The Knights Templar and their real history have been much maligned by having been the victims of dreadful fantasies for centuries, but the French JUST LOVE to poke about with this utter sewage of a subject matter. Indeed, our French “initiates” are quite unable to distinguish myth from reality and prefer to contaminate themselves further with their quaint doses of distorted reasoning and to inhabit false reality.

The myth of the Knights Templar as devised by Pierre Plantard 1964-1988 was recanted by Pierre Plantard in 1990. Those who are supporters of the early Priory of Sion fantasies disregard Plantard’s 1989-1991 activities as if they never existed.

The same thing applies to the late Tim Wallace-Murphy and his supporters. Having committed himself over 100% to the belief in the Knights Templar as a result of taking the Priory of Sion seriously and writing several books, he wasn’t about to give up on the subject matter just because it had been recanted by Plantard. To this day the believers are behaving just like Pierre Plantard had “never recanted” his fantasies about the Knights Templar.

One example of total acceptance – even though at the same time it is critical of the fantasy.

Read in La Lettre du Crocodile by Rémi Boyer:

Templiers et Prieuré de Sion. La Filiation de Christian Tourenne. Published by Editions de L’œil du Sphinx, 36-42 rue de la Villette, 75019 Paris – France.

www.oeildusphinx.com

Christian Tourenne’s book is dedicated to a hypothetical secret Order of the Temple, Priory of Sion, or similar, and its survival. The conditional tense is very present throughout the book, which indicates both the author's caution and the highly fragile nature of the thesis presented. Christian Tourenne has put forth an immense research effort in writing this book. He gathers many very interesting historical elements; it is the links he seeks to establish between these elements that pose a problem, as they are most often simple, unsupported hypotheses.

The central thread of the work is the Lenoncourt list, named after an ancient Lorraine family, the de Lenoncourts, whose last representative, Henri de Lenoncourt, held a list of the Masters of a medieval secret society – an Order of Sion or a Priory of Sion. On several occasions, Christian Tourenne distinguishes himself from the claims of Pierre Plantard’s Priory of Sion and its numerous copies – creations of the last century – in order to study the Lenoncourt list in detail. He establishes that, on several occasions, members of this family could have encountered or did in fact know the Masters of a possible inner Templar order whose names are found on this famous list. He thus seeks to gather clues demonstrating the authenticity of the list.

After retracing the conditions of the birth of the Order of the Temple and summarizing its history – insisting on certain elements such as the possibility of a secret rule, the use of the Abraxas, the Monophysitism of the Templars, etc. – he develops brief biographies of the secret Masters present on the Lenoncourt list, starting from 1189.

“We must not forget,” he says, “that these figures, or their entourage, like the previous Masters of the Temple, surely eliminated all direct proof of their membership in the secret Templar Order.”

“On the other hand, there may exist elements that could justify this membership in the secret Order. What are they? Did these various figures have an interest in the Templars and Solomon’s Temple? Did they have an esoteric conception of Christianity? What symbols did they use, and what was the relationship of these symbols to those of the Templars? What were their coats of arms? If they had one, did it reflect the Templar spirit? These are all questions that we will now attempt to answer.”

We see through this line of questioning the meaning of the approach and the method used, which, of course, would not satisfy a historian.

The first figure who appears is Marie de Saint-Clair, who died in 1261 and who supposedly succeeded Jean de Gisors (c. 1135–1220), the first assumed Templar Master of the Priory of Sion. We note that women are very present on this list. Among the members of the list, some are very well known and played an important role in history, such as René of Anjou or Louis de Gonzaga, Duke of Nevers; and then there are also eminent artists like Botticelli and Leonardo da Vinci, authors like Charles Nodier and Jean Cocteau, and the musician Claude Debussy. Most of the names are known, as Pierre Plantard had appropriated a large part of this list.

While, as we have already stated, the hypothesis of a secret order is not historically verified and perhaps, moreover, unverifiable, this book highlights a “Templarist” atmosphere that undoubtedly endures in spiritual culture over the centuries, which is not without influence – for better or worse – and still expresses a high ideal.

“When we want to address the relationships of the human with our society and the Divine,” the author concludes, “we are forced to note that the last few centuries have not brought harmony to this relationship. In my opinion, the Templar spirit must nonetheless return among us. Access to the Divine allowed the Templars to bring their humanistic help to other beings in society. The earthly must continue to benefit from the celestial.”

He invites the reader to take an interest in the survivals of this Templarism up to the present day.