Commenting on our new page on The Feast of Lights, La Petite Sorciere writes:

I have often heard the Daughter's Taking on of Fate equated to Quan Yin's Vow. I am sure this is correct, but I have a question. Quan Yin's vow is not to enter Buddhahood (oneness with the Divine) until every being is saved "even to the last blade of grass". However the Daughter, while She goes down unto death, is ultimately raised up as Queen of Heaven. Can you shed more light on this?

Thank you for raising this point. What we must bear in mind here is that Myths, which are far profounder than mere terrestrial history, are in fact four-dimensional snapshots of Realities that lie beyond dimensionality - in other words, Transcendent events presented to our understanding as if they were events in time and space. Since we are space/time-bound creatures this is the only way we can perceive them. The primary difference between the "angle" or "perspective" of the Quan Yin story and the Gospel is that of time. In the first place Quan Yin is seen (at least partially) as a human who attains Buddhahood, but refuses it, while the Daughter is Divine from the beginning. Now in fact, Quan Yin is a Goddess assimilated into Buddhism, but even leaving this aside and speaking purely within the logic, or "economy", of Buddhism, the difference between the two perspectives is illusory. Once a being has attained full and ultimate Buddhahood she is Divine and is (one with) the only God that Buddhism acknowledges (and we accept this as a valid Spiritual perspective, although not ours). So the refusal of Buddhahood and the separation of the Daughter from the Mother are two ways of expressing the same thing: the paradoxical separation of the Divine from the Divine, for the salvation of beings. The Daughter is certainly raised up as Queen of Heaven after Her Resurrection, but She remains the Daughter. She is not assimilated into the Mother. And She is the Preserver of the Worlds. It is only through Her that the Mother's creation may continue in existence. She will continue to sustain the worlds, and to guide Her children, until all beings are reunited with the Mother, "even to the last blade of grass". We may also note that the original perspective is never far from the surface. In folk-tales about Quan Yin, She is indeed killed, descends to Hell, liberates the souls there and rises again. While these may be dismissed by High Buddhism as mere peasant tales (or more likely by arrogant Western scholarly Buddhists - eastern Buddhists tend to have more respect and more understanding of the subtleties of spirituality) - what they show is the ultimate unity of the two perspectives.