Crusade Against the Grail - the Struggle Between the Cathars Templars and Church of Rome b

Crusade Against the Grail is the daring book that popularized the legend of
the Cathars and the Holy Grail. The first edition appeared in Germany in
1933 and drew upon Rahn's account of his explorations of the Pyrenean
caves where the heretical Cathar sect sought refuge during the thirteenth
century. Over the years the book has been translated into many languages
and exerted a large influence on such authors as Trevor Ravenscroft and
Jean-Michel Angebert, but it has never appeared in English until now.
Much as German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann used Homer's
Iliad to locate ancient Troy, Rahn believed that Wolfram von Eschenbach's
medieval epic Parzival held the keys to the mysteries of the Cathars and
the secret location of the Holy Grail. Rahn saw Parzival not as a work of
fiction, but as a historical account of the Cathars and the Knights Templar
and their guardianship of the Grail, a "stone from the stars." The Crusade
that the Vatican led against the Cathars became a war pitting Roma
(Rome) against Amor (love), in which the Church triumphed with flame and
sword over the pure faith of the Cathars.
OTTO RAHN was born in Michelstadt, Germany, in 1904. After earning his
degree in philology in 1924, he traveled extensively to the caves and
castles of southern France, researching his belief that the Cathars were
the last custodians of the Grail. Induced by Himmler to become a member
of the SS as a civilian archaeologist and historian, Rahn quickly grew
disillusioned with the direction his country was taking and resigned in 1939.
He died, an alleged suicide, on March 13, 1939, in the snows of the
Tyrolean Mountains.
CONTENTS
Translator's Foreword vii
Map of Southern France xvi
Prologue xix
PART ONE
Parsifal 3
PART TWO
The Grail 43
The Golden Fleece 53
Gwion's Cup 59
How the Bard Taliesin Came to the World 67
The Legend of the Bard Cervorix 68
The "Pure Ones" and Their Doctrine 70
The Caves of Trevrizent Close to the Fountain
Called La Salvaesche 93
Monmur, the Enchanted Castle of Oberon 101
Muntsalvaesche and Montsegur 104
Repanse de Schoye 108
PART THREE
The Crusade 115
PART FOUR
The Apotheosis of the Grail 157
Appendix: Observations on the Theoretical Part 190
Notes 193
Bibliography 211
Index 224
TRANSLATOR'S FOREWORD
WHEN URBAN VERLAG IN FREIBURG published the first edition of Crusade Against
the Grail [Kreuzzug gegen den Gral] in 1933, the book was not an immediate
bestseller. But its eloquence deeply moved those who read it. One so moved was
Albert H. Rausch, the 1933 Georg Biichner prizewinner who published under the
pseudonym Henry Benrath. Rausch wrote an introduction for the book called
Kreuz und Gral [Cross and Grail], which eventually appeared in the Baseler
Nachrichten later in the year.1
Perhaps this was why Hans E. Gunther Verlag in Stuttgart decided to
republish the work in 1964 under the supervision of Karl Rittersbacher, a disciple
of Rudolf Steiner's Theosophical Society. Rittersbacher's edition coincided with
the twenty-fifth anniversary of Otto Rahn's death in the Tyrolean Mountains. Over
the years, some very successful books have named Crusade as a key source,
although, oddly, it was never translated into English.2
Now, seventy-three years
after its initial publication, we owe this first English language edition to Verlag
Zeitenwende in Dresden and Inner Traditions in Vermont—and my wife's
indulgence.
The book's author, Otto Rahn, was twenty-eight at the time of its publication.
Anchoring his work in the poetry of the troubadours, he hoped to resolve the
legend of the Grail and surpass Heinrich Schliemann, the celebrated nineteenth
century German archeologist who had used Homer's Iliad to locate ancient Troy.
"To open the gates of Lucifer's kingdom," Rahn would write, "you must equip
yourself with a Dietrich [skeleton key] ... I carry the key with me."
Rahn was convinced that Wolfram von Eschenbach's thirteenth
viii TRANSLATOR'S FOREWORD
century epic Parsifal provided him with the key that would unlock the mysteries of
the medieval Cathars and their heretical, dualistic form of Christianity, which
venerated something called the Mani. According to Rahn, the characters described
by Wolfram were not the products of an old troubadour's imagination; they were
clearly identifiable as Albigensian Cathars, and their story would guide him to
their lost treasure—the Gral (Grail).
Skillfully blending legends and tales, oral history, religion, art, and colorful
depictions of one of the most beautiful parts of Europe—the region of southern
France that is still known as "the land of the Cathars" [le pays des Cathares]—
Rahn describes the brutality of the Papal crusade against southern France and the
repression of the Albigensian sect by the Inquisition. The Vatican and Royal Paris
combined to destroy Occitan civilization in the first genocide of modern history
because the Cathars had worshipped the Mani or Grail and rejected the cross.
According to some estimates, this crusade killed nearly a m...