“Let us hope not in this case,” Che Lu said.
Yakov’s smile vanished. “What did they say?”
“Betrayal. Fear. Death. Darkness.”
“You are right. Nothing good can come of that. But you are also right in that it is just random chance that determines the fall of the bones.”
Yakov checked the clock on the conference room wall. Fifteen more minutes and the team would be landing in Israel. Even if they did find anything useful, time was running out for them to be able to get it to Turcotte. Once the team went through the second gateway of Rostau, they would be out of communication until they reemerged.
The screen lit up with the beginning of the next chapter.
“Let us read,” Yakov said to Che Lu, holding a chair out for her to sit.
BURTON MANUSCRIPT: CHAPTER 5
Around 1200 B.C. the tribes of Israel began their Exodus from Egypt led by Moses. Here I must give the “accepted” version of what happened next. According to the Old Testament account, they crossed the Red Sea when it was parted by the power of their God. The pursuing Egyptian forces were drowned when the waters fell back in place.
According to biblical sources, this group wandered in the desert — mostly in the Sinai — for forty years. Such a journey seems strange. The desert there, which I crossed going from Arabia to Egypt, is indeed large and desolate, but not that expansive. It is written that they were led by a column of smoke or cloud during the day and a pillar of fire at night. It seems that such guidance could have been more direct, except for the explanation that this was a punishment for the worship of false idols while Moses was away from them on Mount Sinai.
It was here that he received the Ten Commandments from the one God he worshipped and was directed to make a container for the tablets on which the commandments had been written. It was to be two and a half cubits in length, a cubit and a half in width, and a cubit and a half in height. (A cubit is the length from a normal-sized man’s elbow to the end of the middle finger. A little less than a foot and a half. But the cubit was different for many societies, so we must allow flexibility.)
The Ark was to be made of wood, gold-plated on the inside and out. The lid was also to be of gold, with two carved figures of cherubim facing each other. There’s some debate over what exactly a cherubim is. Some say it is a sphinx-like creature. Others claim the two cherubim weren’t separated but were male and female and carved in an erotic embrace, although orthodox religious scholars don’t like that interpretation.
According to tradition, Moses got these basic instructions and he passed them on to a man named Bezaleel who was the most skilled workman available. The ark was built with four gold rings on each bottom corner, so that poles could be placed through for transport. Once completed, the tablets were put inside, and the Ark was covered whenever it was moved in public.
However, I believe that this is a description of an object that already existed and was taken secretly by Moses out of Egypt. It is at Mount Sinai that Moses chose to reveal this Ark to the people. The Ark that Moses had on the Exodus was the Ark of Atlantis, containing the Grail. I feel the transition from Atlantean Ark to Ark of the Covenant is an example of either myth supplanting reality or a deliberate misrepresentation of facts to hide the truth, something I have run across quite often in my study of the Airlia effect on our history.
The first part of this story comes mainly from the Christian and Jewish writing. However there is another body of study that I have perused regarding this journey — the Kabbalah, of which there are several interpretations, some strictly orthodox, others leaning toward the fantastic. I have culled from all these versions some interesting information that sheds light on the Grail.
Kabbalah is defined most commonly as “received knowledge.” Over the centuries it has been considered an occult theosophy of rabbinical origins. It is similar in many ways to sufism, a desire for knowledge, to look beyond the apparent and find the ultimate truth of our world. Unlike those religions that promise revelation after death, those who follow the Kabbalah path seek that truth in this life, and, some say, ultimate life before death, transcending the limitations of time and space.
Delving deep into the various accounts, I have found that most branches trace their roots to the same event — the Exodus at Mount Sinai.
For over a thousand years the Kabbalah was handed down verbally before being written, leading to many interpretations. It is reported that while they were stopped at Mount Sinai, four men were called upon to partake of something “unworldly.”
Three of these men were identified — a rabbi and two noted men of the tribes. But the fourth is only labeled the “Other.” They entered a chamber in the mountain through pillars of marble and gazed upon what was inside. One of the men was killed instantly, overwhelmed by what he saw. The Other directed the two survivors to partake of a “libation “ that would bring them to the fourth level of the soul, the chayyah, which is the life force itself.
I believe this Other wanted them to partake of the Grail. He promised them eternal life if they did so and knowledge beyond anything they could imagine.
I believe this Other was a Guide, sent by Aspasia’s Shadow, to determine if the Grail was being carried in the Ark and if it was indeed the Grail of Atlantis.
Fortunately, both men refused to partake. The Grail was returned to the Ark and the Other disappeared. The Ark was brought to the Promised Land.
But this hint of such a “libation” led to different interpretations in both the Torah and the Christian Old Testament throughout the ages.
Regardless of what happened at Mount Sinai, the Ark, Grail enclosed, traveled to Israel. In 1040 B.C. during the reign of King Samuel, the Ark was captured by the Philistines. It is said to have caused great troubles for the Philistines and they were unable to open it. They returned it to the Israelites, where it was kept for a while in the town of Baala.
In the fourth year of his reign, King Solomon began building a temple fit to house the Ark and the Grail. The head architect was a Phoenician named Hiram Abiff. Seventy thousand men were employed to bring wood from Jaffa to Jerusalem and even more, eighty thousand, to quarry the stone needed for the construction. It took seven and a half years to build — why such a monument for a people that worshipped one God who asked for no idols to be built to him?
Hiram Abiff is rumored to have sent a report about what he was doing and what the Temple was designed to hold — the Ark and the Grail — to his king in Phoenicia. Hiram Abiff was killed by Solomon upon completion of the Temple to keep the secret, but it might have already been too late.
This report made its way through the Muslim World and when they conquered Spain, it went to the center of knowledge they established at Toledo. There it was uncovered by a man known only as Kyot, a sort of sorcerer, a master of a little-known runic language which sounds very much like the High Rune language.
With the secret disclosed, action needed to be taken to preserve both artifacts. On top of that, internal dissension among the tribes and external forces constantly threatened the temple and its precious contents.
The successors to Solomon make it seem less like a kingdom devoted to God than one committed to power. And what was the power they were fighting over?
After Solomon, due to the turmoil that overtook the state, one legend has it that the Ark was taken by Solomon’s son and the Queen of Sheba to Africa, to the Kingdom of Axum, where it has remained to this day. The Ark went south as a ruse to hide the location of the more important piece — the Grail, which remained in Jerusalem, being too valuable and powerful for the priests to part with in their struggles.