Chinon Parchment and the Templars
A Document Has Been Found To Exonerate the Knights of Heresy
Their accuser was Philip IV of France. He attacked the secrecy of the Templar initiation, suggesting deviancy behind closed doors, financial corruption and sodomy. They were accused of idolatory, including the worship of a cat. These charges added up to heresy.
The Knights Templar had abandoned the Holy Land in 1291 CE. The Muslim army, led by Saladin had captured Jerusalem in 1187 forcing the Templars to Acre on the coast of the Holy Land. But after one hundred years and six more campaigns, it was over. They returned to Europe, most of them to France and Jacques de Molay became the Grand Master.
Philip IV of France
In 1306 CE Philip took refuge in a Templar temple. At the time he was devaluing the currency and this led to him being pursued through the streets by an angry mob. While inside, Philip actually saw the treasure.
Philip was an ambitious man who wanted to be the most Christian king in Europe. He believed that, as a direct descendent of Louis, the Saint-King, he was therefore the face of Christ on earth. Not the king, but Christ himself.
But the king was in trouble, he had borrowed money from the Templars to finance his wars against the English. By 1307CE he was desperately low on funds. His kingdom was on the verge og bankcruptcy and he needed the Templar's money. By the beginning of the 1300's the Templars had no reason to exist anymore.
He decided to neutralise the Templars and strip them of their assets. But they were not his to control, only the Pope could legitimately rule the Order. S Philip spread rumours to destabilise them.
The Charge of Heresy
On 13th October 1307, six hundred and twenty Templars along with the Grand Master- Jacques de Molay were arrested and charged with heresy.
The charge was devasting to the Templars- they were bound to uphold and protect the faith, heresy meant a betrayal of the faith. The charge had the potential to destroy the order. Jacques de Molay was slammed with one hundred and four charges of misconduct and heresy. Two weeks after his arrest, Jacques made a complete confession, admitting to all the charges. His confession had a damaging effect on public perception of the Order. After two hundred years of fighting under the sign of the cross in the Holy Land, the Grand Master destroyed their reputation with a confession of heresy.
The real reason for the confession was torture. Philip used torture as was common in that time. He didn't torture them so they would tell the truth, he tortured them so they would tell his truth.
Because the Knights Templar were a religious military order, they were directly under the protection of the Pope. The king had no direct power over them. The Pope was the only one who could save the Templars, but the Papacy was at one of its weakest points in history.
Chinon Parchment
Clement V was a puppet Pope- subject to the whim of Philip IV. The king had single-handedly destroyed a previous Pope, replacing him with Clement and constantly reminded him who was in charge.The Pope was "held hostage" in Avignon, France and wasn't allowed back to the safety of the Vatican. This is commonly known as the Babylonian Captivity. He had one final lifeline to save the Templars- he was obliged to investigate any charge of heresy. This turned Philip's attack into a Papal enquiry.
In 2001, a document was found in the Vatican archive. It was the official Papal enquiry on Jacques de Molay. At the beginning of the enquiry, three of the Pope's cardinals went to Chinon to question de Molay. Far from retracting his confession he repeated it to the Pope's men. He admitted denouncing Christ and spitting on the cross after the formal initiation. He explained it was part of a training exercise for the initiates, if they were ever captured by infidels. According to the Chinon parchment, de Molay was given absolution after he repented.
The Pope decided that the charge against the Templars was one of misconduct and not heresy. He planned to merge the Templars with the Hospitallers, another military order. Philip mounted a blackmailing campaign against him. In 1312, the Pope decided- that even though the charge was not heresy, the acts they were charged with were so grave no one would wear the Templar habit again. Because of the delay in the decision of the charge, he was worried the money the Order had was being squandered and because of the mounting pressure he was receiving from the French monarch, he would abolish the Knights Templar.
The act of Chinon remained a dead letter and on the18th March1314 De Molay was burned at the stake charged with heresy.
The charge of heresy brought against the Knights Templar was devastating. These warrior monks who, for two hundred years had fought to protect and uphold the faith were charged with betraying it. It took Philip IV and Clement V seven years to abolish the Order and now almost seven hundred years later a document has been found that absolved the Knights of this charge.
Sources:
templarhistory.com
Gardner, Laurence, Lost Secrets of the Sacred Ark, HarperCollins, London, 2004
Crusaders wall in Acre
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