SUFISM AND THE ORIGINS OF FREEMASONRY

 Below, excerpts from Idries Shah’s book “The Sufis”.

I read Masonic literature years ago. 

Like 17-18 years ago. 

I can’t figure out what he’s saying.

Does he mean “Bal”? As in “Baal”?

The Square & Compass are Ancient Chinese symbols too.

Shah does refer to some sort of Taoist connection in some places.

He devotes a whole chapter to the secret association of the Sufis with the Carbonari.

Doesn’t sound convincing to me.

There is something called “Black Magic” which is bloody, brutal, disgusting, involves terrible cruelty & infliction of pain, sexual perversions, mutilation & torture, and always has selfish, hurtful objectives.

I doubt if it has any specific relation to “Egypt”.

It maybe remembered by people interested in this stuff, that the “Baphomet” allegedly worshipped by the Templars was often thought to be a substitute for “Mahomet”.

Also: He means to say that the “Temple of Solomon” of the Freemasons did not originally refer to the Temple built by the Jewish, Biblical King Solomon.

“Solomon” is a sort of euphemism for this person known as Kharki.

Why?

Because Maaruf Kharki was a “Son” – i.e. a discipline – of Daud of Tai.

Since the Biblical Solomon was the “Son of David” – Kharki was called Solomon.

In which case this Maaruf Kharki has to be one of the most important human beings who ever lived!

ROBERT GRAVES sums up the essential idea very succinctly:

He also gives an interesting little footnote:

Point is: Has anybody examined this idea ever since Shah wrote his book?

Idries Shah is quite well known.

How is it that nobody has tried to unearth the connection of the Sufis with Freemasonry, even if the connection is an older/extinct one?

Blavatsky does hint in Isis Unveiled that the Freemasonry which was revamped in 1717 was NOT the original Freemasonry.

But honestly, her work is so horribly muddled & so full of inane mystifications & unnecessary ramblings & painful incoherence, that WHAT she means becomes impossible to figure out.

How is it that nobody knows who is this Maaruf Kharki?

Or is he only incidentally important?

Is Idries Shah bluffing, or speaking half-truths, or is he simply correct?

Because, if he is, it would radically alter peoples’ understanding of not only the last 250 years of history, but also of several centuries before that.

This would mean the Sufis have played a very important role in the Revolutionary movements of the 18^th & 19^th centuries, and in Illuminism.

Indeed, he’s basically saying, throughout his book, that the Illuminists are Sufis.

I feel Shah often makes very tall claims – and I certainly can’t accept many of his ideas – but some are worth examining carefully.

I’m not aware if this has been done.

But there are some hints here & there, even in European literature, like the “fact” that the mythical founder of Rosicrucians, Christian Rosenkreutz, was initiated into the esoteric mysteries, in the East.

 

Keep in mind these passages from the Rosicrucian Manifesto, Fama Fraternitatis:

 

“Although the rude World herewith will be but little pleased, but rather smile and scoff thereat; also the Pride and Covetousness of the Learned is so great, it will not suffer them to agree together; but were they united, they might out of all those things which in this our Age God doth so richly bestow upon us, collect Librum Naturae, or a perfect Method of all Arts: but such is their opposition, that they still keep, and are loth to leave the old course, esteeming Porphiry, Aristotle, and Galen, yea and that which hath but a meer shew of learning, more then the clear and manifested Light and Truth; who if they were now living, with much joy would leave their erroneous Doctrines.

“But here is too great weaknesses for such a great Work: And although in Theologie, Physic, and the Mathematic, the Truth doth oppose it self; nevertheless the old Enemy by his subtilty and craft doth shew himself in hindering every good purpose by his Instruments and contentious wavering people.

“To such an intent of a general Reformation, the most godly and highly illuminated Father, our Brother, C.R. a German, the chief and original of our Fraternity, hath much and long time laboured, who by reason of his poverty (although descended of Noble Parents) in the fifth year of his age was placed in a Cloyster, where he had learned indifferently the Greek and Latin Tongues, who (upon his earnest desire and request) being yet in his growing years, was associated to a Brother, P.A.L. who had determined to go to the Holy Land.

“Although this Brother dyed in Ciprus, and so never came to Jerusalem, yet our Brother C.R. did not return, but shipped himself over, and went to Damasco, minding from thence to go to Jerusalem; but by reason of the feebleness of his body he remained still there, and by his skill in Physick he obtained much favour with the Turks:

“In the mean time he became by chance acquainted with the Wise men of Damasco in Arabia, and beheld what great Wonders they wrought, and how Nature was discovered unto them; hereby was that high and noble Spirit of Brother C.R. so stired up, that Jerusalem was not so much now in his mind as Damasco; also he could not bridle his desires any longer, but made a bargain with the Arabians, that they should carry him for a certain sum of money to Damasco; he was but of the age of sixteen years when he came thither, yet of a strong Dutch constitution; there the Wise received him (as he himself witnessseth) not as a stranger, but as one whom they had long expected, they called him by his name, and shewed him other secrets out of his Cloyster, whereat he could not but mightily wonder:

“He learned there better the Arabian Tongue; so that the year following he translated the Book M. into good Latin, which he afterwards brought with him.

This is the place where he did learn his Physick, and his Mathematicks, whereof the World hath just cause to rejoyce, if there were more Love, and less Envy.

“After three years he returned again with good consent, shipped himself over Sinus Arabicus into Egypt, where he remained not long, but only took better notice there of the Plants and Creatures; he sailed over the whole Mediterranean Sea for to come unto Fez, where the Arabians had directed him.

“And it is a great shame unto us, that wise men, so far remote th'one from th'other, should not only be of one opinion, hating all contentious Writings, but also be so willing and ready under the seal of secrecy to impart their secrets to others.

“Every year the Arabians and Affricans do send one to another, inquiring one of another out of their Arts, if happily they had found out some better things, or if Experience had weakened their Reasons.

“Yearly there came something to light, whereby the Mathematica, Physic and Magic (for in those are they of Fez most skilful) were amended; as there is now adays in Germany no want of learned Men, Magicians, Cabalists, Physicians, and Philosophers, were there but more love and kindness among them, or that the most part of them would not keep their secrets close only to themselves.

“At Fez he did get acquaintance with those which are commonly called the Elementary Inhabitants, who revealed unto him many of their secrets: As we Germans likewise might gather together many things, if there were the like unity, and desire of searching out of secrets amongst us.

“Of these of Fez he often did confess, that their Magia was not altogether pure, and also that their Cabala was defiled with their Religion; but notwithstanding he knew how to make good use of the same, and found still more better grounds of his Faith, altogether agreeable with the Harmony of the whole World, and wonderfully impressed in all Periods of times, and thence proceedeth that fair Concord, that as in every several kernel is contained a whole good tree or fruit, so likewise is included in the little body of Man the whole great World, whose Religion, policy, health, members, nature, language, words and works, are agreeing, sympathizing, and in equal tune and melody with God, Heaven and Earth; and that which is dis-agreeing with them, is error, falsehood and of the Devil, who alone is the first, middle, and last cause of strife, blindness, and darkness in the World: Also, might one examine all and several persons upon the Earth, he should find that which is good and right, is always agreeing with it self; but all the rest is spotted with a thousand erroneous conceits.

“After two years Brother R.C. departed the City Fez, and sailed with many costly things into Spain (Idries Shah keeps referring to Spain as being under a very strong influence of the Sufis, Spain having been under Saracen rule for about 700 years), hoping well, he himself had so well and so profitably spent his time in his travel, that the learned in Europe would highly rejoyce with him, and begin to rule, and order all their Studies, according to those sound and sure Foundations.

He therefore conferred with the Learned in Spain, shewing unto them the Errors of our Arts, and how they might be corrected, and from whence they should gather the true Inditia of the Times to come, and wherein they ought to agree with those things that are past; also how the faults of the Church and the whole Philosopia Moralis was to be amended: He shewed them new Growths, new Fruits, and Beasts, which did concord with old Philosophy, and prescribed them new Axiomata, whereby all things might fully be restored:

But it was to them a laughing matter; and being a new thing unto them, they feared that their great Name should be lessened, if they should now again begin to learn and acknowledg their many years Errors, to which they were accustomed, and wherewith they had gained them enough: Who so loveth unquietness, let him be reformed.”

So basically, this means that Christian Rosencreutz was a Sufi.

At any rate, his received all his esoteric training in the Islamic-Sufic Middle East (with some Jewish influence, & also some Zoroastrian influence, if that’s what’s meant by the term “Magia”), in Turkey, Arabia, (this) Damasco, and Egypt.

This would mean, probably, that Rosicrucians were a Sufi sect operating in Europe.

It seems though, that the Sufic connection was lost after some time, though I find it very difficult to believe this theory: but of all that, sometime later, if and when time & circumstance permit.

“Sigmund Freud,

Analyze this...

Analyze this...

Analyze this...this...this...this...

...

I’m gonna - break - the cycle

I’m gonna - shake up - the system...

I’m gonna destroy - my ego...

I’m gonna close my body now...

...

I think I'll find another way... 

I guess I’ll die another day

It’s not my time to go...”

– “Die Another Day”, Madonna

GREECE AND EGYPT: WHAT DOES HERODOTUS SAY. DARK-SKINNED GREEK HEROES.

Beneath are extracts from Book 2 (“Euterpe”) from The History” by 5^th Century BCE Greek historian Herodotus.

“The male kine, therefore, if clean, and the male calves, are used for sacrifice by the Egyptians universally; but the females they are not allowed to sacrifice, since they are sacred to Isis.

The statue of this goddess has the form of a woman but with horns like a cow, resembling thus the Greek representations of Io; and the Egyptians, one and all, venerate cows much more highly than any other animal.

 

(This certainly reminds me of the beliefs of the Ancient Vedic Indians.

Bulls could be sacrificed or eaten, but the cow was sacrosanct.

I know these claims are hotly disputed nowadays.

I beg to disagree with the Hindutva crowd: it makes perfect sense that once upon a time, our forefathers ate all sorts of meat.

It’s normal, it’s healthy.

It was the natural thing to do before the advent of agriculture & city-life.

There is nothing wrong in eating beef: billions of people who eat beef are not inferior – morally, spiritually, intellectually, or physically – to cow-worshiping Hindus.

Vegetarianism is a later development.

The extreme virulence, with which extremist Hindus abuse & attack others on this point, is evidence of their own mental instability.

They have to be militant, because they’re being blatantly stupid.

Since you can’t give a rational argument, you have to threaten to break, thrash & kill.

So they created a furor, trying to stop Ranbir Kapoor & Alia Bhatt from entering the Mahakaal Temple at Ujjain: but then both “big-beef” eater Ranbir, & Alia, were invited to the Rām Mandir inauguration by the big champions of Rām Rājya!

And this is how the Hindutva crowd makes a colossal fool of itself.

That said, I do respect the cow – it’s a beautiful, gentle & docile creature which deserves our love & gratitude – and I would never touch its meat.

The beef that ancient Indians ate might have been bull meat, like the Egyptians, not cow meat.

AND FOR ALL THAT, HOW IS IT THAT I DO NOT FIND ANY SIGNIFICANT COW SYMBOLISM IN ANY OF THE EXTANT HINDU TEMPLES?

HOW IS IT THAT WE DO NOT HAVE ANY COW-GODDESS?

HOW IS IT THAT THE LION, ELEPHANT, YĀLI, MAKARA, SERPENT, BOAR, MONKEY & DEER ARE THE MOST COMMONLY DEPICTED ANIMALS ON HINDU TEMPLES (THE BULL BEING VERY COMMON IN SOUTH INDIA), BUT THERE IS SUCH A NOTICEABLE PAUCITY OF COWS?

I THINK THERE ARE MORE CAMELS THAN COWS, IN INDIAN TEMPLES!

IF INDIANS WORSHIPPED THE COW SO ARDENTLY, I WOULD EXPECT IT TO BE DEPICTED ALL OVER THE PLACE.

TRUTH IS, IT IS HARDLY SEEN ANYWHERE.)

...

“Such Egyptians as possess a temple of the Theban Jove, or live in the Thebaic canton, offer no sheep in sacrifice, but only goats; for the Egyptians do not all worship the same gods, excepting Isis and Osiris, the latter of whom they say is the Grecian Bacchus.

Those, on the contrary, who possess a temple dedicated to Mendes, or belong to the Mendesian canton, abstain from offering goats, and sacrifice sheep instead.

The Thebans, and such as imitate them in their practice, give the following account of the origin of the custom: “Hercules,” they say, “wished of all things to see Jove, but Jove did not choose to be seen of him. At length, when Hercules persisted, Jove hit on a device — to flay a ram, and, cutting off his head, hold the head before him, and cover himself with the fleece. In this guise he showed himself to Hercules.”

Therefore the Egyptians give their statues of Jupiter the face of a ram: and from them the practice has passed to the Ammonians, who are a joint colony of Egyptians and Ethiopians, speaking a language between the two; hence also, in my opinion, the latter people took their name of Ammonians, since the Egyptian name for Jupiter is Amun.

Such, then, is the reason why the Thebans do not sacrifice rams, but consider them sacred animals.

Upon one day in the year, however, at the festival of Jupiter, they slay a single ram, and stripping off the fleece, cover with it the statue of that god, as he once covered himself, and then bring up to the statue of Jove an image of Hercules.

When this has been done, the whole assembly beat their breasts in mourning for the ram, and afterwards bury him in a holy sepulchre.

(Herakles with Minerva and Juno (Hera).

Image from Wikimedia Commons.

This is the link: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Herculaneum_Collegio_degli_Augustali_Ercole_sull%27Olimpo.jpg

Yes, so Roman frescoes & all, with a few exceptions, have all dark-skinned men, and all fair-skinned women and children.

I have noted this point earlier.

I have also wondered if the White Man would ever portray himself as being dark-skinned.

It’s highly unlikely.

Please allow me to clarify that I do not hate the White race, and have no inimical feelings towards them.

But it’s a simple psychological fact: would a White-skinned man ever paint his White-skinned Hero or God as a Dark-Brown skinned man?

I don’t think so.

Dark-reddish brown, as anyone can see.

But why are the women fair?

And the children?

To that, I have no convincing answer: it seems to me that fair women were considered more desirable – or it was an artistic license sort of thing – or an artistic convention, like a certain body type (very muscular bodies, for instance, hardly found in Hindu-Jain-Buddhist Indian art).

I have other thoughts, but I  don’t want to articulate them, right now.)

(The myth of Hercules & Jove reminds me of the episode from the Book of Exodus, in which Moses expresses his desire to see the face of God (Exodus 33):

“¹⁸ And Moses said, Lord, show thou thy glory to me.

¹⁹ God answered, I shall show all (my) good(ness) to thee, and I shall call in the name of the Lord before thee, and I shall do mercy to whom I will, and I shall be merciful, either goodly, on whom it pleaseth me. 

²⁰ And again God said, Thou mayest not see my face, for a man shall not see me, and live.

(And then God said, But thou cannot see my face, for no one can see me, and live.)

²¹ And again God said, A place is with me, and thou shalt stand upon a stone;

 (And God said, Here is a place beside me, and thou shalt stand on a rock)

²² and when my glory shall pass (by), I shall set thee in the hole of the stone, and I shall cover thee with my right hand, till that I pass (by);

²³ and (then) I shall take away mine hand, and thou shalt see mine hinder parts, forsooth thou mayest not see my face.”

The infinite, inexhaustible, limitless Supreme Being of the “Monotheistic” Bible has a “right hand” and a backside too!

Such are the beliefs of those who accuse “Gentiles” of “idolatry”!)

 

“The account which I received of this Hercules makes him one of the twelve gods.

Of the other Hercules, with whom the Greeks are familiar, I could hear nothing in any part of Egypt.

That the Greeks, however (those I mean who gave the son of Amphitryon that name), took the name from the Egyptians, and not the Egyptians from the Greeks, is I think clearly proved, among other arguments, by the fact that both the parents of Hercules, Amphitryon as well as Alcmena, were of Egyptian origin.

Again, the Egyptians disclaim all knowledge of the names of Neptune and the Dioscuri, and do not include them in the number of their gods; but had they adopted the name of any god from the Greeks, these would have been the likeliest to obtain notice, since the Egyptians, as I am well convinced, practised navigation at that time, and the Greeks also were some of them mariners; so that they would have been more likely to know the names of these gods than that of Hercules.

But the Egyptian Hercules is one of their ancient gods.

17,000 years before the reign of Amasis, the 12 gods were, they affirm, produced from the 8: and of these 12, Hercules is one.

 

“In the wish to get the best information that I could on these matters, I made a voyage

to Tyre in Phoenicia, hearing there was a temple of Hercules at that place, very highly venerated.

I visited the temple, and found it richly adorned with a number of offerings, among which were two pillars, one of pure gold, the other of emerald, shining with great brilliancy at night.

In a conversation which I held with the priests, I inquired how long their temple had been built, and found by their answer that they, too, differed from the Greeks.

They said that the temple was built at the same time that the city was founded, and that the foundation of the city took place 2,300 years ago.

In Tyre I remarked another temple where the same god was worshipped as the Thasian Hercules.

So I went on to Thasos, where I found a temple of Hercules which had been built by the Phoenicians who colonised that island when they sailed in search of Europa.

Even this was five generations earlier than the time when Hercules, son of Amphitryon, was born in Greece.

These researches show plainly that there is an ancient god Hercules; and my own opinion is, that those Greeks act most wisely who build and maintain two temples of Hercules, in the one of which the Hercules worshipped is known by the name of Olympian, and has sacrifice offered to him as an immortal, while in the other the honours paid are such as are due to a hero.”

(Hercules with Omphale.

Image from Wikimedia Commons.

This is the link: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eracle_e_onfale,_da_scavo_del_principe_di_montenegro,_pompei,_9000.JPG

Here, Hercules actually looks like an African.

There is NO QUESTION of his being Caucasian.

He would pass for a dark-skinned Asian from Dravidian India (as if there are no dark-skinned people in Maharashtra or U.P. or Punjab!) or Sri Lanka or Bangladesh, but it’s obvious that African is a better candidate for an image made in Pompeii.

And here, Hercules is BLACK.)

...

“To Bacchus, on the eve of his feast, every Egyptian sacrifices a hog before the door

of his house, which is then given back to the swineherd by whom it was furnished, and by him carried away.

In other respects the festival is celebrated almost exactly as Bacchic festivals are in Greece, excepting that the Egyptians have no choral dances.

They also use, instead of phalli, another invention, consisting of images a cubit high, pulled by strings, which the women carry round to the villages.

A piper goes in front; and the women follow, singing hymns in honour of Bacchus.

They give a religious reason for the peculiarities of the image.

...

Melampus, the son of Amytheon, cannot (I think) have been ignorant of this ceremony — ay, he must, I should conceive, have been well acquainted with it.

He it was who introduced into Greece the name of Bacchus, the ceremonial of his worship, and the procession of the phallus.

He did not, however, so completely apprehend the whole doctrine as to be able to communicate it entirely; but various sages since his time have carried out his teaching to greater perfection.

Still it is certain that Melampus introduced the phallus, and that the Greeks learnt from him the ceremonies which they now practise.

I therefore maintain that Melampus, who was a wise man, and had acquired the art of divination, having become acquainted with the worship of Bacchus through knowledge derived from Egypt, introduced it into Greece, with a few slight changes, at the same time that he brought in various other practices.

For I can by no means allow that it is by mere coincidence that the Bacchic ceremonies in Greece are so nearly the same as the Egyptian—they would then have been more Greek in their character, and less recent in their origin.

Much less can I admit that the Egyptians borrowed these customs, or any other, from the Greeks.

My belief is that Melampus got his knowledge of them from Cadmus the Tyrian, and the followers whom he brought from Phoenicia into the country which is now called Boeotia.”

 

(A dark-reddish brown beardless, youthful (almost boyish) Herakles in the Garden of Hesperides.

Image from Wikimedia Commons.

I think this is the link: 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hercules_garden_hesperides_hel_hi.jpg

The image is uncannily similar to that of the Serpent of Eden on the Tree of Knowledge of Good & Evil – as both are, to many similar images from the Ancient Middle East, with a serpent wrapped around a tree.

Mind you, this is a 4^th century CE image.

There’s tremendous consistency in the projection of Greco-Roman heroes as dark skinned over centuries.)

“Almost all the names of the gods came into Greece from Egypt.

My inquiries prove that they were all derived from a foreign source; and my opinion is that Egypt furnished the greater number.

For with the exception of Neptune and the Dioscuri, whom I mentioned above, and Juno, Vesta, Themis, the Graces, and the Nereids, the other gods have been known from time immemorial in Egypt.

This I assert on the authority of the Egyptians themselves.”

 

(Juno is undoubtedly related to the Sanskrit yoni – the source, the origin, the womb – place of birth, spring, fountain – place of rest, repository, receptacle, seat, abode, home, lair, nest, stable.

But “Juno” is not the Greek name – the translator means to say Hera or Here.

Quite contrary to all opinion, I think the Greek “Hera/Here” may be related to the Sanskrit Hari or Hara – in turn, related to the Egyptian Horus, i.e. Har or Heru.

In India, “Hari” is a name applied to several important gods.

The Sanskrit hīra (pronounced heer) – interestingly means a diamond, a thunderbolt, a lion, & a serpent. 

Hīra is also a name of Shiva.

Hīrā is a name of Lakṣmī.

The word Rhea – name of the consort of Kronos-Saturn — Mother of the Olympians – is either an anagram of Hera, or maybe derived from the Sanskrit ṛ – a name for Aditi, the mother of the Devas.

It may also derivable from the Sanskrit sṛ – “to run, flow, speed, glide, move, go”.

Again, by Vesta he probably means Hestia, and by Neptune he means Poseidon.

The translator is egregiously misleading, using the later Roman names for the original Greek ones!

I have a suspicion that Themis is derived from Dharma, like the Pali Dhamma.

But the genesis of all these names is likely to be way more obscure & complicated.)

 

“The gods, with whose names they profess themselves unacquainted, the Greeks received, I believe, from the Pelasgi, except Neptune.

Of him they got their knowledge from the Libyans, by whom he has been always honoured, and who were anciently the only people that had a god of the name.

The Egyptians differ from the Greeks also in paying no divine honours to heroes.

...

“Besides those which have been here mentioned, there are many other practices whereof I shall speak hereafter, which the Greeks have borrowed fom Egypt.

The peculiarity, however, which they observe in the statues of Mercury they did not derive from the Egyptians, but from the Pelasgi; from them the Athenians first adopted it, and afterwards it passed from the Athenians to the other Greeks.

For just at the time when the Athenians were entering into the Hellenic body, the Pelasgi came to live with them in their country, whence it was that the latter came first to be regarded as Greeks.

Whoever has been initiated into the mysteries of the Cabiri will understand what I mean.

The Samothracians received these mysteries from the Pelasgi, who, before they went to live in Attica, were dwellers in Samothrace, and imparted their religious ceremonies to the inhabitants.

The Athenians, then, who were the first of all the Greeks to make their statues of Mercury in this way, learnt the practice from the Pelasgians; and by this people a religious account of the matter is given, which is explained in the Samothracian mysteries.”

(Another very dark-brown Herakles-Hercules.

The Wikimedia Common links are:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hercules-and-telephus.jpg

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Herculaneum_-_Augusteum_-_Hercules_and_Telephos_-_Detail_2.jpg

Hercules doesn’t have any Caucasian features whatsoever.

Again, he looks African.

Yes, he might also pass for a dark-skinned South-East Asian, but it’s more likely he was an African, because Italy is much closer to Egypt than to India, and this image is from 1st century CE Herculaneum!

Anybody reading these posts should decide for himself/herself, if I’m missing something!

I’m going exactly by what I can see.

And all these inputs merely reinforce whatever Herodotus says.)

(P.S.

Regarding the beef issue, or generally the meat-eating issue .... Conservative Indians think that Hinduism was absolutely perfected & fixed something like 5,000 or 10,000 or 50,000 years ago, and has remained perfectly unchanged & static, for all that time.

On the other hand, Liberal Indians demolish Hinduism by attributing everything to some or the other “influence”.... like the gutter view that Hindus “copied” vegetarianism from Buddhism.

That is utter nonsense.

Buddhists were, and still are, non-vegetarians, though there might have been dietary restrictions for monks – different restrictions in different eras & regions.

I prefer seeing Hinduism as something that constantly & dynamically grew, learnt, readjusted, adapted, evolved and transformed itself in response to various new & different experiences and developments in its own history, in the course of its own existence.

There is some evidence to think that Brāhmaṇas have been vegetarians for about 2,000 years – but it’s highly unlikely they were, at the beginning.

“O Rāghava, five kinds of five-nailed animals,

śalyaka (porcupine or hedgehog),

śvāvidha (also a type of porcupine? maybe a kind of boar),

godhā (iguana),

śaśa  (hare or rabbit) and fifth,

kūrma (the turtle)

are edible for Brāhmaṇas and Kṣatriyas”.

So says Vālī to Rāma, after being shot by the latter, in the Rāmāyaṇa.

The evidence is overwhelming.

It’s ridiculous to call it all misinterpretation or interpolation.)

“You can be sure of succeeding in your attacks if you only attack places which are undefended. You can ensure the safety of your defense if you only hold positions that cannot be attacked. Hence that general is skilful in attack whose opponent does not know what to defend; and he is skilful in defence whose opponent does not know what to attack. O divine art of subtlety and secrecy! Through you we learn to be invisible, through you inaudible; and hence we can hold the enemy’s fate in our hands.”

– Chapter 6, The Art of War by Sun Tzu