  I always regard The Temple booklet as being like a taster menu in your favourite posh restaurant. You know that you generally like what they serve but each new supplement brings its own surprises. The helpings are small but introduce you to ideas that you might not have ordered yourself. Some of the servings are complete in their own right but others point the way to a "full-size" version with the taster letting you know what you can expect from the bigger dish.
Thus it is with Issue 11 of The Temple...(Click on "Read More" below to see the full review).
Sylvia Beamon piqued my interest in Royston Cave with an excellently well-balanced and yet still intriguing article about the Cave and its Templar history. Evelyn Lord briefly examines the connection between the Templars and the Cistercians in a similarly well-grounded article while Shawn Sinclair takes a more speculative - but equally fascinating - look at history by following the occurrences of high profile figures dying as a result of their eye being pierced. In the article Mr Sinclair doesn't spend much time delving back into myth but I was struck by the similarities to Balor of the Evil Eye - a story I know well from my childhood and having been to Tory Island a number of times. I was delighted to have Abdias of Babylon highlighted but dismayed not to have a full reference for the "Document 4".
Both Hugh Montgomery and Nicholas Mann/Phillippa Glasson had "taster" articles to herald the release of their new books ("The God Kings of England" and "The Star Temple of Avalon" respectively). Both books (and indeed the Temple booklets) are available from Temple Publications
However the article that gave me the biggest "tingle" was Forrest Lamb's "Perceval's Quest: Redeeming the Sacred Feminine" which was Part 2 of an article started in the previous issue of The Temple. Apart from being a "grail nut" and enjoying the textual analysis of the article thoroughly, as I was reading thearticle a TV biography of Emmylou Harris was playing in the background. I'm not a country fan but when they got to the section on her album "Wrecking Ball" and in particular the song "Deeper Well" I was struck by the lyrics "lookin' for water from a deeper well" which was a brilliant metaphor for looking for something more out of life and a particularly feminine one at that.
After I had finished the article I went to search on the internet for the full lyrics of the song (the programme had only played the first verse or two) and to my amazement the last verse contained the lyrics "Reachin' out a hand for a holier grail". In a matter of minutes, I had two links directly back to the subject matter of the article I had just been reading.
This is the sort of experience you can expect when dining at The Temple!
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