I do not have to look for him very long. Bom Shankar sits on a crate in front of a tiny grocery store. In front of him, a hookah from which he sucks greedy puffs. He greets me with a big smile. I’m so dumb, makes me furious, which reinforces his hilarity.
– Well, Xsavior?that’s how he spells my name Have you read the signs? Have you recognized the two great men who rest here?
Man, I don’t care! There is one thing I want to know first. What happened to the landscape ? The fig tree is gone, thee temple is gone, now the city of Srinagar invades the perimeter. The shock is violent!
– What fig tree? Your head makes movie, my son. Charas too high for you.
– Stop kidding, Bom Shankar! Where is your impeccable French? Why resume your antics? Let doxn your funny mask, I know you!
“Anger eats you, angry man” he said in his saber, smoking his hookah.
– A moment ago you had a beautiful shilom! Where is it?
“Shiwa bless my shilom. Always I get,” he said, showing off the old terracotta shilom that I know too well. “Always.“
Okay, Okay, Bom Shankar keeps on pulling my leg. I won’t give him the pleasure of going mad again. I shut up my face.
“The two men who are buried here are very famous, I say. One is the prophet of the Hebrews, founder of a planetary religion. His name is Jesus.
Words, words, words. The old saddhu continues to mess. I let him speak.
– The other is called Nasr Ud-Din. Known in all Asia. I’ll tell you a big secret. This is the famous Mullah Nasruddin. For centuries his exploits and jokes have made Asian teenagers laugh while educating them. He entertained and raised the grown-up as well.”
At the time, I did not know the famous Mullah yet. I let you imagine the shock when I learned of its existence and fame, years later, from the mouth of Jeff Gros-Sel, my benefactor. But let Bom Shankar continue his delirium.
“If you knew the Mullah, you’d know why I’m doing the monkey, as you say. Now I have to finish my story interrupted the other night. So I was face to face with a boa constrictor. In the face of death, I remained frozen on my rock.
Suddenly his head dives between my shaking legs. And I feel between my calves the endless caress of its soft scales. The march of his rings brings the caress of the rings on my thighs. I tremble with all my limbs, while a monumental erection distorts my longhi.loin clothe“
And the same thing happens to me! Bom Shankar chuckles like a chicken. He is happy with him.
– BOM SHANKAR !! cried he. Bom Lena, bom Shiwa, bommm!
He hands me his hooka.
“Papa Shiva exalts your lingam to dispel any anger in you. Blessed be it a thousand times!
The lingam is the name of the male sex and the symbol of Shiva as the creator of the world. Lingam plays a central role in Shivaic Tantrism. For us Westerners, it is difficult to understand all these women and young girls pouring ghee on enormous phallic symbols, covering them with kisses and pious caresses.Remember it is the 70s Every religion has its rites that deserve both laughter and respect.
– Now that you’re centered, listen to this. Jesus did not die on the cross. He is not risen either, since he is not dead. When the apostles took him down from the cross, he was lifeless. All thought him dead. They deposited it in a tomb dug in the rock, they rolled a big stone in front of the entrance.
Jesus came back to him after a few hours. When the women came to the tomb, the heavy stone that hid the entrance was already rolled to the side. Jesus was no longer there. Where did he go? The holy story does not say it. We only know that he appeared several times to the apostles, and especially to Paul, his detractor, the executioner of the Christians, while he was going to Damascus.
But the truth is elsewhere.
On the inscription and on a flyer lying around, I read: “Roza Bal or Raza Bal means” Tomb of the Prophet “. There are two graves inside Roza Bal, one of Ziarati Hazrati Youza Asouph or Yuz Asaph (or Asaf) and another tomb of Syed Nasir-u-Din. This Islamic saint, a descendant of Imam Moosa Ali Raza, was a great devotee of Jesus. He was buried here in 1451. The Hebrew name of Jesus was Yuza in Arabic or in the Koran, Hazrat Isa or Isa and Issa in Tibetan. Farhang-Asafia explains how Jesus healed a leper and then became Asaf (purified or healed) and the word Yuz means “leader”. Yuz Asaph or Youza Asuph means “the leader of the healed” and designates Jesus Christ. Yuz Asaph’s tomb is also oriented from east to west, according to Jewish tradition, while the Muslim tombs are still oriented north-south. It is strictly forbidden to photograph the sanctuary which is permanently closed. ” (Trip Advisor)
Contrary to his delirium on the Buddha fig tree that is missing now and never was here, this time dear old Bom Shankar does not mess. This is indeed the tomb of Jesus Christ! Long after Jesus’ burrial, in the 15th century, a pious Muslim, a great admirer of Jesus, was buried by his side in the same temple. His name was Nasruddin. In Bom Shankar’s opinion, this is the Mullah well known throughout Asia. Why not?
So Jesus survived the crucifixion, he went to India, he settled in Srinagar in Kashmir where he died, and he was buried at the foot of a hill that bears a name well known to my readers the most faithful: it is called Takht i Suleiman or Throne of Solomon.
The thrones of Solomon are scattered throughout Asia. Legend has it that King Solomon possessed a flying craft on which he was making long journeys in record time. What looks like the performance of Buraq, the flying horse of Muhammad.
To land his plane, Solomon needed a high runway: a high plateau, a truncated pyramid, or a leveled hill are just fine. The Thrones of Solomon are the ancient landing strips of the very wise and powerful king of the Hebrews.
A few days later, I went to the top of this hill. Imagine my surprise to find a Bodhi fig tree, just like the one we’ve seen the other day.
Suddely I remember that we climbed a hill that day, but the Tomb of the Prophet is in the city, and the way to get there is relatively flat. Bom Shankar is having fun at my expense. How is he doing this trick?
Forty-five years later, I still have not the slightest idea. This world is full of ordinary magic, even if we only perceive it in exceptional circumstances.
Quantum physics teaches us that time and space can contract and deform at the whim of the perceiver.
Of course it takes a good deal of personal power to perform such feats, but they were once within the reach of everyone. There are places in the world where this magic has survived despite millennial wear. India is one of those places.
On several occasions, I have been given the opportunity to cross the road of people of power. They are sometimes so powerful that the web of the world is distorted around them. Their path is filled with miracles and wonders, which they most often ignore to protect themselves from an ego’s return.
For the witness however, these manifestations are hallucinating because inexplicable. The reason is not the right instrument of investigation in this matter. But the madness close to us seems terrifying …
It is to ordinary madness that I owe the vision that follows. Jesus did not die on the cross. When he found consciousness deep in his shrine in Judea, he understood that it was over for him from that corner of the world he had loved so much.
Now let us go back a few years before that day, to the tomb of Jerusalem. Do you remember the temptations of Jesus as he fasts for forty days in the wilderness? The devil comes to him, takes him to the top of a hill and says to him: “See the world at your feet. I give it to you if you give up God and worship me in his place. Of course, Jesus refuses.
This is the naïve and watered down version that ecclesiastical authorities have substituted for the original version. For example, we are not told how the devil takes Jesus on this hill.
Well, I’ll tell you. The devil of the scriptures is not a bad guy. He is a great initiate, a man of power and knowledge. He actively participated in the education of Jesus. To deposit him on the hill, the good devil makes him climb into a ship, the same as that of the great King Solomon.
Under the guidance of this devil who is not one, Jesus learned to fly this craft. He even takes a lot of pleasure. The feeling of flying is exhilarating for anyone having donned a body of flesh. Jesus does not escape the rule.
On the hill of temptation, the devil does not offer him the world. Jesus would do nothing. The devil offers him more simply to leave Palestine that does not want him. He tells her about India, especially about Srinagar, where a prophet of his stature would be honored and respected, and where the Romans are absolutely unknown. At the time, Jesus does not care. He still has things to do in Galilee, he refuses the idea of the good devil.
But there, in his tomb, disgusted, bitter, disillusioned, he feels like going to Srinagar. If he stays here, all the Jews will know he is not dead. The scriptures must be fulfilled, Jesus is paid to know it. He also knows where the ship is hidden. He goes there in the dim light of dawn. Nobody sees it. It flies away, sets the GPS on Srinagar, and lets the craft carve its celestial path around the world.
In Srinagar, he lands on Solomon’s Throne whose coordinates are recorded in the ship’s database. And it flows happy days in this mystical country where the population shows him respect and affection. Here at least, no Roman will come to judge him and crucify him.
Many times, however, he will brave danger and return to Palestine. He appears to Paul walking towards Damascus. It appears to Thomas who finds the presence of wounds at his side and in his hands. The acts of the apostles record his brief appearances. They are perceived as supernatural, and ascribed to the miracles of a resurrected son of God.
” God’s Son ? Big deal, he liked to say. All humans are sons of God. As for me, I prefer to say son of Man. When this humanity is over, another will come where all will be like I am. A humanity of righteous people and prophets, a world where the Roman Empire will no longer dictate its iniquitous and brutal law to the rest of the world.”
Gee! I cannot wait for this to happen.