonder of the Graal moves pageant-like through all the pages, but it is more shorn of descriptive allusions than anything that has preceded it in the quests. When the predestined Knight visits the castle, tower, or hold in which the Hallow has been preserved through so many centuries, he sees it plainly enough at the supper-table, along which it passes, carried with no ostentation by a mere page of the chamber; but he is said only to hold a vessel wherein the blood of our Saviour reposed. This is at the first visit, and at the second, when Perceval is initiated into the whole mystery and becomes the Lord of the Graal, the description is repeated merely, as if it were a counsel of perfection to maintain and even to increase in the third text of the trilogy whatsoever could be called vague and dubious in the first.

The Book of the Holy Graal, even when it reproduces with several variations the prose version of Robert de Borron's poem, gives, in some of its codices, an explanation of the Sacred Vessel which is the antithesis of his own. It is described as that Dish in which the Son of God partook of the Last Supper before He gave to the disciples His own flesh and blood. It was, therefore, the Paschal Dish. Certain manuscripts, however, differ so widely that it is difficult to determine the original state of the text. Another codex follows the account of the Lesser Holy Graal. According to a third codex, it was the content and not the Vessel which was called the Holy Graal; but, speaking generally, most versions concur in describing it as the Holy Dish. The connection with the Eucharist is, however, sufficiently close, for he who is elected to say the first Mass and to consecrate the unspotted elements is he also to whom by Divine instruction p. 98 [paragraph continues] Joseph surrenders the vessel. But the Blessed Reliquary would seem to have been rather the outward witness to the presence within those elements. For example, in the first unveiled vision of the Holy Graal which is granted to any one outside Joseph himself, we hear of an altar, on one side of which were the nails used for the Crucifixion, together with the hallowed Lance; on the other side was the Dish; and in the centre there was an exceeding rich vessel of gold in the semblance of a goblet--obviously the chalice of consecration: it had a lid after the manner of a ciborium. More astonishing still, the cup of the Eucharist is placed within the Graal during a ceremony which corresponds to the Mass. In a romance so overcharged with decoration and so lavish in episodes of wonder, we should expect, and shall not be disappointed, that many pageants and ornaments would collect about the Holy Vessel, and that it should work many marvels. The Sacrament consecrated within it reveals the mysteries of Christ openly to chosen eyes, but thereon can no man look until he is cleansed from sin. It gives also on occasion the vision of an Eternal Eucharist and a great company sitting at the high table in the Paradise which is above. So far as concerns the authority of the text itself, it would appear that the Mass of the Graal is not like that of the Church without--an office which recurs daily; it is rather an arch-natural sacrifice, at which the incarnate Christ figures as the sensible oblation and subsequently as the Melchisedech of the rite, communicating Himself to the witnesses, while a thousand voices about him give thanks to God amidst a great beating of birds' wings, and

"Young men whom no one knew went in and out
With a far look in their eternal eyes."
The texts of the later Merlin have several references to the Graal, and it is the chief purpose which moves through the dual romance, leading up, as it does obviously, to a Quest of the Sacred Vessel; but what is p. 99 understood thereby must be gathered chiefly from its reflections of the Joseph legend. We shall see that in certain codices the account differs from that of Robert de Borron. The Vulgate Merlin has one very remarkable passage, which tells how the tidings of the Holy Graal spread through the realm of King Arthur, and how the Graal was that Vessel in which Joseph of Arimathæa received the blood from the side of Jesus Christ when He hung upon the Cross. It represents, therefore, a tradition which is familiar enough not only in the literature of romance, but in that of religious legend, though it is the antithesis of the account given in the Lesser Chronicles, wherein we are told that the blood was drawn into the Vessel after Joseph and Nicodemus had taken down the Body of the Lord. Secondly, the Graal was that Holy Vessel which came from Heaven above into the city of Sarras. We have here a reflection only, and that at a far distance, of the Book of the Holy Graal in the form which is now extant. Thirdly, and to us most important, the Graal was that Vessel in which Christ first sacrificed His Blessed Body and His Flesh by the mediation of His bishop, the Second Joseph, whom He ordained with His own hands. According to the Huth Merlin the Graal was that Vessel in which Jesus and His Apostles ate the Last Supper. It was again, therefore, the Paschal Dish. The Longer Prose Perceval has many descriptions of the vessel, all of which are designed to connect it with the chalice, but they are highly mystical in their nature. As one of the most express attempts to relate the Graal with the Eucharist, it must be regarded as important for the subject of the Hallow-in-chief. This romance and the great Quest of Galahad are both texts of transubstantiation, and they must rank also among the latest documents of the literature. The Lesser Chronicles, even in the prose version of De Borron's poem, offer no suggestion concerning this doctrine, the Graal Vessel being simply a Hallow containing a precious relic. About p. 100 the period of the Quest and the High History, the tide of ecclesiastical feeling, which long previously had set towards the definition of the dogma, must have permeated the mind of the laity, prepared as it also was by the desire of things sensible and tangible in matters of religion. It was, this notwithstanding, still long to the establishment of the high, symbolical festival of Corpus Christi, which provided an external epilogue to the closed canon of the Graal, as if by a final substitution that which was taken away, or at least ex hypothesi, was to be in perpetuity memorialised about the precincts of the gate by the wardens thereof. In connection with transubstantiation, it may be remarked that the religious office of Knighthood was above all things to hear mass, and, next, to confess sins. There are few records in the Graal romances that the chivalry of Logres communicated, except in the Quest of Galahad, and then only in the case of the elect knights. All high festivals were observed, all penances fulfilled; but to participate in the Eucharistic mystery seemed apart from the life of the world and withdrawn into the sphere of sanctity. However this may be, the Longer Prose Perceval has two cryptic descriptions of the Graal Vessel, which, on account of their complexity, but for the moment only, I must present as they stand actually in the story. (1) It is said concerning Gawain, when he looked at the Graal in his wonder, that it seemed to him a chalice was therein, "albeit there was none at this time." It was, therefore, an ark or a tabernacle which was designed to contain a cup, but when the latter was removed it still held the shadow or semblance thereof. (2) In the course of the same episode a change was performed in the aspect of the external object, and it appeared to be "all in flesh," meaning that it was transformed into a vision of Christ crucified. Towards the close of the story, when a certain Queen Jandree relates her visions to Perceval, she sees, in one of these, an image of the crucifixion from which people collect the Blood into a most Holy Vessel, elevated p. 101 for that object by one of them. There are no names mentioned, but for purposes of simplicity we may assume that they were Joseph and Nicodemus. In the castle of King Fisherman the office of the Cup was to receive the Blood which fell from the point of the Sacred Lance. The priest who officiated at the Graal service is said to begin his sacrament, with which expression we may compare the words feisoit son sacrement, which are those of Robert de Borron. There is indubitably reference to the Eucharist in both cases, and perhaps the Graal Mass Book was a traditional version of the Mass, supposed, ex hypothesi, to follow the Last Supper. Speaking generally, the historical account of the Cup follows the Book of the Holy Graal rather than De Borron's poem, for the blood which flowed from the wounds of Christ when He was set upon the Cross is said to have been received into the Sacred Vessel. There is no ministry in respect of material sustenance attributed to the Graal in this spiritual romance. It is, therefore, in one sense the antithesis of the Quest of Galahad, which dwells with equal fulness on the food giving properties of the Vessel and on its connection with the mystery of such a mass and such an office of the Eucharist as never before or after was said in the wide world, apart from this sacred object. When the Holy Graal enters the court of King Arthur and into the banqueting-hall it is clothed in white samite, but neither the Vessel nor the bearer are visible to human eyes. On a later occasion it manifests as a Holy Vessel on a table of silver in an old chapel. Elsewhere it is observed that the Flesh and Blood of God are present in the Graal. When it appears to Lancelot in the Castle of Corbenic, it is still upon a table of silver, but this time the object is covered with red in place of white samite, and it is surrounded by angels. In the course of the ceremony Lancelot sees three men, who represent the Trinity, exalted above the head of the officiating priest. Two of them place the youngest between the hands of p. 102 the priest, who again exalts him. On another occasion a child enters visibly into the substance of the Mass-bread. A man is also elevated, bearing the signs of the Passion of Christ, and this Personage issues out of the Vessel, coming subsequently among the knights present, and causing them to communicate sacramentally. It is after this episode that the Graal is removed to the spiritual city of Sarras. There Christ appears to Galahad and his companions, and this is the last manifestation in connection with the Sacred Vessel. It is the viaticum of the haut prince, who thereafter exercises the high option which has been granted previously and demands that he should be taken away. As the chief Hallow in the Parsifal of Wolfram differs from all the other romances, it will be left for more full consideration in dealing with the German cycle; but seeing that in this cycle there are correspondences outside this great poem with the Northern French accounts, one of these may be placed here so as to illustrate the Germanic allusions to the Sacred Vessel in the general understanding thereof. Diu Crône, the poem of Heinrich, says that it was borne on a cloth of samite and had a base of red gold, on which a reliquary of gold and gems was superposed. It was carried by a crowned maiden. There is here, however, a fresh departure from the Graal in Christian symbolism, for as, on the one hand, it is the quest of a feigned and impossible hero, so, on the other, the content ascribed to the reliquary is not the true content. It holds the semblance of bread, as if that of the Divine Body, but the wine or royal blood, which corresponds to the second element of the Eucharist, is distilled from the Lance of the legend. We are now approaching the term of the inquiry allocated to this section, and it will be seen on reflection that we have three possible hypotheses regarding the precious vessel: (1) that it was a cruet or phial, wherein the blood of Christ was reserved permanently--in which case we can understand the legend on the score of comparative p. 103 possibility; (2) that it was an open platter or bowl, which, it is obvious, could have had no permanent content, much less the precious or indeed any other blood; (3) that it corresponded to the notion of a chalice, but probably with a cover, after the manner of a ciborium. It is in late texts that the vessel appears most indubitably in connection with the sacrifice of the Mass; it was and could be only that which was recognised by Diu Crône of Heinrich and by John of Tynemouth--namely, a reliquary; but the mystic side of the legend, reflecting in the minds of the romancers many conflicting issues, took it over to the Eucharist, influenced by the irresistible connection between the sacramental blood and the sang réal poured out at the Crucifixion. There is evidence that this view is almost coincident with the marriage of the legend to romance. The mind of romance connected the vessel and its office with secret words of consecration and a wonderful grade of priesthood, the root-matter of which must have been drawn from some source wherein relics could have counted for little in the presence of the higher secrets of sanctity. In conclusion as to this matter, the Holy Graal, according to the Greater Chronicles, was not the only Hallow which was brought into Britain by those whose mission was to preach first the gospel therein, but it was more especially the exotic of the legend, as this was developed in Northern France. In several cases the other Hallows, as we shall see, were either present in Britain or arrived some centuries later. As regards the Lesser Chronicles, it is warrantable to decide that, in the mind of Robert de Borron, the Sacred Vessel was a ciborium or covered chalice, and that in some manner which is not clearly declared it was connected with a sacramental service performed in great seclusion. As regards the Greater Chronicles, it was originally a Dish, and that Dish in which the Paschal Lamb was eaten at the Last Supper; but from the very beginning of this ascription the notion of a cup was essential to the Eucharistic office p. 104 which also resided in the Vessel; in the Book of the Holy Graal a cup is inserted therein, but in later texts of the cycle the Dish sometimes undergoes transmutation and reappears as a chalice.

Waite is best known as the co-creator of the Rider-Waite-Smith, Waite-Smith or Rider-Waite (en) tarot deck, widely used in the English-speaking world mainly for divinatory purposes, and as the author of the accompanying manual, Pictorial Key to the Tarot. To design the deck, he collaborated with symbolist artist Pamela Colman-Smith, also a member of Golden Dawn. The Waite-Smith is known as one of the first tarot decks to have all 78 cards fully illustrated, unlike almost all traditional decks1 where only the 22 major arcana are illustrated. The Rider-Waite tarot was first offered for sale in 1910. This Tarot is renowned for being one of the first to have all 78 cards fully illustrated, unlike almost all traditional decks where only the 22 major arcana are illustrated. It is certainly a Tarot that allows you to decode the divinatory meaning of the arcana with great acuity, especially the Minor Arcana. As far as the Minor Arcana are concerned, these are personalized interpretations, which do not necessarily translate the meaning found in the Marseilles Tarot. Waite has fixed the meaning of the arcana, and the illustrations with which he has endowed them, eloquent though they may be, leave little room for imagination, for pure inspiration... And... There's another snag... Waite has inverted the arcana "8" and "11", and in this Tarot we find JUSTICE to be arcana "11" and FORCE to be "8".

Golden Dawn Or Or aurore

Waite joined the Outer Order of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in January 1891 after being introduced by E.W. Berridge. In 1893, he withdrew from the Golden Dawn. In 1896, he rejoined the Outer Order of the Golden Dawn. In 1899, he joined the Second Order of the Golden Dawn. He became a Freemason in 1901,[6][2] and joined the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia in 1902. In 1903, Waite founded the Independent Rectified Order R. R. and A. C. This order was dissolved in 1914. The Golden Dawn was torn apart by internal quarrels until Waite left in 1914; in July 1915, he formed the Fellowship of the Rosy Cross, not to be confused with the Societas Rosicruciana. By this time, there were half a dozen offshoots of the original Golden Dawn, which never re-established itself in its entirety self-destroyed.

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