Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems PLANET EARTH & CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING SERIES Celebrating ‘learning to live together sustainably’ under the aegis of United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005–2014), and understanding the interdependency and fragility of planetary life support systems, and making better global citizenship that promote more humane and peaceful life, and develop mass awakening for universal brotherhood, this Series will publish the innovative and interdisciplinary works that enhance better understanding and reverentially preserving those values of the past that help the humanity in achieving the basic goals of the UNDESD, and also mark the celebration of United Nations International Year of Planet Earth, 2009-2010, and United Nations International Year of Astronomy, 2009, IYA-2009. This is in corroboration with the IGU Kyoto Regional Congress in 2013 that focuses on ‘Traditional Wisdom and Modern Knowledge for the Earth’s Future.’ Think universally, see globally, behave regionally, and act locally but insightfully. This is an appeal for cosmic vision, global humanism, and Self-realization. …… The Series is sponsored by the ‘Society of Heritage Planning & Environmental Health’. Series editor: Rana P.B. Singh (Professor of Cultural Geography, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India). Email: ranapbs@gmail.com 1. Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India: Toward Ecology and Culture in 21st Century. Rana P.B. Singh. Foreword: Prof. David Simon (Royal Holloway, London, U.K.) This book is the first of its kind highlighting the roots of ancient geographical thought that gives a new vision and perspective for scientific vision and global understanding, together with examining the issues of India, Indianness and ecological cosmology. With its interdisciplinary nature and contents, this book will serve as lead reference and also textbook in the courses on geographical thought, Gandhian ideology, ecological history and philosophy, nature theology, environmental history, and cultural studies. 1 June 2009, 22 x 15cm, xvi + 325pp., 7 tables, 15 figures. ISBN: 978-1-4438-0580-3. ISBN: 978-1-4438-0579-7. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K. 2. Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century. Rana P.B. Singh. Foreword: Prof. Martin J. Haigh (Oxford Brooke University, U.K.) This book deals with the contributions of emerging geographical thought from India that has historical and cultural roots emphasising man-nature interrelationships and interactions, which helped to form a distinct culture enriched with metaphysics, literature, lifeworld, village life, landscape, heritage, belief systems, and even the contemporary worldviews. This is a pioneering works from insider’s perspective. 1 August 2009, 22 x 15cm, xvi + 429 pp., 16 tables, 58 figures. ISBN: 978-1-4438-1119-X. ISBN: 978-1-4438-1119-4. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K. 3. Banaras: Making of India’s Heritage City. Rana P.B. Singh. Foreword: Prof. Dr Neils Gutschow (Heidelberg University, Germany) Narrating the making of the Hindus’ most sacred and heritage city of India (Banaras) this book will serve as lead reference and insightful reading for understanding the cultural complexities, archetypal connotations, ritualscapes and vivid heritagescapes that maintain India’s pride of history and culture. 1 October 2009, 29 x 21cm, xvi + 409pp., 60 tables, 123 figures. ISBN (10): 1-4438-1321-4, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-1321-1. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K. 4. Cosmic Order and Cultural Astronomy: Sacred Cities of India. Rana P.B. Singh. Foreword: Prof. John McKim Malville (University of Colorado, U.S.A.) This book deals with the critical appraisal of studying cultural astronomy and cosmic order and its implications in India, illustrated with studies of heritagescape of Khajuraho; manescape of Gaya; Deviscape of Vindhyachal goddess; Shivascape of Kashi, where Shiva dances; Shaktiscape of Kashi; and Naturescape of Chitrakut, where mother earth blesses. 1 November 2009, 22 x 15cm, xiv + 250pp., 15 tables, 72 figures. ISBN (10): 1-4438-1417-2, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-1417-1. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K. 5. Sacred Geography of Goddesses in South Asia. Essays in Memory of David Kinsley. Rana P.B. Singh (editor). This anthology deals with the sacred geography of goddesses in South Asia that manifested and maintained tradition of goddess worship, and possesses the spatial and archetypal symbolism ― the continuity of the scenarios, lifeways and performances that evolved in the past and continued today in spite of superimposition and layering upon layers of various cultures and traditions. 1 April 2010, 22 x 15cm, xviii + 396pp., 34 tables, 69 figures. ISBN (10): 1-4438-1865-8, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-1865-0 Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K. 6. Heritagescapes and Cultural Landscapes. Rana P.B. Singh (editor). Foreword: Prof. William Logan (UNESCO Chair of Heritage, Deakin University, Australia) This anthology deals with the current debate in heritage studies and planning that implied theoretical constructs, and cites case studies from different parts of the world, like Cambodia, India, Japan, Jordon, México, and USA. On the lines of the perspectives of UNESCO World Heritage Committee the prospective features and in-depth local structures are portrayed with field experiences, thus the dimension of heritage studies is broadened. This anthology paves the path of multidisciplinary approaches to the newly emerging discipline of heritage ecology. 2 October 2010, 22 x 15cm, xvi + 344pp, 16 tables, 50 figures ISBN (10): 81-8290-226-6, ISBN (13): 978-81-8290-226-6. Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi 7. Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems. Rana P.B. Singh (editor). Foreword: Prof. Dallen J. Timothy (Arizona State University, U.S.A.) These essays deal with current debate in pilgrimage studies and spirit of place that helps to understand the deeper relationship between human psyche and sacred environment, citing illustrations from different parts of the world, like Canada, China, India, Israel, Nepal, Pakistan, Romania, Spain, Tibet, and the Buddhist places, representing many religions. On the lines of thought linking locality with universality the prospective features and in-depth local structures are portrayed with field experiences. These studies will pave the path of to the newly emerging discipline, pilgrimage studies. 26 January 2011, 22 x 15cm, xiv + 344pp., 18 tables, 51 figures. ISBN (10): 81-8290-227-4, ISBN (13): 978-81-8290-227-4. Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi 8. Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India Rana P.B. Singh (editor). Foreword: Prof. Robert H. Stoddard (University of Nebraska, U.S.A.) This anthology deals with the issues of sacred places and pilgrimages in India, illustrated with case studies representing different regional traditions and emphasising themes like Hindu textual traditions, Varakari tradition of pilgrimages, sacred space and planning, city of ancestral worship, religious tourism and place of sainthood, pilgrimage-tourism, Buddhist practices, and archetypal symbolism. This will open new directions of understanding in pilgrimage studies, and will be used as major text in this field. 26 January 2011, 22x 15cm, ca. xvi + 344pp. ; 30 tables, 46 figs. ISBN (10): 81-8290-228-2, ISBN (13): 978-81-8290-228-2. Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems _______________________________ Editor Rana P.B. Singh Banaras Hindu University, India Foreword Prof. Dallen J. Timothy Arizona State University, USA Shubhi Publications New Delhi Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 7. Cataloguing Data: (Editor) Singh, Rana P.B. (b. 1950) Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi (India). A5 : 22 x 15cm, xiv + 344pp., 18 tables, 51 figures. 1. Pilgrimage studies, 2. Religious tourism, 3. Cultural studies, 4. Landscape studies, 5. Cultural anthropology. Proceedings of the Panel 20 on ‘Heritagescapes and Sacredscapes’, of the 16th World Congress of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Studies (IUAES) held at Kunming, China: 27-31 July 2009. Sponsored by the ‘Society of Heritage Planning & Environmental Health’ ISBN (10): 81-8290-227-4, ISBN (13): 978-81-8290-227-4. Copyright © 2011 by Rana P.B. Singh, and the contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. The Publisher does not necessarily endorse the ideas held, or views expressed by the Editors or Authors of the material contained in its publications. This book first published in 26 January 2011 by Shubhi Publications HQ: 211 Dayacha 39, Haus Khas Village, New Delhi 110016, India. Branch Office: 240, II Floor, City Centre, Gurgaon, HR 122002, India. Phone: +91-124-4088499, Mob: +91-0-9811 065451. Web: www.subhiindia.com ; Email: publisher@shubhiindia.com Cover image: Overview of Santiago de Compostela Photograph © Martin Grey Printed in India by Aegean Offset Printers, Noida, UP. VIEWS ON THE BOOK “This book is an exciting new contribution to the social science of pilgrimage and sacredscapes. It is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding the dynamics of global pilgrimage and the depth of personal meaning associated with travel for spiritual or religious purposes. I applaud the editor and contributors for raising the bar in this area of the social sciences and for their valuable insight into one of the world’s largest and most pervasive forms of human mobility.” ― Prof. Dallen J. Timothy, Program Director, Tourism Development and Management Arizona State University, Phoenix, AZ. USA “I was impressed by the wide range of topics and sites discussed by authors from many different countries and backgrounds. The essays are of high quality, innovative and interesting. This is a valuable addition to the growing literature on pilgrimage, and will be of interest to academics, students and general readers.” ― Prof. Erik Cohen, Emeritus Professor of Social Anthropology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel “This collection of essays is a welcome addition to the literature of pilgrimage studies. The essays collected here explore the multi-dimensional character of pilgrimage in several traditions. Together they underscore how fundamental pilgrimage is to the spiritual life of humanity.” ― Prof. M. Darrol Bryant, Emeritus, Director of the Centre for Dialogue and Spirituality in the World Religions, University of Waterloo, Canada “This is a volume that touches upon many of the under-studied pilgrimage regions of the world. With a good mix of theoretical and descriptive discussion of pilgrimage and sacred landscapes, this book is an excellent addition to the growing literature on pilgrimage systems.” ― Prof. Daniel H. Olsen, Department of Geography, Brandon University, Brandon, Manitoba, Canada viii Views on the Book “This anthology continues the exploration of pilgrimage and social/ spiritual/cultural geography dealt with in previous volumes in the series edited by Rana Singh. The authors offer diverse views into the intertwining relationships between the act of pilgrimage and the emergence and preservation of specific pilgrimage sites around the world with other social phenomena including tourism, religion, economy, literature, experience of the divine, prayer for fulfilment of mundane needs, cultural geography, and individual and social identities. Case studies from different countries and religious traditions enrich the discussion. This volume offers a valuable contribution to the study of the myriad meanings and impacts pilgrimage and religious tourism have for visitors to sacred sites and the communities living near such sites.” ― Prof. Erik H. Cohen, School of Education, Faculty of Social Sciences, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel “This volume of essays on aspects of pilgrimage sheds new light on the phenomenon in a broad but especially Asian context. The authors combine theory with fieldwork studies to examine a variety of prominent pilgrimage centres, from Bodh Gaya, Mecca, Santiago and Kailash to Wutai in China, Nara in Japan, and to explore issues such as the role of legends, literature, memory and identity in depictions, representations and constructions of pilgrimage. They also extend existing studies on pilgrimage and tourism by looking at how, in a modern globalising world, these themes increasingly intermingle, often, as they do, enhancing the international dimensions of prominent sites. As such this volume is a welcome addition to the growing ethnographic study of pilgrimage.” ― Prof. Ian Reader, Professor of Japanese Studies, University of Manchester, U.K. “This collection is a significant contribution to pilgrimage studies. It is to be lauded for its breadth both in time and space. There is great value of having multiple traditions represented in a single anthology. This makes the book more useful as a teaching text. It is also laudatory for its multidisciplinary make up; this is a fine book”. ― Prof. Ronald Lukens-Bull, Department Sociology and Anthropology, University of North Florida, Jacksonville, USA ~~~ TABLE OF CONTENTS VIEWS ON THE BOOK ...................................................................... vii List of Tables ................................................................................... xi List of Figures ................................................................................. xi Preface & Acknowledgements ..................................................... xiii FOREWORD ....................................................................................... 1 ─ DALLEN J. TIMOTHY (Arizona State University, Phoenix, U.S.A.) Chapter 1 .......................................................................................... 5 Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography: Some reflections ─ Rana P.B. Singh (Banaras Hindu University, India) Chapter 2 ........................................................................................ 47 Pilgrimage and Literature ─ Jamie S. Scott (York University, Canada) Chapter 3 ........................................................................................ 95 Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam ─ Muhammad Khalid Masud (Council of Islamic Academy, Pakistan) Chapter 4 ...................................................................................... 111 The ‘Architecture of Light’: Between Sacred Geometry to Biophotonic Technology ─ Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stãnciulescu (National Institute of Inventics, Romania) Chapter 5 ...................................................................................... 131 Kailash – the Centre of the World ─ Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić (University of Zagreb, Croatia) Chapter 6 ...................................................................................... 153 Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal ─ Janice Sacherer (University of Maryland, Okinawa, Japan) x Views, Contents, Preface Chapter 7 ...................................................................................... 175 Landscape, Memory and Identity: A case of Southwest China ─ Zhou Dandan (Tsinghua University, China) Chapter 8 ...................................................................................... 195 The Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China: the Spirit of Sacred place in Buddhism ─ Jeffrey F. Meyer (Emeritus, University of NC Charlotte, USA) Chapter 9 ...................................................................................... 211 Sacred Spaces, Pilgrimage & Tourism at Muktinath, Nepal ─ Rana P.B. Singh (Banaras Hindu University, India) & Padma C. Poudel (Tribhuwan University, Nepal) Chapter 10 .................................................................................... 247 The Mythic Landscape of Buddhist Places of Pilgrimages in India ─ Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana (Banaras Hindu University, India) Chapter 11 .................................................................................... 285 Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism ─ Noga Collins-Kreiner (University of Haifa, Israel) Chapter 12 .................................................................................... 301 The Road to St. James, El Camino de Santiago: the spirit of place and environmental ethics ─ Kingsley K. Wu (Emeritus, Purdue University, IN, USA) Chapter 13 .................................................................................... 321 Sacred Places of Japan: Sacred Geography in the vicinity of the cities of Sendai and Nara ─ James A. Swan (Snow Goose Production, USA) The CONTRIBUTORS ..................................................................... 335 INDEX ........................................................................................... 337 The EDITOR ................................................................................. 344 LIST OF TABLES 1.1. Categories of Sacred Space (after Stump 2008: 302) ........................ 23 1.2. “The Art of Pilgrimage” (after Dawkins 1995) ................................. 34 3.1. Parallels between Juristic and the Sufi views of Hajj ...................... 103 4.1. Archetypal cosmogonic symbols: Romania and India .................... 115 9.1a. Muktināth: Pilgrims by countries .................................................. 232 9.1b. Muktināth: Tourists by countries .................................................. 232 9.2. Age Structure of Pilgrims ................................................................. 233 9.3. Pilgrims’ Groups............................................................................... 234 9.4. Pilgrims by times of Visits ............................................................. 234 9.5. Pilgrims’ motive of Visit ................................................................. 235 9.6. Pilgrims’ accompanying Persons ..................................................... 235 9.7. Pilgrims by Duration ....................................................................... 236 9.8. Amount spent by Pilgrims during Pilgrimage, NRs ........................ 237 9.9. Means of Transportation used by Pilgrims to visit Muktināth.......... 237 9.10. Pilgrims already visited other Sacred Places of India ................... 238 9.11. Pilgrims’ Response to the three most Sacred Places of Nepal ....... 238 9.12. Muktināth: Accommodation capacity in hotels ............................. 239 9.13. Muktināth: Types of shops ........................................................... 239 Appendix 1 Major Historical Events related to the Buddhism .................................. 282 LIST OF FIGURES 1.1. The Tree of Living Earth (after Devereux 1991: 40-41) .................. 25 3.1. Principal Hajj routes, Arabia (after Petersen 1994: 48) ..................... 96 3.2. Stages of the Hajj: spatial view (courtesy: Stump 2008: 352) ........... 97 4.1. The modelling of the universe: archaic to scientific ration ............. 4.2. Representations of the ‘Sacred Geometry’ ...................................... 4.3. Architectural representations of the archetypal forms ..................... 4.4. The Spiritual Center of «ICHTUS»: an archetypal cosmogony ...... 114 121 122 126 5.1. Kailās: The route and main stations ................................................. 5.2. Kailās: notional map of the pilgrimage path ................................... 5.3. Kailās: Snow covered peak and the environs ................................. 5.4. Kailās: A Buddhist Thanka ............................................................. 5.5. Kailās: A Buddhist pilgrimage procession, near Drölma Pass ....... 5.6. Kailās: the ritual flags nearby .......................................................... 5.7. Kailās: Mani stone: ‘Om mani padme hum’ .................................... 133 134 135 139 140 141 142 6.1. The Rolwaling village of Beding .................................................... 6.2. Sacred Omi Tsho lake ..................................................................... 6.3. Orgyen Shuti, the throne of Padmasambhava .................................. 6.4. The Rolwaling approach to Tashi Labtsa Pass ............................... 162 163 166 168 7.1. The village, Pucun (photograph by the author) .............................. 180 7.2. The mountain, Tashan (photograph by the author)........................... 185 7.3. The Stone layout (photograph by the author) ................................... 186 7.4. Cangshuxia (photograph by the author) .......................................... 189 7.5. The stone with the inscription “Tashan” ......................................... 190 7.6. The stone with the inscription “Qian Kaishao fanggechu ............... 191 8.1. The Holy territory of Wutai Shan ................................................... 200 8.2. Xiantong Temple, Mt. Wutai in north ............................................. 207 9.1. India and Nepal Star-frame Five holy places .................................. 213 9.2. Mustang district and Muktināth ........................................................ 214 9.3. The Path to Muktināth (after Messerschmidt 1989a: 92) ................ 215 Sacredscapes and Pilgrimages 9.4. Muktināth Kshetra (modified after Messerschmidt 1989a: 95) ...... 9.5. Sketch view of Muktināth Sacred Territory .................................... 9.6. Muktināth environs and Temple’s Spatial Plan .............................. 9.7. Muktināth Image (murti) ................................................................ 9.8. Jvālāji Gompā: Spatial Plan ............................................................. 9.9. Muktināth: Spatial flow of Pilgrims ................................................ xiii 218 220 221 222 225 231 10.1. North India and Nepal: The Buddhist sites ................................... 249 10.2. Lumbini, Location and the nearby area .......................................... 252 10.3. Bodh Gaya: the contemporary Map ............................................... 255 10.4. Sarnath: Religious Landscape........................................................ 260 10.5. Rajgir: Spatial view of the Central Part ........................................ 263 10.6. Nalanda: excavated remains (after A. Cunningham 1871) ............ 266 10.7. Shravasti (Saheth Maheth) ............................................................ 270 10.8. Vaishali and environs .................................................................... 273 10.9. Kushinagar: the excavated site (after A. Cunningham 1871) ....... 277 10.10. Sankisa and Agahat Sarai (after A. Cunningham 1872) .............. 278 11.1. Israel: The researched holy sites .................................................... 291 11.2. The distribution of visitors to the Holy graves ............................. 293 12.1. The Road to Saint James, El Camino de Santiago ......................... 12.2. Santiago de Compostela: Mental map and notional sketches ........ 12.3. Santiago de Compostela: Mental map and notional sketches ........ 12.4. Santiago de Compostela: Close sketch and ground plan ............... 12.5. Santiago de Compostela: close sketch .......................................... 302 304 305 306 307 PREFACE & ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Since the ancient past man recognised the integral power of the nature in a place, and responded to it with their expression of environmental sensitivity, either in the form of love (attachment), fear (detachment), awe (mystery), and/or visual (beauty). The comprehensiveness and inherent spirit manifested behind such sensitivity is conceived in the form of sacrality – the force of nature that makes a place ‘divine’ or ‘sacred’. According to the integrity of such inherent spirit and degree of human sensitivity together with the superimpositions of the continuity the importance of place is recognised, mytholised and accepted by the succeeding masses of people in the passage of time. Here comes the idea what Mircea Eliade calls hierophany (1959) – the act of manifestation that shows itself to us – manifestation of sacred realities. Its comprehensiveness and universality of such manifestation can be reflected upon the sacrality attached as force that makes it what it can, like sacred space, sacred time, sacred objects, sacred rituals, sacred functions, sacred functionaries,…, and so on. The force of sacrality that communicates as link between humanity and divinity led to the tradition of pilgrimage, a quest to understand, experience and get revealed and healed that makes the life different – holy that makes the vision wholeness. Pilgrimage is a way – to be and become in motion in terms of belief systems supported with myths and traditions that have roots in the human civilizations. Diversity is also a form of natural beauty, which every culture and each of the traditions adhere and follow. Perhaps rather than choosing, the pilgrim is chosen by his/her own way of being from belongingness. In this perspective the ten essays represent those diversities. The original idea of this volume was originated in one of the sessions of Panel 20 on ‘Heritagescapes and Sacredscapes’, organised under the ages of the 16th World Congress of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Studies (IUAES) held in Kunming, China: 27-31 July 2009. It was decided to invite some of the lead papers from established scholars as additional representatives of the theme. The result is in the form of three volumes of anthologies, all published in the “Planet Earth and Cultural Understanding Series” from Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi (India). The present, publication vol. 7 in the series, consisting of thirteen essays from scholars belonging to different countries, representing their studies from China, India, Japan, Pakistan, Romania, Tibet, Nepal, Spain and Israel. xvi Views, Contents, Preface Prof. Dallen J. Timothy (Arizona State University, U.S.A.), a leader in cultural and heritage tourism studies, has been kind enough to go through major parts of this book and gracefully wrote the ‘foreword’. A heartfelt sense of obligation is offered to you Dallen. With all due appreciation I acknowledge the kindness of all the contributors who shown their trust in this project and supported me by following editorial instructions and making changes in their essays as suggested at different stages. Many of the distinguished and established scholars and professors working in the field of heritage studies from different countries have spared time to go through substantive parts of this anthology and have encouraged and supported this project by sending their views. I thank them and personally acknowledge their kindness, viz. Erik Cohen (Emeritus, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel), M. Darrol Bryant (University of Waterloo, Canada), Ronald Lukens-Bull (University of North Florida, USA), Ian Reader (University of Manchester, U.K.), Erik H. Cohen (BarIlan University, Israel), and Daniel H. Olsen (Brandon University, Canada). As always, I keep on records name of my wife Manju (Usha), who suffered and tolerated consistently negligence and carelessness from my end, however always encouraged me to see this project the final light of release. The working environment was made pleasant by all sorts of innocent and childish disturbances created by my two grandsons: 10¾years old Abhisth and 2¾ -years old ‘Vishnu’. I thankfully acknowledge my friend Martin Grey (U.S.A.) who has provided photograph for the cover. Two of my doctoral students Ram Kumar Chaturvedi and Pankaj Prakash Singh have been helpful in re-drawing some of the figures. At the Shubhi Publications, New Delhi (India) Mr. Sanjay Arya has been of immense help at different stages, while the other member associates there also helped me to get the volumes printed in a very short period, while taking care of the quality. I am thankful to all of them, but especially to my friend Rakesh Singh (Harmony Bookshop, Varanasi) for all sorts of help and support, and also to other friends for promoting this Series. ― RANA P. B. SINGH # New F- 7 Jodhpur Colony, B.H.U., Vārānasi: 23 September 2010. Bhādrapada Shukla 15th Purnimā, Mahālayā starts, Vikrama Samvata 2067. FOREWORD Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems Dallen J. Timothy For thousands of years, pilgrimage has been one of the most visible manifestations of spiritual and religious devotion, and one of the most salient motivators of human mobility throughout the world. Archaeological evidence even testifies that temples and alters were built in prehistoric times for worshipping nature gods and various other deities, or for protecting the dead. Göbekli Tepe, in Turkey, is commonly regarded by archaeologists as the oldest human-built place of worship so far discovered. It was erected more than 10,000 years ago. Hagar Qim, in Malta, is another example built approximately 5,600 years ago, and Stonehenge is perhaps the best known example, believed to have been built about 2,600 BCE. Other evidence supports the notion that ancient peoples travelled to sacred natural areas or human-made sites such as those listed above. Göbekli Tepe was apparently built by hunters and gatherers, who may have returned to the site periodically at various times of the year. During the Vedic Age in South Asia, some 5,000 years ago, river-based rituals and festivals began as forerunners to Hindu pilgrimage, although the official pilgrimages of Hinduism (tirtha-yātrā) began much later. Christian pilgrimage began soon after the crucifixion of Jesus; some records show devotees arriving in the Holy Land within 100-200 years of Jesus’ death. By CE 600, Christian pilgrimage was, aside from trade, one of the most widespread movements of long-distance travel in the entire Mediterranean region. Today, worshippers from nearly every religion on earth travel in search of ‘the sacred’. They visit holy places that are venerated for their connections with gods, holy people, ability to heal, or role in miraculous events. Pilgrims travel to increase their faith, to witness miracles, to pray more effectually, to be healed, to seek forgiveness for sins, to fulfil religious obligations, or simply to visit historic sites connected to their own faiths. Although some religions require pilgrimages of various sorts for salvation and eternal life, many others encourage it for increased faith and healing, while on the other end of the spectrum, some faiths actively 2 Dallen J. Timothy discourage religious travel as a waste of time, effort, and money that could be better used seeking God at home and within the inner self. In the contemporary world, though, while following tradition still in many regards, pilgrimage is undergoing a significant evolution in form, function and style. Many people claim to be ‘less religious’ than their forebears but simultaneously more ‘spiritual’, reflecting the truism that spirituality and religiosity are not synonymous; a person can be spiritual without being religious and vice versa. Atheists and agnostics in fact have reported having ‘spiritual’ experiences, but not religious encounters, as they commune with nature or come to understand something new about themselves. Even as adherence to traditional religions is declining in some parts of the developed world, it is growing in other parts and among certain population cohorts in the countries where ‘organized religion’ is in decline. New forms of spirituality have come to the fore in recent decades as disciples of spirituality eschew the materialism, consumerism, traditionalism, paternalism, and other isms associated with Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, just to name a few. Instead, these new age spiritualists seek places where they can develop their own individual beliefs of deity and their role in the universe. Their pilgrimages are motivated by learning, cathartic healing, praising nature gods, and essentially becoming gods and goddesses to their own divine selves. Another perspective of this evolutionary process in religious travel is the growing popularity of luxury and virtual pilgrimages. In most religions, pilgrimage has been treated as a hardship ritual that challenges the faith and physical endurance of even the staunchest disciples. The challenges associated with difficult travel, physical exertion, and mental anguish are viewed as purifying elements that humble the proud and soften the hard-hearted. In Roman Catholicism, walking the route was customarily more important in cleansing the pilgrim than was visiting the final destination. In Islam, the route is important, but the destination and its associated rituals are preeminent. Today, cars and motor coaches transport hundreds of thousands of Roman Catholics to holy sites each year ‒ the same sites their forebears would have walked or crawled to on their knees. Catholicism is not the only faith to see such changes. Affluent Muslims on the Hajj can also ride in air-conditioned coaches or private cars, sleep in four- and five-star hotels, and hire a multilingual guide to escort them through the rituals. Wealthy Hindus have also begun to have similar opportunities during the tirtha-yātrā. In addition, virtual pilgrimages can be ‘undertaken’ via the Internet or television in the Islamic world. While this does not replace the requirement of physically undertaking the Foreword: Sacredscapes & Pilgrimages Systems 3 Hajj, it does provide a temporary substitute for Muslims who are unable to travel to Mecca. Pilgrimage is one of the most complex, multidimensional human phenomena in the world today. Every year tens of millions of people travel from their homes to destinations, often along routes and trails meant to test and try the pilgrim’s willpower and devotion, to destinations of spiritual and religious significance. This spatial and social movement of people through time and space involves elements of motivation, belief, illness, nutrition, poverty and wealth, transportation, ecology, economics, family relations, social networks, crime, and so much more. It has a significant imprint on the heritage of nations, social mores and religious practices, and cultural landscapes of nearly every region of the globe. As a result, scholars from many disciplines and backgrounds have a justifiable interest in studying the global phenomenon of pilgrimage. Geographers, sociologists, economists, tourism specialists, health and medical researchers, religious studies scholars, historians, anthropologists, and political scientists all have a legitimate claim to the study of pilgrimage. As the foregoing information indicates, ‘pilgrimage studies’ is an exciting and ever-evolving scholarly pursuit. This volume, edited by Professor Rana P.B. Singh, one of the world’s foremost pilgrimage scholars, is a welcome addition to the substantial and growing literature on pilgrimage. It is a collection of erudite chapters that delve into the meanings of pilgrimage and the experiences of pilgrims. It provides excellent insight into the most relevant subjects today among pilgrimage specialists. One such issue is the crossover between the natural environment and religion. The concept of environmental ethics is not well grounded in the pilgrimage literature, but this volume addresses this vital issue. Likewise, the notion of sacred space from an ecological perspective dominates several chapters in this volume. The salience of the spiritual meanings associated with rivers, mountains, caves, and sacred groves and forests cannot be understated; this importance is well established throughout the book. Pilgrimage places as spaces of identity and desire is another evident theme throughout the volume. The sanctification of secular space and the sustained veneration of places of religious importance for centuries, and even millennia in some cases, illustrate how pilgrimage, unlike other forms of travel, stands the test of time and is less volatile than other manifestations of human mobility. Pilgrimage is inherently spatial, social, economic, and political, and this volume accounts for all of these. I am particularly impressed by the comprehensiveness of the book as it considers issues of religious obligation, salvation, secular pilgrimage, 4 Dallen J. Timothy sacred architecture, religious festivals, routes and circuits, ritualization, sanctification processes, spatial development, cultural landscapes, UNESCO World Heritage designation, tourism, and so much more. Perhaps most appealing about this book, however, is the diverse range of empirical material from around the world, representing many of the major world religions: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Chinese spiritual philosophies, Shintoism, and even secularism. Another excellent highlight of the book is the diversity of scholars from the four corners of the earth. Such an eclectic panel of distinguished authors lends considerable validity, intellect, and indigenousness to views of sacredscapes and pilgrimage. This widespread coverage is a welcome relief from so many other tomes that focus almost entirely on one or two religions without providing an understanding of how they fit together, and they are often authored by outsiders who possess inherent biases and who have spent only limited time in the research field. This book is an exciting new contribution to the social science of pilgrimage and sacredscapes. It is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding the dynamics of global pilgrimage and the depth of personal meaning associated with travel for spiritual or religious purposes. I applaud the editor and contributors for raising the bar in this area of the social sciences and for their valuable insight into one of the world’s largest and most pervasive forms of human mobility. ― Prof. DALLEN J. TIMOTHY School of Community Resources and Development Arizona State University, 411 N. Central Avenue, Suite 550, Phoenix, Arizona 85004. USA Editor, Journal of Heritage Tourism Email: dtimothy@asu.edu ------------------------------------------§ Dallen Timothy is a pioneer in the geography of tourism. He holds a B.Sc. degree in geography from Brigham Young University, an M.A. in geography from the University of Western Ontario, and a Ph.D. in geography from the University of Waterloo. He is Visiting Professor of Heritage Tourism at the University of Sunderland, UK, and Adjunct Professor of Geography at Indiana University. His research interests in tourism include heritage, religiously-motivated travel, community-based planning, political boundaries and supranationalism, peripheral and rural regions, and travel dynamics in less-developed countries. 1 Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography: Some Reflections Rana P.B. Singh Banaras Hindu University, India ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Since the consideration of ‘sacred space’ as one of the major components in religious system, as propounded by Otto, Eliade, Tuan, and others, the search for imbued meanings, role in religious festivities and similar such notions emerged in the literatures. Sacrality and human environment have been developed as the reciprocal theme in the past and continued even today, e.g. in pilgrimages and rituals. According to various uses, mythologies involved, eulogies narrated and similarly other affiliated local traditions, sacredscapes may be classified into different groups. For reading sacredscapes some generalised axioms (self-evident rules) are proposed, which further help to understand its function. The interactions among sacrality, space and regulating function altogether result into ritualscapes and their geometries. Understanding and experiencing sacredscape would lead to know the culture much better. Keywords: space, place, axis mundi, pilgrimage, sacrality, spiritual magnetism, spatiality. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ “Geography, often considered a trivial subject compared to the more splendid history (the feats of the forefathers), may well be the subject of the twentyfirst century. Where is the best land and who controls it? How much good space is left and who is caring for it? Justice for those on the underside, whether these be human beings or other vulnerable species, has everything to do with space. In a theology of embodiment, space is the central category, for if justice is to be done to the many different kinds of bodies that comprise the planet, they must each have the space, the habitat, they need”. ― McFague (1993: 101-102) 1. Introduction Geography considered to be more relevant in the 21st century when its comprehensibility came across the disciplinary cage when the reference to spatiality of time, temporality of space, and sacrality of space-time 6 1. Rana P.B. Singh function have been accepted as an integral and external exploration where human consciousness meet to the divine cosmos. The traditional and narrow meaning of mapping now changed and extended to explain the possessed images, signs, codes and the network of all of these that make the result complex. Gaia theory is one of such postulates that explain the organism and aliveness of the motherly Earth. One of the representations of the lived Earth is ‘sacredscape/s’, a prominent feature reflecting the embodied human and his/her cultural wholes (e.g. cultural landscapes): being-in-between-environment-and-space as an indissoluble process and resultant scene too (cf. Bergman 2009: 15). Sacred places can be constituted through reiterate cultural practices and performances, including the practice of daily visitation and invisible communication with inherent spirit and human quest. Such performances constantly make sacredscape alive, maintaining friendship with human being. The ongoing process of communication makes sacredscape a rhythmscapes where pluralistic, divine, relative, repetitive – cyclic, lineal and hierarchical repetitiveness – performances making them inextricably linked to auspiciousness of time, sacrality of space, piousness of function and goodness of thought. These altogether help in maintaining the appropriation of spatiality in placemaking. Every religion has its own way of existence and acceptance of sacred foci to which the adherents periodically converge. Notes Bhardwaj (1973: 1) that “from the most ancient civilizations to the present times sacred centres have exerted a powerful pull on the believers.” This is well exemplified in an anthology dealing with ‘pilgrims and travellers in search of the holy’ (Gothóni 2010). We form a sense of our-selves and the sense of our-place at varying range of scales (spatiality), times (sequentiality), function (activity), mobility (pilgrimages), quest (sacrality), and our mental estates (belief systems). We begin from the local scale, and here we first experience the sacred message (spirit of place, genus loci) and power of place. According to theology, sacred places are consecrated or ‘illuminated by faith’, ‘which because of their religious content, become the inevitable subject of auspicious visits. Such places are considered sublime (deva sthana in Hindu traditions) and holy, and their holiness is a result of an event that took place there or because they comprise a place of worship for hosting sacred events or for guarding sacred relics or to receive blissful healing (cf. Vuconić 2006: 242). Very rarely is a place held sacred by one religion considered sacred by other religions as well. One such rare place, which accounts for its fame, is Jerusalem, which is sacred to Judaism, Christianity and Islam, of course that records the history of contestation (cf. Singh 2008: 128-130). Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 7 It is argued that a landscape is sacred because human perceive it as sacred in the ancient past and continued that by transferring that understanding to the successive generations, of course the degree varies. But ‘one way of knowing does not negate the validity of another’, of course there are different ways of knowing about the Earth, about sacred places, and about sacral environs (Carmichael et al 1994: 7). In the scientific era of rationality, direct uses and productive value generally considered as the only validity, but at the other end there exist different worldviews of spirituality, indigenous people, beliefs, taboos and traditions which are directly can’t be explained. Thanks to realisation and recognition of intangible resources and heritage by the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage programme that support the preservation of sacredscapes and associated performances and rituals (cf. Singh 2010a). Among the European languages the word ‘sacredness’ (commonly as in English) is derived from Latin, and is “defined as restriction through pertaining to the gods. The concept of sacred implies restrictions and prohibitions on human behaviour – if something is sacred then certain rules must be observed in relation to it, and this generally means that something that is said to be sacred, whether it be an object or site (or person), must be placed apart from everyday things or places, so that its special significance can be recognized, and rules regarding it obeyed” (Hubert 1994: 11). Although the connotation of words associated with and concepts expressing sacrality in different cultures may be inexact, the concomitant concepts of separateness, respect and rules of behaviour seem to be common to sacred sites in different cultures – broadly moving around the quest and performance to interact with the sublime spirit possessed there in. 2. Sacrality and Human Environment At the dawn of scientific and technological supremacy, people on earth are threatened by two kinds of environmental degradation: one is environmental pollution and ecological disorder ― a menace that we all concern in different ways and trying to come up with better solutions; the other is loss of meaning, especially a kind of cosmic loneliness that we could not have foreseen as children of a cosmic order. Presently many people came to the realisation that all environmental problems arise in the human mind. If it is at all the fact ― in fact, it is a reality ― the solution of such problems also be searched from human sensory. For the first time we realise that we have created our systematically built web of structure, however they are now proved as meaningless places (Walter 1988: 2). We 8 1. Rana P.B. Singh learn from history that archaic people sought, meaningful ways to link the reality and psychic feeling “to combine empirical facts with imaginative fancies and to think in rhythm with their feeling and feel in rhythm with their thinking” (Herberger 1972: 16). Going back to history in a search for holistic theory we find the idea of theoria ― an ancient way of grasping experience that involves all the senses and feelings. With reference to place theoria manifested into Greek idea of genius loci ― the spirit of place. The frame of mind that makes holistic theoria possible is a form of inquiry, called “topistics”, or the study of placeways by Walter (1988: 5). The above view is comparable to Swan’s (1990: 19) idea of “environmental sensitivity”, i.e. a search and understanding of meaning with reference to man’s identity in the cosmos. One of the most visible and experiential forms of such ground is sacred place. The idea of sacred place is linked to man’s quest for an identity and role within the cosmic mystery. In fact, sacred place is the representation of cosmic manifestation ― a process of condensing the cosmos into a smaller sphere. And “by condensing the cosmos into smaller sphere, its laws can be observed and experienced more clearly, and human lives can be placed more accurately in accord with them” (Swan 1990: 35). Humans have used all their senses to search for places where divine beings manifest their power. Several such stories are mentioned in ancient mythologies. In traditional societies or per se the culture which continued and maintain its traditions in spite of transformation, any act performed by humans with respect to nature or being biological specie is a part of sacred act, but its narration depends upon the context, perception, mutuality and exposition (cf. Swan 2010). A sacred space possesses existential value for religious man; says Eliade (1959: 22) that, “for nothing can begin, nothing can be done, without a previous orientation – and any orientation implies acquiring a fixed point”, i.e. sacred space, which inherently possesses manifestive power like spirituo-magnetism that always get re-awakened by rituals. Profusely drawing on the work of Otto (1923), Eliade’s (1958: 367-385) propositions and constructs attracted cultural geographers like Sopher (1981) and Tuan (1978) accepting sacred as being that which is marked by three characteristics (cf. Sitwell 1994: 103, 108): 1. It is absolutely pure and spotless (for it is never our, infantile, fault when things go wrong); 2. Perhaps because of that very purity, it is peculiarly vulnerable to being polluted, i.e. constantly at risk (as we are at risk of parental wrath for reasons that we cannot understand); and Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 9 3. Despite that vulnerability, it is dangerous; specifically, it is dangerous to us mortals, in other worlds, to those whose mere approach threatens it with pollution; those who come too close risk the blast of divine wrath ― the sacred is dangerous (for would we not blast with thunderbolts those who cross us, were we able to do so)? The Vedic sacrificial altar is connected to the transformation of energy from heaven to the earth ― “I am Heaven, thou art Earth” (Brihadaranya Upanishad, 4.4.3). A place thus is transformed into a sacred place, showing how a macrocosm can be transferred into a mesocosm, and further reflected into the human body (microcosm). This process of transformation may be called sacralisation. Eliade (1959: 11) writes, “Man becomes aware of the sacred because it manifests itself, shows itself, as something wholly different from the profane”. He designates this act as the act of manifestation of the sacred, i.e. hierophany. It makes a space to become something else, while continuing to remain itself too and also continuing to participate in its surrounding cosmic milieu. A sacred place’s spatial structure is visible in its archetypal layout, where metaphysical prototypes and heavenly patterns of material things meet (Singh 1993a: 161). Walter (1988: 75) writes: “Any sacred place is a specific environment of phenomena that are expected to support the imagination, nourish religious experience, and conveys religious truth. It organises sight and sound, introduces light to present clarity and order, or makes things dark to suggest unseen presence and hidden power”. That is how a sacred place is both an environment of sensory phenomena and a moral environment for mankind. In the spirit of Eliade (1959: 20-21) Stump (2008: 301) narrates that “the meaning of sacred space include abstract notions of cosmology, but they also reflect belief in the existence of spiritual discontinuities in the material world, extraordinary places where the sacred is linked to physical reality”. Of course in academic discourses exists distinction between space and place, at least heuristically, space refers to an undifferentiated expanse having so many meanings together or for someone no meaning at all! (cf. Bremer 2006: 25). On the other hand, place exposes particular and distinctive locale and environs which carries meaningfulness in all its attributes performances. This was sacred landscape combines the absoluteness of space, relativeness of places and comprehensiveness of landscape; thus altogether result to a ‘wholeness’ carrying the inherent and imposed spirit of ‘holiness’, which is to be called ‘sacredscapes’. In Hindu tradition this 10 1. Rana P.B. Singh is called ‘divya kshetra’ (a pious/ divine territory). According to Tuan (1977: 6), “‘Space’ is more abstract than ‘place’. What begins as undifferentiated space becomes place as we get to know it better and endow it with value.” Sacredscapes have long exercised a special fascination. They are the result of cultural developments and have varied multidimensional levels of significance. They are also places where time is, as it were, suspended, and they are points where holy times and holy places meet; sacredscapes are places apart (cf. Heynickx, et al. 2010). The attachment to place has been an issue of concern in different branches of knowledge, including cultural geography – giving meaning and usability to sacred space. In late 1920s John K. Wright spoke of the emotional bonds between humans and their terrestrial home in terms of “Geopiety”. This idea is further elaborated by Yi-Fu Tuan (1974, 1993) while searching the deeply rooted interdependency of ecology and territoriality through the byway of sensory mode, value and belief system subsumable under the religious concept of geopiety. The sacral bondage between person and place is a reciprocal process what Rudolf Otto (1923) describes as mysterium tremendum associated with special power. It is remarked that “Otto has done his best to delimit the “holy” and make it a distinct mental state. But despite this effort it appears to be closely aligned with theories of the sublime” (Smith 2008: 23). Otto’s perspective was aligned to psychological counterpart illustrated with intensity, state and level of emotionality attached, superimposed and maintained in the passage of transformation of cultural traditions. The variation in the state of sacred depends upon the involved conditions and the responsive contexts. One may not feel easy to accept it; however his idea of ‘transmutation’ and ‘attached emotionality’ is well suited in Indian condition. Of course terror and fear are also the attributes of sacredness or sources of maintenance of ‘sublimeness’, what Burke (1990: 36) narrated that ‘sublime’ is productive of the strongest emotion which the mind is capable of feeling’. And, the “idea of the holy or sublime points us towards a different way of understanding sacred places. This approach would not be marked by the connection of a site to a culturally important narrative, but rather to the kind of commotion elicited” (Smith 2008: 2324). Martin Heidegger (1958: 19) declared that “place places man in such a way that it reveals the external bonds of his existence and at the same time the depths of his freedom and security”. The human relation with nature is received primarily while expressing the place, understanding the place and becoming part of the spirit of place. The concept of place consists of components like location, integration of nature and habitat, framework of Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 11 circulation, a system of land ethic, and dynamic nature of changing its value characterised by the belief system. Place is the central focus Where we experience the harmonic relationship between man and nature. That is how this is one of the basic concerns inter-linking human environments and sacrality. A sacred place is an environment of sensory phenomena and also of moral environment. Somehow still the experiential aspect has not received its attention seriously. Two basic challenges are sought while studying landscape and religious experiences: (i) the notion of reciprocity assuming passive consensus among pilgrims which are not supported by any direct analysis of the assumption, and (ii) the notion of reciprocity among place, landscape and personal religious experience while analysing the pilgrims and pilgrimage centres through the metaphor of text. The latter analysis interprets the set composed of complex, dynamic and multiple layers of personally relevant or shared meaning. The religio-geographical reciprocity and counter interactions among the three boxes of ‘text and content’ are: (i) The broader context of an individual’s or group’s personal experience and social relations, (ii) Interpretation of the place and/or landscape embodying multiple layers of social, cultural and personal meanings, and (iii) Personal attitudes towards religious experience and/ or commitment (Cooper 1994: 81). Cooper (ibid. 82) concludes that “through the reciprocal interaction of place, landscape and religious experience, and through their contextual interaction with other aspects of personal experience and social material relations, which may similarly be considered through the metaphor of text, religio-geographical experience may be conceived of as being formed, developed, maintained and revised through an almost continuous inter-textual dialogue with an eclectic range of phenomena, which are both directly as well as indirectly pertinent to geographical and religious experience.” Accepting cultural landscapes, in the present context the sacredscapes, as texts led to examine a number of issues like how the sacredscapes encode information. This lies around the question of the concept of intertextuality which implies that the context of any text is other texts. In case of sacredscapes and landscapes in general, the context in which they are produced and read may be texts written in other media (Duncan 1990: 4). The mythological literatures are the basic source in this context as one mythology is interconnected to the other. The other issue related to this interpretation moves around that as to how cultural and religious life in general, and power relations in particular, are constituted, reproduced and contested (Duncan 1990: 5). 12 1. Rana P.B. Singh While attempting to answer these questions one must go beyond a consideration of the formal properties of landscape as a. system of communication, rather better to see the sacredscape in relation to both structural symbolic meanings and individual intentions and the experiences and faith involved by a pilgrim (compare Duncan 1990: 5). However, such interpretation of experience of place and of pilgrimage is neither simple nor static; rather it can be complex, ambiguous and dynamic (Cooper 1994: 91). Symbolically ambiguous and encoded within it are multifarious aspects of knowledge, power, purity and identity. Mediating between the divine realm and the human realm, the landscape is an index of sacred as well as secular events (cf. Faulstich 1994: 3). Above all there is a need for understanding and explaining “the inner workings of culture.” Walter (1988: 117) suggests that “the quality of a place depends on a human context shaped by memories and expectations, by stories of real and imagined events ― that is, by the historical experience located there”. The idea of mysterium tremendum also refers to special rule of action, or customary form of making a place felt, experienced and being like an organic reality. There exist energies of place that shape the place ― genius loci, the spirit of place. Relph (1976: 6) observes that “any exploration of place as a phenomena of direct experience cannot be undertaken in the terms of formal geography nor can it solely constitute part of such geography. It must, instead, be concerned with the entire range of experiences through which we all know and make places”. Relph (ibid.: 30) further states that ‘the spirit of place lies in its landscape’. Yet at the same time in spite of changes in space and time, the subtle power of a place is retained and can be experienced too. This constitutes the very uniqueness and distinctiveness of place character. Lawrence (1964: 6) wrote: “Different places on the face of the earth have different vital effluence, different vibration, different chemical exhalation, different polarity with different stars; call it what you like. But the spirit of place is a great reality”. The uniqueness and distinctiveness of a place are special character of sacred place where genius loci and values of human environment are deeply rooted and maintained by performances and rituals there. A sacred place is a place that symbolically represents the world; ultimately it reflects order and wholeness and. is like a music web of the cosmos: its very own layout encloses a world and to man, it becomes, at a deeply sensual level, the cosmos. What I mean to suggest is that the quality of a sacred place depends upon the human context that has been shaped by it, Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 13 with respect to memories, experiences, miracles and expectations. All these aspects are governed by rules of action that maintain continuity over a long span of time. A sacred place is a central place of hierophany, where a divine or transcendent dimension breaks through into everyday life. In the Hindu tradition, sacred places are called tirthas (literally “crossing”), i.e. they are places where one crosses over to far shores or crosses up to the realm of heaven. Probably the most popular of all forms of tourism is the pilgrimage to a sacred place; however, it is little understood. One of the functions of pilgrimage is that it allows us to understand our cultural heritage while searching for a harmonious relationship between man and the sacrality of a given place. Pilgrimage landscape is one of the most distinct representations of sacredscape, possessing multilayered richness of human religious activity (cf. Coleman and Elsner 1995). 3. Sacred Geography vs. Sacred Places: Order and Vision Among the attributes of sacred geography ‘space’ serves as the contextual envelop in which all other processes taken turn. Consideration of ‘space’ together with ‘landscape’ in social and cultural theory, and geography has taken a serious concern by the spatial turn and postmodernistic thoughts since 1980s. Also, spatial sense has opened a fresh insight to understand sacrality and religious notions too. Sacred cartography and sacred geometry together provided spatial vision to sacred geography (cf. Knott 2005: 11-20). The ‘spatial’ is a social construct as many theorists thought, nevertheless it is also a spiritual, visual, contextual and emotional notion that human beings possess inherently. It may be projected metaphorically, metaphysically and mystically, and also alltogether what in Greek thought called cosmos. In the frame of sacred geography in Māyā culture such notions are linked to geographic features and associated gods and beliefs (cf. BassieSweet 2008). However in a recent study sacred complex of holy city of Puri is studied on the line of sacred geography, emphasising structure, organisation and its cultural role in the formation of a sacred centre (Patnaik 2006). While another study projects the cosmic geometry and spatial ordering of sacred cities in India (cf. Singh 2009c). Such studies indicate the increasing quest and fascination to understand and experience sacred geography. In the prime conception of sacred geography it is believed that divinities are also “born of the earth, of space, of the sea, and of the starry sky, they are still here among us, still alive. Among the inspiring ruins of 14 1. Rana P.B. Singh the great temples, the sleeping gods are always ready to be revived” (cf. Richer 1995: xxi). Three broad areas of research emphasised in the study of sacred geography, especially projecting sacred places are: (a) the ritualspatial context of sacred place at various levels of social organisations ― individual, family, society and, cultural group ― and in different contexts and ways; (b) the growth of meanings and feelings attached to sacred places, taking history as a means to elucidate the sequences of their existence, continuity and’ maintenance; and (c) a typology of sacred places in terms of contrasts, similarities and degrees of manifest powers (cf. Singh 2009b: 236-237). Lane (2001: 15) suggests four axioms associated with the character and layout of sacred places; they are particularly useful in understanding the relationship between human beings and environment ― the frame of sacred geography. These four phenomenological axioms are: 1. Sacred place is not chosen, it chooses. It is a construction of the imagination that affirms the independence of holy. God chooses to reveal himself only where he wills. It is perceived as a place quietly seeking a person out, whispering beyond all the previous efforts to locate and fix the place of power. 2. Sacred place is ordinary place, ritually made extraordinary. The locum sacrum is frequently found to be surprisingly unremarkable, esteemed a strong background for ‘place because of neither its sublime setting nor its consciousness’, as reported by Swan (1991: 9-10) in the context of functional importance in the life of the community. It becomes recognised as sacred because of certain ritual acts that are performed there, setting it apart as unique. 3. Sacred place can be trodden upon without being entered. Its recognition is existentially, not ontologically discerned identification of sacred place is thus intimately related to states of consciousness. 4. The impulse of sacred place is both centripetal and centrifugal, local and universal. One is recurrently driven to a quest for centredness ― a focus on the particular place of divine encounter ― and then at other times driven out from that centre with awareness that God is never confined to a single locate. Since the first step of human evolution the idea of particularity of place, mysterium tremendum, has been part of human environment. Joseph Campbell (1974: 184) asserts that “the idea of a sacred place where the walls and laws of the temporary world may dissolve to reveal a wonder is Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 15 apparently as old as the human race”. The identification of a place as sacred place is never essentially one of individual recognition; “in actual fact, the place is never ‘chosen’ by man, it is merely discovered by him” (Eliade 1958: 369). In some way or another the ‘spirit of a place’ attracts and reveals to man, and that is how he merely ‘find’ them but cannot make or select their positions. In spite of the growing field of environmental psychology and sacred ecology, the issue of understanding sacred places has not yet caught proper attention. In fact, grasping effectively the basic question of understanding the deeply rooted meaning and message is the most difficult task. James Swan’s leadership in running the ‘Spirit of Place Symposium Program’ is a real march of awareness in this respect since 1987. During this short period of seven years of annual programmes, “Exploring how modem people might ― become more aware of the subtle significance of place, several scientists shared our growing understanding of how electromagnetic fields and unusual air, water and soil chemistry at certain places could help explain their uniqueness. A common finding among cultures all around the world, we found, was that at sacred places there is more life force energy which has both secular and sacred qualifies. Our understanding of subtle fields and their influence on our fives is just beginning to be understood”. The human response to environment and understanding the intrinsic meaning is portrayed by the concept of “topophilia”, a neologism which includes all the human being’s effective ties with the material environment. In geography this idea was introduced by Yi-Fu Tuan (1974). However the issue of psychic and archetypal environment is not given due consideration in this context. The’ prefix ‘topo’ itself refers to topography primarily. Chora stands out as the oldest Greek word for place where beingness of humankind is preserved. Accepting historical antiquity and insight, Walter (1988: 120) suggests the idea of Chorophilia, the emotional attachment to a place in contrast to chorophobia in place of topophobia. Thales (ca. 624 - 548 BCE), a great scholar of geometry and a philosopher, is supposed to have said: “Of all things that are, the most ancient is God, for he is uncreated. The most beautiful is the cosmos, for it is God’s workmanship. The greatest is place, for it holds the things” (cf. Walter 1988: 121). Walter (ibid.: 5) argues that “our places will not improve until we change our form of topistic (a holistic mode of inquiry for deeply insightful experience of place), experience, and that it is humanly possible to change it”. In a recent study of spatial dimensions of religion, with special reference to ‘sacred places’ and ‘profane spaces’, the term geographics is 16 1. Rana P.B. Singh proposed and three distinct yet interrelated broad areas of inquiry concerning the development of religious self-understanding are proposed (Scott and Simpson-Housley 1991: xii-xiv): (a) literal role, (b) symbolic role, and (c) eschatological (cognitive) role with prophetic and apocalyptic vision. These roles are associated with particular place, regions, or geographical phenomena and lead to religious self-understanding. Based on the ‘Spirit of Place Symposium Program’ Swan (1992: 225) concludes that “The spirit of a place is the result of the interplay between the spiritual world and nature, and the collective product of the interactions of the people of that area too. When they all come into harmony, the spirit of place can really work its magic best”. Swan (1992: 200-201) further observes that ‘the sacred places are the “earth heritage” where one can experience the vibration of the earth energy. They require special care for preservation and protection’. Describing the psychic connection between people and place for enhancing mental health Vine Deloria, Jr. (cf. Swan 1992: 237) states that “unless the sacred places are discovered and protected and used as religious places, there is no possibility of a nation ever coming to grip with the land itself and national psychic stability is impossible”. Powerful places in history became cities and were responsible for generating entire civilisations and seem to condense the culture and values of those civilisations in one place. For example, Varanasi in India is known as the cultural capital of India, and microcosmic India. This character of place is referred as “orthogenetic” ― creating and sustaining the ethos and moral order of the whole culture. Of course, primarily such places, or cities, have developed self-image as they reproduce the cosmological order and make it accessible on the human plane (Eck 1987: 2). Places differ simply from their contextual difference, it may be their physical environments, or the human responses due to varieties of reasons different cultures have their own vision, interpretation, symbolism related to environment and their utility in the process of survival and reproduction. Study of place, its milieu and human context will be set within the physical and entire human-created landscape. In geography, as discipline, most of our concerns have been only engineering, not about understanding. We claim that geography is real and unified, but we don’t know where it is and what it is! If we accept that geography is the study of earth as home of mankind, study of places is to be initiated by their understanding, experiencing and receiving the messages inherently communicated by them. For this change we have to come out of our own geographic cage, and this change is to be taken as a mission. Johnston (1991: 253) feels that Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 17 “Only in that way will we ensure understanding of wholes ― places ― which are much greater than sum of parts, and then With full understanding we can move much more confidently towards the fashioning of better places: to rephrase one of Bunge’s (1973) important epigrams ― ‘May the world be full of happy places”. At present the unified way to approaching social and cognitive environment is encouraging geography to accept salience of place as a great potentiality. One such example to experience and expose the messages of multi-religious shrines or a single shrine that attracts adherents from various religion, whose as separate identities record contestation and conflicts. Above all such shrines are the healing foci of the most fundamental human pilgrimages, the quest for well-being (cf. Bhardwaj 1987: 114). 4. Dimensions of Sacred Geography The notion of sacred geography refers to an all-encompassing reality that maintain the prāna (ethereal breathe/ life-force) by interactional web of the five gross elements (mahābhutas), viz. earth, air, water, fire, and ether/space. The interactional web of network may further be reflected into at least five dimensions (cf. Pogačnik 2007: 5-6): (i) Dimension of eternity ― representation of primeval vibration, the divine all-presence, the light of light, e.g. sacred territory like Vindhyāchal Kshetra. (ii) Archetypal dimension of reality ― the inherent quality of spatial manifestation that preserves the sense of planetary creation or archetypal patterns behind reality, e.g. representation of other sacred places of India in the sacredscapes of Banaras. (iii) Dimension of consciousness ― the operational system of cosmic ideas and archetypes that makes the mindset and covers the range from mental to emotional, and from intuitive to rational ― ultimately making the ‘belief systems’, e.g. various myths, folk believes and rituals that make the consciousness always alive, active and expanding. (iv) Etheric dimension ― possessing vital-energy or bio-energetic dimensions, symbolised with ether that invisible hold and manifests the rest four elements, e.g. Vital-energy fields, Earth chakras, and channel/or site of vital power or places of healing. (v) Material dimension ― the dimension in which embodiment of minerals, plants, animals, human beings, landscape features, stars and the Earth’s crust takes place ― the visual world of physical perceptibility. 18 1. Rana P.B. Singh The knowledge and experience of sacred geography (geomancy) ‘can provide travellers with the tools to deepen their contact and interaction with the land and its sacred energy of the culture they visit, and to create an exchange of energy between the visitor and the visited place’ (cf. Pogačnik 2007: 239). At present the unified way to approaching social and cognitive environment is encouraging geography to accept salience of place as a great potentiality – this is the concern of sacred geography. 5. Axioms for Reading the Sacredscape The following basic and self-evident rules (axioms) are posited by Lewis (1979: 15-26) for reading the landscape which in modified (in Indian context) form are useful in reading the sacredscape (cf. Singh, Rana 1995: 102-103): 1. The Sacredscape is clue to culture. The human impingement trusted upon and cognized by the devotees provide strong evidence of the kind of human culture we possess in the past, preserving in the present, and would continue in the future. In other words, they refer to our processes of becomingness. How in the historical past for their own sake and imitation human being searched the sacred power of place while mytholising them and making them alive through ritualisation process. These activities later converge into a religious tradition. 2. The Sacredscape refers to cultural unity and place equality. All the items and aspects in the sacredscape are no more and no less important than other items in terms of their role as clues to cultural tradition. Sacred journey and circumambulation are as equally important a cultural symbol as the territorial extension, and changes in people’s attitudes and behaviours show the process of “existencemaintenance-transformation-and-adaptation.” This finally converges to make a whole ― a unity ― that is how sacredscapes become holy. 3. The common features of Sacredscapes possess the intrinsic meaning. Whatever we see by a common eye is only the outside appearance; however there also lies invisible intrinsic meaning which would be understood only through the faith and deeper feelings in the cultural context. At super-shrine like the Hindu centre of Varanasi, Stirrat (1984: 208) claims that religious activity embraces both worlds, with no distinction drawn between the pragmatic and the transcendent: “religious activities at such shrines are both matters for making merit for the eternal life and means of gaining benefits in this world.” Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 19 4. For the Sacredscape history matters. Says Lewis (1979: 22): “That is, we do what we do, and make what we make because our doings and our makings are inherited from the past.” The sacredscapes are the cultural heritage resource where history matters. The symbolism, mythology, ritualisation process and the ultimate faithscape evolved ― all are the subject to the historical process of transformation and human adaptation, therefore they need special care (cf. Verschuuren, et al. 2010). 5. The Sacredscapes make little sense if out from sacred ecology. Human psyche and manifestive power in the sacredscape are the basic elements for making it existent and continue. They have specific location interpreted in a broader context of symbolism and where divine power is perceived by human being in transcendental form of consciousness. They replicate the macrocosm on the earth as mesocosm which is further revealed at the level of microcosm (human mind and faith, or an individual shrine or temple). 6. The messages conveyed by Sacredscapes are obscure. As the human psyche varies from one to another, local to regional, and the “messages” conveyed are so varied that making broad generalization is not possible. For understanding and analysis several set of questions be put before into the habit of asking them simply by doing so: What does it look like? How does it work? Who designed it? Why? When? What does it tell us about the way our society and culture work? To understand the message, one has to be a part of the pilgrimage itself as a pilgrim, avoiding completely looking like a pilgrim. This requires a deep sense for the cultural tradition and also a feeling of faith in the frame the followers follow (cf. Gothóni 2010). The landscape, especially sacredscape, communicates, but only to those who can read its messages (Faulstich 1994: 12). 6. Expressing Sacredscapes as Function Sacredscapes function as a system of communication, power and embody; this multiplicity of character needs to be recognised in various contexts and concepts. Meinig’s (1979) has proposed the ‘ten versions of the same scene’ which may be taken as important notions expressing sacredscapes (cf. Singh, Rana 1995: 103-104): 1) as Nature. The sky above, the ground beneath, and the horizon binding the two provide the basic frame as theologically expressed: sky the father, earth the mother, thus we all are brothers and sisters. The sacral 20 1. Rana P.B. Singh power perceived by human being in history was in fact a realisation of nature-spirit. 2) as Habitat. Every landscape is a piece of the Earth as Home of Mankind. Man constantly works as a viable agent of transformation and change and creator of resources (like heritage). In short, man is domesticating and cosmicising the earth. 3) as Artefact. Man in the process of transformation and change sets his mark on the landscape. The monuments, shrines, temples and related structure ― all are the testimony of human’s imprint on the sacred territory ― visible as artefact in the sacredscape. 4) as System. Man and his interaction with the sacredscape form an intricate system of systems ― some visible, but many invisible. This system in itself is a part of belief that implies a faith in man as essentially omniscient ― after all he is also a part of the cosmos and God. In cosmos one is related to other, and everything is related to die other like a ‘Self-regulating system’ what is narrated in the Gaia hypothesis. 5) as Problem. To know more in order to understand better is a notion to achieve the religious merit more perfectly and also to make rituals better for deeper experiences. As human being the performer may incorporate something from all these other views: it evokes a reverence for nature, a deeply felt concern for the earth as habitat, and a conviction that as a child of the divinity we can search our identity in the cosmos. 6) as Wealth. In a broader view, for everything has or affects value within a market economy. As heritage resource sacredscapes and their associated monuments and functions to be appraised as property for monetary transaction like development of pilgrimage-tourism. This view of sacredscape is future-oriented, for market values are always undergoing change and one must assess their trends and demands in future. Of course, this notion is completely a western idea, rooted in American ideology. However for maintenance and preservation of sacredscapes, market-oriented value system to be promoted, of course with care and cautions, as a viable strategy. 7) as Ideology. Seeing and visualising the sacredscape vary from person to person in accordance to the ideology used ― it may be in the context of only abstract structure or objectivity, or in the context of relative underpinnings or subjectivity. Similarly there also lie disciplinary ideologies, sacred vs. secular and several such dichotomies. Meinig’s Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 21 remark is notable in this context: “To see landscape as ideology is to think about how it was created but there is another way of doing that which, while at its best is reflective and philosophic, is also much more detailed and concrete (Meinig 1979: 43). 8) as History. All the underpinnings before our eyes are a complex cumulative record of the work of nature and man in a particular place. The visible feature at a sacred place, or in the sacredscape yields to diligence and inference a great deal of historical past. The physiognomy and chorology both record several layers and facets of change and transformation. In itself a sacredscape is the process and the product in space-place and in time, thus it is an accumulation. However, it is not easy to interpret it in concrete historical context. 9) as Special Place. Sacredscape is a special place, as an individual piece in the infinitely varied mosaic of the Earth where the ‘spirit of place’ (genius loci) plays an important role in making it distinct ― a mosaic of variety of patterns, relationships, interactions, meanings ― between human being and divine realm. The specific communicating character of sacredscape is particularity of place, mysterium tremendum. 10) as Aesthetic. The aesthetic view requires a special conscious detachment by the observer. Sacredscape as art form conveys the message for better understating of harmonic relationship between mankind and nature-spirit. In fact, “it seeks a meaning which is not explicit in the ordinary forms. It rests upon the belief that there is something close to the essence, to beauty and truth in the landscape” (Meinig 1979: 46). It also holds meaning which link us as individual souls and psyches to an ineffable and infinite world (ibid.: 47). 7. Sacredscapes: Taxonomy Among the attributes identifying the intimate relationship between human faith and landscape the sacramental attitudes to particular sites lead to form sacred place/sacredscapes ― as highly manifested and sacral-symbolic form (cf. Singh 1995a: 96-104). Although the degree of sacredness and values attached are highly variable, sacred space implies particular attachment to place (Norton 1989: 127). Obviously, “the more important a sacred place, paradoxically, the more flexible and numerous are likely to be the meanings it encompasses” (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 208). Religion is a major factor and has the capacity to endow space with sacred meaning, broadly categorised into three groups (Jackson and Henrie 1983: 95): 22 1. Rana P.B. Singh (a) Mystic-religious spaces ― associated with religious or other experiences inexplicable through conventional means. (b) Homelands or Temples as sacred spaces ― representing the roots of each individuals, family, people or believers. (c) Historical sacred spaces ― representing sites which have been assigned activity as a result of an event occurring there. All the sacred spaces vary according to the special sense attached to them depending on how “sacred” the space is ― persons, cultures or faiths, and the intensity of attraction at a sacred place as centre of pilgrimage. In India, the holy centres, sacred sites and centres of pilgrimages are almost identical and together in a complex way represent the archetype-mysticism built structure, historicity and faithscape ― to be understood and explained through the framework of heritage ecology. Among the ancient epics, the Mahabharata, dated ca 5th century BCE, is the first source of Hindu pilgrimages (tirtha-yatra). The mythologies of medieval period eulogised the sacred places and their sacred spots, especially as to how the pilgrimage symbolises spiritual progress and how it would be beneficial in getting relief from sins and worldly affairs; that is how pilgrimage is prescribed as a duty for spiritual merit. In general, a four-tier hierarchy of pilgrimage places is popularly accepted in Hindu traditions, viz. Pan-India, Regional, Sub-Regional, and Local. According to ancient mythology and the Hindu mind-set still the most popular sacred place is Kashi (Banaras), eulogised as one of the three ladders to the heaven; the others are Allahabad and Gaya; these three together form ‘bridge to the heaven’ (cf. Singh 2009a, and 2010b). According to varying belief systems in different religions and regions, using different connotations of their traditions and experiences, interpretations that befit to their believes and worldviews, and use of varying degree of physicality and sacrality to the landscape, taboos and behaviours, the sacred spaces may be categorised into seven groups (Stump 2008: 303, cf. Table 1.1). These categories are not within well-defined boundaries; instead there always exist transitions and overlapping in different forms at different degrees and in different ways of expressions, i.e. similarities and distinctiveness, both go together, but the uniqueness and mosaicness coexisting there are subject to change in time, space and functions. Sacred places may be broadly categorised into three groups (Swan 1991: 64-66): (a) human crafted buildings, temples, associated with the uniqueness of a specific locality that has become a specified place for religious reasons; (b) archetypal-symbolic space (cosmologically ordered space) where a larger whole has become condensed into a limited space, maintaining a sense of order and displaying a harmonious relationship Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 23 between human life and the cosmos, and by condensing the cosmos into a smaller sphere, its laws can be observed and experienced more clearly and human lives can be placed more accurately in accord with them; and (c) a place in nature that bears no special making, except for a well-worn footpath, and that is far more commonly found among tribal people, and without special making, known for mystic beauty of sacred architecture drawn in terms of some mythic forces. Table 1.1. Categories of Sacred Space (after Stump 2008: 302). Category Cosmological Theocentric Source of Religious Significance Crucial location, either real or imagined, within the cosmos Continual presence at a location of the divine or superhuman Hierophanic Setting for a specific religious apparition, revelation, or miracle Historical Association with the initiating events or historical development of a religion Access to manifesttations of superhuman power and influence Center of authority as expressed by major religious leaders or elites Repeated ritual usage in relation to an atmosphere of sanctity Hierenergetic Authoritative Ritual Examples Amitabha’s Pure Land; Hell; Mount Kailas as the axis mundi Hindu temple as a god’s dwelling place; Mt. Olympus as home of the Greek gods; Western Wall in Jerusalem Ascension of Jesus from Mount of Olives; Enlightenment of Buddha at Bodh Gaya; Marian apparition at Lourdes Bethlehem as the birthplace of Jesus; Karbala as the site of Husayn’s martyrdom; Temple Mount in Jerusalem Hindu sacred rivers as a source of healing; Icons in Eastern Orthodoxy; Tombs of Sufi shaykhs The oracular shrine to Apollo at Delphi; Potala Palace as the seat of the Dalai Lama; The Vatican within Roman Catholicism The Buddhist pilgrimage route on Shikoku; Camp meeting sites in Christianity; Mosques as sites of communal prayer Churches, shrines and temples are examples of the first category, while mandalic cities like Banaras, Madurai, Beijing and Kyoto belong to the second category, and Mount Fuji, Mount Sinai, the Ganga river, Mount Kailash, Mount Kilmanjaro, etc. belong to the third. These three types of sacred places exist in the consciousness of early earth worship and search 24 1. Rana P.B. Singh for man’s harmonious relationship with the nature’s cosmic mysteries. The special sense of heritage conservation be for the human peace and search for cosmic integrity: “Care for the place and it will care for you” (Swan 1990: 219). Sacred places in transpersonal context and human’s deep faith are seen as “touchstones of cultura1 integrity, serving as inspirational points for health, creativity and religious worship”, (Swan 1991: 8-9); however all around the world sacred places are in trouble. There exists a relationship between the noumenal world of invisible spiritual beings and the phenomenal, physical world of perception. Since sacred schemata and meanings are deeply involved in any, culture, the environmental ethics and spirit of place there, can be understood only in such contexts. 8. Heritage Ecology: Sacredscapes to the Earth Mysteries Heritage ecology as ‘a way of knowing’ follows a system resulting to holistic view – holism – where all the parts have their own distinct characteristics in spite of being part of the three, however together by the unifying principle they form a whole at the end. This is meticulously explained by an analogy of ‘Earth Mysteries Tree’ comprehended by Devereux (1991). He has explained that as to how the seven groups of subjective branches flourish on the top, and at the next level emerges into three main branches, resulting to give a final shape of three whose roots lie in ‘the Living Earth’ (Fig. 1.1); Devereux’s taxonomy and a systems approach would be a guideline for the comprehension and practise of heritage ecology (cf. Singh 1995b): 1) Archaeology. This branch refers the perception and cultural image of time as projected onto the remnants of antiquity – a product and possessor of our ancestral worldview, which has several dimensions to see and to understand. 2) Being and Seeing. To get experience of genius loci, the spirit of place, one has to understand the inherent meaning possessed at a place and the messages conveyed in this respect. To perceive and envision such messages, one needs “clear seeing” – clairvoyance, without any preconceived concepts, “that means being open to feelings as well as to observations …… (ibid.: 88). 3) Ancient Astronomy/ Cultural Astronomy. The association of astronomy and sacredscape is a traditional one in most of the old cultures. The archaeoastronomical explanations synthesises the ancient scientific truth and their perceived images used in the society. In case of India, the solar shrines and their associated myths in Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 25 Varanasi are compared with the values of Global Positioning System of satellites (GPS; Garmin GPS 75 Receivers) which shows a very strong correspondence (cf. Singh and Malville 1995). In fact, astronomy was an element of the spiritual worldview of the archaic societies involved (Devereux 1992: 126). Fig. 1.1. The Tree of Living Earth (after Devereux 1991: 40-41). 26 1. Rana P.B. Singh 4) Sacred Geometry. The perception of cosmic transformation and integration from the heaven (macrocosm) to the earth (mesocosm) and further to individual shrine or site (microcosm) shows the hierarchical form of wholeness. When it takes the form of ground plan geometry, called as sacred geometry. The ancient plan and design of sacred places and sites denote such outline. 5) Folklore & Mythology. “Myth is the high form of the art, and tells us much about the workings of the human psyche. Myth, like sacred geometry and measures, is perennial, and relates to our inner lives now just as much it ever did; it is only that we have lost touch as a culture with the patterns of consciousness that mythological motifs represent (Devereux 1992: 155). 6) Seeing and Monitoring at Sites. There Ms been tradition of watching and understanding mysterious forces manifested at sacred sites of antiquity (ibid.: 169). Certainly there exists some extrasensory perception element in human sensitivities. Many examples and details of sporadic physical monitoring of prehistoric sites are described in Devereux (1990, and 1993). 7) Geomancy. Descending at the second level of the Earth Mysteries Tree, the issue of integrated aspects of ancient sites is taken into account. Geomancy is a kind of yoga for entire cultures ‒ a way to keep human activity in harmony with nature; in a geomagnetic paradigm the seat of divinity, Mother Earth, is perceived as comprising both matter and spirit” (Anderson 1986: 27). 8) Correspondence and Symbolism. If geometry and number represent the ultimate systems’ language, then correspondence and its close companion symbolism represent the oldest and most profound form of systems thinking (Devereux 1990: 227). They are, in fact, deduced from nature itself, for example the numerical symbolism and its correspondence to the astronomical cognition. 9) Energies. The above last three together ultimately distil down to a question of energies of some kind universal force. This ‘force’ is really a deeper dimension of geomancy and also human psychic and spiritual relationship with it (Devereux 1990: 294). 10) Use of Sites. From shamanism and ritual acts to the pilgrimages and recently tourism – all define the special use of all the sacredscapes and sites (cf. Verschuuren, et al. 2010). Pilgrimage is a shared story of understanding through the gates of dharma; similarly other uses too. Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 27 11) The Living Sacred Earth. After all let us guess at how deep and how far its roots are in making the Earth as living organism. The transpersonal experience is one of the ways to get experience of inherent earth spirit. In the vein of Naess’s philosophical sense of deep ecology (transpersonal ecology) is suggested as a distinctive approach to ecophilosophy and be worthwhile to apply in this context (cf. Fox 1990: 204). About the sacred living nature of earth Mitchell (1989: 4) rightly suggests: “The earth was sacred, not because pious people chose so to regard it, but because it was in fact ruled by spirit, by the creative powers of the universe, manifest in all the phenomena of nature, shaping the features of the landscape, regulating the seasons, the cycles of fertility, the lives of animals and men”. Says Devereux (1990: 308): “Our culture has to develop what will be for it new understandings about both mind and planet. That synthesis is essential if the Global Tribe is to survive”; and finally (ibid.): “These ‘new’ sets of connections have to be made, if we are to reorient our worldview. The ancient, sacred places can help us make them”. 9. Sacredscape and Faithscape The notion of holy place is essentially an archetypal connotation of “wholeness”, as Eliade (1958: 371-380) refers that every pilgrimage shrine is an archetype of a sacred centre, marked off from the profane space surrounding it, where heaven and earth intersect and where time stands still, where there exists the possibility of breaking through to the realm of the transcendent. This symbolic purview may not equally be explained in all the religions. “If a sacred centre offers the opportunity for direct contact with divine, then relocating that centre in a human body makes the divine even more accessible and responsive to human needs and aspirations” (Eade and Sallnow 1991: 7). In spatial perspective, the original pilgrimage sites can be moved and re-established in varying forms with no loss of sacred or pedagogical significance, for the same text is merely mapped and described on to the new locations. ‘Ibis process of spatial manifestation and replication is a common phenomenon in Hindu mythology. These texts vividly mytholise and eulogize the manifestive power of the place “to exert a devotional magnetism over pilgrims from far and wide, and to exude of itself potent meanings and significances for its worshippers. The shrine is seen, so to speak, as sui generis: its power is internally generated and its meanings are largely predetermined” (Eade and Sallnow 1991: 9), of course in different texts it varies, however, essentially there does not exist discrepancy or contrast. The puranic epics 28 1. Rana P.B. Singh and treatises eulogise the sacred sites and sacredscapes as textual topography tracing the mythological narrative through the landscape, and projecting various images through the values and, visions. In the cosmos infused with spiritual forces, delineating special places as particularly important and sacred was as natural as it was inevitable. These special places were also “the places of ritual and ceremony, the ones in which the sacred was enacted in daily life; and in the act, the essential mystery and divinity of the universe reaffirmed” (Skolimowski 1992: 260). Pilgrimage as one of the highest forms of ritualisation gives “meaning ― be it collective or generic, psychic or biological, or mental and spiritual ― to such a crisis by revealing it as a necessary phase of transition between two levels (or sublevels) of an impersonal, more, or less universal process which inevitably obeys evolutionary rhythms and “laws” (Rudhyar 1983: 241). A phenomenal particularization in this context is proposed by Heidegger (1962 : 78-79) that sacred sites are having “Beingin-place”; to put it other way that spirit of place is reflected in its manifested spirituality and narrated vividly in mythology. Casey (1993: 314) explains it: “The in of intimacy resides in place before it resides in the more determine modes of in-hood that inhere in being-in-world, a term which we have every right by now to replace with being-in-place.” An ideal guide to the understanding of geography would be the experiences and expressions sought by us as human being to the manifestation of the divine spirit of the Earth as place (cf. Singh 1992). With the process of sacralisation the inhabited place transcends cosmicgeometrical space too. In span of time the power possessed there increases horizontally attracting people from distant spaces, and vertically conveying messages of deep thoughts, symbols and meanings-of course these are also the subject of growth, transformation and expansion of the culture and its deeper traditions (cf. Mugerauer 1994: 155). Landscape is a perceived vision of experiencing environment from human sensory field generated with our own internal environment which man expresses it while encountering the worlds surrounding us. It is not so such value what we perceive but how we feel about what we perceive that is crucial to understanding of human belief systems. A landscape is sacred because humans perceive it as sacred is a notion of deterministic idea. The idea of sacredscape is linked to man’s quest for an identity and role within the cosmic mystery (cf. Singh 1993: 161). Sacredscape is a double directed vision ― special character of spatiality back to the wisdom of the past, and deeper sense of meaning and attachment forward to posterity. Cultural and historical processes intertwined with human psyche strongly reflect the background to Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 29 sacredscape. Unfortunately, at present the growing ‘materialistic cultural running after economics and loss of human sensitivity, man-nature harmonic relationship is badly threatened by, resulting to loss of valuesystem and life-force. Many things are not seen in their full reality until they are seen and experience, not necessarily as sacredscape, but as existing within the context of sacrality’. This is a way of double-vision of spiritual and physical worlds integrated by the human faith and belief system ― what theosophically called as ‘Clairvoyance’, i.e., Clear Seeing. The place becomes sacred by the manifestive power of sacrosanct process and it possesses ‘power’. Power is a spiritual energy of life-force that enables an individual or a place to interact with the forces of the natural and supernatural world (cf. Radimilahy 1994: 91). Sacredscapes are the powerful places where power is needed for transcendental energy or for protection of spiritual danger. Mythological description of these sacredscapes helps to develop variety of images and imaginations too. Sacredscape is more than an imagery product of mind, it is also the landscape of faith, belief system and a state of transcendental consciousness ― always becoming new and transformed by the ‘process of sacralisation and ritualisation. The sacredscape as pilgrimage centre is a particular type of ceremonial centre too (cf. Silverman 1994: 2). The pilgrimage centre distinctly draws “a transient mass of worshippers from across a social, political ‘economic, cultural and spatial spectrum and, in so doing, to synthesize critical social and cultural elements from wider patterns of belief and practice in a region or regions” (ibid.: 3). Our soul is an abode. And by experiencing “sacrality” and ‘sacredscape’ we learn to “abide” within divine interconnectedness. If the process of sacralisation, ritualisation and deeper interconnectedness together make the place as distinct “sacred place,” better call it sacredscape ― the integrative entity of eternal bond between human psyche and the nature-spirit. Through pilgrimage and deep feelings/faith man can transform the materialistic identity into a cosmic integrity at a place. Such place becomes holy where ‘wholeness’ is preserved’. Ultimately the overall wholeness of landscape creates a faithscape that encompasses sacred place, sacred time, sacred meanings, sacred rituals and embodies both symbolic and tangible psyche elements in an attempt to realize man’s identity in the cosmos (Singh 1987a: 522). The mythological stories converge the divinity’s acts and life into a divine environment making a spiritual sphere of faithscape more meaningful. The meaning possessed in the faithscape is more the subject of understanding than narration. ‘The moment human being individual and as member of groups confers meaning at a place, the place becomes specific’ (cf. Entrikin 1991: 16). 30 1. Rana P.B. Singh And, when more specifically the meaning comes from sacredness, the place converges to sacredscape. And at certain level of manifestation sacredscape converges into faithscape. In common Hindu belief concerning cosmology, the physical and spiritual worlds are identified as the two parallel dimensions of existence, and only by faith and revelation one can perceive their interconnectedness. The spiritual dimension ultimately emerges into a theosphere where humane and belief-view may be referred as faithscape. Contemporary studies about pilgrimage have shown that patterns of human movement in pilgrimage may take on cosmological significance, as journey to shrine are identified with macrocosmic cycles or movement among astral bodies (cf. Crumrine and Morinis 1991: 5). The Hindu pilgrimage is a dialogue of “imagining, memorizing and understanding” between outer realm of vision and records, and the inner realm of self. This dialogue results to archetypal expression. These two characteristics are the feature of movement forming two phases: Up from Body to Soul, and Up from Soul to Spirit. By active participation pilgrims employ active imagination ― Up from Body to Soul. And, by active involvement pilgrims proceed to active feeling resulting to understanding ― Up from Soul to Spirit (cf. Casey 1991: xv-xvi). At the completion of the main pilgrimage the pilgrims return successively following the reverse steps, i.e., Down from Spirit to Soul, and Down from Soul to Body. That is how emerges a mandala making a round where starting and coming back meet at the same point. This conception of archetypal as formal a priori structure is a necessity and universal. No sacred place is without archetypal connotation. Says Casey (1991: 290), “They are a common place ― a place of places, a place for places ― and in this abstracted role threaten to become common places, taken for granted in their very universality”; as recently exemplified vividly (cf. Gothóni 2010). Pilgrimage as a ritualized process preserves and deepens the cultures and rediscovers the genius and coded power of their great myths for both personal and social transformation. However, this achievement is the subject to firm determination, awareness, deep involvement in the setting and a kind of internal commitment to take the responsibility of oneself, and at the same time, be respectful to the needs of fellow pilgrims as a whole. Like a Dromenon, pilgrimage is also “a rhythm of awakening, a root pulse that carries with it the coding of all our becoming. It is a yeasting in the searching soul. .. one becomes part of even larger ecosystem, a larger ecology of Being” (Houston 1993: 1, 3). It is evident that special place like sacredscape indeed exerts an active influence on Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 31 pilgrims and they “have begun to understand just how it can do via its memorability and its tie to the human heart” (Casey 1991: 295). The sacredscapes are known as tirthas in Sanskrit literature and Hindu mythologies. Etymologically a tirtha refers to “crossing the ford”, thus serving as bridge to link the three cosmic spheres: macrocosmos (heavenly abode and gods), mesocosmos (the earthly representation), and microcosmos (the human psyche and emotional bond). Of course in literal sense the word tirtha is translated as sacred or holy place, however it fails to fully comprehend its true sense, for the deep spiritual value of devout Hindus it transcends mere sacredness. It is rather difficult for those outside the culture to recognize, except by real involvement in the practices and the rules of behaviour that pertain to them. In ancient Hindu mythology the sacredscapes are identified into two forms: (i) those related to spatial aspect of nature and the earth either in terms of majestic beauty, specific quality or manifestive power entrusted by a sage in historical past known as the Bhauma Tirthas, and (ii) those related to inner environment of human consciousness / transcendence in which by penance and religious practices one purifies his “mind”, i.e., eternal cleansing where soul and body reach to a state of integration and revelation ― Manasa Tirtha. Says the Brahma Purana (70. 16-19) that ‘without the purified and sanctified mind one cannot receive the message of a sacredscape’. There appears a mass of literature on the first category of sacredscapes and their perception, while the second category of thought has yet to be accepted as strategy of re-search and understanding which needs not a line of specific approach but “openness” where everything is open in all the possible ways parallel to the analogy of Hindu belief that the holy dip in the Ganga river is a ritual of purification and renewal ― a divine grace of transformation (see Bryant 1994: 38). The Ganga river considered as the liquid divine energy, motherly river, in its ongoingness as spirit of sustainability is the total symbol of Hinduism and ritualisation ― a sacredscape par excellence (see Singh 1994, and 1996; Singh and Malville 1995). Pilgrimage is a process and performance that links inherent, manifested, mytholised and perceived meanings, commonly referring cyclic nature, worship and satisfaction to human quest through interaction and reciprocal non-verbal communication with the nature divine. Hindu pilgrimage connotes one of the five cultural-coded moral duties (panchakriyas) with a noble aim to live virtually (dharma), celebrate holy days (utsava), honouring the rite of passage (samskara), and ultimately to receive merit/fruit of peace (shanti) making life gratifying (dhanya) with a sublime pleasure (ananda) (cf. Davidson and Gitlitz 2002: 237-238). In 32 1. Rana P.B. Singh ancient period when animistic religions predominated India, the prehistoric geographic features like rock, tress, and especially caves (the womb of the world), rivers (the life-giving fluid of the world), mountains (the boundary between earth and sky, and the source of weather) housed spirits who exerted significant influence over human behaviour (ibid.). Of course due to transformation of landscapes and cultures after passage of time many other traditions superseded, but they all made their imprints and also maintained the insight and spirit that existed in the past ― this is what called also as continuity of unity among cultural diversities, which is the essence of Indian culture. The Hindu paradigm of pilgrimage has served as spirit of awakening and a binding force for ‘communion of minds’, in stead in strict sense of sanctified monologue. Religious colouring (mosaicness) is imparted to the geographical integrity of Indian nation. The political party like BJP glories the sacred geography of India through yatras (pilgrimages in procession). The unity of Hindu India is signified through all the rivers of India, which are symbolically (manifested as archetype) connected with the holy river, the Ganga. Following this way of perception and believes, pilgrimage was effectively transformed into a ritual of national integration, but unfortunately sometimes used by politicians for their vested interests (cf. Deol 2000: 48). The Hindu identity and central importance of India in Mauritius is a manifestation of the holy river Ganga there in a form of lake that attract huge mass of adherents on the annual pilgrimage celebration on an sacred day of Shivaratri (Shiva’s marriage day) ― this creates a sacred geography closely resembling an archetype of Hindu pilgrimage sites and also reflects the process of Gangaisation (cf. Gal 2010: 44, also see Singh 1996). A celebrated Hindu pilgrimage site, Haridvar (Hardwar) that lies on the river Ganga at the edge of the Himalayas, where the river enters into the pains, is inextricably tied to the mythology and reality of the Ganga, and also get imposed upon the changes that have usually reflected worldly forces such as shifting trade routes, improved transportation, or political instability. Nevertheless the intensity of pilgrims and its holiness in the mindset of devout Hindus are maintained and mundane influences have been ignored in the city’s sacred narrative, which presents a fixed, unchanging identity. The recent master study finds that many modern Hindus, like many modern Christians, feel some dissonance between traditional religious symbols and their 21st-century world, and that they are reinterpreting their traditional symbols to make them meaningful for their time according to suitability, feasibility and helping maintenance of their identity (Lochtefeld 2010). Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 33 In the arena of faithscape, the rituals serve as means to transform the power of sacredscape from its invisible form to the level of experience and revelation. Faithscape and sacredscape also provide an ideal medium for symbolism, manipulation and transformation of the past. The permanent landmark in the sacredscape can be represented “by monument building; by this process the human institutions that created the monument are taking on the permanence of nature: architecture and nature united as one” (Cooney 1994: 35). 10. Pilgrimage: Revealing the Sacredscapes There appears constant tension between personal needs and social responsibilities. For methodological , orientation, the frame of behavioural cultural ecology may be applied which incorporates : (a) the dialectic of the individual and the community, (b) the interplay of individual and collective decision in management, or change, and (c) encoding of past experience in cultural institutions and values as transmitted through several levels and several phases of the past (Butzer 1994 : 412). On the line of experiencing more deeper feelings as generally described in the sacred ecology, the modem way of tourism – only exploiting the richness of insight and beauty – should be replaced by pilgrimage. This does not mean to return back to naive tradition or any sort of fundamentalism. One has to remember that “pilgrimage is a rhythm of awakening, a root pulse that carries with it the codings of all our becomings. It is a yeasting in the searching soul” (Houston 1993: 1). Pilgrimage is a journey into larger reality, an initiation that leads to a union, or continuity with powers and principalities beyond one’s little local self. As a pilgrim, one becomes part of an extended larger eco system, a larger ecology of Being – experiencing a unified reality of nature spirit and human psyche. The programmes and plan promoting pilgrimage tourism should be in the light of experiencing Living Sacred Earth – reestablishment and re-search of the values involved and revival of such traditions and festivities with the support of local and private stewardship (cf. Nelson and Woodley 1990). Peter Dawkins (1995) in “The Art Pilgrimage” expresses the overall spectrum of its rootedness, meanings and messages (cf. Table 1.2). While explaining the basic idea behind founding the Gatekeepers Trust, Martino (1995 : 5) expresses that “by exploring and renewing our spiritual relationship with the Earth through Pilgrimage, we may experience the transformative affect that is known between individuals and the living Earth” …. “The Ancient Tree, the historic Cathedral, Ley lines 34 1. Rana P.B. Singh and Stone Circles stand as a silent visual testimony of a Living Sacred Earth receiving and providing a rich and conscious energy of care and celebration that is Light.... That is LIFE.” Table 1.2. “The Art of Pilgrimage” (after Dawkins 1995) § Pilgrimage is an art which brings peace to the soul. § Pilgrims are bearers of love, which they carry to special places of the earth. § By holding a joyful consciousness of this love and of the beauty of these places, pilgrims encourage the natural energies of the earth to flow harmoniously. § Pilgrims are guided by a wisdom based on both intuition and an understanding of the energy routes and sacred places of power in the world. § The gifts of love, hope and joy are inestimable.... They have the power to heal and transform all things. § To be a pilgrim is to be a friend with the earth, with the Divine and with all levels of life.... ― Peter Dawkins Sir Walter Raleigh (1552-1618) in his poem “The Passionate Man’s Pilgrimage” presented a sense of silence and human psyche and a pilgrim’s wish for sacred journey: Give me my scallop shell of quiet, My staff of faith to walk upon, My scrip of joy, immortal diet, My bottle of salvation, My gown of glory, hope’s true gage, And thus I’ll take my pilgrimage. 11. Contemporary concerns: New Dimensions From Mecca to Graceland, Canterbury to Vatican City, special places that affect the human spirit have been luring multitudes of visitors throughout human history. Where are the world’s most important pilgrimage sites? Who are the pilgrims? Why are they going? How do they behave once they reach their destinations? Pilgrimage is a comprehensive compendium of the basic facts on Pilgrimage from ancient times to the 21st century. The recent most about classic the two-volume encyclopaedia presents 500 alphabetically arranged articles on pilgrimage, both religious and secular, in all religions and time periods and in popular culture, arranged into five categories: the abstract-theoretical such as apparitions, veneration of relics, and pilgrims in music and art; incidentals such as Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 35 dress, offerings, mementos, and prayer; people important to the development of pilgrimage; pilgrimage infrastructure such as hospices, transportation systems, laws, and guidebooks; and specific sites (Davidson and Gitlitz 2002). This work has established the path of pilgrimage studies, especially exposing importance of sacred places and their associated traditions; of course it has limitation of selection of sites and their coverage. This work helps explain the attraction and importance that pilgrimage has for millions of people, regardless of nationality, or religion. Says the Bible: “Blessed are those whose strength is in You. They have set their hearts on pilgrimage” (Psalm 84: 5). The Israelites knew it; David knew it; the writer of Hebrews knew it; also John Bunyan knew it. In this mystical world, we are strangers and pilgrims always moving with a noble quest! We’re passing through this place, on a sacred journey to somewhere else ― from this world to the realm of terrestrial. The stories of experiential feelings and understanding explore the approaching of each day as a pilgrimage ― a chance to move one step closer to our ultimate goal and to experience tastes of that goal, even now, through prayerful awareness, study and meditation at once both internal and external (Foster 2010). It is believed, especially from insiders’ views, that travel broadens one’s horizons. But a pilgrimage, on the other hand, expands one’s consciousness and conscience to mystic nature. Thus, the end result of a pilgrimage is the capacity to see the sacredness in the places that are visited and a link to be established. One such sacred place is the vast territory of the Maya world, where thousands of pyramid-temples form a network or web of interconnected sacred sites. These sites, like Tikal in Guatemala and Copan in Honduras, are remnants of a complex and highlyadvanced civilization that existed on the continent of the Americas, forming what was known as the Land of the Plumed Serpent where pilgrimage was taken as the most common and strong force of realising belongingness and unity between divine and human realm (Wigowsky 2010). From the Christian viewpoint, the pain of the world demands our activism, but the urgency and pervasiveness of need distracts us from our own need to find ourselves in Christ, and makes us increasingly vulnerable to burnout ― both personally and communally. A recent study tells one such story of a fragmented life, showing how God awakens us to the truth about us, and the truth about him, as we embark on the journey to sacred places he lays out for each of us (Heuertz 2010). Though the concept of the Christian pilgrimage has its origins in the Exodus of the Jews from ancient Egypt, but it has changed and adapted with the passing centuries. 36 1. Rana P.B. Singh In medieval times millions of pilgrims spent months travelling across Europe to visit holy cities and shrines, and today a modern revival has blurred the lines between pilgrimage and tourism and made places such as Iona, Taize and Santiago de Compostella contemporary Meccas. This can be explain through historical-cultural approaches (Bradley 2010). An anthropological study of life at a Bolivian pilgrimage site, emphasising power and pilgrimage, focuses on the experiences of pilgrims and how, in their Marian devotion, they express and learn to live with the various inequalities they experience in everyday life as part of their lifeways and lifeworlds. Issues of poverty and class inequality, of course, lead them to approach the Virgin of Urkupina to support them in their quest for economic betterment and good social life, where predominance of female is obvious (Derks 2010). Sacred places may be seen to harbour particular forces associated with ‘prehistoric cultures’ that sustained and maintained even today, mostly as a kind modern pilgrimage-tourism (cf. Knudsen and Waade 2010: 231). The Buddhist stupas along the trade routes developed into pilgrimage sites, attracting both devotees and traders ― the two reciprocal and complimentary function counter serving to each other. The brave traders such as the Sogdians, whose faith was Buddhism, travelled to India all the way from distant China. This network of exchange emerged along the borders between agricultural China and the steppe nomads during the Han Dynasty (206 BCE – CE 220), in consequence of the inter-dependence and the conflicts of these two distinctive societies that developed the pilgrimage path, known as Silk Road (Liu 2010: 85). The ASI India has submitted proposal for this route and notable sacred sites associated to this route to be inscribed as heritage in UNESCO WHL (20 January 2010). 12. An Epilogue: Something for Re-conceptualisation Following Jungian quest we have to describe and to explain a sacredscape, the present pilgrimage of which was introduced in the historical past; the basic ground plan dates from the ancient past, and a careful examination of the routes and structures disclose the fact that it was reconstructed on the basis of the realization of nature-spirit possessed by the territory in the past. Through mythology we discover its divine association with the pilgrimage route and sites thereby, and under which are found the roots of man’s deeper understanding of transcendental power of consciousness and his quest to know human’s identity in the cosmicised nature (compare Jung 1928: 118-119). The very fact behind this cognition Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 37 is to take over pilgrimage as tool for analysis of the human soul and human revelation. The perceptions, reflections and glorifying mythologies produced in the discourses of the sacred places also articulate their particular identities. Certainly there exists a close relationship between place and identity. Bremer (2003: 73-74, quote in Bremer 2006: 33) have strongly argued: The making of place, sacred or otherwise, always involves the making of identities; conversely, the construction of identity always involves the construction of places. On the one hand, the meaningful content of a particular place relies on the production of both subjects who inhabit the place and subjects who observe, comment on, and interpret the place, including both insiders and outsiders. On the other hand, all subjects are situated; to attain subjective agency means at the most fundamental level to occupy a particular place, both in the physical and social senses. Thus, place and identity emerge together in a relationship of simultaneity. This simultaneous relationship between place and identity relies on a reciprocal meaningfulness and exchanges that binds people and places together and maintain the continuity of this tradition by passing from one generation to other. Eliade (1959: 23) argues that “Revelation of sacred space makes it possible to obtain a fixed point and hence to acquire orientation in the chaos of homogeneity, to ‘found of world’ and to live in a real sense.” He consistently emphasizes the role of sacred places in orienting religious communities, as when he describes “techniques of orientation” as “techniques for the construction of sacred space” (ibid.: 29). To Eliade, a sacred space represents the centre of the world; it is, in his famous term, an axis mundi. Even moveable objects can operate in this locative, orienting manner. Sacred space, in Eliade’s estimation, “organizes around particular sites, or even particular objects, that become orientational centres in the religious community’s world. These axes mundi decree a locative stability that allows the community to endure in a changing world” (Bremer 2006: 31). Jim Swan (1992: 200-201) observes that ‘the sacredscapes are the “earth heritage” where one can experience the vibration of the earth energy. They require special care for preservation and protection’. Describing the psychic connection between people and place for enhancing mental health Vine Deloria, Jr. (cf. Swan, ibid.: 237) states that “unless the sacred places are discovered and protected and used as religious places, there is no possibility of a nation ever coining to grip with the land itself and national psychic stability is impossible.” 38 1. Rana P.B. Singh Powerful places in history became cities and were responsible for generating entire civilizations and seem to condense the culture and values of that civilization in one place. For example, Varanasi in India is known as the cultural capital of India, and microcosmic India. This character of place is referred as “orthogenetic” that creates and sustains the ethos and moral order of the whole culture. Of course, primarily such places, or cities, have developed self-image as they reproduce the cosmological order and make it accessible on the human plane (Eck 1987: 2). Says Eck (1998: 149) that “in the Hindu tradition, any place can become the sacred abode of the gods, if the proper rites are performed. When a temple is consecrated and its image installed, the great rites of pratishthā serve to call the presence of the divine to that place. With any image fashioned of wood or stone or rudely crafted of clay, rites of invitation (āvāhana) are observed at the beginning of worship, inviting the deity to be present, and rites of dismissal (visarjana) are observed at worship’s end, giving the deity leave to go.” However, there is an exception in case of sacred river the Ganga; Eck further adds “With the worship of the Ganga no such rites are ever observed. This river is no ordinary image in which the divine has come to dwell. She is celestialunmediated and immediate. Whatever is holy, whatever is merciful, whatever is utterly auspicious is already there” (ibid.). At the “end” of the worldly appearance (samsāra) the realm of the “sacred” begins and further extends to infinity (ananta). That is how those who delves into the infinite depth of sacred becomes part of sacred. Here ‘ends’ the human intentionality and converges into the terrestrial realm of divinity. Sacredscapes are the visible space and representation of those terrestrial reflections, and be experienced and revealed within the territory of faithscape. della Dora (2009) suggests a re-conceptualization of sacred space in relational terms, as the product of human and non-human interactions and networked flows, and of ‘sacred places’ as ‘reassuring anchors’ (both territorial and imaginative) within a world of fluid global networks. This preposition further opens fresh ground to re-enact and reconsider varying dimensions and projections of ‘sacredscape’. We are more threatened by the erosion of culture. Should we not rethink to survive at least those festivities related to the earth spirit, power of place and preserving our heritage ecology by celebrating the religious festivities and rituals which symbolise the communionship of human being with the cosmic spirit (sacredscapes)? So now let us rejoice, for we are alive, and life is good; let us participate in the celebration of renewal, in making more harmonious friendship with nature and earth spirit. This is a call of heritage ecology at this crucial time (Singh 1995b: 214). Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 39 The visit to heritage sites and heritagescapes, the effort to understand, the work to keep the mind and heart open to the sacred manifestation, all this charges one’s being with vision, with insight and the purpose (c.f. Jarow 1986: 12). This is the real pilgrimage – ‘an enacting of an internal process in the external world’. Heritage ecology is also a way to pilgrimage ‒ a way of relating to the land (Earth spirit) and the people (Human psyche). It is possible, “by working in certain ways at the ceremonial arrangement and juxtapositions of monuments and natural contours to at least start to share the worldview of the ancient (Devereux 1992: 119). “Let us hope we will have the sense to seek, the wisdom to listen, and the patience to learn” (Devereux 1990: 216). Paraphrased Carl Jung’s (cf. 1970 as quoted in Swan 1991: 304) provoking should be taken as a moral and ethical concern for the sacred environment: People of our earth would never find true peace until they could come into a harmonious relationship with the land they live. 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Ashgate Research Companion to Heritage and Identity. Ashgate Publs., Aldershot & London: 125-141. —. 2009a. Hindu Pilgrimages: From Roots to Perspectives; in his, Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India: Toward Ecology and Culture in 21st Century. [Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 1]. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K.: 152-190. —. 2009b. Sacred space and faithscape; in, his: Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century. [Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 2]. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K.: 227-265. —. 2009c. Cosmic Order and Cultural Astronomy. Sacred Cities of India. [Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 4]. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne U.K. Sacredscapes and Sense of Geography 45 —. 2010a. Heritagescapes & Cultural Landscapes: an appraisal; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) Heritagescape & Cultural Landscapes. [Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 6]. Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi: 7-56. —. 2010b. Holy places and Pilgrimages in India: The emerging trends and bibliography; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India. [Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 8]. Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon & New Delhi: 7-56. Singh, Rana P.B. and Malville, John McKim 1995. Cosmic order and cityscape of Varanasi (Kashi): The Sun images and cultural astronomy. National Geographical Journal of India, 41 (1), March: 69 88. Sitwell, O. Francis G. 1994. Sacred Space reconsidered; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) The Spirit and Power of Place: Human Environment and Sacrality. National Geogr. Soc. India, Res. Pub. 41, Varanasi: 101-110. Smith, Jonathan Z. 1978. Map is Not Territory: Studies in the History of Religion. E.J. Brill, Leiden. —. 1987. To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Smith, Martyn 2008. Religion, Culture, and Sacred Space. Palgrave Macmillan, New York and Basingstoke. Sopher, David E. 1981. Geography and religions. Progress in Human Geography, 5 (4): 510-524. Stirrat, Richard L. 1984. Catholics and the riots in historical perspective; in, Manor, James (ed.) Sri Lanka in Change and Crisis. Croom Helm, London & St. Martin Press, New York: 196-213. Stump, Roger W. 2008. The Geography of Religion: Faith, Place, and Space. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc., Lanham. Cf. Chapter 5: ‘The Meaning and Uses of Sacred space’, pp. 301-362. Swan, James A. 1990. Sacred Places. How the Living Earth Seeks our Friendship. Bear & Co. Pub., Santa Fe. —. (ed.) 1991. The Power of Place. Sacred Ground in Natural & Human Environment. Quest Books, Wheaton, IL. —. 1992. Nature as Teacher and Healer. How to Reawaken your Connection with Nature. Villard-Random House Books, New York. —. 2010. Sacred Places of Japan: Sacred Geography in the vicinity of the cities of Sendai and Nara; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems. [Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 7]. Shubhi Publs., New Delhi: 319-332. Tuan, Yi-Fu 1974. Topophilia. Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, NJ. —. 1977. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. 46 1. Rana P.B. Singh —. 1978. Sacred Space: exploration of an idea; in, Butzer, Karl W. (ed.) Dimensions of Human Geography. University of Chicago, Department of Geography, Research Paper 186, Chicago: 84-99. —. 1984. In Place, Out of Place. Geoscience & Man (LSU), 24: 1-10. —. 1993. Passing Strange and Wonderful. Aesthetics, Nature, and Culture. Shearwater Books, Island Press, Washington, DC. Verschuuren, Bas; Wild, Robert; McNeely, Jeffrey A. and Oviedo, Gonzalo (eds.) 2010. Sacred Natural Sites: Conserving Nature and Culture. Earthscan Publications, London. Vuconić, Boris 2006. Sacred spaces and tourism in the Roman Catholic tradition; in, Timothy, Dallen J. and Olsen, Daniel H. (eds.) Tourism, Religion, and Spiritual Journeys. Routledge, London: 237-253. Walter, Eugene V. 1988. Placeways. A Theory of the Human Environment. The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill. Wigowsky, Paul John 2010. Maya Pilgrimage: Xibalba, Maximon, and Our Galaxy. AuthorHouse, Bloomington IN. ----------------------------Prof. Rana P.B. Singh Professor of Cultural Geography & Heritage Studies, Banaras Hindu University, New F - 7 Jodhpur Colony, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA. Email: ranapbs@gmail.com § Rana is researching in the fields of heritage planning, pilgrimages and settlement systems in Varanasi region since over last three decades as promoter, collaborator and organiser. On these topics he lectured at centres in all parts of the world. His publications include over 190 papers and 38 books on these subjects, including Banaras, the Heritage City of India: Geography, History, and Bibliography (IB 2009), and the eight books under ‘Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series’: - five from Cambridge Scholars Publishing UK: Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India (2009), Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century (2009), Cosmic Order & Cultural Astronomy (2009), Banaras, Making of India’s Heritage City (2009), Sacred Geography of Goddesses in South Asia (2010), and - three from Shubhi Publications (New Delhi, India): Heritagescapes and Cultural Landscapes (2011), Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems (2011), and Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India (2011). 2 Pilgrimage and Literature Jamie S. Scott York University, Canada ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Journeys to sacred sites and writings about them reveal different travel motives and different understandings of the sacred. Religious insiders undertake pilgrimages for devotional reasons, though such devotions may entail religious or secular motives. Outsiders usually travel as tourists, not as devotees, either religious or secular. This essay first discusses the portrayal of sacred sites in western pilgrimage narratives. It then examines portrayals of pilgrimage in western imaginative works. A third section considers the phenomenon of literary pilgrimage in selected British literature. Altogether, these writings blend and blur the testimonial and the touristic, the factual and the fictional, the classic and the conventional, reflecting material and spiritual ambiguities associated with the sacred status of specific sites. The essay closes with some remarks on pilgrimage and literature in religious traditions other than the Christian. Keywords: pilgrimage, sacred sites, representation, pilgrimage literature, literary pilgrimage, religious tourism. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ “… because there ain’t anything that is so interesting to look at as a place that a book has talked about” (Twain 1894: 41). 1. Introduction Conventionally, pilgrimage is associated with travel to sacred sites, whether these sites are of nature’s or of human making. As far as religion goes, though, such journeying has different meanings for ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders.’ Richard Barber implies this sort of distinction when he describes pilgrimage as “a journey resulting from religious causes, externally to a holy site, and internally for spiritual purposes and internal understanding” (Barber 1993: 1). If believers undertake pilgrimages for devotional reasons, however, such devotions may entail spiritual or secular motives. Pilgrimage to a holy mountain or martyr’s shrine, for example, differs from a visit to, say, the American civil war battlefield at Gettysburg 48 2. Jamie S. Scott or the Canadian World War I monument at Vimy Ridge, and still more so, some might argue, from a visit to White Hart Lane, the stadium of England’s Premier League football team, Tottenham Hotspur, or to Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris, to attend the grave of Jim Morrison, lead singer of the 1970s rock band, the Doors. These latter cases seem to entail the apparently self-contradictory notion of secular sacrality. At the same time, outsiders may also go to great lengths to travel to sacred sites, but as tourists, not as devotees, either spiritual or secular. 1 Alison Booth has noted that “Dean MacCannell was among the first theorists, following Erving Goffman, to link tourism to sacred ritual and pilgrimage” (Booth 2007), but critics generally urge some sort of distinction between the two kinds of journeying. Doris Donnelly, for instance, argues that tourists are more concerned with the superficies of travel, while inward commitment drives pilgrims on their journeys (Donnelly 1992: 20). “When the outward molds the inward,” Donnelly writes, “we become pilgrims, women and men in via, persons en route to some destination, toward some end,” while tourists tend to be consumers of commodified travel (Donnelly 1992: 20). In addition, the digital age raises new questions about the medium of pilgrimage; as Lutz Kaelber has noted, paradigms of religious travel now include the virtual tour (Kaelber 2006). Similarly, literature has ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ meanings. On the one hand, we have the canons of literature variously identified by scholars in linguistic terms, or national, or ethnic, or cultural or broadly geographical. The phrase ‘English Literature,’ for example, may refer to English literary classics, or to British literature more generally, or even to Western literature, and may or may not include the ethnic literatures in English of the Scottish, Welsh and Irish, say, or from another critical standpoint, socalled New Literatures in English from Nova Scotia to New Zealand, from Singapore to South Africa. On the other hand, we have the looser sense of literature, which embraces any text purposely written or otherwise made available for public consumption, including but not limited to linguistic, national, ethnic, cultural or broadly geographical literary canons. And as with religious travel, so also has the digital age introduced further 1 James Buzard further complicates the picture, pointing out that from the late eighteenth century forwards, English commentators liked to distinguish between tourists and travellers. “The tourist is the dupe of fashion,” he concludes, “following blindly where authentic travellers have gone with open eyes and free spirits” (Buzard 1993: 1). In this sense, pilgrims seem to be special kinds of travellers. Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 49 complexities to our understanding of literature; we are all familiar, for example, with the phenomena of the graphic novel and the e-book. Third, the connecting ‘and’ in my title, “Pilgrimage and Literature,” may also ‘mean’ several things. Some years ago, Dan Vogel suggested “a lexicon of six terms, each descriptive of a type of movement in a narrative: journey, wandering, quest, pilgrimage, odyssey, and going-forth” (Vogel 1974: 185). But the “interpretive confusion” Vogel wished to avoid with this typology takes another form when we consider that the phrase “pilgrimage and literature” may refer not just only to different kinds of movement in a narrative, but to differing kinds of relationship between movement and narrative. To put it succinctly, we have the literature of pilgrimage, i.e. literature generated by and for pilgrims; pilgrimage in literature, i.e. literary representations of pilgrims and pilgrimages; and literary pilgrimage, i.e. pilgrimages made to sites associated with certain writers and their writings. Dominated by the Roman Catholic church, the European Middle Ages were the great era of pilgrimage in western Christianity. Paradigms and problems about the nature, role and status of pilgrimage come to the fore in this period. In the first part of this essay, I discuss some classic examples of the literature of religious pilgrimage, focusing on medieval English texts; in the second part, I examine representative portrayals of religious pilgrimage in fictional works, again limiting myself for the most part to medieval English writing; and in the third part, I turn to the phenomenon of literary pilgrimage, selecting examples from the English literatures of the British Isles. As we shall see, distinctions among these kinds of writing blend and blur the testimonial and the touristic, the factual and the fictional, the classic and the conventional, reflecting material and spiritual ambiguities associated with the interpretive status of sacred sites. Nor are such matters peculiar to writings in English or to the religious traditions of Christianity, as a few closing examples from scholarship on other literary and religious cultures will show, though here as elsewhere, given the enormous range of potential candidates, I do not mean to imply either the exceptional status of these examples or any sense of exhaustiveness in my coverage. 2. Literature of Pilgrimage A good deal of early Christian literature debates the spiritual meaning and theological status of pilgrimage. As several scholars have shown, the first Christians rarely understood ‘pilgrimage’ to mean travel to a sacred site. Rather, it had to do with the sense of life as spiritual journey. Key 50 2. Jamie S. Scott New Testament texts, the Epistle to the Hebrews 11.13-14 and I Peter 2.11 blend the literal and the metaphorical aspects of inherited Jewish realities of physical and spiritual displacement and transfer them to the early Christian community. “[A]s spiritual apartness finds itself in the metaphor of physical exile,” writes Philip Edwards, “so the passage of the soul of the spiritual exile to its ultimate solace was voiced as a journey” (Edwards 2005: 9, 10). Pilgrimage might mean quite literally ‘wandering,’ a withdrawal from the world into a life of “poverty, asceticism, solitude, contemplation” (Chadwick 1963: 37). Early Irish monastics like Saint Columba urged Christians to exile themselves voluntarily from “their country and land, their wealth and their worldly delight for the sake of the Lord of the Elements, and go in perfect pilgrimage in imitation of Him” (Old Irish Life of St. Columba quoted in Chadwick 1963: 83). Similarly, even when extolling pilgrimage, theologians as various as Augustine, Gregory of Nyssa, Anselm and Thomas à Kempis warn against the dangers of identifying the ubiquitous divine too closely with particular places. Thomas writes: “Many run to divers places to visit the memorials of Saints departed … but behold, Thou art Thyself here present with me on Thine altar, my God, Saint of Saints” (à Kempis 1997: 190). At worst, the argument went, occasional travel to religious sites might all too easily become a substitute for committing more fully to the spiritual demands of a long life of faith. At the same time, though, the identification of Christianity with the Roman imperium and its consequent institutionalization came to include the legalizing of pilgrimage and the sacralising of Palestine as ‘Holy Land’ and Jerusalem as sacred city, and before long Rome, too. From the fourth century, travel to these destinations grew in popularity, leading to the great age of medieval Christian pilgrimage. Some theologians suggested that journeying to sacred sites captured in miniature the sense of life as pilgrimage, even arguing that tackling the difficulties and deprivations of such journeys helped to steel the Christian against the seductions of the material world. Eusebius of Caesaria (260-339), for example, praises Helena, the British mother of Roman Emperor Constantine, for establishing pilgrimage routes from Rome to Palestine and for instigating church-building programmes in Bethlehem, Jerusalem and Sinai. Later, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People (731) and the anonymous Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (9th – 12th centuries) glowingly record the humility and devotion of princes and princesses visiting the shrines of apostles and martyrs. In 1095, Christian knights wrested Jerusalem from the Muslims in the First Crusade, itself sometimes interpreted as armed pilgrimage. Pope Urban granted forgiveness of sins to crusaders, and the Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 51 lure of indulgences increased pilgrimage in general. 2 As Dee Dyas has noted, “[t]he use of indulgences to formalize the remission of penance grew from the twelfth century onwards and played a vital part in establishing and maintaining the attraction of shrines” (Dyas 2001: 134). Travelers for Palestine usually made their way to Venice to undertake the expensive, uncomfortable and often perilous five-week journey by galley across the Mediterranean to Jaffa. From the mid-fifteenth century, Franciscan friars served as guides for the overland trek to Jerusalem. Wealthier pilgrims took in Sinai, Cairo and Alexandria, as well. Venetian, Genoan and other merchants based in Mediterranean ports fuelled a burgeoning cult of relics, so that by the late Middle Ages, as Mary Lee and Sydney Nolan have meticulously documented, the ecclesiastical custodians of thousands of Western European sites were competing for devotees, chief among them, of course, Spain’s Santiago de Compostela (Dyas 2001: 4; Nolan and Nolan 1989; Wu 2010). Alongside debates about the spiritual meaning and theological status of pilgrimage, a small library of pilgrimage texts developed from the early medieval into the early modern period. Writing in the late 1970s, Donald R. Howard identified well over 500 surviving accounts of pilgrimage to Jerusalem alone (Howard 1980: 17). 3 In the centuries before the First Crusade, hundreds of pilgrims travelled from Europe to the Holy Land, but only eighteen eye-witness accounts survive. As John Wilkinson has demonstrated, these texts provide invaluable topographical and archaeological information, as well as being key sources for our understanding of Christian life in the Holy Land under Byzantine and early Muslim rule (Wilkinson 2002). Significantly, the “first vivid account of pilgrimage” comes to us from a woman (Wilkinson 1981: 10). 4 Based 2 According to the Roman Catholic doctrine of thesaurus ecclesiae [‘treasure of the church’] Jesus Christ and the martyrs of the church accumulated more merit than required for their own salvation. This surplus of merit constitutes the treasure of the church, from which popes may grant devotees indulgences, that is, remission of punishments for temporal sins in this life or in purgatory. Numerous activities qualify for such indulgences, from prayers to pilgrimages, from rosaries and reading scripture to reciting the angelus in commemoration of Christ’s incarnation. 3 Howard divides these materials into logs, guides and narrations. A log is little more than itemized list “of places and expenses”; a guide serves as “an omniumgatherum of pilgrimage information”; and a narration approaches the status of a fully imagined literary work (Howard 1980: 18-52). J.G. Davies echoes and amplifies Howard’s typology, identifying seven sometimes overlapping genres of pilgrimage literature: itineraries, pilgrim diaries, lists of indulgences, maps and plans, aids to devotion, guide books, and travel accounts (Davies 1988: 19). 4 For examples of other early pilgrimage narratives, see Wilkinson (2002). 52 2. Jamie S. Scott in Jerusalem for three years, likely 381-84, the Iberian nun Egeria visited numerous sites across the Middle East. Lost for seven hundred years, significant parts of her travel diary, Peregrinatio ad loca sancta [Pilgrimage to Holy Places] (ca. 382), were rediscovered in the late nineteenth century. 5 Also known as Peregrinatio Silviae, Peregrinatio Aetheriae, or simply Itinerarium Egeriae [Travels of Egeria], this text describes sacred sites, geographical features, the daily lives of monks, and the liturgical practices of the Christian community in late fourth-century Jerusalem. Frequently, the text reveals the opulence and grandeur of the holy places; for example, she praises the Martyrium, that is, “the Great Church on Golgotha” now the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre: “It was built by Constantine, and under the supervision of his mother it was decorated with gold, mosaic, and precious marble, as much as his empire could provide, and this not only at the Great Church, but at the Anastasis, and the Cross, and the other Jerusalem holy places as well” (Wilkinson 1981: 127). Scholars especially value Egeria’s writings for the detailed descriptions of early Christian rites. She tells, for instance, of Easter pilgrims literally following in the footsteps of Jesus, as they return to Jerusalem on Good Friday morning from Maundy Thursday’s night vigil in Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives: “Next they go with singing to the city … And from there every single one of them, old and young, rich and poor, goes on through the centre of the city to be present at the next service — for this above all others is the day when no one leaves the vigil till morning comes” (Wilkinson 1981: 136). Sometimes, the text jumps alive; deacons are on guard, for example, as the faithful kiss the cross, for “on one occasion … one of them bit off a piece of the holy Wood and stole it away” (137). Other early pilgrimage memoirs include De locis sanctis [Concerning the Sacred Places] (688), which describes the trip to the Holy Land of Arculf, an otherwise obscure Gallic cleric. Devoted to “the holy places of the city of Jerusalem, and Mount Sion, and the Mount of Olivet, and the Valley of Josaphat,” the first book details numerous churches and chapels in and around the city, as well as other monuments, like a stone column marking the place at which the passing touch of the cross on which Jesus died restored a young man to life. Mostly matter-of-fact in tone, the narrative sometimes conveys a sense of the awe in which the holy places 5 Other early women pilgrims include Paula (347-404) and her daughter Eustochium (368-419), Roman aristocrats who co-authored a joyful letter to a friend, Marcella, describing their pilgrimage in 385 to the Holy Land, where they settled in Bethlehem, pledging themselves and their wealth to the great Christian scholar, Jerome. Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 53 held Arculf; for example, “[t]he effect of this brilliant and admirable coruscation of the eight great lamps shining by night from the holy mountain and from the site of the Lord’s ascension … is to pour into the hearts of the believing onlookers a greater eagerness of the Divine love, and to strike the mind with a certain fear along with vast inward compunction” (Adamnan 1971: I.23). A second book tells of sites in the region, including Bethany, Bethlehem, Hebron, Jericho, the River Jordan and the Sea of Galilee, as well as trips to Damascus and Alexandria. A short third book relates Arculf’s perilous journey home, culminating in a ‘fortunate’ storm which shipwrecks him on the Isle of Iona, Scotland. Here, he meets Abbot Adamnan (624-704), who records his story. The early medieval period produced very few guidebooks, and these are anonymous and amount to little more than lists of biblical sites, martyrs’ graves and the like, with occasional brief descriptions. Instead, travellers relied on what Diana Webb has called the “unwritten Michelin” of word of mouth (Webb 2002: 117). The later Middle Ages, however, saw increased numbers of pilgrims, especially to the Holy Land, Rome and Compostela, creating a reliable market for more sophisticated texts. The Franciscans controlled this market, preparing books and distributing them across Europe through the order’s monasteries. Based in large part on the work of Philippus Brusserius Savonensis, for example, a midfourteenth-century guidebook to Palestine gives detailed descriptions of Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Mount Zion, the Mount of Olives, Bethlehem, Hebron, Bethany, the River Jordan, Tiberias and Damascus, taking care to note the value of plenary and temporal indulgences attached to each holy place (Bernard 1894). Of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the anonymous author writes: Thence you shall come to the glorious sepulchre of the Lord, which up to the time of the Emperor Aelius Hadrian was without the gate. This emperor enlarged the city so much that he enclosed the place of the Lord’s sepulchre within the circuit of the walls, in which place afterwards the Christians, for the reverence they had to the Lord’s sepulchre, built the glorious church of the Lord’s Resurrection within the city, with elaborate workmanship, of suitable shape, and round in form, with one window opened in the roof. This not undeservedly holds the chief place among the holy and memorable sites. In this place the precious body of the Lord was honourably buried with spices, and here He rested until the third day; but on the third day He rose again as He had said, “On the third day I shall rise again.” And there is absolution from pain and guilt (Bernard 1894: 6). As Howard and other scholars have noted, “[t]he pilgrims’ experience of Jerusalem took the form of a drama or an allegory of the life of Christ, an 54 2. Jamie S. Scott idea that survives in the liturgical practice of the Catholic church, the Stations (or ‘Way’) of the cross” (Howard 1980: 48). But notice here, too, how the description of the site blends details from imperial Roman urban planning, Christian ecclesiastical architecture, scripture, and Catholic theological and ritual tradition. The later medieval market offered other items, too. Pilgrims to Rome might purchase the Indulgentiae ecclesiarum urbis Romae, with basic information about important churches, or the larger Historia et descriptio urbis Romae (Miedema 1996: 24-95). Opening with a history of Rome and a prayer to Saint Veronica, this expansive guidebook details more churches and relics, as well as how to find sites, why they were important, and of course, the value of associated indulgences. Stories of healing miracles provided an added attraction. Some guidebooks contained prayers for holy places, as well as practical tips for travel on money-changing, inns and hospitals, safe roads and natural hazards. The British Library’s unpublished early fourteenth-century Pilgrim’s Guide to Compostela, Galicia, Spain, gives advice about safe drinking-water and boarding ferries (Pilgrim’s Guide). The invention of printing multiplied the production of guidebooks, the first copies being published in the 1470s, while expanding education meant increasing numbers of writers and readers (Miedema 2001: 116-18). Later printed editions included scenic views and pictures of key figures from history, myth and legend (Miedema 1996: 11-12). By the sixteenth century, many guidebooks were appearing in the vernacular, too, including German, Italian, English, French, Spanish and Dutch. In these various ways, guidebooks tried to satisfy every pilgrim’s longing to forge living connections with Jesus and the saints and martyrs of the Christian tradition, though competition for business was often fierce. In Timo Saastamoinen’s words, “as guides describe the importance of different churches they show many means by which the past is put to use” (Saastamoinen 2006: 5). The Historia et descriptio urbis Romae, for example, questions the need to travel to Jerusalem or Santiago de Compostela when pilgrimage to the Basilica of St John Lateran earns indulgences of equal value. Still, competition did not always create a level playing field. On occasion, ecclesiastical custodians of sacred sites seemed to discriminate against women, though Jonathan Sumption has argued that unruly crowds might have made safety an issue, a view to which the fifteenth-century English chronicler John Capgrave attests (Sumption 1975: 263). “[P]erhaps some woman was in the press,” writes Capgrave, “and either because of sickness or because of pregnancy was in great peril there; and for this cause they were forbidden to enter these houses, as I Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 55 suppose” (Capgrave 1911: 77). Also, alternative devotional accommodations might be arranged in such cases; women were barred from the chapel of St. John the Baptist at Rome’s Basilica of St John Lateran, for example, but if they “go on pilgrimage and touch the door” they enjoyed the same indulgences as men who entered the chapel (Capgrave 1911: 7172). Three later texts from England offer interesting contrasts with which to close this section of my essay: The Book of Margery Kempe (1438), The Itineraries of William Wey (1456-62) and Ye Oldest Diarie of Englysshe Travell: Being the Hitherto Unpublished Narrative of the Pilgrimage of Sir Richard Torkington to Jerusalem in 1517. 6 Far from constituting a guidebook, Kempe’s accounts of pilgrimages to the Holy Land, Rome, Assisi, Santiago de Compostela, Canterbury and several other English sites embody and express the spiritual interiority of such undertakings. Repeatedly referring to herself in the third person as “this creature,” she claims direct instruction from God to visit the holy places. Just as the Middle Ages placed Jerusalem at the centre of the world, Margaret places her pilgrimage to Jerusalem at the centre of her book. The site of Christ’s crucifixion particularly moves her. Led by Franciscans to “the Mount of Calvary,” Margaret “wept and sobbed as plenteously as though she had seen our Lord with her bodily eyes suffering his Passion at that time” (Kempe 1985: 104). The narrative continues: And sometimes, when she saw a crucifix, or if she saw a man had a wound, or a beast, whichever it were, or if a man beat a child before her or hit a horse or other beast with a whip, if she saw or heard it, she thought she saw our Lord being beaten or wounded, just as she saw it in the man or in the beast, either in the fields or in the town, and alone by herself as well as among people (Kempe 1985: 104). Pained empathy and grateful joy for the sacrifices of Christ transform “this creature” Margaret in her everyday relations with all of God’s 6 Later medieval women pilgrims include Birgitta (1303-73) from Sweden and Margaret of Beverley (1180s) from England. For an ongoing analysis of this literature, see Bolton (1997-). Other notable late medieval and Renaissance texts in English include Henry Timberlake’s A True and Strange Discourse of the Traveiles of Two English Pilgrimes: What Admirable Accidents Befell Them in Their Journey to Jerusalem, Gaza, Grand Cayro, Alexandria, and Other Places (1603), George Sandys’s A Relation of a Journey (1615), ‘T.B.’s A Journey to Jerusalem: or, a Relation of the Travels of Fourteen Englishmen, in the Year, 1669, and Henry Maundrell’s Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem at Easter, AD 1697. For other resources, see Colorado State University’s website, “Traveling to Jerusalem” (http://chass.colostate-pueblo.edu/history/seminar/seminar97.html). 56 2. Jamie S. Scott creatures. Like other medieval pilgrims, she reconstructs “her own life as the drama of spiritual development,” symbolically associating “going eastward to Jerusalem … with … the journey to their heavenly homeland” (Yoshikawa 2005: 193). By contrast, Wey’s practicality also makes him an eminently worldly traveller. For example, the Itineraries advise the pilgrim from Venice, “if ye go in a galley, make your covenant with the patron betimes and choose you a place in the said galley in the overset stage [top deck], for in the lowest under it is right smouldering hot and stinking,” and then once in the Holy Land, “when ye shall ride to flume [river] Jordan, take with you out of Jerusalem bread, wine, water, hard cheese, and hard eggs, and such victuals as you may have for two days, for there neither by the way is none to sell” (Wey 1857: 225, 227). Equally, though, Wey is a man of profound devotion. Of Jerusalem, he writes: “Then kneel we down upon our knee, / When we that holy city see; / For to all that thither come / Is given and granted full remission” (Wey 1857: 9). Thirdly, unlike Kempe and like Wey, Torkington gives a practical account of the route to Jerusalem; the diary even includes a mileage chart (Loftie 1884: 68). But unlike Kempe or Wey, he and his fellow travellers are far from consumed by devotion. Instead, Torkington’s diary foregrounds the merriment of journeying to holy places. The relics on view in Venice impress, for example, but less so than the sumptuous foods, excellent wines and opulent setting of a dinner hosted by local nobility, with music, dancers and acrobats. “The form and manner thereof exceeded all other that ever I saw,” writes Torkington, “so much that I cannot write it” (Loftie 1884: 14). Even on a visit to the site of Christ’s crucifixion, the pilgrims decide to stop and eat. He writes: “[W]e refreshed us with wine and bread and other caseles [?] as we could get for our money” (Loftie 184: 45). Similarly, Torkington trumpets the magnificent entertainment at a dinner hosted by Jewish merchants in “Corfu,” especially the superbly costumed dancers (62-64). The contrasts in tone and attitude between Kempe, Wey and Torkington I have highlighted capture in miniature a transition from the golden age of pilgrimage literature to modern travel writing. 7 Citing John 7 Useful modern English texts in include Travels of Lady Hester Stanhope (1846), Alexander William Kinglake’s Eothen, or Traces of Travel Brought Back from the East (1844), Matilda Plumley’s Days and Nights in the East; from the Original Notes of a Recent Traveler through Egypt, Arabia-Petra, Syria, Turkey and Greece (1845), James D. Finn’s View from Jerusalem 1849-1858: The Consular Diary of James and Elizabeth Anne Finn (1980), and Gertrude Bell’s Syria: The Desert & the Sown (1907). Among recent publications, see especially Ronald Brownrigg’s Come, See the Place: Pilgrim Guide to the Holy Land (1985) and Kevin A. Codd’s Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 57 G. Demaray’s work, Ira Clark writes of narrative shifts “from faith-based to empirical, from biblical to experiential, from iconographic to natural, from ancient to modern, from ideological to pragmatic, from spiritual to humanistic” (Demaray 2006; Clark 2007: 197). That is not to say that the faithful no longer offer their experiences in writing; pilgrimage literature has not become extinct, particularly in the form of diaries and other kinds of life-writing. Here, for example, Geoffrey Francis Bishop (1887-1972), Archbishop of Canterbury (1945-61), recalls in a diary entry his visit to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, 25 November, 1960: From the moment I entered the church, I was engulfed in a great crowd of Orthodox monks and Franciscans and others, who surrounded me and, almost literally, carried me from place to place … At a place I would kneel and feel Our Lord looking at us in this strange mixture of past and present; then be borne on again, this way and that, and feeling lovingly at their mercy. And I felt that somehow like this Our Lord was pulled and hustled and felt at the mercy of his unloving guides. More than that I cannot recall. At intervals the bells would clang again. The whole thing was an astonishing outpouring of every kind of excited emotion, all flowing round and over me, not me as a person, but as a kind of centre point of that triumphal showing forth of Christian fellowship (quoted in Purcell 1969: 277). Dominated by the trope of a transport of body and soul at once historical and geographical, the tone of Fisher’s words echoes Kempe, while the paradoxical ethos of heightened self-consciousness dissolving in the euphoria of selfless Christian community typifies a good deal of the literature of pilgrimage we have seen. At the same time, though, modernity has ushered in all sorts of other travel writing, including narratives of colonial discovery and scientific exploration, eighteenth-century memoirs of the ‘European Grand Tour,’ and most recently, libraries of tourist guidebooks from Karl Baedeker (1801-59) and Thomas Cook (1808-92) to the likes of Eugene Fodor (1905-91), Arthur Frommer (1931-) and the teams of writers working for Lonely Planet and Rough Guides. The extent to which such texts count as pilgrimage literature is a matter of debate, but a sense of sacred or secular devotion certainly permeates many of these texts. Thirdly, advances in the technologies of travel, from steamships to jet airplanes, have allowed more people to visit more places more easily and more frequently, till our digital age permits almost boundless virtual travel anywhere at any time. To the Field of Stars: A Pilgrim’s Journey to Santiago de Compostela (2008). For other resources, see Colorado State University’s website, “Traveling to Jerusalem” (http://chass.colostate-pueblo.edu/history/seminar/seminar97.html). 58 2. Jamie S. Scott Digitization enables religious travellers to distribute accounts of their journeys to a potentially limitless electronic readership. Based in England, for example, and associated with an international network of comparable associations, “The Confraternity of Saint James” hosts a huge website offering, among other things, constantly updated accounts of two dozen pilgrimage routes to Compostela (http://www.csj.org.uk/). Whether religious devotees or secular consumers of commodified travel, contemporary visitors are able to experience holy sites vicariously online, thus multiplying visitorship almost limitlessly. 3. Pilgrimage in Literature Literary representations of pilgrims and pilgrimage vary enormously, with Dante Alighieri’s Divina comedia and Purgatorio perhaps the most celebrated elaborations. Citing Demaray’s views, for example, Mary Baine Campbell notes that pilgrim accounts of the ascent of Mount Sinai provided models for Dante’s ascent of Mount Purgatory; “Dante’s intensely ritualized and liturgical stations on the way up the mountain,” she writes, “mimic precisely the ritual punctuation of pilgrim travel” (Campbell 1997: 17). As with the literature of pilgrimage, though, I wish here to focus principally on works in English, beginning with some medieval writers. Take journeying to Jerusalem, for example. Four fourteenth-century texts—William Langland’s Piers Plowman, Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, and the anonymous Pearl—ring variations on the trope. The mystical vision of Pearl lies at one end of the literary spectrum, while The Travels of Sir John Mandeville lies at the other. 8 Entertaining throughout with accounts of myth and legend, especially fantastical descriptions of China, India and Persia, The Travels begin with fifteen chapters describing a more or less realistic journey to Jerusalem and the Holy Land, taking in along the way Constantinople, Greece, Egypt and Damascus. 9 Titled “Of the pilgrimages in Jerusalem, and of the holy 8 The Travels is included here as a work of literary imagining rather than in the previous section, since we know nothing of Mandeville beyond The Travels, and therefore, not only may he “be creating to a greater or lesser degree a fictional persona,” as C.W.R.D. Moseley has noted, but also “[h]ow far he travelled (if at all) is a similar question” (Moseley 1983: 10, 11). 9 As Howard has observed, “Mandeville was trying to write a new kind of work, a summa of travel lore which combined the authority of learned books and guidebooks with the eyewitness manner of pilgrim and travel writers” (Howard 1980: 58). Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 59 places thereabout,” for example, the tenth chapter interweaves miracle stories and popular folklore with a biblically faithful account of the physical, historical and cultural geography of the city and region. Details abound. Of “the Sepulchre of Our lord,” Mandeville writes: There is a very fine church, circular in plan, well-roofed with lead. On it right side is a fine strong tower for the bells. In the middle of that church is a tabernacle, like a little house, built in a semicircle, decorated very handsomely and richly with gold and silver and azure and other colours. On the right side of it is the Sepulchre of Our Lord. This tabernacle is eight feet long, five wide, and eleven high. Not long ago the Sepulchre was quite open, so that men could kiss it and touch it. But because some men who went there used to try to break bits of ther stone off to take away with them, the Sultan had a wall built around the tomb so that nobody could touch it except on the left side (Moseley 1983: 77). Note how physical description slips comfortably into keen observations about ritual practice, the latter somewhat sardonically testifying to the way in which Muslim control of this Christian sacred site saves Christians from the more avaricious aspects of their own devotional fervour. Information and literary irony aside, however, moral and spiritual concerns permeate The Travels from start to finish. Openly celebrating “the Land of Promise which men call the Holy Land” as “blessed and hallowed and consecrated by the precious blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ,” the “Prologue” bemoans the way in which “pride, envy and covetousness” have distracted Europe’s Christian aristocrats from assuming responsibility for “the land that is promised to us as heritage, while The Travels end with a prayer “to God of whom all grace comes, that He fill with His grace all those who hear or read this book, and save them and keep them in body and soul, and after this life bring them to the country where there is joy and endless rest and peace without end” (Moseley 1983: 43, 44). By contrast, Pearl dramatically allegorizes Mandeville’s implied association of pilgrimage to Jerusalem with life’s journey to the heavenly city. The narrator of this complex alliterative poem dreams he meets his dead child. The father asks to join his daughter in the heavenly Jerusalem, but when he tries to enter the city of God, he awakes with a start. In this stanza, she explains Jerusalem as allegory: There are two spots. To speak of these They both the name “Jerusalem” share; “The City of God” or “Sight of Peace,” These meanings only doth that bear. In the first it once the Lamb did please Our peace by His suffering to repair; In the other naught is found but peace 60 2. Jamie S. Scott That shall last for ever without impair. To that high city we swiftly fare As soon as our flesh is laid to rot; Ever grow that the bliss and glory there For the host within that hath no spot. ― (Tolkien 1975: 115). Inspired, the father pledges to live the good Christian life, so that eventually he may join his daughter in paradise. Contextualized eschatologically and apocalyptically “[a]s John the apostle it did view,” the trope of earthly pilgrimage to Jerusalem, “that city of great renown,” represents the soul’s lifelong journey to the heavenly Jerusalem (Tolkien 1975: 116). In sum, as Dyas concludes, “[i]nner pilgrimage becomes in Pearl the supreme motivation for the pursuit of the pilgrimage of life” (Dyas 2001: 231). Between these extremes of Christian travelogue and mystical vision lie Langland’s Piers Plowman and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. An allegory of the search for the true Christian life, Langland’s poem begins with the narrator, Will, wandering England’s Malvern Hills. He stops to rest and falls asleep. In a vision, he sees a tower on a hill and a fortress in a valley. In between these symbols of heaven and hell, folk from all walks of life are busy trying to find the way to truth. For such a quest, however, travel to holy places is of no use; asked the way to truth, a pilgrim sporting souvenirs from Jerusalem and other holy places blurts out: “Heaven’s no! … I’ve never seen any pilgrim go looking for him [truth] with staff and scrip: never, I can tell you, and nowhere” (quoted in Edwards 2005: 14). Piers the ploughman then appears and offers to lead Will and others in their quest. But taking the first step on the journey towards truth, Piers says, means becoming “… his pilgrim at the plough for poor men’s sakes” (Langland 1886: VI. 102). Ploughing the half-acre captures the penitential nature of a life of humanitarian service in a fallen world. As the poem proceeds, however, the character of Piers gradually develops from guide and teacher to moral exemplar and finally saviour, as Will’s spiritual awareness blossoms through doing well [“Dowel”] to doing better [“Dobet”] to doing best [“Dobest”] (Dyas 2001: 169). As Langland decries the spiritual debasement of contemporary travel to holy places, so he advocates the cultivation of an interior Jerusalem in and through dutiful service to fellow travellers on life’s earthly journey. As Dyas puts it, “Langland … regards seeking holy places as a substitute for living as a Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 61 Christian at home and seeking saints as a substitute for seeking God himself” (Dyas 2001: 170). 10 Chaucer’s attitude towards pilgrims and pilgrimage echoes Langland’s in many ways, though the naturalistic ethos of the Canterbury Tales is likely more familiar to modern readers than his contemporary’s allegorical work. The tales feature a group of pilgrims in a storytelling contest on their way to the shrine of English martyr Thomas à Beckett at Canterbury. As John M. Theilmann has noted, the pilgrims probably travel together “to enjoy the fellowship of the group and to obtain protection as they took part in the pilgrimage” (Theilmann 1987: 99). But despite the apparently serious subject-matter, as Julia Bolton Holloway has observed, “Chaucer … was writing satire” (Holloway 1980: 145). How do we know? To begin with, because the pilgrims travel to Canterbury for the wrong reasons; they do not to seek communion with the divine, but cures for their various physical ills. The tales abound with numerous other clues, too: for example, the pilgrims ride on horseback, which “invalidated the medieval pilgrimage”; they wear bright colors, not quiet shades of penance and humility; and they include in their number both “lecherous pilgrims,” like the Wife of Bath, as well as a monk and a prioress who have violated religious vows of seclusion (Holloway 1980: 145). Chaucer’s stories are full of humour and wit, even outright bawdiness, and the ironic way in which the poet portrays the selfishness, greed, boastfulness and drunkenness of the travelers certainly entertains the reader (Dyas 2001: 177). But just as surely, the banter of the pilgrims reveals not only the dubiousness of their motivations and intentions, but also, like Langland’s poem, the moral and spiritual bankruptcy permeating all levels of medieval English society. Also, the prominence of death in the opening “Knight’s Tale” casts an admonitory shadow over all that follows, while accounts of violence, sickness and other forms of suffering elsewhere in the tales serve as constant reminders of the darker side of life in a fallen world (Irving 1995: 48). In the end, however, the “Parson’s Tale” provides the countervailing touchstone of a “siker [safer] way” (93). Like Langland’s ploughman, this amiable cleric offers “[t]o schewe yow the wey, in this viage / Of thilke parfit glorious pilgrimage / That highte Jerusalem celestial” (“Parson’s Prologue, 49-51). Warning of the seven deadly sins, he calls his fellow pilgrims to genuine penitence. But the Parson does not outright reject trips to holy places, as Langland seems to do, since he himself is also traveling as a pilgrim to Canterbury (Dyas 2001 198). Rather, he locates this sort of pilgrimage within “the larger 10 Compare Walter Hilton’s Scala perfectionis [Ladder of Perfection], which figures the mystical life in terms of the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. 62 2. Jamie S. Scott context of earthly life, marred by transient relationships, trials and uncertainties, yet also holding out the prospect of the eternal security of heaven” (Dyas 2001: 199). In this sense, Chaucer’s poem serves, in Edmund Reiss’s words, as “a microcosmic equivalent of the pilgrimage of life spoken of so often in medieval theology” (Reiss 1970: 296). Though the practice of pilgrimage faded fast with the coming to England of the Protestant Reformation, the images of pilgrimage evident in these four fourteenth-century texts have persisted in various kinds of literature through to the present day. 11 A few examples will have to suffice. In “The Pilgrimage,” the seventeenth-century devotional poet Henry Vaughan offers an interesting variation on Hebrews 11.13: “And they confessed, that they were strangers, and pilgrims on the earth.” Contrasting those earthly travellers who “dream homes of their own” with the Christian who feels exiled from God’s “home,” Vaughan seeks physical and spiritual sustenance for “more days, more nights”: “So strengthen me, Lord, all the way / That I may travel to thy Mount” (Martin 1914: 464-65). As Vaughan indicates in “Regeneration,” though, the journey of life is a pilgrimage, yes, but pilgrimage is “a monstrous mountain’d thing / Rough-cast with rocks, and snow” (Martin 1914: 399). Earthly conditions mark our alienation from God, and redemption comes through the “rushing wind” of divine grace, which itself a mystery: “whence it stirred,” Vaughan writes, “No, where I could not find” (Martin 1914: 399). Thus inspired, the exiled Christian catches glimpses of the heavenly Jerusalem in devotional meditation, which he imagines as a return to the innocence of childhood, “From whence the’Inlightened spirit sees / That shady City of Palme trees” (Edwards 2005: 419). As Edwards has observed, if “[m]ovement is the essence of the pilgrimage metaphor … [a]ntagonism to the metaphor, say in Langland or Vaughan, is chiefly to the idea of progression, of moving stage by stage to an ultimate union, which seems implicit in it” (Edwards 2005: 144). By contrast, John Bunyan’s seventeenth-century allegory, Pilgrim’s Progress from this World to that which Is to Come, as well as other spiritual guides and autobiographies of the period, portrays the individual Christian’s interior struggle in the world as a pilgrimage of gradual progress towards redemption. Framed as a dream, Part I of Bunyan’s allegory opens with the character Evangelist advising the protagonist Christian to abandon the City of Destruction in search of the Celestial City, Mount Zion. Christian 11 Grace Tiffany has examined the ways in the imaginative significance of Roman Catholic medieval pilgrimage persists in the writings of English Protestant figures like Edmund Spenser, William Shakespeare, John Donne, John Milton and John Bunyan (Tiffany 2006). Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 63 leaves behind wife, family and home with the Bible in his hand and the burden of original sin on his back. He confronts and overcomes numerous obstacles: the Slough of Despond; the temptations of Mr. Worldly Wiseman; the monster Apollyon in the Valley of Humiliation, and then the Valley of the Shadow of Death; the false pilgrims Talkative and Mr. Byends; the sinful town of Vanity; Giant Despair of Doubting Castle; the sinners Ignorance, Mr. Flatterer and Atheist; and the Enchanted Ground, where the air sends pilgrims into an everlasting coma. He also receives various sorts of assistance: shelter from Good-will, who guards the Wicket Gate by which pilgrims are required to enter “the straight and narrow way” to the Celestial City; lessons on faith from The Interpreter; guidance from the true pilgrims Faithful and Hopeful; and warnings from wise shepherds in the Delectable Mountains about the treacherous peaks of Error and Caution. Early on, Christian lays eyes Christ’s cross and sepulcher from atop the wall of Salvation and the burden of original sin falls from his back. Part I of Pilgrim’s Progress closes with the residents of the Celestial City joyfully welcoming Christian and Hopeful. Part II describes the journey of Christian’s wife and children, who also reach the Celestial City after overcoming various challenges with the help of such characters as Mercy, Mr. Great-heart, Old Honest, Mr. Valiant-for-truth and Mr. Standfast. Here, it turns out that Good-will is Jesus himself. Colourful, candid, humorous and homely, Pilgrim’s Progress “evinces no doubt about the fundamentals of the Christian religion as Bunyan perceived them” (Edwards 2005: 194). Perhaps for these same reasons, this allegory of the soul’s pilgrimage through life to eternal salvation remains second only to the Bible as the most widely read book in English. Capable of constant reworking, its influence sometimes startles with irony. As Isabel Hofmeyr has shown, for example, Bunyan’s tale of the liberation of the individual soul became a staple of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Protestant missionary school curricula, where it continues to inspire colonized subjects to dream their own long walks to freedom from imperial oppression (Hofmeyr 2004). 12 These variations on the meaning and status of pilgrimage continue in modern English literature. Puritan spiritual guides and autobiographies dramatizing the idea of life as pilgrimage provided a thematic model for Daniel Defoe’s pioneering early eighteenth-century work Robinson Crusoe (Hunter 1966; Starr 1965). Some commentators have argued that 12 The phrase “long walk to freedom” repeats the title of Nelson Mandela’s autobiography (Mandela 1995). In this sense, the South African hero’s story joins the literature of pilgrimage. 64 2. Jamie S. Scott the sense of life as a journey pervading eighteenth-century novels like Samuel Richardson’s Clarissa; or, the History of a Young Lady (1748), Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones, a Foundling (1749), Tobias Smollet’s The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle (1751), Samuel Johnson’s The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (1759) or Thomas Sterne’s The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1759-69) makes pilgrims of their protagonists (Howard 1980: 115). As an exile from innocence, Ronald Paulson argues, the protagonist of such stories needs to “become a moral agent, prove and educate himself, and win for himself a ‘heaven’ that would have been out of the question if he had remained in Eden” (Paulson 1971: 67). Others, though, claim that the lack of a specified goal belies this indebtedness. Similar debates about what does and what does not constitute pilgrimage surround interpretations of a good deal of late-eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literature, too. Some commentators read pilgrimage into William Wordsworth’s confessional revelations about “the growth of a poet’s mind,” to quote the epigraph to The Prelude (1805). Certainly, particular geographical sites conjure key “spots of time” in Wordsworth’s iteration of his poetic development. Take, for example, his recollection of Mount Snowdon, in Wales: … and from the shore At distance not the third part of a mile Was a blue chasm; a fracture in the vapour, A deep and gloomy breathing-place, through which Mounted the roar of waters, torrents, streams Innumerable, roaring with one voice. The universal spectacle throughout Was shaped for admiration and delight, Grand in itself alone, but in that breach Through which the homeless voice of waters rose, That dark deep thoroughfare, had Nature lodged The Soul, the Imagination of the whole (Wordsworth 1805: XIII.54-65). Moving towards these climactic lines, The Prelude concludes with poet and place imaginatively interpenetrating in a vision “of the whole” akin to the sense of transcendent perfection we have heard pilgrims expressing in accounts of their experiences at sacred sites. By contrast, we may ask of Lord Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1812) in what sense, exactly, is “the wandering outlaw of his own dark mind,” whom we meet early in this autobiographical travelogue, the “pilgrim of my song” with whom we are left at the end of the poem (Byron 1970). Of this work Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 65 and Byron’s later portraits of “majestic outlaws” in Manfred (1817) and Cain (1821), Edwards has written: “The idea that, rather than promoting received religion, a pilgrim might actually be questioning it, in search of an alternative fulfillment, runs the risk of stretching the definition of pilgrimage to breaking point” (Edwards 2005: 22-23). Elsewhere, Barry V. Qualls hears echoes of Bunyan’s questing Puritan pilgrim in the lives and writings of Charlotte Brontë, Thomas Carlyle, Charles Dickens and George Eliot (Qualls 1982). For Qualls, the novels of these writers work like “secular scriptures” or “books of life,” dramatizing the efforts of the main characters to rediscover or reaffirm some sense of the transcendent amidst the increasingly alienating industrialism of Victorian England. But since the interiorized Romantic quests of Wordsworth and Byron and the Victorian fiction of Brontë, Carlyle, Dickens and Eliot frequently beg the question of pilgrimage, I would like to end this section of the essay by tending to extremes. On the one hand, nineteenth-century literature does indeed offer more readily accessible instances of the representation of pilgrimage to specific sacred sites for expressly devotional purposes. Take, for example, Benjamin Disraeli’s novel Tancred or, The New Crusade (1847). Disavowing trips to Paris and Rome, the novel’s titular protagonist announces his wishes to his disbelieving father, and in so doing renders a working definition of pilgrimage: “Nor, my dear father,” continued Lord Montacute, “though I did not like to interrupt you when you were speaking with so much solicitude and consideration for me, is it exactly travel, in the common acceptation of the term, that I feel the need of. I wish, indeed, to leave England; I wish to make an expedition; a progress to a particular point; without wandering, without any intervening residence. In a word, it is the Holy Land that occupies my thought, and I propose to make a pilgrimage to the sepulchre of my Saviour” (Disraeli 1847: Chapter VII; http://www.mobilebooks.org/?etext=PG020004). Tancred makes his pilgrimage, and in a chapter titled “Jerusalem by Moonlight” the omniscient narrator ventriloquizes the mesmerizing effect of the holy city and its environs upon the novel’s hero, culminating in a description of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre by night: The last light is extinguished in the village of Bethany. The wailing breeze has become a moaning wind; a white film spreads over the purple sky; the stars are veiled, the stars are hid; all becomes as dark as the waters of Kedron and the valley of Jehosha-phat. The tower of David merges into obscurity; no longer glitter the minarets of the mosque of Omar; Bethesda’s angelic waters, the gate of Stephen, the street of sacred sorrow, the hill of Salem, and the heights of Scopas can no longer be discerned. Alone in the increasing darkness, while the very line of the walls gradually eludes the eye, the Church of the Holy 66 2. Jamie S. Scott Sepulchre is a beacon light (Disraeli http://www.mobilebooks.org/?etext=PG020004). 1847: Chapter XXIII; Reminiscent of the imagery of light so often associated with Jerusalem in early pilgrimage narratives, this passage testifies to the persistent influence of the sacred sites of Jerusalem over the European Christian imagination, an influence all the more remarkable in an age in which, as Disraeli notes elsewhere in Tancred, “[h]alf a century ago, Europe made a violent and apparently successful effort to disembarrass itself of its Asian faith.” Far from condoning such revolutionary French hubris, however, Tancred represents the resurgence of that English Christian faith which “more than six hundred years before … had sent its king, and the flower of its peers and people, to rescue Jerusalem from those whom they considered infidels!” Summoning the crusader spirit of yore, Disraeli’s novel unabashedly advocates muscular Christian expansionism for midnineteenth-century imperial Britain, ironically using the trope of the pilgrimage to Jerusalem to symbolize a redeployment of “superfluous energies [expended] in the construction of railroads” (Disraeli 1847: Chapter XXIII; http://www.mobilebooks.org/?etext=PG020004). On the other hand, what are we to make, decades later, of the fact that in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1902) Charles Marlow describes the harrowing journey up the River Congo as “a weary pilgrimage amongst hints for nightmares,” or of the invocation of the collective title Pilgrimage (1979) for Dorothy Richardson’s thirteen ‘stream of consciousness’ novels (Howard 1980: 116)? Edwards has examined at length Conrad’s novella, arguing that “[i]t is the desire for explanation that makes Marlow’s voyage to Kurtz the great pilgrimage never described as such by Conrad, a pilgrimage which disgraces the journey to expected riches undertaken by those whom his story name as pilgrims” (Edwards 2005: 103). If, as we have seen, pilgrimage makes an extraordinarily elastic literary trope, here at least the teleological seems to return as an interpretive criterion, if only in the abstract sense of a “desire for explanation.” That said, though, pace Conrad and Edwards, might we also expect to hear today about adventure tours up tropical rivers advertized as pilgrimages into the heart of darkness? Or conversely, echoing Dorothy Richardson, has the loose identification of pilgrimage with literary reflection upon almost any sort of existential journey stretched the term to the point of meaninglessness? Elsewhere, for example, Edwards explores other aspects of the imagery of pilgrimage in contemporary writers as different as Emily Dickinson, T.S. Eliot, W.B Yeats, Patrick Kavanaugh, Seamus Heaney and David Lodge. The vein is rich; doubtless, other Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 67 studies will follow, especially where special associations exist between a writer’s work and particular geographical locations. 4. Literary Pilgrimage Associations between individual writers, their writings and particular sites brings me to my third area of interest: the phenomenon of literary pilgrimage. As Alison Booth has noted of nineteenth-century developments of this phenomenon in England, “[l]ike other forms of pilgrimage, tours of literary shrines answered to spectators’ demands for a mixture of entertainment and self-improvement at the thresholds of mortality” (Booth 2007). Mike Robinson and Hans Christian Andersen have suggested that there are two kinds of literary pilgrims: those who visit sites associated with an author; and those who visit sites associated with a text or set of texts (Robinson and Andersen 2003). David Herbert has noted that some literary pilgrims “are genuine ‘students’ of an author or a text and gain a great deal of pleasure from sight of a writing table or a lock of hair; for such people the visit is experiential and they look at, and feel in awe of, the setting in which they find themselves and the ‘meanings’ which that place possesses” (Herbert 1995: 13). 13 The authenticity of the site becomes important here, for it must faithfully “convey the ‘atmosphere’ in which the writer lived” (Herbert 1995: 13). Embodied in the domestic objects a given writer might well have used, the sheer physicality of the site connects the devotee to the time and place in which the writer lived and worked, establishing a transcendent relationship between reader and writer. Beyond these domestic sites, literary pilgrims map the lives of writers through time across the local, regional, national and even international geographies of their lives. At the same time, these geographies of a writer’s life claim special attention because they are assumed to have exercised “a central influence on the generation of the writer’s creative works” (Robinson and Andersen 2003: 16). Such associations in turn prompt literary pilgrims to explore “the world as depicted in literature, discovering real locations used in fiction and seeking to correlate fictional locations with some markers of reality” (Robinson and Andersen 2003:40). Often blurring distinctions between fictional invention and geographical fact, whether of nature’s or of human making, these explorations lead to the construction of formal itineraries, linking sites into 13 Compare Christina Hardyment, who writes: “The place in which a famous writer wrote and the tools of his or her craft are potent magic” (Hardyment 2000: 15). 68 2. Jamie S. Scott the sort of sequential narratives that have become the mainstay of the modern guidebook business to which I have already alluded. Needless to say, mixed motives impel most literary pilgrims in their devotion to a particular author and his or her work. In many respects, literary pilgrimage has its roots in conventional pilgrimage; after all, as we have seen, this phenomenon originated in the way various biblical writers portray the holy places associated with Jesus and early Christian figures like the disciples, martyrs and saints. In England, literary pilgrimage succeeds the great age of medieval Christian pilgrimage. Take, for example, the eighteenth-century ‘European Grand Tour’ of the leisured English classes. Though constructed for the most part around sites associated with the visual arts of antiquity and the Renaissance, such tours often included visits to the haunts of celebrated literati. In turn, travelers published accounts of their experiences, with titles like Notes on a Tour through France and Italy Undertaken in the Years 1739 to 1741, by Thomas Gray, and The Grand Tour of William Beckford. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, sites associated with a number of modern British writers and their writings attracted the attentions of secular devotees, too, notably the Lake District of Romantic poets William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge; Charlotte and Emily Brontë’s family home at Haworth, Yorkshire; and the London of Charles Dickens. We might multiply the list, but here I would like to focus on two authors in particular and the geographies portrayed in their work: the Wessex of Thomas Hardy’s novels and the Dublin of James Joyce’s Ulysses. Whatever the motivation driving individual readers, the phenomenon of literary pilgrimage may have a direct effect on an author’s ongoing relationship with his or her work. Christina Hardyment has noted that “[a]lthough Hardy could take liberties with distance and details in his ‘dream-country,’ the fictional Wessex parallels reality so closely that, from the very beginning of his fame, literary pilgrims were hotfooting it down to drink up the atmosphere of the places for themselves” (Hardyment 2000: 169). These readers were so intent on reading the land and landscape of England’s southwest as the Wessex of Hardy’s novels, however, that they came to exert an extraordinary influence upon writer and writings alike. As W.J. Keith has shown, this influence is evident in the prefaces to the Wessex novels, which Hardy wrote “in or after the 1890s” (Keith 1969: 80). In addition, Keith writes, “the accompanying maps of Wessex, which we accept without question in nearly all modern editions, are a direct result of their topographical interests” (Keith 1969: 80). For the celebrated ‘Wessex Novels’ edition of Hardy’s works, published by Osgood, McIlvaine and Co. in 1895, Hardy actually changes Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 69 family names and relocates events in the texts, seemingly in an effort to deepen “the regional setting of the novels to emphasize what D.H. Lawrence was later to call ‘the spirit of place” (Keith 1969: 81). Alterations to The Hand of Ethelberta, for example, clearly illustrate the influence of literary pilgrims, numerous changes indicating that “Hardy consciously made it easier for his readers to identify his fictional places with their existing counterparts” (Keith 1969: 86). The continuing expression of this interplay between reader and read, hundreds of Hardy’s devotees undertook what Keith calls “a Wessex pilgrimage” (Keith 1969: 88). He quotes the early twentieth-century Hardy afficionado, Hermann Lea: “From far and near and particularly from America, an ever-increasing influx of visitors comes each successive season, drawn hither solely by a desire to behold the actual models from which the scenes of the Wessex novels took shape” (Keith 1969: 88; citing Lea 1904: 3). As Carl J. Weber has recounted, the New Yorker Rebekah Owen typifies this sort of devotion, intoxicated by both the writer and his writings, till her attentions so wore out Hardy that he had personally to break the bonds. As Keith puts it, “[w]hile confusing the dream with the reality, the literary pilgrims recognized the essential bond between Hardy and his native countryside” (Keith 1969: 92). At the same time, though, literary pilgrimage may skew what we might call the ‘hermeneutical history’ of a text or set of texts. Between 1895 and World War I, for example, more articles and books appeared detailing the topography and geography of Hardy’s writings than scholarly essays and monographs explicating their poetic or philosophical aspects. On the other hand, more recent tributes to Hardy and his work take advantage of both sets of resources. Echoing titles associated with the literature of pilgrimage, for example, Margaret Marande’s The Hardy Way: A 19th-Century Pilgrimage traces a 213-mile circular pilgrimage from the writer’s birthplace in Higher Bockhampton, near Dorchester, to the churchyard at Stinsford where his heart is buried, a good deal of the route following the south coast through picturesque communities like Lulworth, Kimmeridge, Wareham and Weymouth. The book draws on a range of materials, from the Ordnance Survey maps of 1811 and 1850 to contemporary photographs, the whole informed by excerpts from Hardy’s poetry and fiction. Let me turn now to Dublin and James Joyce’s Ulysses. Donald R. Howard has noted that in Ulysses, odyssey replaces pilgrimage as a governing trope of literary organization (Howard 1980: 117). On the other hand, several critics have argued that the influence of Dante Alighieri’s Divina comedia is everywhere evident in Joyce’s novel, suffusing Ulysses with a pervasive sense of spiritual pilgrimage. Either way, Joyce’s 70 2. Jamie S. Scott masterpiece has inspired large numbers of literary pilgrims to Dublin, especially for 16 June, known as ‘Bloomsday.’ The Irish capital’s urban landscape assumes sacred significance in this annual celebration of the writer and his writings, as pilgrims trace the interwoven wanderings of Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom, the novel’s central characters. A minor industry of guidebooks and travelogues has developed around this phenomenon. In James Joyce’s Dublin: A Topographical Guide to the Dublin of Ulysses, for example, Ian Gunn and colleagues have concentrated on “the realist aspects of Ulysses,” working on the assumption that Joyce’s novels generally “are more recreations, rearrangements of the known world, than creative explorations of the unknown” (Gunn et al.: 2004: 9, 15). The guide is designed “to provide some aids, both visual and in the form of catalogues raisonnés, towards a better understanding of how Ulysses works, and how it looks and feels when one has related it in detail to those documentary, factual sources which Joyce knew so well” (Gunn et al.: 2004: 11). In effect, though, James Joyce’s Dublin encourages in Joyce’s readers the conviction that in following its meticulously detailed itineraries they are walking in the steps of Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom; in the words of the authors, the itineraries “allow the reader, if he wishes, to follow more closely, either in Dublin itself or on the maps, the imaginary course of the Dubliners” (Gunn et al.: 2004: 26). Admittedly, it is increasingly difficult to distinguish literary pilgrimage from literary tourism in the case of Joyce and Dublin. Even the sanctifying James Joyce Centre commodifies the writer with an annual programme of Bloomsday events, including a walking tour titled “In the Footsteps of Leopold Bloom.” As several commentators have observed, Joyce is central to cultural tourism in Ireland, which ranks as one of the “most important growth areas in the Irish economy” (Dodd 1996: 99). On the other hand, for what Michael Malouf calls “progressive groups” like the Irish Women Writers, Bloomsday offers a chance to hold events that present Joyce as “a figure of inspiration rather than memorialization,” thus presumably perpetuating Dublin’s role and status as a sacred site of Joycean pilgrimage (Malouf 1999: 29). As well as guides like James Joyce’s Dublin, we have the testimonies of numerous devotees to Joyce and the Dublin he portrays, among them not surprisingly perhaps, Irish writers like Seamus Heaney and Patrick Kavanaugh. The phenomenon of literary pilgrimage in evidence in the examples of Thomas Hardy’s Wessex and James Joyce’s Dublin leaves us with one final irony. Readers of Joyce recognize the intimate connection between the writer of Ulysses and the city of Dublin and readers of the Wessex Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 71 novels recognize the intimate connection between Hardy and the rural landscape of southwest England. In the first case, we have a bond between a writer and a natural environment, in the second between a writer and a built environment, but in both cases we have the creation of instances of literary pilgrimage. In both cases, too, we have clear indications that in and through the phenomenon of literary pilgrimage texts become, and maintain their status as, literary classics, and in so doing, constitute and perpetuate literary canons. More to present purposes, though, literary pilgrimage leaves us with an odd turns of events. Robinson and Andersen have argued that “the subjective act of reading” involves the reader in a process of “self-making,” and that this “‘self-making’ is echoed in the tourist’s search for the sites, symbols, places and experiences encountered in literature” (Robinson and Andersen 2003: 52). We began with medieval pilgrims struggling to convey in words the transformative effect of travel to holy places, and we moved through examples of writings which make use of the imagery of pilgrimage to convey a sense of life as sacred journey. Strangely, we end with examples of the way in which self-making readers so profoundly immerse themselves in imagined worlds that they insist on associating fictional places with actual locations, and in so doing, invest those locations with an invented sacrality. Or, we must ask, is the inventive character of literary pilgrimage also in some sense part and parcel of relations between the religious and the literary in pilgrimage literature and in portrayals of pilgrimage in literature? 5. Afterword So far, I have not ventured very far into theories of pilgrimage. We are all likely familiar with the work of Edith and Victor Turner, who discuss pilgrimage in terms of rites of passage, liminality and communitas, as well as with more recent scholarship calling into question the way in which such categories risk homogenizing the complex realities of pilgrimage across histories and geographies (Turner and Turner 1978). John Eade and Michel Sallnow, for example, advocate “the investigation of how the practice of pilgrimage and the sacred powers of a shrine are constructed as varied and possibly conflicting representations by the different sectors of the cultic constituency, and indeed by those outside it as well” (Eade and Sallnow 1991: 5). In turn, Simon Coleman and John Elsner agree that Eade and Sallnow are right to point out the extent to which “pilgrims, even those visiting the same place, engage in a multiplicity of frequently incompatible interpretations,” but argue that nonetheless their emphasis upon “the notion of contesting the sacred” overlooks the extent to which 72 2. Jamie S. Scott “sites also help to constitute the sacred in the eyes of some believers, precisely by absorbing (even casting a discreet veil over) discrepant religious discourses” (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 202, 208). I have no intention of pursuing these complexities here, far less trying to relate such debates to the still more complex issues that arise when we talk about pilgrimage in relation to different kinds of literature. Rather, I would like to complicate the picture yet further with some brief remarks about analogous avenues of research into religious and literary traditions other than the Christian and the European. As Noga Collins-Kreiner has recently reiterated, following the work of scholars like Robert H. Stoddard and Alan Morinis, “[p]ilgrimage is a well-known phenomenon and exists in all religions worldwide, but is especially prominent in Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, and Judaism” (Collins-Kreiner 2006: 67; see also Stoddard and Morinis 1997; Sopher 1967). Equally, instances of pilgrimage literature, the portrayal of pilgrimage in literature and literary pilgrimage abound in these traditions, past and present, though scholarly studies of this material do not. A few more or less random examples must suffice. Avrum Ehrlich has examined Jewish aliyah leregel, that is, the triennial pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem, as well as other travel to other sites, including King David’s tomb, the Temple Mount and Hebron’s Cave of the Patriarchs. Other sites assume importance through association with miracles, like the graves of Rabbi Meir Baal HaNess [Master of the Miracle] and Moses Maimonides in Tiberias, or with the lives and writings of charismatic leaders, like the Hasidim of eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury Eastern Europe (Ehrlich 2000). In an unusual development, Margalit Shilo has discussed the stories of nineteenth-century Jewish widows who migrated as pilgrims from the Balkans, Eastern and Western Europe and from North Africa to settle around holy places, notably Rachel’s Tomb, near Bethlehem in Palestine (Shilo 2000). F.E. Peters has written extensively on the importance of the Hajj in Islamic culture, while Barbara D. Metcalf has analyzed the role and status of this obligatory pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina in a wide range of South Asian “travelogues, letters, journals and guides,” a phenomenon which blossomed, it seems, under the influence of British travel writing upon Indian Muslims (Peters 1994a, 1994b; Metcalf 1990: 85). By contrast, Surinder M. Bhardwaj has noted the importance of other kinds of pilgrimage in Islam, notably the non-obligatory circulatory pilgrimages known as ziarat, especially among non-Arab Muslims (Bhardwaj 1998). “Numerous khankahs, shrines, mosques, tombs and mausoleums of the Muslim saints, martyrs, Sufis, and other holy places attest to the popularity Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 73 of ziarat in most of the Muslim countries,” Bhardwaj writes (Bhardwaj 1998: 70). Motivated either by “a purely emotive or sentimental reason,” like taking part in a festival, or by “reasons related to the problems of mundane existence,” like seeking healing, these Muslim pilgrims revere several kinds of sacred sites, including holy places associated with Muhammad, and the tombs of Shi’a imams and Sufi saints throughout the Muslim world (Bhardwaj 1998: 71). Scholarship on ziarat is sparse, still rarer on representations of the phenomenon in literature. “[T]he Hajj represents the universal aspect of Islam,” Bhardwaj concludes, “whereas the non-Hajj ziarat is the emblem of the regional cultural variety of Islam” (Bhardwaj 1998: 85). Interestingly, Bhardwaj is more widely recognized for his extensive work on Hindu pilgrimage, beginning with Hindu Places of Pilgrimage in India: A Study in Cultural Geography (1973). The literature associated with Hindu pilgrimage is vast, from classic sacred texts like the Ramayana and the Mahabharata through the high culture of the Hindu Middle Ages to contemporary reworkings under the influence of Hindutva, the resurgent nationalism that has swept the sub-continent in the last half-century or so. As Bhardwaj and M. Rao have observed, this movement has also helped to strengthen Hindu identity in diaspora, so that in the United States, for example, the Sri Venkateswara temple in Pittsburgh has become a centre of pilgrimage for North American Hindus (Bhardwaj and M. Rao 1988). London’s Shri Swaminarayan temple and Toronto’s Richmond Hill Hindu Temple are beginning to develop similar status. Studies of the representation of Hindu sacred sites in literature are uncommon, though, an exception being Rana P.B. Singh’s analysis of the role and status of Varanasi in the Hindi novels of Shivprasad Singh (Singh 1994). Though the essay focuses upon Singh’s Street Turns Yonder (1991), it cites the “Preface” to The Blue Moons: Only those can understand the novel in full who have lived in Varanasi like the dwellers of the city. One can’t perceive the eternity of this city by showering a few drops of the Ganga water on his body, or only watching the scene while sitting on the ghats. It is essential to have experience of the holy dip in the Ganga, lived experiences of the street-culture and participation in the festivities and sacred journeys as pilgrim not as a tourist (Singh 226, citing Singh 1988: ii). Singh has further extended his studies in historical context, especially taking into account the ancient literature in Sanskrit that deal with narrating and eulogising pilgrimage as rituals and the merit involved therein (cf. Singh 2005, 2006, 2009, and 2011). Linking historical context, 74 2. Jamie S. Scott based on experiences and perceptions the goals and messages of Hindu pilgrimages are discussed in detail by Sopher (1997, 2011). This distinction between the interior experience of the pilgrim and the tourist’s superficial consumption of commodified sacrality, of course, takes us back to the start of my paper. Recently, Singh has expanded this study to produce Cultural Landscapes and the Lifeworld: Literary Images of Banaras (2004), which includes readings of the work of Kabir, Tulasi Das, Mirza Ghalib, Bhartendu Harishchandra, Rudra Kashikeya, Bishma Sahni, Raja Rao, Shivprasad Singh, Abdul Bismillah, Kashinath Singh and Pankhaj Mishra. Studies of Buddhist pilgrimage abound, too. Designed to engage the western convert, Elizabeth Cook’s Holy Places of the Buddha (1993) and Molly Emma Aitken’s Meeting the Buddha: On Pilgrimage in Buddhist India (1995) take us to important sites in India, including the birthplace of Siddhartha Gautama, the place of enlightenment under the Bodhi tree, and the site of his first sermon. Unlike Cook’s book, Aitken’s study makes extensive use of sacred Buddhist texts and the writings of Buddhist pilgrims over the centuries. Katia Buffetrille’s Pelerins, lamas et visionnaires: Sources orales et écrites sur les pelerinages tibetains (2000) give us comprehensive coverage of sacred sites in Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhism. As for the portrayal of Buddhist pilgrimage in fiction, Anthony C. Yu’s four-volume translation of Journey to the West stands preeminent, with Yu’s scholarly introduction providing us with a helpful account not only of the historical context of this Chinese Buddhist classic, but also its religious significance and literary characteristics, as well as its subsequent influence upon East Asian culture. As David L. Gladstone has shown, however, in developing countries indigenous pilgrims from all walks of life still far outnumber international visitors to religious shrines from the developed world, so we may expect increases in the literature of pilgrimage, the representation of pilgrimage in literature and even literary pilgrimage in proportion to increases in rates of literacy, the growth of a middle class and the expansion of technologies of travel and communication (Gladstone 2005). Finally, it is worth noting that Collins-Kreiner omits mention of Japanese spirituality, so I shall close with an example from this ancient tradition: the life, work and legacy of Matsuo Basho (1644-94), in particular The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches (Basho 1965 [1694]). Born into middle-class Samurai culture, Basho trained in Zen Buddhism. In 1684, he undertook a pilgrimage to Japan’s most sacred site, Mount Fuji. Five year later, once again growing dissatisfied with the sedentary life of a sage, he embarked upon an Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 75 extended journey through the rustic wilds of northern Honshu. Covering 1500 miles or so, Basho’s travels took in important Shinto and Buddhist shrines at places like Kashima, Ise, Mount Haguro and Mount Kurokami. Finished in 1694, Narrow Road to the Deep North recounts these wanderings. At the heart of the book lies the notion of sabi, that is, the idea that gradual immersion in natural cycles of growth, decay and death quietens the noisy ego and helps to cultivate an inward tranquility. For Basho, this inward tranquility permits poetic creativity. As Coleman and Elsner have noted, the goal of Basho’s travels thus becomes less important than the wandering itself, which offers occasions for achieving an interior state of “balance and composure” (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 187, citing Basho). Places Basho writes about, like the waterfall “See-from-behind,” the “Murder Stone,” the “Shadow Pond,” and especially the “Deep North,” “can all be read metaphorically as states of mind” (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 188). Mixing verse and prose, Narrow Road to the Deep North reads as both a naturalistic travel narrative and “an extended concrete reflection of an inner spiritual journey” (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 189). In short, “Basho shows pilgrimage bared to its Zen essentials as existential journey without goal, as metaphor for a spiritually lived life” (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 190). In the succeeding centuries, thousands have taken up and read Narrow Road to the Deep North and followed in the footsteps of the master. Sites associated with Basho’s life have become popular destinations, too. In turn, these pilgrims have bequeathed a small library of pilgrimage narratives, so that in the life, writings and legacy of this Japanese poet and wanderer we see the intertwining of the literature of pilgrimage, the portrayal of pilgrimage in literature, and several varieties of literary pilgrimage. As these brief forays into avenues of research into religious and literary traditions other than the Christian and the European indicate, variations on the phenomenon of pilgrimage, the role and status of various kinds of sacred sites, and relations among pilgrimage and literature are seemingly limitless. It is perhaps unwise, even cowardly or traitorous, to end with a truism, but let me do so anyway. For Boris Vukoni’c pilgrimage means any journey undertaken in search of truth and holiness, even the journey of life itself (Vukoni’c 1996), and I am not at all sure how we might escape this platitude, which seems at once comforting and disturbing. That said, though, not only in Europe but also worldwide, as even these few examples of the literature of pilgrimage, the portrayal of pilgrimage in literature, and the phenomenon of literary pilgrimage clearly indicate, sacred sites of various kinds continue to constitute an essential ingredient in individual and collective social and cultural life. Definitions 76 2. Jamie S. Scott of pilgrimage and tourism, spirituality and secularity, and our understanding of relations between these concepts and associated practices may change, but if we are to preserve and perpetuate the vitality of our social and cultural traditions, we must preserve and protect the places that have inspired such a wealth of literary and religious creativity. ------Note: This essay is mostly based on an earlier publication; see Scott 2010 (op.cit). 6. References Adair, John 1978. The Pilgrims Way: Shrines and Saints in Britain and Ireland. Thames and Hudson, London. Adamnan 1971 [688]. [Arculf’s] De locis sanctis [Concerning the Sacred Places]. AMS Press, New York. [http://chass.colostate-pueblo.edu/ history/seminar/arculf/arculfus.htm; reprint of The Pilgrimage of Arculfus in the Holy Land about the Year A.D. 670. Translated and annotated by the Rev. James Rose Macpherson. Palestine Pilgrims’ Text Society, London, 1895]. Aitken, Molly Emma 1995. 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The Holy Land, Holy Lands, and Christian History. Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer Ltd. Swatos, William H. Jr. (ed.) 2006. On the Road to Being There: Studies in Pilgrimage and Tourism in Late Modernity. Brill, Leiden. Tanaka, Hiroshi 1988. On the Geographic Study of Pilgrimage Places; in, Surinder M. Bhardwaj and Rinschede, Gisbert (eds.) Pilgrimage in World Religions. Reimer Verlag, Berlin: 21-40. Taylor, Phillip 2004. Goddess on the Rise: Pilgrimage and Popular Religion in Vietnam. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu. ‘T.B.’ 1672. A Journey to Jerusalem: or, a Relation of the Travels of Fourteen Englishmen, in the Year, 1669. N. Crouch, London. Thal, Sarah 2005. Rearranging the Landscape of the Gods: The Politics of a Pilgrimage Site in Japan, 1573-1912. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Sacred space and Pilgrimage literature 93 Theilmann, John M. 1987. Medieval Pilgrims and the Origins of Tourism. Journal of Popular Culture, 20 (4): 93–102. Tiffany, Grace 2006. Love’s Pilgrimage: The Holy Journey in English Renaissance Literature. University of Delaware Press, Newark, DE. Timberlake, Henry 1603. A True and Strange Discourse of the Traveiles of Two English Pilgrimes: What Admirable Accidents Befell Them in Their Journey to Jerusalem, Gaza, Grand Cayro, Alexandria, and Other Places. London: np. Tinkler-Villani, Valeria 2005. Babylon or New Jerusalem? Perceptions of the City in Literature. Rodopi, Amsterdam and New York. Tolkien, J. R. R. (trans.) 1975. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo. Allen & Unwin, London. Tomasch, Sylvia and Gilles, Sealy (eds.) 1997. Text and Territory: Geographical Imagination in the European Middle Ages. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, PA. Turner, Victor and Turner, Edith 1978. Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture. Columbia University Press, New York. Twain, Mark [Samuel Clemens]. 1894. Tom Sawyer Abroad. 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Weightman, Barbara A. 1996. Sacred Landscapes and the Phenomenon of Light. Geographical Review, 86 (1): 59-71. Wey, William 1957. The Itineraries of William Wey, Fellow of Eton College: To Jerusalem, AD 1458 and AD 1462; and to Saint James of 94 2. Jamie S. Scott Compostella, AD 1456. (ed.) B. Bandinel. Roxburghe Club, 76; J.B. Nichols and Sons, London. Wey, William 1857. The Itineraries of William Wey. Roxburghe Club., London. Wilkinson, John [ed and trans.] 1981. Egeria’s Travels to the Holy Land. Rev. ed. Trans. John Wilkinson. Ariel Publishing House, Jerusalem. Wilkinson, John 2002. Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades. 2nd edition. Aris & Phillips, Warminster, England. Wilson, Michael 1997. Speaking of Home: The Idea of the Center in Some Contemporary American Indian Writing. Wicazo Sa Review, 12 (1): 129-147. Wordsworth, William 1805. The Prelude’ or, The Growth of a Poet’s Mind; in, Wordsworth, Jonathan (ed.) William Wordsworth: The Prelude: The Four Texts (1798, 1799, 1805, 1850). Penguin, New York. Yob, Iris M. 1989. The Pragmatist and Pilgrimage: Revitalizing an Old Metaphor for Religious Education. Religious Education, 84: 521-37. Yoshikawa, Naoë Kukita 2005. The Jerusalem Pilgrimage: The Centre of the Structure of the Book of Margery Kempe. English Studies, 86 (3): 193-205. Yu, Anthony C. 1977-83. Introduction. Journey to the West. 4 vols. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. ―. 1983. Two Literary Examples of Religious Pilgrimage: The Commedia and The Journey to the West. History of Religions, 22 (3): 202-230. Zukin, S. 1991. Landscapes of Power: From Detroit to Disney World. University of California Press, Berkeley. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Prof. Jamie S. Scott Director, Graduate Programme in Interdisciplinary Studies, & Professor, Division of Humanities & Graduate Programmes in English, Geography, Humanities & Interdisciplinary Studies; York University, 262 Vanier College, 4700 Keele St., Toronto, Ont. M3J 1P3. CANADA. Email: jscott@yorku.ca § Prof. Scott teaches various courses in Religion and Culture, notably “Christianity and Film” and “Religion and Contemporary Cinema.” His latest works include The Religions of Canadians (edited, Oxford University Press, 2010) and “Religions and Postcolonial Literatures,” in the Cambridge History of Postcolonial Literature (Cambridge University Press, 2011). Scott serves as Director of the Graduate Programme in Interdisciplinary Studies, and in the graduate programmes in Geography, English and Humanities. 3 Sufi views of Pilgrimage in Islam Muhammad Khalid Masud Council of Islamic Ideology, Pakistan ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Among the five pillars of undisputedly sacred rites in Islam, pilgrimage is also counted as essential. For every follower of Islam pilgrimage to Mecca, Hajj, is described as the most truthful duty; similarly for Sufis it is additionally an act of revelation and illumination as narrated in Sufi literatures. Sufis looked and interpret rites of Hajj as the way of awakening inner-self, following of the law of Alla’h and the Holy Qur’ān, and a means of having communication with God, etc. Such interpretations and practices sometimes expressed in the form of constituting parallelism that clearly visible between juristic views and Sufi views of Hajj and so also allegorical interpretations. In all such pilgrimages Kā’bāh serves as point of direction for everyone, and circumambulation around it, tawāf, is believed as a symbol of love and passion. The Holy Qur’ān prescribes pilgrimage to Hajj not only to the followers of Islam but to mankind at large. Keywords. Hajj, Hallāj, Haram, ihrām, Islamic law, juristic view, Kab’ah, Mecca, Minā, Qur’ān, Shari’ah, Sufi, tawāf. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction Pilgrimage (a way, a path) in Islam is one of the five pillars of faith. The Holy Qur’ān (the pilgrimage: Verses 67-68) explains its spiritual significance as a value found in all religions: Unto each nation have we given sacred rites which they are to perform so let them not dispute with thee of the matter, but summon them unto thy Lord. Lo! thou indeed follows right guidance. And if they wrangle with thee, say Allah is best aware of what ye do. The Qur’ānic verses signify that pilgrimage is not exclusive to any one people. The significance of the sacred rites need not be disputed, because God is aware of the actions and intentions of the people. Waliullāh (d. 96 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud 1177 AH/CE 1763 [pub. 1964]: 156), a scholar-saint of Delhi, elaborates this point further, stressing that the institution of pilgrimage is common to all religious communities: The principle of pilgrimage exists in every religious community. Every religion must specify a place where one may receive God’s blessings by experiencing the manifestations of God’s signs, by offering sacrifice and by performing certain rituals in the manner of one’s ancestors. There is no place more worthy of pilgrimage than the House of God in Mecca because it has manifest signs of God. It was built by the Prophet Abraham. Explaining the spiritual dimension of pilgrimage to Mecca, Waliullāh (1964: 135) regards it as a means of communion with God: The pilgrimage is in fact the name of the gathering of a large number of pious spirits at a certain point of time. They gather to remember God’s blessings upon the Prophets, the Truthfuls, the Martyrs and the Pious ones. Secondly, it is the name of a place where the clear signs are to be witnessed. In every age, groups of religious leaders have been coming to visit the place to witness these signs and glorify the Divine rites... ... Thus, when the spiritual powers of the pious people of the past as well as of the present come to assemble in one place in such a manner, Divine mercy and forgiveness cannot fail to descend there? Fig. 3.1. Principal Hajj routes, Arabia (after Petersen 1994: 48). Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 97 Fig. 3.2. Stages of the Hajj: spatial view (courtesy: Stump 2008: 352) The term Hajj derives from ancient Semitic custom and was used to describe a journey to a sacred place (Wensinck 2007: 31). According to Islamic tradition the Hajj predates Muhammad and recalls the journey of Ibrahim. Historically the Hajj seems to be linked to festivals which took place in Meccā during which time there would be a period of peace between the various tribes. The journey to the sacred mountain/hill of Arafat, 25km from Mecca, plays a central role in the Islamic Hajj, although the circumambulation of the Kā’bāh is regarded as the first duty of a pilgrim (Petersen 1994: 47). The rites of the Muslim Hajj were proclaimed by Muhammad in a sermon he gave, known as the ‘Farewell Pilgrimage’, in the tenth year of the Hijra; after Muhammad’s death other customs were added ‒ such as a visit to his grave at Medina, although this is in no sense forms part of the Hajj (for a full description of these, see Shahabuddin 1986: 55-72). The Hajj begins on the 7th day of the twelfth month (Zul-Hijja) of the Islamic calendar (Timothy & Iverson 2006: 191). Pilgrimage has a special meaning in Muslim mysticism. Analyzing the historical development of Muslim mysticism, Schimmel (1975: 106) observes that “pilgrimage remained a central point in the Sufi life. Mecca was not only a place where the Sufis would meet and exchange ideas but it was a place where many of them were blessed with revelation and illuminations”. The inner religious impact of Hajj that the mystics experienced had a deep influence on Muslim mysticism and produced a 98 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud special genre of Sufi literature. Tirmidhi (d. 285/898), a Sufi of the early Islam known for his doctrine of finality in sainthood, wrote ‘Secrets of Hajj’ (1969), Ibn al-’Arabi (638/1240, pub. 1972), famous for his doctrine of ‘Pantheism’ in Islam, wrote ‘Meccan Openings’ (1972) and Waliullāh wrote ‘Gains from the Two Sacred Places’ (n.d.). These compositions are outstanding examples of this genre (cf. Figs. 3.1 and 3.2). Presently around three millions Muslims travelled from all over the world each year to partake Hajj rituals (cf. (Timothy & Iverson 2006: 191). Waliullāh (1964: 156) explains his religious experience of pilgrimage in very simple terms. He says that sometimes a man yearns anxiously to see his Lord. Some sort of place or thing is therefore required where this desire may be fulfilled. Pilgrimage is the only form which serves this purpose. Other Sufis describe this experience in a highly mystical and allegorical language. In fact, the symbolism of pilgrimage has greatly enriched Sufi literature with its numerous metaphors and moving imagery. In order to appreciate the Sufi views of Hajj, it must be remembered that it grew in close association with the formal legal doctrines about Hajj, mostly in contrastive parallelism. To understand Sufi allusions, it is necessary first to briefly describe the rites of Hajj which is performed on the ninth and tenth of Dhu’l Hijjah (Zul-Hijja), the last month of the Muslim Calendar. 2. The Path or Pilgrimage Sufism is seen as a spiritual path of self knowledge that leads to the knowledge of God. God is seen by the “eye of the heart”, not by intellectual knowledge or legalistic customs. The outward form of religion is a mere shell which hides the kernel inside it. The kernel is the real Truth, the Sufi’s goal on his spiritual path. The Sufi path contains many stages (Maqamāt) and states (Ahwāl). It begins with repentance when the seeker joins the order and prepares him for initiation. The guide (Sheikh, Pir) accepts the seeker as his disciple by the ritual of initiation when he imparts his grace, gives him strict ascetic rules to follow and a certain secret word for meditation. The disciple’s path is one of continuous struggle against his lower soul. He passes through a number of spiritual stations and states clearly defined by Sufi teaching. There are five Sufi stations, passing from this world towards the divine world of sublime pleasure: (i) detachment from the world (zuhd), (ii) patience (sabr), (iii) gratitude (shukr), for whatever God gives, (iv) love (hubb), and (v) sublime pleasure (rida) with whatever God desires. Linked Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 99 to these stations are specific moods or emotions (ahwāl) such as fear and hope, sadness and joy, yearning and intimacy, granted to the pilgrim by God’s grace for a while with the goal of leading him to on to Ma’rifāh (esoteric knowledge, Gnosis), Mahabbāh (Love) and to the ultimate goal which is annihilation of personality and unity with God. Beyond this stage the Sufi then enters the state of Baqā’, or perseverance in God. He returns from his state of intoxication (Sukr) back into the world completely transformed ‒ reborn. The Sufi path has three ways: Makhafāh, the way of fear of God leading to purification. Mahabbāh, the way of love leading to sacrifice. Ma’rifāh, the way of intuitive knowledge leading to illumination. 3. Rites of Hajj All the rites of Hajj are closely associated with Abraham and his family. Abraham was ordered by God to take his wife Hājirah and the infant son Ismā’il and to ‘leave them in the desert between Safā and Marwah hills. This was a barren land without water and cultivation. Hājirah ran between the two hills several times in search of water, which soon appeared where Ismā’il lay crying. The fountain of water was called Zamzam. When Ismā’il grew up, Abraham came again to comply with Divine orders conveyed to him in his dreams, to sacrifice Ismā’il to God. When Abraham was taking Ismā’il for sacrifice, Satan tried to tempt him three times not to sacrifice Ismā’il. Abraham threw stones at him. God was pleased with them. They both built a House of God in a cube shape that came to be known as Kā’bah. All the rites of Hajj are performed around this place to commemorate Abraham’s exemplary obedience to God. Islamic law prescribes the following conditions and rites for Hajj: 1. First requirement is istitā’at, i.e. the intending pilgrim must be financially and physically capable to undertake this journey and that the journey be safe and secure. 2. When the pilgrims arrive at miqāt, appointed places around Mecca, they take ritual bath and wear ihrām, two white un-sewn pieces of cloth which male pilgrims wrap around their bodies. 3. On their way to Mecca, the pilgrims continue reciting talbiyah, i.e. affirming that they responded the Divine call to Hajj. 4. Reaching Kā’bah, they perform tawāf circumambulations around it, seven times. 5. They perform sa’y, walking briskly between the two hills of Safā and Marwah, seven times. 6. On the ninth of Dhu’l Hijjah, the pilgrims travel to ‘Arafāt, an open space near Mecca, and stay there until night-fall. 100 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud 7. At night they return to Muzdalfah, another open space, from where they travel back, in the morning, to Minā, where they perform the rite of ramiy jimār, throwing stones at the appointed three places where Satan had tried to tempt Abraham. 8. At Minā, they offer sacrifice of animals to complete the rites of Hajj. 9. The pilgrims then go back to Kā’bah to perform the last circumambulation around it. It is in this context that Sufis developed their own views on Hajj. In the following pages we shall first offer a brief analysis of how early Sufis looked at Hajj as a religious obligation, then we shall discuss some examples of the contrastive parallelism that Sufis developed between Hajj and analogous travels, and lastly we shall comment on some allegorical interpretation of Hajj that the Sufi thought developed in finer details. 4. Early Sufis In the early period, i.e. before Qushayri (d. 465/1072), most Sufis did not differ much from the views of Muslim theologians and jurists, and saw the pilgrimage in the same formal religio-legal terms as others did. One finds among them, nevertheless, three varying attitudes to pilgrimage as a religious obligation. One trend recognized that like other duties, performance of pilgrimage was binding. This trend apparently was not concerned with the inner meanings and mysteries of this ritual any further, and therefore abided by its performance as far as Islamic law required, i.e. once in a life time. al-Sarrāj (378/987, pub. 1914: 167) explains that after performing the pilgrimage, Sufis would generally dedicate themselves to achieving Sufi states and moments. They would not go for the pilgrimage again. Thus, Sahl b.’Abdullah (283/896), Bāyazid Bistāmi (261/874), and Junayd (297/ 909) performed the pilgrimage only once in their lives. The Sufi element in their performance of pilgrimage was that they would opt for hardship in journey and would travel even without proper provisions. It is notable that Islamic law requires acquiring necessary provisions for the pilgrimage journey; and Hajj is not obligatory on those who cannot afford (cf. Masud 1975). They called it ‘pilgrimage of Islam’, to distinguish it from the Sufi perception of obligation. Some Sufis stressed the spiritual and gnositc dimension of the pilgrimage over and above its legal and formal aspects. For these Sufis, the pilgrimage was a means to achieve gnosis of God, a journey towards God. When they departed, they would sever all other connections in this world. They would not only opt for hardships in this journey, but would repeat it Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 101 again and again. Some of them would even settle in Mecca to keep repeating the pilgrimage. Hassan Qazzāz Dinawari performed Hajj twelve times, walking all the way bare footed. When Abu Turāb al-Nakhshabi (245/859) performed the ritual he did take food only twice or thrice throughout the journey (al-Sarrāj 1914: 167). A third Sufi trend maintained that the pilgrimage itself was not the purpose, the real goal was to have communion with God. Formalities of the pilgrimage were not sufficient by themselves to achieve communion, rather, indulgence in them would lead one away from God. To get closer to God, one must give up formalities. This attitude was strongly condemned by the jurists and the orthodox Sufis. This trend appeared quite early, in Sufi history with full vigour, but it weakened when the adherents to this attitude were branded as heretics and disbelievers and were punished severely. It did not however, disappear completely. It found its place in poetry, especially in folk literature. One finds it still surviving in popular songs and Sufi poetry. Extreme examples of this attitude were Ibn ‘Abdak al-Sufi (dr. 210/825) and ‘Abdullah b. Yazid, who rejected the obligation of the pilgrimage (Massignon 1929: 11). Another dimension of this attitude was found among the Malāmatiyyah Sufis like ‘Abu, ‘Abdullāh al-Maghribi (279/892) who would reach Mecca for the pilgrimage fully clad in regular clothes with a white sheet on the shoulders as if they were visiting a market. After completing the rites of pilgrimage they would wear the ritual pilgrim garments (ihrām). They would return home and would stay in these garments until their next visit to Mecca (al-Sarrāj 1914: 167). It appears that this attitude developed as a movement within the Hallājiart School. Mansur Hallāj (309/921) explains his view of the Hajj saying: Some people are not capable of seeking God directly. They therefore seek possible means such as do not constitute a direct contact with God. They go to Him through such tangible means as Kā’bāh. Although the journey towards God must begin with a journey towards Kā’bāh, yet one cannot reach God unless one leaves Kā’bāh, behind him. As long as you remain attached to Kā’bāh, you stay away from God. But if you really go farther than Kā’bāh, only then you may have communion with the Creator of Kā’bāh (Jallandhari 1971: 72). Dahyah (633/1236) claims that these radical views about Hajj cost Hallāj his life. According to him, Hallāj’s opponents submitted certain letters to the Chief Qadi. In one of these letters addressed to Shākir b. Ahmad, Hallāj had said: 102 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud Demolish the Kā’bāh. In its place rebuild another one on the foundation of wisdom and reason so that it prostrates with those who prostrate and bends with those who bend before God (Dahyah 1946: 123). In another letter he wrote: If you intend to perform the pilgrimage, proceed to a clean corner in your house. Stop at the door as one stop at the gates of the Kā’bāh. Enter this corner clad in ritual pilgrim garments. When you go from this corner to any other part, walk briskly from that place to the intended corner as if you were walking between Safā and Marwah (Dahyah 1946: 103). When the Chief Qadi was perusing this letter he committed a few mistakes in reading. Hallāj corrected him. The Qadi claimed that by pointing out the errors Hallāj had admitted writing those letters as he even remembered their contents. Hallāj said, “Yes, this is my letter. This is my knowledge”. The judge said, “O enemy of God! You are telling lies. O disbeliever! O sinner! Shedding whose blood is lawful and I do not say this for a Muslim”. Saying this, the judge announced death sentence for Hallāj (Dahyah 1946: 103). Massignon (1954: 62-63) argues that Hallāj’s views on Hajj, which he considers characteristic of the Hallājian school of mysticism, were in fact culmination of similar views of early Sufis like Ibn al-Munkadir, Abu Hazim al-Madani, Bishr al-Hāfi (227/841), Dhu’l Nun Misri (245/859) and Ibn ‘Atā (409/1309). We may conclude this section observing that although quite limited, yet a trend to view Hajj differently from theologians and the jurists had begun to develop in the third century of Islam. This view was sometimes expressed in the form of contrastive parallelism which we study in the next section. 5. Contrastive Parallelism Sufis developed a contrastive parallelism between the exoteric views of jurists and theologians who look only at the external aspects and the esoteric views that seek also inner meanings in the rites of the Hajj. This parallelism is best illustrated by Shaykh Junayd of Baghdad in a dialogue with his disciple as recorded in Shaykh Hujwiri’s Kashf al-Mahjub. Junayd asked his disciple several questions on his return from the Hajj. For instance, he asked, “When you donned ihrām at Miqāt, did you give up human characteristics the same way as you took off your clothes? When you departed for the Hajj, did you also depart from your sins?” A Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 103 long list of such questions is given by Hujwiri. The disciple could not answer any question in the affirmative. Junayd advised him to go back and perform the Hajj again with these questions in mind (Massignon 1954: 6364). Analyzing this dialogue we may develop the following table (3.1) showing parallels in the juristic and the Sufi views of Hajj. Table 3.1. Parallels between Juristic and the Sufi views of Hajj. Juristic Views on Hajj 1. Departure from home 2. Taking of one’s clothes to done ihrām 3. Stay at ‘Arafāt 4. Stay at Muzdalfa 5. Tawāf (circumambulation) 6. Running between Safā and Marwah 7. Stay at Minā 8. Ramy Jimār (throwing of stones) 9. Qurbāni (sacrifice of animals) Sufi Views on Hajj 1. Departure from sins 2. Freedom from human characteristics 3. Kashf and Mushāhadāt (to experience revelation of the unseen and its witnessing) 4. Renouncing of desires and hopes 5. Witnessing the beauty of God in His Secret House 6. Seeking the state of cleanliness and state of manliness 7. Renouncing of pleasures 8. Expulsion of selfish thoughts from one’s heart 9. Sacrifice of the pleasures of soul One notices in this parallelism that the Sufis sometimes allude to alternate meanings of words that are proper names. For instance, Safā is a name of a hill, which literally means cleanliness. The Sufis refer to its literal meaning. They also take advantage of the orthography of words that could be read differently with different meaning. For instance, Marwah is a name of a hill in Mecca. The word could also be read as muru’ah, meaning manliness. Similarly, Minā, the name of a place, read as munā would mean desires. Hujwiri develops this parallelism as a contrast between two types of Hajj: Pilgrimage to the body of Abraham, and Pilgrimage to the heart of Abraham. The place of Abraham’s body is Mecca and the place of Abraham’s heart is friendship with God. The latter is an allusion to Abraham’s epithet: friend of God. He explains that those who intend pilgrimage to Abraham’s body wear ihrām and abandon lust and desires [called hijra, cf. Masud 1990], attend ‘Arafāt and Muzdalfa, offer sacrifice and become Hajjis. On the other hand, one who intends pilgrimage to the heart of Abraham is required to give up everything he loves, and abandon 104 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud desire and comfort in ‘Arafāt. He wears ihrām to disavow remembrance of all things other than God, stays at ‘Arafāt in the state of gnosis, makes journey to Muzdalfa of love, sends his inner secret self to the Kā’bāh of the pure Truth, throws the stones of greed and desire in the security of Minā, and sacrifices his life at the altar of inner struggle so that he may attain the state of Friendship (Hujwiri 1336 Sh: 424). This comment shows that Hujwiri also finds inner meanings in the rites of Hajj and relates them to the themes of love and union with God. Qushayri (465/1072) develops parallels at several levels. Literally, Hajj means ‘to intend’. Spiritually, it means journey to some one that you glorify. Hajj is therefore classified according to the intention of the pilgrims. Qushayri (n.d.: 275) illustrates one parallelism saying that there are two types of pilgrims: (i) those who travel with their selves to visit the House, and (ii) those who travel with their hearts to witness the Owner of the House. The first type of pilgrims takes off their ihrām after performing the rites of Hajj. The others keep on ihrām until they witness God. The ihrām actually consists of avoiding witnessing others than God. According to al-Maybudi (520/1126), common people seek the street of the beloved but the special people seek the face of the beloved. The former go to visit Friend’s house, the latter go to visit the Friend himself. The common people go with their souls and visit looking at the doors and walls of the house. The special people go with their spirits and attain happiness of seeing and speaking with their Friend. Those who go with their souls suffer hardship and pain before they arrive at Kā’bāh, those who go with their spirits travel in comfort and Kā’bāh itself comes to them (al-Maybudi 1331 Sh.: 537). al-Maybudi compares pilgrimage with the journey to the hereafter, a parallelism based on the simile of death which is the journey to the hereafter. The fear of death, rush and hurry seen at the time of one’s departure for the hereafter also occur at the time of departure for the Hajj, Hence, the wise people prepare for the Hajj journey by constantly remembering the hereafter, its stations and destinations in all their actions and states during the Hajj. They keep preparing for the journey which is greater and more difficult than Hajj. He therefore, advises a pilgrim as follows: Firstly when you bid farewell to your family and friends you should recall as if it were the last movements of death when the relatives and friends gather around a dying person and say him farewell. When you ride your mount you should remember that in your journey towards hereafter your body will be your mount. When you say Talbiyah, you should remember that you are responding to the call of God in eternity which will Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 105 resound in your ears on the Day of Judgement, never knowing whether this call will consist of good tidings or misfortune (al-Maybudi 1331 Sh: 552). Like other Sufis, Shirāzi (606/1209) also regards pilgrims of spirits higher than others. He develops a triple parallelism to distinguish them from others. He mentions that besides those who intend for Hajj seeking reward by sacrificing wealth and comforts, there are others who seek only pleasure of God. Yet there are those who intend to visit the house of God with their yearning spirits seeking the realities of His place which is the locus of the manifestation of knowledge, purity and communion. The esoteric people avoid prohibited matters and take off their ihrām after the performance of the rites. The esoteric put on ihrām, prohibiting for themselves dependence on the universe and creatures. They do not take off their ihrām as long as they live and until they attain the vision of the essence of God and the revelation of Divine attributes (Shirāzi n.d.: 103). Kubrā (654/1256), the founder of Kubrāwiyah Sufi order, regards Hajj as a journey towards God and its rites as its conditions and etiquettes. He distinguishes Hajj from other forms of worship, because other forms aim at one’s salvation, closeness or affinity with God, or miracle, but the goal of Hajj is God himself (Kubrā 1330: 69). Kubrā constructs an interesting parallel between Abraham’s Hajj and Prophet Muhammad’s Hajj (peace be upon him). He elaborates that in its form and spirit Hajj is a name of Abraham’s station, but while it is station for Abraham, it is a state for Prophet Muhammad in the same meaning. State is, of course, more perfect than a station, because stations are places of rest in a journey and states are experiences sent as blessed gifts from God. One cannot travel from one station to the other without Divine blessings, and a state cannot be attained without station. Abraham belonged to the people of station that is why he said, “I am going towards God. He will soon guide me” (Qur’ān, al-Sāffāt: 19, 99). On the other hand, Prophet Muhammad belongs to the people of Blessing, that is why God said, “Pure is the entity who took His servant one night” (Qur’ān, bani Isrā’il: 1). Abraham could not go beyond the seventh heaven because he was going on real Hajj on his own. That is why he was detained. “It you are detained, you should sacrifice what is available” (Qur’ān, al-Baqarah: 196). Since Abraham was detained, he was required to sacrifice Ismā’il. On the other hand, Prophet Muhammad was taken on this journey by God himself. That is why he was not detained. Rather he was told “to complete his Hajj and ‘Umrah for the sake of God” (Qur’ān, al-Baqarah: 196). He completed his Hajj “in such a manner that he came closer and closer until he was only at a distance of two bows or rather less” (Qur’ān, al-Najm: 9). He completed his ‘Umrah in such a manner that the intended moons 106 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud appeared before him with the revelation and witnessing of Greatness. The clouds of love shined by the suns of intimacy, and thing happened between the two lovers. He revealed to His servant what He liked. Then call came from the tents of Glory to complete his Hajj. Later, when the Prophet was staying at ‘Arafāt during his last pilgrimage, he was asked to perform the Great Hajj. That was his last Hajj (Kubrā 1330 Sh: 69). 6. Allegorical Interpretations We have seen that Sufis view Hajj as an allegory for a journey towards God. To some, it is analogous with death, which is again a human journey towards God. The parallelisms that we mentioned above illustrate their view. The contrast is essentially with the theological or juristic view that, according to Sufis, is exoteric perception of Hajj. As we have already mentioned, Islamic law prescribes certain conditions and rites for Hajj. The Sufis add esoteric meaning to them. We shall now review a few important terms. Kā’bāh, the house of God built by Abraham, is the focal point in Hajj. For Sufis, it is a locus of Divine manifestation, yet in their allegorical interpretation it is a symbol of direction, a pointer, a mile-stone on the path of God. The semiotic significance explained by Sufis varies depending on their individual experiences. Narrating his Hajj experience, Bāyazid Bistāmi (261/874) says, “First time during my Hajj I only saw a simple house. Second time I saw both the house and its Owner, but the third time I saw only the Owner and no house was in sight” (Hujwiri 1336: 424). Hujwiri explains: In short, Haram (sacred place) is the place where one witnesses the Greatness of God. When truths are revealed to a person, the whole world becomes Haram for hits. When they are not, even the Haram remains the darkest place on earth. No doubt, the darkest place in the world is the house of the Beloved when He is not in it (ibid.). The famous Sufi Muhammad bin Fazl (319/931) wonders at the people who wander in search of His house all over the world. “Why do they not witness Him in their own hearts? When you are searching for His house, it is possible that you may not find Him in it. But you must witness Him during your experience. If it is obligatory to visit a stone at which you can look, once a year, it is better to visit your heart which you experience 360 times during a day” (ibid.). The mystic Rābi’ah Basriyah used to say: Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 107 I do not seek Kā’bāh, I seek its Owner. I have no use of Kā’bāh (Qushayri n.d.: 275). Qushayri explains that Kā’bāh is a house made from stone but it is connected with eternity. When one looks at it through the eye of the creature he stands separated, when one looks at it through the eye of affinity, he receives the communion (ibid.). House of God is stone and man is a fistful of dust. Both are related to each other (ibid.: 272). He explains Hajj in an allegory of visiting a friend’s house. The house itself is not the objective; it is the friend one seeks. Similarly, it is not the physical body whose arrival at friend’s house is an event, it is the spirit and yearning for communion that is significant. If not, it is (human body) meeting a stone (house of God). He, therefore, says: Do not place this House in your heart that was made for you, but rather make your inner heart (sirr) empty to receive the Friend who chose you first (ibid.: 273). Shirāzi (n.d.: 40) explains that Kā’bāh is the point of direction for everyone, for common as well as for special people. It directs those who perform tawāf around it, to various other paths of God. It is through Kā’bāh that God has prevented His Beauty to be witnessed by others. He constructed this house before Adam was created so that it became a place of Test and Trial. By its means Adam and his progeny stay away from the Owner of this house. A person who intends for God by separating his inner-self from the sense of direction, God himself becomes a point of direction for him and he becomes a point of direction for Him. He becomes a point of direction for others, similarly as Adam became the point of direction for the angels. Tawāf, circumambulation around Kā’bāh, symbolises love and passion. According to the Sufi semiotics, it is a movement that symbolizes belonging to the point of circumambulation and finally settling at that point. Qushayri (n.d.: 136) explains that the knowledge about tawāf, that the pilgrims perform around the house of God, was revealed to us by Shari’ah but the knowledge of the tawāf of meanings is known only to the people of Truth. The meanings circumambulate around the hearts of Gnostics (Arifin), but they seek recluse (I’tikāf) in the hearts of the monists (Muwahhidin). The former are called the people whose mystic states are ever changing, and the latter are the people of established states. Safā and Marwah are two hills whose story has been mentioned above. The Sufis allegorise this story and provide allegorical meanings to Safā 108 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud and Marwah. We have discussed above how Shaykh Junayd allegorised Safā and Marwah using the literal meanings of the names of these hills. Rashiduddin al-Maybudi (1336 Sh.: 430) also followed Junayd explaining that “Safā points to the cleanliness and purity of the hearts of friends and Marwah refers to the manliness of the Sufis on the path to service. Presence of this purity and manliness in the nature of human being is one of the signs of God’s divinity, wisdom and power in the ocean of darkness”. Shirāzi’s (n.d.: 40) allegorism develops this similitude in further details. Safā and Marwah symbolise the tents and palaces of the realm of Malakut and Jabarut, because in fact Safā and Marwah are veils of Mecca, Mecca is a veil of Haram, and Haram is a veil of the house of God. It is in this meaning that the house of God is the tent for the Lord and his private apartments. On the mount of Safā the Sufi climbs with the support of the light of knowledge seeking purity of spirit and the vision of God. The mount of Marwah is a staircase for the ascetics who climb on it with tears of repentance in their eyes aiming for the purification of their souls. Safā is the spirit and Marwah is the heart. That is why those who climb the mount of Safā but do not clean their inner-self for God, they do not gain anything from the signs of Hajj. Similarly, whoever climbs Marwah without witnessing the Truth of the unseen he does not gain anything from the signs of Truth. 7. Conclusion Among various forms of worship, pilgrimage is probably the most common among all religions. One may perhaps find some of its features shared even by travels to places that are not sacred apparently. Personal experiences of visitors to these places do help improve one’s mind. These experiences and their interpretations as described in various travel accounts illustrate the point we have made. Sufis tried to highlight and theorise their personal experience in several ways. One may ask: why did they use semiotic terms to explain it? There may be several reasons. May be, they wanted to express their views in such a symbolic language to avoid criticism by orthodox authorities. May be, they wanted to interiorise the obligations of pilgrimage. Or may be, they wanted to stress the moral aspects of religio-legal prescription. May be, they wanted to conceal their views from common people to establish their religious authority. All of these reasons may be true, but in our opinion Sufis’ contribution lies in their attempt to universalize the meaning and significance of pilgrimage as a journey of man towards God. Thus, they could transcend all religious Sufi views on Pilgrimage in Islam 109 diversifies in order to signify pilgrimage as a universal institution. In the Holy Qur’ān, while other obligations are generally addressed to Muslims only, the commandment of Hajj refers to mankind at large: “And pilgrimage to the House is a duty unto Allah for mankind, for him who can find a way thither” (Qur’ān, āl-Imrān: 97). “And proclaim unto mankind the pilgrimage. They will come unto thee on foot and on every lean camel; they will come from every deep ravine” (Qur’ān, the pilgrimage: 27). ---------------------Note: This essay is primarily derived from an earlier paper by the author (Masud 2000); and published here in expanded and updated form. 8. References al-’Arabi, Ibn 1972. Al-Futahāt al-Makkiyyah. al-Hay’at al-Misriyyah al‘Āmma I’il Kitāb, Cairo. al-Maybudi, Rashiduddin 1331 Sh/ CE 1919. Kashf al-Asrār wa ‘Uddat al-Abrār. Tehran. al-Sarrāj, Abu’l Nasr 1914. Kitāb al-Luma. Leiden. Dahyah, ‘Abu Ali ‘Umar b. Hasan Ibn 1964. Kitāb al-Nabrās. Matb Ma ‘ārif, Baghdad. Hujwiri, Shaykh Abu Ali 1336 Sh/ CE 1922. Kashf al-Mahjub. Tehran. Jallandhari, Rashid Ahmad 1971. ‘Ilm Tafsir awr Mufassirin. Maktaba Islamiyya, Lahore. Kubrā, Najmuddin 1330 Sh/CE 1918. ‘al-Ta’wilāt Najmiyyah; in, Bassawi, Ismā’i1 Haqqi (com.) Ruh al-Bayān. Matba ‘Usmaniyya, Istanbul. Vol. 2. Massignon 1929. Recuil des Textes inédites concernant l’ histoire de la mystique en pays d’Islam. Paris. ―. 1954. Essai stir les origins de lexique technique de la mystique musulmane. Paris. Masud, Muhammad Khalid 1975. The Question of Capacity for Hajj. Fikr-o-Nazar, September. ―. 1990. The obligation to migrate: the doctrine of hijra in Islamic law; in, Eickelman, Dale F. and Piscatori, James (eds.) Muslim Travellers: Pilgrimage, Migration, and the Religious Imagination. Routledge, London & New York: 29-49. 2000, Sufi Views on Pilgrimage in Islam; in, Dubey, D.P. (ed.) Pilgrimage Studies: The Power of Sacred Places. The Society of Pilgrimage Studies, Pub. No. 5, Allahabad: 272-287. 110 3. Muhammad Khalid Masud Petersen, Andrew 1994. The archaeology of the Syrian and Iraqi Hajj routes. World Archaeology, 26 (1), June: 47-56. Pickthall, Mohammad Marmaduke (translated) 1996. The Holy Qur’ān [with Arabic text, transliteration in Roman script by M. Abdul Haleem Eliyasee]. Eliyasii Family Book Service, Hyderabad. Qushayri (n.d.). Lata’ if al-Isharat. Cairo. Schimmel, Annemarie 1975. Mystical Dimensions of Islam. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill. Shahabuddin, K.S. 1986. An experience of Hajj (1401 Hj/1981); in, Khan, Z.I. and Zaki, Y. (eds.) Hajj in Focus. Open Press, London: 55-72. Shirāzi, Ruzbahān Baqli (n.d.). ‘Alrāis al-Bayān. Navalkishore, Lucknow. Stump, Roger W. 2008. The Geography of Religion: Faith, Place, and Space. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc., Lanham. Timothy, D.J. and Iverson, T. 2006. Tourism and Islam: Considerations of culture and duty; in, Timothy, D.J. and Olsen, D. H. (eds.) Tourism, Religion and Spiritual Journeys. Routledge, London: 186-205. Tirmidhi, Hakim 1969. Kitāb al-Hajj wa Asrāruhu. Matba’a Sa’ādah, Cairo. Waliullāh, Shāh 1378/ CE 1964. Hujjat Allāh al-Bālighah. Karkhana Tijarati-Kutub, Karachi; vol. 1. ―. (n.d.). Fuyud al-Haramayn. Delhi. Wensinck, A.J. 2007. The pre-Islamic Hadjdj; in, Krämer, Gudrun, et al. (eds.) Encyclopaedia of Islam. 3rd Ed. E.J. Brill, Leiden: 31-33. -------------------------------Prof. Muhammad Khalid Masud Chairman, Council of Islamic Ideology, Plot # 46, Ataturk Avenue, Sector G-5/2, Islamabad. PAKISTAN. Email: contact@cii.gov.pk § Dr. Masud has obtained his PhD in Islamic Studies at McGill University, Montreal, Canada. Until 1999, he was a professor at the Islamic Research Institute in Islamabad (Pakistan). His publications include Shatibi’s Philosophy of Law (rev. ed. 1995), Iqbal’s Reconstruction of Ijtihad (1995), Islamic Legal Interpretation: The Muftis and their Fatwas (with B. Messick and D. Powers, 1996), and the edited volume Travellers in Faith: Studies of the Tablîghî Jamâ’at as a Transnational Islamic Movement for Faith Renewal (2000). He has been an editor of the Islamic Studies, a quarterly journal. 4 The ‘Architecture of Light’: Between Sacred Geometry and Biophotonic Technology Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu National Inventics Institute & “Al. I. Cuza” University of Iassy, Romania ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Into the frame of human life, a novel architecture will be able to mediate the natural harmony between humanity and its cosmic roots, between nature and culture, respectively. By following the archetypal and modern learning too, the light could be considered as the physical, biological, and psycho-social archetype able to unify – not only symbolically, but ecologically and healthily too – the human life and its constructed framework. Also, the hypotheses of a science of the ‘living light’, namely ‘biophotonics’ (biology + theory / technology of lasers), will be able to rationally explain and scientifically recuperate for the benefits of the modern architecture the harmonizing features of the old ‘Sacred geometry & architecture’. The macro-cosmic world – inside whom the human ‘being of light’ is pulsating as an integrative microcosmos – represents the archetypal matrix of a modern ‘Architecture of Light’ – synergically connecting Nature (cosmic space → structural materials → biological body) and Culture (cosmic symbolism → functional planning → psychological human state). In this way, the old heritage of wisdom and the actual knowledge will be no longer artificially separated, due to a new vision of human competence and performance to rebuild the mind’s and body’s architectural space. Keywords: cosmic architecture, cosmogram, human architecture, biophotonic resonance, harmonization. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ‘The world as a cathedral…’ (Alice Bailey): in this statement we see the intuitive synthesis of the following assertions: — the essential forms of the world, naturally created or appeared through the cosmic geneses, define the content of so-called ‘Sacred Geometry’; 112 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu — during human history, some essential (architectural) forms reproduced the principles of the cosmic archetypes, to generate the objects of a ‘Sacred Architecture’; — light represents the unifying factor of the natural world (macro- and microforms) and the human technical-architectural forms, also. The above-mentioned principles recall the Rig-Veda sentence: “So did (created) Gods (the cosmic world), so are the human beings doing (creating / projecting the buildings of the world). 1. The Genesis of the Cosmic Forms: Turning Back to Archetypes According to all the cosmogonic scenarios of the world, starting with those mythical-initial and religious ones and including those current philosophical and scientific ones, the birth of the world has assumed the emergence of the Light (space-order) out of the Darkness (chaos-disorder). From the integrative perspective of a model of the Essential Unity (cf. Stănciulescu 1990), having the light as a unifying element, it can be said that: (1) Structurally, light can be associated with the four archetypal cosmogonic principles: fire and air, water and earth, or in a scientific language with field and information, energy and substance. Light is a dualcomplementary reality manifesting itself – in the same way as the photonic theory of energy-information (Constantinescu and Stănciulescu 1993), as: — wave-vibration, defining the attributes of an integrating generic field; — magnetic wave, predominantly characterized by an information (frequency, amplitude, spin) capable of ‘giving shape’ to things; — electric wave, defined by energy (intensity, substance, and vibration) in order to ‘put things in shape’; — corpuscle-photon that gives consistency to the shape of the things, materializing itself through substance (mass, weight). In the same direction as those above, we can entirely support Albert Einstein’s statement according to which “Everything is light, in different degrees of concentration”; or, in other words, light represents the first creative sign that the human being has symbolically identified with ‘Fiat Lux!’, the primordial uttered word, with the vibration of the creative sound aum or bhuvah, with Nada-Brahma music or with Shiva’s dance, etc., respectively with the Big-Bang of modern cosmogony. Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 113 (2) Funcionally, for the cosmic world that has just exited chaos, the release of such a vibration-signal, implicitly, has also meant the activation of two dialectical laws of the ‘universal becoming’, namely (Stănciulescu 1998): • The law of the entropic cycle that describes the evolution of every world system through the birth-maturation-death cycle. The Hegelian “unity of the strife between opposites” manifests its action in this becoming, in which the growth and the diminution, the evolution and the involution of the shape and of the content determine the appearance and the disappearance of the system itself. • The law of informational continuity that asserts that no system dies entirely as it transfers an essentialized information within a derived system, more or less the same as the first one. It is enough to regard, from a three-dimensional perspective, the manifestation of the two laws, in order to detach from world architecture the omnipresence of four ‘essential forms’, namely (Stănciulescu 2003): the ovoid, the hourglass, the column, the cluster (Fig. 4.1A). Analogically, if we put the representations of some mythical models of Romanian and Oriental (Indian) cosmogony face to face, through their intuitive archetypes, on the one hand, and through their scientific representations, on the other hand, we will notice that, practically, there is not a difference in meaning between them (Stănciulescu 1995; Poenaru 2006). Historically speaking, the ‘essential forms’ have been valued in countless types of cosmograms through which the genesis of the world has been symbolized (Table 4.1). Therefore:   The motif of the ovoid can be found in the Oriental (Indian) spirituality in archetypes such as: ‘the golden twins’, Hiranyia-Garbha, whose total plasma has given birth to the structure of space, the world as a ‘kalakhara chakra’, a wheel of the space-temporality that a section through the cosmic ovoid makes perfectly visible and intelligible, ‘the cosmic snake’ (the sacred cobra, among Indians, whose original cross would have unfolded the whole universe structure) or which, thrown by the centrifugal force of the creative divinity, would have wrapped up like a ‘protective river’ around the Earth (a planet modelled by hand by divinity like an ovoid, ‘little cake of clay’) and of the universe itself (the motif of the protective ‘Saturday water’ among Romanians). The motif of the hourglass is implicitly suggested in cosmogonic models focusing on: the word as a ‘turtle’, among the Chinese and the Indians, whose superposed calotte could generate the image of a cosmic ‘hourglass’; the world as a ‘sacred mountain’, emerged from the original waters under the shape of two inverse pyramids, generating the ‘hourglass-model’, included in the infinite column of Constantin Brâncusi. 114   4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu The motif of the column is suggested in representations such as the world as a ‘fire column’ or ‘water column’, like a ‘sacred tree’ – the mythical ‘column of the sky’, described by the Indian and the Romanian traditions – emerged from the deep primordial waters, incorporating archetypal shapes such as: the ovoid of the crown and of the root united in an ‘hourglass’ through the trunkcolumn continuity. The motif of the cluster, suggested by the existence of an ‘integrating complex’ of systems/forms, is defined by archaic motifs such as ‘the world as a primordial man’ (Purusha) of the Indians, or Tiamat (the Babylonians), whose sequences, chopped by the primordial hero (Arjuna or Marduk), would have shaped the sequences of the world: sky, earth, waters, etc., respectively the world as a ‘primordial giant’ (like Panku, of the Chinese), whose ‘selfsacrifice’ (decomposition) would have given birth to all the world components. From a structural-integrating perspective, these morphological reference points of the world are mythically correlated with some archetypal elements of content. Thus: a) The symbolic statement according to which ‘The universe is a horse’ (or a ‘snake’ that the Indian texts of Rig-Veda formulate) or that ‘The world is a table’ (as in the tradition of the Romanian cosmogony) (Vulcanescu 1985: 158) suggests the implication of the symbolism of the four elements (fire, air, water, and earth) in the world construction. The Oriental cosmograms, like the Indian geometrical magical circles or the old Chinese coins, make the most of the intuition of the four elements integrated within the world in an admirable symbolic diversity. b) The statement that ‘The universe is a tree’ implies the same tetrahedral presence: ‘the root-funnel of the tree’ planted in the ‘cosmic earth’ (substance) and watered by the ‘water’ (energy) accumulated in the funnel of a ‘black hole’ has allowed the rising of ‘the cosmic trunk’ in the ‘cosmic air’ (the information of a vortex / tunnel column light), spread in ‘the air’ of the cosmic sky (the light-field of the Great Universe). Exactly on the basis of such symbolic representations of the cosmic world the models of modern cosmology have been built much later, with or without explicit reference (cf. Stănciulescu 2007: Fig. 4.1). In essence, the description of cosmogenesis as an endless continuity of implosive-explosive processes – being able to transform the cosmic dualities BHQ (Black-Hole & Quasar) in ‘seeds’ that generate an endless number of cosmic worlds in succession (describing the model of some ‘infinite columns’) or in a parallel coexistence (that fits the image of an infinite ‘cosmic cluster’) – corresponds both to archaic intuitions and to recent astrophysical discoveries and theories. Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 115 Table 4.1. The representation of some archetypal cosmogonic symbols common to Romanian and Indian traditions. 116 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu Fig. 4.1. The modelling of the universe, from archaic intuition to scientific ration: A. The laws of the creative becoming: (1) the law of the entropic cycle (‘the ovoid’ and ‘the hourglass’ of the creative becoming; (2) the law of informational continuity (‘the endless column” of the creative becoming); the image of the two laws has generously been synthesized in works like ‘The Infinite Column’, by the Romanian sculptor, Constantin Brâncusi, or in the verse of a genuine inspiration written by the poet Mihai Eminescu: ‘As all people are born to die and die to be born”; (3) the ‘essential forms’ represented volumetrically and in a plan; B. An integrating cosmologic model: (1) galactic ellipsoid (galactom); the model of ‘a cosmic world that is in a throbbing expansion’; (2) the model of ‘the cluster universe’, suggesting the existence of an infinity of parallel spaces and times; (3) the computational model, similar as signification, of the ‘foamy universe’. Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 117 Consequently, having noticed the obvious analogy between the archaic and the scientific models regarding the evolution of the Big Universe and implicitly of our world, as one of its infinite worlds, a paradoxical remark is appropriate: — practically, there are no limits to the manifestation of the archetypal forms that are co-present in quasi-identical shapes – in all times and places, unifying the micro- and the macro- space, nature and culture; — what our forerunners have inferred about space – through experimentalholistic knowledge – has become a premise for the analytic-experimental statements of modern science. 2. The Essential Unity, a reflex of ‘Sacred Geometry’ The same objective forms – diversely arrayed in the meanings of an endowed language, having light as a unifying measure – have defined the history of the relationship between human being and space. Practically, throughout this history, ‘there is nothing new under the sun’. Thus, inferring the omnipresence of the essential forms, human logic has shaped what it is called the ‘sacred geometry’, characterized by Charles Gilchrist [www.charlesgilchrist.com] as follow: • the use of the visual language, being able to intuitively describe the stages in the becoming of the manifest-universe; • defining the archetypes, the perfect and immutable forms – emerged from the Great Architect’s mind – on whose basis the ephemeral forms of the world would have been created; • the emphasis on the fact that the universe is (in) vibration and that the principles of ‘sacred geometry’ are in a direct correspondence with the wave phenomena; • the geometrical nature of space-time, which establishes the fact that the whole architecture of the universe can be described in terms of a vibrating ‘sacred geometry’. Intuitively, we can imagine a passage from the perfect and invisible form of the lines of ovoidal force of a magnet, for example – through a ‘holographic resonance’ process initiated by certain energy – to the evolutionarily imperfect forms materialized in iron filings. This passage represents a process that realizes the major stages of the ‘sacred geometry’, unifying religion and science, metaphysics and physics, in a non-conflicting manner (Fig. 4.2). Analytically, it is enough to regard the way in which this geometry describes the genesis of the world itself (Fig. 4.2A) [www. Charlesgil 118 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu christ.com], in order to understand why all the essential forms are found in models such as: i. The Originary Point(s): points (cf. A1-2) starting to move / rotate, for generating the cosmic archetype of the circle (cf. A3); ii. Vesica Piscis: the archetypal symbol of the ovoid, ‘The Fish’s Bladder’, ‘the uterus / the matrix’ of the universe, the permanent ‘folded mother’ of the ‘sacred geometry’, generated at the intersection of the circles (cf. A4), by complementary principles, yin and yang; iii. The Petal: analogically associated with the hourglass, respectively with the essence of ‘the family’ – The Parents (circle A4) and The Children (cf. A5) – or with the essential couples: Field-Information and Energy-Substance, having as a ‘heart’ the synergy state (the fifth force); the form of twins of the becoming creation is defined by this archetype; iv. The Flower of Life: described by the set of columns whose interpenetration gives birth to the cluster, the integrating matrix of all the forms of the world (cf. A6). The objective correspondence between the intuitive models of the sacred geometry and those proposed by the ‘Essential Unity’ (Stănciulescu 1990), model represents another path to close the distance between the connoisseurs of the initiative times and those of modern times. Based on this metaphysical (onto)genesis, the ‘sacred geometry’ has explained the manifestation of the concise forms of the world, characterized by a series of objective properties, such as (Poenaru 2006): — the symmetry of the natural forms, having as effect the order and the determination of the cosmic / geographic space and implicitly human; — the integrating presence of the spiral, as a dynamic (evolutionary) manifestation of the archetypal forms; — the emphasis of the golden proportion, of some constant harmonious relations that ensures an ideal proportionality to the archetypal forms. Some considerations about each of these are offered in the following lines. 2.1. Geometric symmetry, beauty and stability. The sacred geometry emphasizes the fact that symmetry is a principle that ensures order in space, which gives it stability and harmony. Through the property of symmetry, the forms of the world become – in their turns – beautiful and stable. The research of this structural property can be realized mathematically (through numeric and geometric criteria). Therefore, like the geometricians of ancient Greece have shown, all the structures of the natural, physical and biological (vegetal, animal and human) world can subordinate themselves to some rules of numeric Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 119 modelling, on the one hand, and to some correlations with the angular or circular geometric forms, on the other hand. The condition of conservation of the ‘connection energy-information’ – that imposes an optimum correlation of the human being with the particularities of the environment in which he lives, a natural (the geographic frame, the view, the site) and artificial (the architecture, the set of utilitarian objects, etc.) environment – is permanently present in human life, implicitly accomplishing itself through the (re)cognition and the creative development of the ideal forms (Schneider 1994) (Fig. 4.2B). 2.2. The spiral, light in movement. The spiral is the result of a dynamic informational-energetic cause, more or less known. Mathematically, the sizes (relations) that generate a logarithmic spiral have as a correspondent the so-called ‘law of organic growths’, described by Fibonnacci’s array: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21… This assumes that “every term of the logarithmic series can be found out by adding two consecutive terms, and the relation between two consecutive terms is close to the value of the «golden number» according as the number of terms of the array grows” (Ghyka 1981: 53). This feature of living and non-living material developing through compositions that gather successively has been checked by (astro)physicians, geologists, botanists and zoologists. The last ones, for example, have measured the distances between the knots where the leaves grow etc., or they have observed that the shape of the snails and oysters’ shells, of the animals’ horns or of the big bones corresponds to the law of organic growth. It has thus been proven that the living and non-living material keeps an archetypal shape when growing, the logarithmic spiral, which evolves through a constant maintenance of its proportions. The manifestation of these proportions and implicitly of the law of organic growth can be found in all the evolved forms of the world, in this way giving credit to Pythagoras’ statement: Mundum regunt numeri, a statement that will be rightly justified by the examples below. * * * It is enough to regard these forms to understand that the spiral defines a functional track that is present both at a micro- and macro-cosmic scale, being able to describe the essential forms, from ovoid to column and cluster, which, directly or indirectly, human technology (architectural implicitly) has been capable of reproducing and developing (Fig. 4. 2C). 120 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu 2.3. The golden section: an expression of the harmonious light. Among the algorithms that the light has followed in the process of generating its forms, the one dictated by the law of the golden number has a special signification, mentioning that: “So that a whole, divided in two unequal parts, should look nice from the point of view of the shape, we must have the same relation between the small part and the big part as we have between the big part and the whole” (Ghyka 1981: 259). This section aurea (Fig. 4.2 D) has a universal value because it can be found implied in the fundamental forms of the living and non-living world, making the subject of interest to the exact sciences, of mathematics, first of all. Its intuitive expression stands as a proof, an expression translated both in terms of plane geometry and solid geometry, known from Plato and Aristotle. Proving with the arguments of an original (bio)photonic theory of the energy-information, that shape is a form of field, a result of the actions of the fields (electromagnetic, firstly, but also gravitational, geomagnetic, etc.) on the biological (and physical) material – we can state the fact, having both theoretical and practical value, that the light-field (information-energy) is responsible for the generation of the essential forms and of their geometry results from onto-logical aspects that modern physics has been able to describe in analytical models, such as (Fig. 4.2E): — the volumetric unfolding of a light wave generates the “column of columns”, the integrating “flower of life”, the cluster universe; — the matrices of the ‘sacred geometry’ – triangle, square, pentagon etc. – represent archetypes that the intersections of the adulatory networks of the universe implicitly assume; — the relation between the spiral and the golden proportion can be found in the properties of the electromagnetic spectrum. Consequently, we can state that the essential forms of the world are the effects of the oscillations of light. Such forms of light have been translated by the human eye that has learned how to discover them and to re-create them in cosmograms, geometric models of space itself. Simultaneously, passing ‘from light to enlightenment’, humanity has learned to generate creative products of an amazing harmony and functionality, among which those of architecture are foremost here. Fig. 4.2. Representations of the ‘Sacred Geometry’: A. The genesis of the archetypal forms, from the ‘Originary Points” (1, 2), ‘Circle’ (3) & ‘Vesica Piscis’ (4, 5) to the ‘Flower of Life’ (6); B. Some examples of the subordination of the symmetric forms to some geometric figures: (1) triangle vs. insect; (2) square vs. tungsten atom; (3) pentagon vs. cat and man; (4) hexagon vs. snow flake; (5) a frozen drop of ‘structured water’ (by a ‘thank you’ invocation (cf. Emoto 2001); C. Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 121 The spiral, from physical phenomena to biological ones: (1; 2) macro-cosmos (galaxy) and whirpool; (3, 4) micro-cosmos (Nautilus) and univalve shell; (5) the vortex of a nettle (Schneider 1994); D. The ‘golden section’: (1) the section’s construction; (2) Platon’s perfect volumes [www.geometrycode.com]; E. Models of the light matrices: (1) three-dimensional electromagnetic wave (http://www.who.int/entity/mediacentre); (2) the 3D model of the cosmic network (Tiller) (cf. Dubro, Lapierre 2002); (3) the ‘golden spiral model’ of the electromagnetic spectrum frequencies (Stănciulescu and Manu 2002). 122 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu 3. The postulates of the ‘Architecture of Light’ Passing from the ‘world’s architecture’ to the ‘architecture’s world’ has assumed a natural process of reflection/ transfer of the cosmic archetypes into the area of human existence, a process accompanied by two effects generating ‘well being’, namely: i: the balancing of the human bio-psychical state, through human experientialholistic resonance with the harmony of the essential forms, with their structure and proportion, being able to optimize, through the resonance of the “form waves” the state of the biological human system, modelled by the same universal principles; ii: the harmonisation of the human spiritual-cognitive state, through a permanent (re)actualization of the intuitive learning regarding the genesis of the world itself, to generate effects of cognitive therapy. These two categories of effects have implicitly succeeded in offering intrinsic health-optimizing properties to our ancestors’ life style – starting from dwellings to common utilitarian objects (household objects, clothes etc.). The fact that the archetypal forms have represented an obsession more or less explicit of the primitive architect or of the modern one can be justified by an intuitive recovery of the history of human architecture (Fig. 4.3), in which the curved forms of the ovoid, hourglass, column and cluster and their angular subordinates can recover themselves both in the forms of the sacred architecture (religious), and of the secular one. Fig. 4.3. Architectural representations of the archetypal forms (Tafuri 1980): (1) The motif of the ‘ovoid’: project of Nicolas Leloux; (2) The motif of the ‘hourglass’: Guggenheim Museum; (3) double spiral building (Poenaru 2003); (4, 5). The motif of the column: DNA building (Vilceanu 1983) & Romanian wood church (Monda 1980); (6). The ‘cluster’: block of flats (Pevsner, 1975). Taking into consideration the benefits mentioned above, the postulates of the ‘Architecture of Light’ (Poenaru 2004) should be explicitly recognised and practically valued by all the architects of our time, using in Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 123 this direction the virtues of the integrating science of the ‘living light’ that is biophotonics. An interdisciplinary science discovered at the end of the last millennium by professor Fritz-Albert Popp and his team (1989), biophotonics has as its subject the processes of generating, storing and releasing (bio)photons, under the form of an ‘ultraweak luminescence’, by all living systems (vegetal, animal, human). While German researchers have observed in laboratory conditions that these emissions have the properties of a laser type light – without explaining the phenomenon in detail – laborious Romanian research has led to an explicative theory regarding the nature of this bioluminescence emission (aura), symbolically named the theory of ‘the biological lasers’ (BLT) (Stănciulescu and Manu 2002), representing a real ‘tough core’ of biophotonics. In essence, the postulates of these theories are the following: (i) Structurally, at the level of the human body, the ‘metamorphoses of light’ – which pass from the physical state (photonic) to the biological one (biophotonic) – are ensured by the following two systems: (a) the molecular semiconductor-type system, represented by the complex phosphate / bounded water / molecular oxygen at the cellular membrane level, which generates the bioluminescence phenomenon, that is the laser-type emission of light; (b) the organic structures with liquid crystal properties, such as the cholesterol molecules and phospholipid from the cellular membranes, which determine the physical properties of the laser type emission (coherence, monochromaticity, intensity, directionality of the incident light) through birefringence, polarization and selective reflection. (ii) Functionally, the two premises represent the basis of the major BLT’s hypotheses, namely: (a) The molecules, membranes, cell nucleus, cells, organs and the whole organism function just like some ‘biological-laser’ systems, both ‘linked’ and ‘intricated’. On the one hand, all these systems present evident structural analogies with technical lasers: optic resonator, active substance, optical pumping source of light, cooling system, electromagnetic director field, etc. On the other hand, the functionality of these biological complexes generates a bioluminescent phenomenon, having all the mentioned properties of the ‘natural laser’ emission. (b) The structural-functional particularities of the six types of ‘biological-lasers’ existing in the living complex body (molecular, membrane, nuclear, cellular, organic, organismic) enable us to emphasize the correlated effects of four types of phenomena: Biochemical, Electric, 124 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu Magnetic, Photonic (BEMPh) effects. These phenomena are characteristic of all the biological processes of the living body, by interconnecting the stimuli of the cosmic world. (c) By the energetic accumulation permitted by the presence of light, by the energetic discharges which take place in absence of light respectively, it is possible to define two essential cycles which maintain the vital processes on a dynamic equilibrium: ‘daily cycle’ (of light) and ‘nightly cycle’ (of darkness). By virtue of these premises, the interaction between the human organism and the stimulating reference points of the architectural object (and not only) can be explained in terms of biophotonic technology, demonstrating that: i. The effect of the EM radiations of the geographical area (landscape) and of the Hartman telluric network where the building is placed, doubled by the effect of the ‘form waves’ generated by the relief / landscape, is reflected directly in the health state of the human organism. Architecturally, this state can be optimized / stimulated through Feng-Shui strategies, focusing on the correct placing of the dwelling in relation to the cardinal points, with water, forest or street, through the energetic practices of geomancy, focusing on the placing of some pyramid type ‘volumes / sacred forms’ or some protective ‘cosmograms’ in the building area, these volumes having variable dimensions and made from different materials, capable of cancelling the effect of some harmful, natural or technological radiations, etc. ii. The item of architecture can influence the harmony of the physical, psychical and spiritual state, through the correct utilisation of the colours (the electromagnetic spectrum), of the information on the ‘form waves’ generated by the volumetry and the planimetry of the building, the energy-informational waves of the natural or artificial construction materials, by the system of construction, etc. Hence, taking into consideration the necessities of the beneficiary, we can choose those properties of the architectural whole – from the symbols of the ‘sacred geometry’ used in different decorative variants to the constructive materials that have been used – whose synergy acts through their vibration power both at the cellular level (bio-physiological) and at the human psycho-logical (emotional / intellectual) level. iii. The utilitarian objects present at the dwelling level, starting from houses and furniture to the healthy type of textile products etc., can bring their contribution to the conservation of the ‘connection energy’, and implicitly to the optimization of human health [Stǎnciulescu 2003]. This is exactly the idea on which the project ‘Ecosane Architecture’ is based, focusing on building some ecological-healthy constructions Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 125 (Stănciulescu and Poenaru 2008), under advantageous economic conditions, for a wider range of beneficiaries. The benefits of such an architecture should explicitly be recognized and practically recovered by the architects of our time, for the benefit of harmony that the antique people have simply called mimesis & catharsis, purified through imitation and signification, namely Nature & Culture, connected by the harmony of our buildings. 4. Instead of conclusions: «ICHTHUS», an integrating cosmogram This sketchy presentation of a project of ‘Sacred Architecture” as well as of Eco-Sane architecture stands instead of the conclusions of this work. Suggestively bearing the Greek name of the Christian symbol of «ICHTUS» (International Complex for Human Therapy and Unity of Spirit) Săcărâmb/ Romania, the project aims to accomplish (Poenaru 20042009): • a synergetic view on the relationship between modern humanity and a sacred cosmic-geographic (landscape) space, where a centre of spiritual initiation of the ancient Thracian-Geto-Dacians was placed three millennia ago; • the construction of a modern architectural ensemble, assuming: (1) a hotel complex functioning as a leisure centre and as a centre of bio-psychic optimization; (2) a sanatorium of complementary therapies; (3) a meditation centre, trans-spiritually conceived in relation with the world religions, an ensemble which, through its structure and functions, focuses on body harmony, with the human soul and the spirit; • the interconnection between nature and the culture of a “technological humanism”, through the use of the already mentioned biophotonic reference points when applying the principles of the ‘Architecture of Light’. In essence, the main purpose of «ICHTUS» Săcărâmb (Fig. 4.4), projected by Poenaru and scientifically assisted by Stănciulescu, is to initiate the travellers into the mysteries of cosmic genesis and of the archetypal history of humankind, by walking only among the architectonic objects and by interpreting them in a symbolical way. 126 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu Fig. 4.4. The Spiritual Center of «ICHTUS»: an archetypal cosmogony. A. Two “cosmograms”: (1) the human archetypal embryo (Paris, 4 Match 2003); (2) the analogy of the embryo with the general plane of ICHTHUS; B. A general presentation of the Spiritual Center: (1) the plane: a telluric projection of the Cosmic Tree; (2) a frontal view of the ‘Road of Light’: an initiatory travel / pilgrimage; C. Architectural elements: (1) The ‘Flower of Life’ generated from the ‘originary waters’; (2) The ‘Gate of Space’; D. The ICHTUS ‘temples’: (1) The ‘Temple of Time’; (2) The ‘Temple of the Archetypal Initiation’. Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 127 Hermeneutically interpreted, the «ICHTUS» project takes the form of: (a) an integrating cosmogram, which – from a functional point of view – correlates the three architectonic objectives so that it should represent the image projected in the landscape of a symbolic human foetus, coupling the shape of the ovoid with those of the hourglass and of the column, uniting the principle of fire (light-sky) with air (the mountain ozone), with water (the dam) and earth (the ground of the building); (b) a series of specific cosmograms characterizing – from a structural point of view – the built shapes (volumetric and plane); for example, the centre of the ‘universal spirituality’, placed exactly on the old sanctuary, recovers the image of an Oriental magical circle, in which an equilateral triangle circumscribes / inscribes in section within a circle and a square, and which, on a plane, generates figures of the ‘sacred geometry’, such as vesica piscis, the ‘flower of life’, etc. Consequently, we could appreciate that «ICHTUS» is symbolically representing – using the architectural language – the essential stages of the cosmogenesis. Learning about the cosmic becoming, by walking among the «ICHTUS» architectural cosmograms, the pilgrim has the privilege to understand that: — according to the ancient principle from the Temple of Delphi: ‘Know yourself and you will know the Universe’, the human being – as a divine ‘face and alikeness’ – could be further considered as a ‘measure of everything’ (Fig. 4.4. A1-2); — the Creative Light Matrix (the electromagnetic field / forms generated after the Big-Bang explosion) is essentially involved into the genesis of the cosmic structures, as the ‘Road of Light’s architectural objects are symbolically presenting (Fig. 4.4. B1-2); — in illo tempore, the archetypal sign of the first creation is emerging from the chaotic darkness – identified with the ‘originary waters’ (the «ICHTUS» lake) – as a mythical ‘cosmic tree’, as ‘flower of life’, etc. (Fig. 4.4. C1); — the first creative vibration / radiation of light – identified with the moment of ‘Fiat Lux’ / ‘Big-Bang’– is generating an archetypal matrix of the cosmic becoming, as a potential ‘ovoid of light’/ galactom namely, having inside it the generative “first spark” (Fig. 4.4.C1); — the substantial genesis of the four cosmic elements – Light / Field → Air / Information→ Water / Energy → Earth / Substance , namely – characterizing the structure of the cosmic space, is symbolized by the Gate of Space and its implicit Etheric synergy (Fig. 4.4.C2); — situated in the middle of a successive interfered spirals (implicitly representing the symbolism of the electromagnetic waves of light), the 128 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu Temple of Time is suggesting that the cosmic world is already organized, as the cosmogram of the ‘church of firs’ is presenting (Fig. 4.4D1); — the Temple of the Archetypal Initiation (Fig. 4.4D2) is symbolizing the human world and its esoteric history, which must be recognized and assumed by the modern human being, intuitively or / and analytically, in order to permit him / her to resonate with the history horizontal and with the vertical of the cosmic becoming. * * * In conclusion, we could say that walking among the architectural elements of the ‘Road of Light’, a “symbolical vertebral column” projected on the horizontal plane of the «ICHTUS» complex, the pilgrim will be able to understand that: — the ontological mechanism of the creation of the world is starting from invisible (field) to visible (substance) and that it is gnoseologically understood by human being starting from visible to invisible, by generating a complete onto-gnoseo-logic circuit of the creation of the world, namely… — to imply the principles of the ‘Architecture of Light’, namely the biophotonic principles of the human health, means to stimulate the beneficiaries’ BPL (bio-psycho-logical) optimal state, by a fertile interpretation of the ‘esthetical pleasure’ principle, namely: The (architectural) ‘beauty’ is what we (subjectively) like, because we biopsychically need it. So, such type of ‘Architecture of Light’, which the ICHTUS is implicitly using, will recuperate the two functions of the sacred and laic architecture of the old times, namely: — to be a “learning book”, able to keep in its “pages” the archetypal memory / forms of the cosmogenesis; — to represent a harmonizing frame of life, by its emissions of ‘light’ (colours, forms, volumes waves, etc.), biophotonically resonating with human body / soul / mind complex. That is why the «ICHTUS» SǍCǍRÂMB (Romania), could become a symbolic pilgrimage place, able to realize the symbolical connection between the archetypal times and the modern ones. Acknowledgements We are thankful to Dr. David Cornberg for being kind enough in going through the paper and making all sorts of corrections of English. Architecture of Light: Sacred Geometry & Biophotonic Tech. 129 5. References Constantinescu, Paul and Stănciulescu, Traian D. 1993. Resonance as a Principle of Universal Creativity. Photonic (Quantical) Hypothesis of Information-Energy. Revista de Inventica, 12 (1): pp. 18-25. Dubro, Peggy P. and Lapieree, David 2002. Elegant Empowerment. Evolution of Consciousness. Platinum Publishing House, Energy Extension Inc., Sedona USA. Gilchristm, Charles L. 2008. Sacred Geometry. The Architecture of the Universe; Web: www.charlesgilchrist.com Emoto, Masaru 2001. Messages de l’Eau. I.H.M, General Research Institute, HADO Publishing. Ghyka, Matyla C. 1981. Estetica si teoria artei (Estetics and Theory of Art). Editura Stiintifica, Bucuresti. Monda, Jean 1980. Arhitectura actuală, artă necunoscută? (The actual architecture: an unknown art?). Editura Albatros, Bucuresti. Pevsner, Nikolaus 1975. Pioneers of Modern Design from William Morris to Walter Gropius. Penguin Books, London. Poenaru, Aritia 2003. The ‘Architecture of Light’: towards an integrative urban anthropology. A paper presented in the International Congress of IUAES, Florence, July 6-12. ―. 2004. Centru de sanatate si odihna (Health and Rest Centre,) Sǎcǎrâmb. Unpublished Diploma Project, Technical University, Iasi. Popp, Fritz-Albert; Li, K.H. and Gu, Q. 1989. Recent Advances in Biophoton Research and its Applications. World Scientific, Singapore, New Jersey / London, and Urban Schwarzenberg, München. Schneider, Michael 1994. A Beginner’s Guide to Constructing the Universe, The mathematical Archetypes of Nature, Art, and Science. Harper Perennial, New York. Stănciulescu, Traian D. 1990. O cale a ratiunii catre Dumnezeu? (A path of ration towards God?). Editura Timpuri, Deva. ―. 1995. Miturile creatiei. Lecturi semiotice (The Creation Myths. Semiotic readings). Editura Performantica, Iasi. ―. 2003. Signs of light. A biophotonic approach to (meta)physical fundamentals. Cristal-Concept & WDO, Iasi and Geneva. ―. 2007. The hierarchies of light: from biblical intuition to scientific reason. “Cultura”: International Review of Philosophy (Iasi), nr. 2: pp. 137-156. Stănciulescu, Traian D. and Manu, Daniela M. 2002. Fundamentele biofotonicii (Fundamentals of biophotonics). Performantica, Iasi. 130 4. Aritia Poenaru and Traian D. Stănciulescu Stănciulescu, Traian D. and Poenaru, Aritia D. 2007. The “living light” matrix: a biophotonic approach to human harmony design. PLDC, London, October 24-29. ―. 2008. Ecological-sanogene buildings (invention patent). OSIM, Romania. Tafuri, Manfredo 1980. Theories and history of architecture. Granada, London and New York. Vulcanescu, Romulus 1985. Mitologie româna (Romanian Mythology). Editura Academiei, Bucuresti. Vilceanu, Sabin 1983. Bionica (Bionics). Editura Ion Creanga, Bucuresti. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Arch. Designer Drd. Aritia D. Poenaru National Institute of Inventics & Biophotonic Synergy Design, Iassy Bd. Carol 1, nr. 11, Iasi. ROMANIA Email: aritia.poenaru@yahoo.it § Aritia Poenaru, a graduate from the Institute of Arts & Faculty of Architecture (Iassy), finalizing a doctorate paper in the field of semiotics of architecture. She is a scientific researcher at National Inventics Institute and a practitioner designerarchitect. She realized many design and architectural project, such as ICHTHUS Sacaramb, and published as (co)author two books – The clothing of light (2005), Biophotonic clothing (2008) and over 25 scientific articles; she is the co-author of 3 invention brevets, distinguished with international diplomas and golden medals. Prof. Dr. Traian D. Stãnciulescu, Professor, Department of Science of Communication, Al. I. Cuza’ University & National Institute of Inventics, Bd. Carol 1, nr. 11, Iasi. ROMANIA. Email: tdstanciu@yahoo.com § Traian D. Stănciulescu, a graduate from the Institute of Architecture (Bucharest) and Faculty of Philosophy (Iasi), Doctorate (in logic & semiotics), teaches and coordinates doctoral papers in the field of semiotics and creatology. He is a senior scientific researcher at National Inventics Institute Iasi (studying biophotonics), the President of Romanian Association for Semiotic Studies and a Vice-president of ANATECOR (National Romanian Association for Complementary Therapies). He has (co)authored 30 books, including: Myths of Creation: Semiotic Lectures (prize the of the Romanian Academy), Biophotonics Fundamentals (2002), Therapy by Light (2003), Semiotics of Light (2003), Signs of Light (2004), Semiotics of Love (2007), and El Poder de la Luz (2007), etc. He is also an inventor in the field of biophotonics and human health optimization that are internationally appreciated. 5 Kailās – the Centre of the World Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić University of Zagreb, Croatia ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. This paper is the result of field research conducted by its authors in 1999 (Vinšćak) and 2006 (Vinšćak and Smiljanić) in Tibet. The authors went on a pilgrimage to Kailās and as participant observers followed the same rules as the Buddhist and Hindu pilgrims, advised by methods of cultural anthropology. The paper will try to clarify the importance that the holy mountain of Kailās has for Buddhists and Hindus, and to give an answer to the question of why it is considered to be the centre and the axis of the world– axis mundi. A phenomenon is interpreted within the context of religious anthropology and sacral geography. Special attention was given to pilgrimages of Buddhist and Bon pilgrims (Vinšćak) and to that of Hindus (Smiljanić). During the second Kailās pilgrimage taken in June 2006, the authors participated in the central annual Saga Dawa festival, when a large wooden pole is erected on the base of Kailās’s south face, in a meadow called Tarboche. The pole is adorned with prayer flags celebrating the Buddha’s birthday, enlightenment, and nirvana. The festival of Saga Dawa (Tibetan for full moon) celebrated under Kailās takes place at a holy time in the holiest part of the globe. The purpose of the authors’ stay in Tibet was to acquaint themselves with Tibetan traditional culture, religion, rituals, customs, and their way of life. This paper aims at giving an outline of the course of the journey and also to interpret the most important practices of pilgrimage. Keywords: Kailās, Tibet, axis mundi, pilgrimage, Buddhism, Hinduism, spiritual magnetism. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction All nations and all religions divide the material world into things and phenomena that have holy characteristics and those that are profane. The institution of taboo is what separates the one from the other. The question is: what is it that is holy (or sacred) to certain peoples? Those are primarily 132 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić mountains and their summits, rivers and waters springing from those mountains, lakes that are the abodes of divinities, caves, certain rocks, trees, and plants. Mountains are considered sacred since their unreachable tops are the dwelling places of gods, lords of the sky, thunder and lightning. That is the reason why many researchers of religion believe them to be holy. It is, however, only partially true. Mountains are not sacred for being home to gods, they are sacred by their own merit, and they themselves are divine. Rice is sacred, too, but not because it gives crop. It gives crop because it is sacred. Just as space can be sacred, so can time be both sacred and profane. Most days of the year are profane, and only holidays are sacred because they are at a holy time. Holidays put rhythm into the year (365 days) and introduce people into holy times. The life of any pious pilgrim, whether Buddhist or Hindu, consists of eternal circulation from one holy place to another. This is not merely a physical journey from one place to the next, but also a spiritual one that purifies men from the accumulated layers of profane world. It is a rite of passage of a sort, by means of which a man experiences spiritual recreation. Pilgrims on their journey go through three phases: separation, transition, and incorporation. The passage symbolizes transition from ignorance to knowledge, mortality to immortality. “Mountains have an important place in the symbolic geography of religious traditions the world over, although the ways in which mountains are significant have differed. Some have been seen as cosmic mountains, central to an entire worldview; others have been distinguished as places of revelation and vision, as divine dwelling places, or even as geographical manifestations of the divine” (Eck 1995: 130). Many researchers and scholars of religion will claim that all religions of our civilization share a common foundation that they all originate from the same source. Researchers of religion often wonder at the myriad of details that various stories from one religious system share with those from another, one developed in the opposite corner of the world. They share similar motifs, rites, beliefs. Is it really possible that all religions come from a primordial form? From the very beginning of existence, man placed gods, deities, and all forms worth of worship and reverence to mountain tops, as close to heaven as possible. When it comes to holy mountains, Kailās is definitely in the lead by the number of people who consider it as such. The exact number would be hard to calculate, but it definitely exceeds one billion. For many centuries, the mountains have been a favourite destination of priests, yogis and pilgrims from all over the world who wanted to prove their faith by completing a circle around its base. A ritual circle around Mount Kailās is fifty-four kilometres long at an Kailās – the Centre of the World 133 altitude between 4,500m and 5,600m (cf. Figs. 5.1 and 5.2). The path is difficult, and occasionally even dangerous due to steep segments and the lack of oxygen at high altitudes to which people who do not reside in the region are not accustomed and therefore often suffer from dizziness, weakness, and fatigue. That, however, can easily be overcome. The Tibetan climate and its various surprises present another challenge. Snow, for example, is not uncommon all year round and can block a pilgrim’s journey. The path to Kailās has always been long and difficult, but pilgrims who know where they are headed, whose heart recognizes the holiness of that area and whose mind is familiar with the numerous legends and stories, can hardly give up on the spiritual journey, even at the price of their own life. Fig. 5.1. Kailās: The route and main stations. This mountain stands separate from other mountains, a hundred kilometres to the north from the main chain of the Himalayas. Its peak at 6,714m rises from the Tibetan Plateau in solitude. Many are awed by its beauty and perfect pyramidal shape, as well as by the four faces of Kailās that all differ from each other: the east face is smooth, without rocks and covered in snow; the southern one contains a large and regularly shaped groove separating the mountain’s face right in the middle; the west side is made of black monolith; while the north, or Shiva’s face of the mystical mountain is intertwined with various combination of narrow cracks and 134 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić stone plates (Berljak 2000: 197). The word kailāsha means crystal in Sanskrit. And indeed, Kailās is like a shining crystal, bathed in sun and moonlight, solitary in the vast Tibetan Plateau. This distinctiveness is perhaps the reason why Kailās is connected to the story of the mythical Mount Meru. But what is it that is so special about Kailās, what is it that distinguished this mountain from all the Himalayan and Trans-Himalayan regions to become the centre of the world? Fig. 5.2. Kailās: notional map of the pilgrimage path. 2. Kailās as axis mundi Kailās is a holy place for four Asian religions: Bön, Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism. Even before Buddhism came from India to Tibet, the local Bön population believed the summit of Kailās to be the abode of a deity called Gekho. What the Olympus had meant to the ancient Greeks, Kailās – the Centre of the World 135 Kailās meant to Tibetans and Hindus. There are all together 24 mountains in Tibet that serve as places of pilgrimage. Out of these, three are particularly holy: Labchi, Tsari, and Kailās. All three are believed to be the abode of a Buddhist deity called Demchok (Dowman 1998: 153). It is also believed that no human has ever set foot on Kailās’s summit, nor ever will, for it is too holy and a human foot would desecrate it. Kailās has always been the goal of pious pilgrims. Tibetan Buddhists consider it to be the axis mundi, centre of the world. According to the oldest Sanskrit tradition the Meru or Sumeru Mountain represents the axis of the world and is not only its physical but also metaphysical centre (cf. Fig. 5.3). Fig. 5.3. Kailās: Snow covered peak and the environs. The Jains call Mt. Kailās Ashtāpada and to them it is the place where Rishabhadeva, the first Tirthankara, attained moksha, or liberation (Snelling 1990: 25). To Hindus, Kailās is the heavenly seat of Shiva and the abode of Kubera, while to Buddhists it represents a great universal mandala of the Dhyāni Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, as it is stated in the famous Demchog Tantra. The Bön population identifies the mountain with a crystal chorten or stupa. To an ordinary Tibetan pilgrim, Kailās represents the heavenly king and the surrounding, lower peaks its ministers. To the Hinayāna Buddhists it is a place where Buddha used to dwell with his 500 Arhats, and to the Tantric Buddhists it is the abode of Demchok (Samvara) and his companion Dorje Phakmo (Dowman 1998: 155). 136 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić Tibetans compare Kailās to sahasrāra chakra, which is the psychic centre of one thousand petals in the head. The mountain’s three rivers – Lha Chu, Zhong Chu, and Tarchen Chu – are compared to the Kengmā, the Rengmā, and the Umā, which are the Idā, Pingalā, and the Sushumnā of the yoga shāstra. Tarchen Chu joins the Zhong Chu; Kerleb Chu merges with Lha Chu; further downstream the Zhong Chu flows into the Lha Chu, which subsequently enters Rākshas Tal; Dam Chhu also flows into Rākshas Tal. Ultimately, all rivers of Kailās flow into the Rākshas (Pranavananda 1949: 129) The Hindu texts, Purānas, originating from almost two thousand years ago, mention Mount Meru. It seems that people at the time were aware of tectonic movements of the planet that took place more than a hundred million years ago and resulted in the formation of continents as we now know them and of the seas that wash their shores. The Vishnupurāna sees Mount Meru placed in the centre of seven continents that form concentric circles. These are surrounded by seven oceans made of salt water, and seven seas of fresh water. In its golden glow, Mount Meru stands surrounded by smaller mountains that seem to support it. The fruits born by trees that grow in its vicinity give health and eternal youth (Sharma 2004: 5). Each of Meru’s four faces is of different colour or varna. The mountain is encircled by four other mountains representing the four corners. At night, the Polestar shines above Meru, while at daytime it is encircled by the light of the Sun’s chariot. When Ganges comes down from heaven, it lands on the top of Meru and then splits four ways. Each of the four rivers thus created runs in one of the four directions to water the planet (Eck 1995: 131). The above description corresponds to geologists’ explanation of tectonic movements under the Earth’s surface. Many cultures have various stories in which mountains have the lead role. The mountain as a place of heaven, earth, and hell is mentioned in legends and myths of nearly all cultures of the planet, even those residing in areas that have no mountains. Early Hindus brought with them a legend from central Asia which took root in India where they settled about 1500 BCE. The legend speaks of a heavenly mountain somewhere in the north, mentioned in the Mahābhārata to be: “guarding the world from above, below and across.” The mountain is the home of seven great rishis (seers) who appear in times when spiritual restoration of the world is needed (Le Page 1996: 61-64). Le Page references Eliade and claims he managed to capture the inner meaning of the legend in his statement that the cosmic mountain mentioned in many legends symbolizes the pinnacle of mystical exaltation and enlightenment. That is why all religious centres adopted some part of Kailās – the Centre of the World 137 the meaning of the mythical mountain. The temple, for example, was the highest point of a town or land, the centre of the world, a place of revelation, prophecy, and heavenly gifts. If there were no mountains there, the people would build one, whether a mound, a pyramid or a ziggurat (Le Page 1996: 63-64). In many Hindu temples there is a symbolical recreation of Mount Meru as the centre of the world mandala. The temples’ architecture is based on the prototype of a mountain. The shikhara (tower or spire) is erected directly above the sanctuary which resembles a cave. At the top of the spire is the amalaka, the ring-shaped symbol of the heavens. Recreation of a mountain can also bee seen in the architecture of Buddhist stupas. The dome has gateways facing the four corners and the mast at the top marks the bhumis (“worlds”) that lead to heaven (Eck 1995: 131). People make the pilgrimage to Kailās either alone, with their family, or sometimes with the entire population of their village. It takes at least two days to complete the Kailās circuit, but some stay there for an entire month and make 13 outer khorras after which they are allowed to enter the inner one. First westerners to visit Kailās reached the mountain two hundred years ago and it has been the subject of many researches of Tibet ever since (Snelling 1990: 77-216). One of the possible answers to why Kailās is considered to be the centre of the world appears when we look at a map showing Kailās’s position in the Tibetan Plateau, and the way it is connected to the river system of the Indo-Tibetan region. Kailās is the highest peak of the Tibetan Plateau and an array of rivers flows out of it like wheel spokes towards east, west, northwest, and south. These rivers are the Brahmaputra, Indus (Sindhu), Sutlej, and Karnali. All of them emerge out of the Kailās area and the Mānasarovar Lake. Tibetans believe that these rivers, if looked at from the air, form a swastika with Kailās as its centre. Old scriptures say that these rivers flow out of the Mānasarovar Lake just beneath Kailās and make seven circles around the holy region before they take their separate courses. This is the rivers’ way to show respect to the Seat of Gods in accordance with the old custom of circumambulation (Sanskrit pradakshinā). The Brahmaputra’s spring is east of Kailās and Mānasarovar. Tibetans call it “Tamchog-Kham-bab” (rTa-mchog Khahbab) ‒ flows out of horse’s mouth. Sutlej, emerging from the west, is called “Lanchen-Kham-bab” ‒ flows out of elephant’s mouth. From the north springs out the Indus ‒ “Senge-Kham-bab” (Sen-ge Kha-hbab) ‒ flows out of lion’s mouth. The southern river, Karnali (called Gogra in the plains), is called “Magcha Khambab” (Mag.bya Kha-hbab) - flows out of peacock’s mouth. These animals are symbols of the four Dhyāni Buddhas 138 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić and the names of the rivers show that they are considered to be parts of the universal mandala with Kailās as its centre (Govinda 1984: 199-200). 3. Buddhist pilgrimage to Kailās Walking around holy places connected to the roots and basis of their religion is one of the most important rites to every Tibetan. Two destinations are considered the holiest ‒ the Jokhang monastery in Lhasa and the sacred Kailās Mountain ‒ and all Tibetans wish to visit them at least once in their lifetime. The most persistent of the pilgrims make that, sometimes up to a 1000-km long, journey measuring it with the length of their body by performing prostration through the entire length of the journey. Such pilgrims are rare now because prostration has given way to off-road vehicles or trucks as means of travel, although there are no routes for such transport around Kailās itself. Fig. 5.4. Kailās: A Buddhist Thanka. Kailās – the Centre of the World 139 Tibetan word for pilgrimage is neykhor and means circling around holy places (Dunham 1993: 132). Holy places can be monasteries, mountains, rivers, lakes, chortens (stupas), or sacred trees (Chan 1994: 40). To fully understand the meaning of Kailās and its remarkable surroundings, one should not only observe it from geographical, cultural, or historical point of view, but primarily through the eyes of a pilgrim. Those that make the khorra or the ritual circle around that holy mountain with utmost dedication and perfect spiritual concentration are believed to have made a full circle through life and death (cf. a Buddhist Thanka showing the pilgrimage to Kailas, Fig. 5.4). Two pilgrim paths lead around Kailās: the wider, outer khorra, and the narrower, or inner khorra. It is necessary to make at least 13 outer khorras to be allowed to enter the inner one. The inner khorra leads directly from Darchen through a narrow valley to the gash on the mountain’s southern side and then goes around a small peak called Nandi. This gutter or gash on the mountain’s southern face, viewed from particular spots, seems to Buddhist pilgrims like kālachakra ‒ the wheel of time – while from other locations it looks like a swastika or a Tsi rock. Two Buddhist monasteries are located along the inner khorra path: Silung and Gyentok. According to the Tibetan lunar calendar, in the year of the horse, which comes along in 12-year intervals, one circle around Kailās is worth thirteen. The circle starts and ends in the village of Darchen, south of Kailās (cf. Figs. 5.1 and 5.2). The Tibetans believe that all who complete 108 Kailās khorras in their lifetime are liberated from all life’s sufferings and have an open road to nirvāna, the state of bliss. Their material life in this world ends and they continue to live as enlightened beings. Hindus, Jains, and Buddhists all circle Kailās clockwise (from west to east). Only followers of Bön walk counter clockwise ‒ from east to west. In order to distinguish themselves from the orthodox Buddhists, all of their movements are performed opposite to the direction of the Sun’s apparent orbit. Ethnologists will know that the direction of all movements connected to growth, development, and fertility always follows the direction of the Sun, and that only funeral processions move in the opposite direction. Why then do the followers of Bön perform their rituals contrary to everyone else? The answer is still not clear. According to an old Buddhist legend, the Buddha himself walks clockwise around Kailās, and the Bön pilgrims figured out a way how to be the first who would see Him – by walking in the opposite direction and actually walking towards him. The full moon in the fourth month of the lunar year is the time for a festival called Saga Dawa at which we participated 12 June 2006. This is the most important annual festival on the foothills of Kailās. Thousands of 140 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić pilgrims from all over Tibet pour into the area to hang their prayer flags. Some of them stay here for an entire month performing Buddhist rites (Chan 1994: 278). The rock called Darchen Ngyaye Durtro is a particularly holy spot for Tibetans because it holds remains of the 84 Mahāsiddhas. Pilgrims sometimes feign ritual dismemberment of living people there. The author of the text (Vinšćak) experienced the rite on his own skin when a Tibetan pilgrim “dismembered” him into as many parts as was his age. Tibetans believe that those who have the ritual performed on them are reborn or incarnated after their real death in a holy place near Kailās in Tibet. Fig. 5.5. Kailās: A Buddhist pilgrimage procession, near Drölma Pass. After the first day, walking alongside the left bank of the Lha Chu (Divine) River, we reached a Buddhist gompa called Drira Puk. That gompa is at an altitude of 5000 meters offers the best view of the always snow-clad northern face of Kailās. This is a site where the Tibetan pilgrims perform their rituals. Facing the mountain’s northern face, Buddhist pilgrims send their prayers by performing prostration. While advancing together with Buddhist pilgrims towards the Drölma Pass (Tibetan Drölma La) that separates the northern and southern valleys, we reached a place called Siwatshali Durtrö. This is a place where pilgrims Kailās – the Centre of the World 141 are supposed to lie down on the ground between two large boulders and assume the position of the dying. Then they imagine their journey after death through bardo. After ritually dying, the pilgrims enter the kingdom of the horrible Dorje Jigje, the Death God (Chan 1994: 286). At that time they remember everyone they had loved and who died, and everyone whom they had not loved back, and then pray for their happiness and rebirth in any form. As a confirmation of their wishes, pilgrims leave certain symbols or relics of their earthly lives. These are mostly items of clothing, pieces of cloth, bones, saddlebags, shoes, locks of hair, or ashes from a funeral pyre. Some pilgrims even cut their finger and squeeze out some blood, or knock out a tooth and place it into a rock crack. Pilgrims believe that Milarepa has left his footprint in a rock nearby. Fig. 5.6. Kailās: the ritual flags nearby. All pilgrims symbolically die here. Afterwards they pass through a valley leading to the Drölma Pass (cf. Fig. 5.5). The passage through the 142 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić valley symbolizes the passage through the state of bardo which lasts for 49 days after physical death. We, too, cut off a lock of hair from each other and left them with some clothes beside the great rock. While walking through that valley, one feels very peculiar; like they are leaving their entire life and all the people they knew and loved behind. A half an hour walk away from Siwathal Durtrö towards the Drölma Pass, on our right-hand side we saw a cone-shaped stone called Shinje Melong. Its reddish base is believed to be the “mirror of the death king”, called Shinje by the Tibetans. Pilgrims throw themselves on the ground in front of it and some of them perform a Tantric rite and chant prayers glorifying Padmasambhava or Guru Rimpoche, as the Tibetans call him (Chan 1994: 286). Unlike the rest of the pilgrimage path, where one can hear constant shouting of yak drivers and the chatter of pilgrims, this valley is completely filled with silence and everyone walks calmly and without making a sound. Even the altitude sickness and fatigue disappear. When we reached the Drölma Pass we were all reborn, symbolically, and also purified of all our sins, because Drölma is the goddess of mercy that forgives all sins to those who arrive there (Chan 1994:288). All pilgrims at the Drölma Pass leave holy scarves ‒ kaatas ‒ and prayer flags cf. Fig. 5.6). Fig. 5.7. Kailās: Mani stone: ‘Om mani padme hum’. Down in the eastern valley we reached the Zutrul Puk cave, the home of Milarepa, Buddhist poet from the turn of 11th and 12th centuries and the most famous holy man of Tibet. Milarepa composed poems and meditated Kailās – the Centre of the World 143 there, and today’s pilgrims read the mark on the ceiling of the cave which was turned into a Buddhist temple as his handprint. After a three-day walk, we once again came to the open plain and soon afterwards to the starting and ending point of the khorra ‒ the village of Darchen. Along the way, we passed by many mani walls built out of thousands of rocks with the ‘Om mani padme hum’ mantra carved into them, praising Avalokiteshvara who dwells like a precious gem ‒ mani ‒ in the heart of every pious pilgrim. All who pass there add a rock of their own as a symbol of gratitude for everything this pilgrimage gave them, and as a blessing to all those who will come here afterwards (cf. Fig. 5.7). After successfully completing the khorra around Kailās and after we were, according to Buddhist beliefs, reborn and purified of all our sins, we headed towards the holy lakes Mānasarovar (Tibetan Tso Mapham) and Rākshas Tal (Tibetan Langak Tso) (Vinšćak 2004: 285-296). 4. Hinduist pilgrimage to Kailās Since the advent of Aryan civilization into India, Tibet and especially the Kailās – Mānasarovar Region have been glorified in Hindu mythology as part of the Himalayas (Pranavananda 1949: 9). To many Hindus, Kailās is an unattainable dream. The reason lies partially in the distance of Kailās from their homes in India, but also in issuing of limited number of entry visas from the authorities of People Republic of China (Snelling 1990: 319). The nature of Hindu pilgrimage is contained within the term tirthayātrā which could be translated as “undertaking a journey to river fords” (Bhardwaj 1983: 2). Yātrā signifies the journey, and tirtha is a complex Sanskrit term with several meanings. Tirtha is a gat, but can also be used to signify a seer and holy scriptures. What is common to these seemingly different meanings is the idea of going across – the possibility to move away from the human and into the divine realm, which is evident in Holy Scriptures, places, and people. Every tirtha is a special nod, a place extremely suitable for rites and ceremonies: prayers spoken there are considered to be more effective than when repeated in a different space (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 137). Hindu mystics have developed a concept of the inner pilgrimage by which one visits sacred places within the microcosm of the mind and body (Morinis 1992: 2). The very term used for pilgrimage can be understood in a metaphorical sense – a yogi through meditation undertakes a pilgrimage because tirtha-yātrā is not only a physical journey to a holy place, but represents mental and moral discipline as well (Bhardwaj 1983: 2). It could also be argued that without 144 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić the two components, the significance of pilgrimage is greatly reduced to Hindus since that is the point of pilgrimage as such, regardless of the religion that the pilgrim belongs to – purity of body, mind and soul, dedication and utter devotion to the Devine at that sacred place, but also upon return from it. It is an individual path upon which a human being establishes a direct relationship with the divine. Bhardwaj states that in Hindu tradition, a journey to holy places has no meaning and effect unless the person undertaking the journey leads an upright and moral life. That claim is also often encountered in Hindu religious literature as a condition to visit holy places, enter temples and submerge oneself in the water of holy rivers (Bhardwaj 1983: 2). During pilgrimage, people relinquish their daily tasks, worries and secular duties and they dedicate to prayer, meditation and contemplation. Although it might not be recognized as a primary path to achieve moksha, pilgrimage is still desirable for the pious who live their lives according to dharma. It is only one of the ways in which one can attain bliss (Bhardwaj 1983: 3). Perhaps the earliest allusion to the practice of pilgrimage in Indian literature is to be found in the Āitareya Brāhmana of the Rigveda: Flower – like the heels of the wanderer, His body groweth and is fruitful; All his sins disappear, Slain by the toil of his journeying. (Āitareya Brāhmana, VII-15, as translated by A.B. Keith, hmanas: the Āitareya and Kaush hmanas of the Rigveda, p. 320) In Hinduism, it is traditional to undertake a pilgrimage at the time of major transitions in life. People visit pilgrimage centres to feed their child solid food for the first time, cut their child’s hair or to invest a boy with a sacred thread since those rites have more value there. Newly married couples often visit shrines to gain blessings for their marriage, and the dying visit such sites believing that death there would release them from rebirth (Morinis 1992: 11). A pilgrimage or tirtha-yātrā is a journey to a holy place, a place of transition where the world of gods touches and meets the human world. Tirtha is the place where the transcendental comes down to earth, where the higher spheres join the lower ones, where the holy meets the mundane. It is a mediation between two realities (Flood 1996: 212). And indeed, a man at a pilgrimage site, such as Kailās, for a moment becomes unaware of the difference between dreams and reality and of the line between sacred and profane. Kailās – the Centre of the World 145 The reason why people come to this holy place is to purify their souls and get absolution from sins. When they are removed from the Divine, because they have been taught so by religion, people place their gods into mountain tops, areas far away from their reach, places closer to the heavens. It is very unusual that even today in this modern age when everything goes and when the limits imposed by centuries are simply deleted, no human foot has stepped on the top of Kailās. The summit of this magnificent mountain is considered too sacred to be desecrated by human presence. Lama Anagarika Govinda (1949) said that the modern man driven by ambition and desire for glorification of his ego climbs mountains and yearns to be the first to step on a mountain top, while a pilgrim, a devotee is more interested in the spiritual, rather than the physical climb. To him, the mountain is a symbol of god and as he would not step on a holy image, he does not dare to step foot on the holy mountain top. Like Buddhists Hindus also believe that one parikramā (or one round of circling) around Mount Kailās washes away sins of one life, 13 circuits wash away the sins of one kalpa, and 108 parikramās secure moksha in this very life (Pranavananda 1949: 10). Nobody can approach the Throne of the Gods, or penetrate the Mandala of Shiva of Demchog, or whatever name he likes to give to the mystery of ultimate reality, without risking his life – and perhaps even the sanity of his mind. On the eve before parikramā, Brahmans perform a rite called pujā. Through rituals a man communicates with gods, while customs serve for communication among men (Vinšćak 2000: 421-434). Anthropologist Chris Fuller pointed out that Hinduism represents the non-existence of an absolute border between gods and men (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 137). Before the rite, a priest in Shiva’s temple needs to awake the divine strength within him since religious texts state that “only Shiva can worship Shiva.” Just as men show their respect to gods through the characteristic bow or namaskār – lowering their heads and joining their palms, gods do the same to other gods, but to men, too. Hindus perform rituals of sacrifice and pujā to appease deities and receive blessings. The purpose of private rituals performed by some is to achieve mukti or salvation and to attain heaven of bhukti. Rituals ensure the continuity of tradition, install Hindu values, and help set the Hindu identity (Flood 1996: 223). The act of worship or pujā consists of several parts. One of them is offerings. Gods are offered vegetarian food, incense sticks, and flowers. Pujā is a Sanskrit word that could be literally translated as “worship”. This is a rite performed in the households of the pious, in temples, and on holy 146 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić sites, such as Kailās. It can be as short as an offering of a coin to an image of a deity and receiving the god’s blessing through a mark between eyebrows (tilak) made of sandalwood paste (chandana) and red powder (kumkuma) (Flood 1996: 208). Another part of the pujā ritual is ārati, a form of lamp offering in which a priest sings a prayer from Holy Scriptures and sways an oil lamp holding a number of wicks before the gods image (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 147). The ritual of pujā can be devoted to different deities. Pujā preformed for lord Shiva, at the foot of mount Kailās, is considered one of the most powerful and significant rites for the Hindus’ worship of Shiva. In all forms of Hindu pilgrimage, the pilgrims hope to absorb the beneficial effects of contact with the deity by consuming or receiving sacrilege substance (prasāda) such as food, flowers, water or ash, which have been to the close proximity of the deity (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 148). Shortly before sunrise, Hindu pilgrims wash in the cold water of Lha Chu river (divine river) passing by the Golden Grazing Ground where all pilgrim tents are located, and they start meditation and invocation. Tirthas are usually connected with running water and ritual ablution performed at dawn. It is believed that seven holy rivers come from heaven, and the Ganges is sometimes called “the running ladder to heaven”. Pilgrimage is an opportunity for self-purification through ritual ablution (Coleman and Elsner 1995: 140). The idea of purity is the central point of all Hindu rituals. Those performing the ritual and those participating in it in any capacity, need to maintain body purity – they need to be clear from bodily fluids, have clean hair, neat nails. This purity of the body has to be maintained every morning through a special ritual. There are certain conditions that are considered impure, for example the period of mourning after someone close has died, the time of menstrual bleeding, and birth. People in those conditions are not allowed in temples and holy sites. Women during menstrual bleeding used to be excluded from housework, such as preparing meals, so their impurity would not be transferred to other members of the household. As a rule, the pious need to be pure in the presence of a deity, in a temple or a house shrine (Flood 1996: 219). The idea of purity is one of the main reasons for ritual ablutions in the Mānasarovar Lake on the day before going to the sacred mountain. This is both the process of physical purification by water, and of spiritual cleansing, since the lake is considered to be holy. All prayers pronounced the morning before starting parikramā are directed to Lord Shiva awaiting their arrival on the slopes of the holy mountain: ‘Om namah Shivāya’. Every mantra in Hindu traditions starts Kailās – the Centre of the World 147 with or contains the word “Om”. Lama Anagarika Govinda says: “OM is the quintessence, the seed-syllable of the universe, the universal force of the all-embracing consciousness..”. Mantras are holy syllables that take the devotee to higher realms of consciousness (Govinda 1987: 13). They are words that carry that power, a message from the divine world, bestowing knowledge and helping to change the consciousness of the person pronouncing them. The root of the word mantra is man-, to think, appended with -tra, it forms an instrument – and that is the word (bija-sabda). Thus, mantra means “an instrument for thinking”, “the thing that creates a mental image”. Its sound invokes its content into the current state of reality. Ancient teachers realized that the mantra “Om Namah Shivāya” is the source of what they call tejas, or energy transforming mental thought into spiritual realization. The Shiva Purāna states that the mantra contains the nature of Lord Shiva and that it can lead to higher consciousness if intoned in the proper way and with full concentration of the aspiring. The more times it is pronounced, the greater is the presence of energy. Pilgrims speak out or intone mantras either together of individually. This is followed by meditation to prepare for the pilgrimage. During the entire pilgrimage, the devotees repeat the “Om namah Shivāya” mantra in their head to come as close to Lord Shiva as possible. On the second day of the circle around the holy mountains, Hindus symbolically meet Shiva under the holy rock of Kailās. For all Hindus, alongside Brahmā and Vishnu, Shiva is one of the three gods that make up the holy trinity and is worshiped as the god of destruction. However, for his devotees he is the supreme Lord who creates, maintains and destroys the cosmos. In the traditional iconography he is often portrayed sitting in a lotus position, blue skinned, covered in ashes, with a third eye open, the Ganga flowing from his locks, a crescent moon (ardhachandra) and a cobra (nāga) in his hair. He is seated upon a tiger skin, has sacred rudrāksha beads around his neck, and on his arms. He is also holding a trishula, trident (Flood 1996: 151). Kailās is considered the abode of Shiva and his wife, the goddess Pārvati. Devotees of Lord Shiva consider the north side of mount Kailās as the place where they finally meet their god. The next significant stop for the Hindus is Shiva Tal. Hindus like Buddhist make the same rituals of leaving certain symbols or relics at this holy site. They also face Yama’s judgment, symbolising their own conscience that reminds them of all their deeds. All pilgrims symbolically die there. Immediately after crossing the Dolma La pass, in the midst of rocks and snow, a small emerald green lake appears. It is considered a lake of great mercy. The Hindus call it Gaurikund. Those who bathe in the cold 148 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić water of the lake are initiated to a new life. During our visit the lake was frozen and we had not hade the chance to perform the rite. The water is believed to be holy and to have healing powers so the pilgrims collect it to take home with them. It sometimes happens that pilgrims, especially those from India, die of exhaustion while climbing to the Dolma La Pass. The temperatures there are very low and the air is very thin (Vinšćak 2000: 421-434). Hindus believe in the excellence of death at a pilgrimage place (Morinis 1994: 11). We met an old Indian man who was nearing ninetyfive years of age. He was accompanied by his daughter, a woman of advanced age, and her husband. Coming up to the pass, the man turned ill and they immediately used oxygen bottles on him. He said he had come to die on Kailās, and if that happened, it would be a true blessing from Shiva. Those who come here are blessed with the sight of the sacred mountain and its unearthly beauty, that gigantic natural and perfectly symmetrical temple. But they are also blessed with the darshana of God, whether in the form of Shiva and Pārvati or any other form (Govinda 1960: 215). 5. The holy lakes – Mānasarovar and Rākshas Tal The beauty of Lake Mānasarovar (Sanskrit: ‘spirit of consciousness’) has been sung many times. The lake with its intense, almost unearthly colours that blend from light blue to green emerald is located under Mount Kailās and they form this holy site together. Hindus believe that by submerging their bodies in the waters of the lake frees them from sins of their past lives. Those who submerge their entire bodies in the lake are believed to be reborn as deities. They turn to the verses from the Rāmāyana: “When the earth of Mānasarovar touches anyone’s body or anyone bathes in the lake, he shall go to the Paradise of Brahmā, and he who drinks its waters shall go to the heaven of Shiva and shall be released from the sins of a hundred births. Even the beast who bears the name of Mānasarovar shall go to the paradise of Brahma. Its waters are like Pearls”. One Tibetan saying says that the wise dwell in mountains, while the enlightened ones dwell in waters. Tibetans, thought, do not bathe in these holy lakes. Sailing on the lake is still not permitted to anyone. Under Hindu tradition, Brāhma the Creator made Mānasarovar and the heavenly tree Jambu that grows in its centre unseen to human eye. That is Kailās – the Centre of the World 149 why the ancient Indians called the world jambudvipa (the Jambu continent), and claimed that the fruits of the divine tree turned the water of Mānasarovar into an elixir of life. Hindus believe that Brahmā himself created the lake (Sanskrit Mānas = mind) at the request of twelve rishis who came there to perform rites and meditate. They were blessed with a darshana of the divine couple – Shiva and Pārvati. When the rishis realized they had no water, they prayed to Brahmā who in His mercy created Lake Mānasarovar. Pilgrims walk around the lake hoping to receive rewards in their next life. The water of the lake is considered even holier than that of the Ganga/Ganges (Sharma 2004: 127). According to Buddhist tradition, queen Māyā Devi saw the protector gods of the Anotata Lake (Pāli name for Mānasarovar) in a dream taking her bedspread and washing it in the lake’s holy water. This way it was cleansed of all human impurities so that Buddha was able to enter her womb. In her dream Buddha appeared to her as a white elephant coming from the holy Mt. Kailās within a cloud and entering her body. Just like every temple in India has its lake, Kailās has two holy lakes on its southern foothills. The Mānasarovar Lake is formed like a sun and symbolizes the forces of light. Rākshas Tal has a form of the moon sickle and symbolizes the hidden forces of darkness. As long as their true nature is not conceived and these forces are not directed to certain channels, they appear as demonic forces of darkness. These ideas are expressed through the names of these lakes: mānas is Sanskrit for spirit or consciousness and is considered to be the centre of recognition, a force of light and enlightenment. Rākshasa, on the other hand, is a Sanskrit name for a demon so that Rākshas Tal is a demon-lake. These symbols of the sun and moon are used on every Tibetan thanka (thang-ka) where the Buddhas, deities, or holy men are depicted (Vinšćak 2000: 421-434). Mānasarovar in fact is Kailās, its inseparable part. The lake is the female principle, and the mountain male. Mānasarovar does not stand alone. It is accompanied by Rākshas Tal (Sanskrit rākshasa = demon). The two lakes are joined by a channel called Ganga-chu. The channel used to contain water which flowed from one lake to another. Hindus believe Rākshas Tal to be impure. Topographically, it is positioned to mirror the surrounding mountains. Located west of Mānasarovar, according to Tibetan legends, it was once the dwelling place of demons and nobody drinks its water. The legend also speaks of an argument between two golden fish living in Mānasarovar, after which one banished the other to Rākshas Tal. The path that the banished fish took to the other lake became the Ganga Chu channel, and the second lake became holy as well, since water from the Mānasarovar flowed into it. Since then, 150 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić the water of Rākshas Tal is no longer taboo. The Hindus, however, still consider it impure (Sharma 2004: 112). Interestingly, even the geographical position of the two lakes corresponds to their relationship to light and darkness, day and night. Mānasarovar is in the east, the direction of the rising sun and the beginning of the day with a number of monasteries and ascetic dwellings around it, while there are no human dwellings at the other lake, Rākshas Tal. Although positioned in a beautiful spot, there is a strange and mysterious air about it. Pilgrims look at it in fear and avoid it, although it is as holy as its twin (Govinda 1998: 222-225). The Rāmāyana and the Mahābhārata, all the Purānas, but Mānasakhanda of Skanda Purāna in particular, sing the glory of Mānasarovar (Pranavananda 1949: 9). The most devoted pilgrims make a 120km long parikramā or kora around the Mānasarovar Lake. In the Mahābhārata Mānasarovar is also known as Bindusara and in Jain works as Padma Hrida (Pranavananda 1949: 10). There are legends that say that some pilgrims witnessed their gods mirrored in the waters of Mānasarovar. For most pilgrims this offers a thread of hope guiding them on their path around this holy lake. 6. Conclusion Man has always aspired to the divine, to return to the Source, the Maker, Creator, Mother Nature, or what ever term we might use. We have always been searching for answers to the question of our existence, the reason of being in this dimension, the meaning of life. That is particularly true for times like these when we are surrounded by insecurities, unanswered questions, deprived of true joy, morality and humanity. This is the time of greatest technological progress, of elevated scholastic knowledge, rationalization and bureaucracy. All the preconditions are here to “strip the world of its magic”. But that has not happened. People still believe because the world gives them no hope or future. We also live in the time of knowledge. However, neither this great knowledge nor our advanced technology gave us an answer to the eternal questions: Who am I? Where am I going? What is the meaning of life? Those are the three key questions that numerous religions – those developed through centuries and millennia – are trying to find answers to. The current time is very important for cultural anthropologists. Societies, politics, economy and religion are changing globally and those changes need to be observed and understood. Pilgrimage is an important part of that change, and what better place to research pilgrimages than Mount Kailās? Mount Kailās is the axis mundi, the centre, the heart of the Kailās – the Centre of the World 151 world. Pilgrims see it as a gateway to the world of the dead and to the world of Gods. It stands as an enormous shrine that is the intersection of extraordinary energies – of Earth and of the Universe. This is where Gods receive all hopes and prayers of men. Kailās and Mānasarovar mirror the world of Gods right here on earth. Pilgrims come to holy sites in order to awake the divine within them and to preserve that realization upon their return to everyday life. They come home “reborn”, cleansed of all sins and burdens of life. Although many mountains had been considered sacred throughout history, some have lost their initial importance. Kailās, however, is not one of them. It has maintained its mysticism and remained important and holy to millions of worshipers, explorers and researchers. Maybe it is because of Tibet’s geographical isolation, the altitude or simply because of the beauty of the landscape surrounding Mount Kailās and its accompanying lakes Mānasarovar and Rākshas Tal. What ever the reason might be, the area has remained unspoiled in its holiness to multitudes of believers. If one were to search for heaven on earth, Kailās in Tibet would certainly be the place to look. 7. References Berljak, Darko 2000. Ključevi neba ili Tibetska trilogija. Izvori, Zagreb. Bhardwaj, Surinder M. 1973. Hindu Places of Pilgrimage in India – A Study in Cultural Geography. University of California Press, Berkeley. Chan, Victor 1994. Tibet Handbook: A Pilgrimage Guide. Moon Publs., Chico, CA. Coleman, Simon and Elsner, John 1995. Pilgrimage: Past and Present in the World Religions. Harvard University Press, Cambridge. Dowman, Keith 1998. The Sacred Life of Tibet, Harper Collins Publisher India, New Delhi. Dunham, V. C., Baker, I., & Kelly, T. L. 1993. Tibet: reflections from the wheel of life. Abbeville Press Publishers, New York. Eck, Diana L. 1995. Mountains; pp. 130-134 in The Encyclopedia of Religion, Editor-in-Chief: Mircea Eliade. Macmillan, New York. Flood, Gavin 1996. An Introduction to Hinduism. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Govinda, Lama Angarika 1966. The Way of the White Clouds. The Guernsay Press Co. Ltd, Guernsey, Channel Islands, first published in 1966, revised edition 1968, reissued 1984. Keith, A. B. 1920. Rigveda Brahmanas: the Aitareya and Kaushitaki Brahmanas of the Rigveda. Harvard Oriental Series, vol. 25. Harvard University Press, Cambridge. 152 5. Tomo Vinšćak and Danijela Smiljanić LePage, Victoria. 1996. Shambhala – The fascinating truth behind the myth of Shangri-la. Pilgrims Publishing, Kathmandu, Nepal Morinis, Alan (ed.) 1992. Sacred Journeys: The Anthropology of Pilgrimage. Greenwood Press, Westport CT. Pranavananda, Swami 1949. Kailās Manasarovar; published by Swami Pranavananda and printed by Surya Print Press, New Delhi. Sharma, Veena 2004. Kailās Manasarovar: A Sacred Journey. Roli Books, New Delhi. Snelling, John 1990. The Sacred Mountain, East-West Publs., London. Eliade, Mircea (ed.) 1995. The Encyclopedia of Religion. Volume, 10: 13134. Macmillan Library Reference, New York. Vinšćak, Tomo 2000. Buddhističko hodočastilište Kailās, Trava od srca. Hrvatske Indije 2, pp. 421-434; Sekcija za orijentalistiku filološkog društva i Filozofski fakultet, Zagreb. ―. 2004. Following the Paths of Tibetan Buddhism. Studia ethnologica croatica, vol. 14/15 (2002-03): 285-296; Odsjek za etnologiju, Zagreb. ---------------------------------------------Prof. Tomo Vinšćak Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb; Ivana Lučića 3, HR- 10000, Zagreb. CROATIA. Email: tvinscak@ffzg.hr § She is involved in projects concerning shamanism, customs and beliefs, Slavic mythology, ethnology of India, Nepal and Tibet, Tibetan Buddhism and Bön, sacral interpretation of landscapes, and has published profusely on these themes. Ms. Danijela Smiljanić Doctoral student, Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, University of Zagreb, # Dobrilina 20, HR- 10000 Zagreb, CROATIA. Gsm.: +385(0)98519958. Email: danijelasmiljanic@yahoo.com § She was graduated at the department of Anthropology on the subject of Kailās – A Hinduistic pilgrimage based on scientific field research, based on her visit to Tibet and Nepal in 2006; and presently doing research in the field of anthropology of religion. 6 Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal Janice Sacherer University of Maryland, Asian Division at Okinawa, Japan ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Rolwaling Valley is situated in Nepal just south of its border with the Tibetan region of China. Located approximately 50-km west of Mt. Everest, it lies on the southern slopes of a 7,146 metres peak known as Gauri Shankar in Nepalese and Tseringma in Tibetan. It has been known in Tibetan culture as a holy place for at least a thousand years. Its fame rests on being sacred to five goddesses who live on Tseringma Mountain, and to Padmasambhava, the patron saint of Tibet. The Tseringma goddesses have been worshiped since prehistoric times, while history records that Padmasambhava passed by Rolwaling in CE 817. Along the way he subdued local spirits by converting them to Buddhism, including the Tseringma. Rolwaling became known as a valley sacred to Padmasambhava, or Guru Rinpoche, in Tibetan, only in the fourteenth century however, when Buddhist “treasure finders” received visionary revelations to this effect. Secular historians meanwhile, credit the rise of the sacred hidden valley tradition (beyul) in Tibetan Buddhism to the depredations of the Mongols during this period. Nowadays, Rolwaling is filled with rock monuments commemorating the visit of Padmasambhava and his Tibetan consort, Yeshe Tsogyel. Rolwaling has remained isolated and poor compared to the tourist frequented Mt. Everest region. This isolation results from a combination of geographic and political factors. Problematic however, is how to preserve the sacred nature of the place. Keywords. Padmasambhava, Buddhism, Beyul, Sherpas, Nepal. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. The Geography of Beyul Sacred hidden valleys, known as beyul (sbas-yul)1 in the Tibetan tradition, are special places. Located at the southern periphery of Tibetan settlement and culture, their climate is strikingly different from the Tibetan plateau, even though they are about the same altitude. This results from differential 154 6. Janice Sacherer rainfall north and south of the Himalayan range during the summer monsoon. Tibet itself is arid, often desert-like, a landscape painted in subdued shades of beige, blue and gray, whereas the southern beyul, are universally green in summer and filled with luxuriant vegetation. In winter, when bitterly cold winds sweep the treeless Tibetan plateau, the beyul are sheltered by high mountains on at least three sides. The easternmost beyul of Pemako, lying within the great bend of the Tsangpo/Brahmaputra River, could even be classified as sub-tropical rain forest (Ward and Cox 2001, and 2008; Baker 2004). The Himalayan range represents to Tibetans, not only the frontier of the familiar world, but also a formidable physical barrier to be passed if one wishes to visit the holy places of India where Buddhism began. Finding any of the beyul is yet more strenuous, even when a guidebook or Neyig, is available. These Neyig always give directions from the Tibetan perspective, and are produced by special visionaries known as treasure finders, or terton (Birnbaum 1989: 64-68). Chief among the locaters for secret and sacred hidden lands, are the individual mountains behind which they lie. These mountains have been thought of as the home of gods and goddess since prehistoric times, which in Tibet, means the 8th century BCE, when a writing system based on Sanskrit was introduced along with Buddhism (Snellgrove 1980: 75). These deities are place gods, rulers of both mountains and the regions surrounding them - pagan gods from the Buddhist point of view, who in the past, often caused misfortune if they were not propitiated with offerings, including animal sacrifice. According to Tibetan tradition, it was the opposition of these local guardian deities, which put innumerable hindrances in the way of the first Buddhist teachers in that country (Chan 1994: 45-46). The geographic location of Rolwaling meanwhile, fits all of these classic beyul criteria. It lies on the southern slopes of an important sacred mountain known as Tseringma in Tibetan and Gauri Shankar in Nepali, a mountain that is holy to both Hindus and Buddhists. The highest crest of this massif forms the border between the present day Tibetan Autonomous Region of China and Nepal, while the valleys on its northern Tibetan, and southern Nepalese slopes, are both sacred. It is bordered on its western flank by the north-south valley of the Bhote Kosi River, which was one of the most important trade routes between Tibet and Nepal. Ironically, thousands of traders travelling between Kathmandu and Dingri in Tibet, passed by the entrance to Rolwaling without being aware of it, or if aware, without having the courage and curiosity to explore. It was concealed in this case, almost in plain sight. Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 155 Tseringma Mountain, at 7,146 metres (23,697 feet), is clearly visible as it rises abruptly above the flat plains of Tibet, and is also visible from the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu as well as the district capital of Charikot. From the Nepalese side however, the mountain disappears as one descends into the valley of the Bhote Kosi, approximately 1,000 metres in altitude and surrounded by steep walls. In past times the narrow trail, passable only by human porters and pack animals, could be quite treacherous due to frequent landslides, and narrow bridges that often washed out. Just south of the Tibetan border post, an observant traveller would have been aware that there was a high altitude east-west valley far above, because of the loud and dramatic descent of the Rolwaling river at this point. The Rolwaling River descends no less than 3,000 metres in a great roar accompanied by clouds of rainbow-filled mist and spray. Exploring the source of this spectacular Rolwaling waterfall would have not have been tempting for any but the most stalwart however, as it would have involved climbing the steep, pathless, and heavily forested cliffs beside the crashing water. Even at the top of this steep, slippery climb, one would only have found oneself at the far western end of a narrow (less than 1-km wide), forested valley stretching out of sight, 7-km to the east. Further discouraging travel would have been the many bears and leopards inhabiting the surrounding forest, animals which occasionally make their presence known even today. If one had braved wild animals and the steep and slippery climb, the Rolwaling Valley is so narrow and the surrounding mountains so high, that a view of the majestic surroundings would not have been afforded until the traveller had arrived at 4,000 metres, and finally been above timberline. At this point any visitor gazing around would have realized that the path taken from the west was the easy approach, as Rolwaling is surrounded by snow and ice clad peaks on three sides. Passes across these ranges exist, but they are not obvious, and average 5,600 metres or almost 17,000 feet in height. All require nearly three days’ of travel on either gravel covered, or heavily fissured, glaciers consisting of perpetual ice more than fifty meters deep. Even so, they are generally navigable only in the cold season from October to March, becoming impassable in the spring heat and the summer and early fall monsoon. Lowland Nepalese hunters who may have been the first to venture into Rolwaling, would have been happy to depart quickly for warmer climes, although Tibetan plant or animal hunters, or ascetic holy men, would have realized that compared to their own high altitude plateau, Rolwaling was a veritable paradise of tall trees draped with hanging moss, southern facing slopes covered with bamboo, and higher altitude forests covered with 156 6. Janice Sacherer fragrant incense rhododendron. Altogether there are some eighty edible, medicinal, incense, and other special use plants among the three hundred or so different species dwelling there (Sacherer 1979: 57-61). Other features would have included a spring that never freezes, a variety of sub tropical and high altitude animals ranging from the lesser panda to the elusive snow leopard, two lakes with pristine turquoise-coloured water, and in the summer months, more than a dozen waterfalls surrounded by moss and ferns, and very often, rainbows (Mountain Legacy n.d.). 2. The Spiritual History of Beyul Far more important to Tibetan culture than the spectacular scenery of beyul, is their unique spiritual significance. Tibetans and related ethnic groups such as the local Sherpas, as well as other followers of their form of Buddhism, would say that the significance of the hidden valleys began with the founder of Tibetan Buddhism himself. Appearing first in northwest India roughly a millennium after Shakyamuni, he is thought by many Tibetans to be the second Buddha. Known as Padmasambhava in Sanskrit and Guru Rinpoche (precious teacher) in Tibetan, this great tantric master from northwest India, first travelled to the Kathmandu Valley where he spent time in meditation. He then proceeded northwest on the Nagarkot route to the border at Rasuwa, where he crossed into Tibet in CE 817. He next journeyed due east, passing Rolwaling on his right, since it lies just south of the Tibeto-Nepalese border. Eventually he reached the valley of the Tsangpo River, south of Lhasa, where he also met his Tibetan consort, Yeshe Tsogyal, who figures prominently in the later hidden valley tradition (Yeshe Tsogyal 1978; Dudjom Rinpoche 1991: 512-521). Even more important to Tibetans however, is their belief that he alone was able to transform their land from one beset by jealous and demanding place gods, to one of peaceful Buddha dharma. Buddhism had already been introduced to Tibet but had not made much headway until Padmasambhava was able to subdue the place gods and goddesses who defended both Tibet and the old Bon religion. Once these local place gods submitted to his superior powers, they were then made guardians of the Buddhist religion in the “land of snows”. Following this accomplishment, he was able to convert King Trisong Detsen and the royal court, establish the first monastery at Samye, and train many followers, both lay and monastic (Stein 1972: 66-69; Snellgrove 1980: 96-99). After some years, Padmasambhava decided to depart Tibet, but before he did, he composed and gave to Yeshe Tsogyal, many teachings, ritual implements, and religious artefacts to be hidden for future times and Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 157 rediscovered by future incarnations of his contemporary followers. The hiding places of various physical items included mountains, rocks, caves, lakes, and the air, while there is a tradition in Tibet of terton, or treasure finders, miraculously retrieving such items before crowds of witnesses. Philosophical or ritual texts were sometimes revealed in the form of mysterious writings on yellow paper that could only be translated by the designated terton. Some were also revealed in visionary form during meditation or dreams (Dowman 1988: 291-292; Birnbaum 1989: 65). These practices, gave the Nyingma or “old school” sect of Tibetan Buddhism which Padmasambhava founded, a particular dynamism which has enabled it to be relevant for the succeeding twelve centuries, since treasure finders are still making discoveries in both Nepal and Tibet (Germano 1998: 76-94; Sacherer: <personal observation>). Among the most interesting items Padmasambhava concealed, were whole valleys or beyul in Tibetan. He is said to have hidden them either by making them difficult or dangerous to find, or by placing them so that no one even noticed they were there. These beyul, were concealed so that they would remain undiscovered and uninhabited until future times of trouble, when they would be revealed to provide hiding places for Tibetan people and the Buddhist religion, during those unfortunate times (Birnbaum 1989: 62-63). His beyul concealing activities were not made known to anyone but Yeshe Tsogyal, until the CE 12th century, when his original Tibetan disciples began reincarnating for this purpose (ibid.: 65). Meanwhile, no one knows for sure how many beyul there are, although the numbers 8 or 108, considered auspicious in Tibetan culture, are often cited by informants (Sacherer 1977: 44), while others have counted 7 (Reinhard 1978: 6), and 7 is the number mentioned by the treasure finder Rigzen Godem (Wangmo 2005: 332), though the latter two lists are not an exact match. Further, Birnbaum (1989: 71) has mentioned that there could be hundreds in the Himalaya and that some beyul will cease to exist as hidden lands once their function has been fulfilled. Secular historians will of course note that the 12th century marked the beginning of outside incursions on Tibetan territory and peace, primarily by the Mongols who were also involved in sectarian disputes among the Tibetans themselves (Stein 1972: 75-85; Wangmo 2005: 339). Later Muslim raiders from Indian Kashmir also encroached (Oppitz 1974: 122). Large numbers of Tibetans were displaced from Eastern Tibet in particular, as that was the region most heavily raided by the Mongols, and consequently suffered the most widespread destruction. These eastern peoples, primarily from the province of Kham, fled westward and southward, towards the border with Nepal. Among them were the 158 6. Janice Sacherer ancestors of the present day Nepalese Sherpas, whose very name (shar means east and pa means people), belies their origin. The region, to which the Sherpas fled, was due north of the Himalayan peaks now known as Gauri Shankar and Everest. In particular, many settled near the trade town of Dingri, which itself was associated with two later figures of importance to Tibetan spiritual history – Padampa Sange and Milarepa (Aziz 1978: 23-30; Chan 1994: 921). It was also the region that is mentioned by two important spiritual treasure finders, Orgyen Lingpa (CE 1323-1360) and Rigzen Godem (CE 1337-1408) as part of their revelations (Dudjom Rinpoche 2002: 775-783). Apparently the first to write of Rolwaling as a sacred land was Orgyen Lingpa in the Padma Katang, Shelbragma version. This treasure teaching of over 755 pages done primarily in verse (Yeshe Tsogyal 1978), was revealed to Orgyen Lingpa while he was meditating in the Sheldrak Cave, high above the present city of Tsedang, not far from Samye monastery (Chan 1994: 522). Sheldrak was the first cave Padmasambhava used for extensive meditations in that region, and is filled with his spiritual energy (ibid.: 523). It is worthwhile to note that although the popular conception of beyul, is that of places of safety and plenty, the Padma Katang mentions the Rolwaling area, “The glacier of Tsering”, under Canto 95, as “one of the best places for spiritual attainment in future times” (Yeshe Tsogyal 1978: 645). Still more specific is the reference in the Katang Dupa, The Abbreviated Chronicle, revealed by Orgyen Lingpa, which further mentions in folio 6 that Padmasambhava performed the Vajrakilaya ritual in a cave in Rolwaling which then became known as the Phurbi Drubkang (Wangmo 2005: 14, and 335). Beyul Rolwaling is also mentioned in at least two works of the treasure finder Rigzin Godem. In The Seven Plains and Ridges of the Seven Hidden Countries, he names seven hidden valleys, including the Playground of the Dakinis (rol ba mkha’ ‘gro’i gling) (ibid.: 332). In his General Catalogue of the Hidden Valleys, the Playground of the Dakinis is mentioned as “a hidden valley that is easy to find and can easily be kept by skilful means” (ibid.: 335). The Rolwaling reincarnate lama, Tulku Ngawang Lapsum adds, “According to our traditions, Karmapa created Rolwaling in the 16th century” (Bridges 1999). In searching through the biographies of the Karmapas, the most likely candidate is the 7th Karmapa (Thinley 2001: 83-87; Karmapa.org: n.d.). The biography of Karmapa Chodrag Gyatsho (CE 1454-1506) states that he was prompted by a vision of Padmasambhava surrounded by both Nyingma sect deities and lamas of the Kagyu sect, “to find certain valleys which would afford safety during the Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 159 coming conflict he saw as inevitable”, (Thinley 2001: 85). Known as a vegetarian, he persuaded many people to give up fishing and hunting. He also protected domestic animals by instituting the practice of marking them with ribbons in their ears to show that they were exempt from slaughter (ibid.: 83), a practice followed in Rolwaling where all animal slaughter is forbidden and wool ribbons in an animal’s ears means that even their wool will not be used for commercial purposes. Normally, the discovery of a hidden land and the treasure finder who “opened” it are well known as they are recorded in what is called a Neyig. Unfortunately there was only one copy of the Neyig for Rolwaling kept in the valley itself, and this was loaned to a priest from the Sherpa area of Pharak, whose family unwittingly discarded it after he died. These events occurred at least 50 years ago, according to informants, so there is little current memory as to the content of the Rolwaling Neyig or its author. There must have been other copies in either Kagyu or Nyingma monasteries in nearby regions, perhaps even a major monastery like the Kagyu center at Rumtek in Sikkim, but so far none have been located. Inspired by local oral traditions, anthropologists began looking for beyul literature in Nepal and Tibet about 40 years ago (Jest 1975; Aris 1975; Sacherer 1977; Reinhard 1978; Huber 1999, and 2002), but so far the search has not been systematic. Currently however, groups devoted to individual treasure finders, such as Rigzen Godem (Northern Treasures: n.d.), have renewed translation efforts so there is hope that eventually the Neyig of Rolwaling will be found. Until then, and we have only local oral traditions to go by. 3. Tseringma Mountain Significance Remarkably, the treasure finders of the beyul tradition were not the first mention of the Rolwaling region as a sacred place. This honour belongs to an earlier Tibetan saint named Milarepa (CE 1052-1135), a beloved figure who went from a life of great sin to full enlightenment in one lifetime. A lineage master of the Kagyu school, Milarepa was also a great poet whose collected works are known in English as The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa (Chang 1999). He was born in Tibet near the Nepalese border crossing of Rasuwa, in the sacred hidden valley of Kyirong. Later he journeyed to east-central Tibet, where he studied under the Buddhist translator Marpa, before retiring to isolated valleys in the southern border regions (Milarepa 1996; anon. 1992). In fact, most of his latter life was spent in the Lapchi and Chuwar valleys just north of Rolwaling. Today 160 6. Janice Sacherer Chuwar is known as Rongshar, but its holiness as the place where Milarepa became enlightened, died and was cremated, remains. Milarepa recorded that he was often tormented by the five long life goddesses of nearby Tseringma Mountain, who specialized in sexual taunts and temptations. Although Padmasambhava had initially subdued them on his journey through the region, they needed further teachings from Milarepa, according to some accounts, or alternatively, were merely testing his level of spiritual attainment. In any case, the encounter was fateful as Milarepa resisted all advances, and they became his personal disciples. Modern Tibetans recite Milarepa’s poems describing these experiences in their own language still, and probably his song naming and describing the Tseringma, was the first time their names and attributes were noted in print (Chang 1999: 296-311). The five long life goddesses remain important protector deities for all of Tibet, but particularly for the Kagyu sect of Buddhism, of which Milarepa was a master. The most important religious leaders of the Kagyu sect are the Karmapas, who also represent the first lineage of reincarnated leaders in Tibet. The third Karmapa, Rangjung Dorje (CE 1284-1339), was born in nearby Dingri, and spent time meditating in both Lapchi and Chuwar (Thinley 2001: 55; www.karmapa.org : n.d.), while there is a very strong tradition in Rolwaling that he visited there also, and was gifted by an appearance of Tseringma, the chief goddess of the five sisters, during his visit. The present reincarnate lama of Rolwaling, Tulku Ngawang Lapsum, has stated, “Ramjum Dorge (sic) also visited Rolwaling, and his hand and knee prints can be found between Beding and Na” (Bridges 1999). The Tseringma goddesses are worshipped across Tibet, both collectively and individually. Individually, they each have names, properties, colours, directions, and ritual implements, while riding on different mounts accordingly to the rituals of the various schools of Tibetan Buddhism (Nebesky-Wojkowitz 1977: 177-181). In the hierarchy of Tibetan place gods, they rank as part of the retinue of Palden Lhamo, the chief female guardian of Tibet (ibid.: 30). Their arrangement on icons represents a mandala, with Tashi Tseringma in the centre. Collectively they represent the vast spiritual power present in the great snow mountains of the Himalayan range, while individually, they grace particular mountains and lakes. Nebesky-Wojkowitz (1977: 177) recorded that there were five glacial lakes of different colours on the northern flanks of Tseringma Mountain, representing the five goddesses. However, no one in Rolwaling could name them and they are no longer discernable on either maps from the Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 161 1960’s (Scheneider 1974) or more recent satellite images (Reynolds 2008: <personal communication>). Probably they have melted into the one large glacial lake now seen. The Rolwaling tradition meanwhile holds that the high altitude lake of Omi Tsho, located at 4,700 metres on the southern Rolwaling side of the mountain, is the lake representing the soul of the chief goddess Tseringma. For the Sherpa people, the two most important goddesses of the five, are Tashi Tseringma and Miyo Langzangma. Tashi Tseringma whose name translates as “auspicious long life mother” or auspicious long life female, is the eldest and most important. She is always pictured with a beautiful white face and body, as pure as the Himalayan snows. Her silken clothing appears in pastel colours, while her jewellery is of purest gold. Her mount is the legendary protective animal of Tibet, the snow lion, also pure white, with green mane and tail. In her right hand she carries a golden thunderbolt vajra, a symbol of power, and in her right, a vase containing the elixir of numerous progeny and long life. She always occupies the centre of the five sister’s icon and is larger in size than the others, to denote her greater importance. She is particularly invoked for safety and long life by the Rolwaling Sherpas before they begin a mountaineering expedition. Miyo Langzangma (Immutable fair lady of Heaven), occupies the upper right corner of the icon and is yellow in colour, offering savoury foods with the right hand and holding a gold bowl filled with foodstuffs in the left. She bestows food and wealth while riding on a large young tiger with golden hair, and spends most of her time on nearby Mt. Everest. Because of Everest and the wealth brought to the Sherpas of that region through the many mountaineering expeditions to her mountain, she is worshipped by them as their chief protector goddess. The name of Everest in Tibetan is transliterated as Chomolangma which combines the word for goddess, Chomo or Jomo with Langma, a contraction of her name. In the Sherpa language, the name Chomolungma translates as mother goddess of the countryside, lung/ling (of the Everest region), not mother goddess of the earth as it is usually translated into English. 4. The Sacred Landmarks of Rolwaling 4.1. Tseringma Monuments Because of its dual status as the playground of the five long life goddesses as well as being a hidden valley of Padmasambhava, Rolwaling is blessed with natural monuments commemorating both the goddesses and the Guru. These monuments and the religious festivals associated with them are 162 6. Janice Sacherer divided by function. The place gods and goddesses like Tseringma, her guardians, and the water spirits, are concerned with practical matters such as keeping one’s children, livestock, and crops alive and healthy. By contrast, the Buddhist saints, Boddhisattvas, and Buddhas, are concerned with one’s spiritual growth and future lives. As with other communities of Tibetan culture, every unusual aspect of the physical landscape is given a spiritual significance, and the notion of unusual features of the landscape spontaneously appearing to reveal a sacred property or message, is common (Huber 1999, and 2002; Dowman 1988: 290-294; Chan 1994: 38). These spontaneous monuments, or rangjin, can be revealed by a great treasure finder or by a pious villager who receives a revelation. Fig. 6.1. The Rolwaling village of Beding (3,693 m) with sacred Tseringma/Gauri Shankar Mountain (7,146 m) in the background. Unknown Photographer. The most spectacular monument to the five long life goddesses is of course the Tseringma/Gauri Shankar massif itself which towers above the Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 163 main village of Beding (cf. Fig. 6.1). Almost equally important is the high altitude lake known as Omi Tsho, or Milk Lake, which contains the life force, or chi, of Tashi Tseringma (cf. Fig. 6.2). Fig. 6.2. Sacred Omi Tsho lake lies at about 4,800m and is the site of the highest summer pastures in Rolwaling. The roofs for the temporary dwellings and all other supplies must be carried up. Photo by Janice Sacherer. Omi Tsho also has the quality of giving visions of the future to highly spiritual people and indeed, the reincarnate lamas from Thami (Thangme) monastery in the Sherpa region to the east, have meditated here for that purpose and received visions. This lake is also sacred to Hindus, who visit it in the summer around the first of August, and make offerings. A monument to all five goddesses is a flat rock labelled Shupji Niye, “footprint story”, a flat rock on the path to Na village which has small indentations on the top that are believed to be the footprints of the five goddesses. Another rangjin, of great importance to the Tseringma, is Charka Nasa, a flat rock that has indentations which resemble the marks someone would have made, if they had prostrated themselves, touching knees, hands, and forehead to the ground. It is said to be the marks left by the Third Karmapa, when he had a vision of the Tseringma, almost 800 years ago. On the north side above Na village is Tse Bum, life vase, a rock surface containing the outline of a large vase, before which childless 164 6. Janice Sacherer women, or women wishing for a son, will pray. An interesting aside is the fact, ascertained in demographic studies by the author, that more girls are consistently born in Rolwaling than boys, a phenomenon attributed to Tseringma preferring women. Along these lines, Rolwaling people say that the reason Rolwaling women are so strong and can do the same work as men is due to the influence of Tseringma who aids them. A lesser monument, is that of Tseringma Chabu, a rock on the north side of the valley to the east of Beding, which resembles a chicken (Chabu) and which is said to belong to Tseringma. Since her conversion to Buddhism, she no longer requires blood sacrifice, and the stone chicken is symbolic of this. Other than Tseringma, there are two place gods who watch over the welfare, but particularly the livestock herds of the people. Known as Gora or Terton Gowari, one of these is the Nangi Gora which is worshipped at a particular rock on the north-eastern side of the valley on the way to the village of Na, and has been there as long as anyone can remember. The Tsamtar Gora on the south-western side of the valley is only 40 years old by contrast, and was discovered to be the site of a Chi Gora or life giving Gora, when a yak belonging to a past village headman began disappearing every evening and was found to be going to the site of Tsamtar and expressing her milk on the ground. Since then the Tsamtar Gora has become sacred to both Buddhist Sherpas and lower region Hindus. Tsam and Gora are known in Tibetan religion as guardians of boundaries, (Wangmo 2006: <personal communication>) and since they are formally known as Terton Gowari, one suspects that these were the inner boundaries of the Beyul, as set by the original terton, or treasure finder, whomever that may have been. 4.2. Buddhist Monuments In the modern interpretation of the meaning of Rolpa Ling, (Rolwa ling in Sherpa language) the entire 1 km wide by 7 km long valley is a monument to Padmasambhava. This interpretation has arisen as one homonym of Rolpa means the furrow created in a field by a plough, which is not a bad description of such a narrow valley bounded on three sides by 6-7,000 meter mountains. This change in meaning has arisen under the increasing influence of the Nyingma sect and especially the lamas of Thami monastery. Thus the original “playground of the Tseringma goddesses” meaning has changed to “one furrow wide country”, as created by one sweep of Padmasambhava’s legendary flying horse Balahoka (Yeshe Tsogyal 1978: 734) and a plough. It can also be understood as a greater Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 165 emphasis being placed on Buddhism with a diminishing role for place gods. It is currently believed that having finished this work, Padmasambhava rested in Rolwaling in the company of Yeshe Tsogyal. It is said they were accompanied during their approximately three months’ stay by a retinue of a hundred followers. Historically, it is possible that Padmasambhava visited Rolwaling as he travelled eastward across Tibet, though unlikely. Instead, this legend is better understood in spiritual terms ‒ that he created Rolwaling as a hidden valley and visited it with Yeshe Tsogyal in a meditative state. In any case, one of the most obvious and impressive sites is the Orgyen Shuti, a large square rock which stands alone in the middle of the valley as one approaches the village of Na (Fig. 6.3). Approximately 5 meters high, it is a monolithic piece of stone that is now inscribed on all four sides with the recurring Tibetan phrase, Om Mani Peme Hum, “Hail to the Jewel of the Lotus”, a mantra with multiple meanings. Nearby is a smaller and similarly carved rock named Kanda Shuti, which is said to be the chair of Yeshe Tsogyal, who is also known as Kandro’i Tsogyal, from one of her titles that translates as “Sky Goer” or “Sky Dancer Life Queen”. Lying at the base of these stone thrones are small slabs of rock of many strata, which are said to be holy scriptures, whose meaning has not yet been revealed (many exist around Omi Tsho as well). More important from a spiritual point of view, as it is mentioned in Orgyen Lingpa’s Abbreviated Chronicle, is the Orgyen Drubkang, a cave on the north side of the valley over looking the stone thrones of the Guru and his consort. It is said that Padmasambhava meditated here for several months, most probably in spiritual form. It is also believed that when the sponsors of the summer festival are especially pure of heart, water will flow from the roof of the cave. Near it is a 3m high rock which resembles the face and head of a Lama that is thought to be a spontaneously created likeness of the great Guru. On the south side of the Valley below Na village and not too far from the Orgyen Shuti, is the Neg’i Go, a large rock said to be a “story” door left behind by Padmasambhava which awaits a treasure finder to open it and reveal what lies within (cf. Fig. 6.3). Some Rolwaling people have speculated that it might be the door to the perfected land of Shambala. However, beyul and Shambala are separate traditions (Birnbaum 1980: 7677) so it seems more likely that the original meaning was a door to a deeper level of the beyul. Since the outer, inner, and secret levels of a beyul interpenetrate each other in Buddhist philosophy, a more likely 166 6. Janice Sacherer interpretation for the voices and laughter Rolwalingites sometimes hear in this region, is that they are temporarily encountering a deeper, still secret level of the valley and its particular inhabitants (Birnbaum 1989: 62). Fig. 6.3. Orgyen Shuti, the throne of Padmasambhava, Guru Rinpoche, when he visited Rolwaling in the 8th century. Photo by Tom Weir . Other rangjin on the south side of the valley across from Beding village, are Ringa Rangjin which consists of five small waterfalls side by side representing a special five-sided hat, or ringa, that is worn by high ranking Lamas at special religious occasions. The implication of course, is that every day in Rolwaling is a special religious occasion. Further up the Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 167 Valley is a stone formation that resembles hands folded in prayer and is labeled Chenresi Rangjin, Chenresi being the Sherpa name for the Boddhisattva of Compassion whose Sanskrit name is Avolokiteshvara. Chenresi is the patron Boddhisattva of Tibet whose physical manifestation is the Dalai Lama. There is also Zambale Rangjin, which commemorates Zambala, the Boddhisattva of Prosperity. Above these rangjin are several mountains that also bear Buddhist names – Tabayabyum, the tantric father and mother figures in embrace, and Dorjee Pagmo, another Boddhisattva of prosperity. In the questionable category is a cave named Kira Gomba Dorjee. The author was told that it was the cave where Guru Rinpoche stored his dried goods while in Rolwaling, including dried meat. However, the name closely resembles that of Kyirawa Gonpo Dorje, the mythical hunter who is said to have first discovered the nearby Khumbu region (Wangmo 2005: 21-22). As such, it may be an example of an older pre Buddhist tradition having been sanctified by Padmasambhava. Meanwhile, revelations are ongoing in Rolwaling, as in 1974, the year the author first did field work there, the local Buddhist priest, a renowned holy man, had a dream that a rangjin with the footprints of Padmasambhava, was awaiting discovery. He then had his many young students from Rolwaling go to a specific area near Beding with shovels, to dig on the spot he had dreamed of. And so it was, that the latest rangjin, displaying Padmasambhava’s footprints was found. 5. Sherpa Immigration to Nepal and Rolwaling Since the Sherpas are known to have originated in Tibet and to have crossed over into Nepal around 500 years ago, questions naturally arise as to when and why the Sherpas departed Tibet and what role the beyul tradition might have played in these events. The first research into Sherpa history was done by Michael Oppitz (1968, and 1974), when he discovered genealogical documents in the lower altitude region of Solu. According to these documents, the Sherpas originated in eastern Tibet in the province of Kham, in a region called Salmo Gang, near Derge, more than 1,500 km. from their present location. They left this area because of the depredations of a series of Mongol invasions from the north, toward the end of the 15th century (ibid.: 122; Wangmo 2005: 22). Many people from Kham migrated westward at this time, but only four families are thought to be the direct ancestors of the original Sherpas (Oppitz 1974: 125). 168 6. Janice Sacherer Eventually many of these migrants settled in the Dingri region, (Oppitz names it as Tinkye), just north of the Himalayan range and near where the Sherpas live now. Some Sherpas gradually moved south to the Milarepa valley of Chuwar, now known as Rongshar. While it is not certain, it seems likely that the change of name from Chuwar to Rongshar, is also a reference to the Sherpas (sher = east, pa = people) and their sojourn there. Even this area did not remain peaceful however, as a Muslim general from the west came thorough the area in 1533, destroying Buddhist temples in his wake, and according to Oppitz (ibid.: 122), precipitating the Sherpas’ move south of the Himalayas. The Sherpas could have fled northward into the empty reaches of the Changtang plain in 1533, but chose instead to go south across the Himalaya, a bold move made psychologically possible for them, this author believes, because of the revelations of the treasure finders. Rolwaling Valley itself, was not populated until about 1870 (Sacherer 1977: 290, 1981: 157). These pioneers were a combination of hunters from the Tibetan town of Kyrong, to the northwest, and Sherpa families from Thami, just over the Tashi Labtsa pass to the east. The Sherpa families were seeking to escape bad debts, probably the result of the increased taxation imposed on the Sherpas by the aristocratic Rana family (Ortner 1989: 117-123). These early settlers lived in caves and rock lean-tos at first, and then joined by other families, constructed the first permanent houses at the eastern end of the valley. There was considerable friction in the beginning between a particular Tibetan hunting family who also furnished the first village headman, and the Sherpas, over the issue of whether the Tibetans should continue to hunt. Since hunting was and is, considered a sin by Buddhists, it was thought to be a particularly unfortunate activity in a beyul. Eventually the headman met with a fatal accident and from then on, the killing of any animals, wild or domestic, was banned. Rolwalingites will however, eat the meat of an animal that dies by accident or old age. Later immigrants had their own reasons for fleeing to a place that was so remote and difficult of access that authorities chose not to pursue them once they had arrived. Interviews with the oldest people alive during the 1970’s, revealed many interesting stories of people whose ancestor’s had fled other Sherpa or Tibetan communities to escape feuds, debts, and tax collectors. For many of the original settlers, Rolwaling truly was a hidden land of refuge. However, since Rolwaling is an east-west valley rather than a north-south one like most in the Nepalese Himalaya, it also meant the Rowalingites were never able to benefit from cross border trade as did Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 169 other Sherpa regions, and so paid for their splendid isolation by being the poorest of all Sherpa communities. 6. Recent Rolwaling History The first Western people to visit Rolwaling were Sir Edmund Hillary and Charles Riddford, who crossed into the valley via the eastern Tashi Labtsa pass (Fig. 6.4) after their 1951 Mt. Everest Reconnaissance expedition (Sacherer: 1977: 59-60). Fig. 6.4. The Rolwaling approach to Tashi Labtsa Pass (upper right 5,755 m), which connects it to the Mt. Everest region. Photo credit Tom Weir. On this same expedition, famed mountaineer Eric Shipton approached the Menlung La pass from the north, but was unable to cross the deep crevasses. His trip was notable however, for obtaining the first photograph ever, of a purported yeti footprint (Shipton 1999: 621). Other expeditions and mapmakers followed through the 1950’s (Sacherer 1978: 59-66). Then in 1959, an expedition of the Japanese Alpine Club left Rolwaling and crossed Menlung La pass illegally in order to climb Tseringma Mountain from the easier Tibetan side. Once in Tibet however, they were robbed of nearly everything, by sword wielding bandits on horseback, and had to borrow money from the British Embassy to return to Japan (Kato 1960). The Nepalese government, unable to patrol Rolwaling because of its remoteness, and fearing international repercussions from further illegal 170 6. Janice Sacherer border crossings, decided to put the entire valley off limits. Only in 1973, shortly before the author arrived to do ethnographic fieldwork, was Rolwaling again opened to the public. Through these fortuitous circumstances, the author was able to study a Sherpa community still living a traditional life. The autumn of 1974, however, saw more trekking group visitors (over 200) than there were permanent residents, and as a result, social and economic changes similar to those that had already occurred in the Everest region (Stevens 1993), began taking place (Sacherer 1977, and 1981; Baumgartner 1980, and 1988). Significant for other remote areas being opened up, the greatest number of changes in the valley itself occurred within the first three years of this opening. Not until twenty years later in the 1990’s when nearly half the total population, (now increased to 400) moved to Kathmandu, was there again great change. There were many reasons for this mass relocation, including the official closure of the valley to casual tourists once again, because of Nepalese government concerns over a series of fatal accidents on Tashi Labtsa. While registered mountaineering groups were still allowed, they did not bring as many local employment opportunities as the trekkers. Other strong motivators included the desire of the Rowalingites to give their children a quality education, and the Tsho Rolpa scare. The latter resulted from the glacial lake on the far eastern end of the valley becoming dangerously full of water and in danger of bursting, as have other glacial lakes in the Himalaya (Mool et al. 2001). Since Tsho Rolpa is the world’s largest and deepest glacier lake, and Rolwaling so high and narrow, such an event would bring catastrophe not only to Rolwaling but also to valley dwellers for many kilometres below. Recently however, foreign donors and the Nepalese government have completed major engineering projects to drain the lake of excess water (Reynolds 2005) and this has given renewed confidence to Rolwalingites who hope to return there for retirement at least. A Norwegian backed NGO has become active as have numerous other foreign philanthropic groups, and development for the remaining population is finally underway (Mountain Legacy: 2006). It is the desire of Rolwaling people to maintain their religious traditions and to develop their valley for tourism in a more thoughtful way than the Everest region. To this end, they have requested the author to write a religious guidebook in English, and plan to mark the various sacred sites in that language and others. They have also requested Western aid in getting a prohibition from the Nepalese government on climbing Tseringma Mountain, and they have made a general appeal to commercial Rolwaling: A Sacred Buddhist Valley in Nepal 171 trekking agencies to refrain from slaughtering animals while in the valley (Chokling n.d.). Currently a road is being built that will reduce the trekking time from 5 days to 1½ , and assuming a modicum of peace and political stability in Nepal, both of which have been lacking the past ten years, tourism is bound to increase accordingly. This would open up the possibility of a sacred sites tour similar to one already established in the Mt. Everest region (Mountain Institute n.d.), making Rolwaling a place of pilgrimage for both Nepalese and western tourists, a development which would provide many local employment opportunities and the possibility of a return to the valley for a substantial portion of the Rowalingites who now live and work in Kathmandu. Conversely, if national political stability is not achieved, then Rolwaling is once again likely to serve as a place of refuge from the troubles of the outside world. Note: 1 Tibetan script, which the author does not read, is transliterated in a number of ways. However, the most accurate letter for letter renditions include many consonant clusters which are virtually unpronounceable and are no longer used in modern speech. For this anthropologically oriented paper, therefore, the author has chosen to render the Tibetan and Sherpa terms as they are pronounced phonetically in British English (Wylie system), rather than in the formal Tibetan of 1,200 years ago. 7. References Anonymous 1992. Lhalungpa, Lobsang P. (trans.) The Life of Milarepa: A New Translation from the Tibetan. Penguin, New York. Aris, Michael 1975. Report on the University of California Expedition to Kutang and Nubri in Northern Nepal in Autumn 1973. 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University of California Press, Berkeley. Thinley, Karma 2001. Karmapa Rangjung Dorje 1284-1339: pp. 55-58; Karmapa Chodrag Gyatsho 1454-1506: pp. 83-87; in, The History of the Sixteen Karmapas. Shambhala, Boston. Wangmo, Jamyang 2005. The Lawudo Lama: Stories of Reincarnation from the Mt. Everest Region. Wisdom, Boston. Ward, Frank Kingdon and Cox, Kenneth 2008. Frank Kingdon Ward’s Riddle of the Tsangpo Gorges: Retracing the Epic Journey of 1924-25 in South-East Tibet. Antique Collectors’ Club, Portland, Oregon. Yeshe, Tsogyal 1978. ‘The Setting Forth of the Best Places of Attainment in Future Times’, Canto 95: 645, and ‘the Departure from Tibet Towards the Southwest to Convert the Raksasas’ Canto 107: 734; in, The Life and Liberation of Padmasambhava, Part II, (trans. Douglas, Kenneth and Bays, Gwendolyn). Dharma Press, Emeryville, CA. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Prof. Janice Sacherer [Professor of Anthropology and Asian Studies, University of Maryland, Asian Division]. PSC 560, Box 843, APO AP 96376, Okinawa, JAPAN. Email: jturner@sunny-net.ne.jp ; jturner@asia.umuc.edu § Janice Sacherer received her M.A. in anthropology from San Francisco State University and her PhD from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris, in 1978, for her work on the Sherpas of Rolwaling. She has taught in the University of Maryland’s European and Asian Divisions (UMUC) for more than 30 years, and has also worked in Nepal as an applied anthropologist for the Swiss and New Zealand governments. Resident in Japan since 1982, she retains her research interest in Himalayan populations, and travels frequently to Nepal. She is the author of both: the technical reports and academic articles on cultural ecology, social and economic change, applied anthropology and ethno-history. 7 Landscape, Memory and Identity: A Case of Southwest China Zhou Dandan Tsinghua University, Beijing, China ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. During the great transition from the Ming to Qing Dynasty in China, many Ming loyalists utilized different ways to keep loyalty to their state and struggle against reality. Qian Bangqi was one such and he chose a distant and isolated village, which was located at the margins of the empire, to escape the impending political danger and find peace of mind. There, he lived a reclusive life for eight years and creatively transformed a wild southwest landscape into a familiar southern scene from his homeland. This paper analyses Qian Bangqi’s actions as a landscape case study in which landscape is defined as a constructive process of culture, and as cultural representation to shape individual identity. First, I focus on Qian Bangqi’s identity crisis as he faced the fall of the Ming dynasty and the conquest by Manchus. Second, I discuss the two strategies, waterscape and stone layout, he employed to transform the wild and isolated landscape. Generally, Qian Bangqi used naming, imagination, appropriation, replication, re-creation, writing and inscription to alter Pucun’s landscape, turning a place of exile into a familiar Southern-style garden and intimate home scene. Therefore, the process of landscape transformation and landscape making became a unique and subtle way to express and recognize his personal identity, lessen the degree of his identity crisis, as well as to resist the Qing Dynasty. Keywords: landscape, memory, identity, exile, Qian Bangqi, Ming loyalist, waterscape, stone layout, stone inscription, reign title. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It seemed important to grapple with the politics of landscape, to try to understand how people in a turbulent world create a sense of place and belonging, loss or negation. It seemed right to ask people to talk about contested landscapes, and about landscape of movement, migration, exile and home-coming. — Barbara Bender (2001: 1) 176 7. Zhou Dandan The landscape is never inert, people engage with it, re-work it, appropriate and contest it. It is part of the way in which identities are created and disputed, whether as individual, group, or nation state. — Barbara Bender (1993: 3) 1. The Perspective The fields of cultural geography, art history, and cultural studies have provided different definitions of landscape. Landscape has been conceived as place, scenery, background, land, agrarian modes, way of settlement, visual environment, territory, nature, space, etc. (Zhang 2006). In the 1980s, landscape has been read or interpreted as a “text”, or a social document (Cosgrove and Daniels 1988; Duncan and Duncan 1988). In the 1990s, Mitchell challenges us to “change landscape from a noun to a verb,” and takes “landscape not as an object to be seen or a text to be read, but as a process by which social and subjective identities are formed” (Mitchell 1994: 1). Meanwhile, Mitchell sums up the two major shifts of the study of landscape in the 20th century: the first (associated with modernism) attempted to read the history of landscape primarily on the basis of a history of landscape painting, and to narrativize that history as a progressive movement toward purification of the visual field; the second (associate with postmodernism) tended to decenter the role of painting and pure formal visuality in favor of a semiotic and hermeneutic approach that treated landscape as an allegory of psychological or ideological themes (Mitchell 1994: 1). Mitchell calls the first approach “contemplative” and the second “interpretative.” He stresses that he intends to “absorb these approaches into a more comprehensive model that would ask not just what landscape is or means, but what it does, how it works as a cultural practice” (Mitchell 1994: 1). Generally speaking, landscape has been more and more considered as a dynamic medium rather than a still and transparent present. Moreover, as a semantically rich conception, landscape study is becoming a popular inter-disciplinary topic, and as Barbara Bender has put it, one that operates “at the juncture of history and politics, social relations and cultural perceptions, landscape has to be...an area of study that blows apart the conventional boundaries between the disciplines” (Bender 1993: 3). Towards the end of the twentieth century, anthropologists begin exploring the concept of landscape from an anthropological perspective. In 1995, Eric Hirsch and Michael O’Hanlon edited a book titled The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space. Nine anthropologists and an art historian discuss landscape from different Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 177 approaches; however, all focus on landscape as a constructive process of culture. Eric Hirsch emphasizes that, place and space, inside and outside, and image and representation cannot be arranged further into a set of equivalences or exact homologues of one another, with landscape as their sum. This is because there is no absolute landscape: the salience and relationship between place and space, inside and outside and image and representation are dependent on the cultural and historical context (Hirsch 1995: 23). Their efforts to introduce landscape into anthropology bring about a new dimension of landscape research, but at the same time they realise that landscape remain largely unproblematized (Hirsch 1995: 23). Additionally, Darby maintains that “the construction of identity through recreational participation in valued and symbolic landscapes is a topic little explored in anthropology, even though such activities are assuming an increasingly important role in the lives of many individuals in the affluent countries of Western Europe, Asia, and the United States” (Darby 2000: 1). Thus, in her book Landscape and Identity: Geographies of Nation and Class in England, Darby provides an excellent investigation into the formation of national and class identity of the English through their landscape practice. Darby focuses on a group of people and their collective identity formation process, from a macro-level perspective. Here I attempt to discuss from a micro-level perspective and to analyse the identity formation of an individual in a particular historical period. Just as McCall commented in his review of The Anthropology of Landscape, the term landscape is frequently employed, but its meaning and utility have rarely been examined in a sustained and rigorous manner. Thus, for anyone wanting to discuss landscape from an anthropological perspective, must first rigorously define it (McCall 1997: 676). Here I discuss landscape as a constructive process of culture, and I intend to understand landscape not only as natural environment to be adapted to or to be viewed and enjoyed, but also as “a site of visual appropriation and a focus for the formation of identity” (Mitchell 1994: 2). My fieldwork was carried out in a village in southwest China. In the long history of imperial China from Qin (221-207 BCE) to Qing (16441912) Dynasty, the southwest area was always remained at the margins, which lay outside the political, cultural and economic centre of the empire. During a particular period of dynasty transition from Ming (1368-1644) to Qing, a southwest province, Guizhou, became a place of recluse for several intellectuals, who exiled themselves from the centre, which was a silent way for them to resist the Qing Dynasty. Here, I choose Qian Bangqi (1599-1673), an exiled intellectual as a case of landscape study. 178 7. Zhou Dandan Qian Bangqi lived a reclusive life in Pucun, a village of Yuqing County in Guizhou Province, for a period of eight years. Lived in a time described by Struve as “political dissolution, socio-cultural ferment, and moral dilemmas”, in order to “find peace of mind and integrity of soul” (Struve 2009: 343), he made best use of naming, imagination, appropriation, replication, re-creation, writing and inscription to improve Pucun’s landscape, transforming a depressing place of exile into a garden of southern and homely style. Therefore, as a cultural representation and a means of shaping individual identity, landscape gardening became a special way to express his personal identity and reduce the pain of his identity crisis, as well as to express his resistance of the Qing Dynasty. In the foreword of Contested Landscapes: Movement, Exile and Place, Bender argues that the study of landscape is not merely an academic exercise — it is about the complexity of people’s lives, historical contingency, contestation, motion and change (Bender 2001: 2). In a sense, to understand Qian Bangqi from the perspective of landscape, memory and identity is to probe into the complexities of his life experience in “motion and change” (Bender 2001: 2), which means his exile from the centre to the margins, and the dynasty transition from Ming to Qing. 2. Homelessness: Qian Bangqi’s Identity Crisis During the transition from Ming Dynasty to Qing Dynasty, those who kept loyal to Ming and resisted Qing Dynasty were called Ming loyalists. According to Struve, Ming loyalism “could apply meaningfully to anyone who pointedly altered his or her life patterns and goals to demonstrate unalterable personal identification with the fallen order” (Struve 1979). Qian Bangqi was among this group of people, and as the rest of them, he faced deep identity crisis. First, I will give a short description of the life course of Qian Bangqi, which could make us better understand his choices. Qian Bangqi was known as “an erudite intellectual of the southern Yangtze river” (jiangzuo daru). Information of his life is mainly available in Yuqing xianzi (Yuqing County Document). As the version edited in Qing period recorded: Qian Bangqi (also Kaishao), was born in Dantu [now Zhenjiang, in Jiangsu Province]. As a governmental official, he was promoted from the position of Zhonghan to Duxian. In order to reject the malicious invitations from Sun Kewang (?-1660), he went to Pucun, a village in Yuqing County. During his stay in Pucun, he constructed a lake lined with willows. Several persons followed Qian and learned from him. He and his disciples often wrote and replied in poems, using the same rhyme sequence. He wrote Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 179 Tashanfu (An Essay on Tashan), which was recorded in the literature section of Yuqing xianzhi. (Jiang 1718) Another version of the Yuqing xianzhi, which was re-edited during the Republican period, gives us a more detailed description: Qian Bangqi(also Kaishao), was born in Dantu. He unfortunately failed the civil service examinations several times. He was talented in literature, and wrote poetry and articles as excellently as his contemporaries, such as Zhangfu (1602-1641), Xu Fuyuan (1599-1665), Chen Zilong (1608-1647), Ai Nanyin (1583-1646) and Wuyi (?-1646). He was promoted in the official position from Zhonghan to Duxian, but then was forced into exile in Qian. He was once imprisoned by Sun Kewang, who forced him to assume a position in an illegitimate government, but Qian Bangqi firmly rejected him. In face of Sun’s threat, Qian Bangqi decided to cut his hair to become a monk, and lived a reclusive life in Pucun. There, he made friends with Zheng Fengyuan (1613-1689) and did not care about the outside world. He had many disciples who studied under his instruction. During the time when the Qing court exploited Qian province, he escaped to Heng Mountain and continued his writing assiduously. In the ninth year of the reign of Emperor Kangxi (r.1661-1722), the governor of Yongzhou, Liu Daozhu, invited him to edit and write Yongzhou xianzhi (Yongzhou County Document). In the twelfth year of Kangxi’s reign, the governor of Baoqing, Li Yiyang, invited him to edit and write the Baoqing xianzhi (Baoqing County Document). But six months later he had a serious illness; therefore, he had his friend Liu Yingqi to continue and complete the work on his behalf. Qian Bangqi had a strong personality and was intelligent; he was also a man of integrity and responsibility, and it was said that he never lost his temper around others. Because Qian Bangqi often criticized cruel officials, these people feared and hated him very much (Chen 1927: 208). Besides the narrative of his life course, Yuqing xianzhi also included several poems and articles written by Qian Bangqi, as well as some poems about him by intellectuals of the Qing period. Here I will try to illuminate his exile experiences and complex feelings of “crisis” mainly with these materials. As recorded in Yuqing xianzhi, Qian Bangqi exiled himself to escape the danger from Sun Kewang, and stayed in Pucun (see Fig. 7.1), which had also been described in his writings. In the article Yangmu baifuren shouxu (prelude to a congratulation essay to celebrate the birthday of Yang’s Mother Lady Bai), he wrote, “[...] In the spring of the year Xingmao, I came to Yuqing and stayed there, because Sun Kewang revolted” (Chen 1927: 210). At that time, Qian Bangqi was the governor of Sichuan Province, and the Emperor Yongli (r. 1646-1662) hoped that Qian Bangqi could persuade Sun Kewang to submit to the Southern Ming court, so that his power to resist Qing dynasty would be strength- 180 7. Zhou Dandan ened. Therefore, Qian Bangqi wrote a letter to Sun Kewang, and eventually successfully persuaded him to submit to the Emperor with his territory of Dian. However, when Qian Bangqi told the news to the Emperor, he argued that Sun Kewang should not be accepted by the Ming royal court, because he was not a descendant of the royal family. Fig. 7.1. The village, Pucun (photograph by the author) At last, the Emperor Yongli took Qian Bangqi’s advice and rejected Sun Kewang. Because of this, Sun Kewang deeply hated Qian Bangqi. In fear of Qian Bangqi’s fame and not daring kill him immediately, Sun Kewang came up with an idea of inviting him to be an official in order to shame and control Qian Bangqi. In the following months, Sun sent several invitation letters to urge Qian (Qian 2006). As a traditional Chinese intellectual, according to the moral and ethical principles of Confucianism, loyalty to one’s state is the basic and most important rule. Qian Bangqi would not be a disloyal person and betray Ming dynasty. So he was determined to give up his social position and become a hermit. In general, under continuing pressure from Sun Kewang, Qian Bangqi insisted on a classic Chinese intellectual’s moral tradition and chose to act as a Confucian moral model. In his writings, Qian Bangqi described the period of his life in Pucun as tranquil and undisturbed. His essay Pucun laonong (an old peasant in Pucun), written in the form of the third-person, was actually an autography of himself: “Pucun was in Qian province, and it was uncivilized compared Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 181 with central provinces in China, but the peasant who lived there felt quite satisfied” (Chen 1927: 207). Besides, in one of the twelve poems under the title Pucun guitianshi (a series of twelve poems on Returning Back to the Farmland in Pucun), he wrote: The earthly life restricted me… Once I decided to live as a hermit, I felt harmonious and satisfied. I happily tidied up my clothes which were made of lotus leaves, and put on my bamboo hat. I felt free at the farmlands, looking at the clouds in the sky. Everything was in tune with the rhythm of nature, and I was glad to see birds flying back home hastily in the evening ① (Chen 1927: 233). However, the feelings expressed in his articles and poems were more rhetorical than true. In other words, he created an imaginary world through his writings and pretended to be satisfied with his present life in Pucun. Although his true mood and concerns were concealed by himself, they were well expressed and revealed in other intellectuals’ writings. A good example of this was from a poem by an intellectual of Qing period Li Guangdou, Yongtashan (Song to Tashan): “I can imagine that Qian Bangqi once stood by the lake side years ago, even without mentioning of his country’s political situation and fate, he would not help weeping because of his deep concerns and sorrow” (Chen 1927: 242). If the situation was what described by Li Guangdou, then, how did Qian Bangqi obtained comfort and harmony during the turmoil of exiled life? It is interesting that the notion of landscape played an important role in his life and he chose landscape as a means of finding balance. Qian Bangqi constructed a delicate garden in Pucun so as to transform a wild village into a “home”, or homeland. The process of transforming the landscape is actually a process of reconstructing his personal identity; thus, the landscape became the symbolic representation of his identity. The constructor of the landscape, Qian Bangqi, personified the place and space of the exiled village with intensifying the emotional recognition through his memory of hometown landscape, and made the transformed landscape in Pucun a symbol of his self re-definition. In this sense, the place and space in his exiled village became his “territory” and his “hometown.” Generally speaking, two steps were taken by Qian Bangqi to transform the village into a garden. First, a lake lined with willows (liuhu) was constructed and the waterscape was formed as a famous scene titled “The Morning Mist of the Lake Lined with Willows” (liuhu xiaoyan). Second, a series of stone layouts and stone inscriptions were designed and ① Due to the difficulties of translation, I do not maintain the original structure of the poems quoted in this essay. 182 7. Zhou Dandan arranged, which constituted a main part of an integrated classic Chinese southern-style garden. Through these efforts, an unfamiliar landscape was familiarized and became his intimate domain. 3. The Hometown in His Memory: Construction the Waterscape of the Lake Lined with Willows Waterscapes are an essential part of a Chinese classical garden. In contrast with the western style classical gardens, which prefer fountains with sculptures, Chinese gardens always employ still waterscapes, for example, a pool or a lake; and the scale of the waterscape is designed according to the size of the landscape of the garden. Sometimes, lively waterscapes are also used, such as a cascade or a water curtain cave. Waterscapes add special characteristics to a garden and are an indispensible part of it. Waterscapes not only make a garden more intimate with visitors and bring vitality to a garden, but they are also important in garden composition, and waterscapes with its reflections of architectures, trees, and clouds, can bring pleasant scene and change the rhythms of landscape. According to Yuqing xianzhi, “Qian Bangqi [...] rejected Sun Kewang’s malicious invitation, and lived a reclusive life in Pucun. He constructed the waterscape of a lake which lined with willows [...].” (Chen 1927: 184). This record did not give us any details of the process of how Qian Bangqi carried out his construction; we can only infer that Qian Bangqi may convert a farmland into a lake and plant many willows around the lake. Meanwhile, in a poem Yongtashan liuhu (song to the Waterscape of the Lake Lined with Willows), Li Wenyuan carefully described that Qian Bangqi had diverted a brook in the village and then built banks to form a lake, as well as planted hundreds of willows around the lake. On beautiful spring days, Qian Bangqi would invite his families and disciples enjoy a boat ride on the lake (Chen 1927: 243). According to Li’s version, we can see that before Qian Bangqi came to Pucun, there was not any lake in the village. Besides, there was another version of how the lake formed, which was offered by Qian Bangqi himself. In the prelude to a series of twelve poems, Puncun guitianshi (a series of twelve poems on Returning Back to the Farmland in Pucun), Qian Bangqi wrote: My disciples and I came to a place, where there was a lake about twenty Mu among the mountains, and there were hundreds of willows by the waterside. I asked local people what was the name of the place, and they told me it was Pucun and I decided to stay here. In order to make a Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 183 beautiful scene, I cut the wild grasses around the lake; and then I also built my wooden house by the lakeside (Jiang 1718). In Qian Bangqi’s narrative, there had already been a lake in Pucun before he came, which was contrary to what recorded in Yuqing xianzhi and Li Wenyuan’s poem. Until now, there was still not enough evidence to verify which version was true and what really happened hundreds of years ago. However, whether or not the lake originally existed, the three versions all indicated that Qian Bangqi indeed named the waterscape and did some reconstruction of it according to the aesthetical principles of Chinese southern-styled gardens. Thus, a new scene was formed, which became one of the Yuqing bajing (the eight scenes of Yuqing), and it was called Liuhu xiaoyan (the Morning Mist of the Lake Lined with Willows). As we all know, there is a long tradition of Chinese intellectuals to select and name the famous scenes in a place, the good examples are Yanjing bajing (eight scenes of Yanjing), and Jinling shijing (ten scenes of Jinling). The intellectuals in Ming and Qing periods also selected eight scenes which were the most distinguished ones in Yuqing County, and the waterscape in Pucun was among them. An anonymous poem had described it like this: At the foot of Tashan, there are hundreds of old and green willows; in the morning, dews are dripping on the green leaves; and the silk-like mist is dense. In the beautiful day, birds are singing here and there, while swallows are flying up and down. Thus, all these natural scenes make a picture of wonderland (Chen 1927: 8). Perhaps, we may feel a little confused when we first read the above poem. It appears to be a description of the scenery in a middle or south place of China, rather than the margin of the empire. It was obvious that through Qian Bangqi’s re-creation, the waterscape was distinguished by a traditional southern China intellectual’s taste as delicate and exquisite, sharply contrasting to the general impression of landscape in Yuqing County as desolate, wild and dangerous. As an intellectual in the south of Yangtze River, the centre of high culture area during the Ming dynasty, Qian Bangqi was interested in gardening and had a unique ability to appreciate it. He made the waterscape completely according to the type of south-style garden. We can imagine that with the willows planted around the lakes, the reflection of willows can be viewed; and when a gentle breeze blows, the branches of the willows would swing, and may even sweep the surface of the water. These were familiar scenes in Qian Bangqi’s hometown, and were what he missed and dreamed of in his exiled place. 184 7. Zhou Dandan Compared with the other seven scenes of Yuqing County, the waterscape was quite impressive. Yang Yurun, an intellectual in Qing period wrote eight poems for each of the Yuqing Eight Scenes, and each title was formulated as a four character couplet. In Liuhu xiaoyan (a poetry on the Scene of Morning Mist of the Lake Lined with Willows), he described the scene as follows: The willows were standing on the bank of the lake, and their branches were swaying now and then in the wind. It seemed that the mist and the glow of sunset were both waiting for a long time for a man named Qian Bangqi, who was intelligent and capable of being a teacher of the emperor. Please be careful, and please don’t let the nightingales and swallows tell the secret place to others, because Qian Bangqi was afraid that those outside the wonderland may know he lived a reclusive life here (Chen 1927: 254). It is worth mentioning that the other seven scenes were all natural landscapes; while Liuhu xiaoyan was quite different. As we can see, it was a totally man-made landscape and closely connected with a particular man. In the above poem, Yang Yurun evidently connected the scene with Qian Bangqi. It is interesting that, the word “afraid” in the poem illustrated a paradoxical situation — open, as well as hidden — of the particular landscape. While the landscape was open and invited viewers, the scene tended to remain undiscovered and was kept a secret; it was the wonderland of an exiled person, and the landscape was possessed and under his control. The landscape was appropriated by Qian Bangqi, and endowed with new meanings, thus symbolically became the embodiment of the appropriator’s identity. 4. The Hometown in His Memory: The Stone Layout on Tashan The four main elements of a classical Chinese garden are architectures, stone layout (zhishi), waterscape and plants. And, Tai-Lake stones are regarded to be best for stone layout because of their special shapes, textures and colours. Although the Tai-Lake stones could not be obtained in Pucun, Qian Bangqi still managed to complete his garden design there. The stone layouts were arranged by Qian Bangqi on a mountain named Tashan (See Fig. 7.2). As for this mountain, the Yuqing xianzhi recorded as follows: Tashan, 160 li west of the county, was in Pucun. There were many strange stones on the mountain, and at the foot of Tashan, there was a lake lined with willows. Qian Bangqi lived a reclusive life here, and he inscribed two characters Tashan on one of the stones. (Jiang 1718) Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 185 Fig. 7.2. The mountain, Tashan (photograph by the author) Another version of Yuqing xianzhi edited during the Republican period wrote: At Tashan, three li away from Songyanpu, there was a village called Pucun. Tashan was at the right side of the lake lined with willows. There were many strange stones on the mountain. An official Qian Bangqi in the Ming dynasty lived a reclusive life there in order to avoid the danger from Sun Kewang. He inscribed two characters Tashan on a stone, and inscribed the characters Ming shaobao Qian Kaishao fanggechu (the place where Qian Kaishao sang a song) on another stone near it. Besides, he also inscribed some characters on many other stones (Chen 1927: 8). Tashan is a large mountain in Pucun named by Qian Bangqi because of his stone layout (cf. Fig. 7.3) and stone inscriptions. Before we turn to discussing the stone layout, we need to clearly describe the location and relation of the mountain Tashan, the stone layout and the stone inscribed with the characters Tashan. The stone layout was arranged on a flat place of the mountain Tashan, while the stone on which Qian Bangqi inscribed the two characters “Tashan” was only one piece among the series of stone layout. Qian Bangqi wrote in his essay Tashanji (a description of Tasha): “There was a lake lined with willows in the village, at the left side of the lake was the mountain Tashan” (Chen 1927: 205). We can see that, although the characters were only inscribed on a small stone of his stone layout, Qian Bangqi meant to name the whole mountain “Tashan.” 186 7. Zhou Dandan Fig. 7.3. The Stone layout (photograph by the author) However, it has been long ignored by researchers that these stones were designed by Qian Bangqi and became an important part of his garden. At the first sight of these stone relics, scattered among the grass, one can hardly believe that they were ever carefully arranged. Nevertheless, the stone layout opens a window for us to discern the landscape’s complexities and its connection with personal identity. Traditional Chinese gardens can be divided into different kinds: royal garden, temple garden and private garden. In the case of private gardens, some are built by rich businessman, while others are owned by intellectuals. When an intellectual is retired, or feels frustrated in his career promotion, or experiences great life transition, he builds a garden in order to keep his inner world quiet and satisfied. During the middle to late Ming period, gardening was fashionable among the intellectual elites in southern China: In the middle and late period of Ming dynasty, the phenomena of intellectuals contesting to build gardens in the south were recorded in many books. Just as He Liangjun commented, rich people would constructed gardens after they had built and decorated their houses; while the intellectuals would manage to repair and decorate their gardens, whenever they had a little money beyond their daily life necessities. In some places, for example Songjiang, when intellectuals retired from official positions, they would spend huge amounts of time and money on gardens. It was recorded that their gardens were well decorated and shone splendidly and luxuriously. Among these gardens, the most famous ones were Yu garden, Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 187 Zhuojin garden, and Xi garden. These gardens were all decorated with beautiful flowers and trees; as well as with many pavilions and stone layout. Besides, in Suzhou area, there were still more gardens, and the rich were satisfied with enjoying the beautiful views and sceneries of pavilions, flowers, trees and stone layout (Chen 2007). As an intellectual in Zhenjiang County of Jiangsu Province, Qian Bangqi was undoubtedly deeply influenced by trends of the time. Moreover, as a traditional Chinese intellectual, he had been well cultivated with the ability to appreciate gardens and landscapes, which were well expressed in his writings. In his essay Keyu yiju Pucun wencizhong shanshui fengsu change dazhi (a reply to a friend who asked about the customs and sceneries of Pucun, because he wanted to move here), Qian Bangqi described that the scenery in Pucun was so beautiful and distinctive that even the natural landscape paintings by Mifu (1051— 1107) could hardly be compared with it. (Mijia shuhua chakanni) (Jiang 1718). Mifu was a famous painter in Northern Song dynasty (960-1127). He lived in Zhenjiang for a long period of time. During the years he stayed there, he imaginatively created a new and special drawing skill of mountain-and-water paintings (mijia shanshui) (Chen 1999:157). Mifu’s style was unique in using ink with water to emphasize and express the atmosphere and colour tone of misty clouds, mountains, water and trees. Qian Bangqi exquisitely discerned the familiarities between nature scenes and landscape paintings, as well as made an accurate comparison of them, which obviously illustrated his appreciation capability and aesthetic taste. Besides, his two essays about the stone layout further explained the thoughtfulness of his design. In the Yuqing xianzhi, there were two articles titled with “Tashan”: tashanfu (an essay on Tashan) and Tashanji (a description of Tashan). Although they were both focused on Tashan, they described it from different perspectives. In the former, Qian Bangqi gave a panoramic description of Tashan; while in the latter, he focused on the stone layout. In Tashanfu, Qian Bangqi observed and described the unusual shape of the stones on the mountain from the perspectives of a painter and a gardener. He used vivid comparisons and tropes, for example, some stones looked like lions, and some looked like eagle; while still others seemed to be like dragon in shape. Moreover, he carefully selected a series of special terms in gardening to describe the stones, both from the shape and colour, such as shou, lou, tou, zhuang, zhou, song, xiao. Such descriptions suggest that Qian Bangqi had a particular taste in garden stones and demonstrated an expert’s appreciation of stone selection. According to the traditional gardening principles, after stone selection and arrangement, the following step is stone inscription. Qian Bangqi 188 7. Zhou Dandan created more than ten stone inscriptions, for example cuiping (a stone in the shape of green screen), shifanfeng (a stone in the shape of a boat sail), jiumianfeng (a stone in the shape of a nine-facet peak), meizhou (a stone in the shape of a boat with a plum tree), cangshuxia (a stone in the shape of a valley which can be used as a book library), etc. These stone inscriptions all stood together in one place and made a concentrated stone layout landscape. During my fieldwork, I found another stone with an inscription which was not mentioned by Qian Bangqi’s essays. This stone was far from the stone layout, and on it were inscribed two characters yanduan (Discontinuity of Mist). As we can see, Qian Bangqi used two different ways of stone-layout in a garden. One was to concentrate a series of stones, which was “stone laying”. The other was to scatter a stone somewhere else to express some particular meaning and bring a scene in a garden; this was “scattered-stone”. It is worth mentioning that the meaning of the word yanduan and the location of the stone is quite interesting. The stone with an inscription of yanduan lay fifty miles away from the main stone layout. From the perspective of its location and distance from the main stone layout, it can be said to be a “discontinuity.” But from the perspective of Chinese traditional gardening aesthetics, the discontinuity was in fact continuity, since it was also part of the whole stone landscape. Here, Qian Bangqi delicately unified the continuity and discontinuity. Besides, Qian Bangqi also paid much attention to the artistic and visual perception of the garden. Several examples can be found in his articles, such as “old cypress, plum tree, boxwood, fir were planted interspersed” (Chen 1927: 205). We know that Chinese gardeners stress the importance of trees matching, in order to make the best scene. Here, Qiang Bangqi’s description showed an arrangement of different kinds of trees, matching them in colours, heights, shape of the leaves, and different seasons of blossoms. Furthermore, “a plum tree was planted in a stone cave”; “there was a cave on the right side, it was round, and a plum tree branch extended out” (Chen 1927: 205). These were the matching of stones and trees, which can obtain a harmonious unity of the two. Other examples were about the aesthetic principles of Yibu huanjing, jiejing and dianjing. First, “The view of the other side was quite strange and unique, and the viewer gained a totally different and new perspective with each step he moved forward or backward” (Chen 1927: 205). This was about gaining different view with every step (yibu huanjing). Second, “Sitting in the pavilion, the grotesqueness of the stones can all be viewed” (Chen 1927: 205). That was the “borrowing scenes” (jiejing). “Borrowing scenes” is an important Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 189 design principle and a visual extension strategy in Chinese garden. The scenes, which may be in the aspects of colour, smell or sound, can be borrowed from a near place, or from distance; or, we can borrow scenes when we change the gesture, by looking up or bending down. Third, “this was named according to its shape as cuiping and shifanfeng” (Chen 1927: 205). This can be called as “pointing out the scene” (dianjing). Among these scenes, the cangshuxia (see Fig. 7.4) was unique. For a traditional Chinese intellectual, books are what they cherish most, so library is a most important place for them. Qian Bangqi did not forget this and even arranged an imaginary library in an imaginary southern-style garden. “At the end of the stone there is a gap, nine chi in depth, fifteen chi in height, I called it cangshuxia” (Chen 1927: 205). Fig. 7.4. Cangshuxia (photograph by the author) 190 7. Zhou Dandan Qian Bangqi arranged his imaginary library in a very secret place of the stone layout. From my on-site experience, it was the least conspicuous part of the scenery. Near it, the characters of “Tashan” were inscribed on another stone (see Fig. 7.5). “The shape of the stone is the strangest among those stones. It was less than one zhang in height and stood up-straight. I named it cuiping. The stone is sharp and has a narrow, deep gap in it, and I inscribed two characters Tashan on it” (Chen 1927: 205). Fig. 7.5. Inscription “Tashan” on stone (photograph by the author) The word Tashan originated from a classic book Shijing (Book of Poetry) in the spring and autumn period (Chunqius 770-476 BCE). The poem went like this: Tashan zhishi keyi gongyu (stones from other mountains may serve to polish the jade of this mountain). Later, an idiom gradually developed from this poem. It was a trope to describe that we can learn from others; or other things can be used by us to achieve our own purposes. Moreover, in Chinese, the character ta had a meaning of “otherness”. Here, the name chose by Qian Bangqi was quite significant. For a reclusive intellectual in exile, missing his hometown would stir deep pains in his soul. The place here was undoubtedly “otherness” for him. As Li Guangdou in the Qing period wrote in his poem Yongtashan (song to Tashan)：“Qian Bangqi wanted to do something when he lived in Pucun, as the old poem described, using the stone on other mountains to polish his Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 191 jade; He wanted to tell others of the rise and fall of his dynasty, because he had deep anxiety and sorrow” (Chen 1927: 242). Fig. 7.6. The stone with the inscription “Qian Kaishao fanggechu, yongli dingyouchun ti” (photograph by the author) Besides cangshuxia and the stone inscription Tashan, another salient stone inscription was: Qian Kaishao fanggechu, yongli dingyouchun ti (the place where Qian Kaishao sang a song, inscribed in the spring of dingyou of the Emperor Yongli) (see Fig. 7.6). As we know, the year dingyou of the Emperor Yongli was 1657. However, at that time, Qing dynasty had already been established; and it was the fourteenth year of the reign of the Emperor Shunzhi (r. 1644-1661). It was in the year 1657 that Qian Bangqi eventually left Pucun to follow the Emperor Yongli, when he heard that the Emperor was in the neighbouring province of Yunnan. Before Qian Bangqi left, he inscribed the reign title Yongli on the stone to memorialise it. Yongli was the reign title of Zhu Youlang of a late-Ming court, and Qian Bangqi’s national identity was fully expressed and significantly emphasised by using that particular reign title. Li Dabing, an intellectual in the Qing period, wrote in the prelude to his essay Youtashan mikaishao Qianxiansheng yizong (a visit to Tashan and Seeking for the heritage place left by Mr. Qian): The mountain named by Qian Bangqi is not high. There are several unusual stones on it, and each stone is with an inscription on. For example, Qian Kaishao fanggechu ， yongli dingyouchun ti; Tashan; cuiping [...]. In 192 7. Zhou Dandan Yuqing xianzhi, it recorded that there were cypress and a lake lined with willows, but now they have all disappeared. For me, the strangest thing is the reign title Yongli inscribed by Qian. I am totally confused and can not understand the meaning of the reign title Yongli (Chen 1927: 216). Li Dabing’s question of what the reign title’s meaning implied his differing identity recognition of another dynasty. According to Yuqing xianzhi, Li Dabing was a county governor of Yuqing during the year 1804 to 1805. He was influenced by the orthodox ideology of Qing Dynasty; therefore, it was not surprising that that he would not identify with the reign title Yongli. Moreover, he might even not know this reign title, because of the severe censorship and control of Qing court. But for Qian Bangqi, this reign title was so important that he chose to carve it in stone as a memorial. McCall says that landscape is a process of social perception that relates a meaning-laden relationship to a social past. Qian Bangqi took pains to design and arrange the landscape in order to bond himself with the past and with the decaying empire. The landscape was laden with his life memory, both of his hometown and his nation. 5. Concluding Remarks Through his landscaping efforts, Qian Bangqi was able to turn the strange environment of Pucun into a place that he felt familiar with. With the typical components of a southern-style garden surrounding him, he reduced the burden of his identity crisis as an exile. Darby states that because landscapes, like other material structures, are created and destroyed within an ideological context, in order to understand them one must examine the historical recovery of ideologies specific to particular places (Darby 2001: 106). The landscape of Pucun was created by an exiled intellectual Qian Bangqi within a specific ideological context. The key to understanding the landscape is to return to the historical context of his identity crisis. Thus, doing so not only deepens our understanding of the landscape, but also made us aware of its complexities and its importance to Qian Bangqi. Landscape in the most fundamental sense is an environment where people live, but is also where human activities take place. Through various activities people give meaning to their lives and connect themselves with the outside world. Yet landscape is not only a background to people’s activity. People not only make landscape; at the same time, people are also made and regulated by landscape. People are rooted and they belong to a place during certain periods of their lives, however, people are also Landscape, Memory and Identity in SW China 193 rootless, because they go to other places at other periods. For those who are moving from one place to another: how can they familiarize the strange landscape and make sense of a place? How can they reconcile their identities with a distant hometown and his past? How can they identify themselves when they are in exile? Landscape as cultural representation may provide a possible and delicate way: constructing landscape, constructing memory and at the same time constructing identity. In general, Qian Bangqi provides us a clear example of identity construction through landscape. He made excellent use of naming, imagination, appropriation, reconstruction, replication, writing and inscription to alter Pucun’s landscape, turning a place of exile into a southern-style garden to express his identity, lessen the degree of his identity crisis, as well as to resist the Qing Dynasty. 6. References Bender, Barbara 1993. Introduction: Landscape-Meaning and Action; in, Bender, Barbara (ed.) Landscape: Politics and Perspectives. Berg Publishers, Oxford: 1-17. Bender, Barbara 2001. Introduction; in, Bender, Barbara and Winer, Margot (eds.) Contested Landscapes: Movement, Exile and Place. Berg Publishers, Oxford: 1-18. Chen, Jiang 2007. Recluse and Protest: The Plights and Their Responses of the Intellectuals of the Southern Yangtze River in Late Ming Period. Shilin (Shanghai, China), 100 (4): 99-108. Chen, Mingdian (ed.) 1927. Yuqing xianzhi. Rare, Library of Guizhou Province. Cosgrove, Denis and Daniels, Stephen (eds.) 1988 The Iconography of Landscape. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Darby, Wendy J. 2001. Landscape and Identity: Geographies of Nation and Class in England. Berg Publishers, Oxford. Duncan, James and Duncan, Nancy (1988) (Re) reading the Landscape. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space，6 (2): 117-126. Hirsch, Eric 1995. Landscape: Between Place and Space; in, Hirsch, Eric and O’Hanlon, Michael (eds.) The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space. Clarendon Press, Oxford: 1-30. Jiang Shen (ed.) 1718. Yuqing xianzhi. Rare, Library of Guizhou Province. McCall, John C. 1997. Review of The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space. American Ethnologist, 24 (4): 676677. 194 7. Zhou Dandan Mitchell, W.J.T. (ed.) 1996. Landscape and Power. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Qian, Zailun 2006. The History of Qian Bangqi Exiled in Tashan. Zunyi lishi wenhua yanjiu (Zunyi, China), 4: 42-44. Struve, Lynn A. 2009. Self-Struggles of a Martyr: Memories, Dreams, and Obsessions in the Extant Diary of Huang Chunyao. Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 69 (2): 343-394. —. 1979. Ambivalence and Action: Some Frustrated Scholars of the Late K’ang-hsi Period; in, Spence, Jonathan D. and Wills, John E., Jr. (eds.) From Ming to Ch’ing: Conquest, Region, and Continuity in Seventeenth-Century China. Yale University Press, New Haven: 323365. Zhang, Jianfei 2006. Landscape Perceptions and Perspectives: On Shen Congwen’s Xiangxi Landscape. Tianjin Social Sciences (Tianjin, China), 5: 112-116. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mrs. Zhou Dandan PhD candidate, Department of Sociology, Xiongzhixing Building Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084. P. R. CHINA E-mail: zdd08@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn Mrs. Zhou Dandan (born 19 June 1980) is a PhD candidate at the Department of Sociology at Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. She works on the anthropology of landscape, with particular interest in the relationship between landscape and power. She is currently carrying out her fieldwork on her dissertation project in a Dong ethnic village in Guizhou province, where tourism, state and local interests collide over the landscape. E-mail: zdd08@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn 8 The Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China: the Spirit of Sacred Place in Buddhism Jeffrey F. Meyer University of North Carolina at Charlotte, U.S.A. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Wutai (Five terrace mountain Platform) Shan is one of the four eminent sacred mountains of Chinese Buddhism. It is sacred to Wenshu (the Bodhisattva Manjushri), the place where he has appeared to devoted monks and pilgrims down through the centuries. This article is an analysis of some of the stories of these appearances or manifestations, and an assessment of their significance in helping to understand the Buddhist attitude toward place. The miracles of Wutai Mountain encourage devotees to make the difficult pilgrimage to the sacred territory, with its famous monasteries, temples, caves and shrines. For only there could they hope to have a vision of the Bodhisattva! Also, some of the stories teach that Wutai Mountain is ultimately unimportant, for Wenshu is everywhere. It is in the intersection of these two ideas that one gets a glimpse into a possible basis for a Buddhist environmental ethic. When these two ideas are held in tension, then a creative and protective attitude toward place emerges. On 26 June 2009, Mt. Wutai is inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List as cultural landscape, taking in view the tradition of pilgrimage and serenity of nature, and continuity of temples’ construction on the site since the CE 1st century to the early 20th century. Keywords: Mt. Wutai, manifestations of Manjushri, ambiguity of place, miracle stories, spirit of place, importance/ unimportance of place. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction & Background Wutai Shan is one of the four Buddhist sacred “mountains” of China, each one identified with one of the great celestial Bodhisattvas and therefore an important site of pilgrimage. It is also called Qingliang (clear and cool) Mountain and was early identified with the Qingliang Mountain mentioned in the Huayen (Avatamsaka) Sutra, and therefore called the dwelling place of Wenshu (Manjushri), the Bodhisattva of Wisdom. “In 196 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer the northeast there is a place called Clear, Cool Mountain, where enlightening beings have lived since ancient times; now there is an enlightening being there named Manjushri, with a following of ten thousand enlightening beings, always expounding the Teaching” (Cleary 1993: 106). Actually, Wutai (Five “Platforms” or “Terraces”, from their rather flat or domed tops) is not just a single mountain but is a vast “Holy Land” of approximately one hundred square miles, with the five terraced mountains at the centre. The largest cluster of monasteries is found in or around the city of Taihuai in the central valley (cf. Fig. 8.1). Each of the terraces is identified with one of the directions: north, south, east, west and central. The highest is the northern terrace which rises to 10,033 feet (3,058 metres) above sea level, the lowest the southern terrace, which is 8,153 feet (2,485 metres) above sea level (Gimello 1992: 97). With its five flat peaks, Mount Wutai is a sacred Buddhist mountain. Overall, the buildings on the site present a catalogue of the way Buddhist architecture developed and influenced palace building in China over more than one millennium. Mt. Wutai Shan, literally, the five terrace mountain, is the highest mountain in northern China and is remarkable for its morphology characterized by precipitous sides with five open treeless peaks. Temples have been built on the site since the CE 1st century to the early 20th century. Intense interest and activity at Wutai began in the Northern Wei period (CE 386-535), and reached a peak in the Tang dynasty, when there were hundreds of monasteries, temples and shrines, with thousands of monks and nuns dwelling there. Activity at Wutai has never ceased, continuing through the imperial period, and has managed to survive even the ravages of the twentieth century neglect and the destructive Cultural Revolution. Today there are over one hundred monasteries remaining (approximately one third of them open), maintained by three hundred Han Chinese monks, seventy five Tibetans, and 30 nuns (Sheng Yen 1992: 165). An important feature of Mt. Wutai is the fact that it has for centuries been the meeting ground for Chinese, Tibetan, and Mongolian forms of Buddhism. There is a tradition that Ashoka [r. 270-232 BCE] built a pagoda there, and it is certain that Indian monks have visited it down through the centuries. It can therefore claim the status of an international sacred place, sought out by Buddhist pilgrims from many lands. Ennin, the famous Japanese pilgrim, counted Wutai as the principal goal of his trip to China, spending about two and a half months there (Reischauer 1955: 214 ff.). Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 197 Buddhism, like all the major religious traditions, has had a strong attachment to particular geographical places. Primary among these were the four major sites of the Buddha’s birth, his enlightenment, his first sermon and his death. Yet, unlike other major traditions, Buddhism has at the same time taught the unimportance of place. Particular places, however sacred they may be, are like every thing else in the mundane world impermanent, ever changing and ultimately unreal. Therefore, to become attached to even a sacred place would in some way be a betrayal of the dharma. It is this paradox, constantly present in Buddhist history, which I would like to explore in this article. Previous to the twentieth century the most comprehensive histories of the Wutai area were two gazetteers, the Qingliang shan zhi, first published in CE 1596 and republished a number of times thereafter, and the Qingling shan xinzhi of 1701 (Gimello 1992: 127). There are earlier collections which contain stories of supernatural manifestations and spiritual experiences at Wutai from the Tang and Song dynasties (Birnbaum 1986: 120). I am mainly using the first of these two gazetteers, in the punctuated text which appears in Chung-kuo Fo-ssu shih-chih hui-k’an. One of the eight volumes in the Qingliang shan zhi (hereafter QLSZ, 1786 edition) is called pusa xianying, referring to the traditions which record how the Pusa (Bodhisattva) Wenshu has appeared (xian) to earnest pilgrims in response (ying) to their sincere efforts. There is also a collection of accounts in the lingying (spiritual responses) section of the Qingliang shan quantu, which present the stories in briefer form. My purpose in this article is to trace the paradoxical Buddhist attitude toward sacred space as it is articulated in these stories, and to indicate the basis for the present recognition of Wutai Shan as heritage site by UNESCO. The stories recounted in these collections have the flavour of popular legend, yet some of them contain the sophistication which one identifies with the elite articulation of the Buddhist Dharma. I can frame the concern of my inquiry by posing a single question: “Is it necessary to go to Wutai Shan?” The answer to this question belies the apparent simplicity of the accounts, for it is ambiguous, sophisticated and profound. The first stories told in the collection give accounts of events which took place prior to the arrival of Buddhism in China. Their purpose is to highlight the sacrality of the Wutai area and its “natural” numinous qualities. Next come the accounts of various pilgrims, which begin in the Northern Wei period (CE 386-479) and end with the visit of a palace eunuch, Wang Junjian, in the Wan Li period of the late Ming (CE 15731620). Each contains the account of a manifestation of the sacred, usually the Bodhisattva Wenshu. The purpose of these stories is to elicit faith in 198 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer the hearts of readers; as the author says in the preface: “Vulgar folk cannot see [Wenshu]. Now I set forth the records of those who have seen the sacred to make clear that if one has a pure mind, then the holy beings will respond. If one’s sincerity is carried to the utmost, then one will feel the experience [of the sacred]” (QLSZ : 178) What follows will explore this explicit purpose, while considering the paradoxical counterpoint to the simple expression of piety expressed in the words quoted. 2. The Importance of Place: Pilgrimage to Wutai Shan At one level, all the stories encourage devotees to believe that Wutai Shan is a sacred place and that it is very important and beneficial to go there on pilgrimage. There they will learn the truth about themselves and there alone will they have the possibility of seeing the Bodhisattva. The stories adopt the conventions of Chinese historical writing and are all very place specific, usually giving the exact dates and connecting every pilgrim’s tale with a specific platform (east, west, central, etc.) or with one of the famous temples, monasteries, pagodas or cave shrines on or near them. Most frequently mentioned are: Huayen temple, the True Countenance temple, Chill Clarity temple, Bamboo Grove temple, Buddha’s Radiance temple, the Diamond Grotto, the Golden Pavilion. Even today, the area preserves an aura of sacrality, mystery and expectancy for those who visit. A modern pilgrim to Wutai Shan tells of the roadside sign which warns the traveller on arrival “you have already entered the sacred ground of Wutai. Use care in driving” (Sheng Yen 1992: 130). “The idea,” he goes on, “is to inform pilgrims and visitors that from this point on, they should have sincere and reverent hearts, as they gradually approach each of the great monasteries.” One of the most famous early pilgrims was the Indian monk Buddhapali who crossed the desert to visit Wutai Shan. When he arrived he was so overcome with joy and gratitude that he kowtowed on the earth. “Since the Tathagata’s nirvana all the sacred beings have concealed their spiritual power. Only the great Wenshu is still efficacious, showing his limitless compassion on this mountain. I have come from afar, crossing the flowing sands, to show respect and worship, humbly looking toward the great compassion” (QLSZ : 186). Soon he met an old man who spoke Sanskrit and asked if he had brought a certain sutra with him (the Foding zunsheng toluoni jing; Sanskrit: Ushnisha-vijaya-dharani-sutra. Birnbaum [1989-90: 129] lists it as Buddhosnisa-dharani-sutra). If not, he would never be able to recognize Wenshu. Buddhapali, “determined to renounce his own life,” went back to India and got it. He returned to the Chinese Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 199 capital in 683 CE, according to the account, and then became involved in translation projects for the imperial court. Finally he translated the sutra, and took it to Wutai Shan, where he entered the Diamond Grotto and “never again emerged”, and indicating his attainment of nirvana. This story is a clear expression of the popular understanding that one must go to the sacred place in order to have some hope of meeting the great Bodhisattva Wenshu. During the same Tang dynasty, approximately 100 years later, there came to Wutai Shan a zealous and accomplished monk named Wu Zhuo, who had already attained the “dharma eye” (the insight which leads to enlightenment. But obviously, Wu had not yet become enlightened). He had sought the “woods and springs,” and arrived at the sacred mountain in CE 768, staying at Huayen monastery. While in meditation outside the monastery library, he saw a white light coming from the northeast, which touched his head and left him feeling cool and clear, filled with dharma happiness. The following morning he beaded northeast, in the direction from which he had seen the light coming. Arriving at Louguan valley, “his mind felt that it was a holy precinct, and he did hundreds of kowtows” (QLSZ : 189). Up to this point in the account, the narration straightforwardly emphasizes the importance of the sacred place, but then an old man appears and the conversation turns in a different direction. I will return to the rest of the dialogue in the next section. In the same vein we have the story of the Tang monk Fa Zhao. In CE 768 he began having visions of Wutai sites in his congee bowl. The first was Bamboo Grove monastery, and then on another day he saw all the monasteries of Wutai Shan with Wenshu presiding over a vast throng of holy beings. In a third vision he saw the Pure Land realm of the Buddha. Fa Zhao had some qualms about the veracity of his visions and sought out two monks of the monastery who had actually been to Wutai. Their descriptions of the monasteries of Wutai conformed accurately to what he had seen, but he still hesitated to go there himself. The account goes on to emphasize his doubts and continuing reluctance to make the pilgrimage. Finally he met an old man who said to him: “You previously made a vow to go to the Golden World (Wutai) and worship the Great Being (Wenshu), why have you not gone?” Fa Zhao answered: “These are troubled times and the trip is difficult, how can I go?” To which the old man responded definitively, “But you must go!” He eventually found a group of monks willing to go with him and when they arrived at Buddha’s Radiance Monastery, “he found it exactly like the vision he had seen in his congee bowl, without the slightest deviation” (QLSZ : 196-200). 200 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer Fig. 8.1. The Holy territory of Wutai Shan (after © Joy Chen Lewis; ref. Gimella 1992: 98). Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 201 Another account tells of a remarkable Buddhist nun, called by the name “Samadhi” (Sanmeigu), who possessed many supernatural powers and displayed compassion on poor pilgrims by feeding them congee. In her exhortations, she often cried these words to those who had come to worship at Mt. Wutai: “You people, you people! The three worlds are perishing! But you can come here (to Wutai) and generate Bodhi!” The implication is that, in a degenerate and transient world, Wutai stands as the sole sacred place of refuge and spiritual attainment. On the sixteenth day of the fifth lunar month of CE 840, the Japanese monk Ennin recorded these impressions of Wutai: At this Mt. Ch’ing-liang the nights of the fifth moon are very cold, and one normally wears robes lined with wadding. On the ridges and in the valleys trees grow straight, and there is not a single crooked tree. When one enters this region of His Holiness [Manjushri], if one sees a very lowly man, one does not dare feel contemptuous, and if one meets a donkey, one wonders if it might be a manifestation of Manjushri. Everything before one’s eyes raises thoughts of the manifestations of Manjushri. The holy land makes one have a spontaneous feeling of respect for the region (Reischauer 1955: 225. I have changed the Japanese form used by Reischauer, Monju, to Manjushri, to conform with spelling used previously in this article.) All these accounts suggest that the answer to my question is yes, one must go to Waal. It is a sacred place, the most holy in all of the Middle Kingdom. There alone can the Great Bodhisattva Manjushri be seen. There true pilgrims can flee the degenerate world in the final age of the dharma and discover their own true spiritual condition, overcome their weaknesses and learn their strengths. Some pilgrims remain to spend the rest of their lives at the sacred place. There the most famous monastic pilgrims build monasteries and have statues sculpted in conformity to the models they have been given in their dreams and visions. There they die miraculously, indicating that they have transcended the bonds of rebirth and will never return to the cycle. 3. The Unimportance of Place: “Any grass of tree is the realm of Wenshu” Firm belief in the sacred places may be considered an expression of popular religious sentiment. Buddhism accepts that viewpoint, but works also at a more puzzling and paradoxical level. The two views can at times appear to be in complete conflict with each other, but it is important to realize that they were symbiotic, each requiring the other for its continued 202 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer existence. To give an accurate interpretation of Buddhism, both views must be given their place. The paradoxical or iconoclastic approach is best documented in the Ch’an school, which would see the pilgrimage to Wutai, the search for miracles and supernatural manifestations as a kind of idolatry. There is a kind of student who seeks Manjusri on Wu-t’ai Shan. Wrong from the start! There’s no Manjusri on Wu-t’ai Shan. Do you want to know Manjusri? What you do right before your own eyes, which is never uncanny and in no respect dubitable - this is the living Manjusri. (Lin-chi lu, quoted in Gimello 1992: 119). While expressed most forcefully in Ch’an, the idea is found in most other schools of thought as well. At this deeper level, no place is more sacred than any other place. Distinctions of any kind are attacked as nothing but expressions of the discriminating mind. All of this is well known, but what is surprising is that this more paradoxical understanding of the dharma is also found in these legends of the sacred mountain. A monk named Dao Ming earnestly sought the sacred land (of Wutai), and came to Flower Grove Mountain near the Eastern Platform, bringing a novice monk along with him. Two radiant beings emerged from the forest and Dao Ming asked them for help in “crossing over” (entering the supernatural world accessible at Wutai). One of the radiant beings asked him to wait for other pure disciples who were coming, but warned the novice that he should not come. But when the disciples came, the novice pushed ahead anyway, and suddenly they “crossed over” into a radiant land of natural beauty, surrounding a monastic complex with halls and pavilions as awesome “as those in heaven.” One of the disciples again admonished Dao Ming to send out his novice and this time he obeyed, going forth with him a few paces as he did so. But when he turned his head back toward the sacred precincts, the entire vision had disappeared and only the mountains remained. The author then quotes an old saying which suggests that Dao Ming’s fault lay in his attachment to the novice, his follower. “When you go on a long journey, don’t take your family with you” (QLSZ : 183). Going to the physical mountain is not enough. Without the proper inner attitude, all can be lost. Another story tells of a young monk named Zhi Chong. He had studied with the master Fa Shun, an advisor to the Emperor in Changan, who regularly used the Huayen Sutra to expound the dharma. Zhi wanted to go to Wutai Shan, so the master gave him a sealed envelope to open there if he was able to see Wenshu. Lost in the deep forests and dark valleys, he met an old man who asked what he was looking for. “I seek Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 203 Wenshu but I do not know where he is.” To this the old man answered that he had long ago moved to (hua - manifested himself in a different form in) Changan, so “why do you seek him here?” The old man identified Fa Shun as the form in which Wenshu appeared in Changan, and then disappeared. Zhi opened the envelope and found there a gatha (verse) which said: “Pilgrims go in waves to Wutai, passing along the slopes where Wenshu alone dwells. What further need to seek for Amitabha?” Zhi then understood that his former teacher was a form of the Bodhisattva and quickly returned to Changan, but Fa Shun had already moved on and taken another form elsewhere (QLSZ : 185). One could interpret this story in a number of ways, but it certainly shows that Wutai as a sacred place is of relative importance only. The Bodhisattva can be found elsewhere. Here the ambiguity of place is clear. Since all beings have Buddha nature, why seek it in some external place? Since Zhi Chong already had attained the presence of the Bodhisattva, why go to Wutai Shan to seek it? And yet, paradoxically, had he not gone on pilgrimage, he would not have understood this truth. One of the most intriguing stories in the collection is that of Wu Zhuo, a Tang monk who entered the order early and made very quick progress, achieving the dharma eye under a Master Zhong. I have already related above the part of his story relating to his determination to reach Wutai Shan and his overwhelming sense of its sacrality. When he left the Huayen monastery grounds to seek the source of the white light which touched him in meditation, he encountered an old man leading an ox. The dialogue between the two is too long to recount in its entirety, but the thrust of the old man’s mysterious questions and answers seems to point to Wu Zhuo’s problem of attachment to things, and his tendency to discriminate. For example the old man asked him if the monks in the south (where Wu came from) keep the dharma. He answered that it was the last age of the dharma and few kept their vows. The old monk asked “how many?” and Wu replied: three to five hundred. Then Wu asked the same question of the old man, who answered: “Dragons and snakes are mixed together, the ordinary and sacred intermingle.” “How many are there?” “Before, three three, behind, three three” (gian san san yu hou san san). These are typical Ch’an conundrums, which indicate that the old man was trying to combat Wu Zhou’s tendency to discriminate. Then the old man asked what was Wu Zhuo’s customary religious practice?; and Wu answered “Prajna fogs my mind, I do not get its essence.” To which the old man replied: “Not getting is the essence,” an answer which clearly points again toward non-attachment and nondiscrimination. In the next section of the dialogue, the point becomes even 204 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer more explicit. The old man had said it was time for Wu to leave, but Wu wanted to stay overnight because it is already evening. Old Man: “You have two ‘companions.’ (He means things which Wu is attached to). This is to cling to places where you should not stay. “ Wu: “I in fact have no ‘companions,’ and moreover am not longing after a place. “ Old Man: “If you have no longings, why are you longing to stay here? And if you have longings, how is this not like having companions? “ Finally, Wu asked the old man: in this soiled world of sentient beings, in which goodness is rare, to what should I devote myself to attain release? The old man answered with a gatha: If one sits in meditation for even one moment He will be capable enough to build the seven jewelled pagodas of the Ganga (Ganges) river. (But though) the seven jewelled pagodas of the Ganga will in the end turn to dust One stilling of the mind will yet be true awakening. Shortly after this, the old man called his attendant to lead Wu out of his home, and soon afterward both attendant and home disappeared. After a considerable time had passed, Wu saw auspicious clouds with an aureole of light in which there were many Bodhisattvas. When this vision had passed Wu wrote his own gatha: “This whole vast world is a sacred monastery; I have spoken with Wenshu face to face. I heard his words but do not know how to open the seal, I turn my head and see only the ancient mountains ranges”. (QLSZ : 189-90). Like Chong, Wu Zhuo learned the lesson of non-discrimination that the entire world is sacred. And yet, he too had to make the pilgrimage to Wutai to become convinced of it. The same message appears in a dialogue from the story of Dao Yi, a monk who visited Wutai later in the Tang dynasty. He went because “the sacred beings had hidden themselves, and only at Wutai had the sacred vestiges not been destroyed.” This was a common understanding at the time, that it was the last era of the degeneration of the dharma, and only at the sacred mountain was the Bodhisattva accessible. Dao too had to learn non-discrimination, the interpenetration of sacred and secular. He achieved a meeting with a Bodhisattva, in the form of an old monk, a manifestation of Samantabhadra. Dao asked him what dharma he regularly taught. Samantabhadra replied: “In spring, the trees….. Amitabha Buddha. In the fall, flowers ... Kuanyin (Avalokiteshvara)”. Dao did not understand, Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 205 asking another question: “Here (Wutai), is it a Place of pain and suffering (saha), or is it the Pure Land?” Irritated at his incomprehension, the Bodhisattva banged on his seat with a stick. “Do you not get it?” he demanded. “No,” replied Dao Yi honestly. “You’re not getting it; is that saha or is it the Pure Land?” Dao then began to understand that his wishing to abide in the sacred precincts, holy as they were, was still a type of clinging. 4. Buddhism and the Environment The two previous sections of the article make clear that Buddhism has two attitudes toward sacred places. It would be inaccurate to demean the one as a naive and popular understanding of the dharma which ought to be eliminated; while honouring the other as the higher understanding so well represented in the Ch’an question: why go to Wutai? Manjusri is everywhere. An approach more in line with Buddhist tradition is to pay attention to both understandings, to maintain the paradox. Even Ch’an, after the sutras have been disparaged and the statues burned, returns to the study of the sutras and bows to new statues which have replaced those destroyed. A modern pilgrim to Mt. Wutai Shan, Ch’an Abbot Sheng Yen, exemplifies the paradox in contemporary terms. Planning to build a monastery in Taiwan, Sheng Yen went to China in 1991, with a retinue of associates, to study the monastic architectural tradition of the Buddhist past. Wutai Shan was chosen as the most important of those sites which the group intended to visit, because of its historical continuity and sacred significance. The earliest example of Chinese wooden architecture, dating from the Tang dynasty, is found there in the main hall of Buddha’s Radiance monastery. The architecture of subsequent dynasties, the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing, are also represented in the halls, pagodas, and shrines of the many sites of Wutai Shan. Reflecting on the hundreds of monasteries which have been built at Wutai Shan over its 1500 year history, Sheng Yen was moved by the thought of how many had been destroyed by armies, natural disasters or the simple process of decay. (He had earlier lamented the fact that certain monasteries “ate a village a day,” referring to the taxes extracted from the peasants they controlled - thus creating enormous evil karma). He quotes the Huayen Sutra, noting that every phenomenon in this impermanent world is created by our minds. “Ordinary people’s minds create the vexations and sufferings of this now happy, now sad, but always impermanent, `burning house’ of a three storey universe. But for the 206 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer salvation of all creatures, the sacred beings (Bodhisattvas, like Wenshu), by their pity and compassion, create a ‘clear and cool’ universe. (Sheng Yen is playing on the famous Mahayana description of the world as a burning house, together with Wutai’s alternate name, Qingling shun Clear and Cool Mountain). For this reason, every monastery which is built in this three storey “burning house,” will one by one meet ruin and destruction. At all times people build monasteries, in every place people are destroying them. When I think about myself, an ordinary person, building a Buddhist monastery to expound the dharma and practice the (Buddhist) Way - that is a very happy thing. When that monastery is destroyed it is an extremely painful thing. But speaking from the point of view of the sacred world, creation and destruction are a common matter. Therefore, those great and virtuous monks who built a clear and cool (abode) in this burning world already know that they are producing karma which will in the end ruin and destroy the monasteries which they have built. But they still zealously build anyway” (Sheng Yen 1992: 196). This quote suggests the paradoxical Buddhist attitude toward place in a very perceptive way. Monasteries in the past have sometimes become a plague on the people, a source of pride to those who built them, a hindrance, and a burden to those in charge of them. This is the possible result of building a monastery. All sacred places with their holy buildings, the temples, halls, pavilions, pagodas and shrines are composite things, and therefore doomed to destruction. This is the inevitable result of building a monastery. As part of the impermanent world, they are unimportant, unreal in the deepest sense. Yet, just as the monks of the past have done, Sheng Yen, too will “zealously build anyway”. 5. From Pilgrimage Landscape to Heritage Site Mount Wutai with its five flat peaks is one of the four sacred Buddhist mountains in China, and is seen as the global centre for Buddhist Manjusri worship. The cultural landscape numbers 53 monasteries and includes the East Main Hall of Foguang Temple, the highest surviving timber Building of the Tang Dynasty with life size clay sculptures. It also features the Ming Dynasty Shuxiang Temple with a huge complex of 500 ‘suspension’ statues representing Buddhist stories woven into three dimensional pictures of mountains and water (cf. a scene of Xiantong Temple, Fig. 8.2). The temples are inseparable from their mountain landscape. With its high peaks, snow covered for much of the year, thick forests of vertical Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 207 pines, firs, poplar and willow trees and lush grassland, the beauty of the landscape has been celebrated by artists since at least the Tang Dynasty – including in the Dunhuang caves. Two millennia of temple building have delivered an assembly of temples that present a catalogue of the way Buddhist architecture developed and influenced palace building over a wide part of China and part of Asia. For a thousand years from the Northern Wei period (471-499) nine Emperors made 18 pilgrimages to pay tribute to the Bodhisattvas, commemorated in stele and inscriptions. Started by the Emperors, the tradition of pilgrimage to the five peaks is still very much alive. With the extensive library of books collected by Emperors and scholars, the monasteries of Mount Wutai remain an important repository of Buddhist culture, and attract pilgrims from across a wide part of Asia. Fig. 8.2. Xiantong Temple, Mt. Wutai in north China's Shanxi Province. On 26 June 2009, Mt. Wutai is inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List (WHL) as cultural landscape, in recognition of the tradition of pilgrimage and serenity of nature, and continuity of temples’ construction on the site since the CE 1st century to the early 20th century. This is one among the 38 heritage sites from China inscribed in the UNESCO WHL, and is considered to be a unique example of historical continuity of pilgrimage tradition, religious landscape and associated traditional architecture; that is how it is considered of special universal 208 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer value for the humankind. The following four criteria were taken into consideration: Criterion (ii): The overall religious temple landscape of Mount Wutai, with its Buddhist architecture, statues and pagodas reflects a profound interchange of ideas, in terms of the way the mountain became a sacred Buddhist place, endowed with temples that reflected ideas from Nepal and Mongolia and which then influenced Buddhist temples across China. Criterion (iii): Mount Wutai is an exceptional testimony to the cultural tradition of religious mountains that are developed with monasteries. It became the focus of pilgrimages from across a wide area of Asia, a cultural tradition that is still living. Criterion (iv): The landscape and building ensemble of Mount Wutai as a whole illustrates the exceptional effect of imperial patronage over 1,000 years in the way the mountain landscape was adorned with buildings, statuary, paintings and steles to celebrate its sanctity for Buddhists. Criterion (vi): Mount Wutai reflects perfectly the fusion between the natural landscape and Buddhist culture, religious belief in the natural landscape and Chinese philosophical thinking on the harmony between man and nature. The mountain has had far-reaching influence: mountains similar to Wutai were named after it in Korea and Japan, and also in other parts of China such as Gansu, Shanxi, Hebei and Guandong provinces. All the temples and landscapes associated with the sacred Buddhist Mountain (Mt. Wutai) are included in the nominated area by UNESCO. The integrity of some of the temple ensembles was threatened by uncontrolled development but this has been either reversed or is now being controlled. For the landscape, the visual integrity relies on sustaining the beauty of the mountain and its forests so that the inseparability of the temples and the mountain can be appreciated together with their religious associations. The temples demonstrate a long history of construction and reconstruction. The exception is Foguang East Hall which with its statues has remained largely unreconstructed since the Tang Dynasty. The attributes such as the assembly of temples, the specific buildings that reflect the interchange of cultures, the relationship of buildings to the mountain landscape, the beauty of the forested landscape to the northwest, the pilgrim routes and the masterpieces within the temples, could be said to clearly reflect the outstanding universal value of the property. Miracles of Mt. Wutai, China 209 5. Concluding Remarks Buddhism has often been accused, unfairly I believe, of being a pessimistic and world negating religion. Taken literally, the image of the burning house is a gloomy and frightening assessment of the world we live in. Environmentally, if Buddhism did despise this world, it would seem to give Buddhists licence to do as they please with their natural surroundings. But that is to ignore the other side of the paradox. There are always the appointed tasks of life, there is the sacred land of Wutai to visit, and there are monasteries to be built. The burning world is the very same as the clear and cool world. Building a monastery is to create a thing doomed to destruction, yet their builders “still zealously build anyway”. Sheng Yen, in fact, announced that one of the three principles which will guide the building of his new monastery (Dharma Drum Monastery) will be protection of the environment, specifically preserving the original topography of the site, and protecting the natural springs, the water courses, the trees and vegetation of the mountain site he plans to develop (Sheng Yen 1992: 90). If the natural world were only seen as impermanent and unreal, Buddhism would have a difficult time developing a sound environmental ethic. However, it is also the locus of the sacred world, and the two are not to be distinguished. This Ch’an-like insight informs many of the stories. Keep the paradox which says that the burning house and the clear and cool world are one and the same, and a responsible attitude toward the environment is not only possible, but required. As one of the manifestations of the Bodhisattva says to Song monk and pilgrim Hui Qing: “Any one of the grasses or trees in this place is none other than Wenshu’s world. When in your daily usage you deal with things with clear understanding, this truly is Wenshu” (QLSZ 1786: 202- 03). Mt. Wutai has been now internationally recognised being nominated as World Heritage Site, which will attract a good mass of people to visit and have experiences of serene landscape and the pilgrimage tradition. But it would also turn into encroachments and interferences that may cause to loss the age-old cultural traditions, or even impose upon several irrational transformations (cf. Kang 2009). 6. References Birnbaum, Raoul 1986. The Manifestation of a Monastery: Shen-ying’s Experiences on Mount Wu-T’ai in T’ang Context. Journal of the American Oriental Society, 106 (1): 119-137. 210 8. Jeffrey F. Meyer —. 1988-89. Secret Halls of the Mountain Lords. Cahiers d’Extreme-Asie, 5: 115-140. Chung-kuo fo-ssu shin-chin hui-k’an (A Collection of the histories and annals of Chinese Buddhist Monasteries; compiled by Tu Chiehhsiang). 90 vols. In 3 series. 1980-85. Ming Wen Book Publishers, Taipei, Taiwan. Cleary, Thomas 1993. The Flower Ornament Scripture. Shambala, Boston. Gimello, Robert M. 1992. Chang Shang-ying on Wu-t’ai Shan; in, Naquin, Susan and Yü, Chün-fang (eds.) Pilgrims and Sacred Sites in China. University of California Press, Berkeley: 89-149. Kang, Xiaofei 2009. Two Temples, Three Religions, and a Tourist Attraction. Contesting Sacred Space on China’s Ethnic Frontier. Modern China, 35 (3), May: 227-255. Meyer, Jeffrey F. 1994. The Miracles of Wutai Shan, China: The Ambiguity of Place in Buddhism; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) The Spirit and Power of Place. Human Environment and Sacrality. National Geographical Society of India, Pub. 41, Varanasi: 141-148. QLSZ, Qingliang shan zhi (Annals of Clear Cool Mountain). 1786 edition. Qingliang shan xinzhi (New Annals of Clear Cool Mountain). 1701 edition. Reischauer, Edwin O. (trans.) 1955. Ennin’s Diary: The Record of a Pilgrimage to China in Search of the Law. The Ronald Press, New York. (Shih) Sheng Yen 1992. Huo Chai Ch’ing Liang (Burning House, Clear & Cool). Pastern Pub., Taipei. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Prof. Jeffrey F. Meyer Emeritus Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Hwy 49 North Str., University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28223. U.S.A. Email: jfmeyer@uncc.edu § Jeffrey has received his M.A. from University of Dayton, and PhD from University of Chicago, and has joined University of North Carolina in 1973. He became emeritus faculty in 2007. His notable research publications include Myths in Stone: Religious Dimensions of Washington, D.C (2001), The Dragons of Tiananmen: Beijing as a Sacred City (1991), and Peking as a Sacred City (1976). 9 Sacred Spaces, Pilgrimage and Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal Rana P.B. Singh and Padma C. Poudel Banaras Hindu University, India; & Tribhuwan University, Nepal ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. The sacred power of Muktināth is eulogized in the ancient and puranic mythologies. The manifestive power of the place attracted kings to provide special protection and related programmes which resulted to develop various architectural styles of monuments, Gompās and pouwas. Devotees performing pilgrimage to Muktināth also visit the sacred spots and ancillary shrines in the environs. The inner sanctum of the main shrine is controlled by the Buddhist Lama, however outside shrine by the Hindu priests; this results sometimes into conflict. With the increase of trekking and tourism hotel industry is coming up rapidly — this facilitates pilgrims for easy stay. Most of the pilgrims are Hindus, while about sixty per cent tourists belong to European countries. Pilgrims mostly visit in groups of their kin and kiths, and about ninety per cent of them recorded their visit to Muktināth for the first time. Similar trend is recorded for tourists too. Auspicious glimpse and performing ancestral rites have been the main motives. The other associative motive is to get relief from the cycle of transmigration (moksha). The mystic beauty of nature and the power of place jointly support to experience the nature spirit and to understand the inherent meaning. Keywords. Pilgrimage, pilgrims’ characteristics, Shālagrāma, sacred places, sacrality, spatial structure, spirit of place. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction Following the line of thought advocated by Eliade (1959) that awe, wonder and deep quest to understand the mystical nature have attracted human being in that distant past to come close to nature. After passage of time the spirit of such mystical places with human interaction and manifestation of human construct (mental and built up) shaped that environs as sacred place whose inherent power is sustained by the faith 212 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel system and regularly continued by the pilgrimages. Says Eliade (1959: 28) that “men are not free to choose the sacred site, that they only seek for it and find it by the help of mysterious signs”. This postulate was in case of Muktināth was firstly detailed out in a project in late 1970s by Messerschmidt and Sharma (1980, and also Messerschmidt 1981). Messerschmidt (1989a: 90) states: In Muktināth the signs are found in the high mountain location and the headwaters site, and in the presence of certain natural elements such as fossils and fires; these have tempted Man, in the search for god on earth, to create a supernatural field, a sacred world where Vishnu and other deities are believed to abide. It is not just natural features, however, but anomalies in nature that give Muktināth a special sanctity and attraction. At Muktināth, these include such wonders as fire burning on water and the fossils of primitive sea creatures (ammonites) found high in the mountains, many thousand metres above sea level and thousands of kilometres from any contemporary ocean. These are some of the “mysterious signs”, rare and sacred, that Hindu devotees seek in the religious field of which Muktināth is the central feature. In addition to the most sacred abodes of lord Vishnu lying in the four cardinal directions of India — Badrinath (north), Jagannath Puri (east), Rameshvaram (south) and Dvaraka (west) — Muktināth (northeast) stands as the fifth site in the Himalaya. These five centres form a star shape and compared with the radiating light bestowing wisdom and relief from transmigration, moksha (Fig. 9.1). These places may be called as special places where divine manifestive power always radiates. The silent mountain reflecting on all the passages of one’s life is the most sacred pilgrimage place for Nepalese Hindus. The whole territory has long been sacred to the ancient Hindu culture of sub-continent. In Muktināth the liquid energy of feminine divine (e.g. Damodar Kunda, and the headwaters), the strength of male power (the Himalaya mountains), the fire element of space (as in Jvālāji temple), the serene silence of isolated nature (sacred groves and trees), the message of inherent mystery (ammonite fossil called Shālagrāma found thousand kilometres away from the contemporary sea), in passage of time existence of two traditions of faith system, i.e. Vaishnavite (Vishnu), Shaivite (Shiva) and Shakta (goddess), and several ancillary and associated unique features together make this holy territory (kshetra) distinct and special, which is constantly made alive, awakened, regulated and communicated through the devout pilgrims. The above mentioned “mysterious signs”, rare and sacred, the Hindu devotees seek in the religious field of Muktināth are the central features (Messerschmidt (1989a: 90). The Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 213 interactions between the religio-geographical realities and the pilgrims, humans and divine, microcosm and macrocosm are maintained by varieties of traditions that result to form complex sacredscape in Muktināth (Poudel 2000: 38). Fig. 9.1. India and Nepal Star-frame Five holy places. This essay is an attempt to present the findings of the survey of pilgrims and tourists at Muktināth, illustration with other findings and mythologies that support them. The survey was conducted during the Ashvina Krishna (Pitri)paksha (called as Shrādhapaksha) of Vikram Samvata 2050, i.e., the waning fortnight (dark half) of September-October 1993, in addition to a day before and a day afterwards (30 September to 16 October 1993). This period is chosen purposely because of its importance in worshipping ancestral rites in Hindu traditions. Information were collected by interviewing 78 groups of pilgrims representing 907 individuals. Further, 74 foreign trekking-tourists belonging to 11 nations were also interviewed. For this purpose questionnaires are used, and also dialogues and interactions were carried on. The Himalayan kingdom of Nepal is blessed with an incredible diversity of natural sceneries and a chain of sacred places, including the 214 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel highest mountain peak of the Sagarmāthā (Mt. Everest, 8,848 metres), and the celebrated holy place of Muktināth (North 28°49’ lat. and East 83°53’ long., 3,749m) that lies in the north-western part of Muktināth Village Development Committee (VDC, 3,573 sq. km of area) of Mustang District (3,573 sq. km of area), Dhawalagiri Zone, Nepal, at the foot of the Thorong La mountain pass (part of the great Himalayas) (Figs. 9.2, and 9.3). Fig. 9.2. Mustang district and Muktināth Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 215 Muktināth VDC records 186 households and 990 inhabitants in 2009 (Regmi & Regmi 2009: 33), which was 191 and 899, respectively in 1993. Muktināth experiences markedly arid climate with cool summers and severe dry winters. Patches of alpine vegetation in the inner valleys and thorny bushes in the mountain slopes are the dominant natural scene. The houses of the area are made of muddy flat roofs and walls. The dressing and language are more akin to Tibetan and Buddhist style than Hinduism. The nearby mountain to Muktināth refers to the myth that it symbolizes the sacrificial rice pudding thrown by Brahma (‘the creator’). Pilgrims take with them a quantity of soil from this mountain as mahā prasāda (“the great offered food to god”) and distribute among their friends when they return to their homes. Fig. 9.3. The Path to Muktināth (after Messerschmidt 1989a: 92). 216 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Of course, Muktināth is the famous Hindu sacred place, the neighbourhood is dominated by the Buddhist population. That is how it presents uniqueness in cultural heritage together with natural scenery. Though this place lies in physically remote area, thousands of foreign tourists pay visit to this place every year since April 1977 when Manang Valley (under the Annapurna Trek permit) was open for foreign visitors. The Annapurna area is recently designated as a national conservation area and now becomes a popular mountain destination in Nepal, partly because of its easy accessibility and links with Pokhara — an important regional tourist gateway. Since 1980 Annapurna has increased its relative share in trekking from about half to 68 per cent in 1986 of the national total (Zurick 1992: 615). The influx of Hindu pilgrims has also increased during recent years. 2. Mythic Context and Historical Background Muktināth is eulogized in the ancient and purānic literature as the source site of the Krishnā-Gandaki (or, Kāli-Gandaki) river where a kind of typical sacred stone symbolizing Vishnu, i.e., Shālagrāma, is found abundantly (cf. Kurma Purāna II.35.37; Narasimha Purāna 64.22-26; see Kane 1973, vol. IV: 799). The surrounding hill is called in the same way as Shālagrāmagiri (Varaha Purāna 144.13, 29). The “Forest Canto” of the Mahabharata (III.84. 123-128) describes the merit of Shālagrāma and the holy site where it is found. The whole territory with this divine and manifestive quality is called as Muktikshetra, i.e., “a place where final emancipation is attainable” (cf. Varaha Purāna 145.105), and said to spread over an area of 15 yojanas (ibid.: 182). The measurement fits very closely to the reality (radius 16.25 km, circumference 102.1 km, area 829.58 sq. km). This kshetra (sacred territory) is demarcated by the two extreme spots, viz. Damodara Kunda in the north, and Muktināth in the south; this forms a shape like an egg, and thus symbolizes itself as Shālagrāma. Mythology also refers that the great yogi king Bharata had resided close to this place and performed austerity (cf. Vishnu Purāna II.1.24, II.13.4). Another version of the same story is narrated in the Bhāgavata Purāna (V.7.8-10; 8.30) which refers it with the names like ‘land of illustrious’, ‘the place cherished by many released sages’, ‘the forest hermitage where Pulastya and Pulaha live’, and well known as Shālagrāma Tirtha (pilgrimage place), or sometimes kshetra. The Vārāha Purāna (144.29) states that the Shālagrāma hill in itself is a form of Vishnu, and therefore it is a ‘divine being’ (devatā; ibid.: 145). It Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 217 is also said that Lord Vishnu is always present in the rock of Shālagrāma (cf. Ramottaratapiniyopanishada IV.166). The Agni Purāna (47) mentions that Shālagrāma has a great divine power to bliss all sort of boons, but better to worship it without any desire. Popularly, the Shālagrāma also symbolizes Lord Shiva in phallus form, and the Krishnā-Gandaki as the fluid energy of Sati (the earlier form of Shiva’s wife who committed suicide). According to a version of Shakta tradition, among the 51 shakta pithas where the parts of Sati’s corpse fallen down, the right cheek (dakshina kapāla/ ganda) is associated with Muktināth; thus it symbolizes the 9th sound and letter of Sanskrit alphabet, “lri”. Apparently Muktināth shows its association with Krishna, the 8th incarnation of Vishnu. The ritual tradition of worshipping Shālagrāma with offering tulasi (holy basil) leaves indicates the age-old Vaishnavite myth referring as to how Vishnu fallen in love with Tulasi, and later by her curse He himself became Shālagrāma, and succeeding Tulasi became the Krishnā-Gandaki river. This way Vishnu as Shālagrāma remains in the lap of his beloved Tulasi who was transformed to the Gandaki river. The late 16th century epic, the Rāmacharitamānasa (by Tulasidas) describes the glory of Shālagrāma Kshetra/ Muktināth; this further helped to promote its intensity of attraction for pilgrimage by Hindu devotees. The purānic and mythical stories are interpreted in different ways (see Glasenapp 1928; Yogi 1956: 13; Kaschewsky 1994: 145-149). Several accounts based on personal pilgrimage have also narrated Muktināth (e.g. Kirkpatrik 1793/1975; Hamilton 1971; Gurung 1980), and sometimes personal experiences and diaries have also been recorded (e.g. Snellgrove 1989: 199-203). In spite of its very high sanctity and mytho-magico power, there does not exist any permanent Hindu settlement in Muktināth VDC. Nevertheless the predominant Buddhist inhabitants have mostly been supportive to Hindu pilgrims and other visitors. Apart from water and special stones, other natural objects which promote the sacrality of place in Muktināth area include the holy fig tree (“pipal”, Ficus religiosa), the banyan tree (“ficus” or “vata”, Ficus bengalensis) and the holy basil (“tulasi”, Ocimum sanctum, or Ocimum basilicum). These trees are considered to have close association with Vishnu and preserve healing qualities. The fig and banyan trees cast a cool shade for the tired pilgrims, while tulasi preserves magical healing quality. The mythologies narrate the association of different sages and seers who performed austerities under these trees. Initially the Hindu Khas Malla kings of Karnali region, Kalyal Kings of Jumla and Malla Kings of Parbat, were responsible for the development of Muktināth temple (Dhungel 1987: 1-4). The inscriptions at the second 218 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel roof of the present pagoda and also upon the bell hanging at the southern main gate refer its construction and architectural style to the year 1814, and further its renovation in 1983. The local traditions refer that prior to the present pagoda there was a flat mud-roofed structure. Muktināth is also a home of many Tibetan inhabitants. The Buddhist Tibetans believe that Jvālāji is associated with Chen-re-sig (the Buddhist god Avalokiteshvara) who received enlightenment here (cf. Fig. 9.4). Devotees feel that an auspicious sight of Muktināth on the 10th of waning fortnight of Hindu month of Jyestha (May-June), or on Makar Samkranti (winter solstice; 14th of January) bestows special merit. Popularly, the pilgrims take holy dips in Dhārā Tirtha, i.e. 108 water-spouts (gomukha) before paying visit to Muktināth. The number 108 symbolizes the products of 12 zodiacs and 9 planets, thus it refers to the cosmic coverage. Fig. 9.4. Muktināth Kshetra (modified after Messerschmidt 1989a: 95). Note: 1. The route of circumambulation of the shrine, 2. Sacred springs, source of the Muktināth (Jhong) river, 3. The Vishnu Mandir (temple) and the 108 water spouts, 4. The temple of Jvālā Māi, with the natural gas fires, 5. The Tibetan monastery of Gompa Sarwa, 6. The Tibetan temple of Marme Lhakhang, 7. The sacred grove of poplar trees, 8. Various shelters for pilgrims, 9. Rani Pauwa; site of the horse fair and tourist lodges, 10. Unused temple, 11. Beginnings of the Muktināth (Jhong) river, and 12. Route down the valley to Dzarkot village and Kagbeni (after Jest 1981). Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 219 3. Sacred Places and Ancillary Shrines Landscape features (especially water spots, and sacred groves) and sacred places have close association in the Himalayan realm. Most of the sacred spots in the territory of Muktināth are related to water points like Damodar Kunda, Muktināth and Kagbeni (cf. Fig. 9.4). 3.1. Muktināth The holy site of Muktināth (3,749 m) is located on the north-western slope of a dissected mountain (locally called as Kalo Danda) of Muktināth Himalaya (Annapurna range). A gentle slope trail of about half kilometre links the sacred place and the nearest settlement (Ranipouwa village, Purang), where famous Ranipouwa, hotels and shops are located. There are two temples, three Gompas (Buddhist temples) and five pouwas within the compound of the holy site of Muktināth (Figs. 9.4 and 5). Muktināth temple occupies almost central position in the holy territory. Three-storied copper-roofed pagoda (in Pahari style) temple of Muktināth with southward facing main gate is built on a squared platform of a single tire, occupying 106.58 sq.m. of an area. The outer surface of Muktināth temple covers an area of 18.48 sq.m. The inner space of the temple is only 2.6 sq.m., which is paved with marble stone (Figs. 9.5, and 6). A copper image of the main deity (Lord Muktināth) is enshrined at the central location of the northern wall facing towards the main gate; therefore devotees cannot circumambulate the image from the inside. The Muktināth (Vishnu) image has four arms and is in the lotus position with crossed legs (padmāsana) and lies under the shade of seven hoods of snake (cf. Fig. 9.7); the upper two hands carry the chakra (disc) and shankha (conch shell), and the lower two hands express the gestures. His two wives, Lakshmi (goddess of wealth) and Bhudevi (the earth goddess) are on either side of the main status. In front of him sits Garuda (the divine bird, carrier of Vishnu) and Ganesha. Muktināth statue is of a metre height and a maximum width of 96cm. The style and shape of the image suggest its period around the CE 16th-17th century (Dahal 1988: 61), which supports its association with Jumla kings. According to Tibetan Buddhist legend about Muktināth, Padmasambhava, the “precious teacher” and sage who first introduced Buddhism to Tibet, paid visit to this territory and site in the CE eighth century. Some believers think that as “the founder, culture hero, and protector of Tibetan Buddhism” Padmasambhava has more importance than the Buddha himself (Paul 1982: 151, see Messerschmidt (1989a: 96). The site is also said to have been visited by the eighty-four magicians (mahā-siddhas) of 220 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel late Indian Buddhism, whose walking steeps are believed to have grown into the sacred poplar trees of Muktināth. These magicians are also associated with the sacred springs of Muktināth (cf. Jest 1981). Fig. 9.5. Sketch view of Muktināth Sacred Territory. Other predominantly Buddhist sites and monuments of the complex are the Tibetan Gompa Sarwa (dgon-pa gsar-pa), new monastery, and the Marme Lhakhang (Mar-me lha-khang), temple of the lamps. The Sarwa monastery houses images of Padmasambhava, Lokeswar (Avalokiteshvara), and Sakyamuni (the historical Buddha). The Marme temple was already less significant during 1980s, and by late 1990s get transformed into dilapidated form. Three images of Buddhist Mahayana, gods, viz. HoPang-Me, Che-Pang-Me and Dorga Sempa, also exist in front of Muktināth image. The local priest informs that the three Buddhist images were shifted here from Nrisimha Gompā (a Buddhist shrine located nearby) only to secure and preserve them. Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal Fig. 9.6. Muktināth environs and Temple’s Spatial Plan. Idols/ image (murtis): 1. Muktinārāyan 2. Lakshmi 3. Sarasvāti 4. Ganesha 5. Garuda 6. Ho-Pang-Me 7. Che-Pang-Me 8. Dorga Sempā 221 222 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Existence of side-by-side Hindu and Buddhist images within one sanctum reflects religious harmony; however, overseeing Hindu priests in the inside and Buddhist female monks (Jhomo) in the outside of the same temple certainly create sometimes conflict concerning the role and benefit (property) and frustration among the Hindu pilgrims. In practice, the Jhomo performs rituals inside the temple, and outside the Hindu priests and the donations and offerings at these places are the property of the respective overseers. Fig. 9.7. Muktināth Image (murti). Nearby to the main entrance gate to Muktināth, in the right exist an area of sacred groves of poplar trees of the species Populus ciliata, locally called lekh pipal or bhot pipal. Despite its popular name, the lekh pipal is not of the same genus as the sacred lowland pipal (Ficus religiosa) under which the Buddha meditated to gain enlightenment at Bodh Gaya. Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 223 3.2. Dāmodar Kunda Lying at the distance of 32km in the northeast from Muktināth, located several days’ walk beyond and above Muktināth, Damodar Kunda (4,659m) in a valley of Damodar Himal, is located in Surkhang VDC of Mustang District. This holy spot is described vividly by Kirkpatrik in his journey accounts (1793). The topographic features nearby indicate that there might had several kundas in this area in the past which in course of time dried up, except a few existing even today like Dudha Kunda (pond of milk), Makta Kunda (pond of precious stones) and Nirmal Kunda (pond of clean water). The local priests say that Damodar Kunda represents the combination of all the kundas. For sheltering pilgrims there is only a corrugated sheet-roofed Pouwa (dharamashālā, pilgrims’ rest house), constructed by Mustang District Panchayat. The sanctity of certain lakes like Damodar Kunda, especially in relation to the legend of Padmasambhava’s visit to the Himalaya, is a part of belief systems. Damodar (literally “having a rope round the waist”) is an epithet of Lord Vishnu (Turner 1965: 309b). This and similar lakes in the high Himalaya are sometimes also called Danda Kunda (mountain lake) or Dudh Pokhari (milk lake), the latter due to their glacial colour, the result of a high silt content. 3.3. Chu-mig-brgya-rtsa This refers to “the land of 108 springs, or water-spouts” which surrounds northern half of Muktināth temple compound. The springs of Muktināth seep from the rocky hillside directly east and above the Vishnu Mandir shrine. The water has been carefully channelled down the hillside to feed into a long trough that feeds a line of 108 water spouts atop a stone wall in the form of little brass animal-heads (Snellgrove 1989: 200). The number of these spouts also has magical qualities and associations. There are, for example, 108 books in the Tibetan Buddhist scriptures and 108 beads on the Buddhist rosary. The stream is linked to a water pool called Muktikunda. The chain of water-spouts is known as Dhārā Tirtha and believed that a holy bath in this water can purify one in all the number of 8,400,000 organic species in the cosmos (as in Hindu cosmology believed) — through which the soul passes by the cycle of rebirth. The number of spouts has special significance and gives Muktināth its local Bhotia name of Chumig Gyatsa (Chu-mig brgya-rtsa, Tibetan), meaning “a hundredodd springs” (Snellgrove 1989: 106). They are made in the shape of boars’ heads, the boar being one of the ten avatars of Lord Vishnu. The experience of bathing is described by Messerschmidt (1989a: 97-98): 224 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Bathing at religious sites is always meritorious to the Hindus, and purification by bathing or drinking sacred water is a principal part of each pilgrim’s quest. Virtually everyone bathes at Muktināth: devout Hindus strip down and dash quickly under all the springs, men in loin cloths and women in thin cotton saris; local Bhotias visiting the shrine typically do not undress, and only sprinkle a few drops from some or all of the spouts, and perhaps drink a little of the water. A number of people take advantage of the event and bathe fullscale with a great flurry of soap suds. Before entering the water, all pilgrims are obliged to donate a few pice (small coins) to the Tibetan Buddhist nuns of the Nyingmapa sect who see to the upkeep of the shrine complex throughout the year. 3.4. Kāgbeni At the confluence (beni) of the Krishnā-Gandaki and the Muktināth Kholā (a stream, Jhong) lies the holy spot of Kāgbeni; the confluence spot which is called Hamsatirtha. It is located at an elevation of 2,810 m, i.e., 939 m lower and 9.5 km west of Muktināth. The pilgrims believe that when Vishnu’s carrier, Garuda, “has been honoured with an offering at the start of the pilgrimage, he accompanies them until he reaches Kāgbeni” — his original home (Kaschewsky 1994: 143). The etymology of Kāgbeni reflects this myth: ‘Kāga’ or ‘Kāka’ means ‘crow’. The close by holy site is called as Kāgbenitirtha. The Hamsatirtha means literally “the holy spot of goose/ swan” itself. Kāgbeni is an especially important site for Hindus to perform the final shraddha (ancestral rites) rites for the dead. These rites are commonly performed eleven days after the death of a parent, for example, and every eleven years thereafter. A shraddha performed during pilgrimage at the sacred confluence of two rivers is especially auspicious. Many pilgrims stop at Kāgbeni, usually the day before arriving at Muktināth, to perform the final rites for the departed, after which they are absolved from further obsequies duties. 3.5. Shiva temple A Shiva temple in south of Muktināth replicating the temple of Pashupatināth was built in around CE 1938. Four small shrines representing Dvarakā, Badrināth, Kedārnāth and Rāmeshvaram have recently built near in the affinity of the Shiva temple. This reminds the process of spatial manifestation by which the four abodes of Vishnu (lying in the four cardinal directions in India) are replicated to make the place as the microcosmos of Vishnu. Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 225 3.6. Jvālāji Gompā Jvālāji Gompā lies at a distance of around 60m in the east of Muktināth temple. The present structure is the result of renovations at several times. At present it spreads over an area of 81.6 sq.m. (Fig. 9.8) and records the maximum height of 4.6m. All the five images in the temple represent their Buddhist association. The clay image of Padmasamhhava is the main deity in the Gompā; the image records a height of 87cm and a maximum width of 60cm. This image is dated around late 16th century (Dahal 1987: 65). Other images enshrined in Jvālāji Gompā are Buddhist Mahayana Tantrika Vajrapāni (Chhang-chom-dorje), Manjushri or Manju Ghosh (Tenpachom-den-de) and Chen-Re-Sig. The height of these images ranges between 1.3m and 1.6m whereas the width ranges between 1.1m and 2.1m. Vajrapāni is worshipped by the Buddhist, while Hindus worship Chen-ReSig as Vishnu. There are three females and one male Buddhist monks serving as the priests at this Gompā. From the burning flame Buddhists take fire for cremating the dead bodies. Fig. 9.8. Jvālāji Gompā: Spatial Plan 226 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel It is said that Jvālāji (‘the Temple of Eternal Fire’) was the original site of local Buddhists around Muktināth before the establishment of a Hindu temple. Snellgrove (1989: 201) describes it: Nying-ma-pa . . . . contains images of ‘Boundless Light’, ‘Glancing Eye’ and ‘Lotus-Born’. The flames of natural gas burn a little cave at floor level in the far right-hand corner. One does indeed burn from earth; one burns just, beside a little spring (‘from water’); the one ‘from stone’ exhausted itself two years ago and so burns no longer, at which local people express concern”. The flames in Jvālāmāi temple originally burned from three sources― earth, water, and stone. To Tibetan Buddhists the temple of Jvālāmāi is known as Salame-bar Dolamebar Gompa (Sa-la me-’bar rdo-la me-’bar dgon-pa), the temple of the miraculous fire. This temple (dgon-pa or lhakhang), like most of the structures of Muktināth, is constructed in the northern Buddhist (Tibetan) style of architecture. It shelters the natural gas fires burning from stone, earth, and water (cf. Fig. 9.8). On the altar of Jvālāmāi are images of Padmasambhava, Lokeshvar, and Vajradhara (holder of the vajra, a thunderbolt, symbolizing supreme Buddhahood). Finally, the ammonite fossil of Muktināth/Chumig Gyatsa is considered to be Gawo Jogpa (dGa’-bo Jogs-pa), the Tibetan serpent deity (nāga). Snellgrove (1989/ 1961) gives a detailed account of Buddhist pilgrimage sites throughout the region. His study greatly enhances our concept of Muktināth’s sacred field, particularly from the perspective of Buddhism and of Bon, a religion in which many indigenous pre-Buddhist beliefs have been retained. Muktināth’s dedication to these universally hallowed deities of both Hinduism and Buddhism represents its existential aspect (Messerschmidt (1989a: 96). The flames are a popular object of curiosity and veneration among pilgrims. Buddhists interpret them as “burning changeless and unceasing from the hidden parts of Samvara Male [the tantric deity] and Female [his spouse]” (Snellgrove 1989: 108). Hindus interpret them as a gift from Brahma, who is said to have made offering here by setting the water afire. Because fire and water are normally incompatible, however, popular interpretation gives them a supernatural aspect, as the “miracle” of Jvālāmāi. Geologically, the natural gas which feeds the flames emanates from the same shales in which the famous Muktināth fossils are embedded (Messerschmidt (1989a: 98). Fire is one of the most important gross-elements (panchamahābhutas) in the Vedic ritual and cosmology, representing Agni, the powerful firegod and a cosmic principal that pervades the creation (Kinsley 1995: 55). It is the object of much Hindu mysticism and speculation; and in his role Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 227 as the all-pervader Agni is also said to exist in the three cosmic realms of Vedic cosmology, viz. the upper world (ākāsha), the realm of the earth (prithvi) and the underworld (pātāla). All the three principal characters of Agni are represented in Jvālāmāi and the nearby shrines. They are linked with the pilgrimage rituals by the pilgrims. Fire is central to the ritual act of possessing a territory and in the creation of a sacred site for worship, as exemplified with Muktināth. Moreover, Agni’s presence ensures communication between men and gods: divinity and humanity interactions. Eliade (1959: 30) notes that “the erection of an altar to Agni is nothing but the reproduction-on the microcosmic scale-of the Creation”. The association of fire with water and earth, as for example in the erection of a fire altar or as juxtaposed within the temple of Jvālāmāi, represents the creation and the Hinduisation of Muktināth’s sacred territory (kshetra). Close by also exist ‘Temple of the Lamps’ (mar-me lha-khang), ‘Temple of Encampment’ (sgar dgon- pa) and ‘Place of Mind-Perfection’ (bsan-grub- gling). Jvālāji is the main goddess of local Buddhist around Muktināth area. They call Jvālāji as Sale-Me-Bar, Dola-Me-Bar and Chhula-Me-Bar (sites of divine flames upon the soil, stone and water). Even today one can see the flame. Jvālāji Gompā (Buddhist), or Jvālāmāi (Hindu) is equally popular among the devout Buddhists and the Hindus. Occasionally one can hear some gurgle sound close to Jvālāji Gompā; this is explained by devotees as the sound of invisible river Mandākini, called Svarga Gangā (“the Gangā of the heaven”). This myth is comparable to the invisible Sarasvati river meeting at the confluence of the Gangā and the Yamunā at Prayaga (Allahabad). 3.7. Nrisimha Gompā The two-storied Nrisimha Gompā lies in the north-western side of Muktināth temple at a distance of about 65 metres. Local tales refer this temple as ancient one grown together with Muktināth. It occupies an area of 152.5 sq.m. with the height of 5m. The ground floor of the Gompā is used for religious activities, and the second for the residence of Jhomos. The principal deity of this Gompā is Padmasambhava whose clay image is sitting in padmāsana (cross-legged posture). It records a height of 2.5m and a width of 2.4m. On both sides of the main image exist images of the nurses (kha-do-nza). Among them one is Tibetan (Kha-do-ye-chho-gyal) and another Hindu (Man-d-re-wa). Another popular image enshrined in this Gompā is of Tibetan Tantrika Guru Sen-Dong. On account of its partial shape of lion Hindus pay their homage to this image as Nrisimha — the fourth incarnation of Vishnu. 228 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel The image of Vajra Vārāhi is also enshrined in one side of the Nrisimha Gompā. 3.8. Sang-Do-Gompā Located at the left-hand side of the entrance gate of the Muktināth compound, this shrine is now ruined. Images of the Gompā and construction materials indicate that it was one of the valuable shrines of the local Buddhist tradition. 4. Pouwās, or Dharmashālās (Pilgrims’ Rest House) For pilgrims’ stay and rest in Muktināth area several pouwas are built by different social organisations and the individuals within a proximate distance to Muktināth temple; they are commonly used for the accommodation of police and nuns (cf. Fig. 9.6). Out of them, the oldest and largest one is Rani Pouwa, located at a distance of half kilometre from Muktināth temple, and it was built in 1806 (as mentioned in the stone inscription there) by Subarna Prabha, the wife of King Rana Bahadur Shah. It has two storied builtup structure consisting of two large rooms, 55 windows and 26 doors. The stone-walled and mud-roofed Rani Pouwa can accommodate about 150 pilgrims at a time. The Pouwa is 43.71m long, 34.28m wide and 5.65m high, and has almost a rectangular shape. At the centre there exists an open ground of the dimension of 17.28 x 14.70m. Of course, there are five other Pouwas in the compound of Muktināth, however now they are not in proper use. Therefore, most of the pilgrims stay in Rani Pouwa, which is out of the compound. Nearby to the main gate, in the compound of Muktināth territory, exists Muktināth Darshana Smriti Van Vatika, developed in 1991, where 298 Nepalese and 112 foreigners (from 17 countries) have planted trees. The plantation programme was initiated by Svami H. H. Tridandi, a saint from Andhra Pradesh (India), on the 27th of January 1992 by a donation of NRs. 10,001 (about US $ 205 at rate of that time). Even the Ex-foreign minister of Japan Mr. Rhio Tara Hashimoto had also planted a tree in this garden. There does not exist any institution arousing religious consciousness, except an area of Rakhu Guthi — a piece of land registered in the name of sacred place to supply necessary products for the overseers and pilgrims staying there. Rakhu Guthi records an area of 432 ha khet/ irrigated land and 1086 ha bari/ non-irrigated land. This Guthi was formerly serving as Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 229 the supporting resource to the maintenance of Muktināth temple and associated Pouwas; however, presently its condition is not good. 5. Religious Festivities It is obvious from the literature that regular ritualistic activities (pujā) according to Hindu tradition had been started only after 1904 (Dhungel 1987: 1-15). Formerly only seasonal rituals, four times in a year, were performed. Nepal is a land of innumerable fairs and festivities and that is how these rituals fit to the lifeways of people. Most of the festivals are commonly celebrated by the Hindus and the Buddhists in a similar way. Special rituals and offerings to Muktināth are performed on the occasion of Rāma Naumi, Lord Rāma’s birth day (i.e. 9th of Chaitra lighthalf, waxing fortnight, March-April). On this occasion thousands of pilgrims from different parts of Nepal and India pay visit to Muktināth and take holy dips in the 108 water-spouts (Dhārā Tirtha), followed by darshana to Jvālāmāi - presenting oil lamps in her honour. Other important festive occasions were Akshaya Tritiya (3rd of Vaishakha lighthalf, waxing fortnight, April-May) and Badā Dashain/ Durgā Pujā (10th of Ashvina light-half, waxing fortnight, September-October). The Buddhists perform special rituals at the time of Losar (New Year) and Dhung-chu (both falling in January-February). 5.1. Rishitarpani, or Janaipurnimā On this festive day (Full-moon day in the month of Ashvina, Sept.Oct.) hundreds of pilgrims from Nepal and India visit Muktināth. Pilgrims who intend to visit Damodar Kunda come 3-4 days earlier to this day and return finally on that day to Muktināth. According to the local priest about 1500 pilgrims (mostly upper caste Hindus) visit Muktināth during the period of 3-4 days, and among which about hundred travel further to Damodar Kunda. The main motives of this pilgrimage are to perform rituals honouring the ancestors, offering sacred thread to and replacing their own sacred thread by the new one. Pilgrims believe that by these rituals they would receive peace and blessing of their ancestors. 5.2. Yār-Tong This is a Buddhist festival, symbolizing ‘thanksgiving to the rainy season’. Local villagers celebrate it individually a day before Rishitarpani, whereas in Purang and Jharkot (nearby to Muktināth) people celebrate this at the vicinity of Rani Pouwa on the day of Rishitarpani. People from the 230 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel surrounding eighteen villages dress in varieties of colourful clothes to celebrate Yār-Tong. After having auspicious glimpse to different images of Nrisimha and Jvālāji Gompā, the celebrants take active part in competitions like folk song (dohori git), horse race, dancing and some local games. This tradition is believed to be started by the legendry brother of Jumla Kalyal king. The festival continues during 3-4 days, and the last day is devoted to special meals. The magnitude of the festival depends upon the intensity of harvesting and production: if harvest is good, the magnitude would be high, and vice versa. This way the festival reflects the distinct relationship among sacred time-space, rhythm of season and sense of togetherness — agricultural cycle and festivity. Snellgrove (1989: 202) describes his participation: All the villages in the area were to send up parties on horse-back dressed in their finest clothes. They visit the 108 water-spouts ceremoniously and then a great horse-race is held. Khyeng-khar and Dzar sent up rehearsal parties five days before. They met on the track, and since all were rather drunk and neither party would make room for the other, a fight developed. 5.3. Badā Dashain/ Durgā Puja This is the largest celebrated festival in Nepal, and refers to the worship of Goddess Durgā. As a common tradition people celebrate this festival throughout Nepal, however at Muktināth this is a minor event. At Muktināth during Ashvina Krishnapaksha (i.e., Pitripaksha, dark-half, waning fortnight, September-October) special festivities take place at Muktināth, honouring ancestors. 6. Structure of Pilgrims and Tourists Though foreigners have started visiting the country since late 1960s, it is only after 1970 that Nepal virtually opened its door to the outside worlds. However, the Muktināth area became particularly popular after the opening of Manang valley in April 1977. During June 1992 - July 1993, 13,763 foreign tourists representing 53 countries, excluding India, visited Muktināth area (cf. H.M.G. 1993). Muktināth area (and parts of Annapurna range) consists of two unique features to be seen, viz. panoramic natural beauty, and the holy territory and its sacred places. This way Muktināth attracts a large mass of tourists and pilgrims equally. Hindu pilgrims from different parts of Nepal and India pay visit to Muktināth, however the spatial pattern of pilgrims during Ashvina Krishnapaksha (1993) marked distinctive characteristics. Kavrepalanchok Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 231 and Makawanpur districts in the east, and Gulmi and Rupandeni districts in the west record the longest distant of pilgrims’ belongingness (see Fig. 9.9). Comparing the origin of pilgrims by administrative zone, the highest share (42.4%) is recorded from Gandaki zone, the moderate share from Dhawalagiri (19.1%) and Lumbini zone (17.1%), and the lowest share from Bagman zone (4.1%). Fig. 9.9. Muktināth: Spatial flow of Pilgrims. From India, the majority are from Bombay (Mumbai), Madras (Chennai), Delhi, Bhuwaneshwar and Calcutta (Kolkata) (Fig. 9.9). Among them share of female pilgrims is relatively higher. Regarding the trekking tourists (for pleasure and recreation) five European countries, viz. France, Germany, Holland, Spain and U.K., comprise 62.2 per cent of total share, followed by Asians (28.3%), Americans (6.8%) and Africans (2.7%). The details of the statistical information of pilgrims and tourists and their male-female segregation are given in Table 9.1a, b. The malefemale ratio of trekking tourists was found 1: 0.5 (Oct. 1993). 232 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Table 9.1a. Muktināth: Pilgrims by countries Destination Dhawalagiri Zone 1. Myagdi 2. Baglung 3. Parbat Gandaki Zone 4. Kaski 5. Syangja 6. Tanahun 7. Gorkha 8. Lamjung Lumbini Zone 9. Gulmi 10. Palpa 11. Rupandeni 12. Nawalparasi Narayani Zone 13. Chiawan 14. Makawanpur Bagmati Zone 15. Kathmandu 16. Lalitpur 17. Kavre INDIA TOTAL Male Female Total %age 21 48 15 24 47 18 45 95 33 5.0 10.5 3.6 107 26 20 13 13 143 30 19 14 13 250 56 39 27 26 27.6 6.2 4.3 3.0 2.8 1 35 21 12 1 36 21 11 2 71 42 23 0.2 7.8 4.6 2.5 48 1 44 3 92 4 10.2 0.4 3 7 7 40 438 6 8 8 25 469 9 13 15 65 907 1.0 1.7 1.7 7.2 100.0 (Source for all the followed up tables: Field survey). M, males: F, females. Table 9.1b. Muktināth: Tourists by countries Destination Male U.S.A. Canada U.K. France Germany Spain Netherlands Japan Africa India Nepal Total 3 1 1 4 10 6 2 3 1 14 3 48 Tourists Total -1 5 2 11 -5 -1 1 -26 Female %age 3 2 6 6 21 6 7 3 2 15 3 74 4.1 2.7 8.1 8.1 28.4 8.1 9.5 4.0 2.7 20.3 4.0 100.0 Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 233 6.1. Age Structure Hindus above the age of 40 were found more oriented to perform pilgrimage. It is obvious from Table 9.2 that 64.4 per cent of pilgrims arrived at Muktināth were above the age of 40. It is observed that that majority of visitors below the age of 40 years were, in fact, not the actual pilgrims; rather they came as helping hands and accompanying persons with their parents and relatives. This way the total figure of pilgrims and tourists between the age of 20 and 40 years reached to 32 per cent and 78 per cent, respectively (see Table 9.2). The proximity of distance, more acceptability of locality together with its projection as universality, the strong belief system that fits to the hilly landscape, the continuity of traditions and customs ― all together make Nepalese strong believer to the pilgrimage to Muktināth, that is how their share reaches to above 90 per cent. In his classical study Messerschmidt (1989b: 117) concludes: The behaviour of the pilgrims we encountered reflects the structure of the Brahmanical order and ethos. The zealous Hindu engaged in tirtha-yatra (pilgrimage), does his or her best to follow the strict rules of interpersonal association and commensality, and to maintain the well-defined bounds of orthodox caste propriety while engaged in the sacred quest. The sincerely orthodox devotee would not deliberately go out of his way to seek interpersonal relationships that might abrogate the rules or seriously endanger his social or ritual status. Rather, a pilgrimage is entered into in order to highlight and more fully confirm one’s relationship to God and to one’s fellow human beings. Table 9.2. Age Structure of Pilgrims Age (year) 1. < 20 2. 20-30 3. 30-40 4. 40-50 5. 50-60 6. + 60 Total Nepali 24 91 182 261 196 88 842 Pilgrims Indian Total 24 5 96 12 194 17 .278 23 219 8 96 65 907 %age 2.6 10.6 21.4 30.7 24.1 10.6 100.0 Tourists Total %age 2 2.7 31 41.9 27 36.4 7 9.5 7 9.5 --74 100.0 The above situation is still prevalent, of course during the last two decades changes made and several impositions of traditions marked, however the old traditions predominate the overall scene. 234 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Table 9.3. Pilgrims’ Groups No. of pilgrims (group) Single 2-5 6-10 11-20 21-30 + 30 Total No. of group -20 21 26 9 2 78 %age -25.5 27.0 33.3 11.6 2.6 100.0 6.2. Pilgrims’ Frequency in Groups The main shrine of Muktināth is located in the remote area of Himalaya; therefore pilgrims visit this place in the groups: of course there appear other reasons for group pilgrimage. The field survey (cf. Table 9.3) shows that above sixty per cent pilgrims travel in the group of 6-20 persons. The percentage of small group (2-5 persons) is relatively higher than the percentage of large size group (+ 21 persons). Difficulty in managing food and accommodation facility for large groups is the prime factor, for the preference of small group. Moreover, joint family and closed socio-economic affinity with the neighbours are the other important factors promoting smaller groups. The majority of pilgrims stay only one night at Muktināth, while only few tourists stay 2-3 nights there during their travelling period of 10 days from Dumre via Manang (3,505 m) and Thorung Pass (5,416 m). Table 9.4. Pilgrims by times of Visits Se 1. 2. 3. 4. Total times I II III IV Nepali 754 61 17 10 842 Pilgrims Indian Total 65 819 61 17 10 65 907 %age 90.3 6.7 1.9 1.1 100 Tourists Total %age 59 79.7 12 16.2 --3 4.1 74 100 6.3. Frequency of Visit Only a lower proportion of total pilgrims repeat their pilgrimage to Muktināth, like other shrines in remote areas (cf. Bhardwaj 1973: 160). It was observed that majority of pilgrims (89.5%) and tourists (79.7%) had not visited Muktināth previously (cf. Table 9.4). Only about 10 per cent pilgrims and 20 per cent tourists visited Muktināth twice and more than Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 235 twice. This tendency indicates pilgrims’ high faith and religious consciousness, while tourists’ share indicates their wish to have passion from the silent message from the Himalayan scenery and pristine culture of native people. 6.4. Purpose and Motive of Visit The high-level sacred place (e.g. Pan-Hindu, Supra-regional) like Muktināth is visited largely for general purificatory merit (cf. Bhardwaj 1973: 163). Our surveys show that pilgrims also visit this place for the specific purposes (see Table 9.5). The majority (79.1%) of the pilgrims had visited Muktināth for the ancestral rite and glancing together. However, the purpose of the majority of Indian pilgrims (75.4%) was glancing which ultimately provides purificatory merit and liberation from the cycle of transmigration. Higher percentage (60.4%) of son and daughter-in-laws accompanied with (see Table 9.6) further shows the highest percentage of both the above purposes — ancestral rite and glancing (cf. Table 9.5). In general the majority of pilgrims visit Muktināth to perform ancestral rite. Among the accompanied persons the dominance of sons and daughters is noted obviously (Table 9.6), followed by father and mother. Thus together they share about three-fourths of the pilgrims. However, finally no generalization can he proposed. Table 9.5. Pilgrims’ motive of Visit Motive/Purpose Glancing, darshana The above two Miscellaneous Total Nepali 107 704 31 842 Indian 49 13 3 65 Total 156 717 34 907 %age 17.2 79.1 3.7 100 Table 9.6. Pilgrims’ accompanying Persons Se 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. -- Accompanied persons Father / Mother-in-law Son / Daughter-in-law Brother & Brother-in-law Relatives Hired people Unidentified Total Nepali 99 528 136 64 15 842 Indian 8 20 18 5 4 10 65 Total 107 548 154 69 19 10 907 %age 11.8 60.4 17.0 7.6 2.1 1.1 100.0 Generally the days spent by pilgrims on their pilgrimage refer to the distance covered (see Table 9.7). The majority of pilgrims (77.5%) had 236 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel spent more than a weak, and only a small portion of them (22.5%) spent less than a weak during pilgrimage to Muktināth. It is notable that almost all the Indian pilgrims spent more than 10 days during this journey. The time spent is directly related to the nature and terrain and distant location. Table 9.7. Pilgrims by Duration Days spent <5 5-7 8-10 + 10 Total Number 35 169 508 195 907 %age 3.9 18.6 56.0 21.5 100.0 Describing the purpose and motive of the pilgrims in late 1970s and early 1980s Messerschmidt (1989b: 116) found that “something more profound than friendliness and communitas motivates these pilgrims”. It is rare that Hindus go there for adventure or for fun. He adds (ibid.) that: Their quest is not jātrā, a fair, but yātrā, a sacred experience. The devout pilgrim’s primary objective for going to Muktināth, or to any Hindu shrine, is to do worship and receive darshana of God. In the particular case of Muktināth, the arduous task of travelling to the holy site and the observance of strict personal austerity on the way makes it very special. The fact of being there on the doubly ostentatious occasion of Janai Purnimā [Full Moon festival] makes it all the more important. 6.5. Expenditure Structure Caste is one of the fundamental aspects of Hindus’ social structure, Though invariably higher and lower castes pay visit to Muktināth, the percentage of higher castes (Brahmin, and Kshatriya/ Chhatri) dominates (71.8%) the total mass of pilgrims. One can note that pilgrims from higher caste Hindus are relatively in better economic status for affordability. The percentage of pilgrims spent more than NRs 1000 was only about 30 per cent, while less than NRs 1000 recorded about 70 per cent (Table 9.8). Following the common tradition most of the pilgrims going to Muktināth carry with them the ready-made food (e.g. sattu, powder of parched grain, and khette, dried items) which help to support their half of the food requirement. They also carry with them sufficient amount of rice, ghee, dried vegetables, some spices, etc. They have to pay some charge for shelter, cooking utensils, firewood and green vegetables. This way one can Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 237 assume that the economic status of pilgrims is not distinctively reflected in the pilgrimage to Muktināth. Table 9.8. Amount spent by Pilgrims during Pilgrimage, NRs Se. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Money spent (NRs : in ‘00) <5 5-10 10-15 15-20 + 20 Total Nepali 155 471 143 45 28 842 No. of Pilgrims Indian Total -155 -471 -143 -45 65 93 65 907 %age 17.4 51.9 15.8 5.0 10.2 100.0 (Conversion rate: US$ 1 = NRs 50, in 1993). It is generally accepted that Hindus are more oriented to religious activities, like Tirtha Yātrā (pilgrimage), in the old age and preferably husband and wife together as supported by their major share in the total pilgrims visited Muktināth (i.e., 92.9 per cent). 6.6. Means of Transportation Muktināth is not connected with any means of transportation, except the trail. Jomsom, lying at 24 km from Muktināth and taking about 5 hours of walking, is connected by daily air service from Pokhra and Kathmandu. From Jomsom one can march to Muktināth; however, over eighty per cent of Nepalese pilgrims arrive at Jomsom on foot. Table 9.9. Means of Transportation used by Pilgrims to visit Muktināth. Means used 1. on foot 2. one way air 3. both ways air 4. pony 5. human-back Total Nepali A B 686 830 124 -32 --9 -3 842 842 Indian A B -51 38 -27 --14 --65 65 A 686 162 59 --907 % 75.6 17.9 6.5 --100.0 Total B 881 --23 3 907 % 97.1 --2.6 0.3 100.0 A, Travel up to Jomsom; B, Jomsom to Muktināth. Almost all the Indian pilgrims had used airline service one way, or both the ways. Less than a quarter of Indian pilgrims had used pony, and less than a per cent Nepalese pilgrims had used human-hack to reach Muktināth (cf. Table 9.9). Pony and human-back are used normally to 238 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel travel from Jomsom air port to Muktināth. Since 2006 sixteen tractors and 130 motorcycles and from 2008 nine Jeep began to provide services to the visitors from Ghasa, lower Mustang. All these vehicles were lifted by Helicopter from Pokhara (KC 2008: 59). The present dirt road links Mustang with Pokhara-Baglung national highway. 6.7. Pilgrims already visited other Sacred Places Pilgrims have passion to pay homage at different levels of sacred places (e.g. local, regional and Pan-Hindu). The survey shows that only one-tenth of pilgrims had visited Pan-Hindu level sacred places like Kashi/ Varanasi, Badrināth-Kedarnāth, and Rāmeshvaram (all in India) in their life, while 56 per cent of Nepalese pilgrims had not visited sacred places outside Nepal (see Table 9.10). More than half of Indian pilgrims had already visited other holy places and also the above mentioned sites. This way there exists a clear contrast between Nepalese and Indian pilgrims. Table 9.10. Pilgrims already visited other Sacred Places of India Se 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Sacred place Kashi/ Varanasi Badrinath-Kedarnath Rameshvaram The above (1 to 3) Gaya and Haridvar No other place Total Nepali 134 68 45 60 64 471 842 Indian 11 --35 9 10 65 Total 145 68 45 95 73 481 907 %age 16.0 7.5 5.0 10.5 8.0 53.0 100.0 Table 9.11. Pilgrims’ Response to the three most Sacred Places of Nepal Rank 1 -2 -3 -4 5 6 7 Sacred place Pashupathinath Muktināth Damodar Kunda Lumbini Devaghat Janakpur Gosain Kunda Svargadvari Keladighat Rum (Ridi) Pf (frequency) 823 823 211 204 102 93 68 55 53 37 %age of total 90.1 90.1 23.3 22.5 11.2 10.3 7.5 6.1 5.8 4.1 On the quest about three most important sacred places, Nepalese pilgrims had equally ranked Pashupatināth and Muktināth at the 1st order; Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 239 Dāmodar Kunda and Lumbini at the 2nd order; and 3rd order Devaghāt and Janakpur (cf. Table 9.11). Four more centres of regional importance were also noted. Out of the total 907 pilgrims surveyed 84 had responded “Don’t know”. 6.8. Accommodation Facility and Shops Increasing accommodation facilities and shops indicate the temporal change and requirements needed by pilgrims and tourists at a particular site. The establishment of different Pouwas (pilgrims’ rest houses) close to Muktināth directly reflects the increasing influx of pilgrims, whereas the opening of hotels is to facilitate the trekking tourists. There is no government guesthouse and classified hotel at Muktināth. During the survey period (October 1993) it was found that at Rani Pouwa village, the nearest settlement, to Muktināth, the majority of hotels exist. Except the one, all the hotels are managed by the local people. It is obvious from the statistics that in total 123 rooms with accommodation facility of 276 beds have been available in the hotels at Muktināth, Ranipouwa, Jharkot and Khinga together (cf. Table 9.12). The field survey conducted in 2009 showed that a total of 24 hotels with 126 rooms and 415 beds provide accommodation and catering services to the visitors. This shows that the hotels at these locations have notably increased in numbers of beds and also in the existing rooms. Most of these hotels are established after 1991. Table 9.12. Muktināth: Accommodation capacity in hotels Bed/room Single Double Common Total No. of rooms 16 67 40 123 No. of beds 15 124 125 278 Table 9.13. Muktināth: Types of shops Shop Ritual articles Woollen and handicrafts Retailing Tea stall Total No. 4 6 7 5 22 During the peak season the demand of beds in hotels at Muktināth goes very high than their capacity. Majority of the beds are occupied by tourists. Therefore, pilgrims have to go in the Pouwas for shelter. No 240 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel facility of accommodation is supported by the religious community or organisation. There are only 22 shops at Muktināth, which can be classified into four groups; however they are of miscellaneous nature (cf. Table 9.13). Since 1993 fifty per cent increase of these shops was recorded in 2009. During the peak pilgrimage season most of the ritual article shops and woollen & handicraft shops display their articles along the trail-side, nearby to their houses. 7. Towards the Spirit of Sacred Place Muktināth Kshetra is identically mytholised with Shālagrāma Kshetra cf. Fig. 9.2), where found abundantly ammonites, the fossil remnants of an extinct form of mollusk (of the class Cephalopoda) with a coiled, flat, chambered shell. These creatures lived and left their remains under the prehistoric Sea of Tethys that separated the supercontinents of Laurasia and Gondwanaland well before the continental collision that created the Himalayan uplift joining the Indian subcontinent to what is now Tibet (see Molnar and Tapponnier 1979). Local genera of the cephalopodan mollusk specific to Muktināth include Prograyiceras, Blanfordiceras, and Paraboliceras (Messerschmidt (1989a: 98). Because of their unique internal shape as wheels or spirals (chakra) they are worshiped as epithets of Lord Vishnu (Nārāyana). Some hardy pilgrims even make the three-to-four day trek to collect specimens from the fossil beds of Dāmodar Kunda, the high lake. It is believed that unbroken ammonites are the most efficacious and that it is sinful to deliberately break the stone and open it to expose the internal impression of the fossil. There is an inscription on stone near the Vishnu Mandir attributed to the nineteenth-century Nepali Prime Minister, Jang Bahadur Rana, that admonishes people not to break or sell fossils (ibid.: 98). Hindus have great faith in the Shālagrāma. They popularly believe that in Muktikshetra the insect which perforates chakra (disc) linings in Shālagrāma is Lord Vishnu himself, who by curse of Brahma became a worm, Vajrakita, inside the stone; this afflicted him for twelve years. At the expiration of that period Vishnu resumed his real face, but He wished that Shālagrāma found in Muktikshetra (Kāli/Krishnā-Gandaki basin) should be worshipped as His manifestation. This way the Shālagrāma is worshipped in daily rituals as Vishnu’s image. Brahmins refer it as panchāyatana pujā. There also exist several other ways of rituals including at the time of death when the water in which Shālagrāma is Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 241 dipped, sprinkled upon the dead body with a feeling that the soul would get a good place in Vishnu’s abode. Arkel (1956) has identified eleven species from the larger surrounding region. They come in two forms, as internal casts and as external moulds. The black Shālagrāmas are found along the banks of the Jhong river in the Muktināth valley, and lower down along the course of the Kāli/ KrishnāGandaki where they are avidly collected by pilgrims and other travellers. According to the characteristics like size, hollowness, linings, colours and related features various connotations are endowed upon the Shālagrāma. Most commonly they are classified into 32 types identified with different natures and four basic colours, viz. black, red, yellow and blue (for list see Kaschewsky 1994: 150-151). Further with the mark of circles and colours the Shālagrāma is named after its association with the various names/ forms of Vishnu (see ibid.: 155-157). The details of each of the 32 types together with their merits and the ways of performing rituals are given in the Agni Purāna (46, 47). The most popular 14 Shālagrāmas (cf. Dutta 1985: 178; also Kaschewsky 1994: 150-151) are: Ananta (in the form of a cobra hood) Aniruadha (yellow, circular) Damodara (one circle, two small dots) Janardana (four circles) Krishna (black, circular) Matsya (long, crystal coloured) Pradyumna (six circles) Purushottama (eight circles) Sankarshana (red, two circles) Shridhara (circular, with a wreath of forest flowers) Sudarshana (one circle) Vaikuntha (with a circle and lotus) Vamana (round, blue) Vishnu (black, rod shaped) Pilgrims believe that a pilgrim at Muktināth who finds Shālagrāma whose chakra is discovered by rubbing away one portion of it, certainly receives moksha (liberation) from all sorts of bindings, bondages and sins. And, one who finds Shālagrāma with convolutions towards the right can never be a poor person. Hindus also believe that breaking a Shālagrāma will lead to misfortune, similarly to sell it too. The local Bhotia villagers commonly collect and sell whole or deliberately broken ammonites as souvenirs to believers and non-believers alike. These “souvenir” fossils can be found for sale in the tourist markets of Pokhara and Kathmandu. Some people claim that the fossils contain gold or diamonds, but in reality 242 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel what they find shining inside are fragments of pyrite or quartz crystal Messerschmidt (1989a: 100). A purānic myth also refers as to how Vishnu took the form of Shālagrāma and those who worship Shālagrāma together with tulasi (holy basil) leaves will receive a highest merit. According to Eliadean approach everything that is out of ordinary and novel could become hierophany. This can be exemplified with subtle interpretation of the Shālagrāma which manifests the image of Vishnu; thus in other way it could be said that for redemptive purpose Vishnu became Shālagrāma “the god shows himself to them (devotees) by taking on their inferior mode of being” (Eliade 1958: 27-28). The marriage ritual of Shālagrāma with tulasi plant (symbolizing Lakshmi), in fact, refers to the primitive symbol of “holy place” which preserves the power of coupling of stone and plant (ibid.: 226). This is parallel to the other form of symbolism referring Shālagrāma, the male energy of Vishnu, and the Kāli/ Krishnā -Gandaki, the female energy of his wife, Lakshmi. The associative symbols and ritual performances attached can be compared with the concept of liminality, which refers to the root meaning of threshold — passing from the one yet not reaching to the end — ”betwixt and between”. The pilgrims visiting Muktināth also experience liminality — leaving the profane environment they experience sacred environment. They feel themselves in the state of awareness of revelation, yet at other end not revealed. These paradox pilgrims carry with them and tell to their friends; in span of time other groups follow the pilgrimage and again in the same way the cycle proceeds. Neither they fully leave their emotional feelings to their homes, nor do they fully become part of the divine landscape. This paradox is articulated by their faith, traditions and symbolism side-by-side and the narrative mythology ― this ultimately results to form the faithscape where experiential feelings and belief systems meet together and form a new “theosphere” (cf. Singh 2002: 17). The concept of faithscape is an “expressive sphere” of specific milieu of place with emotional and symbolic features of experience that contains feelings and meanings which may be expressed through objects, structures, forms, surfaces, images, myths and legends, memories, and dreams (cf. Walter 1988: 146-158). However, the magnitude of “expressive sphere” depends upon how well the mental image map (sensitivity) of a person puts to the inputs of his senses. If it is intense and high every piece of particle giving message be received, otherwise the situation may differ. In the earlier case the way of viewing the world becomes divine and cosmic ― the one spirit in the whole cosmic integrity. Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 243 8. Concluding Remarks In a recent study of Lumbini, western Nepal, Nyaupane’s (2009: 157) remark that “despite its potential for attracting Western, regional and domestic tourists and a growing trend in arrivals, the community and the region have not benefited well from tourism” is true substantially in case of Muktināth. But currently experiencing “latent dissonance”, can be reduced through communication, cooperation and collaboration among various stakeholders (ibid.). In the modern era of crises where we cry for an ecological order and human peace, mass of people are still running after materialistic achievements, nevertheless it is now realized that somehow we lack to experience the harmonic relationship between Man and Nature. We are now searching for the earth spirit — a manifestive divine-magnetic power — through which we may feel ourselves cheerful and peaceful. Pilgrimage to places where nature still predominates and mythic landscape is alive (e.g. at Muktināth), man’s power of sensitivity would help, we hope, to receive and experience that the mother Earth is alive and still ready to bliss her children if their heart and soul be opened for her love. It does not mean that one should follow the local rituals and performances. There is more need for participatory and behavioural information from stakeholders together with potentials and prospects for tourists-pilgrims from abroad, linking with economic policy and eco-tourism (cf. Sharma 2006: 46-48). After all religion is a personal matter. Everybody is free to choose performances according to his/her own eternal quest, or believes, however one should also respect the local traditions by being part of it and a wish to have experience. This essay is closed here by an insightful message by Jim Swan (1990: 221) which should be taken as call of the time: “The real reason for going to a sacred place, however, is not just to get high. The purpose is to come into harmony with the greater unity of all life so that you can become who you are and then serve others according to who you are”. 9. References Arkell, W.J. 1956. Jurassic Geology of the World. Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh and London. Bhardwaj, Surinder M. 1993. Hindu Places of Pilgrimage in India. University of California Press, Berkeley. Dahal, S.P. 1988. Muktikshetra. Muktikshetra Sodhkirti Prakashan Samiti, Jomsom, Mustang. V. Smt. 2045. 244 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Dhungel, R. 1987. Dāmodar Kunda eka Parichaya. Nepali Sanskriti (a quarterly of Sanskriti Sansthan), 2 (1). VS 2044. Dutta, M. N. 1985. Agni Purāna. Cosmo Publ., New Delhi. Vol. 1. Eliade, Mircea 1958. Patterns in Comparative Religion. Sheed & Ward, London. ―. 1959. The Sacred and the Profane. The Nature of Religion; [translated from the French by Willard R. Trask]. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Publishers, San Diego/New York. Glasenapp, Helmuth von 1928. Heilige Statten Indiens. Gerg Munchen Verlag, Munchen. Gurung, Harka 1980. Vigenetts of Nepal. Sajha Prakashan, Kathmandu. Hamilton, F. B. 1971. An Account of the Kingdom of Nepal. Manjushri Pub. House, Delhi. H. M. G. 1993. Record of Trekking Permit Checking Booth. Ministry of Home Affairs, District Police Office, Jomsom, Mustang. H. M. G., CBS 1993. Census Record of Mustang District. Central Bureau of Statistics, Nepal, Kathmandu. Jest, C., 1981. Monuments of Northern Nepal. UNESCO Press, Paris. Kane, Pandurang Vaman 1973. History of Dharmashastra. vol. IV. 2nd ed. Government Oriental Series B, No.6. Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Poona. Kaschewsky, Rudolf 1994. Muktināth - A Pilgrimage place in the Himalayas. Geographia Religionum (Berlin), Bd. 8: 139-168. KC, Dik Bahadur 2008.Vehicle management in Mustang District, in Pokhrel, R. (ed.) Mustang Sandesh (in Nepali). Employees Club, Mustang: 59-61. Kinsley, David R. 1995. Ecology and Religion. Ecological Spirituality in Cross-Cultural Perspective. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs NJ. Kirkpatrik, Colonel 1975. An Account of the Kingdom of Nepal. Asian Pub. Services, New Delhi. Originally in 1793, based on his journey accounts as missionary. MacDonald, A.W. 1979. A Tibetan guide to some holy places of the Dhaulagiri-Muktināth area of Nepal. Studies in Pali and Buddhism (Delhi): 243-253. Manandhar, K. M. 1977. Muktināth. The Rising Nepal, 25 November: 2 f. Messerschmidt, Donald A. 1981. Hindu pilgrimage in the Nepal Himalayas. Current Anthropology (Research Conclusions), 22 (5): 571-572. ―. 1982. Social process on the Hindu pilgrimage to Muktināth. Kailash A Journal of Himalayan Studies (Kathmandu), 9 (2-3): 139-157. Pilgrimage-Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal 245 ―. 1989 a. The Hindu Pilgrimage to Muktināth, Nepal. Part 1. Natural and Supernatural Attributes of the Sacred Field. Mountain Research and Development, 9 (2), May: 89-104. ―. 1989 b. The Hindu Pilgrimage to Muktināth, Nepal. Part 2. Vaishnava Devotees and Status Reaffirmation. Mountain Research and Development, 9 (2), May: 105-118. Messerschmidt, Donald A. and Sharma, Jyoti D. 1980. Himalayan pilgrimage to the Hindu shrine at Muktināth: Cultural Meaning and Social Process. Report to the National Geographic Society, Committee on Research and Exploration, Grant No. 2139-80 <Unpublished>. Molnar, P. and Tapponnier, P. 1977. The collision between India and Eurasia. Scientific American, 236 (4): 30-41. Nyaupane, Gyan P. 2009. Heritage complexity and tourism: the case of Lumbini, Nepal. Journal of Heritage Tourism, 4 (2), May: 157-171. Paul, R.A. 1982. The Tibetan Symbolic World. Psychoanalytic Explorations. University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London. Poudel, Padma C. 2000. Muktināth, Nepal: Spiritual Magnetism and Complexity in Space. The Himalayan Review, 31 (1): 37-50. Poudel, Padma C. and Singh, Rana P.B. 1994. Pilgrimage and Tourism at Muktināth, Nepal: A Study of Sacrality and Spatial Structure; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) The Spirit & Power of Place. Human Environment and Sacrality. National Geographical Society of India, Varanasi, Pub. 41: 249-268. Regmi, P. and Regmi, A. (eds.) 2009. District Profile: Mustang District. Government of Nepal, Central Bureau of Statistics, Branch Office, Baglung. Sharma, Sunil 2006. Focusing on Regional Tourism Markets: Prospects and Challenge for Nepal. Economic Policy Network, Policy Paper 28; September. <Retrieved on 15 June 2010>, web: http://www.mof. gov.np/economic_policy/pdf/Focusing_Regional.pdf Singh, Rana P.B. 2002. Towards the Pilgrimage Archetype. Panchakroshi Yatra of Banaras. Pilgrimage & Cosmology Series: Pub. 3. Indica Books, Varanasi. Snellgrove, David 1989 (1961). Himalayan Pilgrimage: A Study of Tibetan Religion by a Traveller through Western Nepal. Shambhala, Boston, 2nd edition. Swan, James A. 1990. Sacred Places. How the Living Earth Seeks our Friendship. Bear & Co., Santa Fe, NM. Tulasidas [1992]. Rāmacharitamānasa; in Hindi. Gita Press, Gorakhpur. A late 16th century epic. 246 9. Rana P.B. Singh & Padma C. Poudel Turner, R. L. 1965 (1931). A Comparative and Etymological Dictionary of the Nepali Language. Routledge & Kegan Paul, London. Yogi, N. (ed.) 1956. Himālavatakhanda. Yog Pracharini, Gorakshatilla (Kashi), Varanasi. Walter, Eugene V. 1988. Placeways. A Theory of the Human Environment. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill. Zurick, David N. 1992. Adventure travel and sustainable tourism in the peripheral economy of Nepal. Annals, Association of American Geographers, 82 (4), December: 608-628. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Prof. Rana P.B. Singh Professor of Cultural Geography & Heritage Studies, Banaras Hindu University, New F - 7 Jodhpur Colony, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA. Email: ranapbs@gmail.com § Rana is researching in the fields of heritage planning, pilgrimages and settlement systems in Varanasi region since over last three decades as promoter, collaborator and organiser. On these topics he lectured at centres in all parts of the world. His publications include over 190 papers and 38 books on these subjects, including Banaras, the Heritage City of India: Geography, History, and Bibliography (IB 2009), and the eight books under ‘Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series’: - five from Cambridge Scholars Publishing UK: Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India (2009), Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century (2009), Cosmic Order & Cultural Astronomy (2009), Banaras, Making of India’s Heritage City (2009), Sacred Geography of Goddesses in South Asia (2010), and - three from Shubhi Publications (New Delhi, India): Heritagescapes and Cultural Landscapes (2011), Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems (2011), and Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India (2011). Prof. Padma C. Poudel Professor, Central Department of Geography, University Campus, Tribhuwan University, Kirtipur, Kathmandu. NEPAL. Tel.: (0991)- 4487531; cell: (0)-9841-284316. Email: poudelpc@hotmail.com ; poudelpc@yahoo.com § Poudel did his doctoral research on ‘Tourist Resources & Environmental Appraisal in Pokhara Region, Nepal’ (1996) from Banaras Hindu University, India. He is member of academic council and research committee, Tribhuban University, and general secretary of Nepal Geographical Society. He is an advisor of Nepal Tourism Board and involved in different research projects related in the fields of tourism resource appraisal, planning, and related environmental issues. He has published several research papers in this field of concerns. 10 The Mythic Landscape of Buddhist Places of Pilgrimages in India Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Banaras Hindu University, India Rana ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. The idea of pilgrimage to sacred places in Buddhism was established by the Buddha himself. Before he passed into Mahaparinibbana, the Buddha advised his close disciples to visit four places that may be for their inspiration after he was gone. They are Lumbini, where he was born; Bodh Gaya, where he attained supreme enlightenment; Deer Park in Sarnath, where he preached the First Sermon; and Kushinagar, where he passed into Mahaparinibbana. The literary sources refer that the follower should certainly visit these places having feelings of reverence, as these places reflect the four special events of the Buddha’s life. In passage of time these four sacred places and associated shrines have become the focal points of inspiration and revelation for any follower. By the time of King Ashoka, four more places, viz. Sravasthi, Sankisa, Rajagir and Vaishali, that were closely associated with the Buddha and scenes of his principal miracles, were added to the list of sacred places. Together they make the Eight Great Places of pilgrimage in Buddhism. Of course, Buddhism had disappeared by the 13th century, however under the guidance of Anagarika Dharmapala (1865-1933), Mahabodhi Society get established and took the leading role in re-establishing and maintaining the tradition of pilgrimages to all the major Buddhist sites. Keywords: Bodh Gaya, Buddhism, Kushinagar, Lumbini, pilgrimage, Rajagir, spirit of place, Sankisa, Sarnath, Sravasthi, Vaishali. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction From the Buddha’s death, or parinirvana, to the destruction of Nalanda (the last Buddhist stronghold in India) in 1197 CE, Buddhism in India went through three phases, often referred as Hinayana, Mahayana, and Vajrayana. The Hinayana, or the Lesser Way, insists on a monastic way of life as the only path to achieving nirvana. Divided into many schools, the 248 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana only surviving Hinayana tradition is the Theravada (Sthaviravada), or the Way of the Elders, which was taken to Sri Lanka by the Emperor Ashoka’s son Mahinda, where it became the state religion under King Dutthagamini in the 1st century CE. In contrast, the followers of the Mahayana, or the Greater Way, believed in the possibility of salvation for all by practising devotional meditation. One of the most notable Mahayana philosophers was the 2nd or 3rd century saint, Nagarjuna. The 3rd school, called the Vajrayana or the Thunderbolt Way, resembles magic and yoga in some of its beliefs; it tries to get in harmony with the cosmos so as to be able to manifest the cosmic forces within and without oneself. The places visited by the Buddha were interconnected by roads used mostly by caravan traders, in whose company the religious people usually travelled for the sake of food, safety and other conveniences as the monks also were not immune from the hands of highway robbers. Many of the holy places were also famous as economic centres and were linked by trade routes. The area covered by the Buddha’s pilgrimages and his missionary activities was confined mostly to the central and eastern parts of India, from Kaushambi in the west to Kushinagar and Rajgir in the east, and from Shravasti in the north to Banaras (Sarnath) in the south. Before the rise of Buddhism the Vedic religion had held its sway in this region for a pretty long time. During the period of Emperor Ashoka (270-232 BCE) Buddhism was transformed into a religious movement and also transcendded the boundaries of India. To make it a popular religion Ashoka promoted the prevalent cult of worship of local holy places (chaitya) which were easily accessible to everyone without distinction. It was an inexpensive and non-violent religious practice. Obviously, it was against the expensive rituals and animal sacrifices that could be commissioned only by rich people and performed only by the Brahmins who had the exclusive right and expertise to perform them. Although Buddhism got patronage from various ancient kings from time to time, there were a few cases of its persecution by certain rulers like the Brahmin king Pushyamitra Sunga (ca. 2nd century BCE), king Mihirakula of the Huna dynasty in the 6th century, and a Shaivite king of Bengal, Shashanka, who had damaged and tried to uproot the Bodhi Tree at Bodh Gaya. But the cruelest blow came during the 12th and the 13th centuries from the Muslim invaders who brutally massacred monks, demolished monasteries, and destroyed the Buddhist centres of learning and their libraries located at Nalanda, Vikramashila, Odantapuri and elsewhere. After the passage of time Buddhism slowly disappeared from Indian soil. However, above all the symbolic physical presence and the cultural roots have survived and since the mid 20th century these places are accepted as sites of peace. The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 249 Fig. 10.1. North India and Nepal: The Buddhist sites ( * ), roads and other sites. 250 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana “Ananda, there are four places the sight of which should arouse a sense of urgency in the faithful. Which are they? ‘Here the Tathagata was born’ is the first. ‘Here the Tathagata attained supreme enlightenment’ is the second. ‘Here the Tathagata set in motion the Wheel of the Dhamma’ is the third. ‘Here the Tathagata attained Parinirvana without remainder’ is the fourth. And, Ananda, the faithful monks and nuns, while making the pilgrimage to these shrines with a devout heart will, at the breaking up of the body after death, be reborn in a heavenly world…” ― Mahaparinibbana Sutta, 5.8. Thus, according to Buddhist tradition, the Buddha spoke to his chief attendant Ananda in the very last discourse he delivered before his death (around 483 BCE). Referring to himself as the Tathagata, or Perfected One, the Buddha prescribed four places of pilgrimage to his followers. He also gave hints for the celebrations to be performed at his funeral pyre. In doing so, he enshrined the activity of pilgrimage as an important act of the Buddhist’s life — an act sanctioned by scriptural recommendation. He tied the Buddhist conception of pilgrimage, at least in its original form, specifically and explicitly to those places that witnessed the most significant events of his life; these are Lumbini (birth), Bodh Gaya (enlightenment), Sarnath (first preaching), and Kushinagar (parinirvana, final release). The other four sites associated with the Great Miracles performed by the Buddha and accepted as places of pilgrimages are Rajagriha (Rajgir), where the Lord tamed a mad elephant, Vaishali, where a monkey offered honey to him, Shravasti, where the Lord took his seat on a thousand petalled lotus and created multiple representations of himself, and Sankisa (Sankasya), where he descended from the heaven. Altogether this group of 8 holy places are called Atthamahathanani (ashtamahasthanani; represented in one of the stone slabs, kept in Sarnath museum). In this list the later additions are the place of childhood (Kapilavastu), the place of several sermons in the 6th and 9th years of enlightenment (Kaushambi), and the place where the Buddha gave his begging bowl to the people (Kesariya). According to the Jatakas, the Buddha visited Nalanda several times; this is the place from where the history of the monastic establishments can be traced back to the days of Ashoka. Altogether these twelve places have become the most revered places of Buddhist pilgrimage. Among these twelve places, Sarnath, Kushinagar, Shravasti, Sankisa, Kapilavastu and Kaushambi are in the state of Uttar Pradesh and are approachable from the central point of Varanasi, or Lucknow. Moreover, the birthplace, Lumbini, is in Nepal at the border of the district of Siddharthnagar. Further, Kesariya and Vaishali are also easily accessible and interlinked with the Buddhist circuit of pilgrimage- The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 251 tourism, taking Varanasi as centre (see Fig. 10.1). In the pilgrimage circuit of the Buddha’s footprints Gaya, Patna and Mathura are also sometimes included, because at those places too the Buddha passed some of his stays. Thus, in total 15 places mentioned above are accepted as the sacred sites in the Buddhist pilgrimage ― having direct association with the Buddha himself (cf. Singh 2009: 23-27, also Tulku 1994, Forbes 1999). The sequence of the fifteen Buddhist places follows the lifecycle and the journeys performed by the Buddha as narrated in the Jatakas and the Tripitaka. Accordingly, the Buddha was born (563 BCE) in the garden of Lumbini (1), passed his 29 years of childhood (563-533 BCE) in the royal palaces of Kapilavastu (2), followed by his march to Bodh Gaya (3), at the age of 29 years (ca. 534 BCE), where he received enlightenment at the age of 35 (528 BCE), and Gaya (4) where he did arduous austerity. Then he proceeded to give his first preaching at Sarnath (5) in 529 BCE. After his success in making mass awakening and teaching in Sarnath he returned to Bodh Gaya. After visiting Rajagriha and Nalanda, he frequently visited Shravasti (6), where out of his passing 45 rainy seasons he stayed 24 times there, performed miracles and gave sermons. During the 6th (522 BCE) and 9th years (519 BCE) after enlightenment he stayed at Kaushambi (7). While returning to Bodh Gaya, to fulfil his promise at the kind invitation of Bimbisara (ca. 543-491 BCE), he paid a visit to Rajagriha (8) together with a thousand monks of his new order, and gave his sermons there. On the request of his two chief disciples Sariputta (Pali: Sariputra) and Maudgalyana (Pali: Moggallana), the Buddha visited Nalanda (9) several times and mostly stayed at Setthi Pavarika’s mango grove. Thereafter, the Lord again visited Rajagriha and Nalanda and further proceeded to Vaishali (10), the capital city of the Lichchhavis, where he gave his last detailed sermons and re-interpreted several of his teachings, and before his final march he stopped at the bank of the Ganga river in Patna (11), called today as Gautama Ghat. While making his final march he stayed a couple of nights at Kesariya (12), followed by his final visit to Kushinagar (13) where he passed away at the age of eighty (ca. 483 BCE). In the same year he descended from heaven at Sankisa (14) and gave his final preaching there. Of course Mathura (15) was also visited by the Buddha occasionally, it developed as the major centre of the Buddhist art and sculpture in the Maurya period (cf. Fig. 10.1; Singh 2009: 2, and 25). These places together with other places associated with the relics of the Buddha, and other places having spatially manifestive representations ― altogether delve into a deeper understanding the inherent spirit of the mother earth and the message of the Buddha (cf. Behrendt 2009’ also Dutt and Bajpai 1956: 327-375). 252 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana 2. Lumbini: birthplace of the Buddha Situated across the border in Nepal, Lumbini is the birthplace of Lord Buddha; it is easily accessible by road from Gorakhpur (232 km from Varanasi). Here found Ashoka’s inscription (249 BCE) that reads “Buddha Shakyamuni was born here, The Blessed One born here” (cf. Fig. 10.2). Fig. 10.2. Lumbini, Location and the nearby area. During a state visit to her maternal home, she stopped to rest in Lumbini garden under the shadow of a shala (teak) tree, as she was pregnant. It was there that Siddhartha (Buddha’s name in his childhood) was born. The scene of nativity is distinctly sculptured in one of the stone slabs in the Mahadevi Temple. It was on the 7th day that the queen, plunging all in dire grief, left the mortal world. Magnificent arrangements were made by the king to bring the Boddhisattva back to the royal city of The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 253 Kapilavastu. Finally he was entrusted to the care of his mother’s sister, Prajapati Gautami. His search and quest for enlightenment was inspired by his realisation of old age, sickness, suffering and death, and at the age of 29 he left home and wandered as a beggar and ascetic (cf. Singh 2009: 4554, also Dhammika 2009: 29-34). In the 5th century CE the Chinese pilgrim Fa-hsien visited Lumbini and referred in his account to the sacred lake in which Mayadevi took her bath before the birth of the noble soul. He has also written about the well, the water of which was used by the Naga kings for bathing the child. Hsüan-tsang, another Chinese pilgrim, came to Lumbini in the 7th century CE. He has given a more detailed account of this place. After a long gap, one noticed that the Khasa King Ripu Malla of Jumla made the last recorded visit to Lumbini in the 14th century before the town’s sacredness was forgotten. During the medieval period this area had turned into a dense forest. A team of archaeologists led by Khadga Samsher and the German scholar, Dr. Alois Anten Führer, traced out for the first time in 1895-96 the Ashokan pillar at Lumbini referring the spot of the born. The most important monument at Lumbini (modern village of Rummindei), south of the foothills of the Churia Range, is the Ashokan pillar, dated 250 BCE, in the 20th year of the Buddhist Emperor’s reign. The inscription in Brahmi script declares that “King Piyadashi, beloved of the gods, 20th years after his consecration, came himself and worshipped saying ‘Here Buddha Shakyamuni was born’, and he caused to make a stone (capital) representing a horse; and he caused (this) stone pillar to be erected. Because here the Supreme One was born, the village Lumbini was made religious centre and also liable to pay only one-tenth share (of produce).” Near the top of the pillar the mantra “Om Mani Padme Hum” is carved in Tibetan characters. The Mayadevi temple (19th century), sacred to both Hindus and Buddhists, has a stone bas-relief of the Buddha’s birth and is thought to have been built over an earlier 5th century temple which itself may have replaced an Ashokan temple. Enshrined in a small pagoda-like structure, the image shows Mayadevi, supporting herself by holding on with her right hand to a branch of a shala tree (teak) with the newly born infant Buddha standing upright on a lotus pedestal with an oval halo. To its south, the sacred pool Pushkarini with its 3 terraces is where the Buddha’s mother Mayadevi is believed to have bathed before giving birth and where Siddhartha Gautama was given his first ritual purification bath. Its sacred water glistens in the faint sun, the gentle breeze creating endless ripples. The single most important place in Lumbini (and in the entire Buddhist world for that matter) is the stone slab located deep in the sanctum 254 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana sanctorum. Existing under the three layers of ruins over the old site of the Mayadevi temple, this site pinpoints the location of the exact spot of the birthplace of Lord Buddha. The sacred site of the Buddha’s birth is at the southern end of the Lumbini grove. Excavations have revealed a series of rooms and a stone slab which is now believed to mark the exact location at which the Buddha was born. The main ruins are enlisted in the UNESCO World Heritage List on 7 December 1997. The Lumbini Development Trust, supported by 13 nations, was set up in 1970. It created a Museum and a library, and made a Master Plan of the area with a view to projecting this as “the creative centre and cultural force to represent the Buddha’s life and teaching”. A Japanese architect, Kenzo Tange, prepared this plan. This includes the transformation of 4.8 sq. km of land, divided into three sections of 1.6 sq. km each. With the help of the Malaysian government and other donors a High School is also running here. In the very near future this sacred complex will have a cultural centre, research institute, library and museum. Near to the sacred garden an eternal flame was lit up on 1st November 1986, the declaration day of the International Year of Peace. The World Brotherhood of Buddhists Association (Thailand) has joined her hands to support various development projects in the area (for tourism analysis see Nyaupane 2009). 3. Bodhgaya: site of Buddha’s enlightenment Bodh Gaya is probably all the more interesting a place by virtue of being much more of a working Buddhist centre than an archaeological site. It is the most important Buddhist pilgrimage site in the world. Several inscriptions found there refer to Sri Lankan, Burmese and Chinese people who performed pilgrimage to this site in the historical past and patronised repairing and installing images of the Buddha. Hsüan-tsang ascribes the erection of the original Bodhi shrine to Emperor Ashoka. According to one of his rock edicts, Ashoka visited this place (called Sambodhi), ten years after his consecration, and it is more than probable that the great emperor constructed a shrine on this holy spot. The vast majority of sculptures from Bodh Gaya date after the Gupta period and primarily belong to the Pala-Sena period (ca. 8th-12th centuries). The importance of this site after the 6th century is indicated by the fact that the Buddha in bhumisparsha mudra (earth-touching gesture) became the most common form for a Buddha image during the Pala period. Although this refers to Bodh Gaya and a symbol of the achievement of Buddhahood, this form seems to have originated elsewhere. 255 Fig. 10.3. Bodh Gaya: the contemporary Map The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India Although the exact circumstances and date are not known, after the 13th century, despite centuries of activity, Buddhist practices at Bodh Gaya largely ceased. Francis Buchanan-Hamilton, who visited Bodh Gaya in 1811, reported that the temple was in a dilapidated condition and that much of the immediate area had been greatly disturbed by the extensive removal of bricks and other materials for local building projects. From the beginning of the 19th century, several Burmese missions also travelled to Bodh Gaya, first to find the site and make offerings, and then, in 1877, to renovate the dilapidated structures. In fact, it was the somewhat haphazard 256 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana renovation by the Burmese that prompted the British Government to undertake a major restoration of the site in the 1880s. Unfortunately, the 19th century changes made at Bodh Gaya have greatly confused the record of earlier activity. Some structures were totally dismantled and many images were moved from their original locations (cf. Singh 2009: 76-77). In 1891 Sir Arnold’s writings helped to inspire Anagarika Dharmapala from Sri Lanka to dedicate his life to the struggle to have Bodh Gaya and especially the Mahabodhi temple under Buddhist ownership rather than accepting the Hindu Mahant who was in control of the temple at that time. Since 1953, under an act passed by the Government of Bihar, the Bodh Gaya Temple Management Committee, whose members are both Buddhists and Hindus, administers this temple and has made vast improvements to both the temple and its grounds (cf. Ahir 1994). The monk Gautama practised austerities in his own way of arduous and austere meditation for six months under the Pipala tree. For the first three of these months, he was alone on the mountain, but during the fourth month, five disciples of Master Uddaka Ramaputta, led by his old friend Kondanna discovered him. Siddhartha was happy to see Kondanna again, and he found out that just one month after Siddhartha left the meditation site, Kondanna himself had attained the state of neither perception nor non-perception. Gautama abandoned the desire to escape the world of phenomena, and as he returned to himself, he found he was completely present to the world of phenomena. One breathe, one bird’s song, one leaf, and one ray of sunlight ― any of these might serve as his subject of meditation. He began to see that the key to liberation lay in each breathe, each step, and each small pebble along the path. Ultimately the night of the achievement came. Entering into deeper contemplation, Siddhartha during the first watch of that wonderful night acquired the knowledge of his past lives in various planes of existence; in the second watch he acquired the supernormal divine vision; in the third watch he fathomed the law of cause and effect and gained insight into the destruction of mental cankers; and at sunrise he attained Supreme Enlightenment, Omniscience. Ultimately Siddhartha acquired the rays of enlightenment on the full-moon day of the spring, i.e. Vaishakha (AprilMay), in 528 BCE. The monk Gautama became the Buddha, ‘the Awakened One’; and later also came to be known as Sammasambuddha (‘the Perfectly Enlightened One’), Bhagava (‘the Blessed One’), Tathagata (‘the Perfect One’), Sugata (‘the Happy One or the Accomplished One’), and Shakyamuni (‘the Sage of the Shakyas’). The fig tree (Ficus religiosa) The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 257 under which he sat became known as the Bodhi Tree, and the area as Bodh Gaya or Buddha Gaya (cf. Dhammika 2009: 43-72). Traditions states that Buddha stayed in Bodh Gaya for seven weeks after his enlightenment. Each week was spent in a different part of the sacred place or complex. The 1st week was spent under the Bodhi Tree. Addressing his friend and follower Savasti, a buffalo boy, the Buddha said, “Love is possible only when there is understanding. And only with love can there be acceptance. Practice living in awareness, you will deepen your understanding. You will be able to understand yourselves, other people, and all things. And you will have hearts of love. That is the wonderful path I have discovered”. The Mahabodhi Temple, located at the place of the Buddha’s enlightenment, is the main site of worship and visit (there is a fee for use of camera). The Mahabodhi Temple is included in the list of World Heritage Sites of UNESCO on 29 June 2002 (cf. Singh and Kumar 2010). Emperor Ashoka (r. 270-232 BCE) paid several visits to Sambodhi, as he preferred to call, along with his spiritual preceptor Upagupta (Mogalliputta Tissa). His visit is vividly described in a Sanskrit text of the period named Ashokavandana. Inspired by his teacher the emperor took a vow and performed special rituals. The temple, resting on a high and broad plinth, with a soaring 54 metres high pyramidal spire with a square cross-section and 4 smaller spires, houses a gilded image of the Buddha, kept behind glass, in the bhumisparsha mudra (earth-touching gesture). This classical gesture, in which the Buddha’s right hand touches the ground while the left rests in his lap, signifies enlightenment. In the centre of the temple there is also a Shiva linga that was installed in about 860 CE. The temple is also sacred to Hindus, as they accept the Buddha as the 9th incarnation of Vishnu, the preserver in the Hindu pantheon. At the back of the Mahabodhi temple is the sacred Bodhi Tree (ficus religiosa, holy fig), said to be a descendant of the tree under which the Buddha attained enlightenment. The tree still appears to radiate an aura of abiding serenity, spiritual solitude and peace. It is believed that the original Bodhi Tree sprang up on the day of Siddhartha’s birth. Legend says that Emperor Ashoka, initially hostile to Buddhism, ordered it to be cut down and burned on the spot. But when the tree sprang up anew from the flames his attitude was transformed, then Ashoka revived it and built a protective-enclosing wall, as had previously been done by King Prasenajit of Koshala within the Buddha’s lifetime. History also tells us that King Sashanka destroyed the Bodhi Tree during the time he persecuted Buddhists around 600 CE. 258 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana Hsüan-tsang (639 CE) says that every full moon of Vaishakha (AprilMay), thousands of people from all over India would gather at Bodh Gaya and bathe the roots of the tree with scented water and perfumed milk, play music and scatter heaps of flowers. Dharmasvamin (mid 13th century) noticed similar expressions of devotion: The platform between the Bodhi Tree and the temple is a large rectangular stone slab thought to be placed exactly where the Buddha sat. This is the oldest object that can still be viewed at Bodh Gaya. It is called Vajrashila (‘the rock of diamond’), and some believe that an enormous diamond buried beneath the earth here fuels the site’s spiritual power. This stone may have been originally been placed over the oldest Vajrasana inside the temple. However, the historical contexts never matter to the devout pilgrims; by touching this sacred stone, or even having its auspicious glimpse they feel deeply overwhelmed and satisfied. The year 1956 had marked the 2500th anniversary of the Buddha’s nirvana. It gave impetus to resurgence of activity at Bodh Gaya. A good number of foreign temples and monasteries sprang up. Most of them take care of high-class rich pilgrims form the East Asia. The earliest among them is the Mahabodhi Sangharama, built by the king of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) in the 4th century CE. Presently there are 47 Buddhist Temples, monasteries and organisations functioning at Bodh Gaya in various capacities. The establishment of so many modern temples and monasteries by the World Buddhist Community at Bodh Gaya has enhanced the spirit of the holy land of Buddha’s Enlightenment and also transformed it into a Symbol of Buddhist Unity. The historic Buddhist revival movement initiated by Anagarika Dharmapala (1864-1933) in 1891 completed its 100th years in 1991. The Centenary Year of the Society was celebrated with great enthusiasm and in a befitting manner by all the Centres of the Society. Being ideally located just close to the Great Temple and the Bus Stop, the Mahabodhi Society at Bodh Gaya is the most convenient contact point for any visitor to Bodh Gaya. The Centre not only provides useful information and guidance to the tourists and pilgrims but also makes available books on Buddhism and Indology. Let Bodh Gaya not be transformed into a Buddhist theme-park, a kind of spiritual Disneyland for mass tourism consumption! Let UNESCO and the recently launched JNNRUM City Development Plan serve as the glue that holds the culture of peace, compassion and global humanism, together recognizing the needs of local communities and other interest groups in a more harmonious way! (cf. Singh and Kumar 2010: 280). The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 259 4. Sarnath: first turning of the Wheel of Dharma A tale from the Nigrodhamiga Jataka refers that the Buddha in his previous life was born as a Golden Deer at Sarnath (Isipatana), and saved the life of a pregnant deer. By this incidence the king of Kashi declared this territory as ‘protected area’, protected from hunting and preserved for mendicants and deers. This is the place where he had delivered his first Dhamma talk on the Four Noble Truths thirty-six years earlier. The Buddha passed his first stay during the rainy season at Sarnath, and there for the first time he challenged the fundamental, conservative and superstitious rules of Brahminism through his teaching called Anattalakkhana Sutta. The Pali texts have mentioned names of many great Brahmin priests in the middle Ganga valley, but no one from Kashi. This indicates that during the period of the Buddha Kashi was not a stronghold of religious-ritual institutions and was also not dominated by conservative groups (cf. Singh 2009: 122-148). Thirty-six years after his first teaching the Buddha visited Sarnath together with his main disciples like Sariputta, Mogagallana and Mahokotithata, and also gave religious discourses and teachings, mostly challenging the superstitious rituals, sacrifices and totemism performed under the Brahminic traditions. This second visit was later followed by several visits to Sarnath. However, after the death of the Buddha the cultural arena turned into different directions where Brahminism superseded over Buddhism (cf. Dhammika 2009: 73-87). At Sarnath, addressing his five old friends, the Buddha said, “Listen! My friends, I have found the Great Way, and I will show it to you. You will be the first to hear my Teaching. This Dharma (Pali: Dhamma) is not the result of thinking. It is the fruit of direct experience. Listen serenely with all your awareness (cf. Singh 2009: 125, also Bapat 1956: 21-22): “Brothers, there are four truths: the existence of suffering, the cause of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the path which leads to the cessation of suffering. I call these the Four Noble Truths. The first is the existence of suffering. Birth, old age, sickness, and death are suffering. Sadness, anger, jealousy, worry, anxiety, fear, and despair are suffering. Separation from loved ones is suffering. Association with those you hate is suffering. Desire, attachment, and clinging to the five aggregates are suffering.” “Brothers, the second truth is the cause of suffering. Because of ignorance, people cannot see the truth about life, and they become caught in the flames of desire, anger, jealousy, grief, worry, fear, and despair.” 260 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana “Brothers, the third truth is the cessation of suffering. Understanding the truth of life brings about the cessation of every grief and sorrow and gives rise to peace and joy.” “Brothers, the fourth truth is the path which leads to the cessation of suffering. It is the Noble Eight-fold Path, which I have just explained. The Noble Eight-fold Path is nourished by living mindfully. Mindfulness leads to concentration and understanding which liberates you from every pain and sorrow and leads to peace and joy. I will guide you along this path of realisation.” Fig. 10.4. Sarnath: Religious Landscape. While Siddhartha was explaining the Four Noble Truths, Kondanna suddenly felt a great light shining within his own heart. He could taste the liberation he had sought for so long. His face beamed with joy. The The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 261 Buddha pointed at him and said “Kondanna! You’ve got it! You’ve got it!” (Vinaya Mahavagga, Khuddaka Nikaya 1, and Samyutta Nikaya, LVI.11). Formerly, two great stupas adorned the site. Only the Dhamekha remains, assigned by its inscription to the 6th century. The Dharmarajika stupa built by Ashoka, some say upon the very place of the teaching, was pulled down in the 18th century by Jagat Singh, who consigned the casket of relics contained within it to the Ganga River. Hsüan-tsang (ca. 635 CE) tells us that the Ashoka’s pillar, which stood in front of the stupa, was so highly polished that it constantly reflected the stupa’s statue of the Buddha. The main stupa was enlisted in the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List on 3 July 1998 (ref. 1096); still waiting for final inscription. During the reign of Skandagupta (CE 455-467) Sarnath had flourished but later was destroyed by Huna. Again since the 8th century the town was continuously expanding its glory until 1017 when Mahmud of Ghazni destroyed most of the monuments, destruction that was repeated again in 1033 by Ahmad Nialtgin. However, during the reign of then Gahadavala king Govindachandra (1114-1154), with the support of his Buddhist wife Kumaradevi, the town was rebuilt, repaired and monuments were preserved. In 1567 Mughal Emperor Akbar made a memorial octagonal tower above one of the ruined stupas in memory of his father, Humanyun, who visited and stayed there in 1532. Afterwards only in 1793 Sarnath came into light with the erection work to supply the building materials for making a market by Jagat Singh. Thereafter during the 19th century initiated by Alexander Cunningham (1834-36), several excavations were done by later officers. In the period of 30th December 1990 to 1st January 1991 the 14th Kalachakra Puja (a Buddhist-Tantric ritual process) was held at Sarnath under the guidance of H.H. the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso. The archaeological area is spread over an area of 16.73 ha, enshrining many monuments and stupas; the religious and historical monuments are spread over an area of 9.59 ha. About 600 m before the museum along the main road, one encounters the first stupa, called Chaukhandi Stupa. Through the recent renovation, landscape gardening and preservations the scenic beauty of the area becomes more attractive. Based on archaeological excavations it is believed that this stupa, or a terraced temple, appears to be constructed prior to the times of Gupta kings, i.e. 5th century. This site assumed to be the actual spot where the Buddha after his enlightenment met five ascetics who earlier left him in disgust at his alleged backsliding, and finally gave the First Sermon, “The Four Noble Truths” (cf. Singh 2009: 125). 262 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana 5. Rajgir: second turning of the Wheel of Dharma When the Buddha was teaching his Law, a new dynasty with Bimbisara as the king (ca. 543-491 BCE) began ruling over Magadha. Gautama, the ascetic, first visited Rajgir on his way to Bodh Gaya and was met by King Bimbisara. The king was so impressed by the Bodhisattva that he tried every means to persuade him to stay. Failing in this, he received a promise from Gautama that he would return to Rajgir after his enlightenment. Accordingly, after teaching in Sarnath, the Buddha travelled to Rajgir followed by over a thousand monks of the new order. King Bimbisara welcomed them all and offered them the Veluvana Bamboo Grove. This was to be the first property of the Order and one of the Buddha’s favourite residences (cf. Singh 2009: 151-205). The Buddha is believed to have converted the Magadhan king Bimbisara on the Gridhrakuta hill. In his old age Bimbisara is said to have been imprisoned and killed by his son Ajatashatru (ca. 491-459 BCE); however later Ajatashatru submitted himself to the Buddha as his follower. Rajgir was the capital of the Magadhan Empire and a known business township until Ajatashatru’s successor Udayin (ca. 459-443 BCE) moved his capital to Pataliputra (Patna). Rajgir is known as the first recorded capital in Indian history (cf. Dhammika 2009: 91-109). On his first visit to Rajgir the Buddha stayed there for about three weeks. Throughout the following weeks, many seekers came to him and asked to be ordained as monks. Many of them were highly educated young men from wealthy families. When the Buddha and all of the 1,250 monks had finished eating, their bowls were taken and washed and then returned. King Bimbisara turned towards the Buddha and paid salutation with folded hands. Understanding the king’s wishes, the Buddha began to teach the Dhamma. He spoke about the five precepts as the way to create peace and happiness for one’s family and the entire kingdom. The Buddha said: “The first precept is do not kill. Observing this precept nourishes compassion. The second precept is do not steal. No one has the right to take away the belongings that another has earned by his/ her labour. The third precept is to avoid sexual misconduct. Sexual relations should only take place with your spouse. The fourth precept is do not lie. Do not speak words that can create division and hatred. The fifth precept is do not drink alcohol or use other intoxicants. Alcohol and intoxicants rob the mind of clarity.” The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India Fig. 10.5. Rajgir: Spatial view of the Central Part. 263 264 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana After the death of the Buddha (parinirvana), Ajatashatru brought his share of corporal relics of the Master to Rajagriha and enshrined them inside a stupa. A few months later, when it was decided to hold the First Buddhist Council (Sangiti) in the Sattapanni (Saptaparni) cave of the Vaibhara hill, Ajatashatru built a large hall in front of the Sattapanni cave. On this occasion for the first time Buddha’s teachings were written down under the guidance of his disciple Kashyapa (Kassapa) of Uruvela. After several discourses with common consensus the two codes of conducts (suttas) were shaped, known as Vinayasutta (‘code of compassion’), and Dhammasutta (‘code of moral acts’). Ananda, Buddha’s cousin, friend, and favourite disciple — and a man of prodigious memory! — recited Buddha’s lessons (suttas). This great happening and its proceedings are described in detail in the Pali text Chullavagga. As 500 monks attended this congress, the proceeding is called as Panchashatika. Travelling about 200m southeast of Satadhara one meets the North Gate of the outer fortifications of Old Rajagriha near the narrow gap between the Vaibhava and Vipula hills. About 1 km further south one meets the Maniyar Math, a stone compound-wall containing a cylindrical brick structure, about 6m high, decorated with stucco figures all around it, and protected by a conical shelter of corrugated iron sheets and some other subsidiary structures. The archaeological remains support the view that during the period of the Buddha and Bimbisara this was an active place for rituals and councils. In course of time the Buddhists and Jains occupied this sacred place and left their marks. Along the road to the new town built by Ajatashatru are the ruins of Jivakamravana Vihara (monastery). The main road continues towards the south and eventually divided into two. The left road leads to a clearing in the jungle containing the ruins of the Jivakamravana, Jivaka’s mango grove that was the Buddha’s favourite retreat within the valley. Jivaka was King Bimbisara’s personal physician and later became a devoted follower of the Buddha. He also used to serve the Buddha when he was injured by Devadatta. The Jivakamravana was the site of one of the most important of the Buddha’s discourses, the Samannaphala Sutta (cf. Digha Nikaya, I: 47). One beautiful moonlit night, King Ajatashatru came to visit the Buddha at Jivakamravana and was deeply impressed by the silence and serene of the large assembly. Following the road running parallel to the inner fortification in the east, one reaches Maddakuchchhi at the foot of Gridhrakuta Hill (‘the Hill of Vultures’). Here the Enlightened One delivered the Lotus Sutra, which promises salvation for all beings. At the heart of this sutra is the The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 265 compassion of the Buddha whose concern is with earthly suffering ― each of us may attain Enlightenment, whoever may have folded their hands or uttered namo (‘respectful salutations’) to the Buddha. Proceeding along the road about another kilometre, one arrives at the narrow pass between Sona and Udaya Hills, which formed the southern gate of Old Rajgir and through which the Buddha must have passed many times. The massive walls climb up both hills and run for over 40 km, although in many places presently they are barely visible. Climbing along the walls one can get a fine view of the fields of Magadha. Towards the east a path leads up to the new white marble wellmaintained monastery stupa with a 50m high golden stupa built by the famous Japanese Buddhist monk Ven. Nichidatsu Fuji of the Nipponzan Myohoji sect in 1969. Located on the top of the Chhatha Hill, a colossal sandstone dome on the Ratnagiri hill, the Vishva Shanti Stupa, is dedicated to world peace. Here visitors may have experiences of both, the sacred and the secular, serenity and spirit of the nature. Rajgir Festival: This festival-carnival held every year for a month during the intercalary month (Malamasa), which falls every third year (cf. for the dates from 2001 to 2044, see Singh 2009: 205). Since the ancient past there is a tradition of holding the religious fair on a grand scale. Rajgir is the only place where festive and religious activities take place in this month. Since independence the government authorities are involved in organising the fair and festival. With the increasing pace of tourism and religious consciousness, around a million tourists and devout Hindus and Buddhists alike gather during this month to have the direct experience of the spirit of place. But above all, the general perceptions of the visitors are not satisfactory; in fact, they blame the government for the mismanagement and misuse of the grant. Remember, above all, Bihar is well known for irregularities and corruption! Of course, the situation improved during last three-four years. 6. Nalanda: site of the great monastic university Lying close to the village Baragaon (Nalanda District), Nalanda has the ruins of the world’s oldest university, founded in the 5th century CE. Nalanda’s main monument (Stupa/ Temple site 3) is listed in the tentative list of World Heritage Sites of UNESCO (dt. 09/01/2009, ref. 5407). Excavations in the 1860s by Alexander Cunningham led to the discovery of the official seal with the inscription Sri Nalanda Mahavihara Arya Bhikshu Sanghasya (Venerable Community of Monks in the Great Vihara of Sri Nalanda). 266 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana Fig. 10. 6. Nalanda: excavated remains (based on A. Cunningham, ASI Reports 1871, and 1920-21) The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 267 The Buddha came to Nalanda often and stayed at Setthi Pavarika’s mango grove. Two of Shakyamuni’s chief disciples, Sariputta and Maudgalyana, came from the vicinity of Nalanda. Sariputta, who was considered the foremost in wisdom and had a very important place in the Sangha, attained Nirvana here. Although Nalanda is one of the places distinguished as having been blessed by the presence of the Buddha, it later became particularly renowned as the site of the great monastic university of the same name, which was to become the crown jewel of the development of Buddhism in India (cf. Ghosh 1986, also Singh 2009: 208219). The Buddha first came here to study philosophy with local gurus, later attracting his own disciples. Even during his last journey from Rajagriha (Rajgir) to Pataligrama (Patna), the Buddha passed by and stopped at Nalanda. According to historical sources, Hsüan-tsang believed that the name was ascribed to it because of the Buddha’s liberality in an earlier birth, and means ‘charity without intermission’. According to Jain texts it was a suburb, situated to the northwest of the famous city of Rajagriha. It is assumed that the Gupta emperors were responsible for the first monasteries. In the 7th century Hsüan-tsang spent 5 years, both as student and teacher, in the residential Nalanda University, which at that time had over 3,000 teachers and philosophers, over 10,000 students and monks and a library of over 9 million manuscripts. He had studied under Shilabhadra, a great teacher and head of the monastery. The monks were supported by 200 villages, and the library attracted people from countries as far flung as Malaysia, Indonesia, China, and Korea. Debating was a necessary part of monastic education, and doctrinal points were continually discussed. Among the renowned Indian scholars trained at Nalanda were Nagarjuna, Aryadeva and Asanga. As narrated by Hsüan-tsang, Buddhism was slowly decaying when he visited India; however centres like Nalanda were prosperous and flourishing. He also noted the increasing impact of Tantrism and Brahmanic philosophy under the influence of Kumarila Bhatta and Shankaracharya. In the first quarter of the 19th century a new phase of historical upheaval started through the accounts of Buchanon-Hamilton, who described the ruins and the Hindu and Buddhist images found at Nalanda. In the 1860s Alexander Cunningham identified the place with the ancient Nalanda; and in 1915-16 the Archaeological Survey of India undertook its excavation that later resulted in the present landscape. The monasteries are numbered from 1 to 11 from south to north, the path from the gate entering between monasteries 1 and 4 at the south end of the site. The path goes west across an open space to the largest of the 268 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana temples, No. 3 (Fig. 10.6). This huge structure standing in the middle of a court on the southwestern flank is surrounded by a number of votive stupas. Almost certainly Ashoka originally constructed it, but his stupa was enlarged several times. The earliest temples were small structures, completely incorporated into the successively larger mounds. It is believed that the north-facing shrine chamber on top once contained an enormous Buddha image (cf. Dhammika 2009: 110-118). Returning to the east, monasteries 1, 1A and 1B are the most important of the monastery group (Fig. 10.6). Ghosh suggests that a Sumatran king built the lower monastery in the reign of the third king of the Pala dynasty, Devapala, between CE 810-850. The excavated cells demonstrate the existence of an earlier monastery underneath, probably after earlier walls at least partially collapsed. It is possible to walk around all three of these southern monasteries. Monastery-1 has been built on the same site at least nine times and what one sees now are parts of at least three or four structures superimposed upon each other. The monastery is entered through an impressive portico, the roof of which was supported by pillars and the stone bases of which can still be seen. Monasteries 1 and 4 to 11 were the colleges where the students of Nalanda both lived and studied, and they differ from each other only slightly. Monastery 4, immediately to the north of the entrance path, was built on an earlier collapsed monastery. Several of these monasteries have wells in their courtyards and drains, probably used as toilets, in their northeast corners. An interesting feature of Monastery 9 is the six ovens in the courtyard. Although it is hard to picture it now, each of these monasteries was originally beautifully painted and decorated and at least four stories high. There are several interesting features in the other monasteries; double rows of cells in Monastery 5, a brick courtyard and two sets of double ovens in the upper courtyard of No. 6, and the evidence of three successive monasteries built on the same site at No. 7. There is an imposing shrine and unique doorway in No. 8, impressive drains in No. 9 and arched doorways in No. 10. The fragments of 25 stone pillars were recovered from the ruins of No. 11, which stood one meter apart at a height of more than 2m. Ghosh suggests that fire was a recurrent hazard and every monastery was at some point of time deserted and re-occupied. In addition to the monasteries and the main temple, four other temples have been excavated (Fig. 10.6). Temples 12, 13 and 14 are in a line stretching north from the main temple. They all have a square outline, and originally had large Buddha images, now kept in the museum. The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 269 The Temple Site 12 temple was the largest structure at Nalanda, being approximately 52m x 50m. To the north of temple 13 the discovery of a brick-smelting furnace with metal pieces and slag in it establishes that metal objects were cast in Nalanda. The niches of the pedestal of the image in Temple 14 contain the only example of mural paintings in Nalanda. The Temple Site 3, consisting of a central tower with four smaller ones at each of the corners, has been rebuilt, modified or renovated at least seven times over the centuries and this together with the numerous votive stupas clustered around it indicates that it was the most sacred shrine at Nalanda. There is little doubt that the original structure here was the stupa marking Sariputta’s birthplace. The first three stages of this temple are covered by the later additions and cannot be seen. By far the most beautiful of all the excavated monuments, Temple Site 2 has a stone sculpted dado with a moulded plinth and sculpted panels revealing 211 figures of Hindu gods and goddesses besides dancers, musicians, warriors, animals and birds and panels showing a wide variety of scenes like loving couples, peacocks and geese, geometrical patterns and scenes from daily life. The panels probably date from the 6th or 7th centuries CE, and may have been brought in from another temple. In addition to the monasteries and temples there are several images, including the Buddha and Marichi (the Buddhist goddess of the dawn). 7. Shravasti: teachings in the Jetavana Grove At Shravasti (cf. Fig. 10.7), in accordance with the practice of previous Buddhas, Gautama Buddha performed one of the Greatest Miracles, after defeating the six philosophers and converting them to his teaching; standing in the air at the height of a palm tree, flames engulfed the lower part of his body, and five hundred jets of water streamed from the upper part in the presence King Prasenajit of Koshala and the assembled audience. The Buddha levitated on a thousand petalled lotus, causing fire and water to leap out of his body, and created multiple representations of himself which went up to the highest heaven. The heretical teachers, discomfited at this miraculous event, dared not show their own feats and were finally confounded by a violent thunderstorm and obliged to run away. The supreme position of the Buddha was thus vindicated, and he preached the Law before a huge assemblage of people that had come to witness the miracle. The Shravasti episode has been a favourite theme in Buddhist art from very early times (cf. Venkataramayya 1981). 270 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana Fig. 10.7. Shravasti (Saheth Maheth) While answering the question raised by the king Prasenajit, the Buddha concluded: “Compassion is the fruit of understanding. Practising the Way of Awareness is to realise the true face of life. That true face is impermanence. Everything is impermanent and without a separate self. Everything must one day pass away. One day your own body will pass away. When a person sees into the impermanent nature of all things, his way of looking becomes calm and serene. The presence of impermanence does not disturb his heart and mind. And thus The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 271 the feelings of pain that result from compassion do not carry the bitter and heavy nature that other kinds of suffering do. On the contrary, compassion gives a person greater strength. Great King! Today you have heard some of the basic tenets of the Way of Liberation. On another day, I would like to share more of the teachings with you.” Shravasti is best remembered as the place where Shakyamuni defeated the holders of the other doctrines. Some accounts say that this was accomplished by debate, others that by miracles; perhaps there were both. The leaders of India’s six main philosophical schools challenged the Buddha to a contest of miraculous powers many times as he wandered through the surrounding kingdoms. Finally, in his 57th year he accepted the challenge at Shravasti. King Prasenajit built a hall especially for the event; in it seven thrones were erected (Fig. 10.7). These and many other miracles he performed and in eight days utterly defeated his opponents, whose followers later adopted the Buddhist doctrines. For a further seven days he continued to show miracles and give teachings to the great assembly. Both Chinese pilgrims describe a tall temple containing a statue of the Buddha, which stood outside Jetavana Grove in commemoration of these events (Singh 2009: 158-173; also cf. Dhammika 2009: 151-164). The Buddha so much liked Jetavana that he spent there 24 rainy seasons, preaching to monks, laymen and women. Sudatta came to be known as Anathapindika (the incomparable alms giver). The grandeur of this vihara was commented upon by Chinese travellers several centuries later. Jetavana continues to attract pilgrims from all over the world who come here to pray and meditate in its serene atmosphere. One of the most beautiful spots in Jetavana is under the Anandabodhi tree. An eternal witness to the vicissitudes of history, this sacred tree was brought as a cutting from the Bodhi tree in Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka, which itself grew from a sapling of the original Bodhi tree in Bodh Gaya. The ruins of Anandakuti and Gandhakuti exude an aura of sacredness because it was here that the Lord stayed during his many visits to Jetavana Vihara. During 1863-1875 Alexander Cunningham excavated the ruins and identified some of the monuments, including 16 stupas. Again during 1875-76 and 1884-85 William Hoey continued the excavations and brought to the light the remains of 34 ancient buildings. The twin name of Saheth-Maheth is applied to two distinct groups of remains. There are remains of 8 temples, 4 monasteries (viharas) and 14 stupas. In the recent excavation (1999-2000) in the nearby village Kolga the whole monastery city of Shravasti was found, which consists of several monasteries, dormitories for monks and a huge water pool for sacred bathing for female monks. One can start from the south and after having a view of the 272 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana remains leave the mound at the north, from where the road takes you back to the other side of the old city. Maheth, situated about 500 m northeast of Saheth, denotes the Shravasti city proper and is a much longer site, situated south of the river Rapti (Achiravati) which flows about 300 m north. All that remains at Mahet, once a heavily fortified city, are two stupas known locally as Pakki Kuti and Kachchi Kuti; the latter is identified as Sudatta’s Stupa. The outline of the city is distinctly marked by a high earthen rampart with a brick wall at the top running along a circuit of 5.2 km and pierced by several gates distinguished by high bastions. Four of these openings (darwaza), viz. Imli, Rajgarh, Nausahra and Kandabhari, situated respectively at the southwest, northwest, northeast and southeast corners of the city-wall, may possibly represent real gates of the ancient city; their present names being due to local usage. A new park has been created around these ruins with flowers and trees shading the lawns. In this case restoration has regained some of the qualities that made the place attractive of old; peace and tranquillity pervade it. 8. Vaishali: where the Buddha was offered honey According to the Buddhist tradition, five years after the Enlightenment in Bodh Gaya Lord Buddha came to Vaishali, the capital of one of the first republican states in the world. Situated on the northern banks of the Ganga, Vaishali is bound by the hills of Nepal to the north and the river Gandak to the west. The Lichchhavi nobility came to receive the Enlightened One with a cavalcade of elephants and chariots bedecked with gold. As the Lord set foot on the soil of Vaishali, loud thunder followed by a heavy downpour purged the plague-infected city. The Buddha preached the Ratna Sutra to those assembled, and eighty-four thousand people embraced the new faith. It was also at Vaishali that Amrapali, the famous courtesan, earned the respect of the Sangha and a place in history with her generous donations. The neighbouring village of Amvara is said to be the site of Amrapali’s mango grove (cf. Dhammika 2009: 124-130). In Vaishali women were ordained into the Sangha for the first time. The Buddha’s foster mother, Mahaprajapati Gautami, along with 500 Shakyan women made a pilgrimage by foot from Kapilavastu to Vaishali, seeking to join the Order. Three times the Lord refused their entreaties. Ultimately they shaved their heads, donned the orange robes and beseeched the Lord once again. The Enlightened One was finally persuaded to admit them as bhikshunis or nuns (cf. Singh 2009: 221-233). The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 273 Fig. 10.8. Vaishali and environs. Here the Buddha spoke to Amrapali, “Beauty arises and passes away like all other phenomena. Fame and fortune are no different. Only the peace, joy, and freedom that are the fruits of meditation bring true happiness. Amrapali, cherish and take good care of all the moments left to 274 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana you in this life. Do not lose yourself in forgetfulness or idle amusements. This is of utmost importance.” Finally the Buddha replied to the question raised by his disciple Sariputta; he said: “Monks, when you have seen deeply and have attained the Way, the beautiful may still appear beautiful and the ugly may still appear ugly, but because you have attained liberation, you are not bound by either. When a liberated person looks at beauty, he can see that it is composed of many non-beautiful elements. Such a person understands the impermanent and empty nature of all things, including beauty and ugliness. Thus he is neither mesmerised by beauty nor repulsed by ugliness. The only kind of beauty that does not fade and that does not cause suffering is a compassionate and liberated heart. Compassion is the ability to love unconditionally, demanding nothing in return. A liberated heart is unbound by conditions. A compassionate and liberated heart is true beauty. The peace and joy of that beauty is true peace and joy. Monks, practice diligently and you will realise true beauty.” ― The Majjhima Nikaya, 55. A century after the passing of the Buddha the Second Buddhist Council (sangiti) was held in 383 BCE at Vaishali to discuss The Ten Points of Vinaya (Indulgences), the rules of conduct under dispute due to sectarian divisions and their interpretations; that have been recorded in the Chullavagga. The Venerable Yasha openly declared these practices to be unlawful. At the same time some 60 Arhats came from the Western Country and assembled on the Ahoganga hill. About 88 monks from Avanti and the Southern Country also joined them. These monks declared the question to be hard and subtle. Finally Venerable Revata at Sahajati had declared them invalid. The dialogue continued by the Assembly of 700 monks presided by Venerable Sabbakami who also put his final mark and declared the Ten Points unlawful. The momentous results of this Council were the dispatch of missionaries to different parts of the world for the propagation of the dhamma. 9. Kushinagar: where Buddha entered mahaparinirvana In one of his last utterances, the Buddha thus named Kushinagar (Kushinara), the site of his parinirvana, as one of the chief places of Buddhist pilgrimage. Three reasons had been assigned for the Buddha’s choice of Kushinagar for the final retreat: (1) it was the proper venue for the preaching of the Maha-sudassana suttanta, (2) to admit Subhadda to the Sangha before his death, as he was living there, and (3) the availability of Brahmin Drona who would solve the problem of his relics. Moreover, it The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 275 had been the site of his death in seven previous births and he beheld no other spot “where the Tathagata for the 8th time will lay aside his body”. At this place the Buddha left his corporeal self and finally attained mahaparinirvana. Thus was assured its sanctity (cf. Singh 2009: 254-267). When he reached his eighty-first year, Buddha gave his last major teaching — the subject was the thirty-seven wings of enlightenment — and left Vulture’s Peak with Ananda to journey north. After sleeping at Nalanda he crossed the Ganga river for the last time at the place where now stands the city of Patna and came to the village of Beluva. While staying for the rainy season at this village near Vaishali, the Buddha told Ananda that he was attacked by illness and bodily pain and the effect of old age. Shakyamuni then rejected prolonging his own life-span. When Ananda later learned of this he implored the Buddha to live longer but his request was refused, for it had come too late. The Buddha suppressed the sickness and continued to Vaishali. He called all the monks residing in and around Vaishali to assemble at Mahavana Kutagarasala and reminded them that his whole teaching consisted of the 37 Bodhipakshiya Dhammas divided into 7 groups (this episode is considered as the Third Turning of the Wheel of Dhamma): 1. Smrityupasthana (Pali, Satipatthanas), mindfulness or awareness of what is happening in one’s body (kaya), feeling (vedana), mind (citta), and what are his acquisitions (dhamma). 2. Samyakaprahana (Pali, Sammappadhanas), right exertions, efforts, i.e. duties prescribed under the sammayayama of the eight-fold path, viz. to eradicate demerits, to collect merits and to preserve and increase the merits. 3. Riddhipada (Pali, Iddhipadas), attainment of supernormal powers by means of strong desire of perfection, application of energy by meditation, application of mind to cultivate meditation, and discrimination of the mental factors accompanying the meditation. 4. Indriya (Pali, Indriyas), dominance of forces or factors led by firm faith in the Buddha as the fully enlightened, wise, world-knower, the excellent guide of men and gods, and so forth; this faith is also extended to the Dhamma and Sangha. 5. Balas, internal strength, or prowess. The five attributes constitute the Balas; they are the same as the Indriyas, viz. Faith, Energy, Memory, Meditation, and Knowledge. The main difference between Indriyas and Balas is that the former is actively operating and does not necessarily remain the same for all times while the latter is the result of the activity of the faculty. 276 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana Fig. 10. 9. Kushinagar: the excavated site (after A. Cunningham, ASI 1871) 6. Sambodhyanga (Pali, Sambojjhangas), acquisitions leading to full enlightenment, destroying impurities and hindrances, and leading to attain knowledge and emancipation. 7. Marga (Pali, Magga), the ‘Middle Way’ between extreme asceticism and worldly life. The Buddha was insistent that his Truth was none of the two extreme views, viz. Shashvata (eternal) and Uccheda (annihilation). The next day, when they arrived at the banks of the Hiranyavati river south of Kushinagar, there, between two pairs of unusually tall Shala trees (shorea robusta), the Buddha lay down on his right side in the lion posture with his head to the north. The Buddha spoke to Ananda his memorable The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 277 words on the doctrines of the faith, some rules of discipline to be followed by the monks, including instructions about the disposal of his body. The Buddha closed his eyes. He had spoken his last words. The earth shook. Sal blossoms fell like rain. Everyone felt their minds and bodies tremble. They knew the Buddha had passed into nirvana (Mahaparinibbana Sutta, D.16). The Lord had instructed that his body should be disposed of in the same way as that of a king of kings: the body should be wrapped in new cloth and corded cotton-wood, placed in an iron-vessel, which should be covered by a similar vessel, and cremated. And finally, stupas should be erected at the four crossroads. Finally, the Buddha uttered his last words: “Behold thee, brethren, I exhort thee, saying, decay is inherent in all component things! Work out your salvation with diligence.” Subhadda then sat nearby in meditation, swiftly fell into a trance and attained parinirvana on the full-moon night of the month of Vaishakha (AprilMay), shortly before the death of the Buddha. Kushinagar was rediscovered and identified before the end of the 19th century. Excavations have revealed that a monastic tradition flourished here for a long time. The remains of ten different monasteries dating from the 4th to the 11th centuries have been found. Most of these ruins are now enclosed in a park, in the midst of which stands a modern shrine housing a large recumbent figure of the Buddha (cf. Dhammika 2009: 165-169). 10. Sankisa: where the Buddha descended from Tushita Heaven Sankisa or Sankasya is associated with one of the Buddha’s Great Miracles, where the Buddha is said to have descended to the earth from the Tushita, ‘Trayastrimsha’, heaven (‘Heaven of the 33 Gods’) where he went to preach the Abhidamma to his mother and other gods. This event is said to have occurred after the Great Miracle was performed at Shravasti, as it was an immutable law that all Buddhas should resort to the Heaven of the 33 Gods after they had performed their greatest miracles. According to Buddhist legend, after giving a discourse to his mother, Mayadevi, the Lord came down by a triple ladder, accompanied by the gods Brahma and Indra (cf. Singh 2009: 271-276). The excellent scene of the great Ladder by which Buddha descended at Sankisa from the Trayastrimsha heavens is distinctly represented in the Bharhut bas-relief (dated ca. 100-80 BCE). The Ladder is represented as a triple flight of solid stone steps, similar in all respects to the single flight of steps, which was found at the Western Gateway of the Stupa. The 278 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana legend of the Sankisa Ladder is narrated by both of the Chinese pilgrims, Fa-hsien and Hsüan-tsang, as well as by the Pali annalists of Ceylon. Fig. 10.10. Sankisa and Agahat Sarai, the ruins and archaeological site (based on A. Cunningham, ASI Report 1872) According to ancient legends, the Buddha visited the Trayastrimsha heavens to preach his doctrine to divinities as well as to his mother Mayadevi. At the end of three months, his purpose having been The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 279 accomplished, he determined to visit the earth at the city of Sakaspura (i.e. Sankassa or Sankisa in Pali, and Sankasya in Sanskrit). Then Sakra (Indra) reflected that he (Buddha) had come from the earth with three steps, but that it would be right to celebrate his departure with special honours. He therefore caused a Ladder of gold to extend from Mahameru to Sakaspura. In the Bharhut bas-relief (ca. 100-80 BCE), the triple Ladder occupies the middle of the scene with a Bodhi tree and a Vajrasan at its foot. There is one footprint on the top step and a second footprint on the bottom step of the middle Ladder. From the description of the Chinese pilgrims Fa-hsien and Hsüantsang, it appears that during the 7th century, both Buddhism and Shaivism were flourishing at Sankisa. There were a number of big monasteries and temples. The Mauryan emperor Ashoka, and after him several other kings, erected a number of beautiful buildings in the town. The present day Sankisa abounds in sculptural and terracotta remains. Emperor Ashoka erected a pillar with an elephant capital to mark this holy spot. This, to which Chinese pilgrim Hsüan Tsang made a reference, has been remounted on a 3m high pillar beneath a stone canopy. And its capital, with an elephant’s figure whose head has fallen, is preserved near the Bisahari Devi temple. The capital bears decorative patterns of lotus flowers and leaves of the Bodhi-tree (holy fig). Here till recently there was no temple, monastery or even a solitary monk (cf. Fig. 10.10), mainly due to the wildness and isolation of the area. The major attractions at Sankisa are a temple with the statue of Buddha, Bisari Devi Temple and Ashokan Elephant Pillar. A Japanese temple is recently opened. 11. Completion to Contemplation: Towards closing up Among the other places, directly associated with the Buddha (cf. Singh 2009, Fig. 10.1) are: Kapilavastu (Piprahwa), where the Buddha spent his childhood; Gaya, the place visited by the Buddha many times and performed his first austerities and meditation there; Kaushambi, Where the Buddha gave sermons in the 6th and 9th years; Patna, an ancient Buddhist site where while he was on his journeys stopped there and later this came the capital of Magadha empire; Kesariya (Kessaputta), where the Buddha handed over his alms-bowl to the people before reaching to Kushinagar where he entered to mahaparinirvana; and Mathura, the capital of Surasena and a centre of Buddhist art that was visited by the Buddha several times, of course he never liked this place. Of course, these places are not popular among the pilgrims or tourists, and moreover no viable 280 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana developments made yet to attract them as destinations for the Buddhist tourism. It is expected that the increasing consciousness towards the Buddhist ecology and the Buddhist tourism would help to like these places with main stream of Buddhist pilgrimage and tourist circuits, especially on the line of pilgrimage-tourism ― like a Middle Way! Of course, these places will be venerated and sacred for the Buddhist adherents, numbering 376 millions all over the world (including 8.2 millions in India). The notion of pilgrimage in Buddhism is intrinsic that inspire to get more closer interconnectedness with enlightened nature where once the Buddha passed his lime, or gave sermons, and later some sacred items (ashes) of the Buddha manifested there and followed up monks had received revelation that encouraged the Buddhist kings to establish commemorative monuments, monasteries or shines. Thus after passage of time developed four-tier hierarchy of the Buddhist places of pilgrimages (cf. Hall 2006 175-176). All such places maintain reciprocity of local to universal interaction or inter-personal relations in different context and at varying degrees, which well suit to the ‘Middle Path’ of Buddhism that refers to ‘the Middle way between devotion to the pleasures of the senses and self-mortification’ on the path of two great pillars, viz. Mahāprajnā (‘Great Wisdom’) and Mahākarunā (‘Great Compassion’). Acknowledgements: This essay is primarily inspired and developed on the line of the illustrious book by Ven. S. Dhammika (1992/1999), an associate monk to Buddha Dhamma Mandala Society at Singapore, who has been the main spring to guide us on the Buddhist trail in search of compassion, peace and human service; this essay is dedicated to him. Note: This essay is mostly based on Rana Singh’s earlier book (Singh 2003/ 2009) and presented here in updated and abridged version. 12. References (and select Bibliography) Ahir, D.C. 1986. Buddhist Shrines in India. Indian Book Centre, Delhi. Arnold, Sir Edwin 1879/ 1999. The Light of Asia or The Great Renunciation. Reprinted by Srishti Publ., New Delhi. Bapat, P.V. 1956. 2500 Years of Buddhism. Publication Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of India, New Delhi. Bechert, Heinz (ed.) 1995. When Did the Buddha Live. Bibliotheca IndoBuddhica Series No. 165. Sri Satguru Publs., Delhi. Behrendt, Kurt 2009. Traces of Buddhist Pilgrimage in ancient India; in, Malville, John M. and Saraswati, B.N. (eds.) Pilgrimage– Sacred The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India 281 Landscapes and Self Organised Complexity. DK Printworld, Delhi for IGNCA: 142-162. Cunningham, Alexander 1871/ 1996. The Ancient Geography of India. Reprinted by Low Price Publs., Delhi. Dhammika, S. 1992/1999. Middle Land, Middle Way. A Pilgrim's Guide to the Buddha's India. Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy (Sri Lanka). Dutt, N. and Bajpai, K.D. 1956. Development of Buddhism in Uttar Pradesh. Publication Bureau, Govt. of Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow. Forbes, Duncan 1999. The Buddhist Pilgrimage. Buddhist Tradition Series 37. Motilal Banarasidass Publ., Delhi. Ghosh, A. 1986. Nalanda. Archaeological Survey of India, Calcutta. 6th Ed. Hall, C. Michael 2006. Buddhism, tourism and the middle way; in, Timothy, Dallen J. and Olsen, Daniel H. (eds.) Tourism, Religion and Spiritual Journeys. Routledge, London & New York: 172-185. Hazra, Kanai Lal 1983. Buddhism in India as Described by the Chinese Pilgrims, AD 399 – 689. Munshiram Manoharlal Publ., New Delhi. HMG 1976. Lumbini Development Project. The Lumbini Development Committee, His Majesty’s Government, Babar Mahal (Kathmandu). Legge, James 1886/ 1998. A Record of Buddhist Kingdoms. Being an Account by the Chinese Monk Fa-hsien of his Travels in India and Ceylone (A.D. 399-414) in Search of the Buddhist Books of Discipline. Reprinted by Munshiram Manoharlal Publ., New Delhi. Michell, George 1989. Penguin Guide to the Monuments in India. Vol. 1. Penguin, Middlesex. Nyaupane, Gyan P. 2009. Heritage complexity and tourism: the case of Lumbini, Nepal. Journal of Heritage Tourism, 4 (2), May: 157-171. Rhys Davids, T.W. 1890. Buddhism. (Series of Non-Christian Traditions). Pali Text Society, London. —. 1903/ 1999. Buddhist India. T. Fisher Unwin, London. Reprinted by Munshiram Manoharlal Pub., New Delhi; in 2002 by Low Price Publ., Delhi. Russell, Jeremy 2009/ 1981. The Eight Places of Buddhist Pilgrimage. Mahayana Publications, Dharmashala. Singh, Rana P.B. 2003. Where the Buddha Walked. A Companion to the Buddhist Places of India. [Pilgrimage & Cosmology Series: 5]. Updated and reprint in 2009. Indica Books, Varanasi. Tulku, Tarthang 1994. Holy Places of the Buddha. Ed. Elizabeth Cook. Shambhala, Berkeley. Venkataramayya, M. 1981. Shravasti. 2nd Ed. Archaeological Survey of India, Calcutta. 282 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana Watters, Thomas 1905/ 1996. On Yuan Chwang’s Travels in India AD 629-645. (vol. I & II). Royal Asiatic Society, London. Reprinted by Munshiram Manoharlal Publ., New Delhi. -------------------------- Appendix: 1. Major Historical Events related to the Buddhism Year 563 BCE 547 534 528 544-493 529 483 483 383 270 259 258-257 256-255 250 249 240 232 187-151 100 BCE Events Birth of Gautama, at Lumbini, son of Suddhodana, a Kshatriya chief of the Shakya clan, and his consort Mayadevi.* Siddhartha Gautama married to his maternal cousin Yashodhara. After the birth of his son, Rahula, one day Siddhartha left his wife Yashodhara and son, and proceeded to an unannounced march. After six years of wandering and self-mortification, Siddhartha realised that penance does not lead to enlightenment. On the 49th day of meditation at Bodh Gaya under a Holy Fig tree he received enlightenment and was given the name of Buddha.* Rule of Bimbisara, king of the Haryanka dynasty at Rajgir, who later became a Buddhist and a close friend of the Buddha. The Buddha’s First Sermon, Dhammachakra Parivartana, at Sarnath, near Varanasi. Death of the Buddha at Kushinagar.* After 6 months of the Buddha’s death, under the guidance of the monk Kashyapa the First Buddhist General Council held at Sataparni cave, Vaibhara hill, Rajgir. Ven. Kakavarna convened the Second Buddhist General Council held at Vaishali. Ashokavardhana (Ashoka, 304 – 232 BCE) became the third Mauryan emperor. Ashoka promoted and established Buddhism. Ashoka’s rock edicts inscribed in four scripts: Greek & Aramic in Afghanistan, Kharoshti in Pakistan, and Brahmi elsewhere. Ashoka’s further rock inscriptions containing the Kalinga Edicts, referring to his conversion to Buddhism. Mahinda (Mahendra), son of Ashoka, became a Buddhist monk, and embarked on a mission to Sri Lanka. Ashoka’s pilgrimage to the Buddhist places, like Kapilavastu, Kushinagar, Bodh Gaya and Sarnath. Under Ashoka’s patronage the Third Buddhist General Council was convened at Pataliputra (Patna). Ashoka died, and his son crowned as emperor. Rule of Pushyamitra, founder of the Shunga dynasty, who promoted Brahmanism and Buddhism. The Buddhist Sangha (‘Order’), funded largely by rich merchants and craftsmen, built cave temples, especially in Deccan. The Buddhist places of pilgrimages in India CE 78-101 101 106-119 357 383 399 404-14 412 606-647 630 638-42 645 664 671-85 770-890 1033 1070 1197 1234-61 1861-85 1871 1881 1885 1891 1949 1954 1956 283 Rule of emperor Kanishka, known as the 2nd Ashoka and greatest of the Kushana rulers; later in his life he became a Buddhist and a patron of the Sangha. Emperor Kanishka presided over the Fourth Buddhist General Council, convened in Kashmir. Kanishka’s son Huvishka crowned and promoted Gandhara School of Art ―images of the Buddha & the Bodhisattvas. A Buddhist mission is dispatched to China, the first in the series of ten. The Indian Buddhist monk Kumarajiva, arrived in China to set standards in the translation of Buddhist scriptures into Chinese. Fa-hsien (374-462), a Chinese monk, arrived in India. Chih-meng, a Chinese pilgrim, travelled in India. Fa-hsien returned to China. Rule of Harsha, who built a large number of stupas. Hsüan-tsang (603-664), a Chinese Buddhist monk, was made a courtier by Harsha Vardhana and became a royal chronicler. Yuan-chan, a Chinese pilgrim visited India, also again in 665. Hsüan-tsang returned to China. Hsüan-tsang died in the Wu Li monastery in China. I-tsing (634-713), a Chinese pilgrim, travelled in India Pala dynasty, under which the Buddhist art and architecture reached to its most mature stage. Hui-wen, a Chinese pilgrim, visited India, by the order of His Imperial Majesty, T’ai Tsung. First major restoration and renovation of the Mahabodhi temple by the Burmese (Myanmar), under the patronage of King Anawrahta (CE 1044-1077). Allauddin Khilji, a Muslim king, sacked Nalanda and massacred all the Buddhist monks. Dharmasvamin (1196-1263), a Tibetan monk, visit to Buddhist places; he died in Tibet. Alexander Cunningham (1814-1893), the founding director of the Archaeological Survey of India; excavated many Buddhist sites. Under the patronage of king Min-donmin the Fifth Buddhist General Council was convened at Mandaley (Myanmar). Foundation of the Pali Text Society at London by T. W. Rhys Davids. Edwin Arnold (1833-1904), an Englishman, visited to Bodh Gaya. Anagarika Dharmapala (1864-1933) visited Sarnath, founded the Mahabodhi Society at Colombo, and died in Sarnath. Bodh Gaya Temple Management Act enacted by the Govt. of Bihar, consting a committee of 4 Hindus and 4 Buddhists. The Sixth Buddhist General Council, inaugurated at Rangoon (Myanmar), on Vaishakha Purnima, 17 May. The Concluding ceremony of the Sixth Council on the occasion 284 1959 10. Rana P.B. Singh & Pravin S. Rana of the 2500th anniversary of the Buddha’s nirvana, at Rangoon, on Vaishakha Purnima, 24 May. In April being exiled from China, the 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso (b. 5 July 1935), head of Gelugpa or Yellow Hat Sect & renowned as Tibet’s god-king settled in Dharmashala, India. * On the day of Vaishakha (April-May) Purnima (Shukla 15th), waxing, Full Moon. In near future the dates for the Buddha Purnima are: 17 May 2011, 6 May 2012, 25 May 2013, 14 May 2014, 4 May 2015, 21 May 2016, and 10 May 2017. ----------------------------Prof. Rana P.B. Singh Professor of Cultural Geography & Heritage Studies, Banaras Hindu University, New F - 7 Jodhpur Colony, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA. Email: ranapbs@gmail.com § Rana is researching in the fields of heritage planning, pilgrimages and settlement systems in Varanasi region since over last three decades as promoter, collaborator and organiser. On these topics he lectured at centres in all parts of the world. His publications include over 190 papers and 38 books on these subjects, including Banaras, the Heritage City of India: Geography, History, and Bibliography (IB 2009), and the eight books under ‘Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series’: ‒ five from Cambridge Scholars Publishing UK: Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India (2009), Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century (2009), Cosmic Order & Cultural Astronomy (2009), Banaras, Making of India’s Heritage City (2009), Sacred Geography of Goddesses in South Asia (2010), and - three from Shubhi Publications (New Delhi, India): Heritagescapes and Cultural Landscapes (2011), Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems (2011), and Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India (2011). Dr. Pravin S. Rana Lecturer in Tourism Management, Faculty of Arts, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA. Email: psranabhu@gmail.com § Pravin holds a master degree (2000) in tourism management and has worked on “Pilgrimage and Ecotourism in Varanasi Region: Resources, Perspectives and Prospects” for his doctoral dissertation (University of Lucknow, 2003), and published a dozen of papers in this area. He is a co-author of Banaras Region: A Spiritual and Cultural Guide (2002/2006, Indica Books, Varanasi, with R.P.B. Singh), and Tourism Geography (2006, New Royal Book Co., Lucknow, with A.K. Singh). During Aug. 2005-July 2009, he had served as Manager of the Children Programme at World Literacy of Canada (India Office); and also gave seminars in Norway and Canada. 11 Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism Noga Collins-Kreiner University of Haifa, Israel ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Whether in its traditional religious form or its modern secular form, pilgrimage is currently experiencing resurgence the world over. This study analyzes the traits of current Jewish pilgrims to Jewish holy sites in Israel and explores the phenomenon of Jewish pilgrimage-tourism in the country. To this end, it employs a variety of methodologies, including a questionnaire completed by 703 pilgrims at seven different pilgrimage sites in Israel; interviews with the pilgrims and staff of organized tours to these sites; observations in situ; and participant observation. Obviously, these sites attract an extremely diverse visitor population, ranging from very religious orthodox pilgrims, to ‘traditional’ pilgrim-tourists, to secular tourists who can also be understood as alternative tourists. The traits of present-day pilgrims can be represented on a scale ranging from ‘secular’ to ‘spiritual’, or from ‘tourist’ to ‘pilgrim’, which enables us to propose a model of site development, and to grade the sites on a scale ranging from spontaneous, undeveloped sites to formal, highly developed sites. The study also indicates that the secular visits of tourists is what triggers site movement toward formal recognition and development, transforming them from pure pilgrimage sites to religious-tourist sites and drawing attention to the relationship between pilgrimage and tourism. It is notable that the convergence of traditional pilgrimage and modern day tourism has much in common. Keywords: Pilgrimage; tourism; Judaism; Israel; religious tourism; holy sites; stages of development. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction This paper deals with the phenomenon of current Jewish pilgrimage tourism to the shrines and graves of tsaddikim (saintly and pious people) in Israel. Current Jewish pilgrimage to the shrines at the graves of saintly personages is a subject which has been barely researched previously. Very little attention has been paid so far to the tourist 286 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner components of this growing phenomenon, which encompasses millions of visits each year and has affected Israeli society and culture. Pilgrimage is one of the best-known phenomena in religion and culture and it features in all the major religions of the world: Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Pilgrimage could be defined as “A journey resulting from religious causes, externally to a holy site, and internally for spiritual purposes and internal under-standing” (Barber 1993: 1) or as a journey undertaken by a person in search of holiness, truth, and the sacred (Vukonič 1996). Whether traditional and religious or modern and secular, pilgrimage is experiencing resurgence all over the world, and longstanding shrines still act as magnets to those in search of spiritual goals (Digance 2003). Superficial relationships between tourists and pilgrims have been acknowledged for several decades by medievalists and historians of tourism (Smith 1992), and more recently have been subject to further research. Pilgrimages have powerful political, economic, social and cultural implications, and even affect global trade and health. As part of a religion, pilgrimage has exerted geopolitical influence for most of human history. The boundaries separating one civilization from another were drawn in part along religious lines. Conflict has often been motivated ‒ or at least justified ‒ by the desire to spread the true faith, to reclaim sacred sites or to make a pilgrimage. Religious groups have also been important in preserving culture, in promoting peace and brotherhood. This very substantial role in defining the heritage of a people is outside the domain of middle-range theory in the social sciences (Voas 2007). This phenomenon has stimulated much interest and much writing about it throughout history, parallel to the practice itself. The “old” paradigm was predicated on the assumption that religious elements were at the core of pilgrimage but, in recent years, there has been a growth in the number of researchers dealing with various aspects of pilgrimage and in their diverse backgrounds. Nowadays we can find researchers from many disciplines studying this field: historians, theologians, sociologists, psychologists, anthropologists, economists, geographers and many more (Vukonič 1996). More significant are the new angles and perspectives that these researchers are dealing with as well as the old and well-known aspects of pilgrimage. The number of books and publications on the combination of a spiritual search with a physical journey is one indication of the popularity and importance of pilgrimage. Clearly, it can be viewed as an inter-disciplinary field (Digance 2003; Timothy and Olsen 2006). Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 287 2. Pilgrimage and Tourism Smith (1992) claims that in current usage the term “pilgrimage” connotes a religious journey, a journey of a pilgrim, especially one to a shrine or a sacred place. However, its derivation from the Latin peregrinus allows broader interpretations, including foreigner, wanderer, exile, traveller, newcomer and stranger. The term “tourist” – one that makes a tour for pleasure or culture also originally evolved from Latin, namely from the term tornus: one who makes a circuitous journey, usually for pleasure, and returns to the starting point. But Smith (1992) also claims that contemporary use of terminology that identifies the “pilgrim” as a religious traveller and the “tourist” as a vacationer is a culturally constructed polarity that blurs travellers’ motives. Until the 1970s’, the field of tourism studies barely existed (Nash 2005) and studies of the relationship among religion, pilgrimage and tourism frequently approached religion and tourism as two separate subjects warranting little interrelated or comparative treatment. This is surprising considering the fact that the development of leisure, and therefore tourism, is incomprehensible without an understanding of religion and the practice of pilgrimage in ancient times (Timothy and Olsen 2006; Vukonič 2002). Initial dedifferentiation between tourism and pilgrimage began to emerge in the 1970s, when MacCannell (1973) argued that the tourist as pilgrim was searching for something different, for authenticity. Later that decade, Graburn (1977) characterized tourism as a kind of ritual, suggesting the existence of parallel processes in both formal pilgrimage and tourism that could be interpreted as ‘sacred journeys.’ These journeys, he contended, are about self-transformation and the gaining of knowledge and status through contact with the extraordinary or sacred. Since then, research has been dealing with the complicated economic, political, social, psychological, and emotional relationship between pilgrimage and tourism. Since then, theories have concentrated on different typologies of tourists and pilgrims as part of the differentiation between visit-related experiences and real life (Cohen 1979, 1992; Smith 1992, 1989; MacCannell 1973). Over the past two decades, a new focus on pilgrimage has emerged via researchers interested in the field of tourism, who have explored interesting political, cultural, behavioural, economic and geographical research subjects (Timothy and Olsen 2006). Many of these new works reflect a tendency toward dedifferentiation, and some researchers have argued that the differences between tourism, pilgrimage and even secular 288 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner pilgrimage are narrowing (Bilu 1998; Kong 2001). Since the 1990s, analysis of this relationship has focused on the similarities and differences between the tourist and the pilgrim (Cohen 1992, 1998; Collins-Kreiner and Kliot 2000; Digance 2003, 2006; Ebron 1999; Frey, 1998; MacCannell 1973; Smith 1992; Stoddard and Morinis 1997; Timothy and Olsen 2006; Turner and Turner 1978; Vukonič 1996). This distinction has been misplaced in that the religious and secular spheres of tourism are quickly emerging, as religious tourism assumes a more prominent market niche in international tourism. A number of researchers have recognized that the ties between tourism and pilgrimage are unclear, blurred, and poorly classified. This relationship is the subject of Eade’s (1992) article, which describes the interaction between pilgrims and tourists at Lourdes, of Bowman’s (1991) work on the place of Jerusalem in Christianity, and of Rinschede’s (1992) description of the touristic uses of pilgrimage sites. Pilgrims and tourists are distinct actors situated at opposite ends of Smith’s continuum of travel, which first appeared in 1992. The poles of the pilgrimage-tourism axis are labelled sacred and secular respectively. Between the two exists an almost endless range of possible sacred-secular combinations, with a central area, which has come to be referred to generally as “religious tourism”. These combinations reflect the multiple and changing motivations of travellers, whose interests and activities may change – consciously or subconsciously ‒ from tourism to pilgrimage and vice versa. Jackowski and Smith (1992) use the term “knowledge-based tourism” synonymously with “religious tourism”. Most researchers identify “religious tourism” with the individual’s quest for shrines and locales where, in lieu of piety, they seek to identify with sites of historical and cultural meaning (Nolan and Nolan, 1989). Smith (1992) understands the difference as stemming from individual beliefs and worldviews. According to Gatrell and Reid (2002), tourism, like pilgrimage, is embedded within a complex of socio-spatial processes that are historically, culturally, and locally dependent. Both are complex systems comprising perceptions, expectations and experiences (Gatrell and Reid 2002; McCann, 2002; Petric and Mrnjavac 2003). Badone and Roseman are the first ones to claim in 2004 that: “Rigid dichotomies between pilgrimage and tourism or pilgrims and tourists no longer seem tenable in the shifting world of postmodern travel” (2004: 2). Thus in their book “Intersecting Journeys: The Anthropology of Pilgrimage and Tourism” they seek to highlight the similarities between these two categories of travel that have frequently been regarded as conceptual opposites Cohen (1992) portrays a typology of pilgrimage centres in terms of Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 289 the relative emphasis on each of these tendencies. He distinguishes two polar types of pilgrimage centres: the formal and the popular. His research on tourist and pilgrim activities at these sites maintains that pilgrimage and tourism differ in terms of the direction of the journey undertaken. The ‘pilgrim’ and the ‘pilgrim-tourist’ peregrinate toward their socio-cultural centre, while the ‘traveller’ a nd the ‘traveller-tourist’ move in the opposite direction. This distinction applies particularly to journeys to formal pilgrimage centres. However, journeys to popular pilgrimage centres will often be marked by a mixture of features characteristic of both pilgrimage and tourism. The polar typology of formal and popular pilgrimage centres defines the end points of a continuum along which given pilgrimage centers can be located. The nature of the ‘tourist experience’ has received much attention from tourism research (Cohen 1979; MacCannell 1973; Turner and Turner 1969, 1978). MacCannell (1973) was the first to claim that it is a quest for the authentic, and that it presents the pilgrimage of modern man. The tourist is perceived as a pilgrim in the current modern secular world. Cohen (1979) proposed a typology of tourist experiences. It is based on the place and significance of tourists’ experience in their total worldview, their relationship to a perceived ‘centre’ and the location of that centre in relation to the society in which the tourist lives. Cohen (1979: 180) holds that ‘the tourist’ cannot be described as a “general type” so he distinguishes several tourist experiences that will help in understanding the phenomenon of pilgrimage. Five main modes are defined, presenting the spectrum from the tourist’s experience as a traveller in pursuit of ‘mere’ pleasure to that of the modern pilgrim in quest of meaning at someone else’s centre. Cohen (1979: 183) classifies them as the “Recreational mode”, the “Diversionary mode”, the “Experiential mode”, the “Experimental mode”, and the “Existential mode”. Cohen claims that tourists travelling in the “Existential mode” are analogous to pilgrims. Both are fully committed to an elective spiritual centre, external to the mainstream of their native society and culture, because they feel that the only meaningful real life is at the centre. Researchers indicate that the difference between old-fashioned pilgrimage and tourism is narrowing (Bilu 1998). Numerous points of similarity are emerging, and the word ‘pilgrimage’ itself is widely used in broad and secular contexts, such as for visits to war graves or the graves and residences of celebrities, for example, Elvis Presley’s mansion and grave in Memphis, Tennessee (Reader and Walter 1993). 290 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner 3. Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism The subject of Jewish pilgrimage-tourism has become more topical recently and reflects the increased demand for numbers of sites. At the same time the volume of visitors has markedly risen. Despite the interest in the theoretical dimensions of religious tourism, only a few studies of Jewish travel and the role that pilgrimage plays in Judaism today have appeared (Ben-Ari and Bilu 1987, 1997; Bilu 1998; Epstein 1995; Goldberg 1997; Levy 1997; Sasson 2002; Weingrod 1990). Therefore, the subject of Jewish pilgrimage tourism represents an emerging research theme. The Jewish religion is focused on the importance of Jerusalem. The city has several important holy sites, of which the Western Wall (Hakotel Hama’aravi) is the most important (Coleman and Elsner 1995). Today, visits by Jewish pilgrims to the Western Wall are usually associated with praying, swearing oaths (nedarim), making requests, and placing notes (supplications) between the stones of the Wall to enhance the chances of the wishes materializing. Jerusalem, and in particular the Western Wall, is a formal pilgrimage centre par excellence. The site is spatially and symbolically central. Other holy sites that could be classified in this category but which are less important and less accessible than the Western Wall are Rachel’s Grave near Bethlehem, the burial place of the Matriarch Rachel, and the Cave of Machpela in Hebron. After the destruction of the Second Temple in CE 70, Galilee in general, and more specifically Safed, a city in upper Galilee, became the main Jewish centre. During Mishnaic and Talmudic times (1st–5th centuries) many rabbis and sages (Tanna’im and Amora’im) settled there. Galilee became an important Jewish centre at that time, a place of sages and poets, and Safed and Tiberias became two of the four holy cities of the Jews. Nowadays holy sites from this historical period include the burial places of holy people (Kivrey tsaddikim) who have become important in Jewish tradition because of a general belief in their holy powers. Since the 1970s these sacred sites have been developed more intensely. One of the main influencing factors in the emergence of these sites as noted by Weingrod (1990) and Ben-Ari and Bilu (1987) was the new immigrations of North African Jews who came to Israel in the 1950s. They brought with them to Israel the popular Muslim tradition of ziara, visiting the holy graves of holy people. This paper deals with pilgrims to these pilgrimage centres. Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 291 4. Methodology A structured questionnaire was distributed to 703 visitors found at seven selected holy sites (Fig. 11.1): Rabbi Yonatan Ben-Oziel’s tomb, the tomb of Rabbi Shimon Bar-Yohai, The cave of Elija in Haifa, the tomb of Rabbi Meir Baal Haness, (near Tiberius), the tomb of Rabbi Crospodai, the tomb of Haarie and the tomb of Raban Gamliel in Yavne. Fig. 11.1. Israel: The researched holy sites. 292 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner The questionnaire focused on the pilgrims’ expression of beliefs, feelings, motivations, behaviour, and experiences and comprised closedend and opened-end questions. The first part of the questionnaire elicited the pilgrims’ personal details and characteristics such as age, sex, origin, socio-economic status, and religious affiliation. The second part asked about their visit to the site: their motivations for the pilgrimage, their activities, length of stay at the site, their pattern of visit and behaviour at the site and the tourist context of their visit. The questionnaires were distributed through March 2005 to December 2005. This period included weekdays, weekends and holidays which have unique and different patterns of pilgrimage activity. About a hundred questionnaires were completed at each site. All the visitors who agreed to participate were sampled. It is estimated that about three quarters of all requests responded positively. The data was analyzed by quantitative methods (percentages, average) and qualitative methods of the 703 completed questionnaires. To analyze the phenomenon from other points of view, interviews were also held with the staff of the organized tours to the sites, tour leaders and employees of the Ministry of Religions in charge of the sites. Observations in situ were conducted in order to identify the pilgrim behaviour modes in addition to the questionnaires. It should be noted that observations at the different sites were made between the years 19952004 and that about 100 small pilot studies of 30 participants were conducted at various sites in Israel during these years, to learn about the phenomena, to estimate the willingness of the visitors to answer questions relating to their beliefs and practices, and to help design the final questionnaire. As there is no written information concerning the general population which visits the site, a non-representative sample was chosen. It may well be that for further research other types of samples will be used. 5. The Visitors’ Characteristics The pilgrims’ age curve shows that most (57 per cent) of the visitors are younger than 35 years. And, 32 per cent of all pilgrims range between the ages of 21 and 35, 26 per cent are aged 36-50 and 25 per cent are younger than 20. Only 17 per cent are older than 51, and this finding point to the relative youth of the pilgrims, which differs from the data in other case studies in Christianity and Judaism. Another finding was the equal number of men and women present at the sites with a small preference to male (58 per cent), which differs from findings in other religions such as Christianity, where the female sex Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 293 predominates. The research findings showed that each site had its “catchment area”, referring to the visitor’s place of origin and its distance from the site. For example, the power of attraction of the grave of Rabbi Shimon BarYochai proved to be international (26 per cent of all visitors) and national (47 per cent), while most of the visitors arriving at Rabbi Yonatan Ben-Oziel’s grave were from the Northern part of Israel (49 per cent) and from other parts of the country (27 per cent). The Grave of Ha’ari is mainly a local attraction, with 49per cent of all visitors coming from the local village, less than 20 km away. Most of the visit (73 per cent) to the sites were classified as religiously motivated, “a belief in the holy figure”, “a wish to pray”, “a holy Mitzvah” and “asking for requests”. 24 per cent of all visitors came because of spiritual non religious reasons such as “improving my feeling, part of a tour, curiosity and an emotional-spiritual experience. The reasons given by the participants may suggest that this is also a cultural heritage location rather than a religious site only. The activity at the site accorded with the motivation for the visit. The most common activity was prayer. The visit also included other activities such as resting, eating, enjoying the view, and watching others ‒ activities attesting that this is also a tourist site, not only a religious one. Most of the visitors went to sites other than the holy grave and participated in different activities, the most popular being hiking in the outdoors. They mostly visited nature reserves but also participated in other activities such as eating out, sightseeing, and visiting tourist attractions. Fig. 11.2. The distribution of visitors to the Holy graves 294 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner The pilgrims were asked to describe their religious affiliation if any, and to describe themselves as ‘secular’, traditional , ‘very orthodox’, or ‘religious’, or whether they would choose a different description. Four main groups of visitors were found to participate in the pilgrimage: ‘traditional’ visitors (36 per cent), religious (25 per cent), very orthodox Jews (19 per cent) and secular (15 per cent) [see Fig. 11.2]. A few people preferred to describe themselves differently, not by any of the conventional appellations. Their choice was based on their own understanding of these descriptions and there was no attempt to influence the interviewees. This self-description is very important for a grasp of the connection and the continuum between pilgrims and tourists. An interesting connection emerged between the self-image and socio-economic status. Those who defined themselves as “very orthodox” and a “pilgrim” tended to describe themselves as belonging to a low socio- economic group, while those who described themselves as “secular” and as a “tourist” tended to depict themselves as belonging to a high socio-economic group. All this seems to indicate that the better the economic status of the pilgrim, at least in his or her own perception, the more likely he or she was to describe himself or herself as a “tourist”. 6. Typologies of Visitors The parameter of religious affiliation, if any, proved the most important for the purpose of the analysis. Culture specific terminology was used in order to give more meaning to the pilgrimage. Current Jewish typology of Hiloneim (non religious) Masortiem (traditional), Dateim (religious) and Haredim (strictly orthodox) is used in order to explain the four types of pilgrims. Parameters such as age, socioeconomic status, place of origin, gender, and affiliation (Sephardim or Ashkenazi) were found to have less influence on the pilgrims’ characteristics. 6.1. Very Orthodox Jews (Haredim) & Religious Visitors (Dateim) Because these visitors to the holy graves are there solely for religious reasons to pray and make supplications there, they may be classified as “pure” pilgrims. Their visit is usually combined with visits to other graves in the area. One type of the very religious group consisted of Hasidic youths ranging in age from seventeen to twenty years old and travelling in Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 295 pairs or groups, usually on organized tours or hitchhiking excursions. These are young males who spend their free time visiting different sites in Israel, especially graves of saintly personages. In the interviews it was ascertained that they came mainly from Jerusalem and Bnei Brak (largely populated by ultra orthodox), but there were others from all over Israel. Their visit was marked by excitement and enthusiasm, and one particular group of Hasidic youths reported travelling at night, hitchhiking from one grave to the other. Another type of group included orthodox Jewish women travelling alone or with a close friend or relative. They typically bring with them prayers relating to marriage, health, or fertility. There were also orthodox family groups on a family tour that included visiting different graves in the area. Some very orthodox Jews travelled to the holy graves as part of an “official pilgrimage,” that is, organized tours of fifty or more people arranged by different religious organizations. These tour buses travel from site to site, and prayers are recited at each location. 6.2. Secular Visitors (Hiloneim) Organized groups of secular men and women visiting holy graves were found to be very common. The participants are mainly middle-aged people of medium to high socioeconomic status. The visit is usually organized by travel agencies or other recreational groups. Each group has a local leader who specializes in spiritual tours to holy sites. Among these visitors, the motivation for visiting varied from curiosity, interest, and a wish to see cultural phenomena, to a search for a different meaning of life. The tour is sometimes organized at night to add some mystery to it. Although these tours usually involve spiritualism and mysticism, they may be classified as part of heritage tourism, which has lately become popular worldwide and includes people who travel to sites for variety of reasons, including nostalgia for the past, the development of identity in terms of place and self, discovering family roots and improving awareness and understanding of historical events and places, which necessarily involve components of history, patriotism and nationalism (Olsen and Timothy 2002). Tours consisting entirely of secular women have proved popular in recent times. These tour participants are usually of high socioeconomic status. Some small tour groups also attend the grave sites to make specific requests to the holy figure, even though they are secular. In addition, secular individuals may happen to visit the graves on rare occasions, as part of a hiking itinerary in the area or simply out of curiosity. 6.3. Traditional Visitors (Masorteim) 296 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner The main reason for the visit of traditional believers stems from their belief in the holy persons themselves, and in what they can offer them. Most traditional visitors are women of all ages from all over Israel, usually from a low to medium socioeconomic background. Most of them are of Sephardic origin, and many usually visit as part of an organized group. They typically ask for fertility, health, marriage, or some other personal need. These women place their supplications on the gravestone of the holy person, light candles, and tie coloured cloths on the branches of a “wishing tree” in order to have their wishes granted. The phenomenon as a whole was found to be more traditional and popular than religious, and will be discussed further below. 7. Stages of Development A typology of sites was compiled according to their stage of development and character. It is based upon the observations, questioners and interviews made at the site. The classification used Sasson’s (2002) and Cohen’s (1992) typologies and is divided into three stages: the first ‘spontaneous-popular’ stage, the second ‘semiformal stage’ and the third ‘formal’ stage. The development of the different sites is contingent on two elements - from above by diverse official bodies and from below by the people themselves. The sites of Rabi Crospodai and the site of the Ha’ari were found to be at the first ‘spontaneous stage’. At this stage, the holy site and its surrounding facilities are undergoing a process of development and at the same time, its existence becomes known by word of mouth. This draws a small but steady flow of people. The Grave of Ha’ari is mainly a local attraction, with 70 per cent of all visitors coming from less than 20 km away. In response, various bodies and groups become involved in maintenance and keeping order. As yet there is no formal body that identifies with the site or ventures an opinion about historical or religious issues connected with it. In the past few decades an increasing number of sites have been found at this primary stage, which includes spontaneous pilgrimage of local people. The site of Ha’ari is ready for the next stage in the model, which is the ‘semi-formal stage’, where the grave of Rabbi Yonatan Ben-Oziel can be located. In this stage, activity increases, and the sites gain recognition by the religious institutions, government organizations, and such official bodies as the Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Ministry of Tourism. The site grows rapidly and its physical development keeps pace. Private enterprise is usually involved at first. An entrepreneur Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 297 builds the basic infrastructure required for the growing number of visitors. In the case of Rabbi Yonatan Ben-Oziel’s grave a woman named ‘Venecia’ came to this site in 1980 and began to care for the site and develop it. This pressure of numbers encourages the local authority to take part in the process from this time on, and thus the place gains formal recognition. The research findings showed that most of the visitors arriving at Rabbi Yonatan Ben-Oziel’s grave were from the Northern part of Israel (57 per cent) and from other parts of the country (30 per cent) and not from the local community. In Rabbi Yonatan Ben-Oziel’s grave, recognition was won in the 1990s’ and then a special road was built to the grave. Signposts started to appear and weekly prayers were organized officially at the site by different groups. In time it grew in size, extending far beyond the original small grave, and a spacious purpose-built sidewalk and a large candlelighting furnace were constructed. A grave-cover cloth was donated. The location started to attain public awareness as it developed, and today the site is ready for thousands of visitors. The grave of Rabbi Shimon Bar-Yohai, The cave of Elijah, The tomb of Rabbi Meir Baal Haness and The tomb of the tomb of Raban Gamliel are at the third and highest level of formal graves, which enjoy formal recognition by the Israeli establishment. By this time they have come under the control of the Ministry of Religious Affairs, which means that they are eligible for certain services just like any other government site. The research findings showed that the power of attraction of the grave of Rabbi Shimon Bar-Yochai proved to be international and national, while the site of the Rabi Crospodai is at the earliest stage, and still awaits a ‘patron’ who could help it move to the next stage. The current situation of lack of visitors and absence of minimal infrastructure are adversely affecting the expansion process and thus it has a ‘catchment area’ which is very narrow and includes only visitors from the local villages. The site of Ha’ari is in a state of development and therefore is expected to advance soon to the ‘semi-formal’ stage, that of the grave of Rabbi Yonatan Ben Oziel. As noted, all the other graves are at the highest level and enjoy wide public and governmental recognition. There was found to be a clear connection between the sites’ development stage and their ‘catchment area’. 8. The Tourism-Pilgrimage Axis One of the main conclusions relates to the existence of a continuum 298 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner upon which the different groups can be represented as proposed by Smith (1992). At one end are the pilgrims, Orthodox Jews who visit the sites out of religious belief. Their main activity is praying. At the opposite end of the scale are tourists (so-called ‘spiritual’ or ‘heritage tourists’) whose motivations are curiosity, cultural interest, and searching for ‘new meanings to life’. Between these extremes are the ‘traditional’ visitors. These are closer to the Orthodox, believing in the power of the tsaddik and his helpful advice. Yet this belief on the part of the ‘traditional’ does not stem from religious faith but from a personal outlook. This is borne out by the fact that they tend to make specific requests rather than offer formal prayers. The difference may be observed in the customs and behavior of the different groups. Whereas the pilgrims pray and the secular visitors just visit, the mid-scale group takes part in many local folklore activities such as lighting candles, placing supplications and notes, and buying souvenirs such as holy water, pictures of the tsaddik, candles, greetings, pamphlets, amulets against the evil eye, and more. The differences noted in the visitors’ attitudes to the sites were found to depend mainly on their religious affiliation, not on their age, origin, socio-economic status, selfperception, sex, etc. The location of each pilgrim on the scale is personal and subjective, and between the extremes lie almost infinite sacred-secular combinations. The research finding of the existence of a scale reinforces the emerging connection between tourism and pilgrimage presented earlier in the article (Smith 1992). Any discrepancy between old-fashioned pilgrimage to the graves and today’s tourism is hard to discern, and it is becoming impossible to differentiate pilgrims from tourists. Both kinds are motivated to undergo an experience that will add meaning to their life. They leave their periphery in order to find a centre that will offer them a stronger belief and a new world. It is important to note that the groups are not homogeneous and comprise different types of people. For example, the secular group is highly diverse, ranging from those who go out of curiosity to those in quest of a meaning, hence they are closer to the pilgrimage pole of the scale, which is shown here. The research findings about the common search for meaning which exists in pilgrims and pilgrims-tourists goes to confirm Cohen’s (1979) typology of several tourist modes, and to reassert the complex connection between tourism and pilgrimage. Based on the study, the following typology for the pilgrims in is suggested: Existential Pilgrims are people whose experiences are characterized by the Existential mode. They are Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 299 Orthodox Jews who see their pilgrimage as a religious experience. The experience of their visits will seldom have recreational, diversionary elements, though they will feel that mentally and spiritually the trip had restorative effects. Experiential Existential Pilgrims are secular visitors, who in addition to their Existential mode of experiences, also have an experiential mode of experience which stresses the quest of meaning outside the confines of one’s own society, motivated by the search for authentic experiences. Tourist Pilgrims are mostly traditional visitors with a combination of modes of experience in which the most dominant one is the experiential mode with, perhaps, small doses of diversionary and recreational experiences. They will add elements of tourism which are directly related to leisure activities. Hardly any tourists, namely people who were looking for recreational and diversionary tourist experiences, will visit the sites. The institutional organizational framework is different, as are the motivations. 9. Conclusions A connection was found between the characteristics of the participants and the sites’ stage of development. At the first ‘spontaneous stage’ of development, religion, folk beliefs and customs mix. Different market segments of visitors go to the sites and co-exist. This is so even though the reasons for visiting and the activities at the site are totally different. Each site is believed to have its own special qualities. These pilgrimage sites fill the need for supernatural or spiritual comfort. The visits by secular people at the ‘spontaneous stage’ are the triggers that cause the site to move from this stage to the ‘semi-formal’ stage, as in the case of Rabbi Yonatan Ben Uziel’s grave. But at the point when the site reaches the ‘formal stage’ and becomes a well recognized religious and pilgrimage site, the secular visitors usually abandon it and move on to another site which is at the spontaneous stage. A few centres of pilgrimage were found to be at the highest formal level. Whereas the visit to the formal site would be the main goal of the visitor, the visit to a spontaneous site would only be a ‘chance opportunity’ for the pilgrim. It may be assumed from the research findings that the visits by secular people are the trigger that causes the site to move from the spontaneous stage to the semi-formal stage, as in the case of Rabbi Yonatan Ben Oziel’s grave. But at the point when the place reaches the ‘formal stage’ and becomes a well recognized religious and pilgrimage site, the secular visitors usually abandon it and move on to another site which is at the spontaneous stage. 300 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner In light of the trends discussed here, I posit that the difference between tourism and traditional pilgrimage is fading while numerous aspects of similarity are emerging: both require spatial movement and involve an emotional desire on the part of individuals to visit sites meaningful to them. Overall, however, the visitor experience, whether we refer to it as pilgrimage or tourism, is in fact not homogeneous and comprises different types. The motivations of visitors are also highly diverse, ranging from curiosity to a search for meaning. Differing market segments of visitors go to the various sites, holy and not holy, and coexist. This coexistence occurs despite the fact that the reasons for the visits vary considerably, as do the activities taking place at the site. As we have seen, the literature has paid special attention to the relationship between pilgrimage and tourism, which it often represents on a scale. But how does one distinguish a visitor on a genuine quest for prayer and spiritual peace from one admiring the work of 11th or 12th century builders, or another contemplating the tomb of a famous person? A key issue of this article relates to the existence of a continuum among different types of visitors that not arranged in accordance with their description as pilgrims or tourists, as in Smith (1992), but in accordance with the visit’s effect on the visitors themselves. Tourism literature typically pays a great deal of attention to the effect of tourism on the local population and relatively little attention to the effect on the visitors themselves (duration, strength, and level). The differing experiences of the visitor, whether pilgrim or tourist, should therefore be represented on a scale based on the effect of the visit, in terms of time and strength. To what extent were they affected after their return home, regardless of their initial classification as tourist or pilgrim? Three levels of change should be considered: external characteristics, perceptions, and attitudes. It is of course also possible that the visit will result in no changes whatsoever. A change on the first level will be evident in visitors’ external features, such as language, clothing, hairstyle and jewellery. Changes on the level of perceptions, or visitors’ outlook on life, beliefs and behaviour, may begin to emerge as they adopt new concepts from the place visited and the local population they met there. Changes on the third level involve a psychological change or a change in attitude. Current research on visits of Westerners to the East notes all of these types of changes. For example, researchers such as Maoz (2006, 2007), Sharpley and Sundaram (2005), and Collins-Kreiner and Sagie-Tueta (2010) have found that different visitors undergo different experiences according to their age, gender, social status, and other factors. Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 301 All visitors have different expectations from their trips. At one end of the scale are spiritual visitors (not necessarily pilgrims), spiritual sites and the spiritual experiences which constitute a search for new meaning in life. Visits of this type can change lives. At the opposite end of the scale are visitors who are not affected by their visit. Visitors may also move along the continuum during their journey, as in the case of Western visitors to the East who left their homes as secular visitors and returned home as spiritual visitors (Sharpley and Sundaram 2005). This paper presents the complex subject of “pilgrimage tourism” dealing with the Jewish religion and offers a point of departure for other studies in Judaism or Tourism as well as other contexts and religions in today’s modern world. 10. References Badone, Ellen and Roseman, Sharon R. (eds.) 2004. Intersecting Journeys: The Anthropology of Pilgrimage and Tourism. University of Illinois Press, Champaign. Barber, Richard 1993. Pilgrimages. The Boydell Press. London. Ben-Ari, E. and Bilu, Y. 1987. Saints’ Sanctuaries in Israeli Development Towns: on a Mechanism of Urban Transformation. Urban Anthropology, 15 (2): 243-272. ―. 1997. Grasping Land: Space and Place in Contemporary Israeli Discourse and Experience. State University of New York, SUNY Press, New York. Bilu, Y. 1998. Divine worship and Pilgrimage to Holy Sites as Universal Phenomena; in, Gonen, Rivka (ed.) To the Holy Graves: Pilgrimage to the Holy Graves and Hillulot in Israel. The Israel Museum, Jerusalem: 11-26. Bowman, Glenn 1991. Christian Ideology and the Image of a Holy Land: The Place of Jerusalem in the Various Christianities; in, Sallnow, Michael J. and Eade, John (ed.) Contesting the Sacred: The Anthropology of Christian Pilgrimage. Routledge, London: 98-121. Cohen, Erik 1979. A Phenomenology of Tourist Experiences. Sociology, 13 (2): 179-201. ―. 1992. Pilgrimage Centers: Central and Excentric. Annals of Tourism Research, 19 (1): 33-50. ―. 1998. Tourism and Religion: A Comparative Perspective. Pacific Tourism Review, 2 (1): 1-10. Coleman, Simon and Elsner, John 1995. Pilgrimage: Past and Present. British Museum Press, London. 302 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner Collins-Kreiner, Noga and Kliot, N. 2000. Pilgrimage tourism in the Holy Land: The Behavioural characteristics of Christian Pilgrims. GeoJournal, 50 (1): 55-67. Collins-Kreiner, Noga and Sagi-Tueta, K. (2010). Tourism to India: a Cultural, Educational and Religious Experience at Dharamsala. South Asian Popular Culture, 8 (2): 229-243. Digance, Justine 2003. Pilgrimage at Contested Sites. Annals of Tourism Research, 30 (1): 143-159. ―. 2006. Religious and Secular Pilgrimage; in, Timothy, Dallen J. and Olsen, Daniel H. (eds.) Tourism, Religion and Spiritual Journeys. Routledge, London and New York: 36-48. Eade, John 1992. Pilgrimage and Tourism at Lourdes, France. Annals of Tourism Research, 19 (1): 18-32. Eade, John and Sallnow, Michael J. (eds.) 1991. Contesting the Sacred: The Anthropology of Christian Pilgrimage. Routledge, London. Ebron, Paulla A. 1999. Tourists as Pilgrims: Commercial Fashioning of Transatlantic Politics. American Ethnologist, 26: 910-932. Epstein, S. 1995. Inventing a Pilgrimage: Ritual, Love and Politics on the Road to Amuka. Jewish folklore and Ethnology Review, 17 (1-2): 25-32. Frey, Nancy L. 1998. Pilgrim Stories: On and Off the Road to Santiago. University of California Press, Berkeley. Gatrell, J. and Reid, N. 2002. The cultural politics of local economic development: The case of Toledo Jeep. Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, 93: 397-411. Goldberg H.E. 1997. Gravesites and Memorials of Libyan Jews: Alternative Versions of the Sacralization of Space in Judaism; in, Ben-Ari, E. and Bilu, Y. (ed.) Grasping Land: Space and Place in Contemporary Israeli Discourse and Experience. State University of New York, SUNY Press, New York. Graburn, Nelson H. H. 1977. Tourism: The Sacred Journey; in, Smith, Valene L. (ed.) Hosts and Guests: The Anthropology of Tourism. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia: 17-31. Jackowski, Antonio & Smith, Velene L. 1992. Polish Pilgrim-Tourists. Annals of Tourism Research, 19: 92-106. Kong, Lily 2001. Mapping ‘new’ geographies of religion: politics and poetics in Modernity. Progress in Human Geography, 25: 211–233. Levy, A. 1997. To Morocco and Back: Tourism and Pilgrimage among Moroccan-Born Israelis; in, Ben-Ari, E. and Bilu, Y. (ed.) Grasping Land: Space and Place in Contemporary Israeli Discourse and Experience. State University of New York, SUNY Current Jewish Pilgrimage-Tourism 303 Press, New York. MacCannell, Dean 1973. Staged Authenticity: Arrangements o f Social Space in Tourist Settings. American Journal of Sociology, 79 (3): 589603. Maoz, D. 2006. Erikson on the Tour. Tourism Recreation Research, 31 (3): 55-63. ―. 2007. Backpackers’ motivations the role of culture and nationality. Annals of Tourism Research, 34 (1): 122-140. McCann, E. 2002. The cultural politics of local economic development: meaning making, place-making, and the urban policy process. Geoforum, 33: 385–398. Nash, D. 2005. The Study of Tourism: Anthropological and Sociological Beginning. Elsevier Science Ltd., London. Nolan, Mary L. and Nolan, Sidney 1989. Christian Pilgrimage in Modern Western Europe. The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill. Petric, L. and Mrnjavac, Ž. 2003. Tourism destinations as a locally embedded system. Tourism, 51: 403–415. Reader, Ian and Walter, Tony 1993. Pilgrimage in Popular Culture. The Macmillan Press Ltd., London. Rinschede, Gisbert 1992. Forms of Religious Tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 19 (1): 51-67. Smith, Velene L. 1989. Hosts and Guests - The Anthropology of Tourism. University of Pennsylvania Press, Pennsylvania. ―. 1992. Introduction: The Quest in Guest. Annals of Tourism Research, 19 (1): 1-17. Sasson, A. 2002. Movement of Graves: The Passage of the Hegemony of Holy Graves from North to South; in, Cohen, M (ed.) Sedot-Negev: Man, Environment and Heritage. The regional Council Sdot-Negev & Makom Ltd., Jerusalem. Sharpley, R. and Sundaram, P. 2005. Tourism: a Sacred Journey? The Case of Ashram Tourism, India. International Journal of Tourism Research, 7 (2): 161-171. Stoddard, Robert H. and Morinis, Alan (eds.) 1997. Sacred Places, Sacred Spaces: The Geography of Pilgrimages. Geoscience Publications, vol. 34; Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA. Timothy, Dallen J. and Olsen, Daniel H. (eds.) 2006. Tourism, Religion and Spiritual Journeys. Routledge, London and New York. Turner, Victor and Turner, Edith 1969. The Ritual Process. Aldine, Chicago. ―. 1978. Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture. Colombia 304 11. Noga Collins-Kreiner University Press, New York. Voas, D. 2007. Does Religion Belong in Population Studies? Environment and Planning A, 39: 1166-1180. Vukonič, Boris 1996. Tourism and Religion. Pergamon, New York. ―. 2002. Religion, Tourism and Economics: A Convenient Symbiosis. Tourism Recreation Research, 27 (2): 59-64. Weingrod A. 1990. The Saint of Beersheba. State University of New York, New York. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dr. Ms. Noga Collins-Kreiner Lecturer, Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Haifa, Haifa 31905. ISRAEL. E-mail: nogack@geo.haifa.ac.il § Noga Collins-Kreiner is also a member of the Center for Tourism, Pilgrimage & Recreation Research at the University of Haifa. Her main research interests are: Religious Tourism, Pilgrimage, Social and Cultural Geography, Tourism Development, Tourism Management, and Eco-tourism. She has published numerous papers on these topics including a book on Christian Pilgrimage (Collins-Kreiner, N. et al. (2006), Christian Tourism to the Holy Land: Pilgrimage during Security Crisis (Ashgate Publications, Hampshire). Her latest paper is ‘Researching Pilgrimage: Continuity and Transformations’, Annals of Tourism Research, 37, (2), 2010: pp. 440-456. 12 The Road to St. James, El Camino de Santiago: the Spirit of Place and Environmental Ethics Kingsley K. Wu Purdue University, U.S.A. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. To help understand constructive blending of cultures in the “global village,” this study looks at one part of culturally diverse society; how it deals with a long history and its continuity, and how “foreign” influences are integrated into present-day life. Since the 9th-century CE, the pilgrimage to the Apostle James at Santiago de Compostela in Spain has been one of the most important in Christendom, bringing influences from across Europe that profoundly affected Spanish politics, economy, religion, and culture. Its legends and lore, and the economic, social and military impact on the region – altogether made this place as a magnificent power of attraction for pilgrimage and to have revealing experiences. It recounts significant foreign cultural influences, and the physical manifestations of the Church that were the environmental ethics of the Road. Keywords. Environmental ethics, heritage legacy, pilgrimage, Saint James; Santiago de Compostela, power of place, Unesco WHL. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Introduction It is important to understand how a society deals with its past in the context of the present-day life. Today, as more countries in the world reduce economic and political barriers, there is a deepening awareness of one’s cultural heritage. This wellspring of emotions can turn ethnic groups xenophobic. Adamant demand for ethnic purity leads to intolerance and conflict with those who are deemed “different.” Objective examination can often reveal that there have been profound mutual influences historically and that there are few real differences ultimately. As the world evolves towards a culture of the “global village,” mutual respect is an essential 302 12. Kingsley K. Wu attitude among all segments of any society. This essay is intended to promote an appreciation of cultural heritage and its roots, by studying a part of a society with a long and diverse history. Since the discovery of Apostle James’s burial ground early in the 9th century CE, his supposed remains have been the object of pilgrimage. Kings and queens, rich and poor, healthy and sick, saints and criminals have made the hazardous pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela at the western end of the European continent, leaving behind a rich legacy of fine Romanesque and early Gothic structures. With the incorporation of ornate Spanish Renaissance and Baroque, these buildings are signposts of the passing of diverse cultural influences which make up the modern Spanish mien. Fig. 12.1. The Road to Saint James, El Camino de Santiago. Santiago de Compostela was originally founded by the Suebi in the early CE 400s, as part of the collapse of the Roman Empire. Then, in the 584 the whole settlement together with the rest of Galicia and northern Portugal was incorporated by Leovigild into the Visigothic kingdom of Spain. Raided from 711 to 739 by the Arabs, Santiago de Compostela was finally recaptured by the Visigothic king of Asturias in 754, about 60 years before the identification of remains as those of Saint James the Great, and their acceptance as such by the Pope and Charlemagne, during the reign of The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 303 Alfonso II of Asturias. From then on, this settlement was not just a city, but a holy city, and one of the main centres of Christian pilgrimage, rivalled only by Rome itself and the Holy Land. Still, there are some who claim that the remains found here were not those of the apostle James but those of Priscillian. They are also thought by many to be someone else altogether. Christian persecution of Spain’s Muslims, following the fall of the Moorish state in 1492, echoes into present time, with local residents evincing antipathy towards those who are visibly Muslim. 2. The Road to Saint James There is a road across northern Spain known as the Road to Saint James (El Camino de Santiago; cf. Fig. 12.1). For centuries since the Middle Ages, it has been traversed by Christian pilgrims from all over Europe on their way to pray at the tomb of the apostle, Saint James (Santiago). “In the Middle Ages, a network of roads crisscrossed Europe, carrying merchants to market, soldiers to war, and pilgrims to worship. Four major roads led across France toward Santiago, passing through Paris, Vezelay, Le Puy, and Arles. The road from Arles crossed into Spain at Somport; the other three joined together at Ostabat, sixteen kilometres north of St. Jean Pied de Port, on the French side of the Pyrenees, and crossed into Spain at the Pass of Cize, near Roncesvalles. These two routes met outside of Puente la Reina and became one, the Camino de Santiago” (Feinberg 1989: 4). Modern pilgrims still make the journey. In the Holy Year of 1965 (Whenever Saint James’s day of martyrdom [July 25] falls on a Sunday, it is a Holy Year), some 800,000 went to Compostela via the main road (Michener 1968: 725). The Camino de Santiago (Fig. 12.2) is kept alive by interest groups and scholarly societies from Europe and the Americas. The Spanish government actively promotes it and it has been declared a cultural heritage by the Council of Europe. Many of the structures along the way are fine examples of Romanesque and Gothic architecture, most are still physically pristine due to the relative slow pace over the centuries of Spanish “progress” towards development. Some of the structures are in use as originally designed; some have been adapted for other uses (cf. Figs. 12.3, 12.4 and 12.5). Many are essential parts of contemporary Spanish culture, lending richness, depth, humanity, and continuity from times past. Some sites are in cities and popularly known, others are in lesser travelled towns and villages, while some are semi-abandoned or in ruins. Together, they contribute to folklore and legends, and give the Spaniards a sense of who and what they are. 304 12. Kingsley K. Wu Especially so, since the road crosses what was Old Castile, the area that epitomizes Spanish culture, and lies mostly within territories where Christianity was at the core of the Spanish struggle for national identity. Fig. 12.2. Santiago de Compostela: Mental map and notional sketches. A. Background of the Road. From the latter part of the ninth century on, multitudes of pilgrims yearly would gather to begin their journeys along the French roads (les Chemins de Saint Jacques). According to the twelfth century cleric Aymery Picaud in the Codex Calixtinus, the roads had their starting points throughout France at Tours (later extended to Paris), Vézelay, Le Puy, and at Arles in the south. These routes wound south and west until they crossed the Pyrenees to become the Camino Aragones or Camino Navarro, finally coming together at Puenta La Rehm in north-eastern Spain, where the main Camino de Santiago begins. The pilgrims would travel hundreds of kilometres through Burgos, León and on to Santiago de Compostela, to what was thought of as the end of the The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 305 earth, at the extreme northwest of the Spanish peninsula. Along the way, they would stop to pay homage to various other saints. To satisfy these pilgrims, religious shrines, churches, and cathedrals were built. To look after the ill and the poor, hospitals and hospices were established. To minister to the travellers, convents and monasteries were formed. To provide protection, castles were erected. Fig. 12.3. Santiago de Compostela: Mental map and notional sketches. Spain is a country laced with influences from diverse peoples: Phoenicians, Romans, Visigoths, Vandals, Gypsies, Jews, and Moors. As evidenced by the paintings in the Altamira caves, the northern parts were peopled since the Stone Age, while in the western province of Galicia. Celtic culture linked it to the people of western France and the British Isles. On both sides of the Franco-Spanish border live the Basques, whose 306 12. Kingsley K. Wu language is so difficult to understand that even the Devil is said to have given up trying to learn it after only seven days. Fig. 12.4. Santiago de Compostela: Close sketch and ground plan. Northern Spain was an ill-defined frontier land during much of the Middle Ages, when various kings and princes of Christian Europe vied for political influence. The Kingdom of Aragon had political ties to England, while Navarra straddled both sides of the Pyrenees. It was the Navarrese who sought the help of Charlemagne to lift the Moorish siege at Pamplona in the year 778. Charlemagne lifted the siege and was hailed as a hero until he went ahead and sacked the city anyway. In the summer of that year, the Navarrese revenged in an epic battle in the nearby Pyrenees, killing his paladin Roland (Neillands 1985: 85). Even though Charlemagne and Roland predated the popularization of the cult of Saint James, they are invariably intertwined with the pilgrimage route. Legends of the exploits The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 307 of Roland formed the basis for the Song of Roland and other chansons de geste written two centuries after his death. Fig. 12.5. Santiago de Compostela: close sketch. Charlemagne and Roland (Carlomagno and Roldán, as the Spaniards call them) are still well remembered. Memorials to their exploits can be found in the Pyrenees just as one crosses into Spain. In Pamplona, parts of the city walls that protected the city from the Moorish siege that Charlemagne lifted are still intact. In the Province of La Rioja, just south of the town of Nájera, there is a hillock named Poyo de Roldan (Stone Seat of Roland). Legend. In the castle of Nájera, there lived Farragut, the Syrian giant who was a descendant of Goliath, but stronger than he. Farragut fought, 308 12. Kingsley K. Wu defeated and imprisoned many of Charlemagne’s warriors, until he met Roland. Spotting the giant sitting in front of his castle at Nájera, Roland braced his backside on a hillside and hurled a fifty-pound stone at lightning speed towards the giant (a distance of more than ‘two miles’!). The stone struck Farragut in the forehead and knocked him down. All the prisoners were set free and the hillock has been called Poyo de Roldzin ever since (Guia 1982: 46). 3. The Pilgrimage to Compostela A. The Story of Saint James. James (in English), Jacques (in French), and Jacobus (in Latin) was Yacob in the biblical Holy Lands. In the old language of Spain; it was Yago or lago. Thus Sant lago came to be called Santiago. The Apostle James, together with his brother John, were early disciples of Jesus Christ, joining Him soon after Peter and Paul. After the death of Christ, James went to the Iberian Peninsula to spread the Word in the then Roman territory. He was said to have founded a number of bishoprics, notably those at Lugo (Province of Galicia) and Astorga (Province of León) (Tate 1987: 144). Others say he made only a few converts after two years of missionary work. Disappointed, James returned to Jerusalem, which turned out to be a fatal decision. Caught in political intrigue and jealousy, James was executed by King Herod Agrippa I, grandson of Herod the Great, in about CE 44 (Davies 1982: 56). His body was brought to the port of Tyre, where legend has it that some knights then took his body clear across the Mediterranean, around the west coast of Iberia in only seven days — and in a marble boat, at that. They were bound for the Roman outpost of Ina Flavia and landed in what is now called Padrón, a small town at the mouth of the river Sur, a few miles south of Compostela. For a small fee, one can ask the custodian of the church to open the front panels of the main altar and still see the stone pillar to which the boat bearing the saint’s body was supposed to have been tied. Latin inscriptions on the pillar date it back to Roman times. Permission was sought to bury the body of Saint James on shore. After initial denial, the local pagan queen, Lupa, was duly impressed by the apparent power of the Cross in subduing some wild bulls. She converted to Christianity and allowed the body to be buried (Tate 1987: 144). There the body had forgotten until the year 813 when a fanner saw a field of stars (Latin: campus stellage; hence, Compostela?) over a burial ground (Latin: compostum; thus, Compostela?) (Tate 1987: 146; Michener 1968: 716). His religious leaders were notified and the area dug up. Hence the body of Saint James was rediscovered. The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 309 The veracity of this account of James after his death and subsequent recovery is a matter of faith. There is no way to prove it factually or historically (Davis 1982: 56). Nevertheless, word spread that the apostle was a healer of illnesses, both physical and mental. Legions of pilgrims began to take the arduous journey to the far corner of Iberia to seek solace. The small church built at the site was soon expanded into a cathedral and, in time, Compostela became one of the three (with Rome and Jerusalem) most important pilgrimage destinations in all of Christendom. B. Santiago Matamoros. It so happened that the Christians were having a difficult time battling the Moors in the northern tier of provinces and kingdoms in Spain. The Moors claimed to have the arm of Mohammed in the great mosque in Córdoba, which afforded them invincibility in battle. To counter such power, the Christians needed something comparable of their own. Thus at the Battle of Clavijo in northcentral Spain, not far from Logroflo (La Rioja) in CE 844, Saint James appeared as a knight on a white horse and stayed seventy thousand Moors, thereby earning himself the nickname of Santiago Matamoros — the Moorslayer (Tate 1987: 146; Neillands 1985: 112). As a consequence, Santiago became the patron saint of Spain and the symbol of the reconquest of the Spanish domain. The Moors were not driven out of the peninsula entirely for another six hundred years. 4. Power of Place A. Impetus for the Pilgrimage. It is difficult to tell exactly which the impetus was for what. The discovery of the saint’s body fitted in the rising popularity of venerating religious relics at that time (Davies 1982: 103-4). Every church worth its altar had some relic of some religious dignitary. The relic was a powerful and popular symbol to draw worshippers who contributed towards the wealth of not only the church itself, but the surrounding area economy as well. Religious fervour was on the rise and pilgrims were the tourists of the era. Spiritual salvation and ultimate release from a hard life on earth were the main goals (cf. Graham and Murray 1997). In seeking solace, it was customary to seek the intercession of religious figures, especially at places connected personally to those figures (Davies 1982: 99). Places of birth and death, monasteries and convents, sites of miracles, and so forth, were prime locations for at least a shrine. A saint’s body and parts’ thereof, burial shroud or bits of clothing, and so on, would be widely distributed. At times, these items or their fakes were “discovered” and “rediscovered” decades or even centuries later, 310 12. Kingsley K. Wu countries and even continents apart (Davies 1982: 111). A relic became the star feature and sometimes the raison d’être of a church or a town devoted to the care and feeding of itinerant pilgrims. Making a pilgrimage as a penance for one’s sins was becoming popular around the tenth century (Fletcher 1984: 87). The growth of popularity of the Road to Saint James also coincided with the closing of routes to Jerusalem by Muslims, which made necessary the forming of the First Crusade in the eleventh century (Davies 1982: 55). B. Settlement along the Road. Not all pilgrimages were taken for religious reasons. The rise of long distance trade made commerce an integral part of religious pilgrimages. To many, a pilgrimage was a holiday mixed with religion and commerce. Making a pilgrimage was “a great social occasion” (Brooke 1984: 23). It was also common for some to be sentenced to make a pilgrimage to Compostela as punishment for a crime. Along the way, pilgrims would collect from the local priests little stamps called compostelas, which became proofs of the journey taken. Of course, this gave rise to quite an enterprise, as those who were stouter of limbs collected loads of compostelas to be sold to would-be pilgrims as they crossed the Pyrenees into Spain. Thus the latter could simply remain in a relatively safe area and in the comfort of well-stocked inns. After an appropriate time, they would return home to show their magistrates the requisite compostelas as proof of pilgrimage taken and hence penance served (Michener 1968: 720). As the Christians pushed southward, there was a need to ensure that the Spanish rear, that is, the northern flank, was secured. Settlement by foreigners was encouraged. Pamplona had three distinct nuclei of settlements, two of which were for French immigrants (Guia 1982: 28). In Estella (Navarra), there is the church of Santa Maria Jus del Castillo, unused now but it had replaced a synagogue that was situated in the heart of a very prosperous Jewish quarter established “as early as the eleventh century” (Aguila 1984: 41). Until their final expulsion in the late fifteenth century, Jewish quarters, or Juderías, were common at one time or another in many Spanish cities. The commercial aspects of the pilgrimage led to the flourishing of secular centres: Logroño, Burgos, and León are still very vibrant cities today. Civil rule, at times rather enlightened, was well established when strong regimes flourished. In the Kingdom of Navarra, a set of rules called fueros, or a charter of rights, was instituted to proclaim and protect the civil rights of ordinary citizens (Layton 1976: 169). Still, the northern part of Spain was unsettled frontier land. Brigands abounded and travellers The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 311 were subjected to the often shifting rules of local luminaries (Brooke 1984: 22-24). Finnisterre, the area thought to be the end of the earth, was but a short distance beyond Compostela. Still, making a pilgrimage on foot or by donkey, while still taking months, was accomplishable as compared to the far more dangerous journey to Jerusalem. Rome, the other main pilgrimage destination, was, of course, always attractive to the devout Christian, but roads to it were well-trodden and laid mostly across “civilized” countries. Santiago de Compostela, however, was not only a destination, but the attractions and distraction along the way made going there a richly rewarding experience. C. Military Protection on the Camino. Armed protection was provided by knights who lived the monastic life bound together under an order. Of the military orders formed during the Reconquesta, the one that was most closely associated with the Camino was the Order of Saint James (Neillands 1985: 136). Established in 1175, its motto, Ruber Ensis Sanguine Arabum (Red is my sword with the blood of Arabs), testifies to the ferocity of the religious knights of these orders. The Order of Saint John was also active in providing military protection, as were the Knights Templar, whose castle in Ponferrada (Province of León), built in 1185 and abandoned when the order was expelled in 1312, is now a national monument. The castle sits strategically high above the river Sil. When it is shrouded in winter mist, eerie echoes of those enigmatic knights seem to reverberate. Then there is a small church at Eunate that is something of a puzzle. It now lies rather forlornly in a wheat field just before one descends into Pamplona and has a rather unusual “exterior cloister” surrounding the small octagonal structure (Neillands 1985: 98). No one knows why it is so. It is Romanesque in style, but its origin is not known. It may have been a funeral chapel. Perhaps it was built by the Knights Templar, to whom many unsolved mysteries are attributed. D. Services along the Way. To service the multitudes of pilgrims, monasteries and convents acted as hostels and as refuges in times of trouble. Religious orders, as well as monarchs, sponsored hospitals and hospices to look after the sick. Aymery Picaud was a French cleric from around Poitiers who compiled a set of books in Latin called the Liber Sancti Jacobi. Although Picaud began his work some fifteen years after the death of Pope Calixtus II (1119-1124), the books are commonly attributed to the pope and are collectively known as the Codex Calixtinus (Davies 1982: No. 7: 42). 312 12. Kingsley K. Wu There are actually five volumes in the Codex. The Book I is an anthology of liturgy, hymns, and sermons given in churches relating to Saint James and the pilgrimage. The Book II recounts miracles attributed to the saint, and the Book III tells of the legends and lore of the life of Saint James, including his supposed evangelization of Spain. The Book IV is about the exploits of three of Charlemagne’s expeditions into Iberia and those of his cohorts, Turpin and Roland, which comprise the epic songs or chansons de geste that are so popular in medieval lore (Layton 1976: 19697; Davies 1982: 19). The Book V of the Codex Calixtinus is often referred to as the first European travel guide, for it details the trials and tribulations of the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, describing the landscape of each country, and where to find sanctuaries and holy places along the way. Picaud had some succinct remarks about the quality of food, water, and nature of peoples one was likely to find. The Codex Calixtinus looked after the spiritual and physical well-being of pilgrims, and is still the basis for historical research today (Davies 1982: 84). One of the miracles narrated in this Book (Codex Calixtinus, Miracle 4) mentioned that: “Thirty nights set out from Lorraine to Santiago de Compostela, all but one vowing to stand by each other. But when one of them fell ill in the Pyrenees, all abandoned him — except for the knight who had not taken the vow. He stayed behind and nursed his companion, but the sick man died. In despair, the knight called out to Santiago — and Santiago miraculously appeared on horseback. He took up both the dead pilgrim and the living knight and carried them the rest of the way to Compostela — twelve days on horseback — in a single night. At dawn, Santiago left the knight on top of Mount Joy; in the distance, he could see the cathedral spires.” In León, one can find the Hospital de San Marcos with a long and low, rather sensual Baroque facade that was added in 1513 to an earlier twelfth century pilgrim refuge (Neillands 1985: 135). In Santiago de Compostela, Ferdinand and Isabella sponsored the Magnificent Hospital Real located next to the cathedral. For political clout, the Catholic Monarchs had to finance the hospital in 1472 after their own pilgrimage to Compostela and it almost bankrupted them. Both of these structures are now parts of a chain of government-run hotels for tourists, thus still fulfilling their original purpose of taking care of travellers. Although located some twelve miles off the Camino, the monastery of San Milian de la Cogolla continues to draw large numbers of pilgrims today. San Milan was a meek and very kind monk of the sixth century, who lived and died in the area, and became a saint for his charitable works. But he became really famous only at the end of the tenth century, The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 313 when he appeared alongside Saint James himself, also on a white charger, and helped to defeat the army of Emir Abdul-Rahaman II farther to the west in Astoria. Thereafter, the monastery received a tithe and the veneration of pilgrims at the tomb of the “Twin Matamoros” (Layton 1976: 113-14). The town of Santo Domingo de la Calzada (La Rioja) is a major stop for pilgrims. An eleventh century priest, probably Belgian, who lived as a recluse in a cave above the river Oja noticed the difficulties pilgrims had in crossing tie river, so he built a bridge for them. ‘This soon burgeoned into a major crossing and a town grew up around the area and more roads were built. Thus the priest became the patron saint of public works, known as Santo Domingo de la Calzada; a calzada is a causeway. Legend. In the fourteenth century, a certain young man stopped by the town of Santo Domingo de la Calzada with his parents on their pilgrimage to Compostela. The local innkeeper’s daughter took a fancy to the young man, but he was not interested. Thinking she could keep him longer, she hid some valuables in his luggage, and on his way out of town the next day, she called the lawmen. Having been found with the goods on him the hapless young man was tried, convicted, and duly hanged. His parents continued on their way to Santiago de Compostela. Upon their return, they found their son still hanging on the gallows, but very much alive, due to the intercession of the saint (James or Dominic?) ― depends on who is telling this story). The parents then went to the magistrate to ask that the boy be taken down, since he was obviously not guilty. Now, the magistrate was just about to sit down to have his big noontime meal of roasted chicken and capon, and was not about to be interrupted. So he said to the parents that if their son was still alive, so would be his roasted chicken. Thereupon, both fowl rose up off the platter and started to cackle. Hence the young man was allowed to go home with his parents. To this day, this story is remembered by a live rooster and a hen kept in a cage in the nave of the cathedral at Santo Domingo de la Calzada. It may well be the only place in Christendom where a rooster sings along with the choir. The popularity and reputation of the Camino de Santiago grew. In its heyday in the thirteenth century, it drew, some one hundred and fifty thousand pilgrims yearly (Michener 1968: 725). The road derived its power of attraction through travellers’ accounts and legends, much embellished through time. No less important was the role of the church as the central unifying factor among the various kingdoms and principalities of northern Spain. 314 12. Kingsley K. Wu 5. Environmental Ethics The environmental ethics of the pilgrimage road was the ethics of the Catholic Church. A. Literacy and Liturgy. As literacy among the populace was low, the church spread its teaching through liturgy, manifested in Illuminated manuscripts, sculptures, paintings, and icons housed in churches. As the liturgy has to be among the people, churches, except those for royalty, knights, and recursive monasteries and convents, had to be where the people were — in town. In the role as paternalistic guardians of spiritual welfare, and sometimes even physical well-being, churches along the pilgrimage route became waypoints and rest stops. Situated in the Castilian plains called the meseta west of Burgos is the town of Frómista, important since Roman and Visigothic times. Its church, San Martin; restored in 1893, is the quintessential Spanish Romanesque church, and has been a highlight of the pilgrimage since its founding by Queen Dona Mayor in 1035 (Guia 1982: 69). B. Ecclesiastic and Civic. As literacy grew and widespread travel became popular, towns grew in size and the merchant class expanded (Brooke 1984: 12). By the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the target of ecclesiastical attention was increasingly directed at the “urban bourgeoisie and the urban poor” (Fletcher 1984: 91). A small area of León makes manifest the link between the ecclesiastical and the mercantile. Pilgrims entered the city through the Puerta Moneda — Gate of the Coin or Currency — and they immediately passed the little twelfth century church of Santa Maria del Camino. The tag end of its name, del Camino, linked the church to the road. However, it has long been changed to “del Mercado” for the market in front of the church that still flourishes today. The parishes of the church in northern Spain were most likely established along the lines of Roman provincial administrative structures (Brooke 1984: 81). Cathedrals, the seats of bishoprics, were likely to be located at provincial capitals. As the church was intimately involved with the civic affairs of the populace—births, education, marriage, health, and death, and so on, church and state evolved together. On the outskirts of Burgos lies Las Huelgas, which began as a leisure palace and later became a Cistercian monastery. Among its attractions are some of the standards captured from the Moors in battles, numerous tombs of kings and princes, and an amazing collection of Arabic and medieval The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 315 fabrics. Missed by the rampaging troops of Napoleon during the Peninsular War, the treasures were not discovered until 1942 (Layton 1976: 124). It was as a convent that Las Huelgas gained most fame, when the power of its first abbess, Mafia Maria Sol, brokered marriages among kings and popes. The nuns also administered the nearby pilgrim Hospital del Rey, founded in 1187 by Alfonso VIII (of Spain), whose wife was the daughter of Henry II (of England) and Eleanor of Aquitaine (of France). At the request of his wife, also named Eleanor, Alfonso VIII had the Chapel of Saint James built. Its Mudejar doorway marks the place where King Henry II “stood vigil and was knighted by Alfonso X The Wise in 1254. The Black Prince stayed here in 1367 after the Battle of Navarrete” (Tate 1987: Caption for Illustration No. 96: 105). A connection to Italy can be found in the church of Santa Maria in Viana (Navarra), where the brother of Lucrezia Borgia, Cardinal Cesare Borgia (1476?-1507) is buried. As a statesman, Cardinal Borgia was the archetype of Machiavelli’s The Prince. Manipulative and politically astute, he personified the adage “the end justifies the means.” Insulted even in death, Cesare Borgia was reinterred in the nineteenth century in the street outside the church so that his tombstone might be stepped on by all those who passed by (Neillands 1985: 105-107). C. Environmental Presence of the Church. Increasingly elaborate churches reflected changing tastes in liturgy (Brooke 1984: 88, 90). As church buildings and interior fittings were expensive as well as difficult to produce, they demanded ever more material and financial resources: hence more urgency in the need to attract worshipers to raise funds. To be sure, they also provided work for craftsmen and artisans, sometimes for generations, as cathedrals took decades to build. Major churches and cathedrals were built in the fashion of the time, particularly that of France, from whence came many of the friars, monks, and other religious person, as the Romanesque gave way to the Gothic style of architecture around the middle of the twelfth century. So the cathedral at León can be considered a true Gothic building. Begun in 1205 over an earlier church, and completed within a century, it is closely related to the cathedrals at Rheims and Amiens. In the shape of a Latin cross, with triple naves, the cathedral is a symphony in light, for it has 125 stained glass windows, 57 small and 3 large rose windows. The cathedral is, indeed, epic drama in colour and light. Located in Burgos is one of the other magnificent cathedrals along the road. It is a masterpiece of Gothic stone filigree, built from 1221 by 316 12. Kingsley K. Wu French masons under the “direction of Maurice the Englishman, Bishop of Burgos” (Neillands 1985: 127). The chapel of Saint James occupies a prominent place in the apse. At the centre of the nave is the tomb of Rodrigo de Vivar, or El Cid, soldier of fortune and hem of Spain, who led a mercenary army in the Reconquesta. The closing of routes to Jerusalem by Muslims that prompted the First Crusade in the eleventh century helped to make the Camino de Santiago more popular (Davies 1982 : p. 54), bringing more foreign influence into the region. The group that had the most impact was the French Benedictine monks of Cluny, whose abbots, saints, and popes, included Pope Calixtus II (1119-24) to whom Aymery Picaud’s Liber Sancti Jacobi was attributed. At, its height in mid-twelfth century, there were hundreds of Cluniac churches and dependencies in Spain and the rest of Europe (Davies 1982: 84; Neillands 1985: 45). Patronage of Cluny extended to Galicia for the first time in 1075 at the monastery of San Salvador de Villa Frio near Lugo (Fletcher 1984: 49). The cathedral at Santiago de Compostela symbolizes French influence on Spanish ecclesiastic architecture. Built from 1078 to 1140 on the foundations of an earlier ninth century church, the cathedral bears marked resemblance to its counterparts at Tours, Conques, and Toulouse, which is not surprising, considering that the cathedral was “completed by two master-masons with French-sounding names, Bernard and Robert” (Tate 1987: 148), but largely done under the auspices of Archbishop Diego Gelmfrez, who was very adroit at gathering men and material, as well as financial and political support for the cathedral (Fletcher 1984: 178). Later Renaissance and Baroque additions make it into its shape today (Tate 1987: 138). Situated magnificently on four squares of different sizes and openness, and at different elevations, the cathedral is really a complex of buildings with irregularly spaced asymmetrical towers. It appears to be much wider, deeper, and more complex, than it really is, for the interior of the cathedral itself, with its singe nave, is quite small and narrow. As a late Romanesque basilica, its narrow width in proportion to its height gave a feeling of loftiness and heralded the coming of the soaring heights of Gothic cathedrals that were to spring up in Europe beginning around mid-twelfth century (Brooke 1984: 84). D. Environmental Impact of the Pilgrimage. Continuous exposure to “foreign” ideas and values deeply affected the culture and environment of the region, making Spanish society a fusion of diverse ethnic roots. It was not until the Baroque period in the sixteenth century that Spanish The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 317 ecclesiastical architecture came to its own with its unique mixture of Arabic, Gothic and Italian influences that was the picturesque manner of expression. Its ornate sculptural richness spread throughout Spain and the New World, much of which was explored under the banner of Santiago. 6. Heritage Legacy The entire route, from the French-Spanish border to Santiago de Compostela, has been declared a cultural heritage by the Council of Europe in 1987 ― recognising that the various cultures of the continent are historically intermingled and proclaiming it as the first European Cultural itinerary. If affirms the notion that ethnicity, cultural behaviour and social mores of different countries are intrinsically related in spite of national borders and the passage of time (Wu 1993: 191). Some 1,800 buildings along the route, both religious and secular, are of great historic interest. And, it remains a testimony to the power of the Christian faith among people of all social classes and from all over Europe. In 1993 the ‘Route of Santiago de Compostela’ was inscribed in UNESCO World Heritage List. As the Old Town of Santiago became a symbol in the Spanish Christians’ struggle against Islam in history, it is inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1985. Destroyed by the Muslims at the end of the 10th century CE, it was completely rebuilt in the following century. With its Romanesque, Gothic and Baroque buildings, the Old Town of Santiago is one of the world’s most beautiful urban areas. The oldest monuments are grouped around the tomb of St James and the cathedral, which contains the remarkable Pórtico de la Gloria. Santiago de Compostela is a miracle of stone work that was born to receive and embrace the thousands of pilgrims that have yearly down through the centuries through the Route to Santiago to see the tomb of the Apostle. A desire, a longing made of stone that down through the centuries to today portrays the splendour of a historical and monumental complex unique in the world. Santiago is, by tradition and by its personality, possesses a personality of an open city with the hospitality as an icon of its identity, ready to show its history and its legends, and to share the beauty of its streets and plazas to its visitors. UNESCO WHC has inscribed Old city of Santiago de Compostela in its List as it fulfils the three out of six criteria for the identification of cultural heritage, viz. (i) representing a masterpiece of human creative genius; (ii) exhibiting an important interchange of human values, over a span of time and developments in architecture, monumental arts, and 318 12. Kingsley K. Wu landscape design; and (vi) directly and tangibly associated with living traditions, with ideas, beliefs, and with artistic and literary works of outstanding universal significance. The last criterion (vi) was considered as additional in conjunction with other criteria (i, and ii). 7. Concluding Remarks In the latter part of the twentieth century, Spain has emerged from years of isolation under the rule of Generalissimo Franco. It has joined the Council of Europe to become an integral part of the European community. As Spanish society becomes freer, the call for independence among some of its ethnic groups is heard more loudly. Along the Camino, the Basques and the Galicians, both of whom are historically prone to rather bloody feuds are noisily calling for independence, which in turn brings suppressive responses by the Spanish government. The call for recognition by both the ethnic groups and Spanish society at large should not be one for separate (even if equal) co-existence. They cannot be separate; they are not separate. Celts, Basques, Romans, Visigoths, Gypsies, Jews, Moors, and European cultures: French, English, German, and Italian, have made deep impressions on the Spanish psyche and are as much a part of that which is called Spanish as Galician, Basque and Navarrese. What was “foreign” has, over centuries, become integral in the Spanish mien. It is important for ethnic groups to assert themselves and be proud that their groups are integral to the larger society. It is just as important for the larger society to accept and recognize that it is made up of all the diverse elements, and that each is a cell in a larger organism. Ethnicity is the identification of a group or place having common historical, racial, or cultural roots. Ethnicity is often assertively expressed, when there is a desire to determine one’s destiny, control one’s daily life, and to feel as belonging to a place. It is a common, if not natural, phenomenon in times of economic malaise or political unpopularity, and when a group feels that it is underrepresented. Demands for ethnic independence can also bring repressive measures by the ruling authority. Recognition of one’s ethnic roots is healthy and proper. It gives one a sense of who he or she is, and it is the basis of a sense of self-worth. However, when it turns xenophobic, it has been the rationale for much ugliness in human history. Xenophobia against all things and anything “foreign” is a narrow minded and short-sighted. It breeds the kind of intolerance and exclusionary tactics that prompted ethnic assertion in the first place. The Road to Saint James – El Camino de Santiago 319 Substitute the various fractions in Spain for Arabs and Jews, Irish and English, Croats, Bosnians and Serbs, and so forth. Look at India and Sri Lanka, at black and white Africa and America, and so on. One can see the potential and reality of explosive confrontations around the world. One can also see the unity, peace, and growth that can result from mutual acceptance, recognition, and respect. As the Camino de Santiago shows, human cultures are more closely related than are sometimes acknowledged. If only everyone would truly accept a neighbour as equal! “Orden no es una presión que desde fuera se ejerce sobre la sociedad, sino un equilibrio que se suscita en su interiors” (Orders is not a pressure which is imposed on a society from without, but an equilibrium set up from within). — José Ortega y Gasset [1883-1955]. The Last words. Wu (2002) had expressed his last experiences in a letter: “This July 2002, my wife and I took our sixth trip to Spain. We visited San Sebastian and the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. We joined some friends from Barcelona at Frómista and began our pilgrimage by walking to Carrion de los Condes the first morning out. We had just returned from a ten-week trip to China and we felt we could handle the walk. Actually, what did us in was not so much the walking but the backpacks (for the first time in our lives) and extra luggage! So, we turned tourists and rode a bus to Sahagún to wait for our walking friends to catch up. We kept this scheme until we reached Léon then took a train to Santiago. Being on the “Road” was a wonderful experience, since this was the first time my wife had ever been to any part of the Camino. My way of commemorating the Camino is to have some of my sketches printed on note cards.” <added by the Editor> 8. References Aguilar, Manuel, and Robertson, Ian 1984. Jewish Spain: A Guide. Altalena Editoms, Madrid. Brooke, Rosalind, and Brooke, Christopher 1984. Popular Religion in the Middle Ages. Thames and Hudson, London. Davies, Horton, and Davies, Marie 1982. Holy Days and Holidays: The Medieval Pilgrimages to Compostela. Bucknell University Press, Lewisburg, PA. Feinberg, Ellen O. 1989. Following the Milky Way: A Pilgrimage across Spain. Iowa State University Press, Ames. Fletcher, R.A. 1984. Saint James’s Catapult. Clarendon Press, Oxford. 320 12. Kingsley K. Wu Graham, Brian and Murray, Michael 1997. The spiritual and the profane: The pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. Ecumene, 4 (4): 389–409. Guia del Peregrino 1982. Ministerio de Transportes, Tourismo y Comunicaciones, Madrid. Layton, Thomas Arthus 1976. The Way of Saint James: The Pilgrim’s Road to Santiago. Allen & Unwin, London. Michener, James A. 1968. Iberia. Random House, New York. Neillands, Rob 1985. The Road to Compostela. Moorland, Ashbourne, Derbyshire, U.K. Tate, Brian, and Tate, Marcus 1987. The Pilgrim Route to Santiago. Phaidon Press, Oxford. Wu, Kingsley K. 1993. Pilgrim Cathedral― Santiago de Compostela: Sketches and notations on the legacy of cultural interchange. Architecture & Behaviour [Lausanne, Switzerland], 9 (2): 191-203; special issue on “The Layout of Sacred Places”, ed. Rana P.B. Singh. ―. 1994. The Road to Saint James― El Camino de Santiago; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) The Spirit & Power of Place. Human Environment and Sacrality. National Geogr. Soc. of India, Varanasi, Pub. 41: 131-140. ―. 2002. Personal reflections. Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology [ISSN 1083-9194, Kassas State Univ. USA], 13 (1), Winter: p. 4; see web: http://www-personal.ksu.edu/~triad Additional/ current references: Rhoades, Roger and Rhoades, Nancy 2005. Santiago de Compostela: Journal of Our Camino. iUniverse Books, Lincoln NE. John Brierley 2010. A Pilgrim's Guide to the Camino de Santiago: St. Jean - Roncesvalles – Santiago. Findhorn Books, Forres, Scotland. 6th Ed. Scheer, Martin 2007. Symbolic Representation of religion, culture and heritage and their implications on the tourism experience: The example of the ‘Ciudad de Cultura’ in Santiago de Compostela; in, Raj, Razaq and Morpeth, Nigel D. (eds.) Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Festivals Management: An International Perspective. CABI Publs., Oxfordshire: 161-169. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ (late) Prof. Kingsley K. Wu § Kingsley K. Wu [born: 22 August 1934, died: 26 February 2004], was a professor in the Department of Creative Arts, School of Visual and Performing Arts at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana (USA), for over sixteen years (1987-2003), and had photographed, sketched, and lectured about the Camino de Santiago, Spain’s medieval pilgrimage road to St. James. 13 Sacred Places of Japan: Sacred Geography in the vicinity of the cities of Sendai and Nara James A. Swan Snow Goose Productions, Mill Valley CA. U.S.A. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Drawing upon visits to sacred places in two regions of Japan ― Tohoku and Nara Prefectures ― this paper gives an overview into sacred places in Japan and contrasts these beliefs record with those of North America. In the form of a distinctive belief, the practice of sei-chi ritual promotes and nature phenomena, apart from any human activities. Thus at least 80,000 shrines in Japan mark sei-chi. This is call for others to understand practices experience the sacral power of nature, as illustrated by author’s own experiences among the shines in Sendai and Nara. Keywords. Nara, onsen, Oriental thought, sacred geography, sacred place, sei-chi, Sendai, spirit of place, spiritual significance. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Preamble Highlights The “genus loci” or spirit of place is an ancient concept about valuing the land that may have many important implications for modern design and science. It may well be an important key to human health and creativity, as well as design excellence. Geomancy is the spiritual parent of modern architecture and design. There are many documented cases of positive results from use of geomancies, especially Chinese Feng Shui. Like acupuncture, which has yet to be understood in the west, the overwhelming success that comes from such systems urges us to study them with an open mind. The concept of a sacred place is universally held by cultures around the world. There is growing data to support the unique qualities of many of these places. Recognizing them and planning to insure their protection honours traditional cultures, and insures that modern people may continue to benefit from their power. 322 13. James A. Swan In the misty rain Mount Fuji is veiled all day ‒ How intriguing! ― Matsuo Basho (Ueda 1991: 102) 1. Introduction The Japanese word “shi-zen” is the equivalent of the English word “nature” and yet the two words have different meanings that reveal important insights into the psychology of mind and nature in Japan. Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary offers several definitions of “nature” in English, which include: the creative and controlling force in the universe, the external world, and natural scenery. Common among all the offered definitions is the concept that nature is something which is separate from oneself. In contrast, the Japanese word “shi-zen” has a different meaning. “Shi” is derived from two root words, “onozukara” and “mizukara”. “Onozukara” means “of itself,” and objectivity. It refers to a state that exists without any help from man. “Mizukara” is a balancing concept, which means “self” and subjectivity, and the product of the human will. “Zen,” the second half of the word “shi-zen” refers to a state of mind. (Not the same as the “zen” of zen buddhism.) From this analysis one can deduce that onozukara means nature as we conceptualize nature in the west, and mizukara is similar to the western concept of self. In the Japanese mind then, one can say that the concept of “shi-zen” refers to a state of mind which arises from the unity of the human self with the natural world, which at their root is one and the same. In the words of Japanese author Isamu Kurita (1992: 123): “...the Japanese tend not to look at nature from a human point of view. They look at humans from the point of view of nature and try to abandon their individual selves and integrate themselves into nature. This attitude is made possible by viewing nature not as a disorderly chaos, but a higher level of harmony. Thus, grasping the natural order as the moment of the highest moral perfection, by observing it, and integrating oneself into it, one serves to discover the truth of life and make it sufficient.” As opposed to western natural sciences, which seek to dissect and name natural objects, describe phenomenon, discover the chemical and physical properties of nature, and study how natural objects may be used to meet human needs, all using research methods that call for objective measurement, a traditional approach to nature study in Japan, China or Sacred Places of Japan 323 Korea, would be to contemplate nature subjectively, seeking to understand natural phenomenon as part of a dynamic, organic, ever-changing whole so as to bring human life and thought into harmony with nature. One this state of mind is then attained, a satori, then both nature and human society may prosper; as in the words of Tohoku University Biology Professor Yoshitaka Shimizu (1991), “real wisdom comes from contact with nature.” The goal of harmony with nature is cultivated in many ways in Japanese culture. One example of the many subtle ways for aiding attainment of harmony between the mind and nature is the Japanese nomenclature for the human face. The names of physical parts of the face are the same words as parts of plants. The eyes are seeds, the ears are fruit, the nose is a flower, and the teeth are leaves. The quality of nature that creates life in Oriental thought is the life force energy, which is “chi” in China and “ki” in Japan. And on both the human body and the earth’s surface there are said to be special places where the life force energy has an unusual abundance and quality, as well as connecting pathways or meridians which extra energy flows. These places on the body are referred to as acupuncture points. In the landscape, they are special holy places, sei-chi, where strong spirits, kami, in the Shinto tradition, are said to reside. The Japanese have a strong feeling for place, taking special care to acknowledge sei-chi as possessing a more spiritual quality, reiteki, through numerous ways, including in the Shinto tradition: delineating the boundary and entry port to a holy place with a torii gate; decorating the place through elaborate means such as gardens, temples and shrines; marking special natural objects with a special straw rope with tassels, shimenawa, hung over special rocks or wrapped around special trees; and performing special ceremonies and rituals. All these activities call attention to the place and honour its powers, seeking to gain favour with the spiritual forces present, the kami, and driving away evil forces. Architecture and landscape architecture at a sei-chi in Japan then not only mark their location and provide religious symbolism, they help to serve as conduits for the kami to enter more directly into human life, and thus the designs can be seen as invocations. Hence, pine trees are often planted around shrines, and special trees and stones which are felt to be conducive to serving as a temporary vessel for the kami, yorishiro, are given special recognition. Additional yorishiro include banners, wands, flags, light poles, dolls and puppets. Such decoration typically adds to the beauty of a place, but the Japanese name for places of spiritual significance is “sei-chi”, which means literally “sacred place,” and it is distinguished from the term “nadokoro”, which is used to describe places 324 13. James A. Swan of extraordinary beauty. Two may be the same, but this is not necessarily so. One seeks out sei-chi with reverence, for kami can possess objects and people, resulting in special powers. According to Carmen Blacker, in his study of Japanese shamanism, The Catalpa Bow (1986: 41), an essential quality of the kami is their amorality. Their nature is “...neither good nor bad, but can manifest itself as benign or destructive to human interests according to the treatment it receives...Treatment which all kami find pleasing consists of assiduous worship, correct offerings, and above all purity on the part of the worshipper. Frequent visits to the shrine, copious offerings of dried fish, rice-wine, fruit, lengths of cloth, swords, spears, [and] horses are all calculated to win its favour.” In Japan there are two primary religions, Shintoism, the traditional religion, and Buddhism, which in some cases have become a syncretism and in others remain distinct practices, and as well many others with smaller followings. While each religion has its own special customs and practices related to sei-chi, a belief in their existence as natural phenomenon, apart from any human activities, is shared by most, except for Christians. One of the most important differences between Shintoism and Buddhism in regard to sei-chi is that Shintoism is more protective of the Japanese sacred places, placing greater restrictions on visiting them and making offerings to show proper respect. There are at least 80,000 shrines marking sei-chi, in Japan, and over 20,000 Shinto priests serving them. It has been my good fortune to make two lecture tours in Japan. During these visits, thanks to my gracious hosts, I had a chance to visit some of the sei-chi of Japan. In this short essay I will briefly describe some of the special holy places in the vicinity of two Japanese cities of Honshu, the main island ― Sendai in the north, and Nara, in the south, which I have been fortunate enough to visit on these visits. I will conclude with some brief comparisons of Japanese practices and concepts with those in North America. 2. Sendai In November of 1991, the city of Sendai in the Tohoku province was the host for the fourth Spirit of Place Symposium; a five-year symposium series designed to explore the modern significance of the ancient belief about the unique power of place (Swan 1990, 1991a, 1991b, 1992, 1996). In contrast to Spirit of Place Symposia held in the United States in 1988, 1989, 1990, and 1993, each of which drew some 40-60 speakers and Sacred Places of Japan 325 crowds ranging from 125 to 375, the Spirit of Place Symposium held in Sendai drew 6,000, including representatives from the Japanese local, provincial and federal government. The size of this meeting is ample evidence of the interest and support for the spirit of place concept in Japan. Sendai is a modern city of 700,000 located some two hours north of Tokyo by bullet train ― shinkansin. It was heavily damaged by fire bombs during World War II and so most of the buildings are very new. Sendai is called “mori no miyako” which means the city of the trees, and most all major streets are lined with trees. It is an east coastal city tucked between the mountains and the ocean, with 10 colleges and universities, and many corporate research facilities as well as farming, fishing and forestry industries. Compared with other parts of Japan, Sendai is a “new city,” developed heavily by the efforts of the shogun lord Masamune Date (1567-1636). Arriving in Sendai, one of the first special places one sees, rising up along the banks of the Hirose River, is a prominent hill to the west, Aoba hill, which is the site of the Aoba (green leaf) Castle of Masamune Date, which today has been preserved as a popular park, Aobayama-Koen Park. On the summit of the 433 feet elevation hill is a statue of the shogun lord riding a horse and wearing his helmet which was decorated with a large crescent moon. The castle stood until 1945 when it was destroyed by bombing, and so today the Gokoku Shrine covers most of the area once occupied by the castle. According to tradition, spirits of deceased ancestors may become kami, and animals, such as birds, deer and foxes may serve as messengers of the gods, such as the powerful mountain god Yamanokami. Nearby Masamune Date’s statue is a second statue of a taka or hawk, commemorating the legend that the emperor Jimmu (660-585 BCE) was guided to victory in battle by a golden hawk. Aside from the enjoyable view from the summit, visitors also often see many hawks, kites, ravens and crows flying all around the hill, evidencing the power of this place. In the Orient, as well as elsewhere, an abundance of animals, especially of one species, is commonly recognized as a sign of a special place. To the north some 35 minutes by train lies Matsushima Bay, which is one of the most beautiful natural areas in Japan; it is in fact one of three places named by the Japanese as their Three Big Scenic Wonders. In the bay there are some 250 small, pine-covered rocky islands, each with a distinctive shape and many unusual rock forms. Sited at the entrance to Matsushima Bay is the Zuiganji Temple, which has been declared a national treasure. Erected in 1606 by Masamune Date, this wooden building with many ornate carvings and paintings and landscaped with two 326 13. James A. Swan ancient plum trees brought from Korea in 1592, is a training seminary for Zen Buddhist priests. Nearby in rock outcroppings are ancient natural caves once used for monks to practice meditation. Visitors to this park make offerings and receive small paper prayers which they tie on the branches of trees to ask the help of the kami in making the predictions come true and warding off evil spirits. Just inside the gate is a modest stone shrine to honour the eel god, whose presence is known by the abundance of eels that are commonly found in Matsuhima Bay. To the south of Sendai, high in the interior mountains, is another spectacular sei-chi, Akyuotaki Park which protects and honours a spectacular waterfall. Visitors to the park may walk down a simple gravel path to see the cascading water, as in a park in place in the world, or they may take the path that leads to the Shinto shrine which honours the god, Fudo, said to be the shaman’s god, the god of fire, who stands for truth and justice. Taking this second path the visitor is transformed from a tourist to a pilgrim. The word “Shinto” means literally “the kami way,” and there are four principal elements of Shinto worship ― purification (harai), an offering (shinsen), prayer (norito), and symbolic feast (naori) (Ono 1962: 51). One knows that one is entering a special place by passing under the overhead arch gateway, the torii. After passes under the torii gate, then one proceeds to a sacred spring where you wash out your mouth and wash the tips of your fingers to purify our mind. Then one moves to a small stand where candles, amulets and artefacts are displayed. This is the first place to make an offering. Traditionally offerings include money, food, drink, materials and symbolic objects. One makes an offering and then takes some incense and burns it in a large urn to dispel evil. A second offering may then be made in a wooden collection box at the foot of the shrine and then one prays, bowing slightly, then deeply twice, then clapping one’s hands twice, before saying any prayers. To finish the prayer one makes a deep bow and a slight bow. Then one may ring the massive gong at the feet of the stature honouring the god, before setting foot on the gravel path to the waterfall. There is debate about the purpose of ringing the giant bell. Some say it calls the attention of the kami. Others insist it drives away evil. Then one moves on down the gravel path to the waterfall, passing many paper fortunes tied to tree branches and small piles of stones which mark similar hopes and wishes. Aside from its natural beauty, the cascading waterfall has a special heritage value. Spiritual seekers traditionally stayed in small caves beside and under the waterfall, fasting and meditating, hoping for enlightenment. Blacker (1986: 91) states that shamanic training in Japan once also called Sacred Places of Japan 327 for neophytes to stand directly in the cascading waterfall for extended periods of time. While standing in the waterfall, aspirants recited various chants and made prayers. On the way back from the waterfall, outside the area of religious worship, some local vendors offer pickled snakes and other amulets for sale, as well as rattles, candles, incense, jewellery and wooden carved objects. These may then be used for celebration. 3. Nara The city of Nara in southern Honshu is originally an agricultural area, especially known for its rice and fine cloth. Founded in 710 by the Emperor Kammu, it was the capital of Japan before Kyoto. A famous attraction of the Nara area is Nara-Koen Park, which is the home of about 1000 extremely tame deer who roam freely among numerous temples and shrines. The origins of the practice of honouring deer here dates back to a time long ago when it is said that a powerful kami messenger, an old man, arrived with an important message, riding on the back of a white deer. In the vicinity of Nara-Koen Park there are many places of special significance. Mount Wakakusa, a hill covered with lush natural vegetation, is set fire each year on January 15 by 15 priests, thus insuring ample new green growth for the deer of the park. The Kasuga Tashi shrine, founded in 768 by the Fujiwara family, is famous for its numerous lanterns more than 2,000 of which are stone and decorated with symbols of the sacred deer. In the Shinto tradition, lighting lanterns is a method of communicating with the Kami. The lanterns are all lit twice a year, February 2 or 3 and August 15, and each year the Kasugamatsuri festival is held on March 13. There are four shrines here, surrounding an art gallery, and in the Shinto tradition, shrines may be torn down and rebuilt every 20 years to purify the site. The Kasuga Tashi shrine has been rebuilt over 50 times. At the shrine there are many “sakaki” evergreen trees (Cleyera ochnacca) which are a sacred Shinto tree. Within the Nara area lies Tenri, which is a religious city and the home base of the Tenrikyo Religion. The Tenrikiyo religion was born at 8:00 am on October 26, l836 when 41 year-old Miki Nakayama, a housewife of the rich farming family, Nakayama, had a divine revelation. She said that God the Parent, Tenri-O-no-Mikoto, spoke to her. As with many prophets, people initially did not understand, and she and her family suffered many hardships, while slowly her teachings gained respect. Between 1869 and 1882 her teachings were written down and preserved in the Ofudesaki, holy book consisting of 1711 versus written in the Japanese waka style, which today serves as a principle scripture for the Tenrikyo religion, 328 13. James A. Swan which has grown to more than 16,000 churches and three million followers world-wide. At the core of the Tenrikyo religion is the belief that one comes to fully benefit from this religion through entering into a mental state akin to that of the Founders, and that once this happens, if one follows their religious practice with devotion and good spirit, the devoted will receive guidance, healing, and recognize omens. In some respects these beliefs are quite similar to Jung’s concepts of synchronicity (Inoue 1988). In honour of the founders, a magnificent wooden temple, The Oysato, the Parental Home, has been erected in Nara, marking the exact place where Miki Nakayama first had her revelation. This main sanctuary, which is said to be the largest wooden building in the world, contains an Inner Sanctuary and four surrounding worship halls which all face the Inner sanctuary. In the center of the inner sanctuary is a hexagonal wooden platform, the Kanrodai, rising up from the floor. This marks the exact place of the Founders’ revelation, and it is called the Jiba, or the place of human creation. There is a hole in the roof overhead, above the Jiba, otherwise all the rest of the worship halls are beautifully polished wooden floors covered with an elaborate and beautiful wooden structure. Twice daily, sunrise and sunset, thousands of people, from near and far, gather in the Oysato, for service, which is led by priests. People in all four directions kneel, facing the jiba, and perform a series of mudras (gestures) and chants, which begins with “Ashiki o harote tasuke tamae, Tenri-O-no-Mikoto” which is translated as “Sweeping away evils, please save us, Tenri-O-no-Mikoto.” Evidence of the power of this place and religious services can be found nearby in a large collection of crutches, canes and wheelchairs which have been discarded by people who report being healed by their visit to the Oysato. Nearby schools and hospitals carry on the teaching and healing work of the Tenrikyo church. Several times a year as many as a quarter million people assemble at the Oysato as an expression of their devotion. In the hills northwest of Tenri is Mount Miwa, another sei-chi. Here there are a number of shrines which dot the landscape, all sited along a gravel path that gently ascends the mountain. The most magnificent is the Suwa shrine. Manned by Shinto priests, who dispense fortunes, perform ceremonies and invite monetary offerings from pilgrims to show their respect for the kami, there are a number of revered shrines on this mountain, whose deity is the white snake. Legend has it that in ancient times one of the kami transformed himself into a white snake so as to gain access to a beautiful girl. In this disguise, he entered her compound and had sex with her. The child resulting from this bonding went on to become Sacred Places of Japan 329 the first leader of a new clan with great power. As evidence of the truth of this legend, it is said that all descendants have a small patch of skin that is scaly like a snake. Along the path ascending the mountain, one of the most interesting shrines honours the god of the alcoholic beverage sake. It is said in ancient times that people learned to make sake from monkeys, and this drink has a spiritual origin. The tale is told that once sake was used by a hero to defeat an eight-headed god of nature who came into villages and ravished young women. No man could defeat this god, and so the hero devised a plan to use the help of sake to defeat the god. When the god came into the village to pillage, the hero invited him to sit down and drink. The god accepted the offer and liked the sake so much that he became intoxicated. Then, when the god was inebriated, the hero be-headed him. While today one may consume sake for entertainment, Shinto and Ainu cultures brew and drink sake in religious rites. Aside from creating good feelings, one of the powers of sake is to make all people equal, thus aiding friendship. Farther down the path, past the sake shrine, one comes to a sacred waterfall. Here one may drink from the water, which some believe is good for your health. Most people turn back at this point, but for the serious pilgrim, one then can rent a white scarf to wear around your neck, and climb to the summit of the mountain along a steep, narrow trail. The white scarf is for protection as powerful spiritual forces are present here. Along the way one sees many shimenawa marking special rocks and trees, and trailside shrines to honour the white snake deity. Descending from the mountain summit, we then explored more of the shrines, which contain many works of art. On the summit of a nearby hill, there is a plaque which shows how shrines and torii in the area have been erected on special lines of subtle force to channel energies between sacred mountains. This is very similar to the concept of leylines in England. The strength of Shintoism, as it is expressed in shrine worship, is in its emphasis on direct invocation of spiritual forces through ritual. Theoretical questions and philosophical discourses are set aside and people go directly to the kami and seek their blessings and powers. This makes Shintoism a living religion, renewed every time and more mutable, resulting in a dynamic ethic, as pointed by Sokyo Ono (1962: 105), “In Shinto ethics, nothing ― sex, wealth, killing, etc. ― is regarded as unconditionally evil.” 4. Onsen Japan has a good deal of volcanic activity, and one consequence is an abundance of hot springs, which are called onsen. There are onsen all over 330 13. James A. Swan Japan, and most all have been recognized in some fashion, for public bathing is a Japanese national pastime. Some of the springs in the mountains have been incorporated into the development of resorts, some with private homes and others in large resorts and hotel complexes. The chemistry of the waters varies and the unique properties are recognized. One of the springs that I visited which had an especially strong healing quality had iron-rich water that was a dark reddish-brown colour. Nearby pools had hot and cold water. After bathing, one then is invite to enjoy tea and elegant meals served in traditional Japanese fashion. In contrast, in downtown Nara, another natural onsen has been developed as part of week-end retreat featuring massage, movie theatres, restaurants, and pachinko games. In this spa, there are a number of pools with water of various temperatures as well as a special pool contains many dissolved herbs. In Japan today, a serious public health problem is karoshi, which means working oneself to illness, even death. As an antidote to stress at work, some Japanese simply spend the week-end at such resorts. 5. Discussion The Japanese landscape is dotted with many wonderful sei-chi of all descriptions ― caves, rivers, hot springs, mountains, hills, waterfalls, etc. In contrast to North America, where sacred space is defined solely by human-made buildings, or scarcely, at best, marked by indigenous tribes, the Japanese take special measures to insure that their sacred places are well-known and honoured. Elaborate shrines and temples are sited at special places, or at their threshold, and local spirits associated with each place are known and respected in ceremonies, rituals and arts. Similar shrines may be found at many homes, both inside and outside, integrating distant spirits with those which preside over the home. The result of the extensive marking of sei-chi is to elevate the overall feeling of sanctity of the land, and to provide a constant reminder of how nature, spirit and the mind are interconnected. Religious rituals, ranging from formal festivals and ceremonies, to individuals making pilgrimages to place to make offerings to invoke the gods, draw upon centuries of respect for natural powers, and enrich Japanese life. The visitor comes away wondering if somehow Japan is more sacred than North America. There is a sharp contrast between Japanese attitudes toward proper behaviour toward sacred places and those of native people indigenous to North America. In Japan one makes a great amount of effort to show honour and respect for places and invites as many people as possible to come and pay homage to the places. There are special customs relating to Sacred Places of Japan 331 how one shows respect for sei-chi, such as making offerings, wearing a white scarf to visit very special places, and taking no photos of especially sacred sites, but people are encouraged to come and visit and learn from first-hand experience what the powers of these places are like, for the places are there to benefit everyone who shows proper respect. Indian tribes of South and Central America traditionally paid more public attention to their sacred places, sometimes erecting large temples to honour various gods and spirits. In North America, however, such humanmade structures are virtually nonexistent, except for the burial mounds of the Midwest. Among American Indians, sacred places are frequently secret and not visited, except perhaps by shamans and or select leaders. The difference in attitudes toward place can be explained due to differences in the nature of the religious practices in each area. Shintoism, an indigenous religion of Japan, is a nature-oriented polytheistic religion with many shamanic qualities. The mountains, caves, waterfalls, and forest groves are the homes of the kami, and each is worshipped through special rituals and shrines. Buddhism is more a commemorative religion, and yet there are still shamanic elements in some sects, and in Japan, Buddhism has frequently incorporated many aspects of Shintoism and even blended with it in some cases. Much the same has happened for Confuscism, and even Christianity to a certain extent. One consequence is that various religious orders have staked claim to specific sei-chi, especially the Spirit Mountains, reizan. The most prominent Shinto mountains are Mount Fuji and Mount Nantai. The syncretistic Shinto-Buddhist sects gather at Mount Yamabushi, where a mountain ascetic tradition flourishes. At Mount Ontake, a favourite place for you or pilgrim clubs to gather, mediums assemble and perform the yorigito ritual to enable them to predict the future and manifest other psychic powers. Farther north, the Ainu of Hokkaido represent the people of Japan with a core shamanic religion closest to Indians of North America, however according to Hitoshi Watanabe (1972), “there are no longer living Ainu who have (fully) personally experienced traditional Ainu life.” 6. Nonetheless When cultures move from shamanic religions to commemorative religions, replacing shamans with priests, then public rites become more commonplace and serve to anchor many cultural values and customs, creating community as well as invoking spirituality. An important question that one is faced after having seen and visited the sacred places of Japan and studied sacred places of North America, is, is anything 332 13. James A. Swan diminished in the powers of place through widespread, respectful recognition of the place? In a world with a growing population and galloping technological development, this question seems very important to study, for Japan, as well as inhabitants of other nations. It has relevance for both heritage preservation, as well as the mental and ecological health of society, and social customs regarding the spiritual values of nature. One of the criticisms made against modern Japanese culture by some is that while the Japanese have a heritage of love for nature, and have developed extraordinary landscape and horticulture arts to maximize natural beauty, they prefer to watch and tame natural environments, and then regard them from a distance rather than coexist with it in a more dynamic state (Kim 1991). In my limited experience, it seems that in modern Japan there is reluctance to go out into nature and appreciate it without any human alteration, in contrast to the United States where many recreationists go hiking and backpacking in wilder realms of the American Wilderness Preservation System. This distancing oneself from nature may be linked with the modern Japanese cultural tendency to avoid individuation through personal exploration the deeper mythic and symbolic meanings of dreams and visions of the unconscious, preferring instead to conform to group standards (Kauai 1991). Nature has a tendency to loosen ego boundaries, facilitating exploration of the unconscious through dreams and visions, etc. (Swan 1992), by removing barriers to accessing the unconscious due to the pressures of modern life. In contrast to the Japanese preference to regard natural beauty aided by human actions, and modern Americans who create parks and reserves to preserve wilderness, the circumpolar Inuit have no word for “park,” as they traditionally live in wild places. Modern Inuit refer to the parks and wilderness areas designated by modern society as “places white people play.” Inuit, like Sammi, Bushmen, and other traditional hunter-gather peoples live in a constant state of dynamic interplay with nature which is essential for their survival, for in nature lies their source of food. Regardless of our cultural heritage, there is a common urge among all people to make contact with sacred places (Swan 1990). In modern society this can be a source of serious problems for land managers and heritage preservationists. At Stonehenge in England, visitation to the original stone circle is heavily restricted due to the numbers of tourists who seek to visit this place. An important difference between use of Stonehenge and Japanese sacred places, however, is that Stonehenge is not considered by most people to be a center for ongoing active religious practice, but rather a historical artefact representing a previous religion and culture. The Sacred Places of Japan 333 difference in cultural perceptions of place between modern society and traditional societies is one example of how mind and nature have become split in modern culture, resulting in alienation within and pollution and destruction of the natural world without. In a modern world, where material values are given so much weight, it would seem that we could learn much from the Japanese legacy of sacred places and the cultural values that preserve and respect them that could be translated to other soil, helping shape values of love for nature that could help guide us to create a more ecologically harmonious world. -----------------------Note: # In preparing this paper I wish to thank Fumio Suda, Tadaaki Kanno, Akio Inoue, Tomohide Cho, Mr. and Mrs. Takashi Tsumura, and the many other gracious Japanese people who supported my visits to Japan and introduction to the study of Japanese culture and thought. --------------------------- 7. References/ select Bibliography Blacker, Carmen 1989. The Catalpa Bow: A Study of Shamanistic Practices in Japan. Unwin Hyman Ltd. London, England. Inoue, Akio 1988. ‘Signs Coincided’ and the Way of the ‘Divine Model’. Tenri, Journal of Religion, December, Number 22. Kauai, 1992. Paper presented at the Tenri Yamato Culture Congress, Tenri, Nara-Ken, Japan, November. Kurita, Isamu 1992. Nihon no Kokoro (Japanese Mind). Maruzen, Co. Ltd., Tokyo, Japan: page 123. Ono, Sokyo 1962. Shinto: The Kami Way. Charles E. Tuttle and Co., Tokyo. Shimizu, Yoshitaka 1991. Keynote speech at Spirit of Place Symposium. Sendai, Japan, November 25. Swan, James A. 1975. Returning to our Roots: Organic Education and Social Transformation. Sage Publications, Beverley Hills. ―. 1990. Sacred Places. How the Living Earth Seeks our Friendship. Bear & Co. Publishing, Santa Fe, NM. ―. 1991a. The Power of Place. Sacred Ground in Natural & Human Environment. Quest Books (Theosophical Publ. House), Wheaton, IL. ―. 1991b. Sacred places in nature and transpersonal experiences; in, Singh, R.L. and Singh, Rana P.B. (eds.) Environmental Experience, & Value of Place. National Geog. Soc. of India, Varanasi, Pub. 38: 4047. 334 13. James A. Swan ―. 1992. Nature as Teacher and Healer. How to Reawaken your Connection with Nature. Villard-Random House, New York, NY. ―. 1994. Sacred places of the Bay Area; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) The Spirit and Power of Place: Human Environment and Sacrality. National Geographical Society of India, Varanasi, Publ. 40: 123-130. ―. 1999. The Sacred Art of Hunting: Myths, Legends, and the Modern Mythos. Willow Creek Press, San Francisco. Swan, James A. and Stapp, William B. 1974. Environmental Education; Strategies toward a More Livable Future. Sage Publ./Halsted Press, New York. Swan, James A. and Swan, Roberta 1996. Working With the Spirit of Place. Quest Books (Theosophical Publ. House), Wheaton, IL. ―. (eds.) 1996. Dialogues with the Living Earth. New Ideas from Spirit of Place from Designers, Architects and Innovators. Quest Books (Theosophical Publishing House), Wheaton, IL. Ueda, Makoto 1991. Basho and His Interpreters: Selected Hokku with Commentary. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA: p.102. Watanabe, Hitoshi 1972. The Ainu Ecosystem. University of Washington Press, Seattle, WA: p.v. ------------------------------------------Dr. James A. Swan Snow Goose Productions, P.O. Box 2460, Mill Valley, CA 94942. U.S.A. Email: sgsprod@comcast.net § James Swan, Ph.D., is an environmental psychologist by research and training who has taught at major universities. He serves as film producer, author of books on transpersonal ecology, actor in the environmental awakening movies, and organiser of the ‘spirit of place symposia’ programmes all over the world. He serves as adjunct research professor at Institute of Transpersonal Psychology at Palo Alto. For his screenwriting, James draws upon having been a University professor of environmental studies, psychology and communications at the Universities of Michigan, Western Washington State, Oregon and Washington, and anthropology at the California Institute of Integral Studies; as well as work with traditional cultures of North America and Asia and inspiration from Joseph Campbell. In 2002 he has founded Snow Goose Productions to deal with the above noble missions. He has authored several books, including The Sacred Art of Hunting (1999), Nature as Teacher and Healer (1992), The Power of Place (1991), and Sacred Places (1990). CONTRIBUTORS Collins-Kreiner, Dr. Noga Assoc. Professor, Department of Geography and Environmental Studies Center for Tourism, Pilgrimage & Recreation Research, University of Haifa, Haifa 31905. ISRAEL. Email: nogack@geo.haifa.ac.il Dandan, Ms. Zhou Research Fellow, Department of Sociology, Xiong Zhi-xing Lou, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084. P. R. CHINA E-mail: zdd08@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn Masud, Prof. Muhammad Khalid Chairman, Council of Islamic Ideology, Plot # 46, Ataturk Avenue, Sector G-5/2, Islamabad. PAKISTAN. Email: contact@cii.gov.pk Meyer, Prof. Jeffrey F. Emeritus Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Hwy 49 North Str., University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28223. U.S.A. Email: jfmeyer@uncc.edu Poenaru, Arch. Designer Drd. Aritia D. National Institute of Inventics & “Al. I. Cuza” University, Bd. Carol 1, nr. 11, Iasi. ROMANIA. Email: aritia.poenaru@yahoo.it Poudel, Prof. Padma C. Professor, Central Department of Geography, University Campus, Tribhuwan University, Kirtipur, Kathmandu. NEPAL. Email: poudelpc@hotmail.com ; poudelpc@yahoo.com Rana, Dr. Pravin S. Lecturer in Tourism Management, Faculty of Arts, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005. Res.: # New F - 7 Jodhpur Colony; Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA. Email: psranabhu@gmail.com Sacherer, Prof. Ms. Janice Professor of Anthropology and Asian Studies, University of Maryland, Asian Division, Okinawa. PSC 560, Box 843, APO AP 96376, Okinawa, JAPAN. Email: jturner@sunny-net.ne.jp ; jturner@asia.umuc.edu 336 Contributors Scott, Prof. Jamie S. Director, Graduate Programme in Interdisciplinary Studies, & Professor, Division of Humanities & Graduate Programmes in English, Geography, Humanities & Interdisciplinary Studies; York University, 262 Vanier College, 4700 Keele St., Toronto, Ont. M3J 1P3. CANADA. Email: jscott@yorku.ca Singh, Prof. Rana P. B. Professor of Cultural Geography & Heritage Studies, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005. Res.: # New F - 7, Jodhpur Colony; Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA. Email: ranapbs@gmail.com Stãnciulescu, Prof. Dr. Traian D. National Institute of Inventics & “Al. I. Cuza” University, Bd. Carol 1, nr. 11, Iasi. ROMANIA. Email: tdstanciu@yahoo.com Smiljanić, Dr. Danijela Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, University of Zagreb, Ivana Lucica 3, 10000 Zagreb. CROATIA. Email: danijelasmiljanic@yahoo.com Swan, Prof. Dr. James A. Snow Goose Productions, P.O. Box 2460, Mill Valley, CA 94942. U.S.A. Email: sgsprod@comcast.net Timothy, Prof. Dr. Dallen J. Program Director, Tourism Development and Management, School of Community Resources and Development, Arizona State University, 411 N. Central Ave., Suite 550, Phoenix, AZ 85004. USA Email: dtimothy@asu.edu Wu, Prof. Kingsley K. [1934-2004] He was an Emeritus Professor, Department of Art & Design, Purdue University, 552 West Wood Street, West Lafayette, IN 47907. U.S.A. Vinscak, Dr. Tomo Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, University of Zagreb, Ivana Lucica 3, 10000 Zagreb. CROATIA. Email: tvinscak@ffzg.hr INDEX Āitareya Brāhmana 144 Amitabha Buddha 205, 206 archetype cosmos, macro- , meso- , micro- 31, 119; cosmicised nature 36, principle 38, symbolism 111, forms 122, initiation 127 Architecture of light 111-128, world as cathedral 111; genesis of cosmic form 112117, darkness 112, energy information 112, structurally 112, 123, functionally 113, 123, universal becoming 113, cosmograms 113, hermeneutical alternatives 115; essential unity 117-118; spiral light 119, law of organic growth 119; harmonious light 119-121, golden number 120, golden spiral 121; postulates 122125, bio-psychical state 122, spiritual-cognitive state 122, types of phenomena 123, ultraweak luminescence 123, connection energy 124, esosane architecture 124 Ashoka, the king 195, 252, 253, 254, 257 Avalokiteshvara 143, 204 axioms, sacredscapes 18-19, culture 18, cultural unity 18, place equality 18, intrinsic meaning 18, history matters 19, sacred ecology 19, obscure 19 axis mundi 5, 37. 115, 131, Kailās 134-138, 150 beingness 15 betwixt and between 242 biophotonics 111, 120, 122, 123, 125, 128, 129 black-whole 114 Bodhisattva 195, 197, 198, 199, 201, 204, 204, 205, 206, 207, 209, 252 Buddhism, environment 205206, Sheng Yen 205, 206, dharma 206, Bodhisattva 205, 206, adherents 280 Buddhist pilgrimage 138-143, nirvana 139, 258, historical events 282-284, Middle way 280 Buddhist sacred places 247-280; historical context 247-251, map north India 249; Lumbini 252-254, Development trust 254; Bodh Gaya 254-258, Mahabodhi temple 256, 257, Bodhi Tree 257, 258; Sarnath 259-261, religious landscape 260; Rajgir 262265, Five Precepts 262, First Buddhist Council 264, Rajgir Festival 265; Nalanda 265-269, excavated remains map 266, monasteries 268269; Shravasti 269-272, Sahet-Mahet 270, 271, Buddha’s sermon 270-271; Vaishali 272-274, Amrapali 338 272, Lichchhavi 272, Buddha’s reply 274; Kushinagar 274-277, Third Turning of the wheel 275276, excavation map 276; Sankisa 277-279, Bharhut relief 279, Abhidhamma 277, China, landscape & memory 175-193; perspective 176178, Pucun’s landscape 178, 180, 181, 182, 183, 187, 190, 191, 192, 193; Qian Bangqi identity 178-182, 192, 193, Yangtze river 178, Yuqing xianzhi 179, 182, 183, 184, 185, 192, Yongtashan 181, 182; waterscape 182-184, garden 182, Jinling shijing 183, Yanjing bajing 183, Liuhu xiaoyan 184; Tashan stone 184- 92, Ming dynasty 186, tashanfu 187, Tashanji 187, shifanfeng 188, 189, jiumianfeng 188, yanduan 188, aesthetic principles 188, cangshuxia 189, Yongtashan 190 China, Mt Wutai 195-209, 210; background 195-198, Taihuai 196, Ashoka 196, ying- xian 197, Buddhist dharma 197-209, pilgrimage 198-201; Tang dynasty 196, 197, 199, 203, 204, 205, 206, 208, pilgrimage landscape to heritage site 206-208, Foguang Temple 206, 208, Xiantong Temple Index 206, 207, Shuxiang Temple 207 Clairvoyance 29 communitas, Turner 71 contemplative 176 contestation 72 cosmogram/s 113; ICHTHUS 125, 126, 127, 128, integration 125-128, creative life matrix 127, etheric energy 127 Cunningham, Alexander Dalai Lama 167, 261 dharma, Buddhist 199, 201, 203, 204, 205, 206, 208, 211, 259 diaspora 73, faithscape, sacredscape 27-33, 38, 242, wholeness 27, sui generis 27, transcendent 27, 29, clear seeing 29, mythology 28, ceremony 28, transient 29, encountering 28, fig tree, pipal 217, 222 Gangaisation 32, Gatekeeper Trust 33 generalised axioms 5 geographics 15-16 geography in 21st century 5 geography, deeper 16-17, 19 geomancy 18, 26 geopiety 10 Göbekli Tepe 1 Hajj 72, 73, 95-109, 100, 102, 103, 106, 108, 109, routes 86, stages 97; rites 99-100, Islamic law 99-100, juristic and Sufi views 103 healing 6 heritage ecology 24-27, 39, archaeology 24, being- Sacredscapes & Pilgrimage Systems seeing 24, cultural astronomy 24, living earth 24, sacred geometry 26, mythology 26, monitoring 26, geomancy 26, uses 26, symbolism 26, energies 26, sacred earth 27 hierophany 9 Hindu traditions 22, 38, moral duties 31, mythology 31, rite of passage 31, prehistoric religious notions 32, Hiranya-Garbha 113 India’s five sacred sites 212, 213 inter-textuality 11 Jambudvipa 148, 149 Japan, sacred places 321-333, perspectives 322- 324; Sendai 324-327, shinkansin 325, Jimbu 325, shi-zen 322, Matsuhima Bay 324, 325, 326, kami way 326, 328, 329, torii 326, 329, Zuiganji Temple 325; Nara 327-329, Emperor Kammu 327, Mt. Wakakusa 327, Tenri 327-328, Jiba 328, sake 329; Onsen 329-330, karoshi 330; sei-chi 321, 323, 324, 330; Shintoism 324, 329, 331; invoking spirituality 331-333, Japanese legacy 333, Japanese life 330, reizan 331 Jerusalem 52, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 66, 288, 290, 294, 301, 303 Jewish pilgrimage 285-301, Israel holy sites 291; background 285-286; pilgrimage-tourism 287-289, sacred-secular 288, tourist 339 experience 289; Jewish 290, Western Wall 290, 300, 301, holy people 290; methodology 291, questionnaire 292, visitors’ characteristics 292294, distribution 293, local village 293; visitors’ typology 294-296 , Orthodox Jews 294-295, 298, secular visitors 293, 295, traditional visitors 295-296, 298; stages of development 295-297, Cohen’s typology 296, 298; tourism-pilgrimage axis 297299, heritage tourists 297, spiritual tourists 297, proposed typology 298-299; concluding remarks 299-301 Kā’bāh 97, 99, 100, 101, 104, 106, 107 Kailās 131-151, 152, map 133, 134, introduction 131-134; as axis mundi 134-138, 150, Shiva’s face 133, pilgrimage path 133, 134, Asian religions 134, snow covered peak 135, circumambulation 137, 145, khorras 137, 139, 142, 143; Buddhist pilgrimage 138-143, chortens 139, gompa 140, Mani stone 142; Hindu pilgrimage 143-148 Kalachakra 113 Karmapa 158, 160, 163, 172, 174 kshetra, holy territory 212, 216, 217, 218, 227, 240, 243 latent dissonance 243 mahā prasāda 215 Mahabodhi Society 258 340 Mahaparinibbana Sutta 250 Mānasarovar 137, 143, 146, 148-150, 151, 152, Rakasha Tal 148, 149, 150, 151, Ganga-chu 149, Anotata 149 mandalic 23, sahasrāra chakra 136 Mecca 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 101, 102, 103, 108 Milarepa 141, 142, 158, 159, 160, 168, 171 modelling of universe 116 moksha, relief from transmigration 211, 212, 241 Mount Meru 134, 136, 137 Muktināth Tirtha: sacred places 219-228, Muktināth 219222, Dāmodar Kunda 223, Chu-mig brgya-rtsa 223-224, Kāgbeni 224, Shiva temple 224, Dhārā Tirtha 224, 229, Hamstirtha 224, Vajrapāni 225, Kāgbenitirtha 224, Shālagrāma Tirtha 216, Jvālāji 212, 218, 225-227, 230, Nrisimha Gompā 227228, Sang-Do-Gompā 228 Muktināth, Nepal 211-243, introduction 211-216, Mustang district 214, 223, 238, 243, 244, 245, path map 214, 215, 218, Manang valley 216; mythic context 216-218, Malla kings 217, Jhomo 221; Pouwa 228-229; festivities 229-230, Yār-tong 229-230, Janaipurnimā 229, Durgā Puja 230; structure of pilgrims, tourists 230-240, spatial flow 230, pilgrims by countries 231-232, age- Index structure 233-234, frequency of groups and visits 234-235, motives 235, duration 235236, expenditure 236-237, transportation 237-238, other places; visits 238-239, accommodation 239-240; spirit of place 240-242, panchāyatana pujā 240 multidimensionality 3 mysterium tremendum 10, 12, 14, 21 mythology 28, 31, 36, 37 Nada Brahma 112 Nepal, Rolwaling 153-171, geography of Beyul 153156, Neyig 154, 159, Bhote Kosi 155, spiritual history 156-159, recent history 169171, dharma 156, terton 157, 164, Mongols 157, Muslim raiders 157, Dakinis 158; mountain significance 159- 161, Tseringma 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 169, 170, Miyo Langzangma 161; sacred landmarks 161164, Buddhiust monuments 164-167, rangjin 162, 163, 166, 167, Rolpa Ling 164, ringa 166, Shambala 164, 172; Sherpa immigration 167-169, Rolwalingites 166, 168, 170 openness 31 orthogenetic 16 Path, the pilgrimage 98-99, stages 98, states 98, sublime pleasure 98-99, esoteric knowledge 99, intuition 99, rules 104-105, self- Sacredscapes & Pilgrimage Systems purification 146, Muktināth Kshetra 211-243 pilgrimage and literature 1, 4794, devotional reasons 47, hard and soft meanings 48, interpretive confusion 49; literature 49-58, Epistle to the Hebrews 50, Roman imperium 50, Holy Land 50, 52, 55, 56, 58, 59; in literature 58-67, John Mandeville’s travel 58, inner pilgrimage 60, John Bunyan 62, 63; Literary pilgrimage 67-71; Grand tour 68, Ulysses 69, 70, self-making 71; afterword 71-76; literary sources 76-94; as a way 95, principle 96, symbolism 98; pilgrimage and sacredscapes 3234; cultural ecology 33, the art 33, 34, passionate man 34; contemporary concerns 34-36, multidudes 34, Maya world 35, ultimate goal 35, Christian view 35-36, Bolivian pilgrimage 36, Jewish pilgrimage 285-301, Santiago de Compostela 308-309 pilgrimage-tourism 36, 287-289, 301, Jewish 290, religious tourism 288 placemaking 5 placeways 8 Primordial Man 114 Qing Dynasty 175, 177, 178, 180, 190, 191, 193 Qur’an, Qur’anic 95-109 re-conceptualisation 36-39, revelation 37, cosmic spirit 341 38, communionship 38, Carl Jung 36-37, 39, 42, orientation 37, rhythmscapes 6 Rig Veda 112, 114 sacrality 5, 6 sacrality and human environment 7-13, 15, 16, 19, holiness 9, meaningless places 7, environmental sensitivity 8, spirituomagnetism 8, re-awakening 8, sensory phenomena 9, relativeness 9, divya kshetra 10, challenges 11, mythology 11, making of place 36, representation 13 sacred characteristics 8-9 sacred geography 13-17, sacred cartography 13, spatial context 13, 14, sacred place 14, happy places 17, topophilia 15, topophobia 15, chorophilia 15, chorophobia 15, contextual difference 16, sacred geography dimensions 1718, ethereal breathe 17, five dimensions 17, sacred geometry 111, 120, 129, representation 120, architecture 112; essential unity 117, visual language 117, space-time 117, ovoidal force 117, 122, genesis model 118, essential unity 118; geometric symmetry 118-119, energy-formation 118, 120 342 sacred place, phenomenological axioms 14, 172, Japan 321333 sacredness 7, earth heritage 37, mental health 37 sacredscapes 4, 5-39, axioms 1819, as function 19-21, nature 19, habitat 20, artefact 20, system 20, problem 20, wealth 20, ideology 20, history 21, special place 21, aesthetic 21; taxonomy 2124, mystic-religious 22, temples 22, historical 22, three groups: human crafted 22, archetypal 22, in nature 23, noumenal 24, categories 23, construction 37, orientation 37, Sagarmāthā, Mt. Everest 214 Santiago de Compostela 51, 54, 301-319, background 301303, cognitive maps and sketches 304, 305, 306, 307, Visigothic king 302, Holy Land 303; Road to Saint James 302-308, background 304-307, Codex Calixtinus 304, 311-312, La Rioja 313, Navarrese 306, 318, Roland 306, 307, 308, legend 307308, Nájera castle 307, 308, holy year 303, Santo Domingo de la Calzada 313; pilgrimage to Compostela 308-309, story of St. James 308-309, Santiago Matamoros 309; power of place 309-313, impetus 309310, settlement along the Road 310-311, military Index protection 310, services 311; environmental ethics 314317, liturgy and liturgy 314315, ecclesiastic and civic 314, environmental pressure 315-316; environmental impact 316-317; heritage legacy 317-318 UNESCO WHL 301, 317-318; reflections 318-319, coexistence 318, the last words 319 sense of place 6 Shālagrāma 212, 216, 217, 240, 241, 242, types 241 Shiva 133, 135, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, sacred metre 146, 147, bija-sabda 147 spirit of place, genius loci 6, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 21, 24, 28, 39, 44, 240-242, 301, 324, 325 spirituality 2, 331 sublime place 6, 10, sublimeness 10 Sufis 100-102, pilgrimage 100, Gnostic dimension 100, communion with God 101; contrastive parallelism 102106; juristic and Sufi views 103; allegorical interpretations 106-108, love and passion 107 text and content reciprocity 11 theoria 8 Theosophy 29 theosphere 30, 242 Tirtha-yatra 1, 2, 13, 22, 32, 143, 144, 146, 223, 237, inner realm of self 30, 31, Muktināth 224-242 Sacredscapes & Pilgrimage Systems topistics 8, 15 topophilia 15 transmutation 10 transpersonal ecology 27 Tree of Living Earth 25 tulasi, holy basil 217, 242 UNESCO Intangible Heritage 7 UNESCO World Heritage 4, Mt. Wutai 195, 197, 207209, Lumbini 253, Bodh Gaya 258, Sarnath 261, Santiago de Compostela 301, 317-318 343 Universe, a tree 114 Wenshu, Manjushri 195, 197, 198, 199, 201, 202-203, 204, 205, 206, 209, 225, 244 Wutai pilgrimage 198-201, territory map 200, sacred ground 198, nirvana 198, Buddhapali 198, Samadhi 201, Bodhi 201; unimportance of place 201-205, Ch’an school 202, 203, 205, 209, gatha 203, 204, Prajna 203, suffering 204 THE EDITOR RANA P. B. SINGH (b. 15 December 1950), PhD (1974), Professor of Cultural Geography & Heritage Studies at Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (India), has been involved in studying, performing and promoting the heritage planning, sacred geography, pilgrimage studies, Eco-tourism and development in the Varanasi region for over last over three decades as consultant, project director, collaborator and organiser. He has been Visiting Professor of Geography at Virginia Tech (USA), Japan Foundation Scientist at Okayama, Indo-Swedish Visiting Professor at Karlstad, Ron Lister lecturer at University of Otago, NZ, Linnaus-Palme Visiting Professor at Karlstad University, and Gothenburg University (Sweden), and Indo-Japanese Exchange Professor at Gifu University, Japan. As visiting scholar he gave lectures and seminars at many universities in Australia, Austria, Belgium, China PR, Denmark, Germany, Finland, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, USA (also Hawaii), and USSR. He is a Member, UNESCO Network of Indian Cities of Living Heritage, and also a South Asian representative to the IGU initiative on ‘Culture and Civilisation to Human Development’ (CCHD), since 2005. He is honoured being an academic Fellow of the Accademia Ambrosiana Milan, Italy (F.A.A.I.), the first one from South Asia, and Member, A.A. Istituzione del Comitato Scientifico (Milan, Italy), 2010-2012. His publications include 13 monographs, 26 books, and over 190 research papers, including articles in reputed journals like GeoJournal, Architecture & Behaviour, Erdkunde, Geoscience & Man, Pennsylvania Geographer, The Ley Hunter, Place, and also in series from Routledge, Ashgate, Longman, Oxford, and Cambridge Scholars Publishing, CSP UK. His notable publications include The Spirit and Power of Place (1994), Banaras Region (2002, 2nd ed. 2006, with P.S. Rana), Where the Buddha Walked (2003, 2nd ed. 2009), Banaras, the Heritage City of India (2009). He is also the Series-editor of the ‘Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series’, and published eight volumes in this series: Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India (2009 CSP UK), Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century (2009 CSP UK), Banaras, Making of India’s Heritage City (2009 CSP UK), Cosmic Order and Cultural Astronomy: Sacred Cities of India (2009 CSP UK), Sacred Geography of Goddesses in South Asia (2010 CSP UK), Heritagescape and Cultural Landscapes (2010, Shubhi, New Delhi), Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems (2011, Shubhi, New Delhi), and Holy Places & Pilgrimages: Essays on India (2011, Shubhi, New Delhi). Contact address: Res.: # New F - 7, Jodhpur Colony; Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA Tel: (+091)-542-2575843 (Res.); (+091)-542-6701387 (chamber). Cell: (+091-0)-9838 119474. E-mail: ranapbs@gmail.com