Travels with Alexander the Great

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Alexander and the Great Unknown



Throughout the ages up to the present day, Alexander the Great has been linked with
tales of mystery, mysticism and the possession of supernatural powers. One of the most enduring ideas is that
Alexander journeyed east not just on a campaign of conquest but on a personal quest for the keys to a secret
teaching. It was this quest, so it is said, that led Alexander to  turn his back on his newly won empire and disappear
for years into the wilds of Afghanistan and beyond.

The young scientist and explorer, Stephan A. Schwartz, set out in 1979 to find the tomb of Alexander in Alexandria, Egypt, using the combined abilities of several gifted psychics. Just prior to this group exploratory work, which he called The Mobius Group, Schwartz visited a historian at Oxford, Peter Fraser, author of the three-volume book, Ptolemaic Alexandria. He asked Fraser what he thought of the idea of Alexander as a man driven by a mystic vision.

Fraser responded, “I think the great achievement is military... The visionary aspect, the cultural aspect, in which he had enormous significance – because of what he achieved in a military sense – is secondary, in my opinion, to his own personality. What Alexander achieved in a military sense altered the face of the world, but whether this is what he intended...” Fraser shook his head. “I believe he did not intend a great cultural revolution. What he sought was what he achieved – the destruction of the Persian ruling house, and the Persian army. Up to that point of the destruction of the Persian army it seems to me a mistake to see anything beyond a military purpose.”

“But why,” I asked, “did he continue after he had succeeded, after he had seen Darius dead?”

“Ah, the great enigma: Why? Why, when he had conquered the Persian army in 331 did he not then retrace his steps and go back to Macedonia? Why did he go on in a series of long and difficult operations that took him across the Indus ... performing no very significant military operations. Ultimately, it's a question we cannot answer with assurance.” 

From The Alexandria Project by Stephen A. Schwartz

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Alexander’s New Atlantis



The ancient Macedonian King Alexander the Great, was taught the great mysteries which
 hitherto were only known by the adepts by Aristotle, perhaps second only to Plato in philosophic importance.
This philosophy was secret; legend has it that Plato's teaching's on Atlantis, the great city that Zeus was said
to have destroyed with a deluge, was fact, as Plato himself intimates.

It is argued by some that Aristotle believed that Plato fabricated the story of Atlantis to serve as a moral inducement towards piety and righteousness. However, others argue that Aristotle believed Plato's account was true but that he feared that non-initiates would understand the great Mysteries and the great Plan which was hitherto cloaked. Plato believed that the Atlantean myth was fact and that it was the universal example of the ideal form of Government, similar to his Philosopher Kings in the Republic. Plato endeavoured, through his Academy, in his lifetime, to create adepts who would pass on this secret knowledge from generation to generation until the Great Plan was realized.

The young Alexander, being the product of a profound liberal education, desired to conquer and unite the world under a system of world government - to realize the dreams of his tutors before him. His conquests were not, contrary to common knowledge, any desire to spread Hellenic culture and language; Alexander was a globalist like few in his day. He understood in order that the Great Plan to be fulfilled he would have to subdue the known world. This was but the first element in the Great Plan to come.

Aristotle warned and chided alexander that if the Great Plan was to be a success, he would have to keep it cloaked. The Ancient Mystery plans to establish a New Atlantis, according to some, was Alexander's great dream. Alexander searched far and wide to learn more about the secret Wisdom; he understood that, after Atlantis fell, a few Atlanteans had survived and took their great and vast knowledge to Egypt, India, and Tibet. Alexander went in search of such knowledge.

http://www.macedoniantruth.org/forum/showthread.php?t=257

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Alexander in search of Shambhala



The fictional earthly paradise of Shangri-La derives from early Buddhist teachings about Shambhala,
a remote realm of advanced spiritual practitioners.  Shambhala is discussed in the Kalachakra Tantra, which
Shakyamuni Buddha is said to have taught the Shambhala King, Dawa Sangpo, and 96 lesser rulers, over 2500 years ago.
It is said that Alexander went in search of this place.

“Alexander the Great made the journey after being secretly anointed in Siwa by the Egyptian priests. They told him of a place called ‘The Great Hall of Records’ hidden in Shangri-La. Alexander believed that the ancient Hebrew kings who once came here held the secrets to ancient wisdom from the stars, and how to contact the gods directly. Having been on the brink of completely defeating the Persians he chose to turn his back on them and trek in a different direction through the Hindu Kush mountains in search of that ancient legend."

From Jesus in Kashmir - The Lost Tomb by Suzanne Olsson

In his book K2 Quest of the Gods Ralph Ellis, states that not only were the Egyptian pyramids constructed to represent the astral belt of Orion, they were also built to represent mountains, and the shafts within the Great Pyramid formed a map that would direct the intrepid traveller to a lost `Hall of Records' buried below the K2 mountain. Not only that, the sole purpose behind Alexander the Great's journey to the Himalayas was his quest to discover this fount of all knowledge including the legendary 'Hall of Records. These records are said to include stone tablets, linens, gold, and other artifacts.

A reviewer of Ellis’ book writes:

“The real gem in K2 is Ellis' treatment of Alexander the Great. Alexander was an amazing man, who faced down one of the world's greatest (or at least most sizable) armies in its own territory - and won, repeatedly. Then, rather than settling down into his spoils - one of the world's richest and most cultured countries - he basically took off into one of the planet's most barren and inhospitable areas: the ever-growing, mountainous foothills by the Afghanistan-Pakistan borders. When he could go no further, only then did Alexander turn south into India.

“Ellis does an excellent job of explaining this 'strange' behavior by weaving evidence that Alexander was actually on a purposeful quest to discover a 'God'-base or immortality-station disclosed by old-religion priests during his mysterious 'side-trip' to Siwa Oasis in Egypt. Since Alexander was obviously extremely intelligent and purpose-driven, he was unlikely to be 'rattling around' such an impoverished area with an entire Macedonian army. Ellis provides a plausible scenario for Alexander's presence there - and a good read, to boot.”

Mythic memory has long held that somewhere on Earth there is a place where we can transcend death and join the gods. In The Stairway to Heaven, Zecharia Sitchin deepens his fascinating explorations into Earth history by looking at this longing for a return to the divine.

Combining the enigma of the Pyramids with legends of human attempts to ascend like gods to Heaven in search of immortality, he delves into the lives of the pharaohs of Egypt, who taught how to travel the Route of the Gods to the "eternal afterlife"; the Sumerian king Gilgamesh, who journeyed to distant lands in his quest to "scale heaven" and ward off his mortal fate; Alexander the Great, who believed he was actually the son of a god; and Ponce de Leon, who explored Florida in search of the legendary Fountain of Youth.

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A map of Shambala, surrounded by its ring of peaks with the palace at the center.
(Musee Guimet Paris/Giraudon)

In 1960 an American travel writer noted in his book Afghanistan: Cockpit of High Asia that in the area of Afghanistan called Nuristan which is close to the Hindu Kush, there are Sufi monasteries almost impenetrable to outsiders. They have been built in circle around an even more inaccessible core circle of monasteries or training centers belonging to a people about whom almost nothing is known, but who are connected with the Sufis. In the most inaccessible place of all is the Markaz or powerhouse of these inner masters although what its nature is no one will say. … It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that the monastic circle Peter King found in Afghanistan is duplicated by other esoteric fraternities … and that all are constellated around a ring of “power points” situated on special mountains, the whole configuration composing Shambhala.”

From Shambhala: the fascinating truth behind the myth of Shangri-La by Victoria le Page.

"Somewhere in these mountains are to be found the hidden monasteries or training centres of what
Afghans refer to as the People of the Tradition. These people, about whom one can learn little, are supposed to
be the custodians of the Secret Traditions which are the bases of religion and man's development. In the most
inaccessible spot  of all is said to be the Markaz or "Powerhouse" of the People. The Sufis of Afghanistan
are closely associated with these "People" but no one will tell an outsider anything more than that these monasteries
and the 'powerhouse' exist." - Peter King

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Song of Shambhala: Thang-La (1943) by Nicholas Roerich

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Nuristan - the "Land of Light"

The story which has long been told is that when the soldiers of Alexander the Great crossed the Hindu Kush in 327 BC, they encountered the Nuristanis. Five of Alexander's soldiers stayed behind, intermarried, and modern day Nuristanis are descended from them. The story of a light-skinned European race descended from Alexander the Great and living high in the Hindu Kush Mountains whom nobody had ever actually seen was dismissed as a myth by the early Europeans to reach India. Believing that it was a fable, Rudyard Kipling wrote a story about them entitled The Man Who Would Be King. Nobody believed that these people actually existed until the British Explorer and Military officer George Robinson went there in 1892. Robinson wrote a book about them entitled Kafeers of the Hindoo Kush .  King Abdul Rehman of Afghanistan incorporated Nuristan into Afghanistan in 1893  and renamed Kafirstan, as it was then known, as Nuristan, which means "The Land of Light".

Panorama of Aranas Village, Nuristan. (Click to enlarge.)

http://v17.nonxt5.c.bigcache.googleapis.com/static.panoramio.com/photos/original/6972264.jpg?redirect_counter=1

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Travelogue written by three men from the American, British, and German embassies in Kabul who hiked the region of Nuristan, Afghanistan in the 1960's. Their narrative gives an excellent chronicle of their interactions with the different tribes and peoples of Nuristan, and gives the reader a clear picture of how ancient Kafiristan must have appeared to the early British explorers in the nineteeth century.

From the travels of Alexander the Great down through the conquerors of the centuries, Nuristan (Kafiristan) has remained an often hidden corner of the world. As a crossroads of political upheavel from the "Great Game" of the 1800s to the modern War on Terror with the Taliban, Nuristan has retained most of its mystery and remote wonder to outsiders.

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These days Nuristan has become a theatre of war in the ongoing battle for Afghanistan.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2074910,00.html

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Alexander was said to have been the recipient of hidden knowledge about the gods.

When Alexander became master over Egypt, he went to one of the central shrines of the nation at which he was shown all the "Mysteries" of the Egyptian religion by the high priest Leo (source: Calmets Dictionary, see link below). What amazed Alexander was the fact that the secrets of Egypt (long kept from the knowledge of the general public) were virtually the same that he was shown in his native Macedonia, Greece, and other regions.

Alexander decided to write a letter to his mother Olympias to describe what he learned in Egypt. When Leo, the high priest, heard of his plan, he tried to dissuade Alexander from such a procedure. He felt that the letter might be read by the public and then all the secrets of the "Mystery system" which only initiates to study, might be made known to all. Alexander did not only reveal that all the deities of the various nations were usually the same with different names, his disclosure also showed that most were once humans who lived on this earth.



In his influential book, City of God, St. Augustine recounts the story:

"And, to treat Numa with all honor, let us mention as belonging to the same rank as these writings that which Alexander of Macedon wrote to his mother as communicated to him by Leo, an Egyptian high priest.

In this letter not only Picus and Faunus, and Aeneas and Romulus or even Hercules, and Aesculapius and Liber, born of Semel, and the twin sons of Tyndaresu, or any other mortals who have been deified, but even the principal gods themselves, to whom Cicero, in his Tusculan questions, alludes without mentioning their names, Jupiter, Juno, Saturn, Vulcan, Vesta, and many others whom Varro attempts to identify with the parts or the elements of the world, are shown to have been men.

There is, as we have said, a similarity between this case and that of Numa; for the priest being afraid because he had revealed a mystery, earnestly begged of Alexander to command his mother to burn the letter which conveyed these communications to her."   (City of God, VIII 5)

The information in the letter leaked out and within a few months the whole civilized world was aware of what only a privileged few were once permitted to know. Some have claimed that this disclosure was beneficial to Alexander’s plan of uniting the world under a common leadership — under his Greco-Macedonian culture and that the discovery also caused the common people to want the same deification that earlier people had secured.

At around 300 BC, shortly after this knowledge apparently became known, a man arrived on the scene who exposed the full teaching of the "Mysteries System." His name was Euhemerus or Evemerus, author of a utopian work (possibly based on Alexander’s disclosure) that was popular in the ancient world; his name was given to the theory that gods are great men worshipped after their death (Euhemerism). His most important work was Hiera Anagraphe (The Sacred Inscription), which was translated into Latin by the poet Ennius. Only fragments survive of both the original Greek and the Latin translation.

He identified the humans in history who had been made gods. "Zeus, according to him, was once a king of Crete who had been a great conqueror" and the deities "Uranus, Cronus, and Zeus" all lived at the same time on earth (Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography, vol. II). Over the next three centuries other writers fully popularized the idea that the deities had gone to heaven directly at death to carry on their lives with new spiritual exploits.

Source: Calmet's Dictionary of the Holy Bible: With the Biblical Fragments

http://books.google.com.au/books?id=LOhSAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA82&lpg=PA82&dq=leo+high+priest+egyptian+alexander&source=bl&ots=JzYqQv9zNX&sig=I2q7edUPCnbCY39honnz3od4Vac&hl=en&sa=X&ei=6-ObT4WqEeWriAfYopDHDg&ved=0CEgQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=leo%20high%20priest%20egyptian%20alexander&f=false

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While Alexander disclosed the mysteries of the gods in a letter to his mother, he was less than pleased to learn that his former teacher Aristotle had also published esoteric secrets in one of his discourses. Alexander conveyed his displeasure in this letter.

“So to Aristotle, Conqueror of the Unknown, Alexander, Conqueror of the Known, sent this reproachful and pathetic and admission of the insufficiency of worldly pomp and power: "ALEXANDER TO ARISTOTLE, HEALTH: You were wrong in publishing those branches of science hitherto not to be acquired except from oral instruction. In what shall I excel others if the more profound knowledge I gained from you be communicated to all? For my part I had rather surpass the majority of mankind in the sublimer branches of learning, than in extent of power and dominion. Farewell."

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Alexander and Napoleon "vehicles for a great spirit"

Esoteric thinkers and others past and present have attributed otherworldly powers to men like
Alexander and Napoleon.

Jonathan Black writes:

“…gods, angels and spirits were believed to be emanations from the great cosmic mind – Thought-Beings in other words [which] expressed themselves through people. … For example, Alexander the Great or Napoleon were vehicles for a great spirit and for a while carried all before them in a remarkable way. No one could oppose them and they succeeded in everything they did – until the spirit left them. Then quite suddenly everything began to go wrong.”

The Secret History of the World

Robert Moss writes:

“The projection of consciousness by remote viewing or travelling clairvoyance has been central to the history of warfare. Celebrated military commanders have been credited with highly developed abilities to travel beyond the body. Alexander the Great is said to have gone beyond his body to achieve a god’s eye view of three of his battles. Napoleon reputedly watched the Battle of Austerlitz from behind a hill that screened it from physical sight.”

Dreamgates: Exploring the Worlds of Soul, Imagination, and Life Beyond Death

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From http://www.hinduwisdom.info/articles_hinduism/73.htm

For over 2,300 years, travellers from the most powerful countries on earth have come to India in search of her priceless spiritual wisdom. When Alexander the Great returned to Persia after his unsuccessful invasion of India, the most valued treasure that he brought back was not gold, jewels, silks or spices - but his guru (spiritual teacher), the yogi Kalyana, callled "Kalanos" by the Greeks.

On a designated day in Susa, Persia, the sage Kalanos gave up his aged body by entering a funeral pyre in view of the entire Macedonian army. The soldiers were amazed that the yogi had no fear of pain or death and never once moved from his position as he was being consumed by flames. Kalanos embraced many of his close companions before leaving for his cremation but refrained from bidding farewell to Alexander, to whom simply remarked:

“ I shall see you later in Babylon." Alexander died a year later - in Babylon. The Indian guru's prophecy was his way of saying that he would be with Alexander both in life and death.

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“Gilgamesh lives again in Alexander”



Gilgamesh – prototype of the epic hero

When Alexander was born the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus burnt to the ground which was seen
as a prophesy of the destruction of Asia. The philosopher Rudolph Steiner saw a deeper
significance in this event.

"And on the very same day when a man, merely in order that his name might go down to posterity, throws the burning brand into the sanctuary of Ephesus, there is born the man who has achieved more than all others for the culture of personality — and on the very soil where the culture of personality was meant to be overcome. Herostratus flings the burning torch on the day when Alexander the Great is born — the man who is all personality! Alexander the Great stands there as the shadow-image of Gilgamish. A profound truth lies behind this. In the Greco-Latin epoch, Alexander the Great stands there as the shadow image of Gilgamish, as a projection of the spiritual on to the physical plane."

http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19101227p01.html

Morris Jastrow writes:

Most curious as illustrating the continued popularity of the Gilgamesh story in the Orient is the incorporation of portions of the epic in the career of Alexander the Great. In Greek, Syriac, and Rabbinical writings, Alexander is depicted as wandering through a region of darkness and terror in search of the 'water of life.' He encounters strange beings, reaches the sea, but, like Gilgamesh, fails to secure immortality. Such were the profound changes wrought by Alexander's conquests that popular fancy, guided by a correct instinct of appreciation of his career, converted the historical Alexander into a legendary hero of vast dimensions.

The process that produced the Gilgamesh epic is repeated, only on a larger scale, in the case of Alexander. Not one country, but the entire ancient culture world - Babylonia, Persia, Egypt, Arabia, Judea, and Syria - combine to form the legendary Alexander. Each country contributes its share of popular legends, myths, and traditions. Babylonia offers as her tribute the exploits of Gilgamesh, which it transfers in part to Alexander. The national hero becomes the type of the 'great man,' and as with new conditions, a new favourite, representative of the new era, arises to take the place of an older one, the old is made to survive in the new. Gilgamesh lives again in Alexander, just as traits of the legendary Alexander pass down to subsequent heroes.

Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, Chapter XXIII.