The Bogomils

[Ani]

THE BOGOMILS

 

“The food of the Bogomils was mainly bread and water. They did not eat meat.”

 

Mediaeval writer

 

“A disciple must eat only plants that have sacrificed their lives for love. The only plant which knowingly sacrifices itself is wheat. As long as people are alive they will eat and drink. What will they eat? Bread. And what will they drink? Water.

 

If you eat meat you will see the results. The animal did not sacrifice its own life.”

 

The Master

 

 

 

BOGOMILISM AND THE BOGOMILS

 

In 1937, the thousandth anniversary of Bogomilism in Bulgaria was marked by the publication of a book by Boyan Boev, disciple and close associate of the Master, Petur Duno.

 

In a convrsation the Master says, “If somebody wants to study the life of the Bogomils, let them see the life of our “Brotherhood. “

 

The White Brothers, or Worldwide White Brotherhood, which was founded in Bulgaria, is the spiritual heir of Bogomilisin without being its continuance — for events do not repeat themselves in Nature. The divine is an eternal present.

 

The three branches of the White Brotherhood came together in the Worldwide White Brotherhood in Bulgaria; firstly in Egypt, Persia and Babylon, secondly in Palestine, thirdly,  Bogonulism in Bulgaria. These three branches of the White Brotherhood emanate from the Centre of Worldwide Brotherhood whose seat is the solar system and whose highest spirit is Jesw Christ. He is the head of the White Brotherhood.

 

Why is it that in the present age Bulgaria has again become the cradle of such a spiritual movement, as was Bogomilism in the Middle Ages? This is because under conditions of advanced materialism the link between the human soul, the nervous system and the higher worlds weakens. Today is the era of diseases of the nervous system.

 

The Master warned people about this difficult time in these words: ‘ If the peoples of today do not take a new direction they will be forced to do so because of the exhaustion of their nervous systems. They will also become neurasthenic and then they, whether they want to or not, will be forced to abandon the old concepts and aspirations and to set out along a new road ...”

 

It was like that when Bogomilism first appeared in Bulgaria in the early Middle Ages, when mediaeval feudal ignorance reigned and people’s spirits were oppressed and imprisoned.

 

After the wave of Bogomilism in Europe, the whole of the continent was filled with mystic brotherhoods which originated in Bogomilism. Bogomilism was born and nurtured in Bulgaria as a manifestation of the Great White Brotherhood ten centuries ago. It carried out an enormous task, the effects of which manifested themselves in the West as well.

 

This movement is a transition to both a new and an old culture. It is the Worldwide White Brotherhood which is preparing for the coming of the new culture, just as in the darkness of the Middle Ages Bogomilism paved the way for the Renaissance. It was the radiant herald of the liberation of the human spirit and personality

 

Bogomilism was not a sect but a powerful movement which brought a fresh stream into human culture. It carried forward with it the most progressive section of the population of Europe.

 

This was the most precious thing the Bulgarian people had given to mankind because the Bogomils preached a common human brotherhood, just as the White Brothers of today desire mankind to be united by the most exalted law in the universe, the Law of Love.

 

The Bogomils opposed violence in any form, they opposed war, the death penalty and slavery. Who would have dared to voice this protest amidst the fanaticism of the Middle Ages in the tenth, twelfth and thirteenth centuries? As well as the Reformation Bogomilism brought with it freedom of the individual, political equality and international solidarity.

 

For this reason Bogomilism was the herald of all great European reformers of whom civilisation is proud today. Eminent Bulgarian scholars with an international reputation and foreign experts as well have written about the meaning and history of Bogomilism. They were also written about in the Middle Ages. This is what one author has to say:

 

“The thing which makes the greatest impression is the strictness of their morals, the purity and honesty of their lives. The clergy, who are their enemies, say, “We don’t know what to make of people who neither lie nor swear ...”

 

The Bogomils were also referred to as Albigenses or Cathars. The word “cathar” means “purity”, coming from the Greek word “katharis” purity.

 

Purity! The most important and eternal condition for exaltation of the soul. But most frequently the Bogomils were referred to as “Bugri” because of their country of origin.

 

Wherever Bogomilism arose its centre was considered to be Bulgaria, whence came emissaries, apostles to all countries where there were Bogomil communities similar to the first Christian communities. The mediaeval writer Robert Altisoid referred to them as “Bulgarum heresis”. This phrase was abbreviated and they became known as “Bugri” Another mediaeval writer, Wlldhardwen, refers lo the land of the “Bugri” as “Bugria”.

 

Bogomilism was born in Bulgaria during the reign of Tsar Petur, heir of the greatest of all Bulgarian tsars, Tsar Simeon, in the 10th century. Its adopted name of its First propagandor and apostle, Bogomil the Priest. But was the latter its founder? According to church sources and the latest research the founder of Bogomilism was the youngest son of Tsar Simeon and the brother of Tsar Petur, Boyan, referred to by the people as “Boyan the Magician”. Extremely well educated and unusually gifted, Boyan the Magician received an excellent education and was well acquainted with the ancient cultures and mystic societies. Bogomilism, however, was of a typically Bulgarian character because the Proto-Bulgars were the bearers of ancient culture and knowledge.

 

It is written about Boyan the Magician in Byzantine annals that he wore his Bulgarian national costume to Constantinople. That was also the costume of the Bogomils depicted on old Bogomil monuments in Bosnia and Herzegovina. These garments remained in the Bulgarian national costume in certain parts of the country until the beginning of the present century. It demonstrates to what extent Bogomilism, like a wave of light, left in people’s consciousness and traditions traces of the white brothers of the Light, the Bogomils. These Bulgarians are still referred to as “white-garmented”. White is the colour of the White Brotherhood and of unselfishness. White is still the colour worn by the White Brothers and Sisters in Bulgaria.

 

Scarcely any material remains of the Bogomils are to be found in Bulgaria because of five centuries of Turkish rule. There are traces of them to be seen in ethnographical monuments, in stories and tales, in fables and songs, in the embroidered motifs on the shirts of old or in manuscripts. For this reason, what they left behind in Bosnia and Herzegovina is of exceptional importance. It has insistently attracted the attention of eminent scholars and researchers, among them A.Benac, A.J.Evans, M.Hoerves, G Wilke, 0 B Merin and A Solovjev. It was for good reason that they dwelt on what the Bogomil monuments contain, not only as a representaiton or effigy but also a suggestion of those stone sarcophaguses looming up in the plains and wide, fertile fields. They are surrounded by dense thickets and the strange beauty of the karst cliffs with their weird forms and the deep gorge of the River Neretva. Here flourished the free Bosnian state and the Bosnian church, referred to as the “heretic’s church”. Even today there are more than fifty thousand of these imposing stone “steles” — and there were many more of them in the past. The stone is soft karst and this reason is crumbling away. Some are still there, in situ, others have been taken to museums. Here is our wise old man, the apostle of the Bogomils, setting out on his way. In his right hand he holds a book aloft — the New Testament. A New Testament with the Gospel according to Saint John. In his other hand he holds a crutch, which he leans upon in all his dignity. It is as if we can see him now, walking along the roads. He meets one of his fraternity and greets him, raising his hand to the sun. This is how all persons are depicted on Bogomil monuments, with an exaggeratedly large hand and the sun above him like a crown. It is as if he is speaking the words, “We adhere to the Word of Life”. The other person also raises his hand and says the same. The thoughts in St John’s gospel are expressed in this phrase: “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was in God. And the Word was God.”

 

Beinsa Duno, wrote a hymn based on the first chapter of St John’s gospel. It is sung in deep mystic meditation.

 

With their migration and the influence they exerted the Bulgarian Bogomils bore their culture and art, their idea, even their clothes and customs to other lands. These figures in the soft karst are an expression, they are not merely images, they are actuality as it was lived and an ideological truth as well, which is contained in the depletion of apostles setting out on ajourney, of the heroes of the Bosnian state and the free church of the Bogomils. There are beautiful horses in a harmonious composition which speaks of rhythm and eternity.

 

Look, they are dancing a “horo”, which has always been part of the life of the Bulgarians. They seem to be leading the dance with a song, rhythmic and free! That song is still sung in Southern France, in places where the Albigenses and Cathars were to be found. It is hummed by all Bulgarians as a song to accompany the “horo”. “Boryano, Boryanke, sal ti li si moma, sal ti li znaish to peesh? Glasut ti se chouva chak do nashta niva, chak do nashta sliva, surpa si ostavih tebe do psiousham.” “0, Boryano, Boryanke, is it only you who are a maid, is it only you who knows how to sing? Your voice carries as far as our field, as far as our plum tree. I put down my sickle to listen to you.”

 

Do not those fine horses with all their accoutrements in a rhythmic canter remind us of the horses by which the Bulgarians are known all over the world as a “Nation of horsemen?”

 

An ancient Balkan legend passed down by word of mouth tells us that the Turks conquered Bulgaria in the 15th century and the last capital of the Second Bulgarian Kingdom in the 15th century, a noble family left Bulgaria and set off over the mountains towards Herzegovina on the Adriatic Sea. Is this not recorded in the rare and half-obliterated inscriptions on the steles, do they not twil us about the Bulgarian nobleman who never forgot his people? He came of a family who provided the tsar and nobles in TUrnovo with the finest horses, horses that charged into battle and fought together with their riders. Was it a matter of chance that led the Bogomils in that direction?

 

The Bulgarians were familiar with the art of stone-carving and the Bogomils took this art with them when they moved westward; and as Herzegovina and Bosnia possessed this heretical church they were also able to lembrace the art of the heretics. Heresy! Knowledge in itself was not heresy. It was an open door through which the people could enter the wide road of independent thought. It is a force which enables a person to comprehend and judge. It is a lighted candle — enables a person to comprehend and judge. It is a lighted candle — and that is the ‘correct thinking’ our teacher was talking about!

 

The Bulgarians, who were the first nation in Europe to hold. church services in their native language (translator’s note: not in Latin or Greek), achieved a truly great feat. Bogomilism was born among the very same people. This made them thinkers, gave them awareness. The Bulgarians indeed had a mighty weapon, the Word, the Daylight written in the Bulgarian, Slavonic language. It was with this book in his hand that the Bogomil set out on his journey!

 

As a Bulgarian historian and writer said in his book “The Bugri”, a spirit of knowledge and criticism flourished in Bulgaria at that time. Educated, thinking Bulgarians could criticise everything, even the church itself and its teaching, and even go so far as to question the dogma itself. Nowhere in mediaeval Europe were there such favourable conditions for such critical thinking.

 

They applied their ideas in practice by means of communities in which they laid the foundations of the Teaching of Love, Wisdom and Truth. They considered work to be the only way to meet the requirements of life and of the community.

 

They were the brothers of the poor, the unfortunate, the imprisoned and the exiled — and all this in the early Middle Ages, the years of superstition and darkness, of injustice and ignorance. Even in those days the Bogomils had schools open to the people, the young people, including girls. They educated everybody by means of enlightenment. The spirit of brotherhood and freedom entered the life of the Bogomil community.

 

How did the Bogomils meet? In the mountains, forest, fields and caves, and at time when there was a lull in the persecution to which they were subjected, in various buildings.

 

At times when the Bogomils were most persecuted their meetings took place at night. That is what happened in Bulgaria and in France as well. They travelled in secret to hold secret meetings and lived in caves during the hours of daylight, whence they emerged to preach to the assembled believers. Loyal young people stood guard at the entrance to the cave and when danger approached, the Bogomils moved on, led by loyal guides who knew secret ways.

 

The Bogomil communities resembled the first Christian communities. They donated their property to the community and everybody worked for one and all. They lived fraternally and shared everything equally, so there were no poor people among them.

 

When a wealthy Bogomil possessed property or land, he worked together with his feudal villagers in the fields and there was nothing at all which distinguished him as the owner of the castle. Bliss reigned in these little communities and blessings rained upon them.

 

Songs and stories remained from those times and troubadours sand about those who died for their beliefs like the first Christians. Their example gave inspiration to many and they, too, became followers of the Bugri.

 

What did the Bogomils eat, what was the food of the apostles, the Perfect Ones? The Bogomils did not kill. They did not eat meat. They were vegetarians. When someone was being interrogated by the Inquisition to find out whether he was a Bogomil, he would be told to slaughter an animal or kill a hen. If he refused, death soon followed. On journeys the Bogomils lived on bread and water. Is not the Living Bread the Word expressed in the gospel of Saint John? What could be better than a loaf baked in the hot embers and pure water from a mountain streamlet or a spring beneath the summit?

 

The prayer of the Bogomils was “Our Father”. They had no rituals, they built no churches. They prayed in the open air and indeed everywhere where the spirit was present.

 

In our age the Master, Beinsa Duno, led his disciples into the mountains. There he opened his school. The high peaks, the sunrise are the aspiration of the disciples of the great school of the White Brotherhood in Bulgaria and indeed everywhere they found friendship and support. How many unforgettable sunrises greeted Beinsa Duno and his students in the ancient Rila Mountains, where the highest mountain in the Balkans is located! In the gentle blue mist of morning one sees the Seven Lakes, set out like a musical scale. Towering over one of them is a stony summit known as the Peak of Prayer, which faces a sleepily beautiful valley. It is from behind this valley that the sun rises and this is the most sacred moment, in which divine consciousness awakens in man, a new consciousness which will awaken all the higher feelings in man?

 

Among the Bogomils, the act of Christening or acceptance into the Brotherhood was the laying on of hands, which means that by way of justice and truth, the symbol of which is hands, I entrust my faith in the divine in you. They laid their hands upon the crown of a new brother’s head, where the silvery leaves of milfoil tremble. It is also the place of the highest human virtues, where love and reverence towards God reside!

 

With a prayer which was uttered at the end of the Paneurythmia, the brothers and sisters make the same movement, saying the words: “May God’s peace be, my God’s joy and happiness shine forth in our hearts!” A new mankind is coming to earth! That is what the White Brotherhood is working for. Today is a transition between a new and an old culture and it is the Worldwide White Brotherhood which is paving the way for the new culture.

 

Modern man’s awareness of the new culture will manifest itself in a completely different way.

 

The wise forces in Nature are preparing a completely different installation for the human nervous system.

 

“ I refer to the new person as a person of light,” says the Master. “You are living in an epoch when the new mankind is being created.”

 

What is the characteristic feature of the new idea that is coming? you will ask. A cosmic awareness awakens in the new person, and this is the factor the Master placed before all others right back at the beginning of the century. He wrote the following lines to one of his women disciples: “Feel like a citizen of the world.”

 

The new person will be formed,” says the Master, “This is the culture of the immortals. The immortals shall live in the sixth race, persons of the ideal,”

 

The sleeping spiritual forces in the human soul are coming gradually to life. New sense organs are developing in man. The Master foretold this with these words: “Leave your prisons! Then a new life will begin. New horizons will open in your minds and then the process of development of the sixth sense will begin in modern man.”

 

Has not modern science also made many surprising discoveries which have led to a deeper understanding of the laws of Nature land then people regard them quite differently?

 

“Something much better is coming!” says the Master. The culture of brotherhood and sisterhood is coming! You cannot live well if you do not live for the entirety. Partial happiness does not exist. Live for everything!