The Curious Question of Vampiric Enlightnenment

Mages think about enlightenment. Scientists, mystics, and magicians alike strive to broaden their view of the world and overcome old modes of thinking. It is in our nature. Perhaps it is our nature.

Enlightenment isn't the first think we think of when discussing vampires. Self-centered, grasping, neurotic, hard to kill, meddling, sure... but enlightened? But speaking of overcoming old modes of thinking, perhaps we (and they) are in for a rude awakening.

Vampiric enlightenment may actually exist. I stumbled on this body of lore while doing a research project on strategies for controlling the beast vampires find within themselves. Since my lasts publication was on the nature of defending against vampire powers, I thought it appropriate to publish something on the pro-vamp side. Maybe not all vampires are asshats. Or rather, maybe they don't have to be asshats.

It turns out that there seems to be a spiritual cure for the Beast, and potentially all aspects of the vampiric curse. But to get these stories, you have to go into the way back, and I mean the way way back machine and tread in realms of myth that are just slightly younger than gravity. I should point out that these stories could be complete and total crap. That said, I like them, and there is a compelling ring of something that might sound a little like truth to them.

The First

The first one begins with the first vampire. Now, there are many first vampires. There are Chinese, Greek, Indonesian, Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Hebrew, and Slavic vampires. And each of these cultures has a different first vampire. So I should point out that I have no reason to suspect this myth is any better than any of the others. It’s the only one that has anything close to a happy ending. In every other story, the vampires are demons who just have to die. So if I were a gambling man wagering on the truth of myths, I’d bet that vamps are screwed. But here’s the one that has a potential happy ending. 

It starts with the murderer Cain. You know the beginning of that tale. Cain bashes in Abel’s head. God doesn’t like that, so Cain (though some vampiric scholars prefer Caine) gets cursed and wanders the land miserably. It isn’t clear exactly how the curse gets laid. Some versions say the initial curse from the Almighty was the whole package. Other versions say that Cain shacks up with some woman (the first Verbena, actually) and she grants him power and as part of that power he gets three curses from three angels while he’s tripped out on a seeking. The curse of fire, the curse of sunlight, and the BEAST WITHIN, which makes him want to dine on blood. Our buddy Cain also gets visited by a fourth angel who tells him that as much as his life sucks, there is a way out. A way called Golconda. A way of forgiveness, salvation, light, and life that will break the other three curses.

Sadly, Cain doesn’t seem to get there. Some stories say Cain tells God to fuck off. Others stories say Cain tries but fails. Either way, the OG vampire never breaks his curse. Further searches on him go cold.

The Demon-Saint

BUT, we are armed with another word. Golconda. Back to the drawing board. Recasting the search we find reference to a dude named Saulot. I’m unclear on the genealogy, and I’m not sure it matters for our purposes. Saulot was a prophet, and unlike the rest of his kind he sorta hated being a vampire. He was into meditation and other spiritual exercises to overcome his condition while also serving his kind as healer. He disappears for a few centuries, some say Asia, and turns up with a third eye and preaching about Golconda. His tale gets weird after that. Some say he’s a hero-saint. Other people say he’s a soul-eating monster. There’s this whole thing with some lich-mage that Saulot may or may not have been eaten by. I tried to find him directly and ask about Golconda (because vampire; he could be alive!), but my cursory search failed.

This Golconda thing has been a bit of a myth. Some vampires claim they have achieved it. It is associated with various boons: the lack of anger or fear, the ability to learn any vampiric power, staying up during the day, and losing the vampiric condition entirely.

How to get there? Mixed reviews. Some say they need a teacher or mentor. Others say they need to foster a saintly demeanor. Others say they need to go on quests to prove their commitment. Others say they need to atone for literally every wrong they've ever done. I can’t find the truth of it, exactly. It all seems like a pseudo-Christian veneer stretched over vampire lore. Some say that Golconda is preceded by a state called Suspire, which is like a nearly perfect state. I like the myth that says the Suspire vampire (which is fun to say) goes on one final mindquest, and afterward either goes into a final frenzy or reaches Golconda.

And that’s where the trail runs cold.

For amateurs.

Any armchair historian listening to the myth of Saulot should be asking him or herself one very simple, very important question: What the fuck happened in Asia? Goes off and comes back with a third fucking eye spouting some new mystical mumbo jumbo and maybe eating souls or maybe causing enlightenment? Saulot 1: shy prophet boy, Saulot 2: ….. Saulot 3: Wacked out Demon King or Saint.

So Asia. Come on. Does that even classify as a mystery?

What went down in Asia? No mention of Saulot, but there is some foreigner who gets referred to as Zao-lat. Really? I’ve had more trouble with Blue’s Clues. Anyway, what do the legends say about this mysterious Zao-lat? I’ll quote: Zao-lat was “a student of Xue, a thief, a despicable creature who benefited from Xue's compassion, learned Ch'iuh Muh, sat at the feet of the master and stole his wisdom.”

Oh-kay. No mincing words there. Now, one of the things we look for in historical records is convergences. If things get mentioned the same way in different sources who didn’t copy each other, they probably happened. Do we have convergence here? I did some looking into Ch'iuh Muh. It’s a magical power of the eastern vampires. It translates roughly into “Dragon Tears.” Badass, right? Do you know what Ch'iuh Muh bestows on its practitioners? A third fucking eye. I’d call that some convergence. Saulot's thievery lead me to Xue.

The Master
Grand Arhat Xue is a super renown “Kuei-jin” (it’s what they call themselves) mystic who articulates in the text the Blood Sutras a philosophy he calls the “Five Dharmas.” Here’s the gist. Vampires are demonic creatures, but they can get to enlightenment and return to the karmic cycle. By behaving a lot like a mage (following a mystic path, having bursts of insight, and striving for enlightenment), vampires can slowly subsist on more sublime chi. If vampires are not enlightened, they draw chi out of blood. As they become more enlightened, they draw it out of the air. Super enlightened vamps can draw it out of the chi let of by the gently unfolding lotus flower of the universe (no shit). These five Dharmas of Xue’s are five different ways of achieving enlightenment. They have to do with resplendent cranes and thrashing dragons and all manner of awesomeness. Here’s a summary: 

• Resplendent Crane (Hun). The Way of the Resplendent Crane is a highly legalistic collection of schools, dedicated to reversing the Wheel of Ages and restoring virtue.
• Devil-Tiger (P'o). The Devil-Tigers believe that they are replacements for the incompetent demons of ages past; they punish sinners and seek enlightenment through pain and violence.
• Song of the Shadow (Yin). The yin-aspected Song of the Shadow, also known as Bone Flowers, are coldly logical necromancers who seek dispassionate reasoning and enforcement of dharmic balance. They are also tightly tied to mortal society through their descendants, and often assist their families even centuries afterward.
• Thrashing Dragon (Yang). The often misunderstood Thrashing Dragon dharma recognizes that they are dead, but seeks to achieve enlightenment by imitating and interacting with the living. Despite the stunned disbelief of some Resplendent Cranes, they are a fully recognized Dharma, even if they seem to eat and screw their way through unlife.
• Thousand Whispers (Balance). The Thousand Whispers live a sequence of masks, new identities they construct after death in order to understand mortal life and hopefully transcend it.

There are other Dharmas created by other people, but those five are Xue’s. I’d stick with the OG. Xue goes on to say that vampires have various souls. A “wind soul” that is the directed, harmonious, rational Hun soul. But they also have a P’o soul, which is what one might call the Beast, and it has three subparts, the fire, wave, and shadow soul.

Here’s some real advice. According to Xue, even though the P’o soul is bad news and unharmonious, vamps can’t just ignore it or stifle it. If they over crush it, they become cold and dead and too fucking rational. They need to be in harmony with their disharmony. No shit. They need to accept, understand, and assimilate their Beast. The vampiric Beast, according to shen philosophers, even has a nature of its own. Which they need to learn and understand. It can be a bandit, deceiver, demon, fool, or any number of seemingly bad but useful and ultimately not bad in that they have to let it be disharmoniously harmonious (or harmoniously disharmonious, I’m not sure, my translation was unclear) with their rational nature.

The eastern vampires have an elaborate list of activities that basically move vamps forward and backward on their quest for Dharmic enlightenment. The nice list includes:

• Being taught by a Kuei-jin who has mastered a higher level in their Dharma.
• Being taught by a Kuei-jin who holds a higher rank than their; but in a different Dharma.
• Receiving instruction from a bodhisattva (super vampire).
• Understanding a master's koan.
• Receiving instruction from a Yama King or similar powerful spirit.
• Journeying through the spirit worlds (for the first time).
• Understanding a master's koan.
• Doing something within the tenets of their Dharma that costs them something important.
• Meditating for at least one week with one of the training methods.
• Coming very near to death.
• Understanding a master's koan.
• Receiving an auspicious omen.

The naughty list (they call them Acts of Blindness)

• Violating some important tenet of their Dharma.
• Attempting to follow the tenets of their path, but failing in some really costly manner.
• Acting in an extraordinarily egotistical manner.
• Losing themselves in mortal concerns and neglecting enlightenment.
• Losing themselves to the P'o (even if they belong to the Devil Tiger path).
• Discovering that a Dharma teacher lied to them.
• Being banished by a priest or other person with True Faith.
• Killing an ancestor or bodhisattva.
• Meeting the Little Death.
• Receiving a bad omen.

Moving Forward
Here’s the bad news. Kuei-jin are different from western vampires. I believe they are metaphysically different. They aren’t made the same way, and there seem to be variances. So maybe none of this stuff works on western vampires at all. But there are a few reasons to hope.

One. The western Golconda myths correlate roughly to aspects of the Dharmic journey. Find a mentor; taught by a master. Can learn any power; chi flows in a way that is magnified. There are corollaries, which suggests it may work.

Two. The western version is ok, but Xue’s method is more complete. Which means there are many things to try, more avenues to go down. Also, based on my academic intuition, I’d say Xue’s is the more coherent doctrine. I think the westernized version oversimplifies the Beast in unproductive ways (influenced by Christianity, if you want my opinion).

Three. It worked for Saulot. It did. He learned the third eye trick. And he taught it. But here’s the very, very best part. You know how I mentioned that Saulot is known for being both a saint and a soul eater? Some chalk this up to lich-mage propaganda. But it isn’t. Here’s the deal.  Ch'iuh Muh, the Dragon Tear, is a discipline that manifests one way when vampires are in their Hun soul, and another way when they are in their P’o soul. When in Hun, they can purify others and coax their souls out and make give them enlightenment. When in P’o soul, they can poison others and coax their souls out and gnaw on their spirit bits. Saulot was just struggling with a spiritual reality misunderstood in his geographical region. But in the east, he would be seen as just crying another Ch'iuh Muh. That mystery I’ll take a little credit for.

So, if you have vampire friends who are interested in overcoming the ravages of their condition, based on the myths of Cain, Saulot, and Xue, there are a few things they can do: 

• Contact Angel #4 and get him to break God’s curse on them. I’m only sorta joking.
• Find Saulot and get him to teach them about Golconda.
• Find another Golcondic (is that a word?) vampire and have him mentor them.
• Travel to the far East and learn from the Bodhisattvas.
• Learn about and meditate on the various paths of vampiric enlightenment and see if any make them want to eat fewer people.
• Repent for all their sins, seek atonement, and fix everything they ever broke.
• Try to pull chi out of the air by breathing.
• Sleep with a Verbena, get her to grant them enlightenment, and GIVE AWAY their power.
• Find Cain, cure him of his curse, and break the curse for everyone.
• Learn Ch'iuh Muh (or Saulot’s watered down version)
• Fulfill their destiny, then let a Euthanatos kill them (the permanent solution). 

Maybe none of this will work, but maybe it will? Who knows.

I will say this. The Ascension War was fought over the notion that ALL humans were worth giving a shot at releasing the arbitrary confines of the realities that controlled them so as to engender a world where the possible was more powerful than the necessary. What if we shot too low? What if all entities, human, vampiric, or otherwise, were what we were supposed to be fighting for?