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To students of history, religion, or the occult, a pattern
of individual names and esoteric movements appears on the
canvas of time like a sudden flash of light, then just as
quickly vanishes. A group of disparate people – sometimes
famous, sometimes obscure, sometimes solitary, sometimes
united, but always engaged in some amorphous activity –
spontaneously surfaces. Just as suddenly their traces evaporate,
their true purpose and the scope of their actions never
comprehended. Understanding their reality seems to be beyond
our grasp. Further study may grudgingly yield information
– but it is inconclusive, incomplete, perplexing. Their
nature and purpose seems to forever remain a mystery. The
search for a solution only leads to speculations, not genuine
answers.
For us to intellectually apprehend how and why esoteric
groups work and influence the world requires a different
type of thinking, a thought process that sees these organisations
and their activities as an ebb and flow of an ideal. Most
of us have approached the inquiry into the nature of how
esoteric groups actually work and influence history by studying
the limited and grossly distorted documentation available
about them, like an investment analyst abstractly examining
from afar the sterile financial structure of a multi-national
corporation. But for us to understand the nature of historical
esoteric groups, we should first attempt to find their underlying
purpose. If we approach their study through that avenue,
we may be able to understand why and how they work to achieve
their purposes.
All of the positive esoterically tinged movements that
have influenced history share one common characteristic.
They seek to positively impact and alter, in a transformational
way, the entire structure and direction of society. Their
impetus is to interject into day to day living a transcendent
awareness and communion with the spiritual element of life,
to give a spiritual orientation and focus to the material
activities of day to day living – to, in effect, spiritualise
the material. The reason for this direction is to correctly
align man with the necessary spiritual path to fulfill his
spiritual destiny. Their motives are highly altruistic,
despite the wildly imaginative suspicions and innuendoes
of many writers and even some church leaders. The methods
employed by many powerful Western spiritual movements are
always entirely in keeping with these goals.
The best known of these movements have manifested at key
transitional points in Western history. The Rosicrucian
movement on continental Europe. The less obvious but equally
influential hermetic academies in Renaissance Italy and
England. The Cathars in southern France. The Essenes at
the dawn of the Christian era. And the best known, and by
far the most misunderstood, of these groups, the Order of
the Poor Knights of Christ and The Temple of Solomon –
The Knights Templar. Each of these groups formed, existed,
and survived a certain duration to accomplish a particular
mission, then vanished. Through their actions, each of them
positively influenced society as we know it today.
Historians and spiritual writers have expended a great
deal of ink unsuccessfully trying to explain what these
groups were about and what they believed. Each of these
groups encountered considerable opposition and conflict
and, seemingly, was superseded by rival groups. History
is invariably altered by the victors to suit their goals
and needs. Most of the existing works about esoteric groups
have been based on deliberately distorted records left by
the supposed victors. For example, as has been very aptly
stated, attempting to draw an accurate picture of the activities
of the Knights Templar by studying the records of the Inquisition
is like trying to get an accurate picture of the activities
of the wartime French resistance solely by studying the
records of the Gestapo.(1)
However, one unaltered stream runs through each of these
groups. It is their operational procedure. Each group has
several common yet contradictory characteristics. Their
organisational structure is both hierarchical and independent.
It is at once interdependent and self-sustaining. In other
words, it is a cell-like structure, organised around a belief
system, designed to be able to function without need for
a central governing body, yet still maintaining dutiful
fealty and responsibility to the doctrine which the overall
body represents. To cite one case, most people, ignorant
of the actual working nature of the Essenes, assume that
the Qumram monastery was the only Essene entity. In fact,
many Essenes lived in the day to day society. The Qumram
community was a centralised training base. Essene headquarters
were on Mt. Carmel. The Essenes, like the Cathars, the Templars,
and the Hermetic academies, could function independently
if cut off from their supposed core. The Rosicrucian groups
are the best recognised model of this structure. This system
later became the basis for intelligence organisations and
underground resistance movements. They were consciously
organised like the esoteric societies, designed to continue
functioning without support or contact from the main body,
yet incapable of revealing the heart or details of the structure
of the entire organism if penetrated or compromised by opposing
forces.
Similarly, each of the esoteric groups has other definite
organisational characteristics: Some sort of unified command
and reporting structure that always appears vague and mysterious
to outsiders. A highly disciplined internal training system.
A firm code of conduct. An adherence to a canon of basic
beliefs not fully comprehended by outsiders. The unwavering
concept of individual personal responsibility and personal
accountability. And the invariable but gracefully unstated
implication of leadership by example.
These traits do not define a belief system per se, but
something far more important and exceptionally relevant
to our society today. They define a principle-centred existence
that is applied in day to day affairs. They define very
clearly a specific way of living one’s life. This way
of life is lived in accordance with the knowledge and principles
that have been carefully and selectively handed down orally
through generations of initiates, and have as their basis
the essential principles of the universe and the knowledge
of the origin and purpose of man. This orally transmitted
information is referred to as “The Tradition”,
and sometimes, when collected in a preserved body of wisdom,
“The Temple.”
Before examining more closely how this system has impacted
us, it will benefit us to review the Western model for the
public visibility of this system. The model was long established
in the West. It entered into a decline. Its adherents transferred
the model to other bases, perpetrated it, and preserved
it for transmission into the future. The model was the Egyptian
Temple system.
All of Egyptian society was organised along an esoteric
and an exoteric basis. The exoteric structure centred around
the pharonic system of government, with which academic students
of this civilisation have occupied themselves in an effort
to comprehend why this society lasted so long and so successfully.
Their studies have not seen much successful fruit, because
they have failed to comprehend that it was the esoteric
structure which sustained the entire basis of the Egyptian
dynasties and the surrounding society for so many centuries.2
This esoteric structure has had little effective study
in academic circles, like most of man’s genuine history.
It was organised around the Temple system. The Temple system
was based on the gradual instruction of an increasingly
elite group. This study took many decades. It involved intensive
personal discipline. It began with a period of self-purification.
It entailed physical, mental, and spiritual training. It
worked on all aspects of the being.
The successful candidate was gradually culled away from
his peers. The less capable aspirants were weeded out. The
more fortunate were advanced progressively and carefully
through the system over many years. They studied the physical
and spiritual aspects of man, his origin, purpose, and relationship
with the divine, becoming true physicians who could heal
not just the physical being. Through increasingly progressive
steps, they ultimately advanced to a series of tests. Some
of these tests proved fatal to the aspirant. One objective
of the training was an induced out of body experience in
the Great Pyramid. To return the aspirant to this plane
required the efforts of a high priest with twelve disciples.
The priests were not always able to return the aspirant,
and the death of the aspirant was not uncommon. When the
aspirant did return to this plane, he consciously saw the
world differently, like one who has been reborn with new
knowledge and a new perspective. This is the origin of the
phrase now so popular with fundamentalist Christians, “born
again”. In the end, a handful of carefully trained
and highly developed individuals were advanced into an elite
priesthood which, through its adherence to spiritual principles,
maintained a balance that facilitated the functioning of
Egyptian society. Their point of view had by now changed.
They no longer worked on spiritual progress for their own
sake, but for the benefit of the upward evolution of mankind.
And from their inner core, they were dispatched to different
corners of the known world to indirectly help the lesser
developed advance themselves, thereby assisting in the progress
of humanity.
The Temple replicated the structure and spiritual principles
of the universe. The outer society replicated the Temple
and its spiritual principles, but in a form not articulated
to the common people who were not sufficiently developed
to consciously understand, honour, and fulfill its reality.
Instead, by replicating the principles in society, the average
person was able to live in rhythm with the principles and
to become positively influenced by them, growing through
this process without making the total dedication and sacrifice
required of the elite core group.
The Egyptian pharonic concept represents the embodiment
in the person of pharaoh the highest principles and aspirations
of the society. The pharaoh was the outward representative
of the Temple principles and of the life of the entire society.
He was supposed to live life in the material world in compliance
with the inner laws of which the populace remained only
vaguely conversant. The pharaoh was supported and aided
in this role by the inner and most highly developed elite
of the Temple priesthood. His dictums were executed by a
separate administrative arm.
It is difficult if not impossible for any group, no matter
how dedicated, to indefinitely sustain itself in accordance
with spiritual principles. Such organisations have a period
of life in which they create an expression suited to the
times, accomplish the mission and disappear to be succeeded
in another time and place by a successor organisation suited
to the expression of its times. During the existence of
any group, as individuals successively replace each other
from generation to generation, changes occur. Some are more
able than others, some less able than those who precede
or follow them. Human frailty sets in. Slight changes in
even a highly disciplined Temple system can have vast implications
over time. Alterations in the focus and dedication of those
holding the pharonic throne could divert the course of events.
Embodying the weathervane of a society or group is neither
easy nor sustainable. Gradually, systems and principles
can deteriorate.
But over that same time period, the seeds of the future
can also be planted. Non-Egyptians were allowed to enter
the Temple system. Some advanced through the full training.
Some returned back to their own countries. This is the origin
of the system called the Mysteries which arose in the Mediterranean
pre-Christian era as Egyptian culture declined. The Mysteries
appeared in a different form but followed the same lines
as the Temple system. It was the same message, simply put
into a different bottle, a bottle styled for the people
of Greece and the Mediterranean world. Similarly, the Egyptian
Temple system is undeniably the training ground for the
great Pythagoras and the system of knowledge that he spread
through ancient Greece and southern Europe.
The teachings of Pythagoras appeared differently as well.
Styled in a more modern form, they followed the same line
as the Temple, but less rigid. Still, they entailed an academy.
A gradual system in which the candidate advanced degree
by degree toward a higher level of mental and spiritual
development. And an outward aspect as well, a concern with
the nature and direction of humanity, just like the Temple
system. Metaphorically, the superiority of the system of
knowledge that he represented is expressed by the parable
of his dying of starvation on the steps of the Temples of
Muses.
While the Temple system was being disseminated to the
north and east of Egypt by Pythagoras, another Temple trained
initiate followed a similar path of preserving the initiatic
knowledge. His name is known to history as Moses. He aligned
with an obscure people and reconstituted their societal
structure and belief system around the Temple principles.
By restructuring an entire ethnic people, he insured that
aspects of the Temple system would be preserved by this
insular group for generations, until its next reconstitution
was necessary in a form applicable to the requirements of
that time.
Moses reconstituted the Temple system among the Jewish
people in a manner stylised after the Egyptian model. A
specific caste of priests was physically organised around
a Temple. The entire twelve tribe system – itself a
mystical anagram – focused on the Temple, and the life
of the nation centred on it, on their faith, and on a specific
identity as a people set apart, unique in God’s eyes,
and held together under a pharaoh-like king. Even the mystical
Tree of Life of the Kabbalah directly corresponds to the
Egyptian Neters. The focus on their religion as the core
of their existence gave the Jewish people their unique identity
and enabled them to survive the cultural annihilation experienced
by others. But it did not give rise to the powerful spiritual
current Moses had hoped. This vacuum gave rise to the mission
of the Essenes.
The Essenes, like the Templars, are a widely misunderstood
spiritual group. Subdivided into different groups and having
members active both in their monastic training ground at
Qumram and throughout the Jewish community in day to day
living, from the headquarters at Mt. Carmel they were directed
toward one specific goal – the preparation of an entity
sufficiently advanced to bear the higher consciousness which
would incarnate in the man known as Jesus. This particular
mission extended far beyond the concept of the messiah,
which may be loosely defined as the priest-king. In the
concept of the messiah is the return of the pharaoh, the
embodiment of the spiritual governing principle in the day
to day affairs of the state, but in the Essene case it involves
a particularly advanced consciousness carrying an impulse
to revive the spiritual facets of mankind. The pharonic
ideal also appeared throughout Europe, degenerating over
time into the present concept of royalty. Interestingly,
all prophetic Jewish literature except one book foretells
and focuses on the coming of a messiah.
For the Essenes, the mission was consuming. In an occult
sense, the entire organisation focused on the incarnation
of a spiritual being who would alter humanity through the
implantation of a spiritual impulse. The documents of their
training base at Qumram denote the discipline that was expected
to be extended in daily life. There is little in the aspects
of daily training in these documents that is not in other
spiritual schools. Their nature has assumed a special character
given that those men and women in the modern world primarily
responsible for studying these documents do not understand
the rudiments of the way in which individuals are trained
to live in society and reflect spiritual values, nor can
they apprehend a methodology so broad that it intends through
deliberately indirect actions the reformation of the entire
society.
The name Essene has many interpretations. One of the most
interesting is “trowel”, the tool with which a
mason works with stone and mortar to create a building.
The Essenes were masons, building the house of God in themselves.
By doing this, they were working to help advance mankind.
Ultimately, the mission of creating the vessels adequate
to sustain the spiritual capacity necessary for the reformation
of society was successful. The Essenes, their mission completed,
disappeared from history, most traces of their existence
obliterated by the different Jewish sects that opposed them.
The start of the Christian era marked a singular turning
point. Prior to this time, many conflicting religious expressions
of the same ideals existed side by side. The Greek Mysteries
are allegorical representations of the Egyptian system.
The rise of various cults such as Sol Invictus, Mithras,
and the Roman system of gods are all representations of
the same group of principles. This mass confusion was consolidated
in the early years of the Christian era as the Roman church
proclaimed itself supreme and systematically absorbed or
annihilated its opposition, driving these movements into
extinction. But by these actions, the church created a widespread
common vocabulary and belief structure.
During this time, Pythagorean thought assumed an academic
and philosophical character and resurfaced later in Neo-Platonic
ideals. Plato’s ideals, often seen as observations
derived from Athenian society or a philosophical treatise,
are really esoteric principles expressed as the restoration
of a balanced and spiritual order. As opposed to blind obedience,
man functions in an intellectual manner driven by principles.
But the outcome is still the same dream the sages have held
for centuries.
The manifestation of the esoteric movements took a different
form in the south of France in the 11th century with the
group called the Cathars. Before reviewing the Cathars,
it is important to hold everything preceding them in perspective
to understand the change in direction that begins its implementation
with the Cathars and the Templars. In Egypt, a highly structured
elite imposed a regimented society based on spiritual principles
on a less enlightened humanity to evolve their awareness.
In Israel, an elite group worked to affect a top down solution
to promulgating spiritual principles, but without rigidly
structuring society. In the Pythagorean and Platonic systems,
a small group worked for the good of humanity, but without
rigidly structuring society and emphasising the value of
individual intellectual reasoning capacity. Each of these
directions represented gradual steps toward the realisation
of the development of human potential and individual freedom.
Centuries later, humanity would realise the benefits from
the seeds planted by these groups.
The appearance of the Cathar movement is viewed by historians
as the rise of a new religion which jousted with Christianity
for supremacy and, like so many groups which have struggled
with the Roman church, lost. The Cathars are primarily known
to us by relatively recent works which interpret their story
in light of our limited knowledge of their activities. The
Cathars are usually traced back to the Bogomils and other
groups. They are, in fact, only the same principles, appearing
again in the guise of the message of the times. The Cathar
priesthood, the Parfaits, were noted for their unimpeachable
conduct, purity, and dedication. They contrasted so sharply
with the corrupt Roman church that people flocked to them,
especially in the south of France. However, it is by their
conduct that we must see what they really are. They seek
by conduct to show men how to change their daily lives.
They do not proselytise. They do not impair individual freedom.
In fact, by standing in contradistinction to the prevailing
power of the predominate secular authority of the time that
imposed its will from top down, the Roman church, the Cathar
parfaits encouraged among the common people the freedom
of individual choice. It is expressed by principles lived
in action by an elite priestly core which maintains focused
spiritual values.
What survives of the Cathars today is distorted by people
who think the incomplete remnants of the misunderstood Cathar
belief system is the key. The key was their code of conduct.
That is what attracted followers, that is what made believers,
that is what they promulgated. Persecuted for forty years
in the very first crusade, hunted down, killed, and driven
underground, they were succeeded by three distinct movements,
the Troubadours, the trade guilds, and the orders of knighthood,
particular the Knights Templar.
The Troubadours were a means through which the sages deliberately
intended to imbue man with an orientation toward putting
spiritual principles in action. Travelling minstrels, harmless
singers of songs, tellers of poetry, the Troubadours offered
no overt threat to the established power structure. They
moved through all levels of society, from royal courts to
common taverns. Through their actions and their travels
the Troubadours began the seeds of the first popular literature,
of the beginning of a common popular consciousness. They
were the first to move ideals on a widespread basis into
the popular imagination. Through them, the legends of The
Grail and high spiritual ideals lived in action came into
popular consciousness. They became the vehicle for inspiring
the popular imagination.
The trade guilds held a simple task. They inspired a code
of conduct in daily living for the common people. A harmonious
order was established. That order constituted around discipline
and respect within the guild for members and for their work.
Work itself became a noble ethic to be valued. And because
of the protection of the Knights Templar, the guilds were
spared from oppression by the nobility. Under the unseen
guidance of the secret orders, the road up from slavery
and serfdom had begun for the common people.
Before turning to an overview of the Templars it is significant
to note how key turning points have occurred in the transmission
of the esoteric spiritual message. It was first transmitted
to an elite in societies. The populace was given a highly
simplified version. After the consolidation of much of the
West by Rome, it was transmitted through role models. After
the suppression of the Cathars, it was spread through the
means of ordinary society, not just to sustain an elite,
but in disguise, through and to every man. It reached into
their lives in songs, it touched their imaginations with
inspiring stories, and became principles in the lives of
working men and the foundation of the guilds. And all these
principles were based on one unifying ideal – the impulsion
of proper spiritual principles and their use in focusing
day to day living to uplift the consciousness of man so
that he could evolve and fulfill his purpose and destiny.
The Knights Templar remain today the single greatest force
for turning the spiritual mind of the West. Many prominent
occultists have contended over the years that the beginning
of the decline of the West and of its spiritual dark age
– the age of Kali Yuga – started with the suppression
of the Templars. Today it is fashionable for writers and
historians working from records left by the Inquisition
to charitably agree with the Inquisition that the Templars
had become corrupt, that they had fallen from principles,
and to tacitly agree with some of the charges against them.
These conclusions are the reiteration of falsehoods promulgated
by the only keeper of information in its time, the Roman
church, to cover up its own actions against the Templars,
actions motivated by church and French leaders’ greed
for the Templars’ wealth.
To review how the Templars worked in the world is not
possible within the confines of this space. But a summary
of a handful of their accomplishments clearly reveals its
purposes and the workings of a genuine esoteric organisation.
Like the Essenes and every other genuine group, a core inner
order actually provided the Templars with their spiritual
impetus and direction. But by bridging all worlds of their
time – spiritual and material, nobility and common
man, religious and military, commerce and contemplation,
Christian, Jewish, and Islamic – the Templars moved
the entire course of history. These activities marked another
turning point in history. While their inner order worked
esoterically on spiritual self-development, everything they
did was an action in the world of its time directed at impacting
the day to day lives of people in a positive and transformative
way. Their goal and mission was the transformation of all
of society, and nothing less. But their method was to work
through the key aspects influencing the society of their
time in order to inject spiritual principles in daily life
and plant the seeds for future change.
The best description written of the activities of the
Templars remains: “The mission of the Knights Templar
was two-fold. Firstly, to inject a certain spiritualism
idealism into the world of their time through a number of
concrete actions. Secondly, to insure the continuity of
the Spiritual Tradition of the Temple by seeking out the
sacred esoteric heritage of mankind wherever it was to be
found, to reunite it, and to present to a certain spiritual
elite a synthesis of the Tradition adapted to the Western
mentality of the Middle Ages.” (3)
The Templars mode of action was uniquely suited to their
times. It moved at one and the same time on multiple levels
because it was practical, pragmatic, and designed to create
immediate effects. But it also created an atmosphere which
carefully sowed the seeds for long term future changes on
material and spiritual levels. In this regard a few concrete
actions of the Templars are particularly worth noting.
The Templars sponsored the building of churches, chapels,
and great cathedrals across Europe. Templar churches embodied
in them certain esoteric geometric and mathematical principles
that create a transformative effect on worshippers. The
effect subliminally led more people to experience the value
of the spiritual on their everyday lives. At the same time,
cathedral building had a positive economic impact on the
overpopulated and impoverished European society. Churches
and cathedrals dedicated to the Templar patron, the Virgin,
promoted the feminine principle of spirituality, and, again
subliminally, raised the oppressed status of women in society
by providing a female role model for veneration.
The Templars created a new class in society. They raised
up the common man by protecting the working masons and sponsoring
the first genuine, independent movement of the trade guilds,
the Compagnons de Saint Devoir (the Companions of the Rule
of Holy Duty), who built the Templar sponsored churches
and cathedrals. These trade groups, formally placed under
Templar protection sometime around 1145, created an internal
hierarchy, taught codes of personal conduct and ethical
values to the illiterate craftsmen, provided sources of
income, protected widows and orphans of members, and created
through the graded craftsman system a hierarchy similar
to the discipline in an esoteric order. In a network of
houses in various parts of every country through which apprentices
travelled and worked, common manners and fair play were
instilled, and a sense of common, shared interests was developed.
From their contacts with the Eastern initiates and esoteric
schools of the Middle East, the Templars imparted to the
master tradesmen certain secrets of geometry and mathematics
for incorporation into the cathedrals, thereby raising the
consciousness of the trade class.
The guild houses eventually evolved into the Masonic lodge
systems, and the shared sense of values created the concept
of a unified society of the working man. In addition to
creating a sense of self-worth among the individual members,
this system was the beginning of the first principles of
equal rights for all. After the suppression of the Templars,
the Compagnons were persecuted for many centuries. But when
the plague swept through Europe and decimated the population,
the longer term impact was the elimination of European overpopulation
that had created a surplus of labour and resultant poverty.
By protecting the guilds from oppression by the nobility
and the church, the Templars left in place a mechanism that
insured both a cohesive structure within plague decimated
common society and a body which spoke on behalf of the common
people. It allowed the standard of living to rise and the
basis for a new way of life to begin. The feudal system
waned, replaced by new centres of power. And, indirectly,
the course of society and the evolution of consciousness
expanded. Principled but indirect stimuli often have far
reaching results. As the modern writer and statesman Vaclav
Havel noted during his own seemingly impossible struggle
against Communist authoritarianism, “Even a purely
moral act that has no hope of any immediate and visible
political effect can gradually and indirectly, over time,
gain in political influence.”
The umbrella of Templar action extended beyond the working
tradesmen. The Templars were originally said to be founded
to protect travellers on their way to Jerusalem. The protection
of travellers to the holy place was a metaphor for providing
the spiritual means to higher knowledge. But one reason
the Templars became widely venerated by the common people
was because their network of European commandaries actually
did make travel on the roads safer for the peasants. Heretofore,
the common people enjoyed no protection from incessant road
bandits or pillaging nobility. The protection of the European
roadways not only facilitated the safe movement of commerce.
It was the first truly widespread societal benefit enjoyed
by all classes of society. For the first time, a commoner
enjoyed the same protection as nobility. Once a seed of
equality is planted and assumed as a given by any society
as a whole, the process of eventual transformation is assured.
By becoming an independent force on which every part of
society could depend, the Templars sowed the seeds for the
concept of common standards for all in society and governance.
Much has been made of the fact that the Templars virtually
invented international banking when they became a repository
of royal treasuries, the executor of wills, and the financiers
of kingdoms, and became fabulously wealthy as a result.
Seen in a different light, it has never been noted that
for the first time there existed through the Templars a
common source of trust and justice. Royalty could be assured
their treasuries would not be pillaged. They could travel
safely from location to location without fear of robbery
and knew that they could secure funds at any Templar preceptory
along the way. They could be assured that heirs would not
deprive each other of their inheritance, because the Templars
would enforce will provisions fairly. And commoners with
possessions could be assured that Templars would execute
their wills justly, prevent their possessions from being
usurped by the nobles, or even care for their children in
the event of their deaths. Again, this was the first widespread
standard of unimpeachable fairness available to all levels
of society, a singular force on which people from all walks
of life could depend. From these actions eventually grew
the ideal that justice could be fair and serve all.
The Templars also impacted the concept of government.
They were both advisors to kings and adversaries of the
tyrannical use of royal power. One of the most famous encounters
between royalty and the Templars occurred when English King
Henry III attempted to upbraid the Master of the Temple
in England and was instead bluntly countered, in modern
terms, “Be careful what you say King. For if you cease
to rule with justice, you will cease to be King.” What
royalty and the church, and later historians, would decry
in this exchange as Templar arrogance, was in fact an assertion
of the rights of society against the abusive power of royalty.
The Master of the Temple in England would later be witness
to the signing of the Magna Carta and a behind the scenes
force in its creation and execution. Similarly, by fighting
for the freedom of the small border kingdoms of Aragon,
Navrarre, and Mallorca from Muslim forces and aligning with
those kingdoms, the Templars insured the existence of smaller
independent and more liberal states.
Lastly, the Templars provided a covert bridge that had
not previously existed to other faiths. Generations of historians
have failed to comprehend that the accusations of Templar
familiarity with Islamic and Jewish sects represented not
the religious “corruption and betrayal” of which
their enemies accused them, but rather the specific mission
of attempting to regenerate a commonality of knowledge and
respect of beliefs – which happens to be characteristic
of modern religious tolerance. By their very existence,
the orders of chivalry, and specifically the Templars, paved
the way for the Renaissance – thus the ideals stirred
by the Troubadours became physically embodied by the orders
of knighthood. Through the orders of chivalry, the idealised
Troubadour poetry became a manifest reality. It demonstrated
that the highest ideals which inspired men could in fact
become a living reality, that the concept of the Grail quest
could became a genuine, worldly search for the spiritual
and a way of life.
By the start of the 14th century the secret orders had
moved from working with a small spiritual elite to a hidden
vanguard which worked quietly in society. The emphasis each
esoteric group made in their lifecycles of approximately
200 years foreshadowed the major next step in human progress
and evolution. The ideals and energy put into motion by
the orders of knighthood soon came to flower in the Renaissance.
In Italy the influence of the esoteric on many of the
leading noble families became a primary motivation for the
explosion of learning and culture that became known as the
Renaissance. Through the sponsorship of families like the
Medicis, learning – new modes of thought and the rediscovery
of ancient wisdom – returned to become a valued world
distinctly apart from the province of the church, as in
ancient Greece.
In the Renaissance, the ideal of the Platonic reformation
of society took root. Through the wealth of key Renaissance
families, art was sponsored, books rediscovered, and esoteric
principles applied in the cultural aspects of life, from
creating a rich fabric of meaning in a garden, to promoting
the translation of the Corpus Hermeticum. For the first
time, the implementation of esoteric ideals was openly through
the medium of families who remained fully engaged in everyday
life. They sponsored activities influencing mundane existence.
They injected the concept of beauty and harmony into their
residences and surroundings. Architecture and music again
became important and vital. Even gardens (e.g. the Boboli
Gardens) became expressions of the esoteric ideals of beauty,
harmony, and balance, inspiring the renaissance and infusing
society. The esoteric mission of the Templars to bring a
moribund society back to life with new ideas and spiritual
principles finally flourished, 180 years after their demise.
Cultural figures took the lead in this revival. Marsilio
Ficino strongly influenced the rebirth of Platonic and esoteric
ideals and teachings. At Villa Carreggi, outside Florence,
Ficino actually started a Platonic academy under the sponsorship
of Cosimo De Medici. However, it was Giorgio Gemistos, long
forgotten to history, who was the hidden hand moving the
Renaissance to fruition by providing the inspiration for
Medici’s actions. An occultist and sage council, Gemistos
met Medici in 1437 when Gemistos attended the ecumenical
council of Florence/Ferrera as the unofficial advisor to
the Greek delegation. During this council he spent time
with Medici. His inspired vision of transforming religion
and culture through a spiritual revival led Medici to redirect
his own life. He began a fervent pursuit of the translation
and introduction of classical texts and metaphysical ideas
to vivify every aspect of life. The objective of this work
was nothing less than the transformation of the life of
man and its orientation toward a spiritual way of living
through inspiring the cultural elements of society. From
the Platonic academy and the esoteric lodges of Italy, waves
of creativity and new expressions surged across Europe,
imbuing all levels of society with new ideas and planting
the seeds for future changes.
In England, in the light of the Renaissance and inspired
by esoteric orders spanning the English Channel and connecting
Britain and the continent, an academy called “The Temple”
arose at Gorhambury, becoming an influence on the future
course of the West. Originally under the direction of Sir
Nicholas Bacon, it became focused around his adopted son,
Francis, along with another esoteric academy founded at
Mortlake by John Dee. Trained from youth for his work and
initiated and trained in an esoteric lodge in France, the
full impact of Bacon and the lodge that worked around him
has not yet been fully realised.
Together with a group of men representing all key facets
of the society of his time, Bacon wrote the plays attributed
to Shakespeare and took the interesting multi-dimensional
symbol of Pallas Athena, the spear shaker, as an image in
works published under his own name. The entire structure
of the Shakespearean plays are based on principles in esoteric
teachings. This is why they have had such an enduring appeal.
They were a message styled to the common man. The design
of even the Globe Theatre was an embodiment of the esoteric
principles. Bacon and his group sought to reintroduce the
proper use of the intellect in reasoning through his essays
and attempts to reform institutions, to redirect the ancient
dialectic methods to a tool which could be, like the plays,
accessed by anyone. Of equal and often overlooked importance,
the group introduced the reformation of the English language
as a vehicle for the transmission of esoteric and cultural
concepts. They firmly planted a series of ideals in English
culture that eventually, through England’s global colonies,
began a far reaching transformation beyond the confines
of Europe.(4)
Attempts during this era to establish a Republic such
as the Palantate in Bohemia, and the little studied activities
of John Dee in Bohemia to reform religious activities, did
not meet with success. But the ideals widely established
through these activities and the concurrent issuance of
Rosicrucian pamphlets fired a wide imagination in society
and, according to some academic sources, most likely led
to the period known as the Enlightenment.(5)
Throughout history, slowly, step by step, the process
of transforming humanity has been gradually aided by the
activities of positive esoteric societies. The actions of
positive groups have resulted in benefits realised sometimes
generations later in society. Most interestingly, to the
students of these groups and of the ebb and flow of history,
they seem to be acting in anticipation of the next advancement
necessary in human evolution. For some time now, the activities
of these organisations have appeared quiet, depending perhaps
on the fruition of past efforts to create a positive movement
in humanity or awaiting a new impetus from their own core.
The trend of worldwide culture for the last 200 years
has inexorably been moving toward the enhanced concept of
individual freedom. Today, with some exceptions, we live
in a world in which individual freedom is often taken for
granted. The options of free will and choice by individuals
are becoming a driving force. Now, even commerce and technology
have joined to accelerate this evolutionary step as free
market economies, the Internet, and broadband technologies
will soon bring to people across the globe previously undreamed
of options for working, learning, communicating, and participating.
Yet, in this time, the stakes in the essential struggle
of the spirit have become higher than ever. The conflict
between light and dark is more subtle, the struggle less
overt, but the future consequences of our personal actions
will be higher than ever because of the variety of choices
and the possibility to exercise self-indulgence through
the vehicles of technology and commerce without restraint
or discernment. The outcome of this struggle, to determine
whether or not man will sink into self-indulgent materialism
or rise above it to create a truly better world, is far
from certain. It no longer depends on others, but on ourselves.
We can actively work to become more spiritual, thereby transforming
ourselves and the material world and successfully realising
what generations of initiates have dreamed of and worked
toward, or we can choose to work to materialise and dull
the spiritual aspect of man into haziness until it is ultimately
lost. The choice of which future we actively wish to create
is now man’s individual responsibility, and the result
of that choice and of our actions will ultimately be our
legacy to future generations.
Footnotes
1. Paraphrased from Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh and
Henry Lincoln in Holy Blood, Holy Grail (New York:
Delacorte Press, 1982).
2. For more esoteric studies of Egypt, the reader is referred
to the works of R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz.
3. Gaetan DelaForge. The Templar Tradition in the Age
of Aquarius (Putney, Vt.:Threshold Books, 1987), p.
63.
4. For a more detailed study of this period, the reader
is referred to the works of the Francis
Bacon Research Trust.
5. For more information on this period and the seeds it
sowed, the reader is referred to Francis A Yates, The
Rosicrucian Enlightenment (London and New York: Ark,
1986).
SOURCES
© Copyright New Dawn Magazine, http://www.newdawnmagazine.com.
Permission granted to freely distribute this article for
non-commercial purposes if unedited and copied in full,
including this notice. For further information, visit
New Dawn Magazine.
© 2000 by Robert Richardson. All rights reserved.
Originally published in New
Dawn No. 64 (January-February 2001).
Robert Richardson is the author of The Unknown Treasure:
The Priory of Sion Fraud and the Spiritual Treasure of Rennes-le-Château
(Houston, TX: NorthStar, 1998), available from Pratum Book
Co., PO Box 985, Healdsburg, California 95448, USA. knowledge@pratum.com.
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