the alternate view on the knights templar

[islamvslizards]

hi guys, hope we can discuss this :)

i believe, as do others, that the knights templar were muslims.

and this is why:

[part 1]

1 - The Knights Templar were tried as heretics thru a Vatican sponsored Inquisition and convicted. The heresies they were charged of were Islamic in nature.

2 - The Knights Templar were Guardians of the Holy Grail. The Holy Grail comes from the word Sang Real. Sang Real means Holy Bloodline. Although the Da Vinci Code believes that this Holy Bloodline was the extension of Nabi Isa's (Jesus son of mary) bloodline thru an alleged marriage between him and Mary Magdalene which produced a daughter called Sarah. And thru Sarah was Nabi Isa (jesus) descendants spawned called teh Priory of Sion. But that is untrue cos you can only have descendants thru sons and not daughters.

lineage is determined by a Y chromosome. since women do not have a Y chromosome, how then can descendents be tracked via a female bloodline?

Furthermore, Imam Ali's sermon rules out this alleged marriage when it states:

Sermon 159 - He had no wife to allure him, nor any son to give grief, nor wealth to deviate (his attention), nor greed to disgrace him.

Thus the Da Vinci Code is a hoax but that does not mean that the Knights Templar were the guardian of the Holy Grail (Holy Bloodline) is also a hoax. It is potentially true.

3 - The Only Islamic sect that glorifies a Holy bloodline is the shia sect. Some are twelvers and some are seveners. Others like Aga Khan Ismailis and Bohras go beyond those numbers where their imamate extends to current leaders.

But the Shia Twelvers glorify the Bloodline of "14 Masoomeen" (14 pure ones) which includes the Prophet, his daughter Fatima and the 12 Imams. This makes a total of 14 and they are signified as Pillars of the Shia Faith.

The Knights Templar symbolised this Holy Bloodline of 14 Pillars at Rosslyn Chapel whose notable feature are 14 pillars of which 2 are unique (Muhammad and Fatima) and 12 are similar (12 Imams)

4 - The Knights Templar also revered the sacred feminine as part of the Holy Grail/Holy Bloodline doctrine.

In 1158, a small town in Portugal was named as Fatima. Although the naming of this town is based on legend, its interesting to note that by 1130, the Templars were not only well entrenched in Portugal but in 1160, established a base in Tomar which is a 30 minute ride from Fatima.

Its thus very plausible that its the Knights Templar who named the town as Fatima since no Crusader would name any town with Islamic/Shia value.

It is therefore with little wonder when i read statements like:

1 - The roots of Templarism itself, and thus of Freemasonry, are actually deeply linked not so much to Christianity, but rather to Islam and particularly to Muhammadism.

2 - The De Payen family's Islamic background (founder of Knights Templar) was Shi'ite and drawn from Sufism, a mystic belief in which Muslims seek to find divine love and knowledge through direct personal experience of God, the very thing the Roman Catholic Church had declared a no go area.

3 - The Templar order's "Muslim" Philosophy which sprang from a Sufi trend of Islamism, was then Shi'ite in concept.

REFERENCES

1 - The Knights Templar of the Middle East - HRH Prince Michael of Albany and Walid Amine Sahab (Book Link (http://www.amazon.com/Knights-Templar-Middle-East-Freemasonry/dp/157863346X))
Pg XI

2 - Ibid pg 68

3 - Ibid pg 75


Although the authors of this book are attempting to paint the Templars as Sufis/Ismailis, but the reality from the symbolism of the Templars is that they were Twelver Athna Asheri Shia. There is no doubt about that.

[islamvslizards]

[Part 2]

rosslyn chapel is a replica of solomons temple - why?

Link (http://www.fiu.edu/~mizrachs/poseur3.html)

Rosslyn Chapel: As with many other aspects of this mystery, the importance of Rosslyn Chapel is unclear and seems to have been obfuscated, unfortunately. Its owners, the Sinclairs, claim to be the hereditary patrons of Scottish Freemasonry, to have explored the New World (particularly Nova Scotia and Oak Island) a century before Colombus, and to be connected to the Templars through marriage and descent. Some of this appears to be in doubt, because it's based on the work of Jacobite historian Father Hay, who used documents that were lost in a fire... in any case, we do know William Sinclair did build Rosslyn in the 1400s, it does contain very unusual carvings (particularly people who look like Templars engaging in things that seem like Masonic rituals), and it does incorporate unusual geometry. (SOME say that this geometry replicates the Temple of Solomon.) Pierre Plantard seems to have changed his name to "de St-Clair" in order to claim affiliation with the Sinclairs of Scotland.

Infact Rosslyn isnt very Christian at all in its design and aesthetics. You can download this PDF file.

http://ca.geocities.com/fidelity231@rogers.com/JPell/Rosslyn.pdf

[islamvslizards]

[Part 3]

some more info, and who was baphomet?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/piallos/2801388560/

templar church nearby, made at the same time of the village of fatima (http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Convent-of-the-Order-of-Christ)

Once you read the content, ask yourself some critical questions. The timeline is identical. The distance between the 2 places is a mere 20 miles and yet history makes no connection between the 2 incidences. Not only are they very related, but of the 2 links, one is factual, the other is part factual but cotton wooled in legend.

And this link is an endorsement of the KT high end intellectual ability:

http://www.bravepen.com/rosslyn/articles/strange.php

secondly - baphomet

what was baphomet? (http://rochester92.newsvine.com/_news/2007/01/26/539125-what-was-baphomet-updated)

firstly, it sounds suspiciously similar to the middle ages pronunciation of mohammed - mahomet.

as you know one of the charges the vatican put against the knights templar was that they worshiped baphomet

But the Baphomet thing happens in the end of the story. Its only during the Inquisition that the Baphomet narrative is actually introduced. Thats 2 centuries into the KT existence with no prior record of Baphomet's existence. There is also no physical evidence of the Baphomet statue. Its obviously a trumped up charge to make the KT belief in Muhammad and Islam as some pagan religion and they got an artist to devise the symbol. If the Vatican was true in its accusation then surely they would have presented the actual statue.

But the KT were very clever. They let their constructions do all the talking for them wherein they left amazing clues. Rosslyn is one excellent source for clues and Convent of Christ in Portugal is another.

[islamvslizards]

[Part 4]

Protecting pilgrims?

It is said by most populist KT Historians that when they formed in early 12th century, their official task was to protect pilgrims traveling to the Holy Land. But dissenting scholars say that its not physically possible for 9 people to protect the pilgrims covering a very large tract of land. Furthermore there is evidence by way of correspondence between the King of Jerusalem (King Baldwin) and other authorities that KT were to be hosted by the King for the sole purpose of excavating the Temple of Solomon.

Then there is the Dome of the Rock which was never desecrated by the KT nor were any mosques destroyed etc. On the contrary, Dome of the Rock was replicated in Portugal while at the same time, a nearby town 20 miles away was renamed as Fatima. Would it be very PC to install Islamic symbols in Portugal at the height of the Crusades and a period in Europe known as Reconquista?

Obviously the facts are incredibly contradictory and they just dont add up. The reality favours the KT being pro Islamic than not. There is no doubt in my mind that when you connect all the loose ends presently available, its the KT who went to the Muslim world and not the other way round. They went in with a pre-determined agenda and mindset.

[islamvslizards]

[Part 5]

didnt the knights templar FIGHT muslims?

its important for you to know that the KT were officially founded AFTER Jerusalem fell to the Crusaders and the fall occured in 1099.

It is also said that once Jerusalem fell to the Crusaders, the Knights formed and headed to the Holy Land. But for what purpose? Now this is where conflicting histories come into play and I would like to demonstrate that:


Version 1

In 1108,a small group of knights who called themselves The Poor Fellow Soldiers of Jesus Christ presented themsleves to the King of Jerusalem. They offered to act as a kind of a police force in the Crusader states, protecting the pilgrims, who were unarmed from marauding Muslim (1)

Here the Military Monks were doing 2 things. First, they were rooting Christianity physically and powerfully in the Holy Land. Second, by colonizing the frontiers, these new military monks were performing, and taking to its logical conclusion, a function that monks had been fulfilling in Europe for years. These monks were pushing aggresively against the Frontiers of Islam and were in the front line of the Holy War. (2)


Refs:

1 - Holy War - The Crusades and their impact on today's world - By Karen Armstrong - Pg 185

2 - Ibid - Pg 186




Version 2 comprising of several quotes completely contradict Karen Armstrong's version:

In public pronouncements they (Templars) had declared that their mission in the Holy Land was to keep the road from the coast to Jerusalem free from bandits. I could find no evidence , however, to suggest that they took any steps to fulfil this mission during those first 7 years of their existence; on the contrary as one authority puts it, "the New Order did very little in this period." Besides, simple logic suggested that 9 men could have hradly protected anybody on a highway almost 50 miles long.

I could only conclude, therefore, that Hugues De Payens and his colleagues must have had some other, undeclared purpose. They largely confined themselves to the precints of the Temple Mount during the first 7 years of their sojourn in Jerusalem - and this suggested very strongly that their real motive must have had to do with that very special site. (3)


One story recorded in the annals of crusader kingdom of Jerusalem tells of a young Frankish Knight entering the Dome of the Rock and being met by a Muslim praying towards Mecca. Losing his temper, he intimated the follower of Islam that he was praying the wrong way. The Frankish Knight then found himself taken to task by 2 Templar Knights and told him not to come back till he had learned both manners and tolerance. (4)

The fact that is that the Order of the Templars, certainly in the Middle East, was only Christian as an alaternative to being Islamic. It (Templar Order) was fundamentally Islamic in both essence and practice. Moreover, the Islamic hierarchy of neither Mecca or Cairo made any military or verbal move to prevent the Templars taking over charge of the Dome of the Rock, the second most holy site of Islam and the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. The reason for their lack of enthusiasm to fight the Templars was simply because the contemporary Islamic records refer to the oder of Knights Templar of Islam. Christians they may have claimed to be, but this was merely a ploy to keep both the Orthiodox and Catholic Churches out of the Mosque, out of the Dome of the Rock, so that their true brothers could go on worshipping God while praying towards Mecca. (5)

Refs:

3 - The Sign and The Seal - by Graham Hancock - Pgs 93/94

This view is also supported by The Second Messiah by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas - pg 28/29

4 - The Knights Templar of the Middle East - by HRH Prince Michael of Albany and Walid Amine Salhab - pg 74

5 - Ibid - pg 75

[lottie]

very interesting indeed... keep it coming!! :)

[islamvslizards]

[Part 6]

the lineage of Hugues de Payns - was he a sayyed (descendent of muhammed)?


(1) Muhammad (570-632)
Seal of the Prophets

(2) 5th Caliph/ 2nd Imam
Hasan d. 670

(3) Hasan II
Son of Hasan

(4) Abdullah al-Kamal
Grand Master
Assassins, or Prince of the Mountain.

(5) Idris I - 789-93
Ruler of Fez

(6) Idris II - 793-828

(7) Umar

(8) Abdullah

(9) Ali

(10) Ahmad

(11) Mamun

(12) Abu Ahmad

(13) Muhammad d. 1008 al-Mansur
Emir of Cordoba

(14) Abba of Pamplona

(15) Abd ar-Rahman an'Nasir
(Prince Sanchuelo)

Wife: Jimena of Cordoba

(16) Theobaldo - Lord of Gardile
Wife: Angelica Doukas

(17) Thibault de Payns
Lord of the Castle of Martigny
Wife: Helie de Montbard

(18) Hugues de Payns

1st Master, Order of the Knights Templar
Wife: Elizabeth de Chappes
Son: Thibault de Payns
Abbot of Abbey of St Colombe

the genealogy is mentioned in this book (http://www.amazon.com/Knights-Templar-Middle-East-Freemasonry/dp/157863346X)

During the First Crusade, it is said that Hugues De Payen fought in that Crusade. Then he returned and went straight to Scotland where he married into the St Clair Family. Today they are known as the Sinclair Family. Now thats important to know cos Hugues De Payen formed the Knights Templar and the 12th Century and around the 15th Century when the Templars were no more, the St Clair family built the Rosslyn Chapel. Although it is also important to note that the name Hugues De Payen does not feature prominently in the First Crudade so his role in that Crudade is not exactly clear.


But after Hughes' marriage and forming the Knights Templar, they returned to the Holy City, Jerusalem, 9 men in all. Now here we have 2 versions of what transpired when the Templars were in Jerusalem. The popular version states that they as Christian soldiers went to defend pilgrims visiting the Holy Land against the Muslims whilst those who disagree say that they were primarily in Jerusalem to excavate the Temple of Solomon. Those who disagree argue that its physically impossible for 9 men to defend pilgrims stretching 50 kilometers and that excavation.

The excavation theory works for me cos Rosslyn Chapel is modeled on the Temple of Solomon. What is critical about the Rosslyn Chapel is that it is

1 - filled with Islamic symbolism like 14 pillars and Arabic inscriptions etc. But its important to know that symbolism is a way of encrypting a message which can only be decrypted for those who recognise the symbols.

2 - It is home of the Holy Grail where the Holy Grail is not a literal chalice but a Royal Bloodline. One theory of this Royal Bloodline led to a Da Vinci Code theory but that theory is not sound cos Jesus cannot have a Royal Bloodline through daughters as alleged but thru sons as Imam Ali has covered this aspect in sermon 159.

3 - Rosslyn was built in the 15th century well after the Templars were eliminated.

4 - The symbolism of Rosslyn does not match the symbolism of the Freemasons. So the link between the 2 cannot be justified.

5 - Rosslyn comes from 2 Gaelic words Ross and Lyn. Ross means Ancient Knowledge and Lyn mean passed down the generations. Therefore Rosslyn means Ancient knowledge passed down the generation.

In the 14th century, relations between the Templars and the Church came to a boil and the Church decided enough is enough and arrested them under the Papal edict of Pope Clement and King Phillipe. It has been alleged that the Templars were blackmailing the Church specifically about the Holy Bloodline. Pope Clement who ruled for a very short period is the same Pope who has gone on record to state that Islamic presence on Christian soil is an insult to God. A curious statement to say the least considering that Muslims were already gotten rid of from Europe by then.

The second most curious aspect of this witch-hunt on the Templars was the Inquisition itself. The Church accused the Templars of various heresies

1 - Templars would worship a pagan statue called Baphomet (Wiki and answers.com have information on this). But the Church to date have not produced this pagan statue. One of the reasons is that there is no statue and the second reason is that Baphomet could be a derivative of Mahomet aka Muhammad. Though Western Scholars deny it could be reverence of Muhammad but without tangible evidence.

2 - Templars denied the Cross. They would spit on it etc. The denial of the Christian Cross is Islamic in nature. So the claim that Templars were Christian Crusaders whose uniform had an emblem of the Christian Cross is something that doesnt make sense.

3 - Templars were accused of practicing sodomy. But thats ridiculous cos Templars pro-created and also believed in strong values like Chastity. They also had a strong dietary laws i.e. animals they could eat and ones they had to avoid. Heck they even sat on the floor when eating.

Now if we combine the following values

1 - Baphomet aka Muhammad

2 - Denial of the Cross

3 - Symbolism of Rosslyn of 14 pillars (2 unique and 12 similar) with Arabic inscription

4 - Rosslyn meaning ancient knowledge passed down the generation

5 - Blackmailing the Church with a Holy Bloodline

6 - Reverence of Sacred Feminine thru a Black Madonna aka Bibi Fatima and her Hijab.


When these 6 values are combined, its pretty clear that the Templars were Muslim and they were Shia Muslim. Thats why the Church had to rid of the Templars cos they were blackmailing them about Muhammad and his Ahlul Bayt as the true successors of Nabi Isa.

[islamvslizards]

more later guys im knackered now lol

[islamvslizards]

[Part 7]

the knights templar, the ark of the covenant and the cathars

i believe that the ark of the covenant was not proof of jesus' bloodline, but proof of another bloodline which would be much more destructive to the christian church - the sayyed bloodline, and holy relics of prophets such as adam, jacob etc

"Opening the Ark of the Covenant" has this information. It begins on page 250 - and this is part of that chronoolgy:

Opening of the Ark of the Covenant
Frank Joseph and Laura Beaudoin
pp. 250 - 251

950 BC - King Solomon completes the construction of Jerusalem's First Temple, and the Ark is moved into its Holy-of-Holies.

587 BC - Jerusalem falls to King Nebuchadnezzar II, whose Babylon troops obliterate the First Temple in their fruitless search for the Ark of the Covenant, which lies hidden in a deep shaft directly below the Holy-of-Holies.

439 BC - The Jews return to Jerusalem from the Babylonian capitivity, but are unable to find any trace of the Ark of the Covenant after the passage of 150 years.

415 BC - The Templae is rebuilt, minus the Ark of the Covenant.

65 - After years of scouring the Temple Mount, Herod the Great fails to find the Ark for his construction of the Second Temple.

398 - A Byzantine theologian writes that the Ark of the Covenant is in Axum, Ethiopia

1103 - Baudoin I, the Crusader King of Jerusalem, learns of local reports locating the Ark on his palace grounds atop Temple Mount. For verification, he dispatches an emissary to his friend, Hugues de Champagne, at Troyes, France, where (Rashi) rabbinical tradition confirms the rumors. Baudoin and the Count begin careful preparations for excavation.

1127 - During mid-summer, after nine years of excavating beneath the Temple Mount, Knights Temnplar unearth the Ark of the Covenant. In the fall, they carry it aboard ship for Europe, arriving at the port of Brindisi, then journey to northern Italy, where they winter at the Abbey of Seborga.

1128 - The Ark is taken to the Cistercian monastery in Citeaux, France, while its permanent home is being built in Chartres, the first Gothis Cathedral. But the abbot, Bernard de Clairveaux, proves to be a security risk, and the Templars move the Ark to the Castle of Boullion, in Flanders. They entrust it to a special order of caretakers, the Cathars, who some years later carry the Ark to a more remote fortress near the foot of the Pyrenees mountains, Montreal-de-Sos.

1204 - The Ark is transported to the Cathar stronghold, Montsegur, which has been continuously refortified over the next 40 years, makingit the best defended castle in Europe.

1244 - After a nine month siege, Montsegur surrenders to the forces of Catholic France. Two days before the capitulation, the Ark is smuggled through enemy lines by four Cathars, who carry it across the Spanish frontier to the abbey of Montserrat, just outside Barcelona.

Since the Cathars have now been introduced I find it needful to explain their Order. At the time that the Cathars carried the Ark away from Montsegur they were being killed by the thousands as a result of the Albigensian Crusade:

The Cathar Inquisition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade

[The Knights Templar refused to participate in this inquisition. The Cathars were their friends and comrades".]

The Roman Catholic Church had always dealt vigorously with strands of Christianity that it considered heretical, but before the 12th century such groups were organized in small numbers, around wayward preachers or small localized sects. The Cathars of Languedoc represented an alarmingly popular mass movement,[4] a phenomenon that the Roman Church had not seen for almost 900 years, since Arianism and Marcionism in the early days of Christianity. In the 12th century much of what is now Southern France was converting to Catharism, and the belief was spreading to other areas. The Cathars, along with other religious sects of the period such as the Waldensians, appeared in the cities and towns of newly urbanized areas. Although Cathar ideas had not originated in Languedoc, one of the most urbanized and populated areas of Europe at the time, for reasons unknown it was there that their theology found its most spectacular success.

The Cathars were especially numerous in what is now western Mediterranean France, then part of the Crown of Aragon. They were also called Albigensians; this is either because of the movement's presence in and around the city of Albi, or because of the 1176[5] Church Council[6] held near Albi which declared the Cathar doctrine heretical. Political control in Languedoc was divided among many local lords and town councils.[7] Before the crusade, there was little fighting in the area and a fairly sophisticated polity.

On becoming Pope in 1198, Innocent III resolved to deal with the Cathars. He first tried peaceful conversion, but the preachers sent out to return the schismatics to the Roman communion met with little success.[8] Even St. Dominic succeeded in converting only a handful.[9] The Cathar leadership was protected by powerful nobles,[10] and also by some bishops, who resented papal authority in their sees. In 1204 the Pope suspended the authority of some of those bishops,[11] appointing papal legates to act in his name.[12] In 1206 he sought support for wider action against the Cathars from the nobles of Languedoc.[13] Noblemen who supported Catharism were excommunicated.

The powerful count Raymond VI of Toulouse refused to assist and was excommunicated in May 1207. The Pope called upon the French king, Philippe II, to act against those nobles who permitted Catharism, but Philippe declined to act. Count Raymond met with the papal legate, Pierre de Castelnau, in January 1208,[14] and after an angry meeting, Castelnau was murdered the following day.[15] The Pope reacted to the murder by issuing a bull declaring a crusade against Languedoc – offering the land of the heretics to any who would fight. This offer of land drew the northern French nobility into conflict with the nobles of the south.[16]

The military campaigns of the Crusade can be divided into several periods: the first from 1209 to 1215 was a series of great successes for the crusaders in Languedoc. The captured lands, however, were largely lost between 1215 and 1225 in a series of revolts and military reverses. The situation turned again following the intervention of the French king, Louis VIII, in 1226. Although he died in November of that year, the struggle continued under King Louis IX. The area was reconquered by 1229, and the leading nobles made peace. After 1233 the Inquisition was central to crushing what remained of Catharism. Resistance and occasional revolts continued, but Catharism's days were numbered. Military action ceased in 1255. In the end, the Albigensian Crusade killed an estimated 1 million people, not only Cathars but much of the population of southern France.

By mid 1209 around 10,000 crusaders had gathered in Lyon, before marching south.[17] In June, Raymond of Toulouse, recognizing the disaster at hand, finally promised to act against the Cathars, and his excommunication was lifted.[18] The crusaders turned towards Montpellier and the lands of Raymond-Roger de Trencavel, aiming for the Cathar communities around Albi and Carcassonne. Like Raymond of Toulouse, Raymond-Roger sought an accommodation with the crusaders, but he was refused a meeting and raced back to Carcassonne to prepare his defences.[19]

Cathars being expelled from Carcassonne in 1209.
In July the crusaders captured the small village of Servian and headed for Béziers, arriving on July 21. They invested the city, called the Catholics within to come out, and demanded that the Cathars surrender.[20] Both groups refused. The city fell the following day when an abortive sortie was pursued back through the open gates.[21] The entire population was slaughtered and the city burned to the ground. Contemporary sources give estimates of the number of dead ranging between seven and twenty thousand. The latter figure appears in the Papal Legate Arnaud-Amaury's report to the Pope.[22] The news of the disaster at Béziers quickly spread and afterwards many settlements surrendered without a fight.

The next major target was Carcassonne. The city was well fortified, but vulnerable, and overflowing with refugees.[23] The crusaders arrived on August 1, 1209. The siege did not last long.[24] By August 7 they had cut the city's water supply. Raymond-Roger sought negotiations but was taken prisoner while under truce, and Carcasonne surrendered on August 15.[25] The people were not killed, but were forced to leave the town — naked according to Peter of les Vaux-de-Cernay. "In their shifts and breeches" according to another source. Simon de Montfort now took charge of the Crusader army,[26] and was granted control of the area encompassing Carcassonne, Albi, and Béziers. After the fall of Carcassonne, other towns surrendered without a fight. Albi, Castelnaudary, Castres, Fanjeaux, Limoux, Lombers and Montréal all fell quickly during the autumn.[27] However, some of the towns that had surrendered later revolted.

The next battle centered around Lastours and the adjacent castle of Cabaret.
Attacked in December 1209, Pierre-Roger de Cabaret repulsed the assault.[28] Fighting largely halted over the winter, but fresh crusaders arrived.[29] In March 1210, Bram was captured after a short siege.[30] In June the well-fortified city of Minerve was invested.[31] It withstood a heavy bombardment, but in late June the main well was destroyed, and on July 22, the city surrendered.[32] The Cathars were given the opportunity to return to Catholicism. Most did. The 140 who refused were burned at the stake.[33] In August the crusade proceeded to the stronghold of Termes.[34] Despite sallies from Pierre-Roger de Cabaret, the siege was solid, and in December the town fell.[35] It was the last action of the year.

When operations resumed in 1211 the actions of Arnaud-Amaury and Simon de Montfort had alienated several important lords, including Raymond de Toulouse,[36] who had been excommunicated again. The crusaders returned in force to Latours in March and Pierre-Roger de Cabaret soon agreed to surrender. In May the castle of Aimery de Montréal was retaken; he and his senior knights were hanged, and several hundred Cathars were burned.[37] Cassès[38] and Montferrand[39] both fell easily in early June, and the crusaders headed for Toulouse.[40] The town was besieged, but for once the attackers were short of supplies and men, and so Simon de Montfort withdrew before the end of the month.[41] Emboldened, Raymond de Toulouse led a force to attack Montfort at Castelnaudary in September.

[42] Montfort broke free from the siege[43] but Castelnaudary fell and the forces of Raymond went on to liberate over thirty towns[44] before the counter-attack ground to a halt at Lastours, in the autumn. The following year much of the province of Toulouse was captured by Catholic forces.[45]

In 1213, forces led by King Peter II of Aragon, I of Catalonia, came to the aid of Toulouse.[46] The force besieged Muret,[47] but in September a sortie from the castle led to the death of King Peter,[48] and his army fled. It was a serious blow for the resistance, and in 1214 the situation became worse: Raymond was forced to flee to England,[49] and his lands were given by the Pope to the victorious Philippe II,[citation needed] a stratagem which finally succeeded in interesting the king in the conflict. In November the always active Simon de Montfort entered Périgord[50] and easily captured the castles of Domme[51] and Montfort;[52] he also occupied Castlenaud and destroyed the fortifications of Beynac.[53] In 1215, Castelnaud was recaptured by Montfort,[54] and the crusaders entered Toulouse. Toulouse was gifted to Montfort.[55] In April 1216 he ceded his lands to Philippe.

Revolts and reverses 1216 to 1225
However, Raymond, together with his son, returned to the region in April, 1216, and soon raised a substantial force from disaffected towns. Beaucaire was besieged in May and fell after a three month siege; the efforts of Montfort to relieve the town were repulsed. Montfort had then to put down an uprising in Toulouse before heading west to captured Bigorre, but he was repulsed at Lourdes in December 1216. In September 1217, while Montfort was occupied in the Foix region, Raymond re-took Toulouse. Montfort hurried back, but his forces were insufficient to re-take the town before campaigning halted. Montfort renewed the siege in the spring of 1218. He was killed fighting in June.

Pope Innocent III died in July 1216; and with Montfort now dead, the crusade was left in temporary disarray. The command passed to the more cautious Philippe II, who was more concerned with Toulouse than heresy. The crusaders had taken Belcaire and besieged Marmande in late 1218 under Amaury de Montfort, son of the late Simon. While Marmande fell on June 3, 1219, attempts to retake Toulouse failed, and a number of Montfort holds also fell. In 1220, Castelnaudary was re-taken from Montfort. He reinvested the town in July 1220, but it withstood an eight month siege. In 1221, the success of Raymond and his son continued: Montréal and Fanjeaux were re-taken, and many Catholics were forced to flee. In 1222, Raymond died and was succeeded by his son, also named Raymond. In 1223, Philippe II died and was succeeded by Louis VIII. In 1224, Amaury de Montfort abandoned Carcassonne. The son of Raymond-Roger de Trencavel returned from exile to reclaim the area. Montfort offered his claim to the lands of Languedoc to Louis VIII, who accepted.

French royal intervention
In November 1225 Raymond, like his father, was excommunicated. Louis VIII headed the new crusade into the area in June 1226. Fortified towns and castles surrendered without resistance. However, Avignon, nominally under the rule of the German emperor, did resist, and it took a three month siege to finally force its surrender that September. Louis VIII died in November and was succeeded by the child king Louis IX. But Queen regent Blanche of Castile allowed the crusade to continue under Humbert de Beaujeu. Labécède fell in 1227 and Vareilles and Toulouse in 1228.

However, Queen Blanche offered Raymond a treaty: recognizing him as ruler of Toulouse in exchange for his fighting Cathars, returning all Church property, turning over his castles and destroying the defenses of Toulouse. Raymond agreed and signed the treaty at Meaux in April 1229. He was then seized, whipped and briefly imprisoned.

Inquisition
The castle of Montségur was razed after 1244. The current fortress follows French military architecture of the 17th century.

The Languedoc now was firmly under the control of the King of France. The Inquisition was established in Toulouse in November 1229, and the process of ridding the area of Cathar heresy and investing their remaining strongholds began. Under Pope Gregory IX the Inquisition was given great power to suppress the heresy. A campaign started in 1233, burning vehement and relapsed Cathars wherever they were found, even exhuming some bodies for burning. Many still resisted, taking refuge in fortresses at Fenouillèdes and Montségur, or inciting small uprisings. In 1235, the Inquisition was forced out of Albi, Narbonne, and Toulouse. Raymond-Roger de Trencavel led a military campaign in 1240. He was defeated at Carcassonne in October, then besieged at Montréal. He soon surrendered and was exiled in Aragon. In 1242, Raymond of Toulouse attempted to revolt in conjunction with an English invasion, but the English were quickly repulsed and his support evaporated. He was subsequently pardoned by the king.

The Cathar strongholds fell one by one. Montségur withstood a nine-month siege before being taken in March 1244. The final holdout, a small, isolated, overlooked fort at Quéribus, quickly fell in August 1255. The last known Cathar burning occurred in 1321.

Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade

[islamvslizards]

[Part 8]

the discovery of the ark, and what happened next, and a tantalising clue as to the religion of the knights templar

The material here is from "Opening the Ark of the Covenant", by Frank Joseph and Laura Beaudoin, ISBN 13 978-1-56414-903-9.

Discovery

They held back at the rough-hewn entrance, as Hughes stepped in alone like the Levite high-priest of old, and withdrew a moldering cloth, ragged and torn with the passage of many centuries, draped over the object. The cover disintegrated into a obscuring cloud of dust, from the center of which emerged the perfectly preserved Ark of the Covenant. The emotionally overcome discoverers fell to their knees before the golden vessel, heartily thanking God for having blessed their years of hard labor. Secretly nootified, , the king rushed to the excavations, where he was lowered into one of the Templar's deep work tunnels. At its bottom, they escorted him a few paces into the small cave sheltering their precious find.

As were Ahkenaton and Moses before him, Baudoin II appears to have been profoundly affected by the close proximity to the sacred object. Although a beloved and successful monarch, he voluntarily abducated, despite the absence of a male heir. He resigned from one of the most powerful kingdoms on earth: Jerusalem, the Navel of the World, vacating the throne to his daughter Melisende, on the condition that she wed Fulk V of Anjou, in France.

Baudoin II, once again Baudoin de Bourq, divested himself of his kingly wealth and all but the humblest personal possessions to live monastically for the rest of his life, in prayer and meditation, secluded among a few monks at the Tomb of the Holy Sepulchre. His transformation was not unlike, fundamentally at least, Amenhotep IV's metamorphosis to Ahkenaton when he came into contact with the Ben-Ben stone, or Moses' transformation upon his descent from Mount Sinai with Yahwehs "tablets." Never given to piety before, Baudoin appears to have been similarly affected by exposure to the Ark of the Covenant's profuse radiation of negative ions. They engendered him in a catharsis or altered state of consciousness equivelant to a Kundalini experience, the opening of his crown chakra to a previously unrecognized spiritual dimension.

As soon as the Templars made their discovery, time began working against them. Any outside inkling of what they had really been up to since 1118 could spark a cultural conflagration beyond the command of all earthly authority to extinguish. The longer they lingered in Jerusalem, with its tens of thousands of eyes, the greater their probability of being found out. Hughes sent a special courier to Bernard with coded words of their find. "Your mission is accomplished," the Cistercian leader answered in response filled with high praise, and begged them to return home at once. The Count booked accomodations aboard the next available ship to Europe, and sailed from the Holy Land with his fellow knights in early autumn. No one else on board could have dreamed that among their crated baggage was the world's supreme religious treasure.

The voyage passed without incident, as did their long trek acreoos Italy, where the Ark and its Templars paused at the Seborga monastery before moving on into France in late 1127 or early 1128. At the Council of Troyes, in January of 1129, a beaming Bernard of Clairveaux succeeded in winning papal recognition of the Knights, who could now don the white robes, signifying purity of belief, for which they became famous. The emblematic red cross would not come for another 20 years, until Pope Eugenious III allowed them to wear it for the first time "as a symbol of Christian martyrdom."

Its first, temporary hiding place was the Cistercian abbey Hughes de Champagne had made possible four years prior to the founding of the Templars. Bernard was devoted to its safekeeping, but could not resist making some obvious hints that imperiled his vulnerable charge. Bernards obvious references to the Ark of the Covenant was underscored by his frequent characterization of the abbey in which it been secluded as "the heavenly Jerusalem." Even the Count of Champagne remarked that, "the abbot of Clairvaux became the oracle of Europe, " meaning perhaps he told more than he should.

By then the Templars were no longer the same nine humble functionaries blindly obediant to his will. Papal recognition had transfigured them with growing wealth and burgeoning membership from the nobility, opening up new spheres of interest in power politics. They overode the command of the indescreet Bernard, removing the Ark form his abbey to Lower Lorraine, the duchy of Godfroi de Bouillon before he helped the First Crusade to the Holy Land, and from which he never returned. But his formidble fortress still stood [as it does today] and had been deeded back to his family after his death. The massive structure was, in fact, eminently defensible, among Europe's foremost military emplacements any besieging attacker would find daunting. [Flanders Castle de Bouillon]

Moreover, its location not far from Troyes allowed the Templars, members of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre, and a privileged few, access to the sacred object and its golden aura. Fifteen centuries of burial deep in the Earth had dampened the Ark's static accumulation, making it safe to approach and be positively responsive to low-frequency input, such as meditation, prayer, or hymns. Troyes became the most remarkable urban center in Europe. While the rest of Christendom wallowed in bigotry, superestition, illiteracy, and ignorance, its citizens enjoyed an intellectual freedom and cultural florescence absent from the outside world. History and the arts were not ocnditioned by papal dogma, while Muslim science - particularly medicine - was studied without prejudice, resulting in the proto-rennaissance of the City of Troyes and Chartres Cathedral.

[foobar]

lineage is determined by a Y chromosome. since women do not have a Y chromosome, how then can descendents be tracked via a female bloodline?

Mitochondrial DNA. It's all from your mother.

[islamvslizards]

Mitochondrial DNA. It's all from your mother.

even for paternity tests?