On the Day of the Martyrdom of the Holy Templars

Friday the Thirteenth of October, 1307: Acting in the name of the Pope, the brutal agents of Philippe IV le Bel of France arrested, tortured and later executed nearly all the Knights of the Order of the Temple in France. Philippe's motives were avarice and jealousy of the Order's temporal power, but he was aided and sanctioned in this totalitarian savagery by Rome on the pretext that the Templars were universally embracing heresy. Later however a cowed Clement V pardoned the Templars of any wrongdoing, but the murders had been committed, the Order broken, and the surviving members cast to the furthest borders of Christendom.

In kingdoms defiant of Rome, particularly Scotland and Portugal, the Order continued for decades if not centuries. In other regions, it merely changed its name or clothed itself in the trappings of other Orders, such as the Knights Hospitaller. But the two centuries of Templar corporate might and unchecked wealth had come to an end.

The Knights Templar were for the most part homicidal thugs, for the lesser part obedient, orthodox Catholics, and for the least part Initiates of the Johannite Mysteries. Despite the hylic nature of Order (obtaining, occupying, owning and killing things) it also served secretly as a repository for Gnostic Wisdom, with the Grand Masters ensuring the continuity of Johannite Tradition and thought. However rough the cup, it bore the wine that is the blood of the Logos. The Templars stand as icons of chivalry, nobility, sacrifice, honour, and service to the Truth:

"in turn lions of war and lambs at the hearth; rough knights on the battlefield, pious monks in the chapel; formidable to the enemies of Christ, gentleness itself towards His friends."

Under torture, some Knights confessed to the adoration of an icon of a severed head – remeniscent of the head of John the Baptist – known as "Baphomet", and encoded name for Sophia, Goddess of Wisdom.

The lesson is that no measure of secular power that we can possess – military, financial, political – can withstand the onslaught of Archonic forces should they choose to exert themselves, regardless of either our innocence or ignorance on one hand or our spiritual gifts on the other. There is no physical castle we can erect against greed, against totalitarian megalomania. Only with gnosis, with Wisdom, with compassion, can we erect the citadel of the heart.

The weeks between today and All Hallow's Eve is known as Umbers, and it marks a period of reflection and detachment from the outer world, a time of turning inward to fortify the heart's chapel and its battlements. It is an invitation to visualize the private Sanctuary of heart's Wisdom – mine is of stone and candles and stained glass, it smells of oak and dust and leather and sandalwood.

May all those cruelly and unjustly suffering find peace and dissolution in the Pleroma.