In 1979, in the Italian Alps, a fledgling community of 28 began digging into a mountain at night…in secret..
The purpose was to build the largest underground temple in the world.
And sure enough, by the time they finished, years later, what they had done was enormous.
Nine ornate temples, on five different levels, linked by hundreds of meters of tunnel, built like a three-dimensional book that narrates the history of humanity through all kinds of art.
All underground.
That cathedral is known as the Temples of Humanity.
“Today it is the center of a reality, the historic center of Damanhur, the capital of the international federation with five communities, 1,500 people around the world,” Barys Elleboro, who was born in Damanhur and today is its ambassador, told BBC Reel. .
The ecovillage and spiritual community is named after the ancient Egyptian underground temple of Damanhur, meaning City of Light, dedicated to the mythical god Horus.
It is located 50 kilometers north of Turin, Italy, and was founded by Oberto Airaudi (1950-2013), who changed his name to Falco Tarassacose.
“Falco is considered by most of his disciples as an extraordinary creature,” said Stephania Palisano, professor of Sociology of Religion at the University of Turin.
For them, it isa man from the future who traveled back in time to carry out a ‘magical mission’ to save Earth and its inhabitants“he added.
disciples
And it is that, in their early years, the Damanhurians talked about what they called time travel experiments, using “travel cabins” that allowed those who had reached the highest level of enlightenment to become “temponauts”.
Falco claimed to have originated 600 years in the future and returned to save humanity from disaster.
He had also traveled into the distant past, and founded and encouraged the development of a colony that, under his leadership, would become the mythical civilization of Atlantis.
Despite the suspicion that this may generate in you, the truth is that, in the more recent past, it sowed the seeds of what became a community with its own philosophical way of life.
“Damanhur is unique in the world”, explained Palisano, who has studied the community for years.
“These are people who have decided to leave their comfort zone to join a difficult mission.”
“Falco encouraged this type of affiliation because, pursuing his ‘magical’ mission, he needed to build temples, where ‘magical technologies’ would reside,” said the sociologist.
Among those disciples is Antelope Verbena of Damanhur Academy, whose name reflects the group’s tradition of adopt the names of animals and plants.
“I came to live in Damanhur on April 1, 1985.
“My first day was interesting because at that point it was a place where you arrived and you had to leave all your things outside and start living in a reality that was very much like a kibbutz.”
Under Falco’s leadership, the first inhabitants of Damanhur began digging.
“We all participated in the construction of the temples in those years. It was our life.”
In secret
“For the first 15 years it was in secret, because in Italy there was no law that could allow the construction of private underground structures,” Elleboro says.
Furthermore, they feared that in a country as Catholic as Italy, a temple linked to another belief was rejected.
So they never applied for any planning permission, and went ahead with their project clandestinely.
Little by little, more people who shared that vision of creating that utopian society that respected and cared for the planet and others joined.
And, little by little, they were acquiring more properties.
To meet the needs of the community and earn a living, they established small cooperative businesses, which became bakeries, vineyards, bookstores, and stores.
The owners of these businesses, as well as those who were masons, artists, farmers, and craftsmen, worked during the day and dug quietly in shifts, year after year.
Despite all the precautions to hide what they were doing without authorization, in some still unexplained way the secret was revealed.
In July 1992, when much of the temple was finished, Damanhur was raided and the state prosecutor issued an ultimatum: “Show us the temples or we will blow up the whole hillside”.
With no other choice, Falco and his colleagues opened the secret door.
Endangered
“It was absolutely impossible to even think or imagine that an incredible and unimaginable world could open up behind such an anonymous wooden doorVerbena pointed out.
The prosecutor and three policemen toured the themed rooms with tall columns covered in gold leaf, and walls and ceilings profusely decorated with murals, mosaics, frescoes and crystals.
“It was incredible, they came with dynamite, but when they saw each chamber and began to understand the inherent wisdom contained, they were moved to tears,” said Damanhur resident Esperide Ananas, in her book “Damanhur: Temples of Humanity.”
“After seeing the nine cameras, we were told to continue with the artwork, but not to build any more.”
Over the next few years, the Damahurians fought a political and legal battle that ended in 1996 with official authorization to maintain and reopen their underground cathedral.
“We collected 100,000 signatures to help save the temples,” Ananas said.
“Temples are a hymn to humanity”Elleboro stated.
“Each room speaks of a different chapter of our life, our way of interacting with ourselves, with the environment, with time, with life and death.
“So they represent – from our point of view – an encyclopedia of human spirituality.”
* If you want to see the video “Damanhur: the world’s largest underground temple”Click here.
See original article on BBC
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