The Encyclopedia of World Religions

184 S Grail

The Grail legend has been attributed to many sources, both pagan and Christian, and has been given many allegorical interpretations. It remains a symbol of the supreme human quest.

means of grace; P ROTESTANTISM emphasizes that God gives grace where he will, that the scrip tures can awaken the faith that enables one freely to receive it, and that the sacraments are simply “signs” of grace. But both acknowledge that God is not bound to any particular means or institu tion in his giving of grace to the world. P URE L AND B UDDHISM has a concept of salvation by means of the grace of A MIDA Buddha received through a faith that is comparable to the Christian. Grail A chalice sometimes said to be that used by J ESUS in the Last Supper. Around the 12th cen tury, legends arose of knights who set out on a quest for the Holy Grail, reportedly kept in a mys terious Grail Castle under the guardianship of the Fisher King, an invalid. His wound and the waste land surrounding the castle were presented as symbols of human sin. If the Grail was found and its meaning rightly understood, the wound would be healed and the wasteland made to bloom. Of the many variants of the legend, the best known associate the Grail quest with the stories of King Arthur, the renowned ancient British ruler. In them, the quest was undertaken by the greatest knights of his Round Table. A knight who succeeded in finding and entering the Grail Castle saw a strange proces sion, in which an attendant bore a lance from which a drop of blood fell (this is the spear that pierced Jesus’ side on the CROSS ), and a maiden carried the Grail, set with gems and radiating an unearthly light. Sir Percival, a well-meaning but foolish knight, was first to see the procession but failed to ask the right question, “Whom does the Grail serve?” The second to find his way into the castle, Sir Lancelot, was the noblest knight of his time but failed the test because of his adultery with Guinevere, Arthur’s queen. Finally, Sir Gala had, the son of Lancelot and the Grail maiden, a youth of impeccable purity born for this task, succeeded and, in some sources, then died in mystic rapture as he gazed into the sacred vessel. But the Fisher King was healed and the waste land restored to bloom.

Greek religion The religion practiced in the ancient Greek states. The term refers especially to the period from the rise of the city-state in the eighth century B . C . E . to the conquest of Greece by Alexander the Great in the 330s B . C . E . HISTORY Greek religion had several precursors. From roughly 3000 to 1450 B . C . E . the Minoan civilization thrived on the island of Crete. It seems to have worshipped, among other beings, an important GODDESS . From 1450 to roughly 1100 B . C . E . the Mycenaean civiliza tion dominated mainland Greece as well as Crete. The Mycenaeans worshipped many gods of the later Greeks, such as Z EUS , Hera, and Dionysos. After about 1100 Mycenaean civilization col lapsed; scholars dispute why. In any case, a wide spread “Greek Renaissance” occurred during the eighth century B . C . E . Population grew; the polis — usually translated as “city-state”—came together; overseas trade and colonization flourished; writ ing was developed; and poets composed works now attributed to Homer and Hesiod. During this period, too, Greek religion assumed its standard forms. With Homer and Hesiod the Greeks acquired common images of the gods. The new city-states built temples. Offerings at Mycenaean tombs led to the WORSHIP of legendary heroes. Sanctuaries for all Greeks, such as the sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia, began to host major festivals. Subsequent centuries were periods of elabo ration and refinement. During the seventh and sixth centuries, Greeks began to build temples in stone rather than wood and mud-brick. Great leaders, like Draco and Solon at Athens, tried to write workable law codes. Philosophers began to talk about the world not in terms of human-like divine beings but in terms of basic principles. One of the earliest, Thales, suggested that water underlay all things. At the same time, individuals