Re: Kensington runestone in the Scandinavian press

On Fri, 10 Jun 2005 08:13:28 GMT,
nospam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

>Apparently on date Fri, 10 Jun 2005 09:20:34 +1200, Eric Stevens
>>nospam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>>><eric.stevens@xxxxxxxxx> said:
>>
>>>>There is the point that not all is likely to be known about a secret
>>>>society under a suppression order.
>>>
>>>It wasn't a secret society.
>>
>>The Templars were officially suppressed in 1312. If they continued to
>>exist after that date they kept the fact secret.
>
>There's the word "suppressed" again but I think I would use the word
>"disbanded."

In the first paragraph of chapter one of "The New Knighthood, A
history of the order of the Temple", Malcom Barber, Cambridge
University Press, ISBN 0 521 55872 7:

" ... they had no idea that the Order of the Temple had been
suppressed in 1312 and that the Grand Master had been burnt
to death as a relapsed heretic two years later"
>
>No doubt lots and lots of the Templars did "continue to exist" but they
>wouldn't need to keep this secret at all, they would merely stop being Templars
>because the order had been shut down.

If you had dedicated your life to a cause in the sense that the rank
and file Templars did, would you have abandoned your oaths and beliefs
so easily?
>
>It's a little bit like being a member of the Scottish regiment, "The
>Cameronians" (Scottish Rifles).

Not at all like that.
>
>When the regiment is disbanded, technically at that moment there are no members
>of "the Cameronians" any more. However, those who were members before and who
>"continue to exist" may well regard themselves as "Cameronians". They may even
>want to have this fact indicated on their gravestone.
>
>You can't get new members to "The Cameronians" because it's been disbanded, it
>doesn't exist any more.
>
>This isn't a question of "keeping it secret" because it's an evident fact that
>there was a Cameronian regiment, it's been disbanded, etc. The *only* reason
>for the society to continue in secret is if it does something that the members
>gain benefits from that is a practice which has been made illegal. Thus, if the
>*practice* of Catholicism was made illegal, people would practice it in secret.
>You can't change the religious beliefs of people by legislation and it is the
>practice of the religion they need, not an official sanction.
>
>The Templar's is an entirely different thing. It's a military order that the
>members wanted to join because it gave them legal / practical advantage over
>non-members. Once disbanded, it wouldn't give those advantages any more. It's
>not a belief system.

It was not just a military order. It was a miltant religious order.
Would you expect a devoted Benedictine or Franciscan to give up that
easily? Why then would you expect a Templar?
>
>Well, it *wasn't* a belief system.

Oh, but it was.

> I daresay those who identify themselves as
>Templar's in the modern world are operating according to a belief system of
>some sort as I don't imagine they are actively guarding the Temple in Jerusalem
>against Saracens and Moors, or whatever the original raison d'etre was.
>
>>I'm not arguing that
>>this happened. I'm saying that if the organisation continued in secret
>>after that date it is not surprising that we have not heard of it.
>
>Nor would it be surprising that we haven't heard of it if it just ceased to
>exist, except in memories and similar.

Quite true, but that does not mean that you can entirely rule out an
ongoing remnant hard core. You certainly can't do it when ther is
evidence which suggests that such a hard core may have existed.

>What do you think these original
>Templars would be doing in secret?

Surviving? Praying for the old days to come back? Trying to keep the
order alive in the mean time? What would you have done?



Eric Stevens

.

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