Buddhism has traditionally credited the cat with a gift for meditation and the ability to see in the dark, which helped it drive away evil spirits. That is exactly why cats were kept in Buddhist temples. And as excellent mousers, of course.
There is a very beautiful legend about the appearance of the first Sacred Birman.
One of the Buddhist temples was guarded by a hundred white long-haired cats with yellow eyes. The monks worshipped the goddess Tsun Kyan Kse, and in the temple stood her golden statue with sapphire-blue eyes. It was believed that the goddess carried the souls of the departed into the afterlife, and that the souls of dead monks were reborn as cats living in the temple. The elder Mun Ha had a beautiful cat named Sinh.
One night the temple was attacked by robbers who wanted to steal the golden statue. The monks froze in terror before the bandits, and only Mun Ha rushed to defend the goddess from desecration. In the struggle he was mortally wounded and died at the foot of the statue. It seemed the deity could no longer be saved, but suddenly a strange cry stopped everyone.
Sinh stood on the head of the fallen Mun Ha, and a magical change came over him. The cat’s fur turned golden, his eyes lit up with the sky-blue of the goddess’s eyes, and the tips of his paws, buried in the monk’s white hair, became white as his holy grey locks.
Obeying the gaze of Sinh’s sapphire eyes, the monks drove the robbers away. The faithful cat remained motionless on his master’s head for seven days, then died, carrying Mun Ha’s soul to paradise. At that same moment all the cats in the temple began to change too. Their fur turned golden, and their eyes played with every shade of blue, from the colour of the deep sea to a clear light blue.
After that the monastery’s cats were considered sacred. They became the ancestors of today’s Sacred Birmans.