Were violent, corrupt and treacherous. There was no law or order that prevailed for any

distance or for any length of time.

 

The papacy in Rome was similarly corrupt and decadent, as reported by Read (1999).

Following the last and most devastating invasion of the Langobards in Italy, whole cities

were wiped out, and it is thought the population of the Roman capital itself sank to as

low as a few hundred people. Powerful Roman families selected popes who would do their

bidding; often those chosen were not only mentally incompetent, but also sexually per-

verted. Some died violent deaths, strangled or stabbed by their bodyguards (Read 1999,

p. 58). Priories and bishoprics were usually controlled by powerful local families, who

placed their younger sons, or illegitimate sons, into holy offices. The income from these

churches and other benefices was diverted to the noble families controlling them, much

as we learned to be the case in Scotland.

 

It was into such a political context that the Normans and their allies entered when

they advanced into Italy and the Holy Land in 1060 C.E. A shocking but probably realis-

tic sociological picture of the Crusaders is drawn by Charles Mackay (1841, p. 360):

 

The only religion they felt was the religion of fear.... They lived with their hand against every

man and with no law but their own passions.... War was the business and the delight of their

existence.... Fanaticism and the love of battle alike impelled them to the war, while the kings

and princes of Europe had still another motive for encouraging their zeal. Policy opened

their eyes to the great advantages which would accrue tc> themselves by the absence of so

many restless, intriguing, and bloodthirsty men, whose insolence it required more than the

small power of royalty to restrain within due bounds.

 

That religious motives were largely a pretext for winning the glory and booty of war

became the subject of innumerable satires in France, Italy and England. Moreover, the

outcome of the Crusades, especially the ill-fated second one, made them increasingly

unpopular and rendered most people back home in Christendom deeply cynical. Over

time, the Normans and their Templar Knights developed a congenial living arrangement

with the Muslim “foes.” As Read (1999, pp. 128-129) describes these events:

 

The disillusion in Europe that followed the fiasco of the Second Crusade obliged the Chris-

tians in the Holy Land to reach the kind of accommodation with the infidel that would have

seemed sacrilegious to the previous generation of crusaders.... The early crusaders had

expected to encounter wild savages and depraved pagans in Syria and Palestine; but those

who had remained in the Middle East had been obliged to recognize that the culture of Arab

Palestine — Muslim, Christian, and Jewish — was more evolved and sophisticated than that at

home.

 

Some had quickly adopted Eastern customs. Baldwin of Le Bourg, having married an

Armenian wife, took to wearing an Eastern kaftan and dined squatting on a carpet; while the

coins minted by Tancred showed him with the head-dress of an Arab. The Damascene

chronicler and diplomat, Usamah Ibn-Munqidh, describes a Frankish knight reassuring a

Muslim guest that he never allowed pork to enter his kitchen and that he employed an

Egyptian cook.

 

Read goes on to report:

 

There was a large measure of tolerance for the Jews in the crusader states; they were treated

much better.... With the [Templars’] capture of the ports on the Mediterranean... and con-

cessions to the growing maritime powers from Italy — Venice, Genoa and Pisa — considerable

trade was stimulated with the Muslims. ... The Templars benefited from this prosperity

through their fiefs, and they also came to extend a tolerance to the indigenous Muslims

which shocked those newly arrived from Europe.

 

By the latter decades of the twelfth century, joining the Templars had become no

longer a sacred calling, but rather a career choice of an entirely lay nature (Read 1999,

p. 153). The established nobles in the Holy Land resented the newly arrived knights from

Europe who strove to incite warfare with the Muslims in order to carve out their own

fiefdoms. For example, Raymond, the Templar master of Tripoli, spoke fluent Arabic and

avidly read Muslim text s. To counteract the ambitions of newly-arrived Guy of Lusig-

naw, Raymond approached Saladin and suggested a collaboration — obviously, the notion

of Christian versus Muslim was no longer the operative force in the Holy Land, but rather

one power bloc versus another. By the time Richard the Lion-Hearted arrived in the Holy

Land in 1 191, this fraternization had progressed to the point that the English king offered

his sister, Joan, in marriage to the Muslim king, Saladin, suggesting they were both bet-

ter off jointly ruling Palestine than fighting one another. Saladin rejected the offer (Read

1999, p. 173). However, by 1192 C.E., an accommodation had been reached and Muslims

and Christians halted combat, leaving the French, English and other European nobles

the opportunity to squabble among themselves.

 

Although subsequent Crusades were mounted by later popes, they had turned essen-

tially into business enterprises and were no longer holy wars. Suppliers of horses, arma-

ments, food, and apparel made fortunes equipping both sets of warriors; alms were

collected across Europe for each effort and diverted to both ecclesiastical and private cof-

fers (Read 1999).

 

By 1250, the Templars had become a largely secret and closed society. Their initia-

tion rites were hidden from view, as were their operations and internal rules (Read 1999).

The majority of persons associated with the order were now estate managers, laborers

and international traders and bankers. Even criminals were permitted to join, if they

brought some skill or resource of value. In addition, the order had become the primary

banking enterprise in the European world. Kings and nobles borrowed money from the

Temple treasury; the order also offered financial investments, as well as annuities and

pensions (Read 1999, p. 183).

 

Meanwhile, in Spain, the Templars had reached such a level of accommodation with

the Moors that Muslims were allowed to use Temple estates as places of worship (Read 1999,

p. 201). Acre became a major trade center, on a par with Constantinople and Alexandria.

The 250, 000 European-descended inhabitants of the Holy Land purchased exports from

both Europe and Asia. In turn, they sold slaves, sugar, dyes and spices to European and

Asian markets. By 1250, there were an estimated 7, 000 fully initiated Templars, with a cor-

responding number of associates and dependents that was seven or eight times as large.

 

Shift in Religion

 

Remarkably, also by 1250, the Templars had altered their religious creed. Though

established initially as Christian soldiers, they now read from the Book of Judges in the

Hebrew Bible, or Torah, and had formed a new identity binding themselves to the ancient

Israelites (Read, p. 216). At the same time, a new Muslim people swept through the Holy

Land. The Mongols under Kublai Khan poured in from the East, while the Mameluks in

Egypt attacked from the South. European control of the Holy Land began to collapse.

Meanwhile in Europe, the pope, Martin IV, called for a crusade not against the Moslem

onslaught in Palestine, but rather against his Christian political adversaries in Aragon,

and Sicily. By 1290, the Europeans had lost the Holy Land to the Muslims, never to be

regained. And at this point, many of the remaining European inhabitants, exhausted by

the corruption of Christianity, converted to Islam (Read, p. 248).

 

In October 1307 c.E., King Philip of France, who had expelled the kingdom’s Jews

the year before in order to confiscate their possessions, turned his attention to the French

Templars. In collaboration with the Pope, he ordered all French Templars arrested, tried

for heresy, and executed; he then promptly appropriated their immense wealth and hold-

ings in France. Some of the members of the French Temple became aware of Philip’s plan

and escaped with a large portion of their treasure (Read 1999). At the same time, a Mus-

lim colony in southern Italy was evicted by Philip’s brother King Charles II and appears

to have formed something akin to an alliance with the fleeing French Templars and trav-

eled with them to Christendom (Read, p. 272).

 

 

A St. Clair tomb at Roslyn Chapel with Ten Commandments motif. Photograph by Elizabeth Cald-

well Hirschman.

 

 

Tau/Tough symbol window at Roslyn Chapel. Photograph by Elizabeth Caldwell Hirschman.

 

 

The French Templar treasure, loaded upon 18 galleys, made its way to Scotland,

reportedly to the Isle of Mull. From here, the Templars and their treasure took refuge

with the St. Clair family at Rosslyn Castle. Nearby Rosslyn Chapel, built in the 1400s,

was, and is, an edifice filled with images and icons drawn from three faiths— Christian-

ity, Judaism and Islam. It contains ample testimony to the “sacred geometry” of the

Jewish Cabala, as well as architectural reflections of the St. Clair family’s travels and

 

 

Ten Commandments motif window at Roslyn Chapel. Photograph by Elizabeth Caldwell Hirschman.

 

Templar tomb at Roslyn Chapel with Tau /Tough symbol. Photograph by Elizabeth Caldwell

Hirschman.

 

 

Top: Templar sarcophagus at Roslyn Chapel. Bottom: Templar tomb at Roslyn chapel with Lion of

Judah motif. Both photographs by Elizabeth Caldwell Hirschman.

 

 

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