The three kings and the King: epiphany on the board

“A symbol, worthy of the name is that in which the

Archetype ‘s radiation predominates over its projection”.

Symbol & Archetype. Martin Lings

Quaternity has given me many exquisite moments, but what I am about to share stands among the most remarkable. It eloquently confirms something I wrote a few months ago—what was once just an intuition now feels more or less validated.

The game in question was highly unusual—not only because the application malfunctioned twice, but also due to the extraordinary final positioning of the pieces, which seemed to take on a symbolic configuration.

“However, I would not be surprised if what happens on the Quaternity board is 'only' a reflection of some real event ‘up there’ provoking, symbolically, a whole range of effects, ‘down here’”. 1

As seen in Fig. 1, moments before the final outcome, the game had already reached a decisive moment. Three armies were advancing against the green player, whose forces had been significantly reduced. With limited options left, Green found itself cornered, on the brink of checkmate. (Persian: shâh = king, Arabic: mât = is dead.)

Unlike White (myself) and Red (Anael), who had already engaged in direct attacks against Green (Inma), Black (Jorge) was still in the positioning phase, maneuvering towards the confrontation. Meanwhile, Red and White were actively competing for the final checkmate.

There was a curious malfunction in the application, which occurred even earlier than what is shown in the image: the sudden appearance of a second green queen in J2.

This anomaly caught my attention because it had never happened before. Even if it was merely a technical glitch, it felt unusually significant. The first thought that came to mind was that Inma was the only woman playing—and also the least experienced of the four. Yet, somehow, the board now showed an almost orchestrated situation, where the three of us appeared to be simultaneously advancing against her army.

Perhaps, for this very reason, she was receiving extra help? I wondered, recalling what I like to call “the wind of Divinity”—or even “the twist of fate.”

Despite the error, we continued playing, and I decided to take a screenshot so I could report the issue to the programmers later.

Curiously, when I captured the image, the cursor of my mouse—normally a circle instead of an arrow—appeared as a blue halo over the white pawn that was about to be promoted.

At this point, White and Red were competing to deliver the final checkmate. The outcome was triggered when White’s pawn, promoting to a queen on L1, placed the Green king in check. However, this turned out to be a miscalculation on White’s part—one that ultimately worked in favor of the Red army.

Red’s queen, moving immediately after White, sealed the checkmate in J3. (Fig. 2)

The next move should have belonged to Black. But another error in the application occurred—this time, reducing Black’s time to zero, abruptly halting the game and preventing us from continuing.

Once again, my antennae were telling me that something special had happened. I had the distinct feeling that we had just witnessed something, something that had manifested in front of our eyes—yet, as the creator of this game would say, it was hiding in plain sight.

Then, the word Epiphany came to mind... (from the Greek: ἐπιφάνεια, meaning ‘manifestation,’ but also ‘apparition’ or ‘Divine presence’).

Checking the chat, I saw that Carlos, who had been watching the game, had also made a connection—like me, he associated the magical appearance of the second Green queen with the Three Kings, as if it were a gift ‘fallen from heaven’ for Inma, the Green player, who had been struggling and seemed destined for defeat.

Sandra, who was also watching, jokingly remarked, “That queen has a life of her own!”

It was becoming increasingly clear that the Green queen and king had been guided, protected—perhaps even inspired—by a ‘Green Apparition.’

And then, a deeper realization struck me. I began to associate this presence with the Holy Spirit, or Khidr, ‘the Green’—perhaps even the same hidden principle in different forms.

Ibn Arabi, in 'The Wisdom of the Prophets', identifies the Spirit with the Archangel Gabriel:

“When the 'faithful Spirit' (ar-ruh al-amin), that is, Gabriel, appeared to Mary 'in the form of a harmonious man'”. 2

“...then we sent unto her Our Spirit, which appeared unto her, and it assumed for her the likeness of a perfect man”. 3

“He said, 'I am only the messenger of your Lord, charged to grace you with a pure son”. 4

I took another screenshot, and what I saw on the board was striking—what appeared to be a symbolic Nativity scene, represented by the white pawn, wrapped in a halo of blue light (compare Figs. 1 and 3), making its way toward the corner of the green territory—the manger, where the child would soon be placed after birth (square L1).

I have yet to explore the potential connection between the chess notation system and the Abjad system—that is, the symbolic correspondence between the meaning of the pieces, their positions on the board (both in terms of letters and numbers), and their interactions with one another. Such an investigation would be an extensive study in itself.

However, one detail stands out: in a purely phonetic sense, the square where the promotion of the white pawn—or rather, its birth—takes place is L1. Phonetically, in Spanish, “L” (El) sounds like the pronoun He—which, in Arabic, corresponds to Hu or Ahad, meaning The One.

This suggests that the transformation of the white pawn—a piece symbolically linked to purity—into a queen represents the very moment of the birth of Jesus.

But this raises a question: Shouldn’t the pawn have been transformed into a king—‘King Jesus’—rather than a queen?

The answer may lie in the roles already represented on the board: the green king was symbolically portraying Joseph, the green queen as Mary.

So why a queen instead of a king?

We must remember that, in the original game of Chess, before the queen was introduced, there was another piece—the vizier. The vizier was the king’s closest advisor, his deputy or caliph, second in power. When Chess was brought to Europe, the vizier was replaced by the queen, fundamentally altering the dynamic of the game.

“Among the many mysteries of chess history, one of the most intriguing is how and why the vizier of the Middle East was replaced by the queen when the game came to Western Europe in the late 11th century”. 5

“In Oriental chess, the 'queen' is not a queen, but an 'advisor' or 'minister' of the king (in Arabic mudabbi or wezir)”. 6

Thus, when promoting, the pawn would not simply become a queen in the conventional sense but rather a vizier, a deputy to the king. The term deputy or vice-regent has been used in sacred scriptures to describe the prophets, who serve as God’s vice-regents on Earth, beginning with Adam himself.

It was after these seemingly random reflections that I suddenly realised something remarkable: the name of our friend Inma, who commanded the green army, is an abbreviation of Immaculada, the very name by which the Virgin Mary is remembered. From this, the connection to the Immaculate Conception of Jesus became unmistakable.

And then another layer of meaning emerged.

Inma’s surname, Puente, Spanish for “Bridge,” reinforces Mary’s role as a bridge, a vehicle for the coming of Jesus. In some apocryphal scriptures, Mary is even referred to as a gate.

And what of the three red queens?

They would be none other than the Three Wise Men—Melchior, Gaspar, and Balthasar—journeying from afar to witness and honor the birth of Isa ibn Maryam, Jesus, son of Mary, as he is known in Arabic.

Even the spatial arrangement of the game aligns with this idea. The red army, positioned diagonally opposite the green army, is the farthest from it, mirroring the journey of the Magi, who came from the East to pay homage to the newborn child. 7

“In its most universal meaning, the figurative combat of the game of chess represents the combat of the devas with the asuras, the 'gods' with the 'titans', or the 'angels' with the 'demons', all other meanings of the game being derived from it”. 8

These other derived meanings to which Burckhardt alludes must refer not only to the implications of the struggle between light and darkness but also to what follows once one has prevailed over the other. In this case, it would signify the arrival of an inspired prophet, a presence of supreme luminosity meant to correct what had been distorted and restore sovereign law and divine justice to humanity.

To leave no doubt that the event had been fully consummated, with nothing left to add or remove, the application stopped at the exact moment when all of this unfolded on the board.

As if these coincidences were not proof enough, their timing and setting added further significance. It happened on a Thursday night, a day of special importance in the Sufi tradition, and on January 7th, just hours after the Christian celebration of the Epiphany. Moreover, it occurred in the territory of the green pieces, a color strongly associated with Sufism.

In Revelation of the Magi: The Lost Tale of the Wise Men by Brent Landau, based on a fourth-century apocryphal manuscript, it is said that the radiance of the star that guided the Magi to Jerusalem was "many times greater than the sun" and that "each of them saw the star-child in a different form," suggesting that the child and the star were one. (Fig.3)

“If the meaning of the different pieces of the game is transposed into the spiritual order, the king will be the heart or spirit and the other figures will be like the various faculties of the soul”. 9

If we accept that traditional chess has a symbolic dimension, with each piece representing a specific function within a pre-established harmonic order, then it should not be surprising that their interaction on the board—especially in Quaternity, where possibilities expand geometrically—can generate an almost infinite range of symbolic patterns, including, perhaps, even the occasional "failure" of the application.

If the laws of the cosmos are reflected in the game and reenacted during play, it follows that certain significant events might also manifest symbolically on the board. Recognizing them, however, requires a heightened awareness and a perceptive eye.

“Alfonso ‘the Wise’ (13th. c.) also speaks of a 'great game of chess' played on a board measuring 12 x 12 squares, the pieces of which represent mythological animals, attributing it to the sages of India”. 10

The birth or awakening of a new energy or faculty, as Wes Jamroz describes it, along with any other internal process of spiritual significance, can be portrayed within a simple game of Quaternity. Just as a photograph captures a landscape or moment onto a sheet of paper, the game can serve as both a symbol and a reminder of the event and the time it occurred.

Adoration of the Magi. Gentile da Fabriano. 1423

"From the point of view of the game observer, there are no winners or losers. There is only a constructive process leading to the formation of a new faculty. It is in this way that those who are watching the game can become familiar with the various stages of activation of the inner structure of the human mind". 11

Rather than a mere battle between the forces of good and evil, the arrival of the three armies in the green territory could symbolise the fulfillment of a summons—a universal celebration. Each one, like a wise king, presents its own offering to the Messiah: gold, incense, and myrrh—symbols of majesty, sacredness, and the endurance of the soul in the face of mortality.

Some might argue that I am projecting meaning onto events where none exist. Yet an intuitive impulse led me to believe that there was something here—something to recognize, decipher, and contemplate. This was not a mere coincidence, nor does it need to be classified as a miracle.

Perhaps it is simply what P. Beneito refers to when he quotes Ibn Arabi…

"Ibn Arabi says: "There is nothing else in manifestation, there is nothing else but God manifesting himself, making himself present in a theophanic form". What constitutes a veil here is that we do not have a symbolic awareness that allows us to recognise the theophany. The point is to realise that what you are contemplating is the theophany. Symbolic awareness allows us to recognise it”.

It's as simple as that. 👼🏼

Notes:

1: “Understanding the Game”, J. R.

2: “The Wisdom of the Prophets”, Ibn Arabi (p.86)

3: “Quran”, XIX, 17

4: “Quran”, XIX, 19

5: “A History of Chess: from Chaturanga to the present day”, Yuri Averbakh (p. 58)

6: “Symbols”, The symbolism of Chess, Titus Burckhardt (p.14)

7: “Among the Dervishes”, The followers of Jesus, Michael Burke (p.105)

9: “Symbols”, The symbolism of Chess, Titus Burckhardt (p.23)

8: “Symbols”, The symbolism of Chess, Titus Burckhardt (p.15)

10: “Symbols”, The symbolism of Chess, Titus Burckhardt (p.18)

11: “He who tastes not, knows not”, Wes Jamroz

J. Romano

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