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Journey Amongst By
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This night has been long, yet the sky along the horizon began to glow some time ago giving notice of the approaching sun, that torch of day, the light of history! I am standing at the temple at the dawn of time.[1] All around me are the priests and priestesses who live in this holy place. We have been awake all night conducting ceremonies, some secret, others openly.
The air around is thick with the low sound of chanting, a slow, deep drone,
gently caressing as it resonates off the temple walls.[2] It is a sound made
only by male voices, pitched at about 150 cycles, and has been going on all
night. The Goddess's walls could be felt to tremble at times under this gentle
ministration, at which point, they say, she is awakening. At such times the
priestesses break into tune, a tone that is equally resonant as the male
counterparts, when voices penetrated the smoky air and into the heart of the
stone. The shrill Harpy like voices entered like angels this stranger's body and
produced a feeling of surrender tinged with terror.
At other times my mind withdrew from that unfathomable moment, and observed the
faces of those nearby, expressly women, to see if they too were experiencing
something similar. Some, with open eyes, would meet this gaze of mine and in our
meeting, a discharge of understanding, like a recognition of our mutual
existence, occurred. And then we would smile. This, a completely relaxed
exchange, produced untension. It felt as if, gazing through each other at an
infinite horizon, that we fell upon eternity together.
Others held their eyes closed, faces bearing a strange, expressionless look,
which seemed, at times, to express the pain embedded deep within, welling up
inside, like the pangs of childbirth, emerging into life, to cry in ceaseless
sorrow in the "grip of unending loneliness"[3] that is wrought upon our living
lives. But there was ecstasy in this moment, and the warmth that life brings,
for here life shows its graces and mercies and bolsters the heart of one, who,
while in the grips of faraway gods playing Tragedy, disheartens at the thought
that all our deeds will be forgotten.
Yet always, as I gazed into their open wells, their faces maintained a peaceful
acceptance of what was happening to their bodies, in the presence of their
minds.
Then I thought I could see a flow between them and the world around them.
What a strange kind of consciousness moderns have, I thought, as I drifted into
the sheltered safety of my thoughts. With all our artful, social sensibilities,
the all conquering will of the modern mind seeks only to control every instant,
or otherwise destroy what it cannot place into the prisons of its paradigms. And
I, and You, and We - are mere extensions.
Well, we are now confronted!
*****
II
The night has been long! And all through it huge fires have been burning.
Whereupon once every log thrown into flame was ceremoniously treated during the
last days before the festa, and through the soaking therein of a thickish amber
fluid, and with it a fresh cauldron of heavenly juices, prepared especially by
Her brethren, ensured that these were not the flames of war. Thus, each log
dutifully despatched, so sanctified, gave up its ephemeral scent. None were the
same! All are unique!
All manner of ceremonies and rituals have been carried out. Black sheep and grey
goats, a white sow with young,[4] and a thundering red bull of majestic
proportions, were all tethered at different times to stone alters receiving
gently, then giving, their special libations, as the raved utterings of the
priestly sibyls spilled forth, and a gently turning blade did kiss their
throats, and release their yearnings for peace, into the Air, and skyward, where
a full blazing Moon, tinged red at times it seemed, looked down upon with
soothing smile, awaiting their sweet arrival. And all the while the Earth and
the Temple walls erupted.
Elsewhere in the world, other jealous spirits were arising,
casting spiralling spells. There competing settlements wielded bronze and other
Vulcanic tricks until the Ancient World became their own, casting our people
adrift ...
Such troubling realities belong to all our dawning days.
Yet deep within the safety of these tombs, inside their inner sanctum, other
acts of divine treasure were being taken. Here young sages and elder crones,
fertile maidens and the wasted king[5] gathered and entwined together in the
holiest of holy places, and crazed beyond confusions, their robes and limbs
bathed in the sacred liniments, did enter upon each others bodies, a flaming
blade. Whence women part their living door to enter in endless agonizing ecstasy
the echoing bell(e)s of eternity, emerging slowly from the halls of time and
issue forth crazed mutterings. Received gladly in tlay heir brewing feast, His
brewing yeast claimed all. There, warm soft flesh ridden, and swallowed the
sacred loaf without regret. Thereupon, Her secret room lay opened, whence, once
the juice of life does flow, none may it ebb, for such is Her destiny, some say,
to consume while being taken.
And all the while Her brethren continued stroking for ceaseless
hours, for His breathing Sky to enter Her ovens. Whilst forever mining such
deeper, richer reaches, their silent voices broke, at last, from their swollen
egg-like faces, wherewith the freeing glances of His hardened blade, stroked
firmly the earthbound walls, a swarming hot-bed of passion, and released a river
of living grain.
There, once inside, their lifted heads on extended necks are plucked, then issue
forth in basest groans, a thunderous rising clamour - the deepest sounds that
mankind ever makes. Thus the stubborn birth of History ignored Her place.
Erstwhile, in all this darkling confusion, the Earth and Moon did find each
other and join in hearty laughter, for there, re-made, at last, at least in
trust of a morning after, go dancing through their final hours, and hold aloft
the lighted torch of a newborn day. This set the world ablazing.
Then the Oracles of Perception began to say ...
Hear our speech, hear us now, for now 's the time.
This is no mere recount of birth
given by the most ancient of Ancient Mothers -
lets call her by her name -
Shama[6]
and bring Her forth again in "Mnajdra."
This is a tale of a hole celestial journey.
This is our divine calendar.
At last, we conduct to you
the stories of our peoples
of whom, hitherto, so little is yet known.
When human knowledge fails true history,
you must look elsewhere to find the truth.
And when consciousness is eclipsed by darkness,
so the unconscious must bear the light.
For nowhere will the dark of Night stay hidden
from the searching beams of understanding.
Night is in fact so filled with light,
that you are blinded by Her lightning most sublime.
From this moment on She will not be resisted.
Yet if brashness of her younger peoples
in their youthful, warring tribes,
filled the annals of written histories,
there remains a chapter that is unwritten.
Standing singularly before your eyes
is She standing here since the dawn of time.
Some, seeing her traces before you, have said already that
"[Our Mother's decline] overlapped by only a century ....
the building of the pyramids."[7]
"Imhotep, ... honoured as the world's first architect ...
[was] a contemporary of [our unnamed] architect
who worked on Tarxien Central...
[who] in turn was a thousand years later than his predecessor
who had designed and built [Her] first ... temples."[8]
Let us now testify.
Long ago, so some historians believe,[9]
the Greeks had egos whose self confidence was only matched by their love of war.
And then came the Romans!
who let their Caesars search for Light that acted like a sword
incising and slicing living life,
that is the font of their hollow wealth.
In the face of power, fear, and war,
the elders of our clan chose here to remain,
submerged within the bowels of this Earth
a time immemorial, a boundless land.
In these we choose to plunge with Neptune's spear,
now buried in the silted memory of time,
standing alone inside this empty space.
There are no clay tablets here for Scholars to decipher,
nor walled up writings to make paper tracings over.
All here is now,
transcending the jaws of time,
our megalithic memory, hidden and scarred abound.
You are our descendants!
Yet still deny our knowledge from you your past.
Do not fear our spiritual embrace, for you too quickly forget.
Leave in place some space, in heart and mind,
for you, our people, our army of exiles
are still captured by the conquering walls of time.
But now, at last, return here home and find
the real sanctuary of your promised land.
Far from a farmers cove and Southern Lands you go
let here now stay awhile, this is your place.
Our deathly thwarted adult nationhood
is not as if we ne'er possessed our commonweal.
Her sovereign's rights have never been depleted.
Always renowned as healers,
with wines of mirth and herbs of health our only dealings.
not a lust for what another has.
Here contentedly, we wait
where we have waited for more than ten millennia.
Why She went, you cannot know
though there is a rumour ...
"on the one side ... Athens was reported to ... have directed the contest;
the combatants on the other side were ... of the islands of Atlantis."[10]
But as all must fade by day, so be it, so should they,
our Ancient relics now rotting,
yet She is not forgotten.
Her wandering soul
contrasts with other monuments.
"The revolutionary decision to ...
excavate, a temple below ground ...
impl[ies] initiative" [11] and
the beginnings of progress.
But let not that be your only grounds to judge Her.
Listen now, you have no longer the option to ignore us.
Ignorance cannot succeed, for memory knows,
even in self deception.
Even if you flay your dreams, She will not retreat,
for we will live on in dreams.
A writer's hands can kill if it will,
the quill is mightier after all.
But we all lose in such reckless actions.
The time will come when silenced voices return.
It makes no difference descending relatively down the line
to invoke some artifice of science
and quiet what is undeniable.
You get justice with a shining light
The day is nigh.
Hold on to your dreams
and listen to our schemes.
*****
III
This night has been too long!
With those final words I left Her inner sanctum, this, the first, the highest
inner temple, and moved outside! There, in a flurry of activity, all began to
take their places. Far below, the sea could be heard smashing and crashing,
eroding the bastions of this Island cliff face. The horizon was ablaze and I sat
alone in contemplation, watching as they began to go, those ghouls of the night,
their widespread winged memories, to be caught again in light. With the dawning
wind of time, my inner ear began to whirr to Her words still whispering near....
Some Oracles will impost.
The words of wondering prophets,
arising East and West,
out of the bosoms of Mohammed, of Christ, of Mammon.
As Arab King comes stealing by,
accompanied by the Semite and the Jew.
Tuscany then called the tune,
later Francs and Normans,
before bedevilled,
she lay tangled in an Anglo Saxon net.
No home now lies upon those rocky shores
for others to come claiming falsely.
Here Harpies come a-gnawing
the liver of women ever mourning
as every night their isolation,
learns how to fly like Daedelus!
And learn to enjoy Her wondering suffering,
for while it eats you, you cannot die.
Remember that, too, is a lie.
For just as surely as you live you die,
and as surely as you do, you know it.
Be brave, sons and daughters, for your fathers we are not,
though if we were would you be not the greater? [12]
Surely yes, but not!
Move on from History's Sin.
Our Ancient Crusader was not put in
by invading army, migration, or decline.
Rather be assured,
no years of wanting, famine, and hunger,
brought down the Highest of the Holy Lands.
Her withdrawal was that of a reigning hand.
Our Goddess grew weary of day
went about her tending child at hand.
Searching deep, Her pockets wanting nothing, found waiting
not the grains of wheat
but the grains of Father Time's sand.
And so sat She and pondered,
as holy priests looked on in horror.
and priestly Sibyls endured in terror.
Soothing, praying, sacrifice,
the One who strolled no longer
either in the Heavens or upon the bleaching Earth.
'Twas the time for catastrophe!
Elder fathers and mothers with salt bitten hands
watched and stroked Her gently.
'Oh Goddess' they pleaded 'why has though forsaken us?'
Resigning torment, another day.
Grown exhausted, our Ancient Crusader to the Underworld retired
without distress.
The One who knows the time has come,
accepts it gracefully and, as She did, then so should you.
In the end, you must but follow,
returning to our earthly mother, a dirge apace.
For burial is a ritual rite that must be duly honoured.[13]
Greater should you fear a tired spirit left wondering.
Unsighted still, just lying here, the Shades of those left beckoning
than giving life back to the living, a burden no one else may bear.
Now "sprinkle dust upon [this] corpse....
cross the Stygian stream....
Give poor [our gypsy band] your hand....
[and] rest in quiet place."[14]
Oh tombless time, unthinkable!
Her clan would never visit this upon Her land.
Return with will and strength,
Close behind the heavy grim face of death's door.
Then lay Her in Her warm Darkness,
and the spirit of Her exhausted partners.
Kissing each other in eternal embrace,
Dwelling in sunlight till night calls,
our rock is a open cut womb.
Our tomb the "Hypogeum."
Yet some survive, maintaining existence, [15]
as it allows.
The loss of well-leaving Goddess
is not a loss at all.
And even as, so few in number, we are overwhelmed today,
you should not fear Her spirit remaining,
embedded in the rocks of time.
Death is not a cause for resignation,
a failing crop, a withering of divine grace.
Now go, you here, and leave this place, your time has gone.
For younger still you are, in fortune,
your seed is still left unplanted.
Do not lie or die, not here, 'tis not your fate.
Hear and remember these words,
Let them console you in your toils,
And restrain you in good fortune.
Seek out your brother and your goodly neighbours,
With whom you are compelled.
These portents from heaven come filled with grace
and only charity that life bestows.
Spare the dead their due
A burial, a grave, but most of all,
their memory.
(Author notes appear below)
John Grech is an artist and writer who has published and
exhibited in Australia, Malta, The Netherlands, the USA, and Canada. His is the
Artist, Writer, and Producer of Sharkfeed, a web installation
produced in collaboration with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and in
association with the Australian Film Commission. He is presently living in
Europe where he is completing research towards a Ph D in Humanities and Social
Sciences.
Visit website:
www.abc.net.au/sharkfeed
© John Grech, 2002
Return to Story Index
Return to Introduction
AUTHOR NOTES
This revised transcript is of a Chapter from my Master's
Thesis Images From The Underworld and documents a psychic visitation
amongst the Ancestors undertaken between the 18th and 28th of December, 1991.
The interdisciplinary approaches encouraged at the Faculty of Humanities and
Social Sciences of the University of Technology, Sydney enables the development
of epistemic forms of knowledge beyond the capacity of conventional intellectual
disciplines. The doxia of traditional realist discourses has led to the neglect
or ignorance of many important social, cultural, and historical sites and events
such as the temple cultures of Malta. On the other hand, human
imagination and creativity have always provided the means of overcoming such
material limitations and these faculties have helped to produce the research
findings below. It is encouraging to see that the institutional neglect of
Maltese culture is being addressed by the Temple Cultures web site and I would
like to thank the Editors for undertaking this project.
Endnotes
[1] Refer also to P.I. Micallef, Mnjadra Prehistoric Temple, A Calender In
Stone, Union Press Malta, 1989, pp 21-22
[2] The use of resonant chambers in prehistoric religious ceremonies in Malta
has been suggested by D.H. Trump, Malta, An Archaeological Guide, Progress Press
Malta, 1990, p 63
[3] See H. Griffin, "Follow the Ecstasy; Thomas Merton, the Hermitage Years,
1965-1968", Latitudes, 1983, p 80, cited by J.S. Dunne, Peace Of The Present,
Univ. Of Notre Dame Press, 1991, p 13
[4] See R. Parker & M. Robinstein, Malta's Ancient Temples And Ruts, Institute
For Cultural Research Press, 1988, pp 12-13. There is every indication that this
image was embedded within popular memory of Roman Culture and was an important
source for Virgil as many other poets beside.
[5]See M. Eliade, The Myth Of The Eternal Return, Arkana Press, 1989, pp 57, 60,
and 64-65 on the renewal of the King at New Year. Also J.G. Frazer, The Golden
Bough, Macmillan Press Abridged, 1963, pp 308-330
[6] Literally the sun, linguistically similar to the Semitic us of Shamash or
Sumerian Utu, to whom Shamesh was principally the judge and law-giver with some
fertility attributes. For the Semites, this deity was also a victorious warrior,
the God of wisdom, the son of Sin (Sumerian Nanna, the moon, the chief Sumerian
astral deity, the father of Sumerian Utu-Semite Shamash, the sun, and
Ishtar, whose parents were Enlil and Ninlil, and had his chief temple in Ur. To
the ancient Maltese, this deity was probably female rather than male, Nanna
meaning grandmother). The Semite Shamash was reputedly greater than his father,
and the husband and brother of Ishtar (Sumerian Inanna, the goddess of love and
fertility, also goddess of war, called the Queen of Heaven, and was the
daughter of Anu). Shamash is represented in Semite and Sumerian as a saw with
which he cuts decisions. See N.K. Sandars (trans), The Epic Of Gilgamesh,
Penguin 1972, pp 24, 122, 124.
[7] See C. Renfrew, "Malta and the calibrated radiocarbon chronology",
Antiquity, XLVI, no. 184, Evans, 141-5, cited by D.H. Trump, "Megalithic
Architecture in Malta", in C. Renfrew (ed), The Megalithic Monuments Of Western
Europe, Thames and Hudson, 1983, p 69
[8] ibid., p 69.
[9] In the first volume of Black Athena: The Afro-Asiatic Roots of Classical
Civilisation (The Fabrication of Ancient Greece 1785-1985) (Rutgers University
Press, 1991), Martin Bernal has controversially argued that the prominence given
to the Greeks in the Ancient World actually commenced with the birth of Hegel's
'Aryan' theory of History.
[10] See M. Hope, Atlantis, Myth Or Reality, Arkana Press 1991, p 18, citing the
dialogue between Critias and Socrates in Plato's Timeus And Critias, (D. Lee
trans.) Penguin 1977
[11] See D.H. Trump, "Megalithic Architecture in Malta", in C. Renfrew (ed), The
Megalithic Monuments Of Western Europe, Thames and Hudson, 1983, p 70
[12] See N.K. Sandars (trans), The Epic Of Gilgamesh, Penguin 1972, p 124
[13] See C. Renfrew, "The Megalithic Builders Of Western Europe", in C. Renfrew
(ed), The Megalithic Monuments Of Western Europe, Thames and Hudson, 1983 p 8-9
[14] A quote from Virgil, The Aenead, (C. D. Lewis tans.) Four Square Press,
1962, p 129
[15] See also R. Parker & M. Robinstein, Malta's Ancient Temples And Ruts,
Institute For Cultural Research Press, 1988, p 44.