#priest for exorcism first wedding later

[harringroveera]

Billy: So you wanna marry me?

[lenavonschweetz]

Grace For Sale

Sam Winchester x Reader

Synopsis: Your town could definitely handle themselves, but a little help isn’t something you’d willingly turn down.  When the Winchesters show up - do things get better, or worse?

Warnings: language, anti-religious sentiments, slight religious inner conflict, angst? If you squint?, smut, Under 18 keep faaaar away.

A/N: Takes place during s5:e17 - 99 Problems.  So funny story, I actually AM a preacher’s kid so this episode kinda made me laugh then gave me the idea for this.  Title comes from The Devil’s Carnival.  Also, this has been sitting in my drafts for literal years, guess it’s about time I post it. As always, I don’t have a beta so please excuse any typos. I’ll fix any that are pointed out to me.

Enjoy!

Sam and Dean aren’t exactly sure what to make of your little town.

The welcome wagon was a little more off the wall than they were used to - what with a firetruck full of holy water, a portable exorcism, and a group of civilians that actually knew about the things that go bump in the night.  Still, it wasn’t…the strangest introduction they’d encountered.

“So, are we gonna talk about that?”  Sam asks as Dean steers impala into town - right on the tail of the Sacrament Lutheran Militia’s truck.  What kind of a name was that anyway?

A church looms overhead, answering Sam’s unspoken question, and he wishes he hadn’t even asked.

It’s definitely the apocalypse, what with the devil’s trap brandishing the walkway up to the church door.

Sam’s eyes are heavy - spending the wee hours of the night fighting hellspawn will do that to you.  Especially when you’re bleeding out.  At least the militia had some quick fix first aid handy.

The first thing the brothers notice upon entering the sacred building is the couples standing at the alter, all facing the priest who prattles on about finding something special amidst the impending doom.  The second thing they notice is all of the townsfolk holding shotguns.

Sam scoffs.

“A wedding?  Seriously?”  How in God’s name - no, y’know what, scratch that - how in the Hell were they hosting a wedding at a time like this?

“Yup.  We’ve had 8 so far this week.”  The man to his right, Paul, says and it’s obvious Sam isn’t the only one who’s less than impressed.  At least they’re in good company.

It’s definitely the first time the brothers can be completely transparent in their introductions.  Sure, sometimes they’re found out, or sometimes they’re among other hunters.  But to tell an entire town - and a priest, no less - that they are demon hunters?  Yeah, that may take a little getting used to.

So is the priest toting a gun and the children packing salt rounds in the basement of the church.  Dean makes a quip about running scared or sticking around and making a home out of the place and Sam thinks he’d be leaning toward the later if the end of the world wasn’t resting on their shoulders.

But none of that explained how a whole town had taken up hunting.

Well, until the mystery prophet is introduced in the form of the “Packing Preacher’s” daughter - Leah.

Well…he’d been through stranger.

Dean makes a pass at her - right in front of her father.  The father.  Sam just rolls his eyes, gaze landing on the corner where another figure lurks.

Oh.

This one…he thinks…this one is much more his speed.

“Ah, my other daughter.”  Pastor Gideon says, holding a hand out to beckon you forward.  Sam watches as you push off the wall and approach the group.  There’s little family resemblance, he notes, but definitely isn’t complaining.  While your sister is clad in muted colors, baggy sweater, and tennis shoes - you opt for something a little form-fitting under your dark leather jacket with the combat boots to match.  You scream ‘hunter’, ‘capable’, and ‘danger’ more than anyone else in this town and he has trouble tearing his eyes off of you.  Now, you’re not complaining.  In fact, your eyes linger on Sam just as much as he does on you.  And when he realizes this, the mountain of a man becomes a flustered mess.   It brings a smirk to your face and a blush to his.  “Y/N, this is Dean and Sam Winchester.”

“So I’ve heard.”  You chuckle, arms crossing in front of the very cleavage Sam’s staring at beneath your open flannel.  You cock a brow, baiting him, though he seems too nervous with your father present to answer the challenge.  “Shame Leah never mentioned you.  Though,”  you cast an appreciative glance over their strong frames and Sam very nearly shivers.  Beside him, Dean practically preens.  “I can see why.  If I knew fine specimens such as yourself were going to be crashing in our little town, I’d keep it to myself too.”

The Father is none too amused when you wink at your sister and the two of you share a giggle.  Again, Sam notes the distinct lack of resemblance but brushes it off.

“Y/N,”  Your father says in warning, which you completely ignore and grant the taller Winchester another ravenous once over before turning on your heel.  If anyone asked, you would deny that you were overemphasizing the swing of your hips.

“If you need me,”  you tell him without so much as a glance, calling over your shoulder as you saunter up the basement stairs.  “I’ll be at Paul’s!”

—————

The next time you see the brothers, it’s at the house Leah’s vision lead you to.  Well, actually, that’s a lie.  You saw them the night before at Paul’s bar, but they seemed to be wrapped up in a very important conversation - if the concentration on their brows had anything to say about it. 

Still, that hadn’t stopped you from ordering the brothers a couple of beers.  To his credit, Paul doesn’t judge you - which is a lot more than you can say for your family as of late - and even brought the boys their drinks so that you could do the ever so clique cheers across the bar.

Sam merely nodded in his head in thanks, raised his own beer with a silent ‘cheers’, then went back over to his brother.

So you couldn’t get a better read on them that night.  That’s ok.  It gave you the perfect opportunity to ogle to your heart’s content.

They were some fine specimens, that’s for sure.  The perfect hunters.  Sharp eyes, strong statures.  Hell, Sam looked like he could take out multiple demons all on his own - I mean, come on.  Those arms!

God, you had gotten such a perfect look at them while they brooded and planned what with the way Sam’s sleeves had been rolled and pushed up to his elbows.  Had you ever found forearms as attractive as you did at that moment?  Probably not.

And that jawline?  Christ, you could cut glass on that thing.

The sideburns may have been a little much, but hell, if that was all you could pin as off, you’d take it! 

Your ogling session had been cut short by the bell tolling - another of your sister’s visions - and after arguing with your father in front of the whole church that ‘yes, I am going with them’ - your hunting group was on the doorstep of the abandoned home.  Most of the townspeople are toting guns full of salt or sprayers of holy water, all armed with the ridiculous incantation your sister had told you to use to exorcise them.

But not Sam.  No, Sam was only wielding a knife, and God did he make it look easy.  If you weren’t too busy kicking ass and getting your ass kicked, you’d be drooling over that too.

Only when the dust settles do you take the opportunity to approach the brothers.

“You really are the hunters my sister made you out to be.”  Sam’s perfect eyebrow arches at that, gaze flickering to the way your chest rises and falls with your heavy panting.

“You didn’t think we would be?”  You mirror his smirk and shrug, ignoring the way Dean is eyeing the two of you like he knows exactly what’s going on in your head.  Honestly, he probably did.  Dude seemed about as horny as you did.

 “So,” Sam pants, following the group out of the house.  You miss the way he’s eyeing your ass as you’re just steps ahead of him.  “That’s what it’s like.”  There’s no shortage of sexual innuendo in his voice and you decide to poke the bear a little more.  Whether your father was in earshot or not.

“What what’s like?”  You’re turned to him now, handing in your pockets and treading carefully backward.  He meets your hungry look with one of his own and shivers absolutely rattle your body.  Again he smirks, making sure the coast is clear of your father before saddling up right next to you.

“Having back up.”  He all but whispers in your ear, large hand grazing just inches above your bottom and god, how did he make such an innocent statement sound so filthy.  There’s no way he misses the way you tremble and sigh, not with the way he smirks at you while walking away.

You’re not sure what’s going to kill you first.  The Demons or your insatiable need for Sam fucking Winchester.

—————

Neither.

Neither of those things is gonna kill you first.

Because it’ll be your father that kills you.

Because you’re going to fucking murder your sister.

After the Winchesters brought back a murdered Dylan…well, things were tense. People started to resent them and the warm welcome they had initially received turned cold. Only you and Paul would speak to them without adding to the guilt you knew they already felt.

You knew it wasn’t their fault.  Hell, half of you had been through it before - coming off a hunt all together too cocky and not aware of the demon that still lurked around until it was too late.  Dylan was a good hunter.  Dean and Sam were good hunters.  It had happened to the best of you.  And so you do what you always did - you held a funeral and vowed to be more vigilant next time.

But that wasn’t enough for the townspeople.

Or for your sister.

No, she had to go and suck the fun out of everything.

No drinking, no gambling, no pre-marital sex.

All per the angels’ command, of course.

“What a crock of shit.”  The empty glass thunks against the wood of the bar - as hollow as you feel right about now.  Paul only echoes your sentiments and pours you another glass.  The only thing that pulls you from your ire is the bell signifying a newcomer.  For the first time since Leah’s proclamation, your scowl softens as the person you wanted to see most walks right through that door.

“So, what happened to, uh,” he makes a grand gesture to the empty bar - earning a snort from the two of you,  “’the apocalypse is good for business’?”

“Yeah, right up until Leah’s angel pals banned the good stuff.”  Paul says, earning a groan from you as you pinch the bridge of your nose at your damn sister’s name.  “Y/N’s here helping me kill some inventory.”  Sam chuckles at the glass you raise, tipping it toward him and saying ‘I’m only doing the good work.’  “Want to help?”

With a drink in hand, Paul pours a shot for each of you.  He doesn’t hold back on his opinion of the ‘holy rollers’ nor their hypocrisy, to which Sam calls him out for his noticeable lack of faith.  Paul shrugs it off, defending his honorable lack of prayer.

“Look, there’s sure as hell demons.  and maybe there is a god, I don’t know.  Fine.  But I’m not a hypocrite.  I never prayed before and I ain’t starting now.  If I go to Hell, I’m going honest.  Besides,”  Paul nods to you just as you put your shot glass - empty again - back on the bar.  “I figure if this one can get away with it, so can I.”  Sam’s eyebrows raise at that, eyes finding you.

“You either?”

“I grew up in the church,” you explain.  “I’ve seen how the…holiest of us all can be far worse than the ‘hooligans’ of the world.”  You wink at Paul, air quotes bouncing as you mimic your father’s ‘preacher’ voice.  The two of you share a laugh and you miss how Sam’s fingers tighten around his glass along with his jaw at the intimacy you two seem to share.  “Yeah, I believe in some kind of higher power.”  You continue, focus shifting to the Adonis beside you.  He doesn’t miss the bitter tone your voice takes on. “But I don’t believe in the church.  The organized religion crap.  Never been too big on it.  But then, neither had Leah.  And now, out of nowhere, she’s some chosen prophet?”  You scoff.  “I dunno.  I just can’t trust it.  And like Paul said, I’m no hypocrite.  I know I’m messed up.  Won’t pretend otherwise.”

This time when you regard Paul, patting his hand as one would a brother, Sam’s shoulders relax.

“Yeah, I, uh…I know what you mean.”  A moment of heavy, thick silence passes between the two of you before you’re pressing him for his thoughts with nothing more than a look.  “I believe.”  But he doesn’t sound so sure.  More convincing himself than he is you, maybe, so you stay quiet and let him work through his thoughts.  “Yeah, I do.”  He says, more assured this time.  “I’m just pretty sure God stopped caring a long time ago.”

“Yeah, I can see that.”  A big sigh breaks from your chest, one of those sighs that comes when you feel like you’ve forgotten how to breathe, and suddenly this conversation is too heavy for how drunk you are not and for how drunk you want to be.

After a few moments, a morbid, hindsight joke blooms in your head and you can’t help but laugh, noting the questioning look on your drinking buddies’ faces.

“Guess those newlyweds knew something we didn’t.”  You chuckle, taking a pull of your drink.  “Tied the knot before Leah could restrict ‘em.  Betcha they’re bangin’ like rabbits right about now.”  The liquor burns, smothering your humorless chuckle as you knock it back.  “Lucky bastards.”  

Behind the bar Paul chuckles, noting the tension in the air, the sudden shift of mood, and takes his exit - mumbling something about grabbing more from the back. Neither you or Sam really hear him, though - too wrapped up in the other’s stare you share at what you’re implying.  

Helluva wingman, that Paul.

Once the two of you are alone, Sam swivels in his chair until his long legs drape open and you have to force yourself not to look down.  A bushy, perfectly masculine brow arches.  Then he speaks - voice low and sweet and pure sin.

“Really?  You, uh, don’t seem to have much issue with breaking the no-drinking rule.”  And it isn’t a question.  He flicks the back of his fingers against your glass, warm eyes staring right at you as the faint tinkling tickles your ears.  Your heart shutters in time with the tinkling of skin on glass and you don’t realize you’re chewing on your bottom lip until his eyes flicker to it.  “You gonna draw the line at pre-marital sex?”

“Now, Sam Winchester...who said I would do that?”  The look you fix him with has him adjusting his suddenly too-tight pants.

“Not afraid of being damned?  Of not being one of the ‘chosen’?”

“I’m no ‘chosen’.”  You scoff, bouncing air quotes once more.  “That’s my sister.  Me?  I’m just the poor little preacher’s kid who lost her faith a long time ago.”   It isn’t seductive talk - in fact, it’s dark as hell.  But he asked, and like you’d said before - you were no liar, and you were no hypocrite.  You turn to your companion, renewed .  “But you know…there is a curfew.”

The tonal shift isn’t subtle, but that doesn’t keep the space between you from growing ever smaller, Sam’s large hand sliding up your thigh and again you must fight off the urge to shiver.  Especially when he lowers his voice once more, those big hazel eyes glancing at you from under his full, coal black lashes.

“Is that so?”  A squeeze to your thigh, and you jolt just the tiniest bit, to Sam’s great amusement.

“My place is right around the corner.”  You explain with a shrug, that damn lip caught between your teeth again. And suddenly in the dark, empty bar, you don’t care if you are damning yourself to hell.  As long as it’s at the hands of Sam Winchester, you’ll go willingly.

—————

The wall of your entryway meets your back sharply, a hiss of pain escaping you momentarily before it’s silenced by Sam’s eager lips.

Hurried hands rid you of your clothes, his own falling like breadcrumbs alongside yours until the two of you are falling on to the bed.  Fingers skilled at far more than knife-wielding ghost up your thighs, featherlight touches leaving a fire under your skin.  He’s slow in his undoing of you.  Reverent even.  Watches the way you keen beneath him, begging for his fingers.  Holds your eyes as he drags those fingers through his lips before trailing the wet tips down your front. When he finally gives them to you, one long digit sliding right up to the knuckle, your teeth break the skin of your lip just enough to hurt and you’re gasping - begging for more - which he gives to you, gladly. Working you until you’re ready for him and at the precipice of falling over the edge.

He had looked good in his clothes, sure, but god damn he’s ten times more beautiful out of them.  Infinite smooth, golden skin lays beneath your greedy fingers, a dusting of fine hair contouring the plane of his chest and down below his waistband.  Your mouth waters and you tug impatiently at his jeans.

“Someone’s eager.”  He chuckles, low and husky, standing to drop both pants and boxers.  Oh.  Good God.

“Oh, you have no idea.”  You only break your eyes away to grab a condom before you shove him on his back and straddle those strong thighs.  "I've been wanting to get your clothes off since the second I laid eyes on you."

"Trust me," he breathes - no, borderline growls - and you shutter, walls fluttering at how fucking empty you are and just how fucking bad you need him inside of you right now.  "The feeling's mutual."

He’s big all over, just like you expected, and even rolling the latex over his thick shaft has you shivering in anticipation.  The action doesn’t go unnoticed by the gigantic man beneath you and before you can react, he’s rolling his hips with a moan that takes your breath away.  It takes immense focus to speak through your gasp.

“Don’t finish this before it’s even started, Winchester.”  He laughs at your warning, fingers digging into your thighs and ass.  Oh, this man is going to wreck you, you just know it.

“You have so little faith in me?”  A quip lies on your tongue, something about having no faith at all, but that melts into a strangled moan the second his fat head presses past your opening.  “Oh, Christ.”  He hisses, teeth clenched and head thrown back in unadulterated pleasure at the feel of you, your hips rolling slowly as you try your best to take the overwhelming size of him.  Your fingers digging into supple pecs does nothing to ebb the overwhelming feeling of Sam spearing you open.

“Leave him outta this.”  You quip, sinking down the rest of the way - finally.  You both shiver at the feeling of him fully seated in you before you start rocking against him.

Not much else is said - not much else needed to be said - as the two of you chase relief and distraction in each other.

The stretch burns in the best way and you realize you're going to be feeling this for days.  Every step, every shift is going to take you right back here - your hands splayed out on sculpted pecs, Sam's angelic and angular face contorted in ecstasy as he does his best to keep his eyes open and watch you ride him for everything he's worth.  Those big hazel eyes blink up at you, fluttering and rolling at a particularly deep stroke before they're suddenly open - fiery and determined.  There's no time to even tease or question before he's pistoning up into you, his marble body rubbing yours in such a way that has you gasping for air, his massive hands splayed over your ass to keep you exactly where he wants you. Sloppy thrusts turn to rocking hips and the new angle has your toes curling.

His cock grazes just the right spot with every rock of his hips, both of you whispering moans and groans of the other’s name.  You do your best to keep up, rolling your tired hips when you can, nails biting into his skin when you have to focus solely on not imploding right where you are.

Your orgasm crests, and you beg him to go faster - to take control - and he does, practically throwing you onto your back to angle you the exact way he wants to.  The height difference is dizzying - even with you on your back and him on his haunches - all you can see while he hammers into you is the brand on his chest.  You itch to bite into the ink, to make him mewl against your skin once more but all rational thought flies out the window when his thumb reaches between your splayed legs, presses in tight, dizzying circles, and sends you spiraling into oblivion as aftershock after aftershock rocks your nerves.

In the aftermath of it all - after you’ve seen white from the intense pleasure he milked out of you - you lie in a daze.  Memorizing the way his hands feel as he wipes some of his spend off your chest.  Jesus, the sounds that man had made when he came...you have half a mind to tie him down and never let him leave - your sister's 'orders' be damned.

“It’s past curfew, y'know?”  You remind him, fingers tracing the divots and curves of his abdomen.  God, he’s perfect.  You could spend hours memorizing every inch of skin.   Pity said skin disappears behind thick flannel once more.  You bite back a disappointed groan, casting your eyes over his massive stature.  You don't think you'll ever get over just how small he makes you feel - in the best possible way, of course.  Especially when he flashes that perfect fucking smile at you, dimples and all.

“Yeah?  What about it?”  He urges, a shit-eating grin playing at his lips as he dares you to ask him to stay.  You sit up on your knees then, leveling yourself with his chest and drag your fingers down once more.  "Something you want to say, Y/N?"  If possible, his grin grows wider when you crook an eyebrow at him, beckoning him to your level with a come hither finger to match.

“If you’re waiting for me to ask you to stay, Sam Winchester,"  you whisper, lips ghosting over his own and you take great pride in the way his sinfully long lashes flutter against the tops of his sharp cheeks.   "You can keep waiting.”  The low groan that escapes his throat when you cup him once more makes you ache in the absolute best way.  You're seconds away from throwing your pride to the wind and pulling him back into bed with you.  But this is the end of the world after all.  No doubt he has other pressing matters to attend to.

“Yeah, well, as much as I would love to…I should get back before Dean gets worried.”  Disappointment laces his words, but you’re both too grown-up for any fairytale crap.  Your life felt like more a horror lately than a fantasy, anyway.  So, with incredibly gentle fingers, he pulls your hand toward his lips, grazing them over your knuckles as his eyes bore into yours.  Hmm, he plays dirty.

“Yeah…my dad’s probably expecting me at the church.”  You offer lamely, though there's probably some truth to it.  Not one night goes by without a demon attack or a vision from the chosen sister.  You're surprised you haven't been interrupted by a frantic call from your father already, as a matter a fact.  He smiles at you again, your heart running rampant as he's tossing the towel down to wrap his arms around your waist once more.  The look in his eyes and the hardness pressing into your belly are tempting enough, but you manage to grit out a warning "Sam..."

“And here you are, sinning with the outsider.”  He rumbles, smirking as his eyes drink in your face for - most likely - the last time.  You return his smile, reeling him in for one last kiss...or twelve.

“Yeah, well, if I’m going to hell anyway, may as well make the road there fun.”

If only you knew the literal hell that awaited you in the next few hours…

FIN

[mask131]

Love in the French Middle Ages (2)

# The woman, in the vision of the courtly love, was a character of the divine, of the absolute and of the impossible (mostly because she was of a very high social rank, and was very often married - but we’ll come back to that later).

# The “power of words”, the “performative speech” was VERY important in the Middle Ages. Lots of people thought about, discussed and believed in the power of words during medieval times. The power of words was used and discussed in trial documents and in the domain of justice ; in occult treaties and the domain of magic ; in theological studies and manuals for clercs/clerics - in fact, one of the first thing you had to learn when becoming a cleric was how to read and write, it was needed to reach the first degrees of ordination... And there was no real wall or frontier between those various domains - justice, occultism, religion - since they tended to re-use the same theorical ideas or the same speech-techniques. 

# In the context of these Christian Middle Ages, the belief in the power of words came first and foremost from the Bible - which was THE book of reference during all of the Middle Ages. The Genesis in particular was used in this context, because it described how the world was created through words - God merely had to say things for them to appear. In the beginning of the Gospel of John, we find this power of words re-affirmed when John writes that “In the Beginning, was the Verb”. One has to remember that the medieval society was an ecclesial society, where the Church was intertwined with the economy, with politics and with the history of ideas - and given it believed in the power of words, this belief bled into these other domains. Theologians keep searching in the Bible to analyze every speech, every sentence, every word, trying to find holy meanings and secret messages in them ; and on the opposite way, the Church also catalogued and established “counter-forms” of performative word, counter-model, “corruptions” of words and speech - in the form of sinful things such as “lies” or “blasphemies”. In fact, in the 12th century, theologians gathered together these performative but toxic words in one group called in French “les péchés de la langue” - in English, “the sins of the speech” or “the sins of the tongue”. 

Through the words, we communicate with eac other. Through the words, we describe reality. But sometimes through words we do more than describe reality or talk to other - we can influence over people, or reshape reality. The most obvious belief tied to this was the belief in curses - a curse was before all a performative magical sentence. Exorcisms were practiced through speeches. And the Christian sacraments all relied on an effective, performative speech. Saint Augustin (or rather “saint Augustine” as you call him in English) did describe the sacramants by saying “The sacrament produces what it signifies/The sacrament creates what it says.” For example, when the priest holding the host says “This is my body”, these words actually transform the host into the body of the Christ. Other sacraments such as the baptism or the wedding also use very precise words and formula - and one can only be considered baptized or married once the priest pronounces a given sentence, not before. After this, there is a great debate as to whether the word alone has a power, and if it needs something else - and this debate already existed in the Middle Ages. For some it was the sentence, the formula, the speech that was powerful in itself, but others believed that intention or will was needed, else the words would be empty and meaningless. This was one of the questions people thought about in the Middle-Ages: are the sacred words of the sacraments powerful enough to apply to someone something they do not want or believe in, or are they powerless if the person that receives or pronounces them does so without any true will or desire behind it? Another example: one of the “sins of the tongue/sins of the speech” was the one called in Latin “turpiloquium”, literaly the “obscene or immodest speech” though it was often shortened as “turpitude” - and it was a sin that love stories in the Middle Ages were often accused of practicing. Because this sin relied on the belief that people, upon hearing obscenities, would become perverted. Remember that in the Middle Ages, the concept of “individual reading” basically did not exist. People never read silently, in their own head - people always read out loud their texts, often with other people listening - and for theologians, to read out loud obscenities or coarse language would perform the sin of “turpitude”

# During the 12th and 13th centuries, there was a tension, a rivalry, a conflict that appeared between two “axis”, two “types” of speech: the vertical speech and the horizontal speech. The vertical speech was the speech from human to God - and it was a form of speech that belonged to the clercs/clerics, to the upper-class. We talked about the divide between clercs/clerics and laics/lay people, secular people ; but the medieval society was also divided in three different classes, the bellatores (those that made war), the oratores (those that speak) and the laboratores (those that work). The oratores where the ones who had access to the vertical speech, those who were in contact with God. However, with the growth of cities and the economical development at the turn of those specific centuries, a new speech was born: the horizontal speech, born out of the social mutation, a speech from a person to another person, from one human to another human. It is this form of speech that ruled over economical, political and social interactions, and in the cities the horizontal speech started to gain more importance and more ground than the vertical speech. It was this new form of horizontal speech that annoyed deeply the theologians - and it was in reaction to that that they created the “sins of the tongue”, as a way to stigmatize all the words they deemed “bad”. By doing so, the theologians placed forward again the vertical speech, and highlighted the performative aspect of words. The most performative, effective and efficient of the horizontal speeches was the promise or the pledge - which was very powerful and very respected in the Middle Ages. The “vertical” equivalent of the promise or the pledge was the oath - which was another form of pledging, but this time taking God as your witness. 

# As a small note: while saint Augustin/Augustine was NOT a medieval man, he actually lived and wrote his sacred texts in the sixth century, he was actually one of the major sources and references of the courtly love. Saint Augustin was one of the big references and influence of medieval literature and thought, without himself being a medieval man. 

# There is a type of characters in French courtly love that is called the “losengier”  (losenger in English apparently?). Strictly speaking, the “losengier” was a name of Old French used to designate anyone that used the words badly or for evil purpose. The losengier was the flatterer who used false praise and false compliments to manipulate others, save himself or obtain what he wants, or it could be the trickster that lied and cheated through words. In the world of the literary courtly love, the “losengier” was a type of antagonist that used the words against the lovers - for example it could be someone that spoke ill of one of the lovers, spreading nasty rumors and causing fake scandals about them ; or it could be someone that learned of the lovers’ secret, and revealed it to another antagonist. 

# To return on the topic of oaths. Oaths were considered the “complementary” of the promise - the promise pledged a human in relationship to another human, while the oath pledged the human in relationship to both the one he made the oath to, and God, who was invoked as a witness of the pledge. “By God, I swear that...”. In the Middle Ages, oaths were a BIG deal - the oaths had a very important social and political role, because they actually tied the lord to his vassals, and so false oaths, wicked oaths, and oath-breakers were heavily punished. The oath was such a constricting system that it was one of the best “security measures” when you wanted to force someone to do something for you. And in the Middle Ages there were two types of oaths: the assertory oaths, and the promissory oaths (”serments assertoires” et “serments promissoires”). The assertory oaths were oaths about something in the past - one claimed that such a thing did happen, or did not happen, or happened in a certain way. For example “I swear that I did not kill this man”. The promissory oath, however, was about the future - “I swear that I will do this thing”, it was an oath in actions, it was commiting yourself to doing something. 

# In the secular medieval literature, when an animal was white, it was a proof to their fairy or supernatural nature. White horses, white deers were all thought to be either fairy animals or manifestation of the divine power - this is why unicorns were thought to be all white, no other color. Similarly, the forest was perceived in this literature as both the world of the adventure and the world of the magical encounter - the forest was the place of the wilderness, of the chaos and of the supernatural, opposed to the domesticated, tamed and civilized world inhabited by humans. I remember we studied one of the lais of Marie de France, and in it there was an animal that clearly was meant to be supernatural because it was a doe wearing deer antlers. Having a doe, a symbol of feminity, wear explicitely masculine and virile attributes (the deer antlers) created an androgyny - and all things androgyne are by nature supernatural, or rather outside of the given categories of the normal world. 

# Prophecies are another type of performative word, since they settle and shape the destiny or fate of a person by merely saying said fate out loud. In fact, the line between prophecies and curses was often quite blurry. 

# In medieval literature, the “wonder” or the “marvel” (anything supernatural) could have three different and distinct origins - the “holy” wonder, that was divine in nature and came from God, the “diabolic” wonder, the supernatural act or being coming from the devil, or the “magic” wonder, which was something tied to magic not part of the Christian duality between heaven or hell. While sometimes these divisions are clear cut, other times they can become quite confused - for example, to take back the lai we studied, where this androgynous doe-deer appeared and spoke to a knight with human speech, telling him a specific prophecy. The first clues point out to a “divine wonder”, because the animal is white and has deer antlers - the white deer, in medieval belief, was an agent of God, a carrier of God’s word or a manifestation of the divine in the woods. But the problem arose of the androgyny of the beast, which makes it distinct from the white deer, and the fact that this lai was not a sacred or clerical text, but a secular love story. So, the “wonder”, despite having clear “divine” tones and elements, has to belong either to the “diabolical” or the “magical” wonder. This confusion was usually done on purpose in these texts, because there was a whole “secular fantasy” genre that was building itself at the time, trying to create itself against the “Christian marvels” and “Christian fantasy” that characterized the clerical literature - and so the secular literature had to paradoxically re-use the topics and themes of the clerical literature to assert itself as its own thing. 

# A topic that pops up from time to time in courtly love is the ambivalence and ambiguity of the love experience in the life of people - as love is on one side negative, it is a process of trials and suffering and torments, and a hard and exhausting quest ; but on the other side it is also positive, because through love one always ends up finding what they are missing, a form of happiness and a form of divine in their life. Love is pain, but a pain that always brings something good in the end. 

# Love in courtly texts is also whining. A lot. Well I caricature here - but one of the typical ways of expressing love was through the lament or the complaint. People moaned about their trials, complained about their feelings, cried about their fate - it was part of the whole “love is pain” mindset I described above. 

# Courtly love was a form of “I’ll tug on the string for as long as I can” game, if I may. The whole idea of the courtly love was that the man had to declare his love for the woman, be clear and blunt about it, while the woman (well the lady, because it was always a lady) had to play the game of “Not yet, not now, I can’t just accept like that, let me wait, let me thing, go wait a bit” while also leaving hints and clues indicating that she was enclined to accept his proposition. For example, a typical case: a knight falls in love with a lady, and tells her very directly. The lady says she refuses his love, or at least begins her speech by refusing it, but then it devolves into “Leave me some times to think it over, leave me some times to settle on the question”. And all throughout this speech, she calls the knight “ami”. In modern French, “ami” means “friend” - and it is a very common mistake to read it as meaning “friend” in the medieval texts. But in Old French, the word “ami” actually meant what we call in modern French, “amant”, that is to say “lover”. So she refuses the knight’s love, while obviously calling him the one she loves. What many misread as “Let me wait a bit, my friend, to see if I can love you back” or actually “Let me wait a bit, my lover, to see if I can love you back”. Courtly love was technically a game of “hot and cold” on the part of the lady. Because the whole goal of the knight was to actually prove and show his feelings to the lady by convincing her of his good intentions and persuaded her of his true feelings. Even if the lady actually does love the knight before he declares her his love, it does not matter, she will still have to play the “hard to get” persona - BECAUSE the whole point of courtly love is that the knight must show he deserves the love of the woman, and there is this tacit rule that, even if love is present for the first day, the knight must undergo a pretended “winning” of the lady’s love and thus obtain it as a reward somehow, even when it is not actually a reward. It must look quite weird to a modern day reader, but think about it: imagine a lady that immediately agrees and shares the love of the knight that makes his advances on her. What would it look like in the world of courtly love? It wouldn’t look like “love at first sight” - on the contrary, it would mean that the lady’s affection and feelings are quite worthless, or at least not very strong, if she just throws herself at the first guy that tells her he loves her. It might seem harsh today, but in medieval times it was as it was: a woman who says “Yes” too fast or too easily to someone’s love could be suspected of being what we call as an insult today, “a whore”. A good love was a long-awaited, hardly won love. If a knight of courtly literature discovers he has no trials to undergo, no monster to slay, no jealous husband to keep away from or no tournament he must win - he will be VERY disappointed. 

# In courtly romance, you will often find promises and pledges - but promises that are not oaths. In secular texts, the name of God is not to be used in vain, and oaths are too sacred, heavy and constricting for the structure and aesthetic of the text. So whenever that is a promise of faithfulness, or fidelity or of true love, the courtly authors use another way to make the promise more ritualized, more sacralized or more binding: to the exchange of words and promises is added a literal physical exchange. It can be the exchange of rings, it can be an exchange of belts, it can be the making of a knot in one’s shirt that only the beloved can undo... This physical exchanges makes the promise much more potent and effective. Plus, on a literary side, it is the perfect ground for more twists, turns and trials in the great adventure - as much on the “marvelous/supernatural” side of the story that on the “courtly” one. For example, if we take the knot only the beloved can undo, it makes the story go into a “fairytale feeling” of the love of magic ; the exchange of belts or rings or whatever also allows the two lovers to recognize each other, even when they must keep their identities hidden or try not to reveal themselves to the other. Finally, on a more symbolic side, these elements tend to be used to prove the fidelity and chastity of the two lovers, who through this exchange destine their own bodies only for the other one, and shield themselves from other possible lovers (it is very telling in cases such as the belt, worn near the sexual body parts, or with the symbolism of the knot in the shirt nobody can untie). 

[lovedrunkheadcanons]

(Arranged Marriage Fic) Read on AO3 

Chapter Contents

SUMMARY: The year was 2014. With the marriage of Satoru Gojo and Hannah Thames made official, the first of its kind, a bridge had finally been established. Relations between the jujutsu and Western factions practically improved overnight, bringing hope that Ryomen Sukuna would be exorcized at long last, but things are never that simple.

There was nothing aesthetically remarkable about St. Ignatius.

In light of towering cathedrals and ornate basilicas, one could scarcely believe the rickety old cabin was a church at all. An assortment of Japanese maple and Miharu cherry blossoms protected the little church from being spotted. However, if concentrating hard enough, one could catch the glittering stained glass and smiling Madonna peaking through the tangled brush.

If Hannah had visited on any other occasion, she’d have found the little chapel charming. But alas, there was no charm strong enough to break her melancholy.

And this wasn't a happy occasion.

Examining her surroundings she realized the chapel's interior was as plain as its exterior. Stale incense, seeped into aged oak permeated the air. The small little stained glass windows filtered the morning sunlight in various hues of red, gold and green. Five rows of pews on each side guarded the center aisle. A baptismal font was stationed near the right of the altar. To the left, a lit red candle hovering over a tabernacle indicated that the church had regular parishioners, albeit very few.

Hannah wished a Curse would appear from thin air and swallow her whole. Anything but this.

She barely felt the floor as she moved towards the altar. Nervous butterflies pounded in the pit of her stomach with each passing step and the weight of the white chiffon felt enormously heavy. The lace veil obscuring her face and pinned hair, did nothing to invoke confidence. Though she couldn’t lift a hand to touch her cheeks, her skin felt unbearably hot and flushed. She wondered if she was sweating through the dress, the bouquet in her clammy grip visibly shaking. The sour taste of bile coated her throat.

She must have made a sorry sight.

A bride should exude the epitome of happiness on her wedding day. She should be woken up to the cliché of bubbling champagne, giggling bridesmaids, and her mother’s tears of joy as she placed a wedding veil in her daughter’s hair. Her father joining soon after.

If only she had parents to speak of. Not even her dear uncle chose to attend the wedding. Not that I'm surprised, Hannah thought bitterly.

All she had for “family” were the likes of Mother Superior, His Eminence, Cardinal Xavier Wrath, two sorcerers from The Association who she couldn’t identify because of their hoods, and a small group of Benedictine nuns in charge of singing a processional hymn.

Their glowering stares were directed solely at her. Resolute and unyielding, as if daring her to make the mistake of running away.

No use in trying. It was too late for that.

And before she knew it, she was greeted by a priest, dressed in his chasuble and stole. He offered her a sad smile. Pity lined his soft brown eyes. An indicator that, he too, wished for her circumstances to be different. If the bride were to guess, the humble Capuchin was probably “obliged” by The Association to preside over the union. Poor Fr. O'Malley had not been given the option to refuse such a request, whereupon he would swear denial for his involvement later. By all means necessary, this wedding was to be kept an absolute secret.

After all, it wasn’t everyday that The International Association of Exorcists and the Big Three Sorcerer Families of Japan could breathe in the same room. Much less, attend a wedding.

At this point, Hannah thought it appropriate to glance over her left, her hazel eyes spotting the many Japanese elders in attendance. Even through her veil, it appeared most of them were wrinkly old men, their formal hakama and haori made of fine silk. She recognized the Zen'in, Kamo, and even the Inumaki emblems, kamon as she learned they were called, pressed neatly just below the nape of their necks and sleeve caps. It was comical how distressed they all looked, having to participate in this strange Western wedding. No worries, though. Since there was no Mass, the ceremony would only take half an hour at most. They would be released from the awkwardness soon enough.

In an effort to appease both parties, there would be two marriage ceremonies; one Christian, the other Shinto. A naive observer might be believed into thinking this was a way to show respect, when in reality both parties were trying to claim superiority over the other. A dangerous game of “my culture is better than yours” and what not. The bride could feel the suffocating tension behind her. It was a miracle no punches had yet been thrown, or fighting words exchanged.

Which brought her back to the task at hand.

The young bride was trying everything in her power not to meet his gaze, eyeing the guests, or looking down at the floorboards. If the bride wanted to, she could reach out and touch him, but she didn’t dare.

Hannah knew she was shy, but when had she resorted to such childishness? She had already consented to the proposal months prior, dedicated hours to learning Japanese and practicing proper etiquette, and now she couldn’t muster the courage to look at him? She could already envision Mother Superior’s familiar scowl, shaking her head in disapproval for her incompetence. No, it was better to get this over with then prolong the inevitable.

Besides, didn’t she want to put a face to the name?

Closing her eyes, the woman quietly took a breath. Never had her heart hammered so violently in her chest. Her circulating blood was pounding in her ears, it was almost painful. She just wanted this ordeal to be over with.

Stop being such a baby, she mentally scolded herself. Look, dammit.

She slowly opened her eyes and tilted her head a fraction to the right.

The first thing she noticed were his hands, how enormous they were compared to her own, but more specifically the scars. The fleshy white blemishes covered almost every square inch of his knuckles. Most looked old, while others looked fairly recent, retaining a pinkish hue. She could also make out the tiny calluses blotching the tips of his fingers. He was strong, no doubt.

A sorcerer’s hands told many things. For one, Hannah knew it took many years of training and spell-casting to forge scars like these, meaning only the most powerful sorcerers possessed such features. Particularly, older sorcerers. Not young men. Hannah had recently turned twenty this past January. It was now April. Wasn’t he supposed to be a few years older than her?

The little bride swallowed, a slight tremor shook her chest. Dark thoughts flooded her head. There were countless horror stories about jujutsu sorcerers abusing their loved ones, being too powerful for anyone to stop them. Although these were likely fabricated rumors to uphold animosity amongst the East and West, Hannah couldn’t stop the grim imagery from invading her mind. What kind of power radiated from those hands? Would he hurt her?

The emblem, printed on the sleeve of his haori, was not lost on her either. She had memorized its features well; a three tiered pine tree in the middle of a circle. The clan soon to be her own.

"Gojo"

Her eyes continued to travel upward, straining to see a chin, but he was so damn tall. How troublesome, she thought. The woman had just about made it past his broad shoulders, caught a flash of white locks, when Fr. O'Malley cleared his throat. His voice serene.

"Hannah and Satoru,” he said, shifting his eyes right and left nervously. “Have you come here to enter into marriage without coercion, freely and wholeheartedly?"

At the sound of her name, Hannah eyes snapped back to look at the priest. He was addressing her now. The two of them. The silence was deafening. Though she knew what words to say next, her tongue felt as if it were made of lead. There was ringing in her ears and the young bride wasn’t sure whether she had spoken the next syllables at all.

“I-I have,” came her reply, but not before being accompanied with another.

The bride and groom would have to answer these questions in unison. He must have memorized what to say. Unsurprising, since she would have to do the same for the second ceremony.

"Are you prepared, as you follow the path of marriage, to love and honor each other for as long as you both shall live?”

“I am,” she replied, relieved that her voice hadn’t cracked. Their words synchronized again. This time, she could draw out the velvety baritone. It was decidedly masculine; seductive enough to coax anyone into doing his bidding, while striking fear in his enemies’ hearts. From the way he spoke, Hannah surmised his English would hold a slight lisp from long usage of Japanese.

"Are you prepared to accept children lovingly from God... ”

At the mention of children, Hannah no longer wished the priest to speak. Fr. O’Malley sounded as though he were talking through dense mud. His words began to sink in. Acceptance that the end was near and resistance was futile. In a few seconds, she would no longer be Hannah Thames.

She could almost laugh.

Caught in her sudden nihilism, she hadn’t felt the pair of callused hands sliding a gold ring onto her finger, or his simple reply of “I do.” She hadn’t realized that Fr. O’Malley began talking to her again, or that it was her turn to make vows. She had already tuned half of it out.

“…Do you promise to be faithful to him in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, to love him and to honor him all the days of your life?”

A tingling sensation prickled down her spine, leaving gooseflesh. Her mouth hung slightly agape, less her eyes deceive her.

At last, the young bride had compelled herself to look up.

The chapel.

The Association.

The elders.

Curses.

Magic.

Jujutsu.

Shame.

Guilt.

Fear.

The world faded away.

Because her hazel eyes currently beheld the most wondrous pair of turquoise blue. No ocean could comprehend their depths, as past, present, and future merged within his gaze. A cosmic force that defied the laws of nature. He was impeccably handsome with a long face, strong jaw, and hair white as freshly fallen snow.

Hannah was certain that no greater specimen existed in the known universe. She felt small under his imposing stare.

She slid the gold ring unto his finger.

“I do”

Thus, sealing her fate.

Gojo Satoru, her now husband, pierced directly into her soul.

And his furrowed brows and clenched jaw revealed his silent anger.

Chapter Contents

[vajranam]

Milarepa Biography

Milarepa (mi la ras pa) is one of the most famous individuals in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, but very little of his life is known with any historical certainty. Even the dates of his birth and death have been notoriously difficult to calculate. Tsangnyon Heruka (gtsang smyon heruka, 1452-1507) – Milarepa's most famous biographer – records that the boy was born in a water-dragon year (1052) and passed away in a wood-hare year (1135), dates also found in biographical works from a century earlier. Numerous other sources, including the important mid-fifteenth-century Religious History of Lhorong (lho rong chos 'byung) push back the dates one twelve-year cycle to 1040-1123, a life span widely accepted by modern scholars. A number of prominent Tibetan historians, including Katok Tsewang Norbu (kaH thog tshe dbang nor bu, 1698-1755), Situ Paṇchen Chokyi Jungne (si tu paN chen chos kyi 'byung gnas, 1700-1774), and Drakar Chokyi Wangchuk (brag dkar chos kyi dbang phyug, 1775-1837), however, place Milarepa's birth in 1028. Still other sources place his birth as early as 1026 or 1024. He is usually said to have lived until his eighty-forth year, although sources again record variant life spans of 73, 82, or 88 years. In any case, it is clear that he lived during the eleventh and early-twelfth centuries, at the advent of the latter dissemination (phyi dar) of Buddhism in Tibet.

According to Tsangnyon Heruka's account, Milarepa's ancestors were nomads of the Khyungpo (khyung po) clan from the northern region of the “central horn,” (dbus ru) one of two administrative regions of Tibet's central province (dbus). One early ancestor was a Nyingma tantric practitioner named Jose (jo sras). Khyung po Jose became famous for his exorcism rites, a practice that earned him both respect and a good deal of wealth. While residing in a place called Chungpachi (gcung pa spyi) in the region of Lato Jang (la stod byang), he had an encounter with a particularly fierce spirit and at last caused the demon to cry out in horror “mila, mila (mi la),” an admission of submission and defeat. Jose subsequently adopted this exclamation as a new clan title and his descendants came to be known by the name Mila.

Khyungpo Jose eventually married and had a son. This son in turn had two sons, the elder of whom was known as Mila Doton Sengge (mi la mdo ston seng ge). The latter's son was named Mila Dorje Sengge (mi la rdo rje seng ge). Dorje Sengge, who was fond of gambling, lost his family's home and wealth in a fateful game of dice. The family was thus forced to seek out a new life elsewhere and eventually resettled in the small village of Kyangatsa (skya rnga rtsa) in Mangyul Gungtang (mang yul gung thang), close to the modern border of Nepal. The father Doton Sengge served as a local village priest, performing various rituals and religious activities, while the son undertook trading trips in Tibet and to Nepal. In this way they were able to regain a good deal of wealth. Dorje Sengge married a local woman and had a son they named Mila Sherab Gyeltsen (shes rab rgyal mtshan); the latter in turn married a woman named Nyangtsa Kargyen (myang rtsa dkar rgyan). This couple then gave birth to the boy who would become Milarepa.

Upon hearing the news of his child's birth, Mila Sherab Gyeltsen is said to have exclaimed, “I am delighted to hear the news that the child has been born a son,” and so the boy was named Topaga, literally “delightful to hear.” He later proved to have a pleasing voice and so lived up to this name. Several years later, his sister Peta Gonkyi was born and eventually Milarepa was betrothed to a local village girl named Dzese.

Courtesy of David Nalin. Used by permission.

When the boy turned seven, his father was stricken with a fatal illness and prepared a final testament that entrusted his wife, children, and wealth to the care of Milarepa's paternal uncle and aunt, providing that Milarepa regain his patrimony once he reached adulthood. The uncle and aunt, usually depicted as greedy and cold-hearted, responded by taking the estate for themselves, thus casting Milarepa's family into a life of abject poverty. In at least one version of the life story, by the fourteenth-century author Yungton Zhije Ripa (g.yung ston zhi byed ri pa), the relatives' actions are partially justified, noting that local marriage customs dictated that following Sherab Gyeltsen's death, the estate should have rightfully remained within the family of his brother, i.e. Milarepa's paternal uncle. In any case, the boy was sent to study reading and writing with a Nyingma master while his mother and sister were forced to labor as servants for their uncle and aunt.

Nyangtsa Kargyen then sent her son to train in black magic in order to seek revenge upon their relatives. Carrying out his mother's wishes, he trained in black magic with Nubchung Yonten Gyatso (gnubs chung yon tan rgya mtsho) and thereby murdered thirty-five people attending a wedding feast at his aunt and uncle's house. From Yungton Trogyal (g.yung ston khro rgyal) he then learned the art of casting hailstorms. Unleashing a powerful storm across his homeland, he destroyed the village's barley crops just as they were about to be reaped, washing away much of the surrounding countryside.

Milarepa eventually came to regret his terrible crimes and in order to expiate their karmic effects he set out to train with a Buddhist master. He first studied Dzogchen (rdzogs chen) with Rangton Lhaga (rang ston lha dga') in Nyangto Rinang (myang stod ri nang). His practice, however, proved ineffective, and Rangton instead directed Milarepa to seek out Marpa Chokyi Lodro (mar pa chos kyi blo gros, 1002/1012-1097), the great translator residing in Lhodrak (lho brag) in southern Tibet.

Milarepa eventually reached Lhodrak where he met a heavyset plowman standing in his field. In reality, this was Marpa who had had a vision that Milarepa would become his foremost disciple. He had thus devised a way to greet his future student in disguise. Marpa was famous for his fierce temper and did not immediately teach Milarepa. Instead, he subjected his new disciple to a stream of verbal and physical abuse, forcing Milarepa to endure a series of ordeals, including a trial of constructing a series of four immense stone towers. Marpa eventually revealed that Milarepa had been prophesied by his own guru, the Indian master Nāropa. He further explained that the trials were actually a means of purifying the sins he had committed earlier in his life. The tower still stands at the center of Sekhar Gutok Monastery.

Marpa first imparted the lay and bodhisattva vows, granting Milarepa the name Dorje Gyeltsen (rdo rje rgyal mtshan). Milarepa then received numerous tantric instructions that Marpa had received in India, especially those of tummo (gtum mo), or yogic heat, the aural instructions (snyan rgyud) of tantric practice, and instructions Mahāmudrā. Marpa conferred upon Milarepa the secret initiation name Zhepa Dorje (bzhad pa rdo rje) and commanded him to spend the rest of his life meditating in solitary mountain retreats.

Milarepa returned to his homeland for a brief period and then retired to a series of retreats nearby. Most famous among these is Drakar Taso (brag dkar rta so) where he remained for many years in arduous meditation. With nothing but wild nettles to eat, his body grew weak and his flesh turned pale green. He later traveled widely across the Himalayan borderlands of southern Tibet and northern Nepal, and dozens of locations associated with his life have become important pilgrimage sites and retreat centers. In his account of the life story, Tsangnyon Heruka drew largely upon earlier sources in order to document dozens such locations, but he reorganized them to create a new map of sacred sites—many of which were designated “fortresses” of meditation—along Tibet's southern border:  six well-known outer fortresses, six unknown inner fortresses, and six secret fortresses, together with numerous other caves. Stories of Milarepa's taming and converting demons in these locations, recorded in Tsangnyon Heruka's companion volume The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa (mi la ras pa'i mgur 'bum) echo accounts of the eight-century Indian master Padmasambhava. Many of Milarepa's most famous retreat locations were said to have been previously inhabited by Padmasambhava himself. Tsangnyon Heruka's reckoning of Milarepa's meditation sites therefore reveals a process of spiritual re-colonization, one that effectively claimed much of the Himalayan border for Milarepa's lineage. Three famous sacred sites of southern and western Tibet – Tsāri (tsA ri), Labchi (la phyi), and Kailāsa (ti se) – are said to have been established or prophesied by Milarepa, and all three later became important Kagyu retreat and pilgrimage centers, identified as Himālaya/Himavat, Godāvarī, and Cāritra/Devīkoṭa from the list of twenty-four pīṭhas of the Cakrasaṃvara Tantra, as well as the maṇḍalas of Cakrasaṃvara's body, speech, and mind. Drakar Taso became in important monastic institution and printing house under the direction of Tsangnyon Heruka's disciple Lhatsun Rinchen Namgyel (lha btsun rin chen rnam rgyal, 1473-1557).

Courtesy of Michael and Beata McCormack. Used by permission.

Milarepa spent the rest of his adult life practicing meditation in seclusion and teaching groups of disciples mainly through spontaneous songs of realization (mgur). One of the first of Milarepa's songs recorded inTsangnyon Heruka's takes place after returning to his homeland for the first time and poignantly marks his decision to take up a life of solitary meditation

[eternal-echoes]

Catechism of the Catholic Church

The mystagogy of the celebration

1234 The meaning and grace of the sacrament of Baptism are clearly seen in the rites of its celebration. By following the gestures and words of this celebration with attentive participation, the faithful are initiated into the riches this sacrament signifies and actually brings about in each newly baptized person.

1235 The sign of the cross, on the threshold of the celebration, marks with the imprint of Christ the one who is going to belong to him and signifies the grace of the redemption Christ won for us by his cross.

1236 The proclamation of the Word of God enlightens the candidates and the assembly with the revealed truth and elicits the response of faith, which is inseparable from Baptism. Indeed Baptism is "the sacrament of faith" in a particular way, since it is the sacramental entry into the life of faith.

1237 Since Baptism signifies liberation from sin and from its instigator the devil, one or more exorcisms are pronounced over the candidate. the celebrant then anoints him with the oil of catechumens, or lays his hands on him, and he explicitly renounces Satan. Thus prepared, he is able to confess the faith of the Church, to which he will be "entrusted" by Baptism.39

1238 The baptismal water is consecrated by a prayer of epiclesis (either at this moment or at the Easter Vigil). the Church asks God that through his Son the power of the Holy Spirit may be sent upon the water, so that those who will be baptized in it may be "born of water and the Spirit."40

1239 The essential rite of the sacrament follows: Baptism properly speaking. It signifies and actually brings about death to sin and entry into the life of the Most Holy Trinity through configuration to the Paschal mystery of Christ. Baptism is performed in the most expressive way by triple immersion in the baptismal water. However, from ancient times it has also been able to be conferred by pouring the water three times over the candidate's head.

1240 In the Latin Church this triple infusion is accompanied by the minister's words: "N., I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." In the Eastern liturgies the catechumen turns toward the East and the priest says: "The servant of God, N., is baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." At the invocation of each person of the Most Holy Trinity, the priest immerses the candidate in the water and raises him up again.

1241 The anointing with sacred chrism, perfumed oil consecrated by the bishop, signifies the gift of the Holy Spirit to the newly baptized, who has become a Christian, that is, one "anointed" by the Holy Spirit, incorporated into Christ who is anointed priest, prophet, and king.41

1242 In the liturgy of the Eastern Churches, the post-baptismal anointing is the sacrament of Chrismation (Confirmation). In the Roman liturgy the post-baptismal anointing announces a second anointing with sacred chrism to be conferred later by the bishop Confirmation, which will as it were "confirm" and complete the baptismal anointing.

1243 The white garment symbolizes that the person baptized has "put on Christ,"42 has risen with Christ. the candle, lit from the Easter candle, signifies that Christ has enlightened the neophyte. In him the baptized are "the light of the world."43 The newly baptized is now, in the only Son, a child of God entitled to say the prayer of the children of God: "Our Father."

1244 First Holy Communion. Having become a child of God clothed with the wedding garment, the neophyte is admitted "to the marriage supper of the Lamb"44 and receives the food of the new life, the body and blood of Christ. the Eastern Churches maintain a lively awareness of the unity of Christian initiation by giving Holy Communion to all the newly baptized and confirmed, even little children, recalling the Lord's words: "Let the children come to me, do not hinder them."45 The Latin Church, which reserves admission to Holy Communion to those who have attained the age of reason, expresses the orientation of Baptism to the Eucharist by having the newly baptized child brought to the altar for the praying of the Our Father.

1245 The solemn blessing concludes the celebration of Baptism. At the Baptism of newborns the blessing of the mother occupies a special place.

[the-cookie-of-doom]

Just for fun, I decided to add a table of contents now that I have everything fully copied over, and. Dude. My ToC alone is 7 pages

I’ll post it below the cut to give you guys a lil sneak peak about what’s to come ;)

January 2019

Strings of Fate 9

Crimson Peak AU 21

Southern Gothic AU 21

ABO Angst (First Fic) 32

Genie/Demon Slave AU 40

Maker AU 40

Construction AU 41

A/B/O & Teen Parents 42

Nude Modeling/College AU 44

Vampire Academy AU 45

Gym AU W/Emily 47

Mitch/Peter Canon Meta 57

Panther AU 59

Stiles/Mitch/Peter Void AU 69

Drifter/Amnesia AU 70

Point Break AU 71

A/B/O Spy AU 72

Single Dad AU W/Amelia 74

Siren Highschool AU 77

Werewolf AU (Mitch Goes Missing) 79

Mob/Panther AU (Peter/Mitch) 81

Criminal Minds AU 83

February 2019 83

Reincarnation AU (Stiles/Peter/Mitch) 83

Exorcism AU 85

Dorian Gray AU 87

Mini AUs (Mitch/Derek) 91

Priest AU (Steter) 93

Siren/Selkie AU 95

Angsty Band AU 96

Babysitter AU 97

Stiles Gets Sick 98

Runaway AU 99

Teen Angst 102

Undead Mitch (Mitch/Peter) 132

Southern Transfer Student AU 133

Professor/Stripper AU 134

Eichen House AU 136

Psychic Mitch AU (Mitch/Peter) 137

ABO Escort AU 138

Faerie Ring AU 140

(Lame) Bartender AU 140

Prohibition AU 141

Time Travel AU 141

Umbrella Academy AU 142

Stripper/Hitman/Runaway AU (Katrina/Mitch/Stiles) 142

Online Relationship AU 145

Mitch/Nogitsune/Stiles AU 145

John Wick AU 148

March 2019 148

Pornstar AU 148

Drifter AU 149

Drifter/Hooker AU (Sterek) 149

Hometown AU 150

Void Stiles AU (Steter) 151

Post-Nogitsune Body Horror AU 152

Country AU 153

Diego/Klaus Meta?? 156

Mitch/Chris Casual Sex AU (Ft. Interdimensional Travel) 158

Equilibrium 158

Survivor’s Guilt 159

Summer Roadtrip AU (Stetopher, Mitch/Katrina) 169

Massage AU 170

Conspiracy Theory AU 173

That Time They (Almost) Fucked* 176 *note for readers, it’s part of the Conspiracy AU

Stardust AU 178

Mitch/John AU 179

1500s(?) AU 181

Mitch Raised Little Brother Stiles (Platonic) 182

Snowed In AU 182

Camboy AU 183

Opposite Time Travel AU 183

Family Fight (Mitch/Peter) 185

Mitch/Void AU 188

Fantasy AU w/Dragons 194

House AU (S. 6 Ep. 4) 195

House AU 2.0 Single Dad w/Sick Daughter 197

Chronicles of Nick AU 198

Game Designer/YouTuber AU 202

April 2019 202

Peter’s Anchor AU 202

Hunter Mitch AU (Mitch/Peter) 203

Eichen AU (Mitch/Peter) 209

Teen Angst But WORSE 210

MMA/UFC AU 214

Restaurant AU 215

House AU 3.0 Stiles Gets Sick 216

Neighbors AU 217

Supernatural AU 219

Magic Mike AU 220

Hunter AU (Mitch/Peter) 221

Misc. AUs 222

- Elemental AU 225

- Angel/Demon AU 225

- Doppelganger AU 225

- Sordid Catholic Happenings AU 226

- Stoner AU 226

- Yogi/Body Builder(?) AU 226

- “I don’t love you” AU 227

- Avian AU 227

- Supernatural Detectives AU 227

- Mini Cyberpunk AU 228

- Domesticated Crptid 229

- Katrina Tops AU 229

- Mitch Being Abused (& Adopted by Hurley) 229

Death AU 230

ReplicantCloud Atlas AU 231

Serial Killer/Psychologist AU 233

DID/Nogitsune AU 234

Chambers AU 236

May 2019 246

Parole AU 246

Talia Takes Peter’s Memories (Meta) 247

Forced to Mate AU 247

What You Sow (ABO) 248

Service Dog AU (Peter/Mitch) 249

Victorian ABO AU 251

Beyond Reasonable Doubt 253

Accidental Puppy Acquisition 254

Mitch/John AU 257

Night Angel AU 257

Trafficking AU 258

Demon/Witch AU (Mitch/Katrina & Stitch) 259

Post-Apoc (Original) 259

Speech Counselor AU (Mitch/Peter) 261

Medieval Cult ABO 262

HS/College AU (Spin the Bottle) 265

Single Dad w/Bailey 266

June 2019 

Roadtrip AU 272

Werewolf War AU (Mitch/Laura, Stiles/Derek) 273

Lake Siren/Monster AU (Original) 275

Neighbors AU (Mitch/Stiles, Allison/Scott) 275

Stardust AU 276

Cyberpunk Post-Apoc AU 277

Highschool ABO 278

Priest/Sinner AU 279

Crossdressing/Historical Convention AU 282

Love Sacrificed AU (Mitch/Stiles/Peter) 284

Fake Dating AU 285

Devil AU 285

YouTuber AU 286

Vintage Porn AU 289

Prohibition Porn AU 289

WW1 Prostitute AU 290

Artillery 290

Stiles Kills Someone 297

Morning After AU 298

Captured By Hunters AU (Mitch/Peter) 299

July 2019 299

Necromancer AU (Stiles/Peter) 299

Rape Recovery (Mitch/Peter) 301

Vampire AU 303

Altar Boy/Sinner AU 304

Emissary Mitch AU 306

Agent Provocateur (Original) 308

Post-Nogitsune Wandering 308

Hippie/Punk AU 309

Mom’s Roadtrip Horror Stories 311

Renaissance AU (Stiles/Peter) 312

Harem AU (Mitch/Peter/Stiles) 312

The Hobbit AU 315

Buzzfeed Unsolved AU 318

Ice Skating AU 319

Non-Serious BDSM 320

August 2019 321

Dad Fic/Child Abuse* (Mitch/Peter) 321 *note for readers, Mitch and Peter aren’t the ones doing the abuse, they adopt the kid being abused and kill their dad. 

Unstable (Stiles/Derek, Mitch/Peter) 328

Christmas AU 334

Hunted 338

GoT Inspired/Birthday Fic 340

AHS: Coven AU 342

Stiles Kills Donovan 346

Stranger Things AU 349

Allison Angst (Wings of a Butterfly) 352

God/Mortal AU (w/Reincarnation) 353

Crimson Kiss 355

Mitch Saves Peter (Unrequited Love, Peter/Stiles) 356

Jigsaw AU 358

Kid Fic (Inspired by that one PtV Song??) 359

Blood Drive 360

Summer Camp AU 361

Succubus/Cupid AU 364

Human/Sex Demon AU 365

Rescue Me (Mitch Saves Stiles from Rogue Werewolves) 366

September 2019 367

AHS: Murder House AU (Mitch Sees Dead People) 367

Disney Cast Members AU 368

Winter Soldier AU 368

Definitely Not Haunted 369

Elemental AU (inspired by a Steter fic) 369

Fever Dream 370

Halloween Pumpkin Carving (Mitch/Peter) 373

Mitch Raises Cora 373

Naughty Bits 386

Dad Mitch (Not sure which au??) 396

Kill Shot/Strip Club AU 396

Sims AU 397

Mercy 404

Ghosts Katrina & Mitch 410

Musician/Long Distance AU 413

AA Girls/Lydia 416

Marionette Meta (GoT) 417

Cold War AU 419

Unicorn AU 419

Mitch Sleeps With An Informant (Jack Ryan-esque) 420

Vampire AU (Museum Edition) 422

Snowed In AU 423

Medieval Tourney AU (Peter/Chris) 423

October 2019 429

Crown Prince AU (Mitch/Peter) 429

Peter Has A Kink For Being Picked Up 431

Creepy Boarding School AU 431

Damaged Bois 435

Dracula AU (Mitch/Katrina/Stiles) 436

The Last Time 437

Worst Fears AU (Stiles/Peter, inspired by Jae/Allistair) 440

November 2019 444

Eichen House (Political Prisoner Mitch) 444

Dragon AU 444

Transfer Student Mitch Usurps Jackson 446

Locker Room Slut Stiles 447

Petopher AU 447

Rebound 448

Princess and the Pauper AU 467

Rival College Sports Teams AU 481

Teen Dad/Lawyer AU (Mitch/Peter) 482

Childhood Best Friends AU 487

Culinary AU 489

Rival/Married Teachers AU 490

Angel/Demon AU 491

December 2019 492

Christmas Fake Dating/Wedding AU 492

Vikings AU 495

Artist/Muse AU 498

CIA Escort Agency 498

Mitch Can’t Die 499

Hooker Mitch/Act of Treason (?) 500

Long Live the King 500

Mitch Gets Wrecked (Triathlon Aftermath) 504

The Mirror’s Curse (Original) 504

Angel/Reaper AU 505

January 2020 508

Bystander Effect 508

Melting Point 509

Vampire AU "I'll bet you're hungry." 512

Vampire AU - Katrina Turns Mitch 514

Witch/Incubus Bookshop & Sanctuary AU 517

Cottagecore Wish Fulfillment (Fae Stiles) 518

Ace Mitch 520

Monster Menagerie 521

Vampire Venom Black Market 523

Florist/Tattoo Artist 524

Gentle Angst AUs 524

Counselor/Praise Kink 526

Hanahaki AU 527

There is something bitterly funny about the last idea I told my ex about, being a Hanahaki AU, only for her to break up with me a month later bc I’m aromantic...

When I realized that last night while looking at this, it really made me see hanahaki AUs in a different light lmao. Maybe there’s a reason they’ve always been one of my favorite.

If there’s an AU that sparked your interest, feel free to ask me about it! I love talking about my fics : 3

[kamimuse]

Seeking answers

Hisao had been in the trade capital for three days now, hunting for answers. Thankfully he hadn’t been alone in his search. Neugdae, who had disappeared months ago had returned just before the priest had left Eorzea for the east. He’d been against bringing the younger man along on his trip, but the young assassin wouldn’t be denied, and had decided to stow away on the ship regardless of the hingan’s protests. When Neugdae was revealed to have followed him all the way to the foreign trade country, the priest eventually gave in and allowed the miqo’te to assist in his search. He had help and he wasn’t going to refuse it this time.

His efforts in Thavnair had not entirely proven fruitless, but the options he’d found to break this blood bond with the others were less than ideal. There had to be something else, something more ceremonial, maybe a bind breaking ritual. His last night in the Shroud before leaving had left the man unable to breathe. He hated this. This had been why he stayed away from people. This had been why he shut himself away from the world. It had been almost two decades since he had felt this much pain and fear. He couldn’t concentrate on his work, and he certainly didn’t want to risk the lives of others when he still had so much left to do. The hearing gift the Raen had was only a small part of the problem, but it certainly added to a growing pile of concerns. Thankfully it made for the best excuse to see this new task done. He couldn’t have others distracted or worrying about him.

Scouring shops, libraries and temples for alternative answers to what he’d found had been in vain. Even his last-ditch effort to look for answers in Alchemy had given him nothing to work with. His former master, from whom he’d learned of blood magics, was gone. He’d seen to that personally. He didn’t dare seek out the guild of underground witches, not after what he had done. A short trip to his master’s former home had been unwise, but it was the only place he had left to search that may have answers. Walls along the outside of the burned down estate had given way to secret passages that lead to the underground study that had been left abandoned for years. Some flooding and mildew had claimed the floors of this hidden study, but most of the magical materials and tomes were still intact within. Among the many books the priest picked out to take home with him, it had been a short time of searching before the two had even found what Hisao had been looking for. If not for Neugdae he might have overlooked his master’s most precious Grimoire. It was only after that they had returned to the Inn to compile what they had found, Hisao spent hours pouring his focus over every tome until he’d opened the Grimoire only to find one of the two answers to his query.

There was no doubt someone had noticed his presence in the city when he and Neugdae had been scouring for answers. Not that anyone could do anything about it- he was already boarding a ship with his apprentice and headed for Kugane. He knew someone there who might be able to help at least, someone who specialized in magic involving bonds. He was at least grateful he had sent word to her before he left on his trip, on the off-chance it would come to this- and it had.

The trip to Kugane had not taken as long as the trip to Thavnair from Eorzea. Most of it had been spent sleeping. It had been some time since he’d been back to Hingashi for personal reasons as he usually only came passing through on business related affairs. While this was business related, he still felt it was a very personal affair. He had been in the city for all but maybe an hour, getting off the boat and making his way to the Hostelry for a bite to eat with Neugdae, then sending the younger man on some errands to fetch him some items off a shopping list he would need for the exorcism he would perform back in Eorzea when he eventually did return home. After he’d sent his apprentice off, he finally made his way to the Rakuza district.

Conveniently nestled near the end of the market and around the corner from Kugane’s courtesan district, a shop of interest caught the Raen’s eye.  A hole in the wall magical services shop. Dark double doors, one front window full of plants and what looked like statues of different eastern Deities- all of which looked either like goddesses or feminine depictions of different Kami and spirits. The signage outside of the shop advertised love potions, love spells, infatuation charms, glamour magic, and natural aphrodisiacs.

The priest stood outside the shop with a grim expression, and likely stood there for a minute or two before finally finding the mental strength he would need to deal with what resided inside the snake oil shop.

Stepping inside the small doorway, the priest found everything as he expected it would be. Shelves lined the walls with a variety of different home remedies, alchemical goods, ritual components and edible items such as supplements and the like- anything you could imagine a shop like this would have was readily available to the public for those who wished to enhance their vitality in the affairs of love making. Hell, there was even fertility tools for those wishing to start a new family. It was exactly the kind of business practices the priest refused to offer. The man would not have been here had he not been desperate.

Moving his way to the front counter, Hisao noticed no one was around even though the sign out front said it was open. Curiously the older man looked back to the entrance and saw the enchanted bell above the door had not been tripped. Walking back over to inspect the bell’s enchantment, he frowned when he realized it had been deactivated. Just as he was starting to suspect foul play, the sound of light thumping could be heard from the back room behind the counter. Thump. Thump. Thump. Heavy breathing between two parties and then a soft gasp.

The Raen’s eyes slipped shut as his irritation began to build upon realization of what he was hearing. Of course. He did not expect anything less. Striding back over to the front counter the Raen slammed his hand down on the service bell next to a little basket of “infatuation bath soaps”, to which he genuinely sneered at. The sound of brief hingan cursing was passed from a feminine voice, and soon there was shuffling of clothing and as though someone was hastily getting dressed. A moment later a young hingan man stepped out from behind the back room, passing through beaded curtains. He was hastily tying his Yukata closed and pulling his pants up and fastening a belt, his face bright from embarrassment and likely afterglow. He didn’t bother making eye contact with the priest standing at the counter, likely out of shame- Nope. He quickly made a quick escape through the front door as soon he could, but did not leave until after a young and pretty hingan Raen woman stepped out from behind the curtains, her own yukata tied loosely around the waist, slipping off to one side to bare a lovely pale shoulder. “I’ll see you next week.” The woman said with a playful wink, earning herself a bashful smile from the young man before he disappeared out the doors with a bounce to his step.

Hisao’s brows narrowed at the young woman as he inhaled a deep breath. Kami help him. He cleared his throat to get the woman’s attention, her pale sea foam green eyes eventually shifting over to the dark-haired au ra, a slender hand reaching up to comb through her own dyed purple and aqua colored hair. The woman flashed Hisao a wicked smile finally as she wiggled her painted nails at him, striding confidently around behind the counter as she leaned across it, pushing up on her tip toes to make herself a little taller as her tail playfully swayed behind her.

“Welcome home brother.” She teased. “It’s rare I see you coming into my shop. Are you here for a divination reading on your future love life? Maybe an infatuation incantation or a love potion by chance?”

“Yui, a pleasure as always.” He said flatly, turning and moving to the front of the shop and flipping the open sign to ‘closed’ and then promptly locked the door behind him, earning a slight annoyed scowl from the younger Raen.

She’d recognized this behavior and it meant he had to talk about something serious. He rarely came home for anything other than business, so that’s likely what it was related to. Deciding she would need to be buzzed for this, the woman reached under the counter to produce a pipe and some of her own personal moko stash and began working away at stuffing the pipe as she spoke towards her older brother.

“Pleasure? Yes, that’s what I specialize in, but I doubt that’s what you came here for. You must be working on some odd case to have come all the way here. I doubt this is family related- unless Setsuna sent for you.”

“What’s wrong with Setsuna?” He asked, casually striding over as they regarded one of their many siblings.

“Mm. She’s getting married next spring. She’s been in the market for a priest, and thought you should have the honor, but Yoko was against it.”

“Typical.” Hisao muttered quietly. “Unfortunately, I don’t do weddings- even for family.”

The priest crossed his arms over his chest, his gold eyes peering around the shop in thought, pondering how long had it been since he’d been here? Likely since it first opened some time ago, and the younger woman had owned the shop for many years now.

The small femme raen lit the end of her long-stemmed pipe and took a long drag from it. It was a pretty piece- ornamental dark hardwood, all hand carved with what looked like Kirin running across swirling clouds. Tapping her long purple nails across the end of the pipe in thought, she drew it away from her lips and exhaled a slow rolling stream of smoke from her dark purple painted lips. Her makeup was excessive but complementary to her waist length hair and pale gaze.

“Yes, I told her that.” Yui said, eyeing the older au ra a little scrutinizing now.

She could sense something was wrong with him. His aether felt… unnatural. Different somehow. She couldn’t put her finger on it. It was then she noticed the sleepless rings under his eyes and the fatigue that wore him down physically, despite the enhanced braces she knew he wore. Finally, she spit it out.

“Something happened. What did you do?” she asked quietly, her voice low but accusatory all the same.

Hisao’s turned his gaze back to the woman finally and gave her a quiet look.

Then he explained.

   Yui was quiet for several moments in near disbelief after her brother had regaled her with the details that had unfolded for him for the past week or so. She had always known and understood Hisao had practiced the more taboo in terms of his work, so the young woman wasn’t surprised by the priest’s sudden predicament. Setting her pipe down and beginning to pack it away, she started to chuckle.

“What did you think would happen?” She cast him a sly and arrogant look, her tone condescending as if she were scolding a child.

This earned her a frown from the older man as he inhaled a breath, trying to will himself not to be criticized by a lesser mage. He’d already been harassed by Belia about his magics. One woman belittling him was more than enough. Even then, she was probably right. He should have planned for these sorts of consequences- to be fair, he had expected something different. Just not this. Still he remained quiet and trained a focused eye on her as she continued to laugh in his face.

“There was no time, and no other options. I did what I had to.”

“You could have let them just die and be done with it. Wipe your hands clean of- “

“I didn’t ask for your opinion.”

The woman leveled a flat stare at their brother then gestured to the door. Amusement gone from her features as she snapped right back at him.

“If you didn’t come here for my opinion, then why are you here, Hisao?”

That seemed to shut him up. He was seething below the surface, but he did come here for her help after all. She was the only one of his sisters who still talked to him, and it was likely because they were both black sheep in a family of mages. Deviating from the family tradition of walking the path that was chosen for them, rather than what they had wanted. Hisao was still attempting to break from his path as a healer, but when it was your strongest gift, habits die hard. Inhaling another deep breath to settle his nerves, his gaze softened as he peered down at her in a pleading manner.

“I told you in my letter why I went to Thavnair. As you can expect, I could only find two methods for breaking a blood bond.” Hisao explained, his expression falling a little.

“I thought severing the aetheric connection would be enough, but it isn’t. I can either kill those I am bonded to, or I can have my memories of those bonded erased.” Clearly the priest didn’t like either of these options. They were drastic. All those late-night conversations and gentle bonding. Both he had grown incredibly close two.

“There has to be another way.” Hisao’s hope was hinging on his younger sister that she might know other options available to aid in the bond breaking.

The woman looked skeptically at the older man.

“Have you considered just- you know. Living with it? Maybe develop some real relationships? The Kami know you need something positive in your life. It’s not healthy spending your days alone in your garden.”

“I’m not going to subject myself to emotions that are not my own. Much less put anyone else through the same.” Hisao frowned at her. If he wanted to live with it, he wouldn’t have come to see her!

Seeing her older brother’s huffy expression, she rolled her eyes as she brainstormed for a moment. After a moment, she frowned, her long lashes fluttered as she turned to peer up at him with concern. She didn’t like what she was about to offer, but at least it didn’t suck half as bad as the other options he’d found in Thavnair.

“There is a few options. Though only one certain one I can think of off the top of my head that has a guaranteed success rate.” She said simply, drumming her nails on the countertop as she straightened up, pulling the shoulder of her Yukata up and over the bare skin, making herself a little more decent.

“I have a ritual I’ve performed for people who are heart broken. I’m sure it will work in a similar fashion to sever ties of empathy. It’s not irreversible, but it’s very difficult to undo once you’ve completed the ritual. It doesn’t cut the blood-bond to the other person, but it helps.”

Hisao waited with bated breath. Well? What was it? Could she even help? It certainly had to be better than a memory erasure or death. Two absolute extremes. A silence hung between them for several minutes and Hisao finally shrugged at her, upturning a hand as if silently asking her to continue. What was the hesitation?

Finally, she caved and sighed with a more worried look on her features than before.

“Hisao, this method completely cuts out all emotion from your being. This means you would feel nothing going forward. No joy, no anger, no humor, no love- nothing. You won’t feel pain, but you won’t feel relief either.” She explained slowly, her tone lowering as though she were trying to explain the consequences of the spell she was speaking of.

At first Hisao seemed very interested, his eyes widening some as he thought about what she was offering. Something that would remove all distraction from his life, something to let him -focus-. He was already a great mage as it was, but this would give him an advantage to become perhaps one of the most powerful. True it would strip away what made him a person, so it wasn’t ideal in that aspect, but it was better than some of the other alternatives. As he was about to say something, she cut him off, frowning as she recognized the look of contemplation in his gaze.

“Sure, you’ll function like anyone else, and through the bond you will recognize when someone else is experiencing emotions, but you won’t feel them. You won’t know how to process them- you won’t be able to. You’ll never feel fear, and you’ll never feel comfort. Think about this Hisao.” She warned.

The more she explained the more conflict he felt. If he went through with this, the bond wouldn’t be broken, but it would mean he would not endanger or subject himself to distraction for the others. It would stop any conflict in the future, and it would put the priest’s mind at ease. Yet to not feel the joy and love for the earth he so cherished. It was a cruel hand that fate had dealt him. As things stood, he could not continue on the same path. In only a few short days he had been undone. He would need to find another alternative soon if this wasn’t the answer either.

It was then that he closed his eyes, and he could see the empty darkness in his mind’s eye. Floating endlessly with nothing but silence and darkness that stretched on forever. Perhaps it had been a premonition not of just death of the physical body but the unavoidable silencing of his heart. Did he sacrifice his memories or his emotions? He smiled, perhaps a bit bitterly as he lowered his gaze. Dark magics always came with a price after all.

“…You can perform these rituals?”

“I can.”

“Come with me to Eorzea then.”

There was a silence that hung in the air after his request for her to join him back home and she had to consider his offer carefully. Yui didn’t want to be responsible for damaging her very own flesh and blood, but she didn’t want the older Raen to do something reckless either. Finally, she sighed at him and pushed herself away from the counter as she turned to head into the back room, casting a cool glance over her shoulder to the priest who was still reeling in thought.

“I’ll pack my things then.”

[rubyeyeproductions]

See Ya Around

Every Friday I go to the Starbucks near my office for lunch. I used to think the boy behind the counter was nice. He looks maybe 18, 20 at the most. Last time after getting my stuff, I said to him, “See ya around.” I thought it was a normal thing to say since I come in once a week, but he just stared at me, the ends of his lips slightly turned up into a smile, and said, “Okay.” I thought that was a strange response but who cares. I went back to work, and the rest of the day was fine.

But then I actually started to see him around. I didn’t think anything of it at first. I’d see him at the grocery store walking past the isle I was in or walking out of the bank as I’m walking in. Just silly stuff, like how you run into your neighbors or old friends. Who knows, I might’ve crossed paths with him many times before and just never noticed till now.

I only started to realize things were weird when I saw him while picking my girlfriend, Emily, up from work. She’s an elementary school teacher, so I was parked outside the school as all the kids were leaving and I saw him sitting on a bench maybe waiting to pick up a little brother or sister or something. He was looking my way, so I waved to him. He didn’t react. He just kept staring. And smiling?

It wasn’t quite a smile. The ends of his mouth were raised just slightly, almost like the beginning of smile that froze. I kept waiting for his smile to widen, but it only ever stayed halfcocked.

That’s when I noticed that he was still in his uniform. Same black hat with the logo, black shirt, and a green apron in the front. And he just stared. And smiled. At first it was funny. He felt very out of place in his uniform and he just sat so still, it looked silly. But then his friendly face started to look sinister. He didn’t change his smile or expression, it was just, the more I looked, the creepier his face became.

My girlfriend got in the car and asked me what I was looking at, so I pointed to the guy on the bench and asked her if she knew why he was there. She kept saying she couldn’t see anybody, but I thought that might’ve been because of all the kids walking out, but she finally said, “Honey, there is nobody sitting on the bench.” I turned to look at her and when I turned back, he was gone. She asked if I was okay and I just made up an excuse about a long day at work.

As the week went on it got really bad. I’d be driving down the street and see him on the side of the road. Not even 10 minutes later and he’d be on the side of the road again, a few miles down, waiting for me. He’d be on the bus next to my car, looking at me through the window. In store fronts where the mannequins are as I walk down the street. Everywhere.

At work, I sit right next to the vending machines and people often stop and talk next to them when getting something. I looked up and saw two of my coworkers talking as one of them got a snack and standing in between them was the Starbucks employee. He was still staring at me. My coworkers took no notice of him, but he was standing right in the middle of them. Not even six feet from me.

I understand this sounds funny, seeing an out of place Starbucks employee everywhere you go, but the humor starts to get lost pretty quick. I never felt alone. I always felt like I was being watched. Actually, it felt more like I was being observed, almost like some sort of experiment. One time I tried walking up to him, but when I got within arms-reach of him I blinked and he was gone. Whereever I go he’s just there. He’s never walking towards me, never says anything, I don’t even think he blinks. He is always just there!

Luckily Wednesdays are date night, so I was excited to go out with Emily and not think about it. But when we got to the restaurant and sat down, a few rows back and off to the side, was the same guy, just sitting alone, at a table. Staring. Emily must’ve noticed I was freaked out because she turned around and tried to see what I was looking at but didn’t notice anything. I tried to point him out but she saw nothing. She sked me if I was okay, but I just told her I was fine. She must’ve understood I didn’t want to talk about it and we moved on.

Yet he was always in the corner of my vision as I looked at her. I could feel his eyes on me.

When we left, I rushed us out of there as fast as I could. When Emily asked why I was rushing, I just said I wanted to take her to see a movie and I didn’t want to be late, she said it was sweet, but I could tell she didn’t entirely believe me. She seemed concerned.

At the theater we got our tickets and some food and the entire time I saw him in the lobby. No matter where I walked his body would just turn in my direction. He wouldn’t move, but his body would, almost like he was standing on a turntable or something. I could see Emily wanted to ask me if I was okay, but she never did.

Once in our seats and with the lights off I started to relax. There was no way to see him now and the movie should distract me. And it did. Until about halfway through I saw him in the background. Still in uniform. Still staring at me.

When the angle changed, he was still in the same position on the screen, just closer. And when it cut again, he was closer. Cut, closer. Cut, closer. Eventually he was in the center of the screen, taking up the whole frame. All he was did was stare. And I don’t mean, like, staring at the camera, but me. He was looking down at me, like he was 40 feet tall on the screen.

I couldn’t even hear the movie anymore. I just heard silence as I stared back up, too scared to move. Everyone in the theater laughed at a joke I couldn’t hear. But all I wanted to do was scream. Emily leaned over and asked what was wrong and I told her I felt sick and ran to the bathroom.

I went to the bathroom to try and clear my head. I could see his eyes staring at me through the crack in the stall. I charged out of it ready to swing, but he was gone, just fucking vanished. When I walked out of the bathroom Emily was waiting for me. She said she could tell I wasn’t okay we should probably leave. I said okay probably more enthusiastically then I should’ve but I couldn’t help it, he was in the poster on the wall behind her.

When I dropped her off at her place she said she was concerned. She said, “I don’t know what’s going on and I understand you don’t want to talk about it, but I’ll be here when you’re ready. Until then take care of yourself. Do whatever it is you gotta do to fix this and give me a call.” As she opened the door to her apartment, I saw him sitting on her couch.

That night I was on my phone before bed going through Instagram and I saw him in the back of the pictures people were posting. And just like at the theater, he was getting closer. I tried to swipe past them as fast as I can, but it really just turned the pictures into a flip-book-like animation of him approaching the screen. I kept scrolling, which kept the animation going. That’s when he waved.

I turned my phone off and tried to go to sleep, but I felt like I was just seeing him with my eyes closed as if he was painted on the inside of my eyelids. I didn’t get any sleep.

The next morning, I started to notice him in the photos in my apartment. Pictures of me and my girlfriend on our first date, my sister’s wedding, my family on vacation in Italy, he was always there with us. My sister even has her arm around him and his around her.

I saw him on the way to work. I saw him at work. I saw him on the way home from work. At one point I slammed on my brakes because I saw him in the rearview mirror in the back seat. When I looked up to drive, he was in front of my car. I just stared at him, but then I decided to take action. I floored the pedal and drove straight for him. My car went through him like he was mist. I sped all the way home.

I am terrified and don’t feel safe. He’s everywhere, all the time! Home, work, streets, mall, computer, phone, pictures. I feel like I’m losing my goddamn mind. I want to call a priest and get an exorcism. I want to get a witch to lift this fucking curse off me. I just want this to fucking end! This sounds funny, I know, but trust me, this is horrifying. This feels like I’m living out a joke that lost all its humor. I don’t want to live like this anymore and I just want to be left alone. I’d stay home, but he’s in the photos at my apartment, I’d take them down, but he’d be in my phone. I’d gouge out my eyes, but then he would probably be all I ever see for the rest of my life. He’s always there and I’m no longer ever alone.

I hate Starbucks.  

[shamankingasakuraworld]

Asanoha Douji

So, here history of family begins. I already made ( not so) small post about what i think her personality was. See https://shamankingasakuraworld.tumblr.com/tagged/asanoha-douji, only post there besides this one. Beware, there might be spoilers. 

Asanoha Douji. First known member of Asakura family, before that name existed. Formidable woman and excellent mother. Hailed as kitsune. Hated by her neighbors. Killed by dastardly priest. Mother of series’s main villain. One who arguably, saves the day in end with her slaps.

We don’t know much about her. We know that villagers with which she lived were all human, that they had her murdered, leaving her infant son alone. I learnt that according to one fanbook ( Mentalite, i think) Hao’s father was human and samurai, and that Hao never met him, and that Asanoha run away, fearing that she and Hao will be discriminated for their powers ( well, even more). Aside from that, we know nothing about her. So here are some theories and headcanons that I have formed.

Warning for long talk, pictures, many headcanons and mentions of discrimination, murder and family and relationship abuse. Because of all this, I’m putting post under read more.

We know that villagers saw Asanoha talking to herself ( in truth, conversing with ghosts and demons). This obviously led to her ostracization. Those who were superstitious would believe her to have supernatural powers ( which she kind of did) and those who didn’t believe in such things would see her as crazy.

As we see here ( images taken from tumbrl), Asanoha lived near forest, appearing to be isolated from other houses, though there was path presumably leading to village. It is likely that Asanoha choose to isolate herself and Hao ( then Asaha) to prevent frequency of attacks on them. This likely also inspired fear and loathing of people there, as Asanoha was brave enough to live so near forest, not afraid of wild animals or spirits, which would strengthen opinion that she was either mad or supernatural creature herself.

Ohachiyo reveals that stories of demon attacks are stories invented by humans, in order to justify things like plagues and wars, especially when it is human’s fault ( for example, throwing corpses in rivers). People who mostly suffered from this were shamans, who were either condoned for being in league with demons, or treated like demons themselves. While what Ohachiyo says isn’t completely true- as we have seen, oni can be pretty vicious- it is likely 90% true. So Asanoha likely became spacegoat for village’s troubles.

I would also say that there was more to ti then just talking to herself, however. She was, according to fanbook, outsider, somebody who came to village from who knows where and set up home for herself. Single mother,  with equally strange child, no husband in sight. I sincerely doubt that Asanoha just accepted treatment village gave her, that she cowered and showed fear. I think that somebody as strong-willed and self-sufficient as her would never do that ( though it remains possibility. people react to discrimination in different, often surprising ways). She likely back-talked to villagers and got in arguments, refusing to back down, very possibly slapping quite a few. She would across as haughty and violent, with surprising strength.  Given that she probably worked alone on fields, and either built her house or restored abandoned one, that would make her social pariah- no family, strange behavior, isolation from village, mysterious past.

Hera appearance could also put some oil on fire. Her blonde hair could have been seen as strange, maybe even unnatural, or proof of mixed heritage ( Shaman King has some rather outrageous hair colors that appear to be natural, but this is putting it in real life context). She is also portrayed with unusual eyes, amber or yellow,  which could have been quite intimidating and taken as proof that she is fox in disguise.

Asanoha, while not hating humans in slightest, was surely careful and maybe even scared when she had to deal with them, with good reason. She wanted to minimize harm that would come to her and Hao, and appears to have found it easier to converse with spirits, who understood what she was and didn’t mistreat her. Given that Hao actually believed that he was demon child till Ohachiyo revealed truth to him, it is possible that Asanoha too had some misgivings about her nature.

If Asanoha came from shaman family,I believe that they were known as tsukimo-tsuji. Clan whose ancestor became kitsune-tsukai, person capable of controlling kitsune because they somehow aided them ( most often by feeding them, helping with cubs or similar). Kitsune was heerditary, and such families became known as tsukimo-tsuji. They were severely discriminated against, particularly if family gained some wealth in short time.

Her family could have truly had contact with kitsune of legends. They could have simply been fox ghost who didn’t still evolve to such state. They could have had no contact at all, but because of their shamanic abilities and some state of circumstances, were believed to be using kitsune to carry out nefarious deeds. As such, samurai who had child with her would have been shunned as well, as his family would be believed to be tainted with black magic by contact with Asanoha.

Another possibility is that she was born in human family that didn’t support her, which could explain reluctance to confront humans and doubts about being demon. I read somewhere really interesting theories about their status ( mostly based on analysis of kimono and her hair, which sadly I’m not qualified to speak about, as I know next to nothing about fashion today, and fashion from thousand years even less), that mentioned possibility of them being nobles who gave Asanoha away for prostitution, due to her being unfit to wed because of her abilities. I think that, even if they weren’t nobles, it is possible they kicked her out, and she became either prostitute or servant in some household.

I have no idea what her relationship with samurai could have been. It may have been romance, tryst that resulted in child and nothing more, or maybe even abuse and rape. Whatever case, she found it necessary to run away.

I doubt her shamanic powers were strong. I believe she could talk with spirits and perform Hyoi Gattai at most. She could have had some minor exorcism knowledge and weak prophetic abilities. I don’t believe she was strong and skilled shaman, for all she was extremely strong individual.

We don’t know where Hao was when Asanoha was killed.Image shows him watching from fence, which would be near house and makes it likely for Densen Hoshi and villagers to catch him. Densen could have spared him, but I find it unlikely. His comment in Mappa Douji, howhe knew he should have killed Hao too, makes me think that Hao hid in house when they came with fire and, at Asanoha’s urging, escaped, or that he was outside at time, and run to forest, and Densen choose not to pursue him because it was too bothersome and because he thought Hao would die, either from starvation or killed by beasts

Asanoha could have heard plans of villagers, been told about them by spirits, or received a vision that led her to either hide Hao, send him away from house, or urge him to leave her behind.

What happened next is mystery. She could have departed for Great Spirits, where she later met Ohachiyo ( who confirms they were in same Soul Society). Why Hao couldn’t summon them is unexplained and plothole at worst. We know that he searched for them. Asanoha claims that they were with him, but he couldn’t see them because he was blinded by his negative feelings. Which also doesn’t really work ( we were never given indication that person’s emotional state affects their ability to perceive spirit world, but it is possible and fits with tone of series). However, it makes me think, why would everybody else be unable to see them? So I have two headcanons

First, Asanoha was metaphorical, and she was in afterlife, but watching over Hao. She may have been in some really faraway corner of afterlife, and hao never reached it due to his heart, and his emotions made him unable to summon them.

Second, just as he absorbed Ohachiyo ( which also needs explanation, as we have never before seen human, much less child, absorb spirit), young Hao by accident absorbed Asanoha’s soul. So she was whole time inside him, but his hatred, loneliness and sorrow blinded him.

[manjushriwisdom]

Milarepa

མི་ལ་རས་པ།

Milarepa

b.1040 - d.1123 Milarepa (mi la ras pa) is one of the most famous individuals in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, but very little of his life is known with any historical certainty. Even the dates of his birth and death have been notoriously difficult to calculate. Tsangnyon Heruka (gtsang smyon heruka, 1452-1507) – Milarepa's most famous biographer – records that the boy was born in a water-dragon year (1052) and passed away in a wood-hare year (1135), dates also found in biographical works from a century earlier. Numerous other sources, including the important mid-fifteenth-century Religious History of Lhorong (lho rong chos 'byung) push back the dates one twelve-year cycle to 1040-1123, a life span widely accepted by modern scholars. A number of prominent Tibetan historians, including Katok Tsewang Norbu (kaH thog tshe dbang nor bu, 1698-1755), Situ Paṇchen Chokyi Jungne (si tu paN chen chos kyi 'byung gnas, 1700-1774), and Drakar Chokyi Wangchuk (brag dkar chos kyi dbang phyug, 1775-1837), however, place Milarepa's birth in 1028. Still other sources place his birth as early as 1026 or 1024. He is usually said to have lived until his eighty-forth year, although sources again record variant life spans of 73, 82, or 88 years. In any case, it is clear that he lived during the eleventh and early-twelfth centuries, at the advent of the latter dissemination (phyi dar) of Buddhism in Tibet.

According to Tsangnyon Heruka's account, Milarepa's ancestors were nomads of the Khyungpo (khyung po) clan from the northern region of the “central horn,” (dbus ru) one of two administrative regions of Tibet's central province (dbus). One early ancestor was a Nyingma tantric practitioner named Jose (jo sras). Khyung po Jose became famous for his exorcism rites, a practice that earned him both respect and a good deal of wealth. While residing in a place called Chungpachi (gcung pa spyi) in the region of Lato Jang (la stod byang), he had an encounter with a particularly fierce spirit and at last caused the demon to cry out in horror “mila, mila (mi la),” an admission of submission and defeat. Jose subsequently adopted this exclamation as a new clan title and his descendants came to be known by the name Mila.

Khyungpo Jose eventually married and had a son. This son in turn had two sons, the elder of whom was known as Mila Doton Sengge (mi la mdo ston seng ge). The latter's son was named Mila Dorje Sengge (mi la rdo rje seng ge). Dorje Sengge, who was fond of gambling, lost his family's home and wealth in a fateful game of dice. The family was thus forced to seek out a new life elsewhere and eventually resettled in the small village of Kyangatsa (skya rnga rtsa) in Mangyul Gungtang (mang yul gung thang), close to the modern border of Nepal. The father Doton Sengge served as a local village priest, performing various rituals and religious activities, while the son undertook trading trips in Tibet and to Nepal. In this way they were able to regain a good deal of wealth. Dorje Sengge married a local woman and had a son they named Mila Sherab Gyeltsen (shes rab rgyal mtshan); the latter in turn married a woman named Nyangtsa Kargyen (myang rtsa dkar rgyan). This couple then gave birth to the boy who would become Milarepa.

Upon hearing the news of his child's birth, Mila Sherab Gyeltsen is said to have exclaimed, “I am delighted to hear the news that the child has been born a son,” and so the boy was named Topaga, literally “delightful to hear.” He later proved to have a pleasing voice and so lived up to this name. Several years later, his sister Peta Gonkyi was born and eventually Milarepa was betrothed to a local village girl named Dzese.

Courtesy of David Nalin. Used by permission.

When the boy turned seven, his father was stricken with a fatal illness and prepared a final testament that entrusted his wife, children, and wealth to the care of Milarepa's paternal uncle and aunt, providing that Milarepa regain his patrimony once he reached adulthood. The uncle and aunt, usually depicted as greedy and cold-hearted, responded by taking the estate for themselves, thus casting Milarepa's family into a life of abject poverty. In at least one version of the life story, by the fourteenth-century author Yungton Zhije Ripa (g.yung ston zhi byed ri pa), the relatives' actions are partially justified, noting that local marriage customs dictated that following Sherab Gyeltsen's death, the estate should have rightfully remained within the family of his brother, i.e. Milarepa's paternal uncle. In any case, the boy was sent to study reading and writing with a Nyingma master while his mother and sister were forced to labor as servants for their uncle and aunt.

Nyangtsa Kargyen then sent her son to train in black magic in order to seek revenge upon their relatives. Carrying out his mother's wishes, he trained in black magic with Nubchung Yonten Gyatso (gnubs chung yon tan rgya mtsho) and thereby murdered thirty-five people attending a wedding feast at his aunt and uncle's house. From Yungton Trogyal (g.yung ston khro rgyal) he then learned the art of casting hailstorms. Unleashing a powerful storm across his homeland, he destroyed the village's barley crops just as they were about to be reaped, washing away much of the surrounding countryside.

Milarepa eventually came to regret his terrible crimes and in order to expiate their karmic effects he set out to train with a Buddhist master. He first studied Dzogchen (rdzogs chen) with Rangton Lhaga (rang ston lha dga') in Nyangto Rinang (myang stod ri nang). His practice, however, proved ineffective, and Rangton instead directed Milarepa to seek out Marpa Chokyi Lodro (mar pa chos kyi blo gros, 1002/1012-1097), the great translator residing in Lhodrak (lho brag) in southern Tibet.

Milarepa eventually reached Lhodrak where he met a heavyset plowman standing in his field. In reality, this was Marpa who had had a vision that Milarepa would become his foremost disciple. He had thus devised a way to greet his future student in disguise. Marpa was famous for his fierce temper and did not immediately teach Milarepa. Instead, he subjected his new disciple to a stream of verbal and physical abuse, forcing Milarepa to endure a series of ordeals, including a trial of constructing a series of four immense stone towers. Marpa eventually revealed that Milarepa had been prophesied by his own guru, the Indian master Nāropa. He further explained that the trials were actually a means of purifying the sins he had committed earlier in his life. The tower still stands at the center of Sekhar Gutok Monastery.

Marpa first imparted the lay and bodhisattva vows, granting Milarepa the name Dorje Gyeltsen (rdo rje rgyal mtshan). Milarepa then received numerous tantric instructions that Marpa had received in India, especially those of tummo (gtum mo), or yogic heat, the aural instructions (snyan rgyud) of tantric practice, and instructions Mahāmudrā. Marpa conferred upon Milarepa the secret initiation name Zhepa Dorje (bzhad pa rdo rje) and commanded him to spend the rest of his life meditating in solitary mountain retreats.

Milarepa returned to his homeland for a brief period and then retired to a series of retreats nearby. Most famous among these is Drakar Taso (brag dkar rta so) where he remained for many years in arduous meditation. With nothing but wild nettles to eat, his body grew weak and his flesh turned pale green. He later traveled widely across the Himalayan borderlands of southern Tibet and northern Nepal, and dozens of locations associated with his life have become important pilgrimage sites and retreat centers. In his account of the life story, Tsangnyon Heruka drew largely upon earlier sources in order to document dozens such locations, but he reorganized them to create a new map of sacred sites—many of which were designated “fortresses” of meditation—along Tibet's southern border:  six well-known outer fortresses, six unknown inner fortresses, and six secret fortresses, together with numerous other caves. Stories of Milarepa's taming and converting demons in these locations, recorded in Tsangnyon Heruka's companion volume The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa (mi la ras pa'i mgur 'bum) echo accounts of the eight-century Indian master Padmasambhava. Many of Milarepa's most famous retreat locations were said to have been previously inhabited by Padmasambhava himself. Tsangnyon Heruka's reckoning of Milarepa's meditation sites therefore reveals a process of spiritual re-colonization, one that effectively claimed much of the Himalayan border for Milarepa's lineage. Three famous sacred sites of southern and western Tibet – Tsāri (tsA ri), Labchi (la phyi), and Kailāsa (ti se) – are said to have been established or prophesied by Milarepa, and all three later became important Kagyu retreat and pilgrimage centers, identified as Himālaya/Himavat, Godāvarī, and Cāritra/Devīkoṭa from the list of twenty-four pīṭhas of the Cakrasaṃvara Tantra, as well as the maṇḍalas of Cakrasaṃvara's body, speech, and mind. Drakar Taso became in important monastic institution and printing house under the direction of Tsangnyon Heruka's disciple Lhatsun Rinchen Namgyel (lha btsun rin chen rnam rgyal, 1473-1557).

Courtesy of Michael and Beata McCormack. Used by permission.

Milarepa spent the rest of his adult life practicing meditation in seclusion and teaching groups of disciples mainly through spontaneous songs of realization (mgur).  One of the first of Milarepa's songs recorded in Tsangnyon Heruka's takes place after returning to his homeland for the first time and poignantly marks his decision to take up a life of solitary meditation:

I bow down at the feet of most excellent Marpa. Bless this beggar to turn from clinging to things. Alas. Alas. Ay me. Ay me. How sad. People invested in things of life's round— I reflect and reflect and again and again I despair. They engage and engage and stir up from their depths so much torment. They whirl and they whirl and are cast in the depths of life's round. Those dragged on by karma, afflicted with anguish like this— What to do? What to do? There's no cure but the dharma. Lord Akṣobhya in essence, Vajradhara, Bless this beggar to stay in mountain retreat. In the town of impermanence and illusion A restless visitor to these ruins is afflicted with anguish. In the environs of Gungtang, a wondrous landscape, Grasslands that fed yaks, sheep, cattle, and goats Are nowadays taken over by harmful spirits. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. This home of four pillars and eight beams Nowadays resembles a lion's upper jaw. The manor of four corners, four walls, and a roof, making nine These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. This fertile field Orma Triangle Nowadays is a tangle of weeds. My cousins and family relations Nowadays rise up as an army of foes. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. My good father Mila Shergyal Nowadays, of him no trace remains. My mother Nyangtsa Kargyen Nowadays is a pile of bare bones. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. My family priest Konchok Lhabüm Nowadays works as a servant. The sacred text Ratnakūṭa Nowadays serves as a nest for vermin and birds. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. My neighboring uncle Yungyal Nowadays lives among hostile enemies. My sister Peta Gonkyi Has vanished without leaving a trace. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. Lord Akṣobhya in essence, compassionate one, Bless this beggar to stay in mountain retreat.

While staying at Drakar Taso, Milarepa later reaffirms his commitment to meditation practice in a stirring song about his the aim of dying in solitary retreat:

I address my prayers to the lord lama's body. Bless this beggar to stay in mountain retreat. My happiness unknown to loved ones And misery unknown to foes— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. My aging unknown to companions And sickness unknown to my sister— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. My death unknown among people And rotting corpse unseen by vultures— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. Flies sucking on my putrid flesh And insects gnawing my bones— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. No footprints upon my doorstep And no sign of blood inside— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. No one to stand round my corpse And no one to mourn for my death— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. No one to ask where I've gone to And no one to say I have come— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. May the prayer of this beggar to die In a cave of some lonesome locale Be cast for the benefit of beings. When cast, my aims are fulfilled.

Milarepa passed away at the age of 84, after eating poisoned curds given by the jealous geshe Tsakpuwa (rtsag phu ba). After Milarepa's body was cremated, ḍākinī goddesses are said to have carried away his corporeal relics, leaving his disciples with little more than a piece of his robe, a lump of rock sugar, a knife and flint steel, and the yogin's many songs of inner realization.

Milarepa is credited with gathering numerous disciples; the best known are Rechung Dorje Drakpa (ras chung rdo rje brag pa, 1084-1161) and Gampopa Sonam Rinchen (sgam po pa bsod nam rin chen, 1079-1153). The latter helped to establish a lineage of Kagyu masters and institutions that continue to play an important role in the dissemination of Tibetan Buddhism.

Andrew Quintman is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Wesleyan University. He completed his PhD in Buddhist Studies at the University of Michigan in 2006.

Published April 2010

Sekhar Gutok

Kailash

Tsāri

Drakkar Taso

TRADITION

Marpa Kagyu

SUBSEQUENT INCARNATIONS

Gotsangpa Gonpo Dorje

TEACHERS

Marpa Chokyi Lodro

STUDENTS

Gampopa Sonam Rinchen

Rechungpa Dorje Drakpa

HISTORICAL PERIOD

11th Century

12th Century

INSTITUTION

Sekhar Gutok

Kailash

Tsāri

Drakkar Taso

CLAN

Khyungpo

Name variants: Mila Zhepe Dorje

Wylie: mi la ras pa

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Images

Avalokiteśvara Jinasagara with Kagyu Masters

Avalokiteśvara Jinasagara is depicted at center with meditation deities immediately surrounding: Hayagrīva (left), Guhyajñāna (right), Siddharajni (center top), Mahākāla (center bottom). On the uppermost level is Milarepa on the left, Marpa in the center, and Gampopa on the right. 

Cakrasamvara with the footprints of Drigungpa Rinchen Pel.

Chakrasamvara, Sahaja Heruka, with the footprints of Drigungpa Rinchen Pel.

Drukpa Kagyu and Kagyu Lineages

Eighteenth century thangka of Drukpa Kagyu and Kagyu lineage masters.

Drukpa Kagyu Lineage of Bhutan

Nineteenth century painting of the Drukpa Kagyu lineage of Bhutan.

Episodes from the Life of Milarepa

This nineteenth century painting of Milarepa is possibly a copy of an original from Pelpung Monastery. A representative of the Situ style, it exemplifies the types of paintings commissioned by Situ Panchen and his circle. 

Karma Kagyu Refuge Field

Karma Kagyu Field of Accumulation painting with the Fifteenth Karmapa, Kakyab Dorje, as the last lineage holder at the time of the compositions creation.

Karma Pakshi with lineage

A thirteenth-century portrait of the Second Karmapa, Karma Pakshi.

Milarepa

An eighteenth century scuplture of Milarepa from Tibet, carved of stone.

Pema Karpo

This 19th Century painting from Bhutan shows Pema Karpo surrounded by deities and Buddhist masters Marpa, Milarepa, and Marpa. The primordial buddha Vajradhara is pictured above the central figure. 

Taklung Tangpa Tashi Pel with lineage

A portrait of Taklung Tangpa Tashi Pel with the basic Kagyu lineage, dating to the thirteenth century.

Bibliography

Aufschnaiter, Peter. 1976. "Lands and Places of Milarepa." East and West 26, no. 1-2: 175-89.

Bachhofer, Joss. 1986. Verrückte Weisheit, Leben Und Lehre Milarepas. Haldenwang: Schangrila.

Chang, Garma C. C. 1962.The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa. New Hyde Park, N.Y.: University Books. Reprint, (2 vols. in 1), Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1999.

Kunga Rinpoche, and Brian Cutillo. 1978. Drinking the Mountain Stream. Translated by Kunga Rinpoche and Brian Cutillo. Novato, CA: Lotsāwa Press.

Kunga Rinpoche, and Brian Cutillo. 1986. Miraculous Journey. Translated by Kunga Rinpoche and Brian Cutillo. Novato, CA: Lotsāwa Publications.

Lhalungpa, Lobzang P. 1977. The Life of Milarepa. New York: Dutton. Reprint, Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1984.

Martin, Dan. 1982. "The Early Education of Milarepa." The Journal of the Tibet Society 2: 53-76.

Quintman, Andrew. 2008. "Toward a Geographic Biography: Milarepa's Life in the Tibetan Landscape." Numen 55, no. 4: 363-410.

Quintman, Andrew. 2010. The Life of Milarepa. Translated by Andrew Quintman. New York: Penguin Classics.

Quintman, Andrew. 2013. "Wrinkles in Time: On the Problem of Mi la ras pa's Dates." Acta Orientalia 74: 3–26.

Quintman, Andrew. 2014. The Yogin and the Madman: Reading the Biographical Corpus of Tibet’s Great Saint Milarepa. New York: Columbia University Press.

Roberts, Peter Alan. 2007. The Biographies of Rechungpa: The Evolution of a Tibetan Hagiography. London: Routledge.

Schaeffer, Kurtis R. 2007. "Dying Like Milarepa: Death Accounts in a Tibetan Hagiographic Tradition." In The Buddhist Dead: Practices, Discourses, Representations, edited by Bryan J. Cuevas and Jacqueline I. Stone, 208-33. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Schmid, Toni. 1927-1935. The Cotton-Clad Mila: The Tibetan Poet-Saint's Life in Pictures, Sino-Sweding Expedition, Pub. 36. Stockholm: Statens etnografiska museum, 1952.

Sernesi, Marta. 2004. "Milarepa's Six Secret Songs: The Early Transmission of the Bde-Mchog Snyan Brgyud." East and West 54, no. 1-4: 251-87.

[ngakpakonchokdorjetsondonmystic]

Milarepa

མི་ལ་རས་པ།

Milarepa

b.1040 - d.1123 Milarepa (mi la ras pa) is one of the most famous individuals in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, but very little of his life is known with any historical certainty. Even the dates of his birth and death have been notoriously difficult to calculate. Tsangnyon Heruka (gtsang smyon heruka, 1452-1507) – Milarepa's most famous biographer – records that the boy was born in a water-dragon year (1052) and passed away in a wood-hare year (1135), dates also found in biographical works from a century earlier. Numerous other sources, including the important mid-fifteenth-century Religious History of Lhorong (lho rong chos 'byung) push back the dates one twelve-year cycle to 1040-1123, a life span widely accepted by modern scholars. A number of prominent Tibetan historians, including Katok Tsewang Norbu (kaH thog tshe dbang nor bu, 1698-1755), Situ Paṇchen Chokyi Jungne (si tu paN chen chos kyi 'byung gnas, 1700-1774), and Drakar Chokyi Wangchuk (brag dkar chos kyi dbang phyug, 1775-1837), however, place Milarepa's birth in 1028. Still other sources place his birth as early as 1026 or 1024. He is usually said to have lived until his eighty-forth year, although sources again record variant life spans of 73, 82, or 88 years. In any case, it is clear that he lived during the eleventh and early-twelfth centuries, at the advent of the latter dissemination (phyi dar) of Buddhism in Tibet.

According to Tsangnyon Heruka's account, Milarepa's ancestors were nomads of the Khyungpo (khyung po) clan from the northern region of the “central horn,” (dbus ru) one of two administrative regions of Tibet's central province (dbus). One early ancestor was a Nyingma tantric practitioner named Jose (jo sras). Khyung po Jose became famous for his exorcism rites, a practice that earned him both respect and a good deal of wealth. While residing in a place called Chungpachi (gcung pa spyi) in the region of Lato Jang (la stod byang), he had an encounter with a particularly fierce spirit and at last caused the demon to cry out in horror “mila, mila (mi la),” an admission of submission and defeat. Jose subsequently adopted this exclamation as a new clan title and his descendants came to be known by the name Mila.

Khyungpo Jose eventually married and had a son. This son in turn had two sons, the elder of whom was known as Mila Doton Sengge (mi la mdo ston seng ge). The latter's son was named Mila Dorje Sengge (mi la rdo rje seng ge). Dorje Sengge, who was fond of gambling, lost his family's home and wealth in a fateful game of dice. The family was thus forced to seek out a new life elsewhere and eventually resettled in the small village of Kyangatsa (skya rnga rtsa) in Mangyul Gungtang (mang yul gung thang), close to the modern border of Nepal. The father Doton Sengge served as a local village priest, performing various rituals and religious activities, while the son undertook trading trips in Tibet and to Nepal. In this way they were able to regain a good deal of wealth. Dorje Sengge married a local woman and had a son they named Mila Sherab Gyeltsen (shes rab rgyal mtshan); the latter in turn married a woman named Nyangtsa Kargyen (myang rtsa dkar rgyan). This couple then gave birth to the boy who would become Milarepa.

Upon hearing the news of his child's birth, Mila Sherab Gyeltsen is said to have exclaimed, “I am delighted to hear the news that the child has been born a son,” and so the boy was named Topaga, literally “delightful to hear.” He later proved to have a pleasing voice and so lived up to this name. Several years later, his sister Peta Gonkyi was born and eventually Milarepa was betrothed to a local village girl named Dzese.

Courtesy of David Nalin. Used by permission.

When the boy turned seven, his father was stricken with a fatal illness and prepared a final testament that entrusted his wife, children, and wealth to the care of Milarepa's paternal uncle and aunt, providing that Milarepa regain his patrimony once he reached adulthood. The uncle and aunt, usually depicted as greedy and cold-hearted, responded by taking the estate for themselves, thus casting Milarepa's family into a life of abject poverty. In at least one version of the life story, by the fourteenth-century author Yungton Zhije Ripa (g.yung ston zhi byed ri pa), the relatives' actions are partially justified, noting that local marriage customs dictated that following Sherab Gyeltsen's death, the estate should have rightfully remained within the family of his brother, i.e. Milarepa's paternal uncle. In any case, the boy was sent to study reading and writing with a Nyingma master while his mother and sister were forced to labor as servants for their uncle and aunt.

Nyangtsa Kargyen then sent her son to train in black magic in order to seek revenge upon their relatives. Carrying out his mother's wishes, he trained in black magic with Nubchung Yonten Gyatso (gnubs chung yon tan rgya mtsho) and thereby murdered thirty-five people attending a wedding feast at his aunt and uncle's house. From Yungton Trogyal (g.yung ston khro rgyal) he then learned the art of casting hailstorms. Unleashing a powerful storm across his homeland, he destroyed the village's barley crops just as they were about to be reaped, washing away much of the surrounding countryside.

Milarepa eventually came to regret his terrible crimes and in order to expiate their karmic effects he set out to train with a Buddhist master. He first studied Dzogchen (rdzogs chen) with Rangton Lhaga (rang ston lha dga') in Nyangto Rinang (myang stod ri nang). His practice, however, proved ineffective, and Rangton instead directed Milarepa to seek out Marpa Chokyi Lodro (mar pa chos kyi blo gros, 1002/1012-1097), the great translator residing in Lhodrak (lho brag) in southern Tibet.

Milarepa eventually reached Lhodrak where he met a heavyset plowman standing in his field. In reality, this was Marpa who had had a vision that Milarepa would become his foremost disciple. He had thus devised a way to greet his future student in disguise. Marpa was famous for his fierce temper and did not immediately teach Milarepa. Instead, he subjected his new disciple to a stream of verbal and physical abuse, forcing Milarepa to endure a series of ordeals, including a trial of constructing a series of four immense stone towers. Marpa eventually revealed that Milarepa had been prophesied by his own guru, the Indian master Nāropa. He further explained that the trials were actually a means of purifying the sins he had committed earlier in his life. The tower still stands at the center of Sekhar Gutok Monastery.

Marpa first imparted the lay and bodhisattva vows, granting Milarepa the name Dorje Gyeltsen (rdo rje rgyal mtshan). Milarepa then received numerous tantric instructions that Marpa had received in India, especially those of tummo (gtum mo), or yogic heat, the aural instructions (snyan rgyud) of tantric practice, and instructions Mahāmudrā. Marpa conferred upon Milarepa the secret initiation name Zhepa Dorje (bzhad pa rdo rje) and commanded him to spend the rest of his life meditating in solitary mountain retreats.

Milarepa returned to his homeland for a brief period and then retired to a series of retreats nearby. Most famous among these is Drakar Taso (brag dkar rta so) where he remained for many years in arduous meditation. With nothing but wild nettles to eat, his body grew weak and his flesh turned pale green. He later traveled widely across the Himalayan borderlands of southern Tibet and northern Nepal, and dozens of locations associated with his life have become important pilgrimage sites and retreat centers. In his account of the life story, Tsangnyon Heruka drew largely upon earlier sources in order to document dozens such locations, but he reorganized them to create a new map of sacred sites—many of which were designated “fortresses” of meditation—along Tibet's southern border:  six well-known outer fortresses, six unknown inner fortresses, and six secret fortresses, together with numerous other caves. Stories of Milarepa's taming and converting demons in these locations, recorded in Tsangnyon Heruka's companion volume The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa (mi la ras pa'i mgur 'bum) echo accounts of the eight-century Indian master Padmasambhava. Many of Milarepa's most famous retreat locations were said to have been previously inhabited by Padmasambhava himself. Tsangnyon Heruka's reckoning of Milarepa's meditation sites therefore reveals a process of spiritual re-colonization, one that effectively claimed much of the Himalayan border for Milarepa's lineage. Three famous sacred sites of southern and western Tibet – Tsāri (tsA ri), Labchi (la phyi), and Kailāsa (ti se) – are said to have been established or prophesied by Milarepa, and all three later became important Kagyu retreat and pilgrimage centers, identified as Himālaya/Himavat, Godāvarī, and Cāritra/Devīkoṭa from the list of twenty-four pīṭhas of the Cakrasaṃvara Tantra, as well as the maṇḍalas of Cakrasaṃvara's body, speech, and mind. Drakar Taso became in important monastic institution and printing house under the direction of Tsangnyon Heruka's disciple Lhatsun Rinchen Namgyel (lha btsun rin chen rnam rgyal, 1473-1557).

Courtesy of Michael and Beata McCormack. Used by permission.

Milarepa spent the rest of his adult life practicing meditation in seclusion and teaching groups of disciples mainly through spontaneous songs of realization (mgur).  One of the first of Milarepa's songs recorded in Tsangnyon Heruka's takes place after returning to his homeland for the first time and poignantly marks his decision to take up a life of solitary meditation:

I bow down at the feet of most excellent Marpa. Bless this beggar to turn from clinging to things. Alas. Alas. Ay me. Ay me. How sad. People invested in things of life's round— I reflect and reflect and again and again I despair. They engage and engage and stir up from their depths so much torment. They whirl and they whirl and are cast in the depths of life's round. Those dragged on by karma, afflicted with anguish like this— What to do? What to do? There's no cure but the dharma. Lord Akṣobhya in essence, Vajradhara, Bless this beggar to stay in mountain retreat. In the town of impermanence and illusion A restless visitor to these ruins is afflicted with anguish. In the environs of Gungtang, a wondrous landscape, Grasslands that fed yaks, sheep, cattle, and goats Are nowadays taken over by harmful spirits. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. This home of four pillars and eight beams Nowadays resembles a lion's upper jaw. The manor of four corners, four walls, and a roof, making nine These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. This fertile field Orma Triangle Nowadays is a tangle of weeds. My cousins and family relations Nowadays rise up as an army of foes. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. My good father Mila Shergyal Nowadays, of him no trace remains. My mother Nyangtsa Kargyen Nowadays is a pile of bare bones. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. My family priest Konchok Lhabüm Nowadays works as a servant. The sacred text Ratnakūṭa Nowadays serves as a nest for vermin and birds. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. My neighboring uncle Yungyal Nowadays lives among hostile enemies. My sister Peta Gonkyi Has vanished without leaving a trace. These too are examples of impermanence and illusion, Examples that call me, a yogin, to practice. Lord Akṣobhya in essence, compassionate one, Bless this beggar to stay in mountain retreat.

While staying at Drakar Taso, Milarepa later reaffirms his commitment to meditation practice in a stirring song about his the aim of dying in solitary retreat:

I address my prayers to the lord lama's body. Bless this beggar to stay in mountain retreat. My happiness unknown to loved ones And misery unknown to foes— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. My aging unknown to companions And sickness unknown to my sister— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. My death unknown among people And rotting corpse unseen by vultures— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. Flies sucking on my putrid flesh And insects gnawing my bones— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. No footprints upon my doorstep And no sign of blood inside— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. No one to stand round my corpse And no one to mourn for my death— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. No one to ask where I've gone to And no one to say I have come— If thus I can die in this mountain retreat The aims of this yogin will be complete. May the prayer of this beggar to die In a cave of some lonesome locale Be cast for the benefit of beings. When cast, my aims are fulfilled.

Milarepa passed away at the age of 84, after eating poisoned curds given by the jealous geshe Tsakpuwa (rtsag phu ba). After Milarepa's body was cremated, ḍākinī goddesses are said to have carried away his corporeal relics, leaving his disciples with little more than a piece of his robe, a lump of rock sugar, a knife and flint steel, and the yogin's many songs of inner realization.

Milarepa is credited with gathering numerous disciples; the best known are Rechung Dorje Drakpa (ras chung rdo rje brag pa, 1084-1161) and Gampopa Sonam Rinchen (sgam po pa bsod nam rin chen, 1079-1153). The latter helped to establish a lineage of Kagyu masters and institutions that continue to play an important role in the dissemination of Tibetan Buddhism.

Andrew Quintman is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Wesleyan University. He completed his PhD in Buddhist Studies at the University of Michigan in 2006.

Published April 2010

Sekhar Gutok

Kailash

Tsāri

Drakkar Taso

TRADITION

Marpa Kagyu

SUBSEQUENT INCARNATIONS

Gotsangpa Gonpo Dorje

TEACHERS

Marpa Chokyi Lodro

STUDENTS

Gampopa Sonam Rinchen

Rechungpa Dorje Drakpa

HISTORICAL PERIOD

11th Century

12th Century

INSTITUTION

Sekhar Gutok

Kailash

Tsāri

Drakkar Taso

CLAN

Khyungpo

Name variants: Mila Zhepe Dorje

Wylie: mi la ras pa

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Images

Avalokiteśvara Jinasagara with Kagyu Masters

Avalokiteśvara Jinasagara is depicted at center with meditation deities immediately surrounding: Hayagrīva (left), Guhyajñāna (right), Siddharajni (center top), Mahākāla (center bottom). On the uppermost level is Milarepa on the left, Marpa in the center, and Gampopa on the right. 

Cakrasamvara with the footprints of Drigungpa Rinchen Pel.

Chakrasamvara, Sahaja Heruka, with the footprints of Drigungpa Rinchen Pel.

Drukpa Kagyu and Kagyu Lineages

Eighteenth century thangka of Drukpa Kagyu and Kagyu lineage masters.

Drukpa Kagyu Lineage of Bhutan

Nineteenth century painting of the Drukpa Kagyu lineage of Bhutan.

Episodes from the Life of Milarepa

This nineteenth century painting of Milarepa is possibly a copy of an original from Pelpung Monastery. A representative of the Situ style, it exemplifies the types of paintings commissioned by Situ Panchen and his circle. 

Karma Kagyu Refuge Field

Karma Kagyu Field of Accumulation painting with the Fifteenth Karmapa, Kakyab Dorje, as the last lineage holder at the time of the compositions creation.

Karma Pakshi with lineage

A thirteenth-century portrait of the Second Karmapa, Karma Pakshi.

Milarepa

An eighteenth century scuplture of Milarepa from Tibet, carved of stone.

Pema Karpo

This 19th Century painting from Bhutan shows Pema Karpo surrounded by deities and Buddhist masters Marpa, Milarepa, and Marpa. The primordial buddha Vajradhara is pictured above the central figure. 

Taklung Tangpa Tashi Pel with lineage

A portrait of Taklung Tangpa Tashi Pel with the basic Kagyu lineage, dating to the thirteenth century.

Bibliography

Aufschnaiter, Peter. 1976. "Lands and Places of Milarepa." East and West 26, no. 1-2: 175-89.

Bachhofer, Joss. 1986. Verrückte Weisheit, Leben Und Lehre Milarepas. Haldenwang: Schangrila.

Chang, Garma C. C. 1962.The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa. New Hyde Park, N.Y.: University Books. Reprint, (2 vols. in 1), Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1999.

Kunga Rinpoche, and Brian Cutillo. 1978. Drinking the Mountain Stream. Translated by Kunga Rinpoche and Brian Cutillo. Novato, CA: Lotsāwa Press.

Kunga Rinpoche, and Brian Cutillo. 1986. Miraculous Journey. Translated by Kunga Rinpoche and Brian Cutillo. Novato, CA: Lotsāwa Publications.

Lhalungpa, Lobzang P. 1977. The Life of Milarepa. New York: Dutton. Reprint, Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1984.

Martin, Dan. 1982. "The Early Education of Milarepa." The Journal of the Tibet Society 2: 53-76.

Quintman, Andrew. 2008. "Toward a Geographic Biography: Milarepa's Life in the Tibetan Landscape." Numen 55, no. 4: 363-410.

Quintman, Andrew. 2010. The Life of Milarepa. Translated by Andrew Quintman. New York: Penguin Classics.

Quintman, Andrew. 2013. "Wrinkles in Time: On the Problem of Mi la ras pa's Dates." Acta Orientalia 74: 3–26.

Quintman, Andrew. 2014. The Yogin and the Madman: Reading the Biographical Corpus of Tibet’s Great Saint Milarepa. New York: Columbia University Press.

Roberts, Peter Alan. 2007. The Biographies of Rechungpa: The Evolution of a Tibetan Hagiography. London: Routledge.

Schaeffer, Kurtis R. 2007. "Dying Like Milarepa: Death Accounts in a Tibetan Hagiographic Tradition." In The Buddhist Dead: Practices, Discourses, Representations, edited by Bryan J. Cuevas and Jacqueline I. Stone, 208-33. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Schmid, Toni. 1927-1935. The Cotton-Clad Mila: The Tibetan Poet-Saint's Life in Pictures, Sino-Sweding Expedition, Pub. 36. Stockholm: Statens etnografiska museum, 1952.

Sernesi, Marta. 2004. "Milarepa's Six Secret Songs: The Early Transmission of the Bde-Mchog Snyan Brgyud." East and West 54, no. 1-4: 251-87.