TEMPLARS. Following the example of two knights, one from Burgundy, the other from Northern France, who in 1119 undertook to defend pilgrims in the Holy Land, a small body of men took an oath to the Patriarch of Jerusalem and constituted themselves a religious com munity and a military order. " The members lived in chastity, poverty, obedience; and found their chief active duty in guarding the public roads in Palestine. Baldwin the king gave them the (so-called) Temple of Solomon in the Holy City, and they derived their name from it. They devoted themselves to reclaiming and converting to penitence and sacred uses the rabble of excommunicate and stranded knights who had come to the Holy Land rather for plunder than holy ends. Later, the Templars were for this reason immune from sentences of excom munication pronounced by bishops and parochial minis ters " (F. W. Bussell). The rules of the Order were drawn up in 1128, and in the course of two centuries the Templars became the richest corporation in Christendom, and a force to be reckoned with by Emperors and Popes. They enjoyed all sorts of papal privileges (control of their own churches and churchyards, freedom from tithe, etc.). But their career was not nncheckered. They had to meet charges of treachery and corrupt practice. For instance, when the Emperor Conrad III. failed to take Damascus in 1149, this was said to be due to a secret understanding between the Templars and the garrison.
The fact that the Templars carried on their rites of initiation in secret excited curiosity and unfavourable comment. " Chapters were held in guarded rooms with strictest privacy and at break of day; no participant might reveal what took place at each lodge-meeting even to a brother-member. Suspicious or prurient minds invented the usual tales about esoteric societies: at his reception, the postulant spat on the crucifix, denied Christ, and was required to bear sexual outrage without complaint. At the Mass the words Hoo est Corpus Hewn, were omitted, and on Good Friday the Cross was trampled underfoot. A form of devil-worship was used —either of a black cat or a black idol called Baphomet." In France it was even believed that the Templars roasted children. Modern apologists have sought to prove the innocence of the Templars, and in large measure seem to have succeeded in their efforts, though " it is beyond question that the Templars had long and profitable dealings with the Assassins " (Bussell). It may be re called that charges similar to some of those brought against them have frequently, and even in our own days, been brought against the Jews. In 1312 by papal Bull most of the estates of the Templars were transferred to the Knights of St. John.