Cederberg - Journeys in the Kali yuga: a pilgrimage from esoteric India to pagan Europe

JOURNEYS IN
THE KALI YUGA

Often one has to travel far afield to the farthest edge to find out where one belongs. Aki Cederberg tells us the fascinating tale of his journey to the wild heart of mythical India, a journey that changed his life and led him back to his roots.

WOLF-DIETER STORL, PH.D., AUTHOR OF SHIVA: THE WILD GOD OF POWER AND ECSTASY

Cederberg has made the outer and inner journey from one end of the geography of tradition to the other, which is only an outer reflection of the inner journey many pilgrims make from the outer world to inner experience. What is remarkable about Cederbergs journey is that he, like Odysseus of old, found his way home again. The knowledge he gathered on his journeys gave him the tools he needed to discover the inner treasures of his own homeland. By reading this book you can gather some of this knowledge without ever going to India.

STEPHEN E. FLOWERS, AUTHOR OF ORIGINAL MAGIC: THE RITUALS AND INITIATIONS OF THE PERSIAN MAGI

From the erotic passion of Shiva to the surreal bliss of the Khumb Mela, Aki Cederberg chronicles his search for meaning in modern India. But, as he discovered, Pilgrimages have to come to an end. Ultimately, one must return homenot just physically but spiritually as well. His story of how his own native European gods called to him is powerful, beautiful, irresistible. This book bears an important message for our times and delivers it in a way that captivates the reader. I recommend Journeys in the Kali Yuga without reservation.

STEPHEN MCNALLEN, AUTHOR OF ASATRU: A NATIVE EUROPEAN SPIRITUALITY

Aki Cederberg is an outsider in the modern, spiritually barren West. His quest for a sense of spiritual place takes him to the exotic East. There he is an outsider as well but is allowed something close to an insiders participation in a living pagan religious tradition. Instead of satisfaction, he finds only more yearningfor the largely forgotten traditions of his own people. Cederbergs journeywhich makes for a highly colorful, absorbing talefunctions as a kind of initiation into those traditions. It is a journey home.

COLLIN CLEARY, AUTHOR OF WHAT IS A RUNE? AND OTHER ESSAYS

This book is as much a classical adventure story as it is a tale of genuine spiritual progress. Cederbergs travels in search of the roots of pagan/religious culture and how they affect us is both a personal vision quest and a wider speculation. Every plant has its roots, and Cederberg is generous to share his own roots exploration in such an eloquent way. The book is inspiring, intelligent, and a truly great read.

CARL ABRAHAMSSON, PUBLISHER AND AUTHOR OF OCCULTURE: THE UNSEEN FORCES THAT DRIVE CULTURE FORWARD

Unlike the congratulatory stories told by self-proclaimed gurus or superhero yoga masters, this is the spiritual autobiography of a guy like you or me whos just trying to figure it all out in a world that has lost its way.

JOSHUA BUCKLEY, EDITOR OF TYR: MYTH, CULTURE & TRADITION

Ever since the Beatles, India has had its fair share of spiritual tourists. Aki Cederberg is not one of them. The gurus and babas he described having encountered there obviously viewed him as a sincere spiritual pilgrim. His odyssey to the East seems best summed up in the lines of a poem by T. S. Eliot in Four Quartets: And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

ROBERT N. TAYLOR, MUSICIAN AND AUTHOR OF REMNANTS OF A SEASON

Aki Cederbergs Journeys in the Kali Yuga offers a visceral, gritty, and at times humorous account of the dreamlike world of Indian Naga Babas. A story of an ongoing search for something real in a world where the deepest concerns of human spirit have become mere commodities, this is a timely book about timeless topics.

MATTI RAUTANIEMI, AUTHOR AND YOGA HISTORIAN

Written in poetical prose that is sharp, witty, and honest, the book is a valuable offering to all seekers and pilgrims on the eternal search of self.

YOGANANDA PURI, NAGA SANNYASI

Whereas most Westerners drawn to Indian spirituality have an interest in yoga or meditation, it was his passion for magic that led Aki Cederberg to the Naga Babas. With a background within European pagan magic, he is particularly capable of appreciating the esoteric dimensions of the yoga traditiondimensions largely shunned within modern Western yoga.

CHRISTIAN MLLENHOFF, FOUNDER OF YOGA & MDITATION PARIS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you:

Shri Mahant Rampuri, Shri Mahant Mangalanand Puri and Surendra Puri, and all the Babas and sadhus, named and unnamed, of the Juna Akhara and beyond.

Ike Vil, Michael Moynihan, Carl Abrahamsson, Savitri Puri, Yogananda Puri, Vijaya and Lars, Christian Mllenhoff, Antti Haapapuro, Matti Rautaniemi, Justine Cederberg.

Jon Graham, my editor Laura Schlivek, Jeanie Levitan, Manzanita Carpenter Sanz, Erica B. Robinson, Patricia Rydle, Jill Rogers, and everyone else at Inner Traditions who has worked on the present book.

My mother, Anneli Kangas-Cederberg.

All fellow travelers and seekers, present and far away, with whom the journey has been shared.

Just as in the embrace of his beloved,
a man forgets the entire world,
all that exists within himself and without,
so in union with the Being of knowledge,
he no longer knows anything, either within or without.

UPANISHADS

Om Shri Ganeshaya Namaha

FOREWORD

For One Who Wanders Widely

By Michael Moynihan

IF THE HUMAN BEING is a Homo religiosus by nature, as so many signs suggest, then the impulse toward pilgrimagea sacred journey or a journey in search of the sacredmust be nearly as old as the human sense of the higher powers themselves. The whole notion of pilgrimage assumes that divine forces are not restricted to a supernatural realm, solely accessible through worship or prayer, but instead may be found lingering in particular places here on Earth. These sites, marked by the gods and their most ardent devotees, may be numinous features in the natural landscape such as mountains, groves, trees, lakes, wells, and waterways, or man-made structures like temples, altars, and shrines. In many cases, natural and man-made elements are brought together to amplify and concentrate the spirit(s) of a place.

Sacred sites are remarkably resilient, thus demonstrating their innate power. They often maintain their special status despite the seismic shifts in external religious belief and custom that can occur with the passage of time. Even in the Westwhere the past few millennia saw earlier polytheistic worldviews replaced by monotheistic Christianity, which gave way to a muddleheaded modernismsacred places can still be found dotted across the landscape. Some are as old as the Neolithic period.

Pilgrimage is an abiding feature of religions in the East and West. The Indian traditions of Hinduism and later Jainism recognize the action, yatra (pilgrimage), and the destination, tirtha (pilgrimage site or crossing-over place), terms that derive from ancient Sanskrit. Buddhists travel to the Mahabodhi Temple, the site of the bodhi tree under which Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment. For any able-bodied Muslim, a hajj (pilgrimage) to Mecca is a mandatory pillar of the faith. In pagan Scandinavia, the temple at Uppsala drew throngs of visitors who came from every part of Sweden to attend the great and bloody sacrificial feast that was held there every nine years. In late antiquity, Christians began making pilgrimages to the Holy Land. By the early Middle Ages, the city of Rome and its basilicas of the martyrs Peter and Paul had become a sacred destination for Christian pilgrims who traveled there from all parts of Europe and from as far away as Iceland. Common routes and roadmaps were developed for these pilgrimages, but the passages were beset with all manner of dangers. The journey itself would surely test a pilgrims faith; successfully completed, the pilgrimage was a testament to the steadfastness of that same faith.