Knights Templar
David Steel
Henry Lincoln(a self-proclaimed expert on the Templars) cites that
Baphomet makes a very good
cryptogram of the Hebrew for Sophia(Goddess of the feminine principle
and wisdom). Sophia was
revered by the gnostics also. On that score, all the books that come out
about the Templars:
"The Temples of the Knights of God"
"Murdered Magicians, the templars and their myth"
"Proceedings against the Templars in France and England for heresy
AD1307-1311"
"The Templars:Knights of God";ISBN 0892812214
All give varying pictures. Some books emphasize the Solomon's temple in
the masonic tradition. The reason for that is that they were called "The
poor fellow knights of Jesus Christ and the temple of Solomon".
In the 12th century(1118) the order was founded. The order was founded
along Cistercian lines hence the white cloak. The red cross is added to
the mantle later.
It is also necessary to explain about the Templar's themselves,
constituted in a very small part of knights. More numerous were the
clerics and the third group of craft workers, cooks, carpenters and
stonemasons etc. Clerics carried out the administration work of all
kinds, Knights did the fighting, the craft workers did the
fortifications etc and the order held rites of sanctuary. The order did
not contain many knights in relation to the other groups. It expanded
quite rapidly from its foundation. In the 200 year period from 1118-1310
a great deal in communications and work took place. Pilgrimmages,
travel, banking, organisation of people in boundaries, holy wars and
crusades entirely occupy this period and all enmesh the people of
Europe. There were great disruptions of material life and their are
colossal movements of mind and spirit underway. The Arthurian tales tell
us of an age of chivalry promoting the feminine as a symbol of the human
soul. The princess or soul trapped in the tower. The tower being
materialism. Freed by the Knight Errant. The sleeping princess held in a
state of enchantment in a stone castle in the middle of a dense wood is
awakened by a kiss(love conquers all). Vast sufferings and loss of life
during the crusades ultimately lead to failure and to the Saracens
retaining the holy land and the heart of Christianity ie.Jerusalem(the
holy city). And perhaps a question arose as to how could God allow such
a thing to happen.(Deliberate aggressive warfare is not really a
Christian ideal, but defensively okay). But the war was seen as the Holy
of holies. Had evil triumphed? The problem with the relationship with
spirit with matter was it was clearly interwoven with how evil entered
into this God created world. The juxtaposition of matter and
energy(spirit) clearly played a part in the manifestation of order and
chaos(good and evil). The gnostic belief of salvation though knowledge
that is by comprehension of the true nature of reality appealed to the
artisans, mystics and soldier monks. A new outlook was emerging-study of
Greek classics, alchemy, Babylonian mathematics,gnosticism and
neo-platonism. These began to reveal a sort of western mystery tradition
long suppressed by the church and also heralded the dawn of the age of
chivalry. Chivalry is a teaching system. There are many legends of
chivalry and man's veiled accounts of man's search for truth. These
beautiful stories are not merely folklore but are part of a once well
organised teaching process that involved an individual on the quest for
something remote and hidden(a treasure beyond price). Perhaps the best
know of this mystery teaching is the high history of the Sangreal.
Traditions of the Holy Grail and its connections to the Knights Templar
can be traced in many European authors and Parsifal the perfect
Knight(Wolfram Von Eschenbach) achieved a great deal of acclaim in the
13th century.
In fact Templesium, the Knighthood of the Grail and the Templar order
are practically indistinguishable in German mystical lore. The only
other possible contender for the title of Templesium understood to be
the Knights of San
Salvador de Montreal (1120) founded at the same time as the Templars and
possibly part of that order. They were later known as the order de San
Salvat. The knights had lent their name to the mysterious Mount Salvat
which stood the legendary castle of the Holy Grail. In the 14th century
a subsequent order had been founded by Bridget of Sweden known as the
Brigateen order. This order disguises the grail tradition in a Christian
guard. Centres of that order were in Scandanavia, Germany, Scotland,
Netherlands and San Diego de Compostella, Golithia, Spain- the most
popular and greatest centre of the Brigateen order. The nature of this
European gothic material is perhaps best understood in Eschenbach's epic
medieval poem Parsifal. Eschenbach wished to depict through his work the
Templar's as a Christian brotherhood seeking to create a kingdom of the
faithful (an elect of the Lord).
An institution outwith the Roman hierarchy free from the pope,
privileged priesthood and without the inquisition. A new body of
honourable mankind. Living without fear and where God himself would
allow revelation of the Grail and be King and judge of such a people.
Eschenbach considered the real and natural priesthood to belong to those
individuals who struggled towards a true affinity with God and not an
exclusive class of persons merely following the vocation of priests.
Finally he proclaimed for the templar's the idea of a perfect
constitutional brotherhood something which was heretical. It suggest
something distinct from both church and paganism. It also implied that
the quest for the grail kingdom alone led to salvation. Honour and glory
to the vanquisher of death. To the source of life eternal went the
phrase for the Grail. Just as the Knights of the Temple fought for the
Holy Sepulchre. So would the knighthood of the Grail fight their way
through death's dark veil to Mount Salvat (the Mount Royale in the Grail
Kingdom). If this mystic dream of such brotherhood could become a
practical reality then the political and religious institutions of
Europe would almost certainly undergo change.
But in 1307 such dreams became a nightmare of the repression due to
torture, death and arrest of the Templar order. The legends of the
Sangreal bore a message not of the usual Christian form but veiled in
the guise of chivalry. The true knight is not to seek war but the
kingdom spiritual. The temple is not made with human hands, but is
eternal in the heavens. The communion between God and man is complete.
Legends personify seekers of the grail as Ticheval the seeker of the
grail. He is a poor knight having war'd against the saracens(it is an
allegory against all godless materialism) gives his last to the poor and
needy. His courage and humility is marked with his piety and humility.
The perfect knight while one day walking in the wood comes face to face
with an angel who informs him that he is to be the guardian of the
mysterious chalice known as the holy grail. This he will find on Mount
Salvat. The knight is warned by the angel that he may speak of his quest
to no-one. Ticheval then ponders which direction he should take and
where Mount Salvat should be. Nobody to this day has found this mystical
place. The trials of Ticheval who possesses nothing, but his sword and
armour(and largely also allegorical) he passes through vast solitudes of
impenetrable woods, climbs jagged peaks, overcoming obstacles,
overcoming all barriers of faith and fortitude. Trusting all the while
in nothing but a small intangible cloudy light. This mystically leads
him onwards and finally clinging to the black rocks and gazing straight
ahead and scales the last possible height of Mount Salvat and there he
behold's a beam of radiant light. The Sangreal bourne in the air by
invisible hands. He raises his heart in passionate prayer so that he may
be found worthy enough to take up his charge as guardian. In a state of
rapture he then hears the spirits of a welcoming host of veteran knights
in shining armour.
The Sangreal as it seems so effervescent as it is beautiful soon
allegorically fades. The mystery tradition tells us that the Grail
vanishes from earthly view. Only when mankind becomes too materialistic
and too gross to obtain the wonder in its midsts. Because the grail
could no longer visibly sustain itself on the Earth. Ticheval conceived
the plan of building a worldy temple of great purity suitable for its
reception in a future and more spiritualized Earth. 'Legends of the
Middle Ages' pg.246-The knights who help build this mystic temple are
called templars as the legend tells us. There is an obvious similarity
between Ticheval's temple and King Solomon's temple can hardly be
overlooked. It has long been said that there exists a secret doctrine
for those who undertake and devote their lives for the search for the
grail. In this respect the Teutonic grail sagas of Germany are also
mirrored in the Celtic Arthurian cycle and in Spanish and French myths.
The grail is seen as the chalice of Christ's blood or the Celtic vessel
of resurrection. Allegorically it could be viewed as a secret gospel or
secret doctrine or a tradition of a spiritualized knighthood only giving
allegiance to divine kingship as embodied in the spirit of Ticheval and
his sacred mission. Through these teaching stories such knighthoods were
answerable only to God and not the man made institutions.
The chief function of the grail kingdom seems conceived to supply a
constant type of spiritualized person who can obviously govern worldly
society. Ideal and perfect knights trained and destined to become a
practical incorruptible civilizing power. Such knights not seen as a
passive spiritual force in humanity but also accurate and powerful in
the banishment of evil from this earth. The acquisition of high
conscience and natural personal nobility could not be reached other than
by the conquest of one's lower nature gained in this earthly field of
struggling and suffering where gross and godless materialism was the
tyrant giant the impossible barrier that the solitary knight must
overcome before the vision of the grail kingdom can become manifestly
visible. To sustain the poor fellow soldiers still fighting their way if
you like to self-realization in the ever the shadowy vision of the
mystical guardians led by the mystic king to whom is entrusted charge
the holy relic and teaching.
The earthly sights from which this invisible help operated was enshrined
in secrecy. Legend has it that so carefully secluded was the spot that
it could not by discovered other than by the aid of a higher power. And
that the Grail King still has communion with the gross material world
despatching the occasional faithful champion in cases of relentless
need. The belief in such occult intervention in the affairs of base man
was frowned upon by both the Vatican and state. Faiths and concepts
which lay beyond political and religious control were being accused of
being heresy and treason or both. The challenge to the Temple and the
religious authorities inherent in the idealized grail kingdom and
psychic inheritance seems very clear. But allied to the far flung
Templar institutions of the 13th century was the involvement of the age
of chivalry. The concept of sacrifice and emphases on honour, courtesy,
care of the poor and the weak. and the idealization of the feminine.
This new amalgam didn't fit in well with the totalitarian aims of
European history with its ethics of the jungle and wars of universal
homicide and the quest for political power. In 1307 the slaughter of the
Templar order suddenly eradicated the problem or did it?
The whole question of what happened after the Templar suppression is one
which I suppose occupied many scholars and those interested in the
occult. There is no question that some books teach that the Templars
fought at Bannockburn. It is a fact of life that the Templar suppression
was ordered everywhere in Europe except for the sole exception of
Portugal and Scotland where no order for suppression was ever issued. A
verdict of not proven was issued by the papal authorities in Scotland
headed by Bishop William Lamberton of St. Andrews. But the order in
Scotland lost its cloak, its insignia, its construction and property.
Its property consisted of 625 properties administered by clerics and
workers. The knights were a very small body. But only the knights were
charged with heresy. No charge is brought against clerics or fellow
craft but the disruption caused huge upheavals. Although you could
suggest perhaps that this underground movement did not die but continued
on. Rosycross (Rosicrucians) The individual founder member of this order
wandered the roads of Europe and founded the knowledge of alchemy. Its
symbols are similar to the templar symbols. However the templar order in
Scotland was demolished and handed over to the order of St John. Mystic
teachings of the Grail ie.Veil of Veronica and where Adam is buried were
of great interest to Madame Blavatsky. One of these were the occultic
paintings of the Scottish painter John Duncan another was the 1810
revival in Germany. A document 'Templars in Cyprus' produced in Germany
revealed the subject of matter and energy. The key which opens the
futures iron door and all the hidden caverns of the past and natures
most occult laboratory. Blavatsky stated that she believed the templars
were about:
1. Restoration of true Christianity
2. Freedom of thought and restoration of one universal religion
3. Sworn to a vow of obedience, poverty and chastity
The templars were the first true knights. The cross pointed to the four
corners of the compass and was recognized in all countries. In order to
avoid the persecution the Templars performed rituals in the greatest
secrecy. Ecclesiatical worship was carried out in chapels belonging to
the order. The main charges brought against the order were correct from
the standpoint of the Vatican of what the pope and his council believed
to be correct. The superior form of Christianity which the Templars
possessed could be described as a amalgamated from of free thought and
Theosophic outlook. Other Templar groups in Europe have developed
strange horrendous untruths. But the Scottish order remains true to most
of the original aims and purposes.