In the introductory article on the Occult Universe, we establish the basic model of Chinese thought that Confucius inherited. His contribution was to imbue this primitive but complex system with moral value. Confucius was an innovative conservative. While upholding the ceremonial rituals of the existing cultural model, he gave them a moral significance of his […]
The impetus for the construction of a palace on Lhasa’s Red Hill came from King Songtsen Gampo (608-650) who commissioned it. This was smaller than its 5-square-mile (13-square-km) successor, which was named the Potala (“Pure Land,” or “High Heavenly Realm”), after Mount Potalaka in India, the abode of Tibet’s patron saint, the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara of […]
Lying at China’s southern most point, Hainan Island has at various times been a Chinese penal colony, suffered invasion and exploitation by the Japanese, used as a port of free trade, and, in its current incarnation, is an island that China likes to compare with Hawaii. The comparison is not out of place as tourism […]
Beijing or Northern Capital was made capital of the world’s largest ever, land-based empire by the Mongol conqueror, Kublai Khan, in 1271. What was then the quiet market town of Yanjing was promptly remodelled into a glorious city befitting the attention and tributes of the world. After the Mongols were overthrown in the coup of […]
According to ancient mythology the Yarlung valley – not Lhasa – is the homeland of the Tibetan people. The first Tibetan king stepped off a heavenly ladder onto earth not in Lhasa, but here. The Yarlung valley was also the kingly seat of the first Tibetan kings as well as their burial site. This being […]
