The Holy Grail and the Eucharist by Michael Martin

The Middle Ages “Behold, I Make All Things New”: The Holy Grail and the Eucharist By Michael Martin An idealistic young ty. tion to this, his best known work. knight, an ailing and aged But what about the men who wrote Wolfram von Eschenbach, whose Parzival king, a chalice bathed in these stories? Were they, indeed, sending is based on Chrétien’s work, was a light: such, in miniature, literary messages in bottles in hopes that Bavarian knight and small land-holder. are the trappings of The Story of the some enlightened souls from the future Robert de Boron, the author of Joseph of Holy Grail. The very concept of this would be able to decipher them and Arimathea , may have been a Burgundian object, this relic, testifies to the existence reveal the “truth” to mankind? Were they knight with little scholarly training, owing of the ideal in the face of the real, and is setting up a rival to the established to his clumsy style. The Queste del Saint an avowal of the power of Truth, Beauty, Church, anticipating a “once and future Graal (The Quest of the Holy Grail ), the and Goodness in the world, despite all Church” purified of all corruption? flower of the Vulgate cycle, was almost the evidence to the contrary. A young While no theory on the whys and where - certainly written by a Cistercian cleric, but man searches through forest and waste - fores of the authors’ purposes can ever his name is unknown to us. land, through castle and hermitage for be absolutely conclusive, we can still The Grail literature is by no means a this mystery of Christ. The knight seeks make a pretty good hypothesis. Maybe, uniform whole. “There never was a Story this sacred token made an agent of mira - just maybe, they were trying to write of the Grail”, writes A. T. Hatto, “and cles and grace through contact with the down a ripping good tale. That, I think, is never could be. On the other hand there Holy Blood. Many on this quest have reason enough. were stories of as many different Grails failed. Many have died. Many have ended as there were writers or syndicates in disillusionment and despair. Yet he exploiting the potent name.” 1 Le Conte del perseveres. Graal and Parzival have as their hero Over the years an amazing number of Parzival (Perceval), a knight who devel - books have been published whose For the Christian mind of the ops from a country bumpkin, a pure fool, authors boast that they have “found the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, it was to the ideal of knighthood. Parzival is real secret of the Holy Grail.” The “real only a short step from seeing the Grail flesh and blood; he has a wife and chil - secret” ranges from a revelation that dren. He is a sinner, albeit an uncon - Jesus was “secretly” married to Mary as the vessel containing Christ’s blood scious one. On the other hand, the hero Magdalene (as made all-too popular in to seeing it as the chalice of the Mass. of the Queste is Galahad, a chaste and The Da Vinci Code ), to a description of the noble knight who, though born of sin, is Grail as a cipher for a “secret” Johannine spotless otherwise. The Queste was writ - Church, to a postulation that the Grail is ten c. 1225, a good fifty years after the in reality the Ark of the Covenant, held Conte and roughly fifteen years after to this day “in secret” by the Ethiopian Parzival . Considering the author was Coptic Church. While the conclusions The History of the Holy Grail probably a Cistercian it is no wonder found in these approaches range from What we do know about some of the Galahad is such a Christ-like figure. the ludicrous to the plausible to the irrel - writers of the Grail literature is sketchy. Boron’s tale, based on the apocryphal evant, there is something in all of them Chrétien de Troyes, the author of the Gospel of Nicodemus and other works, which suggests the Grail is the sigil for incomplete Le Conte del Graal , which is breaks ranks with all of the different some kind of arcane conspiracy theory also known as Perceval , was a poet and approaches and tells how the Grail came that the benevolent authors are just now scholar in France who has left us several to Britain. bringing to light for a benighted humani - works on the Matter of Britain in addi - The times in which the Grail literature 12 July/August 2010 StAR was written were marked by a level of fathers than to the Benedictine Rule. Also cultural cross-pollination as Europe had like the Byzantines, the bishops were celi - never known. From c. 1174, when bate, having risen from the monastic Chretien’s Le Conte del Graal was written, ranks, and often referred to Eastern to 1235, the date of the last of the authority in conflicts with Rome. 8 Most Vulgate cycle, Europe was transformed. likely the Celtic Church was Eastern via The Crusades had opened up the Gaul and the form of monasticism and European mindset. Encounters with liturgy developed by St. Martin of Tours. 9 Muslims, Arab or African, initiated As late as 1185, Giraldus Cambrensis Europeans into the wonders of algebra describes an Irish monastery in North and Aristotle among other things. Munster where a few monks “called Contact with Byzantium opened Culdees devoutly serve God.” 10 The European eyes, at times suspiciously, to a Culdees observed liturgical customs simi - different style of Christianity. This period lar to those found in the Christian East. also witnessed the careers of St. Francis But the Celtic liturgy is not Ireland’s only of Assisi, whose simplicity and devotion contribution to the milieu that creates the vastly altered European devotion, and St. background of the Grail literature. Albertus Magnus, magnanimous scholar In the Grail stories one notices some - and mentor of Aquinas. Gothic architec - thing that is atypical of other twelfth cen - ture and the sublime prayer of the Rosary tury literature: women are assigned roles Christ at the Gates , Jef Murray also found their origin at this time. 2 of authority and importance. At the Grail den at the Council of Westminster in castle a company of women process with The Real Presence and the Holy Grail 1175. 4 the Grail and offer healing. In Wolfram, Perhaps inspired by Western Christen- The withdrawal of the chalice from the Parzival receives all of his best advice dom’s contact with the liturgical practices laity may have influenced the writers of from women, until he meets the hermit of the Byzantines coupled with the the Grail literature, even if subconscious - Trevrizent. advent of the intellectual rigor of ly; but, whether or not the Grail is sup - The prestige which women held in Scholasticism, one issue that was particu - posed to be a chalice, a paten, a ciborium, Celtic society betrays a reality that did not larly relevant at this period was that of or even a stone (which may suggest an completely disappear with the Roman- the Real Presence in the Eucharist. altar) is not always clear. 5 From author to ization of Ireland by the Church. Irish Christians did not doubt whether they author we have different representations. women bore a tremendous influence on really partook of the Body and Blood of However, in the Byzantine Liturgy the religious life of the island. Abbesses Christ in Communion. What they were Communion in both kinds is from the held great esteem and authority in the wondering about was when the bread and chalice . But the writers of the Grail litera - early days of Irish Christianity; and the wine became the Divine Flesh and Blood. ture did not necessarily need to go to Asia power swayed by St Brigit, in particular, Was it at the words of Institution, or at Minor in order to find a variety of was indeed formidable. 11 Given the the Epiclesis as the Byzantines suggested? Christianity different from their own. esteem of women in Irish society, it is no As James Douglas Bruce puts it “in no They could go to Ireland. wonder that women have such an impor - other period of the Church has the doc - tant role in the Grail literature. Yet the trine of transubstantiation been so imme - The Celtic Church tendency to allude to a conspiratorial and diately the centre of theological interest Prior to the twelfth century, the Celtic clandestine “Church” that permitted the and discussion as in the later part of the Church was more akin to its Eastern than feminine participation in the Grail pro - twelfth century and the early decades of to its geographically closer Roman cession proves false, as such participation the thirteenth.” 3 Theologians were also brethren. Like the Byzantines, the early was allowed in the East as well as in concerned as to whether or not one Irish Church had a married priesthood. Ireland and Britain. 12 Although initial needed to communicate in both Species. Indeed, the apostle of the Irish, St. contact between Rome and the Celtic This subject was eventually resolved in Patrick, was the son of a deacon and the Church was not always friendly, the Celtic the ordination of the Feast of Corpus grandson of a priest. 6 “Patrem habui Church was no rogue community. On the Christi in 1246. The chalice, however, had Calpornium diaconem,” he writes, “filium contrary, the Celts “never ceased to see been gradually removed from lay com - quondam Potiti presbyteri” 7—“I had for Rome as the spiritual capital.” 13 Like the munion over the course of the twelfth father the Deacon Calpurnius, son of one pre-schism Byzantine Churches, the century in the Latin West, although some Potius, a priest.” The Irish also had a tra - Celtic Church had different cultural and places practiced intinction (dipping the dition of monasticism more compatible liturgical practices, but adhered to the Bread into the Wine) until it was forbid - with that of the North African desert same dogma as Rome.

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