Suddenly, Catholics were persona non grata and arrested in large numbers, suspected of being behind ‘Papist Plots’ to bring down King Henry. There were great expectations of finding loads of money and the immense treasure of the Templars. I mean “vanguard” literally in this case, they actually stood in the front of an army with swords and everything. Allegations of heresy were also a handy way to discredit and attack your enemies. Who were these medieval monastic knights, whose exploits were the stuff of legend even in their own day? The luckier ones were burned at the stake like the sect's founder, but others suffered worse fates. The order, which was a military brotherhood, simply practised a secret ritual that was grossly misunderstood and misinterpreted." The trial of the Templars resulted from the king of France’s desire to confiscate the order’s considerable wealth. The religious persecutions started when Henry Vlll split with Rome in 1534 and started his own ‘Church of England’ with the King being its head. Sir Richard Arcos (II) 4. These charges and the Templars’ prosecution and trial are covered later in the book. While this seems a simple conclusion, there were other factors involved. But the king did not get what he so eagerly hoped for – no great treasure was found. Lies, all lies. Templars: Heretics or Heroes On Friday 13 th October 1307, less than two centuries after the Order was founded, the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon ( The Templars ) were effectively disbanded by Philip IV, King of France. More than 5,000 arrests were made in France. All of which adds to the irony of the Templars’ arrest in 1307 on charges of heresy and blasphemy. Philip eventually pressured the French pope, Clement V, into closing the Order down in 1312. I was wondering if this is actually true - because they were trusted with the kings all over europe and all of the popes - and i don't see how they could not realize the Knights were heretic. Thus, the rites that led to the downfall of the Knights Templar were only heretical from the perspective of those who were not initiates of the gnostic-alchemical path. The Chinon Parchment is the definitive and incontrovertible proof of the Templars’ innocence, and should finally put this question to rest. This is a list of people burned after being deemed heretics by different Christian Churches.The list does not attempt to encompass the list of those executed by burning for other reasons (such as victims of witch hunts or other persecutions). ... From their origins as defenders of pilgrims to the Holy Land to their dramatic finish as heretics burned at the stake, Pernoud offers a concise but thorough account of the Templars' contribution to Christendom. New members of the order were required to deny Christ as their reception into the order, spit on the cross and 'defile' it (urinate on it, etc. Over time, they grew into a sort of an international organization. “The papal process started by Pope Clement V, to investigate both the Order as a whole and its members individually found virtually no knights guilty of heresy outside France. Similar motives caused the Kyteler case, but this time the greed was Alice’s step-children’s as … The Knights Templar were accused of heresy in the early fourteenth century. Monarchs of Christendom were given orders to arrest the Knights Templar and sequester their lands in the name of the papacy. Many of the knights afterwards denied their confessions, but in May 1310 fifty-four Templars were burned at the stake in a field outside Paris, after which many of those still alive in prison hastily announced that their confessions had been true after all. In recent years a number of writers have claimed that, although the Templars were not heretics or apostates, abuses—such as denial of Christ and spitting on the cross—did take place at Templar admission ceremonies. The trial period of the Templars took 5 years with protests occurring throughout Europe. The Templars were in every European nation. The Knights Templar were part of the Catholic Church, like the Knights Hospitaller or other orders of chivalry created for the Crusades. Were the Templars Heretics? The power and influence of the Templar were growing at a fast pace and in an unstoppable way. Regine Pernoud . The Templars at that time had lost their original aim - they were no longer protecting pilgrims or even fighting against the muslim invasions (e.g the Knights of St John (Maltese) still fought on). In reality, the Templars rose to become a rich and powerful organisation, financiers of regional wars and holders of valuable property. Receptions were held in secret [As I said, this was standard practice in all orders, and no-one said the Benedictines were worshipping a cat], Templar were made to swear they would not leave the order, and sodomy was encouraged. Ordinary soldiers who confessed were given prison terms, then allowed to join other Orders. Thirty-eight, mostly elderly Templars were tortured, 105 ‘confessed’ and 69 leaders were burnt at the stake. Since the Templars were around to keep Christians safe on their journey to and from the Holy Land, the new Muslim order kind of put them out of a job. The Templars were not heretics. Pope Clement supported the campaign against the Templars by Philip IV of France, who owed them a great deal of money and had initiated the first arrests against the Templars on 13 October 1307. The Templars were persecuted, most of all, for the Templar Magna Carta enforcing the Rule of Law over arbitrary abuses of State power by secular Kings. Alongside the Seekers of Truth, who were formed to oversee the templars, they were the Inquisition, bound to serve and protect the righteous. The famous Templar Cross is … Temple Church, London - this is where Knights Templar who had been killed in battle against the heretics were buried. The Knights Templars were accused of the following errors of belief: 1. The Catholic Church hunted down and killed heretics including the Templars therefore the Templars must have been heretics. They were supported by powerful members of the Catholic Church such as Bernard of Clairvaux, who wrote the Templar’s initial rules. Dulcino of Novara, the successor to the founder, was publicly torn to pieces with hooks, as was his wife. “The Templars were accused of idolatry, including worshiping a cat and it all added up to a catastrophic charge of heresy. In 1310, dozens of Templars who’d retracted their confessions were burnt at the stake as relapsed heretics. The arrests were made, the Knights were tortured and their leaders eventually burned at the stake. Templars were to be pensioned off and their property turned over to the Hospitallers. Take the Templars; in their day they were the vanguard of draconian religious aggression. Many of the Knights Templar in France were arrested on October 13, 1307 at the orders of King Philip IV of France.King Philip was severely in debt to the military order, and hoped to claim their wealth for his own purposes.Scores of charges were leveled at the Templars, many of them similar charges to those which had been directed at other of Philip's enemies, such as heresy and blasphemy. They protected the land and the Chantry from all manner of threats, be it maleficarum (blood mages), abominations, demons, cultists and heretics who sought to subvert the Andrastian religion. After they were granted official recognition by the church, their fame and success skyrocketed. A new book, Processus contra Templarios, will be published by the Vatican's Secret Archive on Oct 25, and promises to restore the reputation of the Templars, whose leaders were burned as heretics when the order was dissolved in 1314. The Knights Templar were a powerful and secretive group of warrior monks during the Middle Ages. Now, after my last post I thought I ought to say something about the Knights Templar as 'heretics'. But soon the institutions they represented became too extreme even to brook them, and they ended up purged. Historians believed that the Templars were innocent of the charges brought against them by Philip IV, but many outside academia still suspected the Templars of having been heretics and occultists. 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