Reddit reviews An Illustrated History of the Knights Templar
We found 1 Reddit comments about An Illustrated History of the Knights Templar. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
Indeed. I consider it more a form of artwork and source of curiosity than anything. Speaking of the Templars, I recently happened upon a book you will likely find of interest:
http://www.studio31.com/templar-heresy-a-story-of-gnostic-illumination/
I have yet to read this particular title personally, however have gone through others by the same author, of the non-fiction variety. The book above is technically fiction, historical fiction, though contains a number of largely unknown references to the Templars and of their initiation into the Gnostic mysteries, among others, for example the Assassins and Sufi they had also encountered during the time of the Crusades.
You can find more of his work here:
https://www.amazon.com/James-Wasserman/e/B001JP1ZT0
including a non-fiction title covering history of the Templars:
https://www.amazon.com/Illustrated-History-Knights-Templar/dp/1594771170/
and various works covering other areas of the Western Mystery Tradition, the Kemetic/Egyptian mysteries, esotericism in general, as well as detailed analysis of the work of Aleister Crowley and Thelema, which was what brought his body of work to my attention initially, and not surprising considering the depth of his involvement with the OTO.
You can find more on the Gnostic current adopted by the Templars, from the Essenes and Johannites in particular, in the following podcast:
Some background on the author and lecturer interviewed in the aforementioned podcast:
> He is a Knight Templar in the York Rite and a 32* Knight Commander of the Court of Honor (KCCH) in the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite (SJ).
> Timothy has been knighted into the Royal Order of Scotland as a Rosicrucian Knight of Kilwinning. He is a Past Sovereign Master of Allied Masonic Degree Chapter 425. He is an active officer in the Societas Rosicruciana In Civitibus Foederatis. He has been knighted as a Sir Knight of the East and West in the Knight Masons of Ireland.
> He is a Past Master of the Rocky Mountain Lodge of the Ancient Mystical Order of Rosicrucians (AMORC), having completed 9+ degrees. He is also a Past Master of the Rosicrucian Lodge of the Phoenix and the Grail.
For more on the subject of the Knights Templar from the same contributor:
Another perspective on the history of the Templars, from occult author and researcher Robert Ambelain:
And yet another perspective on the fate of the Templars, from the writing of Albert Pike, once Sovereign Grand Commander of the Scottish Rite, the individual largely responsible for formulating the degrees and ritual of the Scottish Rite as we know them today, and purported co-founder of Freemasonry's alleged inner order of the Palladium, in his magnum opus Morals & Dogma:
> Morals and Dogma: Council of Kadosh: XXX. Knight Kadosh
> "The Pope and the King soon after perished in a strange and sudden manner. Squin de Florian, the chief denouncer of the Order, died assassinated. In breaking the sword of the Templars, they made of it a poniard; and their proscribed trowels thence-forward built only tombs."
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> [The Order disappeared at once. Its estates and wealth were confiscated, and it seemed to have ceased to exist. Nevertheless it lived, under other names and governed by unknown Chiefs, revealing itself only to those who, in passing through a series of Degrees, had proven themselves worthy to be entrusted with the dangerous Secret. The modern Orders that style themselves Templars have assumed a name to which they have not the shadow of a title.]
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> "The Successors of the Ancient Adepts Rose-Croix, abandoning by degrees the austere and hierarchial Science of their Ancestors in initiation, became a Mystic Sect, united with many of the Templars, the dogmas of the two intermingling, and believed themselves to be the sole depositaries of the secrets of the Gospel of St. John, seeing in its recitals an allegorical series of rites proper to complete the initiation.
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> "The Initiates, in fact, thought in the eighteenth century that their time had arrived, some to found a new Hierarchy, others to overturn all authority, and to press down all the summits of the Social Order under the level of Equality."