from
Mystae
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The Baphomet
Rumors and Charges
An Abominated Idol
"Public indignation was aroused by...charges
of ...worshipping the devil in the form of an idol called Baphomet."
Baphomet was "the Templar symbol of Gnostic rites based on phallic
worship and the power of directed will. The androgynous figure with a
goat's beard and cloven hooves is linked to the horned god of antiquity,
the goat of Mendes."
- Peter Tompkins, The Magic of
Obelisks
"Some confessed that they had also
worshipped an idol in the form of a cat, witch was red, or gray, or
black, or mottled. Sometimes the idol worship required kissing the cat
below the tail. Sometimes the cat was greased with the fat from roasted
babies. The Templars were forced to eat food that contained the ashes of
dead Templars, a form of witchcraft that passed on the courage of the
fallen knights."
- John J. Robinson, Dungeon, Fire
and Sword (1991)
In the list of charges drawn up by the
Inquisition against the Templars on 12 August 1308, there appears the
following:
"Item, that in each province the order
had idols, namely heads, of which some had three races and some one,
and others had a human skull.
Item, that they adored these idols or that idol, and especially in
their great chapters and assemblies.
Item, that they venerated (them).
Item, that (they venerated them) as God.
Item, that (they venerated them) as their Savior....
Item, that they said that the head could save them.
Item, that [it could] make riches.
Item, that it made the trees flower.
Item, that [it made] the land germinate.
Item, that they surrounded or touched each head of the aforesaid
idols with small cords, which they wore around themselves next to
the shirt or the flesh.
Item, that in his reception, the aforesaid small cords or some
lengths of them were given to each of the brethren.
Item, that they did this in veneration of an idol.
Item, that they (the receptors) enjoined them (the postulants) on
oath not to reveal the aforesaid to anyone."
- The Articles of the
Accusations
An Eastern Origin?
"...They bestowed worship in their chapter
on a heathen idol, variously described as to its physical
characteristics, but known as a 'Baphomet', which etymologically was the
same word [in Old French] as 'Mohammed'. [Once or twice the form Mahomet
is actually used by witnesses in the trial.] Like so many persecuted
heretical groups of the past, they were said to hold their chapters only
secretly and at night."
"It was impossible for the Templars to have 'picked up in the East' the
practice of worshipping an idol bearing the name of the Prophet
Mohammed, since no such idol existed anywhere in the Levant, even among
breakaway sects such as the Ismailis or the Druse. The idea that Muslims
were idolaters was itself a part of another system of 'smears', the
pejorative representation of the oriental world by western Christians."
- Peter Partner, The Murdered
Magicians
"Probably relying upon contemporary Eastern sources, Western scholars
have recently supposed that 'Bafomet' has no connection with Mohammed,
but could well be a corruption of the Arabic abufihamet (pronounced in
the Moorish Spanish something like bufihimat). The word means 'father of
understanding.' In Arabic, 'father' is taken to mean 'source, chief seat
of,' and so on. In Sufi terminology, ras el-fahmat (head of knowledge)
means the mentation of man after undergoing refinement - the transmuted
consciousness."
- Idries Shah, The Sufis
Sufi martyr Husayn ibn Mansur al-Hallaj died in 922CE. He was "a
pantheist, an alleged miracle worker, and a most definitely unorthodox
Muslim, Hallaj was imprisoned and tried for blasphemy for his public
descriptions of his mystical union with God. Finally convicted after a
nine year inquiry, Hallaj was maimed, crucified, beheaded, and his torso
was cremated. Some of the stories surrounding his death include an
account of the Caliph's Queen Mother having Hallaj's head preserved as a
relic (Singh, 1970). Various Sufi sects have rituals commemorating
Hallaj's death, and Shah claimed that Hallaj was the model for the
'Hiram Abiff' character in the Master Mason initiation ritual."
Hallaj "according to the medieval Islamic poet and historian Farid
al-Din Attar, turns out to have been known by several titles beginning
with abu-....Could the charge that the Templars 'worshipped a head
called Baphomet' not have had some factual basis, namely the
commemoration of a decapitated Sufi martyr whose head became a relic and
who had been given the sobriquet abufihamet? The only problem here is
that despite all the other abu- titles belonging to Hallaj, there is no
known documentation linking him to abufihamet."
- Frater Baraka, IV, "Baphomet: A
'Mystery' Solved At Last?"
A Gnostic Origin?
"Another theory suggests that Baphomet is a
compound of the words 'baphe' (baptism) and 'metis' (wisdom) ...Both
theories imply the Templars were worshipping, or at least privy to, a
secret knowledge. Several commentators believed this points to the
Templars having been gnostics ('gnosis' meaning knowing)."
- Encounters magazine, issue 11:
45
A Bearded Head
The Brothers Testimony
The idol was described by Philip the
Fair as:
"...a man's head with a large beard, which
head they kiss and worship at all their provincial chapters, but this
not all the brothers know, save only the Grand Master and the old ones."
- Philip's instructions to his
seneschals
During The Trial of the Templars in 1307
Brother Jean Taillefer of Genay gave evidence.
He,
"was received into the order at Mormant, one
of the three perceptories under the jurisdiction of the Grand Priory of
Champagne at Voulaine. He said at his initiation 'an idol representing a
human face' was placed on the altar before him. Hughes de Bure, another
Burgundian from a daughter house of Voulaine, described how the 'head'
was taken out of a cupboard, or aumbry, in the chapel, and that it
seemed to him to be of gold or silver, and to represent the head of a
man with a long beard. Brother Pierre d'Arbley suspected that the 'idol'
had two faces, and his kinsman Guillaume d'Arbley made the point that
the 'idol' itself, as distinct from copies, was exhibited at general
chapters, implying that it was only shown to senior members of the order
on special occasions."
"The treasurer of the Paris temple, Jean de Turn, spoke of a painted
head in the form of a picture, which he had adored at one of these
chapters."
"Nearly all the brethren agreed that the head was bearded and had long
hair, and the Templars, like the majority of their contemporaries,
regarded long hair as effeminate, so the length of the 'idol's hair was
remarkable for this, if for no other reason."
- Noel Currer-Briggs, The Shroud
and the Grail - A Modern Quest for the True Grail
According to the most consistent accounts, the
idol was:
"...about the natural size of a man's head,
with a very fierce-looking face and beard."
- Deposition of Jean Tallefer
"He went on to say that he could not describe it more particularly,
except that he thought it was of a reddish color."
- Ian Wilson, The Shroud of Turin
- The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?
The mysterious object at one of the Templars'
Paris ceremonies was,
"brought in by the priest in a procession of
the brethren with lights; it was laid on the altar; it was a human head
without any silver or gold, very pale and discolored, with a grizzled
beard like a Templars."
- Stephen of Troyes
"Other descriptions, clearly referring to
copies, included mention of gold and silver cases, wooden panels, and
the like. But the Paris head is different. One gets the distinct
impression that this was the holy of holies, accorded ceremonial
strikingly reminiscent of that used by the Byzantines."
- Ian Wilson, The Shroud of Turin
- The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?
The Templar Cord
"In the Inquisition evidence there are
several references to members of the order receiving on initiation a
little cord that had been in contact with the 'head'."
- Ian Wilson, The Shroud of Turin
- The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?
Upon being initiated into the Order of the Peacock Angel (Yezidis), "a
holy thread, of intertwined black and red wool, is put around the neck.
Like the sacred thread of the Parsis and other ancient Middle Eastern
cults, this must never be removed; and it sounds like the cord that the
Templars were accused of wearing when the Order was suppressed as
heretic."
- Arkon Daraul, Secret Societies
Theories About the
Head
Alchemists' symbol
Caput Mortuum
(the dead head)
John the Baptist?
It is possible that the head idol was
intended to represent the severed head of John the Baptist, based on
allegations that he was revered by the Order.
The Templars took part in the
sack of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade in 1203-4. Robert de Clari
described the opulence and numerous relics at the sacred chapel of the
Boucoleon Palace, amongst them supposedly the head of John the Baptist.
An egregore is a magical entity that is artificially created by the
focused thoughts and desires of a medium (analogous in many ways to Tibetan
tulpas.)
Supposedly a medium or statue could then serve
as a tenant for the egregore, nourished by the sexual life-powers of the
members.
"The Egregora does [sic] exist in the
so-called 'astral plane' and it is a
demon, that is to say, an illusory
entity. It is not a true Microcosm, but a gestalt of vitalized shells, a
focus for everything that is negative, defeatist, maudlin, bigoted,
introverted in human nature - a morass completely hostile to progress
and to the spiritual evolution of mankind."
- Marcel Ramos Motta (from P. R.
Koenig below)
"The representation of the egregore as bust recalls the ancient literary
tradition of animated statues or Salome, who wanted the head of John the
Baptist, probably to master his visionary powers.....The classic
prototype of such an egregore is Baphomet, the alleged egregore of the
Templars, who was (as the Roman Emperor of the Gods) likewise worshipped
in the form of a bust. In the secret statutes of the Templars, Baphomet
was besought with the introduction to the Qu'ran and dismissed with the
24th chapter of the
Book of Sirach."
- P. R. Koenig, "Too Hot to
Handle"
A Likeness of the Lord?
Another possibility as to the identity of the Baphomet may lie with
Nicodemus, who in the Gospel of John who brought spices for Christ's burial.
He is also mentioned in the apocryphal Evangelium Nicodemi (4th C.) as a
ruler of the Jews who testified in Christ's favor.
The Interpolation in the First Continuation of
Chrétien's Perceval (12??) tells of the flight of Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea to England and includes the following intriguing passage:
"Nicodemus had carved and fashioned a head
in the likeness of the Lord on the day that he had seen Him on the
cross. But of this I am sure, that the Lord God set His hand to the
shaping of it, as they say; for no man ever saw one like it nor could it
be made by human hands. Most of you who have been at Lucca know it and
have seen it."
- Interpolation in the First
Continuation of Chrétien's Perceval
The Skull of Hugues de Payen?
"Another possibility for the origin of the
Head relates to the imagery on the first Grand Master's shield, which
consisted of three black heads on a gold field. After about two hundred
years, it is plausible that this head imagery could have worked itself
into the legend of the Baphomet. According to more than one account, the
Head was the actual skull of Hugues de Payen, which was preserved as an
object of veneration."
- Forrest Jackson, "The Baphomet
in History and Symbolism"
The Mandylion/Shroud of Turin?
"Surely this evidence [given by Templars at
their trial] suggests that copies of the head, perhaps some of them not
unlike the Sainte Face de Laon, others of carved stone or alabaster,
such as those of the Nottingham School of the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries, were widely distributed throughout the order's houses. This
would at least explain why nothing resembling a pagan idol was found
after the brethren had been arrested, and why none of the pictures found
in their chapels raised so much as an eyebrow."
- Noel Currer-Briggs, The Shroud
and the Grail - A Modern Quest for the True Grail
The idol was also described as:
"...An old piece of skin, as though all
embalmed and like polished cloth."
- Chronicles of St. Denis
Ian Wilson also hypothesizes that the Templar
idols were representations of Christ's face copied from the Mandylion/Shroud.
A possible surviving example, on a painted panel
found at Templecombe (image below), England, shows,
"a bearded male head, with a reddish beard, life-size, disembodied, and, above all, lacking in any identification
mark.... It conforms too, to some of the most rational Templar
descriptions: 'a painting on a plaque', 'a bearded male head', 'life-size',
'with a grizzled beard like a Templars'. (The Templars cultivated their
beards in the style of Christ)."
- Ian Wilson, The Shroud of Turin
- The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?
A Daemon Guardian?
"...The descriptions given of it [the
Baphomet] varied wildly. The physical characteristics assigned to the 'Baphomet'
seemed to come either from the maufé or demon of northern folklore, or
from church reliquaries. It was often said to represent a cat, a beast
traditionally associated with witchcraft and heresy."
- Peter Partner, The Murdered
Magicians
"INQUISITOR: Now tell us about the head.
BROTHER RAOUL: Well, the head. I've seen it at seven chapters held by
Brother Hugh de Peraud and others.
INQUISITOR: What did one do to worship it?
BROTHER RAOUL: Well, it was like this. It was presented, and everyone
threw himself on the ground, pushed back his cowl, and worshipped it.
INQUISITOR: What was its face like?
BROTHER RAOUL: Terrible. It seemed to me that it was the face of a
demon, of a maufé [evil spirit]. Every time I saw it I was filled with
such terror I could scarcely look at it, trembling in all my members."
- from M. Michelet, Procés des
Templiers
Based upon the idol's description as a "demon"
having "very fierce-looking face and beard", the idol very likely could have
been Asmodeus, the "daemon guardian" who helped Solomon build his Temple.
A statue of the demon guards the door of the
parish church at Rennes-le-Château.
"The Templars' stronghold in Jerusalem, the
site of their foundation, was finally overrun by the Moslems in 1244.
Thirty-three years later the victorious sultan, Baibars, inspected their
castle and is recorded to have discovered inside the tower 'a great
idol, in whose protection the castle had been placed: according to the
Frank who had given it its name [this is an unreadable word, made in
diacritic letters]. He ordered this to be destroyed and a mihrab [Moslem
prayer niche] constructed in its place."
- Ian Wilson, The Shroud of Turin
- The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?
A Feminine Origin?
CAPUT LVIIIm
"...We found indisputable evidence for the
charge of secret ceremonies involving a head of some kind. Indeed the
existence of such a head proved to be one of the dominant themes running
through the Inquisition records.... Among the confiscated goods of the
Paris preceptory a reliquary in the shape of a woman's head was found.
It was hinged on top, and contained what appeared to have been relics of
a peculiar kind."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
The reliquary was:
"A great head of gilded silver, most
beautiful, and constituting the image of a woman. Inside were two head
bones, wrapped in a cloth of white linen, with another red cloth around
it. A label was attached, on which was written the legend CAPUT LVIIIm.
The bones inside were those of a rather small woman."
- Oursel, Le Procés des Templiers
"Caput LVIIIm - 'Head 58m' - remains a baffling enigma. But it is worth
noting that the 'm' may not be an 'm' at all, but the astrological
symbol for Virgo."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
"The number 58 is less puzzling if one remembers that five (5) is the
number of the pentagram and eight (8) is indicative of Isis. We may now
complete the simple equation which exposes her secret number:
5 X 8 = 40 = 58 - 18 ISIS
"The numbers 5 and 8 are also exhibited in the beliefs of the 'Brothers
of the Rose Cross', where the rose is constructed with a centre of five
petals, surrounded by eight petals."
- David Wood, GENISIS (1986)
"That it had a feminine origin is shown by Gerald Massey who writes
'METE was the BAPHOMET or mother of breath'. According to Von Hammer,
the formula of faith inscribed on a chalice belonging to the Templars is
as follows: Let METE be exalted who causes all things to bud and
blossom, it is our root; it is one and seven; it is octinimous, the
eight-fold name."
- Kenneth Grant, Nightside of Eden
Skull & Crossbones
Cults of the Severed Head
"Herodotus (4:26) speaks of the practice in
the obscure Issedones of gilding a head and sacrificing to it. Cleomenes
of Sparta is said to have preserved the head of Archonides in honey and
consulted it before undertaking an important task. Several vases of the
fourth century BC in Etruria depict scenes of persons interrogating
oracular heads. And the severed head of the rustic Carians which
continues to 'speak' is mentioned derisively by Aristotle."
- Julian Jaynes, The Origin of
Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind
A
similar tradition could be found in the Celtic cult of the severed head
which figured predominantly in Peredur, a Welsh romance about the Holy
Grail.
"A great lady of Maraclea was loved by a
Templar, a Lord of Sidon; but she died in her youth, and on the night of
her burial, this wicked lover crept to the grave, dug up her body and
violated it. Then a voice from the void bade him return in nine months
time for he would find a son. He obeyed the injunction and at the
appointed time he opened the grave again and found a head on the leg
bones of the skeleton (skull and crossbones). The same voice bade him
'guard it well, for it would be the giver of all good things', and so he
carried it away with him."
- Ward, Freemasonry and the
Ancient Gods
"One chronicler cites the name of the woman in the story - Yse, which
would seem quite clearly to derive from Isis."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
"At one time there was only God. He was all omnipotent and existed
alone. This caused him to become discontented, thus he split himself in
two in order to create a mate. He kept the elements of Order and Logic
for his own being and gave his mate the elements of Chaos and Emotion
for her being. Her name is Yse (pron. Issa).
She became so overwhelmed
with love at her creation that when he kissed her, she gave him a
reaction which was to become known as the 'Chosen Response'. The Chosen
Response was the first acknowledgement and reaction of love between a
male and female in the universe, and this became the greatest secret of
and mystery of mankind, being 'The Holy Grail'."
- Synopsis from the Merovingian
Bible, "Angels Among Us! The Gnostic (Johannine) Christian Path"
Use of the Atbash Cipher
Dr. Hugh Schonfield in The Essene Odyssey
"had discovered a system of cryptography - he called it the 'Atbash
Cipher' - which had been used to conceal certain names in Essene/Zadokite/Nazarene
texts. This system of coding figured, for example, in a number of the
scrolls found at Qumran."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Messianic Legacy
Schonfield "showed that by applying the Hebrew Atbash code to the name
Baphomet, the name Sophia [ShVPIA], female wisdom, is revealed. Sophia
is equated with Isis by Plutarch."
- David Wood, Genisis
Isis's magic was allied to the wisdom of the
Egyptian god Thoth. His wife or consort, Nehemaut, was known to the Gnostics
as Sophia.
"By this analysis, therefore, when the
Templars worshipped Baphomet what they were really doing was worshipping
the principle of Wisdom."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
"From the Templars' use of the Atbash Cipher, it is probable that some
form of Nazarean or neo-Nazarean sect had continued to survive in the
Middle East as late as the twelfth century, and had made its teachings
available to the West."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Messianic Legacy
The Black Virgin
"Plutarch compares Isis to knowledge, and
Typhon to ignorance, obscuring the light of the sacred doctrine whose
blaze lights the soul of the Initiate. No gift of the gods, he holds, is
so precious as the knowledge of the Truth, and that of the Nature of the
gods, so far as our limited capacities allow us to rise toward them."
- General Albert Pike, Morals and
Dogma
"The great Egyptian goddess Isis, often depicted as a black woman, is
inextricably linked with alchemy and is closely associated with the
Black Madonnas of Europe."
- Lynn Picknett & Clive Prince,
Turin Shroud - In Whose Image? The Shocking Truth Unveiled
"The ankh [the looped cross of Egypt] which Isis carries as supreme
initiatrix may account for some of the oddly-shaped scepters carried by
the Black Virgins who, like Isis, often favor the color green. Their
greeness and blackness points to the beginning of the opus whose secret,
according to alchemists, is to be found in 'the sex of Isis'."
-Ean Begg, The Cult of the Black
Virgin
"The Black Virgin... is Isis and her name is Notre Dame de Lumiére."
- Pierre Plantard de St Clair
(former Grand Master of the Priory of Sion)
"The Templars, imprisoned and awaiting death in the Castle of Chinon... composed
a prayer to Our Lady acknowledging Bernard to be the founder of her
religion. In addition to the numerous hymns and sermons he addressed to
her, he wrote about 280 sermons on the theme of the Song of Songs, the
epithalamion of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, whose versicle 'I am
black, but I am beautiful, O ye daughters of Jerusalem' is the recurring
refrain of the Black Virgin cult."
-Ean Begg, The Cult of the Black
Virgin
"I am black, but beautiful, daughters of Jerusalem. Like the black tents
of Cedar, like the pavilions of Solomon."
- Song of Songs 1:5-6
Most of the several hundred statues in France
known as
Black Madonnas were accidentally darkened by smoke and fumes from
votive candles. Others were originally constructed of a dark wood like ebony
(and later pear) or deliberately darkened through periodic treatment with
oil or wine. Syrian, Coptic, or Ethiopian images transported to France
during the Crusades may have served as prototypes for the Black Madonnas.
Black represented the color of earth - the source of fertility and life, or
divine flesh, or sorrow. Many effigies of goddesses were black including
Isis, Diana and Cybele. From early on in Christianity, the Bride of the Song
symbolized the Church and the Virgin Mary.
Churches of the Black Virgin often bore the name of Mary Magdalene. In 1247,
Emperor Baldwin II (who helped establish the Templars in Jerusalem)
exchanged pieces of the Shroud of Turin with the Abbey of Vézelay for the
purported body of Mary Magdalene. A secret tradition states that the
Magdalene was Jesus' wife and bore Jesus' offspring to Southern France.
There she was revered as a medium of occult
revelation.
The Hidden Legacy of the Templars
Deep into Africa
Prester John
"In the year 1145, the German bishop Otto of
Freising reported in his Chronicon a most astonishing epistle. The Pope,
he reported, had received a letter from a Christian ruler of India,
whose existence had been totally unknown until then. And that king had
affirmed in his letter that the River of Paradise was indeed located in
his realm.
"Bishop Otto named as the intermediary, through whom the Pope had
received the epistle, Bishop Hugh of Gebal, a town on the Mediterranean
cost of Syria. The ruler, it was reported, was named John the Elder or,
being a priest, Prester John. He was reputedly a lineal descendant of
the Magi who had visited Christ the child. He defeated the Muslim kings
of Persia, and formed a thriving Christian kingdom in the lands of the
Ends of Earth."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
"Prester John is a corruption of Presbyter John - the Apostle John -
even in the Gospel, it says that a rumor had arisen that John would
never die, but that this was not true. Combine that with the several
emperor Johns of Byzantium, at a time with Europe was threatened by
Muslim invasion, and it becomes conflated into a rumor of hope of
assistance."
- Steve.Schaper (@cheswicks.toadnet.org)
"...No sooner had Bishop Otto reported the existence of Prester John and
of the River of Paradise in his realm, then the Pope issued a formal
call for the resumption of the Crusades. Two years later, in 1147,
Emperor Conrad of Germany, accompanied by other rulers and many nobles,
launched the Second Crusade.
"As the fortunes of the Crusaders rose and fell, Europe was swept anew
by word from Prester John and his promises of aid. According to
chroniclers of those days, Prester John sent in 1165 a letter to the
Byzantine emperor, to the Holy Roman emperor, and to lesser kings, in
which he declared his definite intention to come to the Holy Land with
his armies. Again his realm was described in glowing terms, as befits
the place where the River of Paradise - indeed, the Gates of Paradise -
were situated."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
"If indeed you wish to know wherein consist our great power, then
believe without doubting that I, Prester John...exceed in riches,
virtue, and power all creatures who dwell under heaven. Seventy-two
kings pay tribute to me. I am a devout Christian and everywhere protect
the Christians of our empire...We have made a vow to visit the sepulcher
of our Lord with a very great army...to wage war against and chastise
the enemies of the cross of Christ...
"Our magnificence dominates the Three Indias, and extends to Farther
India, where the body of St. Thomas the Apostle rests. It reaches
through the desert toward the place of the rising sun, and continues
through the valley of deserted Babylon close by the Tower of Babel..."
- Prester John in a letter
addressed to Manuel Commentus, Emperor of Byznatium (1165)
"Where was Prester John? His reference to the Apostle Thomas' tomb
pointed to India, but so muddled were medieval notions of geography that
India was thought to be somewhere near the Nile; thus when, in 1177, the
Pope wrote to PresterJohn, his letter was presumably carried into
'Middle India', or Ethiopia."
- Mysteries of the Past
"Harbay, reigning Zagwe monarch of Ethiopia before his brother Lalibela
deposed him, is deduced to have been the mythical Prester John. "Derived
from Jano, a reddish-purple toga worn only by royalty, the word [Jan]
meant 'king' or 'Majesty'..."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
Prester John's letter also contained a warning
against the Templars, who were believed to have been allied with his brother
against him.
"There are Frenchmen among you, of your
lineage and from our retinue, who hold with the Saracens. You confide in
them and trust in them that they should and will help you, but they are
false and treacherous...may you be brave and of great courage and, pray,
do not forget to put to death those treacherous Templars."
- Prester John in the letter
written to varous Christian kings (1165)
The Churches of Lalibela
In Parzival,
"a member of the Grail Company...spoke,
amongst other things, of riding 'deep into Africa...past the Rohas'. ...Rohas
was the old name for a town in the remotest highlands of Ethiopia - a
town now called Lalibela in honor of the great king who was born there
and who made it his capital when he returned to it in triumph in the
year of our Lord 1185... Lalibela had spent the previous quarter of a
century in Jerusalem rubbing shoulder with the knights of a
military-religious order whose headquarters stood on the site of the
Temple of Solomon - knights who would have had a special interest in any
contender to the throne of a country which claimed to possess the lost
Ark that the Temple had originally been built to house."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
"Writing was seen on the Gral to the effect that any Templar whom God
should bestow on a distant people...must forbid them to ask his name or
lineage, but must help them gain their rights. When such a question is
put to him the people there cannot keep him any longer."
"If a land should lose its lord, and its people see the hand of God in
it and ask for a new lord from the Gral Company, their prayer is
granted... God sends the men out in secret."
- Wolfram von Eschenbach, Parzival
Ethiopia's diplomatic relationship with
Christian Europe were to continue into the following century.
"It is known that this emperor [Wedem Ara'ad
of Ethiopia] in the...year of our salvation 1306 sent thirty envoys
[who]...presented themselves reverentially before Pope Clement V at
Avignon."
- Giovanni da Carignano (a Genoese
cartographer active during the years 1291-1329)
"By a considerable margin, the eleven rock-hewn churches of Lalibela
were the most architecturally advanced building that Ethiopia had ever
known (indeed, in the considered opinion of UNESCO, they deserved to be
ranked amongst the wonders of the world.).... Towering edifices, the
churches remain places of living worship eight hundred years after they
were built. It is important to stress, however that they were not built
at all in the conventional sense, but instead were excavated and hewn
directly out of the solid red volcanic tuff on which they stand. In
consequence, they seem superhuman - not only in scale, but also in
workmanship and in conception."
"...Considerable efforts have been made to cloak their real natures:
some lie almost completely concealed within deep trenches, whole others
hide in the open mouths of huge quarried caves. Connecting them all is a
complex and bewildering labyrinth of tunnels and narrow passageways with
offset crypts, grottoes and galleries - a cool, lichen-enshrouded,
subterranean world, shaded and damp, silent but for the faint echoes of
distant footfalls and priests and deacons go about their timeless
business."
On the arch "of the ceiling of the rock-hewn church of Saint
Mary's...can be seen a stylized croix pattée contained within a Star of
David - a most unusual symbol in a Christian place of worship, but one
to which it is known that the Knights Templar were particularly
attached. Behind the arch...[is]a cloth-wrapped column said by the
priests to have been engraved by King Lalibela himself with the secrets
of how the rock-hewn churches were made."
Another croix pattée is carved on a boulder
on the outskirts of Axum, and several more can be found "in the ruins of
King Kaleb's palace - a structure that could well have been still
standing and inhabited in the thirteenth century."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
Portugal: The Knights of
Christ
"In Portugal, the Templars were cleared by
an inquiry and simply modified their name, becoming the Knights of
Christ. They survived under this title well into the sixteenth century,
their maritime explorations leaving an indelible mark on history.
(Vasco da Gama was a Knight of Christ; Prince Henry the Navigator was a grand
Master of the Order. Ships of the Knights of Christ sailed under the Templars' familiar red
patte cross. And it was under the same cross that
Columbus's three caravels crossed the Atlantic to the New World.
Columbus himself was married to the daughter of a former Grand Master of
the Order, and had access to his father-in-law's charts and diaries.)
- Baigent & Leigh, The Temple and
the Lodge
"...The first and most active figure on whom any solid information is
available was Prince Henry the navigator, Grand master of the Order of
Christ and a man described by his biographer [Zurara] as possessing
'strength of hear and keenness of mind to a very excellent
degree...[who] was, beyond comparison, ambitious of achieving great and
lofty deeds."
"Born in 1394, and actively involved in seafaring by 1415, Henry's
greatest ambition - as he himself declared - was that he would 'have
knowledge of the land of Prester John'. Chroniclers who were his
contemporaries, as well as modern historians, are in full agreement that
he devoted the greater part of his illustrious career to the pursuit of
precisely this goal."
"It is notable that he immersed himself in the study of mathematics and
cosmography, 'the course of the heavens and astrology', and that he was
constantly surrounded by Jewish doctors and astronomers - men in every
was reminiscent of Wolfram's character Flegetanis who 'saw hidden
secrets in the constellations [and] declared there was a thing called
the Gral whose name he read in the stars without more ado' [Parzival ]."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
In Portugal, Dom Enrique, mestrat of the Knights of Christ became know
as Enrique the Navigator and "exploited every modern method. At Sagres
his staff included geographers, shipwrights, linguists, Jewish
cartographers and Moorish pilots. The team studied map making and how to
improve navigational instruments, the astrolabe and compass.
Islam had
conquered the Spains; Christianity would conquer Africa, then Asia. By
1425 his brethren had colonized Madeira and the Canaries. In 1445 they
settled the Azores. The systematic exploitation of the west African
coast began in 1434, made possible by the new caravels, the most
seaworthy ships of their day. Rigged with many small sails instead of
one or two huge spreads of canvas as hitherto, these new ships were much
easier to handle - a smaller crew make provisions last longer."
- Desmond Seward, The Monks of War
"Our knowledge of the Henrican voyages is inadequate, and this is
largely due to the adoption of a policy of secrecy which included the
suppression of facts...historical works...nautical guides, maps
instructions to navigators and their reports."
- Edgar Prestage, The Portugese
Pioneers
"Indeed, so great was the commitment to secrecy in Henry's time that the
release of information on the results of the various exploratory voyages
that were undertaken was punishable by death. Despite this, however, it
is known that the prince was obsessed with the notion of making direct
contact with Ethiopia - and that he sought to achieve this end by
circumnavigating Africa (since the shorter route through the
Mediterranean and then into the Red Sea via Egypt was blocked by hostile
Muslim forces). Moreover, even before the Cape of Good Hope was rounded,
the masters of Portuguese vessels venturing down the West African coast
were instructed to enquire after 'Prester John' to see whether it might
mot be quicker to approach his kingdom overland."
"It was not until the early years of the twentieth century that certain
secret archives pertaining to the last decade of his life came to light.
Among these archives a brief note was found to the effect that 'an
ambassador of Prester John visited Lisbon eight years before Henry's
death'. It is not known what the purpose of this mission was, or what
the prince and the Ethiopian envoy discussed. Nevertheless, two years
after their meeting it can hardly have been accidental that King Alfonso
V of Portugal granted spiritual jurisdiction over Ethiopia to the Order
of Christ."
In 1487 "King John II of Portugal, then Grand Master of the Order, had
sent his trusted aide Pero de Covilhan on a perilous journey to the
court of Prester John via the Mediterranean, Egypt and the Red Sea.
Disguised as a merchant, Covilhan passed through Alexandria and Cairo to
Suakin and there, in 1488, he took ship in a small Arab barque for the
Yemeni port of Aden. He then became caught up in various adventures
which delayed him considerably.
As a result it was not until 1493 that
he finally succeeded in entering Abyssinia. Once there, however, he made
his way immediately to the emperor's court where he was first welcomed
but later paced under comfortable house arrest. One can only speculate
as to why this happened, but...Covilhan's greatest skill was a spy (he
had previously worked as a secret agent in Spain)..."
In 1497 Vasco da Gama, also a Knight of the Order of Christ "devoted a
considerable part of the expedition [to India] to African exploration
and is reported to have wept for joy when, at anchor off Mozambique he
was rightly told that Prester John lived in the interior far to the
north."
"...the first official Portuguese embassy to the court of Prester John
landed at the port of Massawa in 1520 and made its way inland [in a
grueling eight month march] to meet with Lebna Dengel, the Solomic
emperor who had been on the throne since 1508.
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
"We saw...to our great joy the tents and camps of the Emperor Prester
John."
- Captain of the Portuguese
expedition (October 20, 1520)
"At the center of this tent capitol, in a red pavilion guarded by
warriors wearing lion skins and by live lions on leashes, the travelers
beheld him, the negus, or emperor, of Ethiopia. That neither he nor any
of his subjects had heard of Prester John fazed the Portuguese not at
all, so elated were they to have found him at last."
- Mysteries of the Past
"One of the members of this embassy was Father Francisco Alvarez...who
had been told by priests of the ancient tradition that the rock-hewn
churches of Lalibela had been 'made by white men'....Carved into the
roof of this great edifice [the church of Saint George], he said, was 'a
double cross, that is, one within the other like the crosses of the
Order of Christ."
- Graham Hancock, The Sign and the
Seal
Spain: "Viva la Muerte"
"In Spain the brethren of Calatrava,
Alcantara and Santiago were the spearhead of the Reconquista,
consolidating the Christian advance, destroying the exotic Moslem
civilization of Cordoba and Granada. On the vast and lonely meseta where
no peasant dared settle for fear of Moorish raiders, the monkish
frontiersmen ranched hears of cattle and sheep, a practice which reached
North America by way; of the Mexican haciendas. In the later Middle Ages
politicians used them to capture the whole machinery of Castilian
government."
"They were the perfected instrument of five
centuries of warfare with Islam, given their final shape by the Templars'
example."
"Much of Spanish history cannot be understood without some knowledge of
the brethren [which became the Order of Knight's of Christ and The
Aragonese Order of Montesa after the dissolution. They had become the Reconquista itself and helped form their country's military tradition,
that compound of unspeakable ferocity and incredible gallantry,
expressed in the modern Tercio Extrajero's motto - 'Viva la Muerte'. It
was this spirit and the techniques of the Reconquista which overcame
Aztecs and Incas, creating the Spanish Empire, while Portuguese brethren
transformed the crusading idea into a movement of colonization which
ended with Europe dominating the world."
- Desmond Seward, The Monks of War
"Not long after the Templar dispersal, very accurate and inexplicable
sea-charts began to appear all over Europe. These maps, called portolans
(thought to be derived from 'port' to 'land'), were far superior to the
Ptolemaic maps studied by academic ecclesiastics in the monasteries and
fledgling universities. Most of the portolans covered the area of the
Mediterranean and the European Atlantic coast. They covered the areas
crucial to European sea-commerce.
"The earliest dated portolan chart is the
Opicinis de Canestris map of
the Mediterranean of 1335 A.D. It demonstrates that maps of inexplicable
accuracy began to appear in Europe less than 25 years after King
Philippe's surprise raids against the Templars and the papal elimination
of the Order under Clement V."
"...Is it mere coincidence that his flagship, the famous Santa Maria,
bore Templar crosses on her sails when Columbus set sail from Palos? Is
it mere coincidence that his voyage was financed, not by the sale of
Isabella's jewelry as so commonly thought, but by a mysterious
consortium of wealthy men which included Jews and other heretics? And is
it only coincidence that Columbus weighed anchor on August 3, 1492 just
a few hours before the deadline for all Jews to be out of Spain?"
- Michael Bradley, Holy Grail
Across the Atlantic
England - The Peasants'
Rebellion
For several years before the Peasants'
Revolt in England in 1381, "a group of disgruntled priests of the lower
clergy had traveled the towns, preaching against the riches and
corruption of the church. During the months before the uprising, secret
meetings had been held throughout central England by men weaving a
network of communication. After the revolt was put down, rebel leaders
confessed to being agents of a great Society, said to be based in
London."
"Another mystery was the concentrated and especially vicious attacks on
the religious order of the Knights Hospitaller of St. John, now known as
the Knights of Malta. Not only did the rebels seek out their properties
for vandalism and fire, but their prior was dragged from the Tower of
London to have his head struck off [along with the Archbishop of
Canterbury and the Treasurer] and placed on London Bridge, to the
delight of the cheering mob.....One captured rebel leader, when asked
the reasons for the revolt, said, 'First, and above all...the
destruction of the Hospitallers.'"
"Pope Clement V had directed that all of the extensive properties of the
Templars should be given to the Hospitallers" almost seventy years
before the Peasant's Revolt."
Walter the Tyler "exploded into English history with his mysterious
uncontested appointment as the supreme commander of the Peasants'
Rebellion on Friday, June 7, 1381, and left it as abruptly when his head
was struck off eight days later on Saturday, June 15. Absolutely nothing
is known of him before those eight days. That alone suggests that he was
not using his real name...In Freemasonry the Tyler, who must be a Master
Mason, is the sentry, the sergeant-at-arms..."
"Archbishop Courtenay, who became the leading churchman in England as
successor to the archbishop whose head had been lopped off by Wat Tyler,
identified the existence of the Lollard group in the spring of 1382,
less than a year after the Peasants' Rebellion. He drove them out of
Oxford and attempted to crush the entire movement. Lollardy, however,
survived his efforts, and those of other civil and church leaders, for
the next two centuries by the expedient of going underground. The
Lollards conducted business in 'conventicles', or secret meetings, in a
network of cells throughout the country, and they somehow gained the
support of certain members of the aristocracy, especially the knightly
class."
- John J. Robinson, Born in Blood
"In the early 1300s John Wycliffe, a professor of Divinity at Oxford
University, realized that the major problem with the Church in England
was that the Bible could only be read by the educated clergy and
nobility because it was written in Latin. Although the common man was
generally illiterate, Wycliffe decided that if an English translation of
the Bible was available, then general literacy might be stimulated as
well.
"As Wycliffe translated the Latin text, he organized a group called the
Order of Poor Preachers. They began distributing the new Bible
through-out England to anyone who could read. For the first time, it was
possible for the common man to know what the Bible actually said.
Suddenly, peasants flocked to the village greens and country parsonages
to hear preachers read aloud from the new English translation.
"Opponents of Wycliffe's Order of Poor Preachers called them and their
followers 'Lollards', which means 'idle babblers'. The Lollards grew so
quickly, not only among the country folk, but even the artisans and
noblemen that one opponent wrote: 'Every second man one meets is a
Lollard'.
"The Lollards made such an impact in Britain that eventually Wycliffe's
words were banned and the Pope ordered him to Rome to undergo trial.
Although Wycliff died in 1384 of a stroke before he could undertake the
journey, Lollardy continued to grow. By 1425, forty-one years after his
death, the Roman Church was so infuriated with Wycliffe that they
ordered his bones exhumed and buried together with 200 books he had
written."
- William T. Still, New World
Order
Scotland - The Scots
Guard
"The church at Kilmartin, near Loch Awe in
Argyll, contains many examples of Templar graves and tomb carvings
showing Templar figures; furthermore, there are many masonic graves in
the churchyard."
"...There was a strong Templar connection with this area of Scotland
from the time when Hugues de Payen married Catherine de St Clair. In
fact the first Templar perceptory outside the Holy Land was built on St
Clair land at a site to the south of Edinburgh now known as Temple. By
the beginning of the fourteenth century the Templars had many estates in
Scotland and a great deal of affection and respect from the people."
The Templars reportedly provided assistance
to William Wallace. "...There was a battle between the Scots and the
English at Roslin in 1303 which was won with the support of Templar
knights, led by a St Clair."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
"Scotland...was at war with England at the time [1307], and the
consequent chaos left little opportunity for implementing legal
niceties. Thus the Papal Bulls dissolving the Order were never
proclaimed in Scotland - and in Scotland, therefore, the Order was never
technically dissolved."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
"...Part of the Templar fleet made the decision to head to Argyll and
the Firth of Forth, where they knew Robert the Bruce was engaged in a
rebellion against England. The fact that Robert the Bruce was
excommunicated combined with the long St Clair family links with Rosslyn
was the greatest attraction of Scotland as a sanctuary - it was one of
the few places on the planet where the Pope could not get at them.
Because of the war with the English the Templars also knew that as
skilled warriors, they would be received with open arms."
"The Scots' greatest triumph was the Battle
of Bannockburn on 6 November 1314. The battle is recorded as going
strongly against Bruce's army until an intervention by a unknown reserve
force quickly turned the tide of the whole battle and ensured victory
for the Scots. Stories quickly spread that these mysterious warriors had
carried the Beausant (the battle flag of the Templars)."
The force was "led by the Grand Master of the Scottish Templars, Sir
William St Clair."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
"According to legend - and there is evidence to support it - the Order
maintained itself as a coherent body in Scotland for another four
centuries."
- Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The
Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
"At the bloody Battle of Verneuil in 1424, the Scottish contingents had
acquitted themselves with particular bravery and self-sacrifice. Indeed,
they were virtually annihilated, along with their commander, John
Stewart..."
"The new French army created by Charles VII in 1445 consisted of fifteen
'compagnies d'ordonnance' of 660 men each - a total of 9000 soldiers. Of
these, the Scottish Company - the 'Compagnie des Gendarmes Ecossois'...was
explicitly accorded premier rank over all other military units and
formations, and would, for example, pass first in all parades. The
commanding officer of the Scottish Company was also granted the rank of
'premier Master of Camp of French Cavalry'."
"In 1474, the numbers were definitely fixed - seventy-seven men plus
their commander in the King's Guard, and twenty-five men plus their
commander in the King's Bodyguard. With striking consistency, officers
and commanders of the Scots Guard were also made members of the Order of
St Michael, a branch of which was later established in Scotland.
"The Scots Guard were, in effect, a neo-Templar institution, much more
so than such purely chivalric orders as the Garter, the Star and the
Golden Fleece."
"The nobles comprising the Guard were heirs to original Templar
traditions. They were the means by which these traditions were returned
to France and planted there, to bear fruit some two centuries later. At
the same time, their contact with the houses of Guise and Lorraine
exposed them in France to another corpus of 'esoteric' tradition. Some
of this corpus had already found its way back to Scotland through Marie
de Guis's marriage to James V, but some of it was also to be brought
back by the families constituting the Scots Guard. The resulting amalgam
was to provide the true nucleus for a later order - the Freemasons
[Scottish Rite Freemasonry]."
"As late as the end of the sixteenth century, no fewer than 519 sites in
Scotland were listed by the Hospitallers as 'Terrae Templariae' - part,
that is, of the self-contained and separately administered Templar
patrimony."
- Baigent & Leigh, The Temple and
the Lodge
"c.1560. When the Knights-Templars were deprived of their patrimonial
interest through the instrumentality of their Grand-Master Sir James
Sandilands, they drew off in a body, with David Seton, Grand Prior of
Scotland, at their head."
- A History of the Family of Seton
West to America?
"Josephus, the historian of the Jews in the
first century, observed that the Essenes believed that good souls have
their inhabitation beyond the ocean, in a region that is neither
oppressed with storms of rain or snow nor with intense heat, but
refreshed by the gentle breathing of the west wind which perpetually
blows from the ocean.
This idyllic land across the sea to the west (or
sometimes the north), is a belief common to many cultures, from the Jews
to the Greeks to the Celts. The Mandeans, however, believe that the
inhabitants of this far land are so pure that mortal eyes will not see
them and that this place is marked by a star, the name of which is 'Merica'."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
Knight and Lomas argue that this was the true
source of the name "America". Historical convention, of course, states that
the continent was named after Amerigo Vespucci.
This was, Knight and Lomas say, is due to an
error committed by an obscure monk in the Duchy of Loraine who had mused
over a meaning for 'America' and confused it with the amateur navigator.
"Now, these parts of the earth (Europe,
Africa, Asia) have been more extensively explored and a fourth part has
been discovered by Amerigo Vespucci (as will be described in what
follows). Insomuch as both Europe and Asia received their names from
women, I see no reason why any one should justly object to calling this
part Amerige (from the Greek 'ge' meaning 'land of'), i.e., the land of
Amerigo, or America, after Amerigo, its discoverer, a man of great
ability."
- Cosmographiae Introductio
When the monk published the information in
Introduction to Cosmography it quickly became part of popular folklore.
"If you look at a map of the road network of
France, which the Templars had built and policed, it is very noticeable
that all the great long-distance routes meet at one point - at La
Rochelle, on the Atlantic coast. The harbour of La Rochelle lies in a
natural bay, is easy to defend, and it was laid out and developed by the
Templars very early in their history.
Furthermore, the Order owned a
huge fleet, and other seaports in the north, for links with England, and
in the south, as a starting-point for voyages to the Holy Land and the
Mediterranean islands. La Rochelle, however, is far too far north to
serve as a viable port of embarkation for Palestine, and the same
applies to voyages to England. For this purpose, it was far too far
south. There were other ports from which one could cross to Britain far
more quickly and simply.
"For this reason, La Rochelle must have had some very special
significance. The town was not merely the seat of a simple Commanderie,
but also the capital of a Templar Province. Its population grew quickly
over the years. In which direction did the Temple's shipping lines lead,
if it was neither to the north nor to the south? There can only be one
possible explanation for the position of this seaport - the Order's
ships set course from it due west, to America."
"After Napoleon conquered Rome in 1809, some files were brought back to
Paris from the secret archives of the Vatican. Among these were a few
documents relating to the Templar trials. In one of these records was
the statement of Jean de Chalons, a member of the Order from Nemours in
the diocese of Troyes."
- Johannes and Peter Fiebag, The
Discovery of the Grail, translated from the German by George Sassoon
"On the evening before the raid, Thursday October 12th 1307, I myself
saw three carts loaded with straw, which left the Paris Temple shortly
before nightfall, also Gèrard de Villiers and Hugo de Chalons, at the
head of 50 horse[men]. There were chests hidden on the carts, which
contained the entire treasure of the Visitator Hugo de Pairaud. They
took the road for the coast, where they were to be taken abroad in
eighteen of the Order's ships."
- Jean de Chalons
"There is no record of the seizure of eighteen Templar ships from their
naval base at on the French coast, or of any Templar ships anchored in
the Thames or at other seaports in Britain.... Since many of the Templar
ships were galleys, they were ideally suited for piracy, because
becalmed ships were always easy prey for those that did not depend upon
the wind."
- John J. Robinson, Born in Blood
The Zeno Narrative tells of a mysterious ocean
voyage west one hundred years later by a Templar descendent, Henry Sinclair,
Earl of Orkney. Indian legends and a number of clues suggest that the
landfall was Nova Scotia.
Preserving the Secrets
Rosslyn Chapel
Rosslyn Chapel
"It is known that the Templars fled to
Scotland, too, after the dissolution of 1312, and it is known that some
found refuge among the Saint-Clairs of Rosslyn in Midlothian. There is a
Templar cemetery there."
-Michael Bradley, Holy Grail
Across the Atlantic
"No family in Europe beneath the rank of royalty boasts a higher
antiquity, a nobler illustration, or a more romantic interest than that
of St. Clair."
-Sir John Bernard Burke,
Vicissitudes of Families and Other Essays
Rosslyn Chapel Choir
"...We encountered repeated references to
the Sinclair family - Scottish branch of the Norman Saint-Clair/Gisors
family. Their domain at Rosslyn was only a few miles from the former
Scottish headquarters of the Knights Templar, and the chapel at Rosslyn
- built between 1446 and 1486 - has long been associated with both
Freemasonry and the Rose-Croix. In a charter believed to date from 1601,
moreover, the Sinclairs are recognized as 'hereditary Grand Masters of
Scottish Masonry'. This is the earliest specific Masonic document on
record."
-Baigent and Leigh, The Holy Blood
and The Holy Grail Choir
Rosslyn Chapel "is decorated inside with carvings of Masonic
significance...and botanical significance. Arches, lintels, pillar bases
and such like are mostly covered in decorative but highly detailed plant
motifs, with many different species represented."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
Two of the motifs resemble the aloe cactus and
maize cobs, plants indigenous to the New World and supposedly unknown to
Europe before the sixteenth century.
Greenman
"...Everywhere there were manifestations of
the 'green man', the Celtic figure that represented fertility. Over a
hundred 'green men' have been counted but it is believed that there are
even more subtly peeping out of the vegetation."
"The symbolism is Egyptian, Celtic, Jewish, Templar and Masonic in
profusion. A star-studded ceiling, vegetative growth coming form the
mouths of the Celtic Green Men, entangled pyramids, images of Moses,
towers of the Heavenly Jerusalem, engrailed crosses and well as squares
and compasses. The only certain Christian imagery was in later Victorian
alterations: the stained glass windows, the revolting baptistery and a
statue of the Madonna and child."
Recalling the legend of Hiram Abif, "high up in the corner where the
south and west walls meet, and level with the organ, is a head with a
severe gash on the right temple and in the opposite side of the west
wall is the head of the person who killed him."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
"...William St Clair himself masterminded the whole construction of the
building from its inception to his own death in 1484, just two years
before it completion; furthermore, he personally supervised every tiny
detail of the work...William St Clair had brought some of Europe's
finest masons to Scotland for this great project, building the village
of Rosslyn to house them."
"From the outside, Rosslyn is a representation in stone of the Heavenly
Jerusalem as depicted in Lambert's copy, with towers and a huge central
curved, arched roof. Inside the Rosslyn shrine, the layout is a
reconstruction of the ruin of Herod's Temple, decorated with Nasorean
and Templar symbolism. In the north-east corner we found a section of
the wall carved with the towers of the Heavenly Jerusalem complete with
the Masonic compasses, styled exactly as they are shown on Lambert's
scroll."
"As we looked directly upwards from the organ loft, we could see that
the arched roof had a running series of keystones down its length, just
like the one the Royal Arch degree describes as found in the ruins of
Herod's Temple!"
- Christopher Knight & Robert Lomas, The
Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the Secret Scrolls
of Jesus
Apprentice Pillar
"Early this morning on resuming our labors
we discovered a pair of pillars of exquisite beauty and symmetry:
proceeding with our work, we discovered six other pairs of equal beauty
which from their situation, appeared to be the remains of the
subterranean gallery leading to the Most Holy Place."
- Royal Arch Degree
"In Rosslyn, we observed that the fourteen pillars had been arranged so
that the eastern eight of them including Boaz and Jachin, were laid out
in the form of a Triple Tau. The formation and the proportions were
exactly as the Royal Arch degree depicts today."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
"The Triple Tau, signifying, among other occult things, Templum
Hierosolyma, 'the Temple of Jerusalem'. It also means Clavis ad
Theosaurum - 'A key to a treasure' - and Theca ubi res pretiosa
deponitur - 'A place where a precious thing is concealed', or Res ipsa
pretiosa - 'The precious thing itself'."
- Royal Arch Degree
"The famous Grail Seeker Trevor Ravenscroft claimed in 1962 that he had
finished a twenty year quest in search of the Grail at Rosslyn
chapel.....His claim was that the Grail was inside the Prentice Pillar
(as it is known) in this chapel. The chapel is often visited now by
Grail Seekers and many references to the Grail can be found in its
stonework and windows.
Metal detectors have been used on the pillar and
an object of the appropriate size is indeed buried in the middle. Lord
Rosslyn adamantly refuses to have the pillar x-rayed."
- Chris Thornborrow, "An
Introduction to Current Theories about The Holy Grail"
Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas believe that
the small crypt of the Rosslyn shrine was the lower middle chamber where the
masons received their wages.
Before the vaults were sealed off when the
chapel was completed, twenty Templar knights were buried there in full
armor.
"Seemed all on fire that chapel proud,
Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffined lie:
Each baron, for a sable shroud,
Sheathed in his iron panoply."
- Sir Walter Scott, "The Lay of
the Last Minstrel"
"The vaults themselves may yet be far more than a simple tomb, other
important artifacts may be contained therein. The one recorded action of
the Lords Sinclair that apparently contradicts their well earned
reputation for chivalry and loyalty may also be explained if the vaults
are opened, for it is just possible that some clue as to the whereabouts
of certain treasures of great historical interest may also be
discovered."
- Tim Wallace-Murphy, An
Illustrated Guide to Rosslyn Chapel
"The Companion's Jewel of the Royal Arch is a double triangle, sometimes
called the Seal of Solomon, within a circle of gold; at the bottom is a
scroll bearing the words, Nil nisi clavis deest - 'Nothing is wanting
but the Key', and on the circle appears the legend, Si tatlia jungere
possis sit tibi scire posse - 'If thou canst comprehend these things,
thou knowest enough'."
-Royal Arch Degree
Knight and Lomas speculate that the
reconstructed treasure vaults of Herod's temple are located below the main
floor of the Chapel.
An Seal of Solomon (Star of David) can be
constructed from the alignment of pillars between the entrance and Triple
Tau formation.
"At the very center of this invisible Seal
of Solomon, in the arched roof there is a large suspended boss in the
form of a decorated arrowhead that points straight down to a keystone in
the floor below. It is, we believe, this stone that must be raised to
enter the reconstructed vaults of Herod's Temple and recover the
Nasorean Scrolls."
"Rosslyn is not a free interpretation of the ruins in Jerusalem; as far
as the foundation plan is concerned, it is a very carefully executed
copy. The unfinished sections of the great western wall are there, the
main walls and the pillar arrangements fit like a glove and the pillars
of Boaz and Jachin stand precisely at the eastern end of what would be
the inner Temple. The spot we identified as being at the center of the
Seal of Solomon turned out to correspond exactly with the center point
of the medieval world; the middle of the Holy of Holies; the spot where
the Ark of the covenant was placed in the Temple at Jerusalem."
- Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas, The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the
Secret Scrolls of Jesus
Andrew Sinclair (The Sword and the Grail, Arrow Books 1994) "did some
ground radar investigations of the chapel and found evidence of large
metallic objects and vaults. They drilled down into a vault but were
unable to get a mini-TV camera down because rubble kept filling the
borehole."
- George Sassoon (private
communication)
Freres Maçons
"Jacques de Molay and his predecessors
signed documents over the title Magister Templi, Master of the Temple.
And that temple, taking its name from the Temple of Solomon, certainly
was left unfinished upon the murder of its masters, who also had been
tortured to reveal their secrets by three assassins who ultimately
destroyed them. Not Jubela, Jubelo, and Jubelum, but Philip the Fair of
France, Pope Clement V, and the order of the Knights of the Hospital of
St. John of Jerusalem."
"What the secret society needed was men who would affirm their belief in
God, with a desire for brotherhood strong enough to accept any man's
personal religious persuasion as secondary to their principal goal of
survival."
- John J. Robinson, Born in Blood
The formation of the
The Illuminati by
Freemasons and the instigation of the French Revolution and anti-papacy
movements in the eighteen century have been seen as a fulfillment of Templar
revenge.
"The Templars, or Poor Fellow-Soldiery of
the Holy House of the Temple, intended to be re-built, took as their
models, in the Bible, the Warrior-Masons of Zorobabel, who worked,
holding the sword in one hand and the trowel in the other.
"Therefore it was that the Sword and the Trowel were the insignia of the
Templars, who subsequently, as will be seen, concealed themselves under
the name of Brethren Masons. [This name, Freres Maçons in the French,
adopted by way of secret reference to the Builders of the Second Temple,
was corrupted in English into Free-Masons]."
- General Albert Pike, Morals and
Dogma
"Thus the Order of Knights of the Temple was at its very origin devoted
to the cause of opposition to the tiara of Rome and the crowns of Kings,
and the Apostolate of Kabalistic Gnosticism was vested in its chiefs.
For Saint John himself was the Father of the Gnostics, and the current
translation of his polemic against the heretical of his Sect and the
pagans who denied that Christ was the Word, is throughout a
misrepresentation, or misunderstanding at least, of the whole Spirit of
that Evangel."
"Hence Free-Masonry, vulgarly imagined to have begun with the Dionysian
Architects or the German Stone-workers, adopted Saint John the
Evangelist as one of its patrons, associating with him, in order not to
arouse the suspicions of Rome, Saint John the Baptist [the Johannite
heresy], and thus covertly, proclaiming itself the child of the Kabbalah
and Essenism together."
- "Allocution of Pio Nono against
the Free Masons"
