Perlesvaus
“Arriving at the chapel of the Grail, the king tethers his horse and goes to enter, but something prevents him, and all he can do is watch from outside (this is a typical event in the quest where those deemed unworthy are prevented from entering). What he sees is remarkable: …looking towards the altar…at the hermit’s right hand he could see the most beautiful child that ever a man beheld: he was dressed in an alb, with a golden crown on his head laden with precious stones, which shone with a brilliant light. To the left was a lady so beautiful that no beauty in the world could match hers. And…the lady took her son and sat on the right-hand side of the altar upon a huge, richly carven chair, setting her son on her knee and kissing him gently. “Sire,” she said, “you are my father, and my son, and my lord, and my guardian, and guardian of everyone…” And when the hermit began to sing mass, the king could hear the voices of angels answering; and when the holy Gospel was read, the king looked towards the altar and saw the lady take her child and offer him to the blessed hermit…And when the child was offered to him he placed him on the altar; then began the sacrament…it seemed to him that the hermit was holding in his arms a man, bleeding from his side, bleeding from his hands and feet and crowned with thorns; he could see him quite clearly.”
“Later in Perlesvaus the king visits the Grail Castle, along with Perceval, where we learn that at that time there was no chalice in the land of King Arthur. The Grail appeared at the consecration in five forms, but they should not be revealed, for the secrets of the sacrament none should tell save he who God has granted grace. But King Arthur saw all the transubstantiations, and last appeared the chalice; and the hermit who was conducting the mass found a memorandum upon the consecration cloth, and the letters declared that God wanted His body to be sacrificed in such a vessel in remembrance of Him.110 This is a clear reference to the central mystery of the Mass, but why was it felt necessary to set forth what reads as the origins of that mystery if it was available upon every altar in the land? 111 The only reasonable explanation seems to be that the Grail romances were indeed seen as offering an alternative spiritual path. The reference to the “secrets of the sacrament” also implies a body of secret teaching. Elsewhere, in the Vulgate quest, we get a further hint, where the author receives the story he is writing in a small book handed to him by Christ himself—perhaps even written by him. This implies a deeper awareness of the mysteries underlying Christianity and shows just how profoundly the authors of the romance tradition saw into the heart of the Arthurian Grail myths.”
- Arthurian Magic, John Matthews, Virginia Chandler