History

**Warning - this will be a long post!!**

So, as many of you know (if anyone is actually still reading this) - over the past few years I've taken a big interest in the history of the Templar's and the Freemason's.  Little did I know that the 2 were associated, however loosely, at the time.
I've always been a closet history buff - it's always been a favorite study of mine, which of course can only translate and explain my love of reading (or maybe the reverse is true).  My senior year in high school I was introduced to a book called "Focault's Pendulum" by Umberto Eco.  I remember being intrigued, and fascinated by the story which combined history, conjecture, magic, theology, theosophy, numerology and good helping of fiction.  I can't remember how I discovered the book, but I do recall that I read it for the first time for a book report in my English class.  The report was horrible, as I began writing it - I realized that I had understood nothing of the book aside from what I stated above.  But the book so fascinated me (think of it as a pre-cursor to Dan Brown's style of writing with the Da Vinci Code), that I continued to read and re-read it.  For Christmas a few(?) years later my mother bought me the book.  I remember feeling a little sheepish as the reviews on the book declared it: "Brilliant..Experimental and funny, literary and philosophical.." by the New York Times.  I recall thinking to myself, "Funny? There was humour in this book?".  I realized at that point that I had taken the book too seriously.  How could I not?  The first paragraph of the book goes into describing the absolute perfection of Pi!  Anyway, my interest in the Templar's came from this book - as they were mentioned briefly in relation to the story - a little tid-bit of information that left many more questions than it began to answer.  At that time the Internet was still in it's infancy (as far as I was concerned or exposed to it).  It consisted of BBS boards that allowed 1 or maybe 2 users to connect to another person's computer at a time.  In many ways it was the pre-cursor to today's blogs and forums.  So the only information I could find in relation to the Templar's was really limited to the local libraries - and those books so often contradicted each other, that it was impossible to find an actual story - it all seemed to be more guessing and playing connect the dots when there were no dots.
During the following years I encountered a lot of things that held my interest, a lot of the things ironically enough that Focault's Pendulum addressed.  I read everything I could get my hands on, from "Isis Unveiled" by H.P. Blavatsky, "The Book of the Law" by Aleister Crowley, "Grosses Traumbuch" by Dr. Abdul Azem (Large Dream book, a book about the interpretation of dreams), to books on the Oriental Religions, Middle-East, Celtic, and on and on.  This reading gave me in large, my opinion of Religion as a whole - but that's a whole other discussion.  And with it came my introduction to "secret societies".
With the Internet being a veritable cesspool of information, opinions, theories, and nut-jobs - there was no end to the amount of information available.  But it tended to cause the same problem as I had years earlier with a lack of information - it contradicted itself, points of it were pure flights of fancy, and some contradicted themselves - and this was just in searching for the Templar's!  Plan on several months of reading time if you try searching for "Secret Societies".  You'll encounter everything from the Illuminati to The Royal Order of the Buffalo from Flintstones fame!  But as I was discovering, nearly every search of the Templar's and the volumes of information read, there was nearly always a reference to the Freemason's.  Once I thought I had read what I thought to be the most credible pages on the Templar's (HA!), I started following up on the Freemason's.  I left the Templar's behind mainly because there were so many questions that remained, 1) A year after the inception of the Templar's where 9 monks who had promised themselves to a life of charity, chastity, and poverty among other things - were knighted by the Pope to help guard pilgrims on their way to visit the "Holy Land".  Then suddenly, they appear a year later - a huge force, wealth beyond belief, answerable to none save the Pope himself.  They were knights sure, but that was after the fact.  They were monks first who still held to their original belief.  They were forbidden to shave, bathe, they were held to the strictest of regulations set forth by the church - Hell! they were not allowed within a "hand-span of their mothers or sisters"! 2) Almost 270years later, the Pope and King Phillip of France decided for their own reasons to disband the Templar's, whom in that time had more or less established the beginning of international banking, and a slew of other accomplishments.  They were richer than most kingdom's, in land, possessions, markets and gold.  They were disbanded by accusing them of numerous crimes, heresy, worshipping carven idols - and worse.  The Templar's in France were in a spectacular coordination by the French government were rounded up in one day on Friday Oct 13, 1307 (yeah, it's where Friday the 13th began as an "unlucky day").  They were tortured by the Inquisition into admitting these crimes.  Ultimately they were disbanded.  Many were executed, many died of torture.  This order for the capture of all Templar's was received in England as well - but was essentially ignored, and gave the Templar's there time to prepare.  29days later a papal bull administered by the Pope was received by the King of England and he reluctantly tried rounding up the Templar's there.  By then however nearly all had escaped.  A few were captured, many escaped - and by the restrictions put upon the Dominican Inquisitors - the captured Templar's didn't give into the torture administered to them.  Due to different political situations at the time, especially between Scotland, England and the Vatican - it is suspected, and widely accepted that many of the Templar's made a run for Scotland as a safe-haven to assume new identities, lives etc.

This is turning out much longer than I anticipated, so I will continue this tomorrow.  If you have anything to say, comments to make, disagreements, or want to point out grammatical errors in any of my posts - you can do so by clicking on the "Post Comment" link under each blog entry.