THE HOLY GRAIL
THE LONGEST LIST OF THE LONGEST STUFF AT THE LONGEST DOMAIN NAME AT LONG LAST

The Never Ending Quest 

Many scholars have researched and written about the Holy Grail throughout history but there is no definitive answer to the often asked question: What is the Holy Grail? The answer to that would surely be the end of the quest.

The story of the Grail begins with the Last Supper of Christ before he was crucified. The Grail is believed to be the challis that he used to celebrate the first communion, or Eucharist, with the Apostles. After Christ's death, Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy Jewish merchant, requested and was given Christ's body. He prepared the body for burial and placed it in a tomb that he had originally prepared for himself.

All of this had to have been done quickly, before the Sabbath Day. One of the rituals of the time was that any blood shed by the deceased was to be collected and buried with the body in the tomb. There has been evidence that the Grail was also used to collect the blood that fell from the wound in Christ's side as he hung on the cross. Hence, the Grail would have been placed in the tomb.

There it remained until Helena, mother of the first Christian Emperor of Rome, found the Tomb of Christ. The Grail was supposedly recovered and remained in Rome until the fall of the Roman Empire and the Dark Ages.

The story then is blurred between the Biblical and the legend. The Boy King, Arthur, ascended to the throne in the area of Britain and brought peace to the area after much strife. As the legend goes, the time of tranquility left the Knights of the Round Table lazy and bored until one day during the feast of the Pentecost, an object came to hover above the table and threw a magnificent light all around the room. The object was said to be the Holy Grail. It then disappeared and the Knights had a new reason for being - the Quest had begun.

To fill in some of the gaps in the Grail's story, we go back to Joseph of Arimathea. It is believed that after Christ's death and resurrection, Joseph and a group of people including his daughter and son-in-law traveled to the area that was to become Britain. Joseph took the cup with them and it was used to continue the ritual of the Eucharist. When Joseph died, the Grail was passed to Bron, the son-in-law. He guarded it faithfully, even after being mortally wounded; Sir Galahad arrived and took possession of the Grail. Sir Galahads quest had ended.

There is no Holy Grail on display in any museum to give us a tangible, touchable artifact to believe in. All that is left are writings of the Bible and the legends of Arthur and his Knights to spark the imaginations and curiosity of scholars, history buffs and followers of magicians and wizards. This is enough to keep our quest for answers alive.

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