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JACQUES DE MOLAY

LAST GRAND MASTER KNIGHTS TEMPLAR

BY Lorne Pierce 32 degree

Past Assistant Grand Chaplain A.F.& A.M. Ontario

Foreword By

D.G. McIlwraith 33 degree

Sovereign Grand Commander A.A.S.R. for the Dominion of Canada

FOREWORD

It is, I think, a fair assumption that most of us who have received

the Consistory degrees of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite

have felt a passing curiosity as to the identity of "the

illustrious personage represented by the initials," whose martyrdom

is re-told in the Thirtieth Degree.  But very few, I am sure, have

come away with the urge to turn back the pages of Masonic history

to discover who and what he was, and why his memory is revered

nearly six hundred and fifty years after his death.

In the succeeding pages Ill .'. Bro .'. Lorne Pierce has painted a

vivid picture of the growth of a great Order and of the death of

its last Grand Master.  Once again he has made a valuable and most

interesting contribution to Masonic education, which should meet

with peculiar appreciation among our Brethren who have received the

chivalric and philosophic grades.

I commend it to all Consistories of our jurisdiction as an aid to a

clearer understanding of the historical background and teaching of

the Thirtieth and Thirty-second Degrees.

D.G.McILWRAITH.

Jacques de  Molay LAST GRAND MASTER KNIGHTS TEMPLAR

1.

The origin of knighthood is lost in the dim past. In early England

a knight seems to have been a youth who attended a member of the

court; it was a position of honour and of service and might lead in

time to Royal recognition and rank.  In Germany the early knight

may have been regarded much in the same way, a disciple. In both

countries the knights were obviously ambitious and high-spirited

youths as one might expect.  It was in France, however, that the

idea of chivalry arose, and this conception quickly spread

throughout Europe.  Some knights had made themselves useful to

Earls or Bishops, that is the principal landlords and magnates and

military chiefs of the realm, and might be classed as superior

civil servants in times of peace, becoming leaders of the armies,

both secular and religious, in times of war.  There were, of

course, many foot-loose knights wandering about Europe in quest of

adventure, but on the whole a knight was a responsible link in the

Feudal chain reaching from the king to the peasant. In time the

ideal of chivalry came to prevail, and the high honour accompanying

it seems to have derived from prehistoric Teutonic custom. The

candidate had to submit to a rigorous investigation of his

character and qualifications.  Then the community turned out to

welcome him with fitting ceremony and investiture with sword and

shield, with belt and sword, or with gilt spurs and collar, usually

by the knight's father or some exalted personage. In time t hose

who had fought against the Saracens became pree minent, and were

accorded rank and dignity independent of birth or wealth.

The Knights Templar, or Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and of the

Temple of Solomon, was one of the three out-standing military

orders of the Middle Ages in Christendom.  The brotherhood was

founded, about 1118, by Hugues de Payns, a nobleman residing near

Troyes, in Burgundy, and Godefroy de St. Omer (or Aldemar), a

Norman knight.  Their original purpose was to protect pilgrims to

sacred places, more especially those who sought the Holy Sepulchre.

At first there were eight or nine Knights Templar.  They b ound

themselves to each other as a brotherhood in arms, and took upon

themselves vows of chastity, obedience and poverty according to the

rule of St. Benedict.  It is also recorded that they pledged

themselves to fight against ignorance, tyranny and the enemies of

the Holy Sepulchre, and "to fight with a pure mind for the supreme

and true King." Baldwin I, King of Jerusalem, assigned them

accommodation in his palace, which stood on the site of the T emple

of Solomon. In this way their name, Templars, was der ived.  At

first the knights wore no uniform or regalia, nothing in fact save

the cast-off garments that were given to them in charity.  It was

the poverty, sincerity and zeal of the order in its first years

that endowed it with importance.  They sought out the poor and the

outcast, the excommunicated as well as the unwanted, and shepherded

them within their fold.

Hugues de Payns, accompanied by several of his knights, returned

home in 1127 for the purpose of securing adequate ecclesiastical

sanction for some of the special privileges which the order had

usurped.  Among the very special privileges was immunity from

excommunication, which threatened a good deal of trouble.  Bernard

of Clairvaux, the greatest abbot of his day, received Hugues de

Payns, and not only praised the Knights Templar, but went much

further.  The future St. Bernard did not attend the Council of

Troyes in 1128, at which the Rule of the Temple was drawn up, but

he seems to have inspired it - the constitution, ritual, discipline

and very core of the order.  Finally there got abroad the idea,

that in the rule of the order there existed a "secret rule," and a

legend speedily grew up around this "lost word." In time this was

the undoing of the order.  The whole Rule of the Temple was

probably never written out, its more essential parts bein g

conveyed by word of mouth, by symbol and sign, and protected by

proper safeguards.  The point of importance was, that the order now

had ample acknowledgement and authority, and from this moment

onward power and treasure flowed into its hands in an unending and

broadening stream.

II

The Templars and the Crusades are forever associated in history and

legend.  The Templars, in an astonishingly short time, spread over

Christendom.  They had thousands of the fattest manors in the

Christian world. They became the bankers of the age, the money

exchange between Europe and the East, the trust company of the

time.  They provided loans to princes, dowries for queens, ransoms

for great warriors, safety deposit vaults for the treasure of

emperors and popes.  Their chapters were the schools of dipl omacy

of the time, training grounds for prospective rulers, colleges in

commerce and finance, sanctuaries for all who needed protection,

high or low.  It was inevitable that they should attract to

themselves the envy of the less fortunate orders and guilds.  In

time, in fact before the death of St. Bernard, in 1153, they had

not only received the tribute of kings and cardinals in the form of

lands and treasure, but they freed themselves from the n ecessity

of paying tax, tithe or tribute to any power, prince or pope, which

privilege they claimed as defender of the Church.  This was enough

to bring upon themselves the inevitable reckoning for overreaching

ambition, but they went further, very much further.  They not only

claimed exemption from excommunication, but claimed exemption from

all papal decrees except those specially aimed at them by name, and

they owed allegiance to no power or authority on earth except their

own head, the Bishop of Rome.  They had become a separate social,

economic, political and re ligious order, cutting across and

transcending kingdoms, principalities and archdioceses, with only

the Vice-gerent of God superior to their Grand Master.  The

enormous powers of the Knights Templar were bound to be challenged

by the popes as well as kings who demanded loyalty within their

realms.  The order found itself in increasingly compromising

situations, the victim of treachery on the part of kings and

princes of the Church, or the instigator of trickery and subterfuge

on i ts own part to preserve its powers.  The King of France,

Philip the Fair, set out to unite the Hospitallers and the Templars

into one grand order, The Knights of Jerusalem, the Grand Master of

which was always to be a prince of the royal house of France.  The

Grand Master of the Knights Templar invariably was Master of the

Templars at Jerusalem, and in Cyprus after the loss of the Holy

Land to the Turks.  He came in time to live in a sumptuous manner,

befitting his great wealth and vast powers.  In th e field, during

the campaigns, he occupied a great tent, round, with the black and

white pennant flying above its high peak, bearing the red cross of

the Templars.  Regional Grand Commanders were accorded similar

honours and no one took precedence over them except the Grand

Master, when he was present.

We know little concerning the initiation ceremonies of the Knights

Templar.  Probably there was some cleansing ritual, robing in

white, the all-night vigil and Holy Communion, gilt spurs, sword or

other gift of honour, and finally the oath and accolade.  Certainly

the order was a Christian institution.  Their war-cry - Beauseant!

- also inscribed on their banners and pennants, pledged loyalty to

their friends and promised terror to their foes.  Likewise both a

prayer and a pledge were the well-known words:

Non nobis, Domine, non nobis, sed nomini tuo da gloriam.

Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy Name be the glory.

III

Jacques de Molay was the twenty-second and last Grand Master of the

Knights Templar.  He was born about 1240 at Besancon, in the Duchy

of Burgundy, and was of noble but poor family.  He was admitted to

the order of knighthood, in 1265, at Beaune and proceeded shortly

to the Holy Land, under the Grand Master William de Beaujeu, to

fight for the Holy Sepulchre.  Jacques de Molay remained in the

Holy Land for many years, for he was still with the order in

Jerusalem when, about 1295, he was elected Grand Master upon the

death of Grand Master Gaudinius - Theobald de Gaudilai.  After the

loss of Palestine by the Templars, de Molay took his few remaining

knights to the Island of Cyprus.  In 1305 he was summoned to a

conference with the Pope, Clement V, who stated that he wished to

consider measures for effecting a union between the rival Templars

and Hospitallers.  A long and bitter feud had existed between the

two great orders.  However, both had agreed not to accept

disciplined members who might desire to transfer their allegiance

from one order to the other.  Also, in battle, it was permitted

members who became hopelessly separated from the main body of one

order to rally under the cross of the rival order if near.

Jacques de Molay, accompanied by sixty knights, made a royal

progress westward.  He called upon the Pope who consulted him

regarding a further Crusade, and de Molay requested an

investigation into charges that were already being openly made

against the order.  Finally he arrived in Paris with kingly pomp.

Philip the Fair, King of France, suddenly arrested every Knight

Templar in France, October 13, 1307, de Molay and his sixty friends

among them.  They were brought before the University of Paris and

the ch arges read to them.  De Molay spent five and a half years in

prison.  Of those arrested, one hundred and twenty-three knights of

the order "confessed under the torture of the Inquisition." Some

confessed that at the initiation ceremonies they had spat upon the

Crucifix.  When the Grand Master's turn came he likewise confessed,

apparently to bogus charges prepared beforehand by the Inquisition,

fearing torture, but he denied the charges of gross practices

indignantly, and demanded audience with the Po pe.  Th e Pope

himself believed the Templers were guilty, at least on some of the

counts, but he resented the intrusion of Philip in what he regarded

as his own special precinct, in spite of the fact that he largely

owed his papal tiara to Philip.

Many retracted their confessions regarding their indignity to the

Crucifix, only to be burned at the stake.  Many who returned to

their homes throughout Christendom, recanted, but the Inquisition

followed them and they burned.  Despotism, naked and cruel, without

scruple or any capacity for shame, had broken loose upon the world.

It was a new and bloody technique that proved vastly effective in

the hands of tyrants - both secular and religious.  Civilization

was to hear a good deal about this arbitrary rul e, this summary

and vindictive totalitarianism, without conscience, hungry for

power, wholly wicked, completely mad. In 1311, Clement and Philip

became reconciled, which prepared the way for the final act in the

tragedy.  The next year, at Vienna, the Pope condemned the order in

a sermon while Philip sat at his right hand.  Later the inevitable

occurred; the Knights Templar were broken up.  Much of their

treasure was given to the Knights of St. John, but Phil ip the Fair

and Clement V reserved land and treas ure, castles and Abbeys for

themselves and their friends.

No full hearing seems to have been given to all the charges, or any

comprehensive judgment handed down on the order as a whole.

However, in 1314, Jacques de Molay, whose fear had made him a

pathetic figure, and whose craven "confessions" contrary to the

oath of his order had sent hundreds to their death, again

confessed, again recanted his confession, again confessed, each

time shrinking miserably in stature both as a man and Grand Master

and having humiliation and utter disgrace heaped upon him for his

pa ins.  Finally, after the long imprisonment and tragedy and

sorrow of it all, he was led out upon the scaffold in front of

Notre Dame in Paris, in company with his friend Gaufrid de Charney,

Preceptor of Normandy.  The papal legates were in attendance and a

vast multitude of people filled the square.  He was to confess by

arrangement and hear the legates sentence him to life imprisonment.

Jacques de Molay finally atoned.  Instead of confessing he

proclaimed the innocence of the order.  King Philip the Fa ir did

not hesitate or consult with the Pope's legates; he had de Molay

burned forthwith, "between the Augustinians and the royal garden."

Guido Delphini was burned with them, and also the young son of the

dauphin of Auvergne.  With his dying breath Jacques de Molay

shouted to the multitude that King and Pope would soon meet him

before the judgment seat of God.  The common people gathered up his

ashes, and before many days it was as de Molay had for etold, Both

Clement V and Philip the Fair were dead.

IV.

The immortal Dante maintained the innocence of the Knights as did

many another famous contemporary.  Today it is generally admitted

that the Inquisition went to the poor knights in prison, told them

that their officers had confessed to spitting upon the Crucifix,

and then wrung from them "confessions" by the most brutal of all

institutions.  The confessions are all discounted.  The evidence

against them was from their rivals, the Dominicans and Franciscans

and others, all worthless.

The Order had long held the Turk in check, and kept alive the dream

of a united Christendom.  It had given to the world the idea of the

chivalrous man as a religious man, the servant of his state not

ashamed to own his God.  It had paved the way for the large part

laymen were to play in the religious life of the nations.  It was

the school of diplomacy and commerce, of international finance and

opinion.  Those who destroyed the order opened the way for Turkish

conquests in the West.  They also made known th e horrors of

despotism, of trial by pogrom and purge, which kindled again in the

wicked days of St. Bartholomew's and in the mad days of the French

Revolution - the cult of cruelty, that ran its course even in the

New World with witch huntings and burnings, and that is not yet

dead. It has been said that the thirteenth of October, 1307, was a

day of humiliation for the whole race. If the world remembers, and

recovers its sense of shame, its capacity for indign ation, it may

not have been in vain.

The Middle Ages were past, and deep rivers of Christian blood had

flowed for two hundred and fifty years, before the Turk was

expelled from the Spanish peninsula.  Under Don John of Austria the

Mediterranean states, organized into a league, sent an armada of

two hundred ships against the Turkish fleet that had sailed

westward from Cyprus and Crete.  Christian met Saracen off Lepanto,

October 7, 1571, broke the naval power of the Turks forever and set

barricades to their western expansion to this day.  Thus was

October 13, 1307, at last avenged.  Nearly every European state and

noble family was represented.  There was also present a humble

Spaniard who had his arm shattered but who lived to write a book,

with his one good hand, the novel Don Quixote, that laughed the

last dregs of a corrupt and bogus chivalry out of Europe.  He died

in 1616, the year our Shakespeare died, and an era ended.  The era

of the common man followed; a new day had dawned.

THE SCHOOL OF CHIVALRY

There are, if I may so say, three powerful spirits, which have from

time to time moved over the face of the waters, and given a

predominant impulse to the moral sentiments and energies of

mankind.  These are the spirits of liberty, of religion, and of

honour.  It was the principal business of chivalry to animate and

cherish the last of these three. And whatever high magnanimous

energy the love of liberty or religious zeal has ever imparted, was

equalled by the exquisite sense of honour which this institutio n

preserved.

Valour, loyalty, courtesy, munificence, formed collectively the

character of an accomplished knight, so far as was displayed in the

ordinary tenor of his life, reflecting these virtues as an

unsullied mirror. Yet something more was required for the perfect

idea of chivalry, and enjoined by its principles; an active sense

of justice, an ardent indignation against wrong, a determination of

courage to its best end, the prevention or redress of injury.

EUROPE DURING THE MIDDLE AGES,

HENRY HALLAM