by Manjit Handa
Nothing retains the shape of what it was,
And Nature, always making old things new,
Proves nothing dies within the universe,
But takes another being in new forms.
What is called birth is change from what we were,
And death the shape of being left behind.
Though all things melt or grow from here to there,
Yet the same balance of the world remains.
"How many creatures walking on this earth
Have their first being in another form?
Yet one exists that is itself forever,
Reborn in ageless likeness through the years.
It is that bird Assyrians call the Phoenix,
Nor does he eat the common seeds and grasses,
But drinks the juice of rare, sweet-burning herbs.
When he has done five hundred years of living
He winds his nest high up a swaying palm-And delicate dainty claws prepare his bed
Of bark and spices, myrrh and cinnamon-And dies while incense lifts his soul away.
Then from his breast-or so the legend runs-A little Phoenix rises over him,
To live, they say, the next five hundred years.
When he is old enough in hardihood,
He lifts his crib (which is his father's tomb)
Midair above the tall palm wavering there
And journeys toward the city of the Sun,
Where in Sun's temple shines the Phoenix' nest."
As Ovid describes, the Phoenix comes from Assyria, but this bird is described at various places which includes its Chinese, Japanese, Egyptian, and Native American counterparts. The mysterious beginnings of the phoenix (also fenix or phenix) can be seen in its very name, a Greek word that also means "purple-red," "crimson," "date," "date palm," and "Phoenicia." The date palm continually renews itself, and Phoenicia is "the red land." Together, the several words suggest that the bird is associated with red and purple and comes from the East, land of the sunrise. Traditionally, the phoenix has been sacred to the Sun.
Fêng-Huang is the Chinese equivalent of the phoenix, has three legs and lives in the Sun. The Feng is the male and the Huang is the female, together symbolizing everlasting love. They have the head and comb of a pheasant and the feathers of a peacock. The plumage blends the five colors and the song of this bird constitutes a harmony of five notes.
The Ho-Oo is the Japanese counterpart. The Ho being the male bird, and the Oo the female. It comes to earth to do good deeds for people, and this appearance symbolizes the beginning of a new era. The bird then soars back to heaven anticipating a new era. The Ho-Oo is seen as a symbol of the royal family, representing the empress. It also symbolizes justice, fidelity and obedience.
The Benu or the Egyptian sun bird also comes close to the description of the phoenix. This bird is identified with Ra the sun god. The word Benu in Egyptian means purple heron and palm tree. Just like the phoenix, this bird was identified with the temple of the Sun god at Heliopolis.
Interestingly, all these birds are identified with the Sun and are very similar to the bird described by Ovid. However, the first mention of this bird was by Hesiod in the eighth century B.C., and the most detailed account is by the Greek historian Herodotus. He says, "I have not seen it myself, except in a picture. Part of his plumage is gold-coloured, and part crimson; and he is for the most part very much like an eagle in outline and bulk."
As Pliny recorded, a maggot is born from the bones of the older bird and grows into the younger phoenix. The Roman historian Tacitus said that the dying bird builds a nest and "infuses into it a germ of life."
If we coalesce all these descriptions, the Phoenix emerges as a large eagle or heron like bird with red, crimson, purple and gold feathers and is also known to have a melodious voice. It lives in a distant garden of flowers and crystal springs. When its wings become heavy with age, the bird builds a nest of spices, herbs and barks on the tree top of date palm. The heat of the sun ignites the twigs, and the phoenix stands in the flames with its outspread wings and burns to ashes. In the cool starlight a young phoenix is then formed from the remains of its parent. The re-born bird spreads its bright new wings with the rising sun and greets the day and when it has grown up and gained sufficient strength, it lifts its nest from the tree (its own cradle and its parent's sepulcher), and carries it to the city of Heliopolis (the city of the Sun, as Ovid describes it) in Egypt, and deposits it in the temple of the sun. Its own parent and its own child, the only one of its kind in the world, the aged phoenix dies and is reborn over and over again, through all eternity. It is supposed to live a long life which could be 500 years, 540 years, 1000 years, 1461 years or even 12994 years. The bird's legendary counterparts in China never die at all and live in the Land of the Immortals. This is the Phoenix as we know it, the bird that self-reincarnates from its own ashes.
By the fourth century A.D. the phoenix myth had changed so that the mature bird self-immolated after turning its nest into a funeral pyre. After three days, it "rose again". Thus the phoenix became identified with the resurrection of Christ and became a symbol of both immortality and life after death.
Myths and fables always have a lesson for us. Greatest of the mythical birds, the phoenix is the triumphant symbol of rebirth and renewal of the human spirit; it is mere ash (ounce?) of strength it takes to build and reconstruct all that is lost, once again. It is a patient task, takes the whole night of bad patch to revive, but the sun finally does dawn and before you know it, you soar high again. The cycle goes on. And on.
