Response from Robert Richardson to Paul Smith's "The
Robert Richardson Hoax" (January 6, 2005)
Unfortunately, Paul Smith seems less than capable of tolerating
a point of view or conclusions different from his. This
is unfortunate because it reflects poorly on the effort
he has expended to reveal the reality of the Priory of Sion
and detracts from the effectiveness of the efforts of anyone
else who is trying to bring the truth to light. Neither
the work of Paul Smith, myself, nor any other researcher
is about one person claiming sole or exclusive credit for
exposing this fraud. It is about providing sources to counterbalance
the gross and deliberate disinformation intentionally created
to mislead the public in order to attain the personal, political
and financial goals of various individuals, authors, publishers,
and filmmakers. Paul Smith's efforts have been concentrated
in bringing more attention on obscure documents which are
available in the public domain and on private correspondence
relating to the individuals most prominently engaged in
originating this fraud, while my efforts have been focused
on intentionally using information readily available to
anyone to explain how the Priory of Sion fraud was constructed
and the intellectual roots providing the motivations for
why this fraud was constructed. In both cases, we are using
information which could have been secured by authors of
popular and misleading books (and movies) had they made
the effort or been diligent in their research. My most recent
article, which has upset Mr. Smith, is intended to explore
a narrow and extremist religious mindset which furnished
a foundation for the point of view in the fraudulent documents
created in the Priory of Sion affair. I believe it is important
to understand why this point of view exists and appears
in this affair and the article is concentrated on that.
The following are comments on some points Mr. Smith asserts
in his most recent criticism. The following headings are
not Mr. Smith's words, but they summarize his rambling rants:
I. Book profits are the only reason why this fraud exists
Several years ago Gerard de Sede stated in an interview
that he had worked with Plantard and Cherisey to write books
starring the Priory of Sion for a profit. Cherisey admitted
a number of years ago he had fabricated documents related
to the Priory fraud. This is not new information. It has
been known for some time to researchers. Seeking wealth
is not the only motivation for the actions of Mr. Plantard.
Mr. Plantard never became wealthy. (He could have, if he
sold Priory membership cards to the readership of Holy
Blood, Holy Grail.) Were there other reasons which could
have kept him involved in promoting the Priory fraud? Why
are there people claiming to be Priory spokespersons involved
in promoting it today, several years after his death? Have
they some other motivation than 15 minutes of very questionable
fame? There is value in exploring these questions and the
article which has upset Paul Smith attempts to explore them.
II. Plantard's delusions are excluded from the article
Plantard had been promoting himself as the Merovingian
pretender to the throne of France since the 1950's, around
the time the Priory of Sion name first appeared. I have
written specifically about this promotion in the 1950's
several years ago. It is omitted from the new article because
the new article is designed to explore the seeds which later
appeared in Plantard & Company's activities. The late
Mr. Plantard did not wake up one morning as - poof! - an
occult genie and Merovingian worldruler. The ideas came
from somewhere. Where? Why? What are the roots? These are
the subjects of the new article. Because Mr. Plantard's
delusion's are not the subject of the article, they are
not covered in it.
III. Rennes-le-Château is not important and Mr.
Smith doesn't like what I wrote about it elsewhere
There are several distinct aspects to this entire fraud
which have been run together to manufacture the Priory of
Sion fraud and which are separate stories in their own right.
One is the Priory of Sion fraud. Another is the story of
the priests in the Rennes-le-Château from 1790 to
1917. A third is the story of this area from 1100 to 1790.
The last is the story of this area in pre-Christian times.
All is this is presented by Priory of Sion devotees as one
continuous affair. It is not, and each aspect needs to be
examined separately. To date, none of the books about this
area have done it. If the crypt is ever explored and the
tomb, which Abbé Saunière notes in his journal
as having found, is reopened, we will find that Rennes-le-Château
is an ancient Celtic religious site. Very old Catholic churches,
including Chartres Cathedral, are built atop the religious
sites of the older faiths they replaced. None of this is
addressed in the new article, but Mr. Smith is troubled
by a different article dealing with it.
IV. The "one lone nut" theory
According to Holy Blood, Holy Grail, The DaVinci
Code and countless other sources (including his own
fantasies), Mr. Plantard was the leader of an invisible
and omnipotent army secretly controlling world events. According
to Paul Smith, Mr. Plantard was one lone nut who, from the
age of 17 on, did everything by himself - writing, printing,
distributing, fabricating, financing, falsifying, embezzling,
organizing youth groups, depositing false documents in libraries,
and somehow finding the time to have read enough superficial
esoterica that he faked it well enough to fool a number
of authors because, you see, he was after all just crazy
and never slept and did this all around the clock except
when he got tossed in jail because, well, he did some other
things, too. (No wonder he never got anywhere in life -
the poor man had no time to do anything else.)
I have some trouble with the "one lone nut"
theory.
Anything is possible, but not everything is probable. If
it were just the 1960's onward version of the Priory of
Sion, I might be able to stretch to try to buy it, but even
then would be very reluctant and curious about the sources
where Plantard and Company got the information they used
to fabricate the fraud, and what, if anything, else motivated
their actions. But stretching back to age 17? When he grew
up in a two-room apartment where he lived with his mother
who supported him on a minor pension until he was 30? I
can see him as a stooge and front man for others who let
him do the grunt work and set him up for the police. In
case the police or German occupation authorities took a
dislike to their activities, I could even buy them putting
his name on every article (which I have difficulty believing
a 17 year old wrote, pasted up, printed, and paid for in
occupied France on his mother's small pension). But all
this by his precious little self? The man must have been
an unsung prodigy.
V. The Mr. Plantard is the best source of information
contention
Mr. Smith selectively uses Mr. Plantard, and various documents
which Mr. Plantard may or may not have created, as a source
to confirm his assertions and discards Mr. Plantard's claims
and comments when they don't fit the "one lone nut"
theory. Similarly, when Mr. Plantard's successors have claimed
that Camile Savoire etc. were members of the Priory of Sion,
which happens to support a hypothesis different from Mr.
Smith's, he discards their claims. It is rather difficult
for me to follow the logic of Paul Smith's contention that
Plantard did everything alone because his documents and
publications prove he did and that settles it but Plantard
was nuts so we shouldn't believe him when he says in his
documents that he was head of a supersecret society running
the world and descended from Jesus and maybe from people
from other planets, too, but it's OK to believe that he
did it all alone.
I am sorry, but I just can't diagram the logic.
As you can see from Paul Smith's comments and the above,
debate on this affair is really quite counterproductive
to efforts to expose its real nature. It is important to
instead spend the time trying to peel back layers revealing
what has been behind this affair, rather than to argue about
it. When the movie version of The DaVinci Code appears,
that effort will prove helpful to people confused and deluded
by Hollywood's desire to turn this fraud into cash regardless
of the cost to the truth.
[Followed by More
Robert Richardson Hoaxes by Paul Smith]
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