The Knights Templar: The True and Surprising Story Of Histories Most Secretive Order

by Patrick Auerbach

  When it came to the ideal of character and the facing down of adversity, the knights called character the metaphorical vessel which holds our values. The Order claimed that character was the way one’s innermost soul sparked one’s actions and whether it came from a good and noble place. They considered that the way one treated another person was directly correlated to the convictions of their heart. They vehemently believed that nothing was impossible through Christ. Any sort of adversity that stood in their path could be overcome with strength of faith. Their resolve came from the mind-set that God would have not allowed the obstacle in their lives unless He believed they could overcome it. Therefore, putting faith in Him gave them strength in purpose and enabled the knights to overcome any and all adversities. The knights also had the same view regarding loved ones as well. If one was harmed by a loved one’s actions, one was not to lash out or seek revenge but to seek justice. If for some reason justice could not be employed, they must believe that it had happened because something better would come from the situation. This again went back to the theme of divine intervention. The knights must have believed that no matter what the circumstance, good or bad, that living a life of God meant that they should trust in him. Strength of character and faith in God, it was said, would carry the knights on any journey they embarked on. They believed that the Christian faith was the righteous one and that God was on their side. But then again, that’s what their Islamic neighbors believed as well.

  Templar knights usually convened at their church under the cover of night. The potential candidate was ordered to remain outside the doors where he would then be asked three times by a messenger of the Grand Master whether he truly wished to become a Templar. After he delivered his answer, he was brought in formally. The Grand Master would then ask something like: “The rules of our order are strict, and you are beginning a life of endurance and not one of ease; one of danger and one of self-denial. You will have to watch when perhaps you will be sighing for sleep; to endure fatigue when you would fain rest; to be hungry and thirsty when you are longing to eat and to drink; and to leave one country for another without a moment’s hesitation, if your vow requires it. Do you really wish to be a Templar? Are you in good health? Are you betrothed or married? Are you in debt, and cannot pay? Do you belong to any other order?”

  If the aspirant gave satisfactory answers to all of the Grand Master’s questions, he was administered the vow of the order. The vow consisted of three major points which were that of poverty, obedience and chastity. They would have sounded something like, “I swear to defend with my life, my strength and my speech, the holy doctrines of the Trinity and the Catholic faith. I promise to be obedient and submissive to the Grand Master; and to travel by sea or land if need be, to defend my brother Christians against the Infidels. My right hand and sword shall be dedicated to the service of the king and church against the Moslems; and I swear never to shun a combat with any miscreants if only three in number. I will fight them in single combat, and never fly from an enemy.” The knights seemingly had a special obsession with numerology and the number three shows up many times during the initiation process. They joined together with other chapters three times per year, observed mass and ate meat three times a week, and if at any time they failed during the course of duty, they were flogged in front of the entire chapter three times. However if a Templar failed in his duty of fighting the Infidels, he would be banished from the Order for life.

  Generally, the Templar code is not unlike anything we live by today. Most people consider things like honor, family and truth to be paramount and try to embody these values on a daily basis. In my research for this book, I came across countless modern “orders” complete with a dot com address and promoting these knightly ideals. The practice of this moral code gives people purpose and a sense of pride in their family, community and their faith. Even in the modern age, long after the time of the Knights Templar, some people are even vowing to live a life of righteousness and morality as outlined by the Templar code.

  Chapter 4: Symbolism During the Crusades and Middle Ages

  The Knights Templar used a multitude of various symbols and insignia to distinguish themselves and their property. The first of these is the Beauseant banner, which features a black and white flag that can be symbolic of the battle against good and evil. The banner was one of the most widely-used symbols for individual Templars. Knights were expected to always be aware of the banner’s location while on the battlefield according to the statutes of the Order. If ever the men became scattered or overwhelmed by the enemy, they were required to take up formation under the Beauseant.

  The symbol of the cross had been used as a symbol of Christianity long before the middle-ages. There was nothing more suitable for the armies of Crusaders than to use the cross as a visual distinction. Abbot Guibert’s History of Jerusalem claims that Pope Urban II called to use the sign as both an indicator of military status and a motivational symbol for Christian knights to fight with valor for a Godly cause. The abbot attested that the Pope ordered the Crusaders to cut out crosses from any sort of material and sew them onto their cloaks and tunics. Fulcher of Chartres penned the following: “O, how fitting and how pleasing it was for us all to see those crosses, stitched in silk or in gold, or made out of any kind of material, which the Pilgrims, following the order of the Pope, fashioned on their shoulders after pledging to set out on this march”. Evidently in the beginning, there was no specific design or color that was required of the Crusaders. The original nine members of Knights Templar Order were said to have worn crosses on their tunics in Palestine during the first Crusade, but history has been unclear about the way they looked originally. Pope Honorius II allowed the Knights the privilege to use distinctive white cloaks without crosses in the year 1128. The idea of a simple and modest white robe was symbolic of innocence. It wasn’t until 1145-1153 that Eugene III mandated that the Order wear the red cross of martyrdom.

  The image of the lion is found quite often when researching the Knights. The animal is an ancient symbol of power and regality and appeared on quite a few occasions in medieval history. In that sense, it is not surprising that lions were used in Templar seals and architecture. The tower of the Order’s bastion was crowned with four gilded lions, costing 1,500 bezants, as told by the historian known as the “Templar of Tyre”. These would have certainly been a conveyance of the Order’s incredible wealth and might. The knights more than likely chose this symbol for multiple reasons, one of course being the connotations of military valor and strength. Bernard of Clairvaux’s “In Praise of the New Knighthood” likened the Knights Templar to the vehement beast as well as the meek lamb which the Knights also used in its seal.

  Throughout the years the Templar seal was changed multiple times, but most commonly during the end of the 12th century the Templar Grand Masters employed the use of a two-sided seal which depicted The Dome of the Rock – an architectural addition to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. On the other side appeared the Order’s commonly used symbol of two knights riding on a single horse. This specific design was first used by Bertrand de Blanquefort, the sixth Grand Master of the Order, in 1158 and remained the standard until the dissolution of the Templars in 1312. In addition to the double-sided seal, there was also a single-sided one featuring only the Dome of the Rock – or Dome of the Holy Sepulchre. According to Innocent IV, around the year 1251 it was common for provincial masters who experienced a fair amount of success to use the same seal. The provincial master continued the use of the Agnus Dei, or Lamb of God seal. William of Cardona, the Aragonese master, used a seal which depicted a knight on horseback who carried a shield and lance with a cross and the wording “S. MINISTRI TEMPI 1 ARAGON 7 CATALON”. This was translated to “Seal of the Minister of the Temple Aragon and Catalonia.”

  Thirty meters below the city of Jerusalem lies a vast and intricate network of cave systems that were made by cutting through the limestone. The catacombs were given added strength by stone colu
mns which were 70 feet high. These caverns were said to have been carved out by the Knights Templar over 900 years ago in their search for religious relics after they took residence in the Haram al-Sharif at Temple Mount. When the tunnels were excavated by Cities of the Underworld, they discovered a fleur-de-lis carved into one of the grand columns and caught it in the documentary footage as the crew conducted their exploration.

  Chapter 5: The Second Crusade

  In the span of two short years between 1147 and 1149, The Second Crusade was considered to have provided a sort of measurement of the success that the Templars established. On the night before Christmas 1144, an army commanded by the governor of Aleppo and Mosul Imad ad-Din Zengi overthrew the city of Edessa. Nearly a year later, the news of Edessa’s fall finally reached Pope Eugenius III. In a letter, he urged King Louis VII of France to lead a second Crusade against Islam and take back the city. The problem was that Louis was not in exceptional favor with his barons. Three years prior he had intentionally started a war in order to illegally seize a large portion of land from Theobald of Champagne. Much to his surprise, not many showed interest in his proposal to launch an eastern expedition. Louis turned to Bernard of Clairvaux in the hope that he would be able to rally the public in a meeting scheduled for Easter of 1146 in Burgundy.

  Reminiscent of Pope Urban's address to the clergy in 1095, the scene in Burgundy on March 31st 1146 drew immense crowds. People flooded into the city, so many that Bernard delivered his speech from a platform which had been built specifically for this event. The hordes had come for the prospect of listening to Bernard preaching the sermon of the Crusade. Many of the attendees were themselves children and grandchildren of the first Crusaders, just as keen on carrying on the honor of the family as they were on liberating the city of Edessa. His speech had fallen on eager ears. He wrote a summation to King Louis claiming: “Villages and towns are now deserted… Everywhere you will see widows whose husbands are still alive.”

  The next spring, both Pope Eugenius and King Louis attended a Chapter meeting at the Paris Temple. Four archbishops, 130 Templar knights and just as many squires and sergeants gathered together. As well as discussing departure and strategy, Pope Eugenius appointed a treasurer to receive the tax he had levied in order to support the new Crusade. William of Tyre suggested that during this meeting Eugenius should give to the Templars the honor of adding a red cross to their white mantles as a symbol of martyrdom and their willingness to make the ultimate sacrifice for their faith and their righteous cause.

  Germany was brimming with zeal for the crusades during this time, and King Conrad III of Germany was on board as well after hearing Bernard’s speech in the Rhineland. Conrad was intent on leading German soldiers to fight alongside the French. Accompanied by Master Everard des Barres from the Temple of France and those knights who were present at the Chapter meeting in spring, the French and German armies took the same route as the First Crusade. Everard played a crucial role in negotiations with the Byzantine Emperor Manuel Comnenus. King Louis looked upon Manuel with skepticism, as he had joined in peace with the Seljuk Turks forming an alliance against Roger of Sicily. Tensions were high, as Manuel didn’t think highly of the prospect of western forces bearing down upon his empire and the French were wary to trust an emperor who would sign a peace treaty with the Turks. Despite these factors, Everard succeeded in securing safe passage for the Crusaders.

  This was seemingly the first and last victory of the Second Crusade. In January of 1148 the French, browbeaten and demoralized by the unrelenting winter, learned that Conrad’s army had been defeated by the Seljuk Turks at Dorylaeum. While trudging through the narrow passages of the Cadmus Mountains the French found themselves under attack as well. Their heavy weaponry was immobilized and rendered useless in the rocky terrain, and the masterful archers of the Turkish light infantry rained arrows down upon them. The French who were lucky enough to escape death suffered from blows to their morale and severe shortages of provisions.

  Once again, Louis called on the Knights Templar and Everard des Barres who divided the army into smaller units of 50 men and appointed a Templar as commander of each. This action alone breathed fresh air into the French and boosted morale enough for the disparaged troops to make it to the port of Attila, where Louis took the most skilled and able-bodied warriors to Antioch. Once they reached the shore of Antioch the Crusaders once again suffered another blow, and once again Louis turned to Everard de Barres for help. In getting his army through Asia Minor, Louis had used up almost all of the allotted tax funds. In an effort to find sufficient funding for the Second Crusade, de Barres sailed to Acre where he succeeded in securing enough capital to continue their journey. This act served as proof that the Templars had indeed become an unrivaled financial institution. Everard was able to either draw from the Templar treasury directly or borrow the funds using the Order’s many assets as collateral. Whichever was the case, it solidified the bond between the French monarchy and the Templars resulting in the Templars acting as the French Royal Treasury until the 13th century.

  In the remaining years of the Second Crusade, the Order seemed to have backed away from their formerly prominent role. They had secured funding but saw that the excursion was taking a turn for the worse when they silently bowed out. In June, a council was drawn together in Acre to decide on a new course of action. Both the Grand Master of the Hospital, Raymond du Puy and the Templar Grand Master, Robert de Craon, were present. The group argued back and forth in a debate as to whether they should march through Aleppo toward Edessa or if they should instead take on Ascalon to the south. After a long and drawn out process, it was finally decided that the next target would be Damascus.

  The Crusaders had been planning to attack the city in the following month. The Crusaders did have a fair amount of success in the western side of the city; however the men made the unfortunate mistake of moving around the eastern border. Their new position in the east was not as well supplied as their previous camp had been. They were without water and for some reason had agreed upon launching their next attack at the most fortified portion of the wall that bordered Damascus. Upon hearing the rumors that a massive Muslim force had been forming under Nur ed-Din, son of Zengi, the Christian army made the excruciating decision to pack up and retreat. The Second Crusade had come to an anticlimactic end and blame began to circulate for its failure.

  Many different theories were revealed to explain the fiasco that was the Second Crusade. Some were sceptical about the Knights Templar’s early exit and the Order was accused of treachery. The Templars, on the other hand, had looked down upon the Christians of Outremer, or “Men of Jerusalem”, for assimilating to eastern ways. There was plenty of blame to go around. John of Wurzburg was a German monk who sided with the Christians in Outremer, believing that the Templars were to blame for the fall of Christians at Damascus. He and an anonymous colleague claimed that they had been bribed by the Damascenes to bow out of the battle and spare the city. They both turned out to be justified in their accusations. There were rumors that the “Men of Jerusalem” had accepted money in exchange for their mercy. The early 13th century account of Ernoul and Bernard the Treasurer claimed that the Hospitallers were working with the Templars and profiting from these Holy Wars. The Order had in fact been paid off by Damascus, and with counterfeited money at that. However many of these accusatory claims were made decades after the end of the Second Crusades and most scholars believe that the chroniclers were merely reflecting disdain for the Temple and the Hospital that went back to 1148.

  Chapter 6: The Battle of Montgisard

  Stephen Howarth described the ensuing battle like this: “There were twenty-six thousand Saracen horsemen, only a few hundred Christians; but the Saracen were routed. Most were killed; Saladin himself only escaped because he rode a racing camel. The young king with his hands bandaged, rode in the forefront of the Christian charge – with St. George beside him, people said, and the True Cross shining as brightly as the sun. W
hether or not that was so, it was an almost incredible victory, an echo of the days of the First Crusade. But it was also the last time such a great Muslim army was beaten by such a small force.”

  In the year 1177, the Christian empire was in the midst of a crisis. King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem, who suffered from leprosy, was unable to produce an heir due to his affliction. He was crowned in July of 1174 at only 13 years of age after the death of King Amalric. The “Leper King” became somewhat of a figurehead for the Crusade despite his illness as he was admired for his displays of loyalty, courage and wisdom. Sensing the vulnerability of his kingdom and dealing with his own mortality, Baldwin sent for western aid. In the summer of 1177 the Count of Flanders, Philip of Alsace, arrived in Acre accompanied by a rather large group of Western knights.

  Philip offered to assist Baldwin in alliance to complete the invasion of Egypt with the help of a Byzantine naval fleet, the task left behind by the previous King of Jerusalem- Amalric. Plans were halted, however, when Philip began making demands that neither the King of Jerusalem nor the Emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire were comfortable meeting. Philip had requested to be made king of any regions that were conquered by the Christian armies. At this, the expedition was entirely abandoned. The Byzantine navy withdrew their support and Philip left to travel north with his knights in an attack on the Seljuk posts at Harim and Hama.