Compendium of the Original Mysteries

Mystic treatise containing a marginalia of recipes

Think you that the high sages of the Azoturian Oraculum even need to eat? Those high souls of the mysteries? Hah! Who cares? You should stay here with us, brother. We've got soul food to spare.

— Mun-Ra of Azoturia

Spiritual Treatise
Language: Pimacan
Medium: Vellum Manuscript
Provenance: Late ninth-century PCE

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Summary

Though the Azoturian cult known as the Common Comrades of the Primordial Truth has been defunct for generations, its primary sacred text, Tazzi Naradu's Compendium of the Original Mysteries, still circulates as a source of wit, wisdom, and even useful tips for household management. Tazzi may have founded the Comrade cult as a spiritual leader, but he began his career as a hosteler with a passion for cookery. That zeal is intertwined with his spiritual fervor and works its way into his various dicts and sayings in the form of metaphors and aphorisms that play upon culinary motifs. The Compendium is liberally peppered with these rhetorical tropes.

I've heard it said that cupidity is the root of all evil. Maybe so! I know it can't help. When a rich man eats rich food it toxes him up in his innards. He can't digest properly. It takes a long time to get right again. It is the same with the spirit. When a man feeds his soul with vanities it can take a long time to get pure again.

— “Book I - On Relations," Compendium of the Original Mysteries

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The Manuscript

The original holograph Pimacan manuscript of the Compendium is believed to be written by the hand of one of Tazzi's close disciples. This ms. demonstrates advanced technical artistry compared to the barkskin codexes produced in Pimaca and Pachuco, for it is inscribed upon cow vellum in the style of Merikan mss. of the period (late ninth-century PCE).

The vellum codex includes a variety of marginalia including notes pertaining to specific dates and glosses explicating difficult passages. The hand is rushed and relatively messy and untrained compared with the work of the original scribe, and received lore indicates that these later inscriptions were made by the hand of Tazzi Naradu himself.

Further Reading

What? Should we fast and make ourselves bunkered out from hunger?

— “Tazzi's Prelude,” Compendium of the Original Mysteries

There are also recipes scrawled in certain sections of the text. These recipes detail the ingredients and instructions required to prepare a variety of meals. All of these recipes describe dishes that are in accordance with the Common Comrades' ascetic vegetarianism and so it appears they are intended to be served among the faithful, but the culinary marginalia includes no specific explanatory notes on when or why these meals ought to be prepared or eaten.

Most have made the obvious conjecture that the recipes are positioned in the margins of the codex to correspond with nearby text in the main body of the text. This assumption led many of the Comrade faithful to pair the preparation of marginalia dishes with readings or sermons on their corresponding passages from the main text. The act of reading a dictum from the compendium is coordinated with a digressive meal preparation during which the reader meditates on the text while performing recipe instructions.

A Sample from the Compendium

The following sample includes the beginning of the second book of the Compendium, a treatise on how to live an "Active Life," that means a life of spiritual devotion without seeking the seclusion of contemplative monastic life. The introduction on the active life is accompanied by a marginal note that includes the ingredients for cooking a sweet potato polenta bake.

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Here begins the second book of Tazzi's Compendium - Concerning the Active Life.

So be it.

Active life lies in love and charity showed outwardly in good bodily works, in fulfilling of divine commandments, and of deeds of mercy, bodily and spiritual, to our fellow comrades in faith. This life belongs to all worldly men and women that have riches and plenty of worldly goods and also to all others which either have position, or office, or authority over other men and have chattels to spend. Both learned and ignorant, layperson or clergy, and generally all worldly men are compelled to strive for perfection according to their ability and their knowledge, as reason and discretion require. He that has much, must do much. He that has little, may do little. He that has nothing must keep good will. These are works of active life, either bodily or ghostly.

A part of active life also lies in great bodily deeds which a man does alone, such as long vigils and other harsh penance-doing for to chastise the flesh with discretion for prior trespasses, and by such atonement to suppress superfluous lust and desire for conspicuous worldly goods, and make flesh obedient and ready to perform the will of Spirit! These works, though they pertain to the active life, they nonetheless greatly help and ordain a man to reach towards the contemplative life if they are used with discretion.

The City of the Phoenix is a high and noble goal of the active life. Many have sought it but none have obtained the prize, the golden city where the lord of lightnings and thunders dwells among the Wells of Titans. While contemplatives seek the sacred city in their dreams, those who live the active life can scour the jungles in worldly pursuit. The incomplete pilgrimage reminds us that the journey of spirit is no momentary distraction but a lifelong mission.

Sauce: 2 measures tomato crushed, 1/4 measure water, 1 spoon chilies crushed, 1 stir cumin, 1 stir dried oregano, 1/2 stir garlic powder, 1/4 stir salt, 1/8 stir cayenne pepper Peppers: 1 stir olive oil, 2 garlic cloves minced, 1 yellow onion chopped, 1 red pepper diced Bake: 1 polenta, 2 spoons water, 2 measures legumes, 1 yam thinly sliced, 1 measure shredded cheese Garnish with cilantro and avocado