Part 11
And this ethnico-mystic structure acquired a splendor and a power never before equaled, so that the system was credited to divine intervention, whereas its purely human origin might easily have been traced. The root idea of the ethnic mysticism was to seek the supposedly “lost deity,” to find him, to be unified with him. And the self-same idea underlay the Christian mysticism, and it was by calling that idea into play and by giving it expression in brilliant achievement, that this mysticism won its highest triumph, and, aided by the Papacy, its widest influence. This new embodiment of the mystical idea was seen in the Crusades, in which the Christian mystics joined, going forth to seek the lost sepulchre of their God, and to obtain control of it. Possession of the sepulchre would be the surest guarantee for the unification of godhead and humanity.
In this undertaking the two most powerful estates of the Middle Age took part—the monks and the knights. The monks, under orders from the Pope, joined the armies of the cross; the knights, commanded by the Emperor, marched to the Holy Land and conquered it. After the conquest, when there was a kingdom of Jerusalem after the model of the kingdoms of the West, there arose, as the necessary summit of medieval aspiration, the union of monkery and chivalry, in the monkish orders of knights, whose members wore the sword of the knight and took the monastic vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
These organizations had their origin in the gradual assumption of knightly elements by the monastic orders. Some merchants of Amalfi, oldest commercial emporium of Italy, had, as early as 1048, founded a monastery and a church at Jerusalem, and in conjunction with these a hospital in honor of John the Baptist. There the monks cared for pilgrims who were poor or ailing. Pope Paschal II. granted them a monastic constitution in 1113, and Godfrey of Bouillon, soon after the capture of Jerusalem, endowed them with considerable properties.
They took the title of Brothers Hospitalers of Saint John of Jerusalem; their habit consisted of a black mantle with a white cross. A few years later (1119) the Knights Hugo of Payns, and Godfrey of Saint Omers, associated themselves and six other knights, all French, in a military league, under the style “Poor Knights of Christ,” pledging themselves to keep the highways of the Holy Land safe for pilgrims, and to observe the rule of Saint Benedict. The members were favored by King Baldwin I. and the Patriarch of Jerusalem, and came to be called Templars, because their convent stood on the site of the Solomonic Temple. The Templars received from the Synod of Troyes in 1128 recognition as a regular order, a monastic rule, a monastic habit, a special banner, etc. About the same date the Hospitalers, Johannites, or Knights of Saint John of Jerusalem, became invested with the knightly character. After the Hospitalers came the German Knights, whose theatre of action was principally the region of the Baltic Sea, but they also saw service in Spain in the war against the Saracens. Other knightly orders were those of Calatrava, of Alcantara, of Santiago de Compostella, in England the order of the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre, etc.
2. THE TEMPLARS.
None of these orders rose to higher distinction than the order of the Templars, or of “the Poor Companions of the Temple of Jerusalem,” as it was styled in its rule. In those days it was full of the spirit of lowliness, but the time came when the knights were no longer called themselves “Poor Companions,” but “Knights Templar.” At first the brethren begged their bread, fasted, were diligent in attendance on divine worship, performed the duties of their religion, fed the poor, cared for the sick. Plain and unadorned was their attire, in color either black, white or brown; and the brother who tried to get the finest habit got the shabbiest. The hair and beard were close cropped. The chase was not permitted, except for the extermination of beasts of prey. Women were not allowed to live in the houses of the order; the brethren might not so much as kiss their female relations. But their mode of life became in time very different. They became rich in worldly goods, and so broke the vow of poverty. As an order and as individuals they followed their own inclinations, and thus was their vow of obedience made nought; and their vow of chastity fared not better; while the specific vow of the order—protection of pilgrims to the Holy Land—became a nullity through their negligence, or even by their treasonable surrender of posts to the Saracens.
The candidate for admission to the order was required to be of noble birth, though sometimes illegitimate sons of knights were received. Furthermore, the candidate must be unmarried and unbetrothed; but this rule was circumvented by taking married candidates as “affiliate” members; they also admitted minors and even small boys. Lucre was the impelling motive of this disregard of their rule; money was their god. No other order of knights was in such disrepute for lewdness, duplicity, even treason. Originally all Templars were of one rank and degree—that of knights. But in time ecclesiastics were admitted to attend to the spiritual affairs, and these ecclesiastics were made independent of the ordinary jurisdiction of diocesans. Thus was formed a second rank or degree, subordinate to the knights, and mere dummies on festival and ceremonial occasions. Then was added still another class, Servientes, who were the personal attendants of the knights, or were otherwise employed for the benefit of the order, as mechanics, laborers, etc. The class Affiliates comprised persons of all ranks in life and of both sexes. They were not bound by all the vows of the order; they were required to make the order heir of their property; but they did not live in the houses of the order. These several classes were distinguished by their attire. Knights wore a white mantle with an eight-pointed red cross over the left breast. Clerics wore the cassock, with brown mantle (the mantle of the higher clerics was white). Servientes wore a brown garb. The members called each other Brother, and indeed they stood by each other like brothers; in battle their personal bravery was irreproachable.
All these religious orders of knights possessed great power in the Middle Age, their grandmasters ranking next after Popes and monarchs. In fact they recognized no emperor or king as their lord, but only the Pope. The orders were favored by the Pontiffs, who loaded them with praise and privileges, though they feared them. If the Popes had now the arm of the flesh and not of the spirit only to defend them against the secular power, they owed that advantage to the knightly orders. And specially were they beholden to the Templars in this regard. The Templars were free from all Church tribute, and by the Pope’s favor had the right to harbor excommunicated knights, to conduct divine service in churches that were under interdict, to found churches and churchyards; which privileges brought down upon them the enmity of the clergy. As the order was exempt from all episcopal jurisdiction and subject only to the Roman See, the bishops endeavored to have that and other like privileges abated by the Lateran Council in 1179. At the time of their suppression the Templars possessed an empire of five provinces in the East and sixteen in the West, with 15,000 houses of the order. In possession of such resources, they aimed at nothing short of making all Christendom dependent on their order, and to set up a sort of military aristocratic commonwealth, governed ostensibly by the Pope, but really by themselves, with their grandmaster at the head. The grandmaster of the Templars was elected by a college of eight knights, four servientes and one cleric. The Grandmaster was only president of the Council and its representative; but in war he had supreme command; as the Pope’s deputy he had jurisdiction over the clerics. A splendid retinue attended him, and he had a treasury at his disposal. Next in rank after him stood the Seneschal, his deputy for civil affairs, and the Marshal for military, the Treasurer, the Drapier. The Council (Conventus) consisted of the Grandmaster, his assistants (i.e., the grand officers just mentioned), Provincial Masters who might be present, and such knights as the Grandmaster might summon. By addition of all eminent Templars the Council became the General Chapter; this was the legislative body. The other knightly orders were organized on a plan not essentially different. What interests us most at present is those features of the Templar order which marked it as in some respects a secret society.
The order took its first steps in this direction in the thirteenth century, moved thereto by desire to safeguard its riches and power. Its secret doctrines or tenets were borrowed from the heretical sects of the time—Albigenses and Waldenses—or were such beliefs as were held in secret by many of the most enlightened men. Such views were shared by religious men, scholars, and worldlings alike, by the first class out of indignation against the moral degeneration of the rulers of the Church; by the second, because they suspected that the Church’s dogmas were but inventions of Popes and councils, and by the third, because in rejecting the Church’s authority and accepting the heretical doctrines, they fancied that they were freed from the obligations of morality. But the Templars, who were neither pious nor learned, but of whom many were very worldly indeed, found the enlightened new opinions to coincide well with their interest, which prompted them to care rather for their numerous possessions in the West than for the few they held in lands occupied by the Moslem. God, said they, showed his favor to the Mohammedans in the Crusades, and evidently willed the defeat of the Christian arms. So by adopting the more enlightened views, they prepared the way for a withdrawal from the useless Crusades, and a return with bag and baggage to Europe, where they could rest from their glorious but hard and thankless martial labors, and devote themselves to the service of princes, or pass the time in the splendid houses of their order, amid Oriental luxury, and surrounded by gardens like Fairyland, beguiling the hours with gaming and the chase, with songs and lovemaking, the while not neglecting their political interests. But the Templars were rapidly nearing their downfall.
3. THE SECRETS OF THE TEMPLARS.
The Arcana of the Templars consisted of a secret doctrine and of a cult based on the same. The doctrine, which had no ground in scientific research, seems to have been akin to the doctrine of certain sects, specially the Albigenses, who worshiped a superior god of heaven and an inferior god of earth, and ascribed to the latter the origin of evil. For the Templars, Christ was no Son of God, had worked no miracles, had neither risen from the dead nor ascended into heaven; he was, in fact, often spoken of as a false prophet. The Church’s doctrine regarding the transubstantiation of the bread in the mass was for them crass superstition, the eucharist only a commemorative rite, the sacrament of penance a priestly imposture, the Trinity a human invention, veneration of the cross an act of idolatry. That the opposition of the order to the last-mentioned custom led on festival occasions, and particularly when new members were admitted, to overt acts of contempt for the cross, to spitting on the cross, for example—accusations like that are grave not only from the point of view of the Church, but even of common propriety, and they played an important part in the prosecution of the Templars. That postulants were compelled by force of arms and other violent means to perform such highly reprehensible acts is not to be discredited entirely, for they may have been part of a test of the postulants’ willingness to obey superiors: and besides, the objectionable ceremony was not practiced everywhere, but only in France. More excusable was the offense of the Templars in looking on the cross broidered on their mantle, not as the sign of redemption, but as a double T, the initial letter of the name of their society. They were said also to have substituted John the Baptist in the place of Jesus as the order’s patron, because John did not pretend to miraculous powers nor declare himself the Messiah. The clerics of the order must have approved these heretical opinions and practices. There were at that time many enlightened churchmen, and it is to be presumed that the Templars would adopt such of them as were at variance with the hierarchy and took refuge in the order.
The Templars’ secret rites, introduced in the middle of the thirteenth century, were practiced as part of their peculiar religious service, and at the admission of new members: for though the Catholic liturgy was used in their chapels, the initiated performed a cult of their own in the chapter house, or chapel, before break of day. This consisted of confession and communion, as understood by Templars. This confession they regarded on the one hand as an act of brotherly trust, and on the other of brotherly counsel: hence, they confessed only to the chaplains of the order; in the latter times of the order the members were forbidden to confess to priests that were not Templars. By them the communion was taken in the natural species and substance of bread and wine, and in token of brotherly love, not as commemorative of any sacrifice.
Two images played a part in the Templar rites. The image of John the Baptist typified the order’s opposition to the Church’s creed. The other image, jealously guarded from the eyes of outsiders, has been called an “idol.” It was made chiefly of copper, gilt, and represented now a human skull, anon the countenance of an old man heavily bearded (makroprosopos), again a very small face (mikroprosopos), which would be now the face of a man, then of a woman, anon male and female at once; it would have now one, again two or three, heads, with bright shining eyes of carbuncles. The idol was by some Templars called “Bassomet,” but why, does not appear. From the statements of members of the order it would seem that this idol was a kind of talisman that brought all manner of good fortune; that it was set up for veneration as rival to the cross, and that they called it “the savior of the order.”
There were two forms of admission, the general and the special (or secret) form: the latter was used only at the admission of postulants that could be trusted with the secrets of the order. The Scribe, acting as Receptor, first asked the brethren, in chapter, if they had any objection to make the admission of the postulant. If none objected the postulant was led into an adjoining room and questioned as to his purpose in seeking entrance to the order, whether he knew of any impediment on his part, whether he owed debts that he could not pay, whether he was married or engaged to be married, and so forth. The questions having been satisfactorily answered, and the minutes of the replies reported to the brethren, the matter was again put to vote. Next, the candidate was brought before the chapter, and, after more questioning, took the vows and was formally admitted. In the secret rite of admission the Receptor showed to the candidate the Idol, with these words: “Believe in this, put your trust in this, and all will be well with you.” Then he girded the candidate with a cord of white wool fibres, the Baptist’s girdle, as it was called, which he was to wear over the shirt. The obligation of secrecy was very sternly enforced. Those who betrayed any of the secrets of the order were cast into prison, and the candidate was threatened with dungeons and death should he communicate to an outsider any information about the ceremony of initiation.
Thus did the Templars, an order instituted for the purpose of guarding the Church’s interests, in the end reject the Church’s doctrines, and adopt principles that tended inevitably to the overthrow, not only of the Papacy, but of Christianism itself. Such was the irreconcilable opposition between the avowed and the secret convictions of the Templars, and such was the hypocrisy of the order: for, though they had apostatized from the creeds of the Church, they would not formally quit her communion; and though they regarded as true many points of anti-Christian doctrine, they veiled these with mystery, or even on occasion made sport of them, instead of publishing them, as so many poor, unarmed heretics did; and hence their aspirations were foiled, and the most powerful association of that time perished, not in glorious battle, but in ignominious dungeons and at the stake.
4. THE DOWNFALL OF THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR.
The Crusades having failed utterly, the Holy Land having again come under the power of the “infidels,” and the occupation of the knightly orders having gone, the Popes cast about for a remedy for this undesirable state of things. The order of German Knights had already forestalled the problem by choosing as their theatre of action the countries on the Baltic Sea, and the Spanish orders by waging continual wars against the Moors; and the Knights of Saint John (Hospitalers) later found a place for themselves by occupying Rhodes. But the Templars were without any fit employment, and that circumstance was the occasion of their downfall. About the year 1305 Pope Clement V. proposed a union of the Templars with the Hospitalers, and, if possible, with other orders, but both Templars and Hospitalers rejected the advice.
Philip IV. (the Fair) of France found in the Templars a serious obstacle to his ambition, and in the early years of his reign sought to compel them by force to aid him in his schemes; but failing in that design, tried to win them by loading them with favors. Many different explanations have been offered to account for another change of policy on the part of Philip, but none of them is historically sound. Probably the change noticeable in the king’s attitude toward the order in 1305 was in some way connected with the outrageous doings of the Inquisition in the South of France; doubtless rumors of heresy in the Templar order had come to the omnipresent ear of the Holy Court. The Inquisitor-General of France, William Imbert, prior of the Dominicans in Paris, begged the King to call the Templars to account. The King, on Nov. 14, 1305, informed Clement V. of the accusation, but Clement, notwithstanding this, invited not only the Grandmaster of the Hospitalers, but also the head of the Templars, to meet with himself in conference about the project of a new Crusade. Yet in his letter to the Templars’ Grandmaster, James Molay (who resided in his palace in Cyprus), he counseled him to come without escort, “lest the news of his departure should give occasion to enemies (of the order) to make a sudden onslaught.” The Master of the Hospitalers was unable to come, being busied with the siege of Rhodes, and Molay, contrary to the Pope’s advice, came to France escorted by his entire council, sixty knights, and bringing the treasure and the archives of his order. In May, 1307, the Pope and the King met at Poictiers, and, it is supposed, discussed thoroughly the question of the Templars: about the same time the Templars informed the Pope of the dangers that threatened them, and asked for an investigation of the charges brought against them: such investigation the Pope decided to institute. It cannot be determined whether it was with the Pope’s approval, or against his wishes, that Philip on Oct. 13, 1307, had all the Templars in France arrested and their goods seized.
Five heads of complaint were alleged against the order; viz., profanation of the cross, worship of an idol, indecent rites of initiation, omission of the sacramental words (i.e., the words of consecration or of transubstantiation, Hoc est corpus meum) in masses performed by priests belonging to the order, and indulgence of unnatural lusts. Two days after the arrests the people of Paris, whose partiality for the Templars was feared, were assembled before the royal palace, and there were labored with by monks and royal officials, to turn them against the order. The King took up his residence in the “Temple,” the Paris house of the order, in which was hid the treasure of the Grandmaster (150,000 gold florins, and twelve horseloads of silver pence). It was not quite 500 years later when the Temple became the prison of a descendant of the King. In that same building, in presence of the masters and bachelors of the university, the trial of the Grandmaster and his brethren was commenced, and proceeded under the direction of Imbert. The procedure was the same as in the ordinary trials for heresy and witchcraft in the court of the Inquisition. Confessions were obtained by use of the torture, and it is impossible at this day to tell how much in those confessions was due to the employment of that peculiar method of eliciting truth, and how much, if any part, was prompted by the desire to atone for past offenses by truthful (even if forced) admission of guilt.
The Pope was not pleased with this turn of affairs. He claimed for himself the right to proceed against the Templars, declared that the King was infringing the privileges of the See of Rome, and attributed the action taken against the Templars to a desire to get possession of the order’s treasury and to annihilate a society whose existence was a cause of anxiety to the King. He, therefore, protested against the whole proceeding, and demanded that the arrested Templars and their property should be surrendered to him as judge of the questions at issue. The King refused, but he came to an understanding with the Pope in the matter of the prosecution, and Nov. 22 the Pope, by the bull “Pastoralis Praeeminentiae,” ordered the arrest of all the Templars throughout the Christian world. The King of England, Edward II. who was Philip’s son-in-law, obeyed this precept, though he had previously expressed disbelief of the guilt of the Templars. A like change of mind was seen in Aragon. In Cyprus the Templars attempted resistance, but submitted. Denis, King of Portugal, refused to institute a prosecution against them.
Inasmuch as the measure was one that affected all countries, the case of the Templars belonged of right to the Papal jurisdiction. Even Philip admitted this; but he mistrusted the Pope, and feared that the Templars might be acquitted, and then take revenge on the King. Negotiations were opened. The King demanded the death of the Templars, but the Pope would not consent to this till their guilt was fully proven; and again he demanded the surrender to him of their persons and their possessions. The King at last acceded to the demand, for he had need of the Pope’s assistance in procuring the election of his brother as successor to the assassinated German King, Albert.