This book proposes that the secret history of Freemasonry is that its formal genesis occurred following the suppression of the Knights Templar in the 14th century, when a branch of the Order escaped to Scotland and another went underground in France and across Europe (and some even took to the high seas, possibly looking for La Merica/America). The Templar’s themselves originated in the early 12th century but the book proposes that they did so as part of a coordinated emergence of European noble families centered in France who were themselves blood-descendants of a first-century Jewish-Christian priest class which gathered at the Jerusalem Church under the Apostle James, brother of Jesus Christ. This priest class escaped the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD and hid their secret knowledge under the temple to be excavated by the Knights Templar Order a thousand years later. This priestly order themselves allegedly trace their lineage back another millennium (approximately 3,000 years ago) to the establishment of Solomon’s Temple, and who are alleged to possess antediluvian wisdom derived from one of the two pillars encoded by Enoch prior to the flood. According to legend, one of the pillars was recovered by Hermes who then established the Egyptian civilization around 3000 BC. The other pillar was recovered by the Jews at some point, again according to legend. The over-arching idea binding all this history together is the notion that Jesus was not God become Man, but was an initiate of the mysteries through this Jewish priest class (and perhaps through his time in Egypt, although that piece isn’t explored in the book) and emerged as human messiah to establish a hereditary lineage of kings, what’s called the “Rex Deus” or Kings of God. The dispersed priests who escaped the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD fled across Europe and established noble families preserving holy bloodlines of this lineage which reaches back to King David.
The book spend considerable effort explaining how the Shroud of Turin is the linen cloth which wrapped Jacques de Molay following his mock-crucifixion at the hands of the French Inquisition in October 1308, and this seems to be a well-documented theory. The suppression of this truth by the Catholic Church was intended to quell the rise of a potential cult of a second messiah at a time when papal influence waned due to global instability.
Whatever your response to the claims made in this book, it is important not to ignore them because powerful people throughout history have believed them, and their collective belief has shaped world history right up to today. The Crusades were initiated for this very reason, it is suggested.
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