Celtic Doctrine of Rebirth
Filed by Aine MacDermot
THE RE-BIRTH STORY CONCERNING KING MONGAN
We have preserved to us a remarkable re-birth story in which the characters are known to be historical. 1 It concerns a quarrel between the king of Ulster, Mongan, son of Fiachna–who, according to the Annals of Ireland by The Four Masters (i. 245), was killed in A. D. 620 by Arthur, son of Bicor–and Forgoll, the poet of Mongan. 2 The dispute between them was as to the place of the death of Fothad Airgdech, a king of Ireland who was killed by Cailte, one of the warriors of Find, in a battle whose date is fixed by the Four Masters in A. D. 285. 3 Forgoll pretended that Fothad (p. 371) had been killed at Duffry, in Leinster, and Mongan asserted that it was on the river Larne (anciently Ollarba) in County Antrim. Enraged at being contradicted, even though it were by the king, Forgoll threatened Mongan with terrible incantations; and it was agreed that unless Mongan proved his assertion within three days, his queen should pass under the control of Forgoll. Mongan, however, had spoken truly and with certain secret knowledge, and felt sure of winning.
When the third day was almost expired and Forgoll had presented himself ready to claim the wager, there was heard coming in the distance the one whom Mongan awaited. It was Cailte himself, come from the Otherworld to bear testimony to the truthfulness of the king and to confound the audacious presumptions of the poet Forgoll. It was evening when he reached the palace. The king Mongan was seated on his throne, and the queen at his right full of fear about the outcome, and in front stood the poet Forgoll claiming the wager. No one knew the strange warrior as he entered the court, save the king.
Cailte, when fully informed of the quarrel and the wager, quickly announced so that all heard him distinctly, ‘The poet has lied!’ ‘You will regret those words,’ replied the poet. ‘What you say does not well become you,’ responded Cailte in turn, ‘for I will prove what I say.’ And straightway Cailte revealed this strange secret: that he had been one of the companions in arms under the great warrior Find, who was also his teacher, and that Mongan, the king before whom he spoke, was the reincarnation of Find:–
‘We were with thee,’ said Cailte, addressing the king. ‘We were with Find.’ ‘Know, however,’ replied Mongan, ‘that you do wrong in revealing a secret.’ But the warrior continued: ‘We were therefore with Find. We came from Scotland. We encountered Fothad Airgdech near here, on the shores of the Ollarba. We gave him furious battle. I cast my spear at him in such a manner that it passed through his body, and the iron point, detaching itself from the staff, became fixed in the earth on the other side of (p. 372) Fothad. Behold here [in my hand] the shaft of that spear. There will be found the bare rock from the top of which I let fly my weapon. There will be found a little further to the east the iron point sunken in the earth. There will be found again a little further, always to the east, the tomb of Fothad Airgdech. A coffin of stone covers his body; his two bracelets of silver, his two arm-rings, and his neck-torque of silver are in the coffin. Above the tomb rises a pillar-stone, and on the upper extremity of that stone which is planted in the earth one may read an inscription in ogam: Here reposes Fothad Airgdech; he was fighting against Find when Cailte slew him.’
And to the consternation of Forgoll, what this warrior who came from the Otherworld declared was true, for there were found the place indicated by him, the rock, the spear-head, the pillar-stone, the inscription, the coffin of stone, the body in it, and the jewellery. Thus Mongan gained the wager; and the secret of his life which he alone had known was revealed–he was Find re-born 1; and Cailte, his old pupil and warrior-companion, had come from the land of the dead to aid him 1:–’It was Cailte, Find’s foster-son, that had come to them. Mongan, however, was Find, though he would not let it be told.’ 1 But not only was Mongan an Irish king, he was also a god, the son of the Tuatha De Danann Manannan Mac Lir: ‘this Mongan is a son of Manannan Mac Lir, though he is called Mongan, son of Fiachna.’ 2 And so it is that long after their conquest the People of the Goddess Dana ruled their conquerors, for they took upon themselves human bodies, being born as the children of the kings of Mil’s Sons.
There are other episodes which show very clearly the relationship between Mongan incarnated in a human body and his divine father Manannan. Thus, ‘When Mongan was three nights old, Manannan came for him and took him with him to bring up in the Land of Promise, and vowed (p. 373) that he would not let him back into Ireland before he were twelve years of age.’ And after Mongan has become Ulster’s high king, Manannan comes to him to rouse him out of human slothfulness to a consciousness of his divine nature and mission, and of the need of action: Mongan and his wife were frittering away their time playing a game, when they beheld a dark black-tufted little cleric standing at the door-post, who said:–’”This inactivity in which thou art, O Mongan, is not an inactivity becoming a king of Ulster, not to go to avenge thy father on Fiachna the Black, son of Deman, though Dubh-Lacha may think it wrong to tell thee so. . . .” Mongan seized the kingship of Ulster, and the little cleric who had done the reason was Manannan the great and mighty.’ 1
In the ancient tale of the Voyage of Bran–probably composed in its present form during the eighth, possibly the seventh, century A. D.–there is another version of the Mongan Re-birth Story, which, being later in origin and composition than the Voyage itself, was undoubtedly clumsily inserted into the manuscript, as scholars think. 2 Therein, Mongan as the offspring of Manannan by the woman of Line-mag–quite after the theory of the Christian Incarnation–is described as ‘a fair man in a body of white clay’. This and what follows in the introductory quatrain show how early Celtic doctrines correspond to or else were originated by those of the Christians. And the transcriber seeing the parallels, glossed and altered the text which he copied by introducing Christian phraseology so as to fit it in with his own idea–altogether improbable–that the references are to the coming of Jesus Christ. The references are to Manannan and to the woman of Line-mag, who by him was to be the mother of Mongan–as Mary the wife of Joseph was the mother of Jesus Christ by God the Father:–
A noble salvation will come
From the King who has created us,
A white law will come over seas,
Besides being God, He will be man. (p. 374)
This shape, he on whom thou lookest,
Will come to thy parts;
‘Tis mine to journey to her house,
To the woman in Line-mag.
For it is Moninnan, the son of Ler,
From the chariot in the shape of a man,
. . . . . . .
He will delight the company of every fairy-knoll,
He will be the darling of every goodly land,
He will make known secrets–a course of wisdom–
In the world, without being feared.
To him is attributed the power of shape-shifting, which is not transmigration into animal forms, but a magical power exercised by him in a human body.
He will be throughout long ages
An hundred years in fair kingship
. . . . . .
Moninnan, the son of Ler
Will be his father, his tutor.
[paragraph continues] At his death
The white host (the angels or fairies) will take him under a wheel (chariot) of clouds
To the gathering where there is no sorrow. 1
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