Merlin part 1 of 3

from Merlin: High Priest of the Holy Grail,
Copyright,2011, James Stivers

Chapter Seven
THE PROPHECIES OF MERLIN
Part 1 of 3

It is now that we must take up perhaps the most complex yet most rewarding aspect of this study. I think sufficient evidence exists that Merlin was Desposynic, and in his role as king he was guardian of the Grail family. However, it is in his role as prophet that we begin to see him as the pivotal figure of “high priest of the Holy Grail.” The legends of Merlin speaking from his stone prison takes us back to the Israelite priesthood and the Urim & Thummim: the stones held in the ephod of the High Priest from which Divine revelation was forthcoming.

Merlin’s prophecies are placed by Geoffrey in the same setting as his encounter with Vortigern while Merlin was still a boy. While this is possible, it is more probable that Geoffrey has simply invented the story. Vortigern would not have been interested and no one, presumably, would have taken the trouble to write them down. Although the first verses certainly pertain to Vortigern and serve as a warning, we are more likely in possession of a collection of his prophecies based upon visions over the course of his life that were finally written down before his departure for America with the Desposynic [redacted term].[97]

“The Prophecies,” as they have come down to us, were preserved and translated by John of Cornwall of the 12th century (a theologian and colleague of Peter Lombard), but they were already a well-known part of oral tradition. That they have suffered under the hands of editors and bardic embellishments, there can be no doubt. Interpolators have substituted place-names known to medieval contemporaries instead of the ancient ones which would have been known to the people of Merlin’s time.

But there are themes enunciated in the prophecies which transcend time and have survived the editor’s modifications. As to whether they constitute sayings of true prophetic value requires closer examination.
Merlin, like a Nostradamus, sees history in advance in his visions.[98] The earliest periods described in his visions pertain to the immediate struggles and calamities befalling the Celtic Britons. These visions are cloaked in symbolic language and require some knowledge of subsequent history for interpreters to see their connection to the prophecies.

[ I have chosen to use R. J. Stewart’s, The Prophetic Vision of Merlin, Routledge & Kegan Paul, NY (1986) as my primary source with some of his commentary below used for illustrative purposes only]

For example, the 5th prophecy reads and is interpreted as follows:

“Religion shall again be abolished, and there shall be a movement of the metropolitan Sees. The dignity of London shall adorn Dobernia, and the seventh pastor of York shall be visited in the kingdom of Armorica. Menevia shall put on the pall of the City of Legions, and a Preacher of Ireland shall be dumb on account of an infant growing in the womb.”

[Interpretation – Stewart et al]: HISTORICALLY. This refers directly to the increased emigration to Brittany in the middle of the sixth century, and the Celtic or British Church (presumably restored during the reign of Arthur) was affected, particularly by movement of bishops to Brittany. Menevia, St David’s, is moved to Caerleon (the City of Legions, cited as King Arthur’s court in the visionary description in Geoffrey). The Bishopric of London was similarly moved to Canterbury. Brittany remained an important centre for the old British Church for a long period of time, and complex arguments about validity and authority were to develop as a result of this movement.
MYTHICALLY. The anecdote of the miraculous child is one usually ascribed to Christ, in a number of apocryphal stories. The reference may be to a tale of this sort, widely familiar to the medieval audience, acting as an analogue of spiritual inspiration or revelation.”[99]

And another,

“Seven who hold the Sceptre shall be killed, one of them shall become a saint.”

This refers to the Saxon kings from Cynewulf, who ascended to the throne in 757, to Ethelred who ascended in 866, and was canonized. . . (Cynewulf, Brihtric, Egbert, Ethelwulf, Ethelbald, Ethelbert, and Ethelred.)[100]

Of course, with the hindsight of history, these prophecies could simply be the invention of Geoffrey or John of Cornwall. We are tempted to say so; for when the prophecies approach Geoffrey’s own time period, we see hints of editorializing:

“After this shall succeed two dragons, whereof one shall be killed with the sting of envy, but the other shall return under the cloak of authority. Then shall succeed a Lion of Justice at whose roar the towers of Gaul and the island dragons shall tremble. In those days gold shall be squeezed from the lily and the nettle, and silver shall flow from the hooves of bellowing cattle.”

HISTORICALLY. William Rufus slain while out hunting, possibly murdered by an assassin’s arrow (1100). His brother Henry returns from Normandy to rule for thirty-five years. Henry I ruled an extensive kingdom in Europe as well as most of Britain, excluding Scotland. He raised a new taxation system from landowners.

We are now approaching the time when Geoffrey’s opinion and contemporary interest begin to show clearly; there is a political element present which derives from a man writing about his own time (but as if within an ancient prophecy), and adding some of his own or his patron’s wishes and hopes.[101]

To further illustrate:

“Albania shall be enraged, and, assembling her neighbors, shall be employed in shedding blood. There shall be put into her hands a bridle that shall be made on the coast of Armorica the eagle of the broken covenant shall gild it over and rejoice in her third nest.”

HISTORICALLY. The succession to the throne is disputed, Stephen claims the throne, but Scotland invades in support of Matilda. Eventually Matilda defeats Stephen, and is in turn forced to retire to Normandy in 1145. Her son, Henry II, eventually succeeds to the throne.

Geoffrey wrote the “History of the British Kings” in approximately 1135, so the events of the civil war between Stephen and Matilda were sensitive points. It may well have been this disruption of the order of kingship that prompted, in part, the writing of the work, both for reasons of Celtic nationalism (a recurring theme) and to help establish a continuity of lineage in the imagination of the noble listener.[102]

When we reach the 22nd prophecy, we approach a transition point in which the prophecies are no longer contemporary with Geoffrey but become truly prophetic, reaching to a period beyond his lifetime.

For example, prophecy 23 reads: “Then from the first to the fourth, from the fourth to the third, from the third to the second, the thumb shall roll in oil.”

Stewart observes:

This strange line marks a very significant transition into accurate prediction. If, as has often been suggested, “rolling the thumb in oil” refers to the use of anointing oil during the ceremonial of king-making (in which the Archbishop applies consecrated oil to the proposed monarch’s brow), then we have the following sequence:

Richard I to Henry IV 1189-1413 [“first to the fourth”]
Henry IV to Richard III [“fourth to the third”]
Richard III to James II [“third to the second”][103]

It is for the period following Geoffrey’s own time that a sense of respect is engendered for these prophecies. Obviously, any accurate description of subsequent monarchs, famines and wars lends credence to these prophecies, whether they were Merlin’s or not. It suggests that they could not have been literary devices “written after the fact” and strengthens the case that the predictions which have yet to be fulfilled, may indeed actually occur.

Alternatively, we must consider the possibility of self-fulfilled prophecy. There are some mystic cults which have been popular among the European nobility. It is entirely possible that such groups view these prophecies as a sort of “civic liturgy” which they are called upon to “make happen” by orchestrating historical events to fit them. Ritual assassinations, wars and the naming of royal offspring can intentionally invoke mystical beliefs to shape the destiny of such children.

This was heavily evident among the Rosicrucians and their “star-child,” Princess Elizabeth, the daughter of James the First. It is beyond the time-period under discussion in this book, but it is helpful to know that there is always an esoteric history within publicly acknowledged history. In the case of Princess Elizabeth, it was the hope of the Rosicrucians and the Protestants that she would marry the Prince of Bohemia and that they both would have created Merlin’s “union of the Celt and Saxon dominions.” The Protestants hoped that a Protestant Empire would have emerged in central Europe, and from this union, a counter-balance to the still powerful Catholic dominions of Spain and its allies. The attempt failed, of course, but one sees in this whole episode an example of prophecy as a script for human action in an attempt at cultural alchemy.[104]

Christian or Pagan?

There is no doubt that the historical Ambrosius Merlin was a Christian, but he was one skeptical of the Latin variety. Rome was gone and Merlin found his faith in Pelagianism and the heterodoxy of the Desposynic Church.

His prophecies clearly show evidence of biblical symbolism, but it constitutes a very small part of it. Rather, its symbolism is animistic and astrological, a method of seership which reaches back to the times of Enoch, Daniel, and the Druid tradition of the ancient Magi.

For its lack of Christian content, The Prophecies were banned by the Church at the Council of Trent in the 16th Century, which was not cancelled until 1966. This reflects the general aversion the Roman Church has had for anything Celtic and Grail related. Obviously, as noted before in the Hierogamy book, the Grail Romances were a clever assault upon medieval institutions. They suggested a rival church to the state-established one, an alternative church which was in possession of the ultimate relic of the Mass: the Cup of the First Eucharist. We should not be surprised that this entire body of literature was viewed with hostility.

It is also understandable that modern mystics would be drawn to the ritual value of Merlin’s prophecies just as they have to the general mysticism of the Grail legends. As noted earlier, the primary source for this study of the Prophecies is R.J. Stewart’s The Prophetic Vision of Merlin (1986). Stewart is a self-professed esotericist who is interested in the psychological and ritual application of Merlin’s visions. He represents a neo-druidic renaissance of recent years which consists of people who believe in magic.

However, our interest here is not in magic. We do not believe that Merlin’s visions were meant to teach the “weirding way” or an occult tradition. While a psychological interpretation is sometimes useful – as is demonstrated in Jungian psychology freely used in the Hierogamy book – our interest here is understanding how these visions have been understood by the covenant keepers of history. Before we can do that, we must come to a better understanding of the role of astrology as biblical symbolism.

Part 1 of 3 Footnotes:
[97] We also may be in possession of writings from an earlier Merlin.
[98] This is consistent with Isaac Newton’s historicism.
[99] R. J. Stewart, The Prophetic Vision of Merlin, Routledge & Kegan Paul, NY (1986), p. 82. Also available on the Internet. He is my principal source for the prophecies.
[100] Ibid, p. 83
[101] p. 87-88
[102] p. 89
[103] p. 90
[104] Phillips, chapter eight