What do templars do

In the last Master, Jacques de Molay, was burned at the stake in Paris. That grisly demise has lent the Templars lasting notoriety and a thick shrouding of myth. The Templars have also been widely revived and imitated for purposes both benign and sinister since at least , when the Scottish Freemason Andrew Michael Ramsey wrote a pseudo-history of Masonry that claimed ties to the medieval Templars.

Today Templar revivalism remains strong. Templar iconography is popular with European neo-fascists: The Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik claimed to be a Templar, and Knights Templar International is an online network that connects far-right activists, particularly in Britain. In Mexico, a drug cartel called Los Caballeros Templarios has borrowed from Templar symbolism to create its own brand and code of honor.

Templar imitation is enduringly popular but seldom historically literate. Yet the Templars I meet in Nashville are mostly fascinated by the history, at times exhaustingly so. They have recently self-published a long, painstakingly footnoted book about Templarism over the centuries. Their internal literature liberally cites medieval texts such as those of St.

For the men and women I encounter, being a 21st-century Templar is about far more than medieval cosplay with a donation cup: It is participation in a living metaphor for evangelical Christian advocacy, financial expertise, internationalism and a militaristic ethos of duty and service to the cause.

SMOTJ was founded in the s under the umbrella of an older, international network of Templar revivalists called Ordo Supremus Militaris Templi Hierosolymitani, which was itself formally recognized by Napoleon Bonaparte in They are attached to 33 priories from Arizona to Wisconsin, and many stay in touch via a closed-membership smartphone app.

To try to combat confusion, SMOTJ has a legal officer called the Grand Avocat who works on registering trademarks to guard its brand identity. A faltering war in the middle east. A global financial network unaccountable to any government. A sinister plot founded on a web of lies. The main function of the tax-exempt SMOTJ is raising money for Christian causes in the Holy Land: funding schools and scholarships in places like Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Bethany and Ramleh, and sponsoring children through Christian schools.

But members also sit in an advisory capacity on committees in the United Nations, and claim informal involvement in international diplomacy. Some dream of one day having the order restored to papal favor with recognition by the Vatican.

There are also perks of membership. Auteri maintains that there is a seriousness to the dress-up. The knights and dames who join them wear white mantles with red crosses. Many men wear military formalwear underneath. The modern order recruits strongly from the officer classes of the U. In Nashville I meet several one- and two-star generals and many colonels, majors and captains.

The Rule was particularly obsessed with fashion. Templar uniforms were black or white robes with a red cross on the chest. Templars knights were legendarily tough soldiers, known for their iron discipline. This was enforced with a system of harsh punishments. Minor infractions were punished with floggings. More serious misdemeanors, such as fighting or disobeying orders could result in a brother being forced to eat his meals on the floor with the dogs for up to a year.

By the early 14th century the crusades were failing and the Templars were going out of fashion. There are lots of reasons people think Friday 13 is an unlucky date, one of them being the fact that one of the ugliest political persecutions in history began on just such a day more than seven centuries ago.

When Philip attacked the order his ministers produced a sexed-up dossier of allegations, accusing Templar brothers of spitting on images of Christ, having secret homoerotic induction ceremonies and worshiping statues. Test your visual vocabulary with our question challenge! Love words? Need even more definitions? Just between us: it's complicated. Ask the Editors 'Everyday' vs. What Is 'Semantic Bleaching'? How 'literally' can mean "figuratively".

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