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Fear of Friday the 13th may have roots in historical event By LARRY ESKRIDGE Friday, January 13, 2006 11:34 AM CST of the Daily Ledger Friday the Thirteenth has come to be regarded as a day when bad luck proliferates and people need to be on their guard. But how this superstition came into being is a matter of much speculation. Some scholars believe the belief of unlucky Friday 13 has an exact date of origin: Oct. 13, 1307. On that date, Philippe IV (le Bel) of France authorized the arrest of the members of a military and religious order popularly called the Knights Templar, charging them with various heresies and immoral practices. Interestingly, the move was approved by Pope Clement V, in spite of the fact that the Templars had been pledged to obey only the pope's orders and were subject only to his authority. Even today, questions remain about the Templars. Who were they really, and what was their mission? Why were they so violently persecuted in France and with the approval of a church they had pledged to defend? And what happened to the vast wealth they had apparently accumulated? Most authorities agree on the basic history of the order. In the year 1118, a man named Hugues de Payen and eight companions presented themselves to the king of Jerusalem, which was then under Christian control, and pledged themselves, as the Order of the Poor Knights of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, to keep the roads and highways of the Holy Land safe, especially for religious pilgrims. The king was so appreciative that, according to authors Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln in their book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" (Dell Publishing,1982, 1983), he moved them into a wing of his own palace, supposedly built on the foundations of King Solomon's Temple. Even though nine warriors were not enough to perform the duties to which they were pledged, within a decade their reputation had grown to such an extent that Saint Bernard of Clairvaux declared they were the highest example of Christian values (Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln). Membership spread across Europe and the Holy Land until they were one of the most powerful institutions of the Middle Ages. The Templars, as they became known, lived under a rule quite similar to that of the Cistercian monks, composed by Saint Bernard, which swore them to poverty, chastity, and obedience. Eventually, Pope Innocent II issued an edict which placed them under allegiance only to the pope himself. While individual Templars could not own wealth, the order itself became quite rich, both from donations and bequests and from the rule that members had to give away their possessions to the order when they joined. Because of this, the Templars possessed large tracts of land as well as money, often lending sums to kings and serving as intermediaries for merchants. The Templars are considered by many to be the creators of modern banking and the inventors of the check. The Templars also enjoyed a reputation as diplomats. They were influential as go-betweens between the various European powers and between the Christian and Islamic world. They were also known for their breadth of knowledge in technology and medicine. But mostly the Templars were most famous for their bravery (some say recklessness) in battle. The Templars were forbidden to retreat unless the odds against them were 3 to 1, and when Acre, the final Christian citadel in the Holy Land, finally fell to Muslim forces, the Templars remained to fight to the death while they allowed women and children to escape. After the conquest of the Holy Land by Islamic forces, the Templars lost their main reason for existence, but continued to be a force in Europe. However, their wealth and power brought them many enemies, and reports of the Knights pledged to poverty leading debauched lives began to circulate. One of the proverbs repeated during that time was "to drink like a Templar." Philippe IV reportedly owed large amounts of money to the Templars, and he feared their power, since their forces were greater and better equipped than his own, and since they owed allegiance only to the pope. Having purportedly murdered two popes to set up his own puppet on the throne of St. Peter, Philippe finally received approval to arrest the Templars on the above date. While the action was supposedly secret, the fact that the Templars did not resist suggests to some authorities they were aware of the coming persecution. In addition, the idea they were forewarned was strengthened by the fact that the vast wealth of the order was nowhere to be found. Some authorities (Baigent, et al) suggest the treasure had been loaded onto 18 vessels at the Templar port of La Rochelle, and transported to a still unknown location. Others, such as Frank Sanello in "The Knights Templars: God's Warriors, The Devil's Bankers" (Taylor Trade Publishing, 2003), suggest the amount of Templar wealth had been exaggerated. Suffering under cruel torture, many Templars confessed to crimes ranging from sodomy to spitting on the cross, but many of them recanted after the tortures ended. One of these was the Templars elderly Grand Master, Jacques de Molay, who was slowly roasted to death in 1314. As he died, he called on the king and the pope to join him before the thrown of Heaven to be judged for his death. Within a month, the pope was dead. The king died within a year. Nor did the supposed Templar curse end there. Many stories suggest de Molay's curse extended to later French kings. When Louis XVI was guillotined, it was reported a man ran to his body, dipped his hands in the king's blood, and, spattering it on the crowd, called out, "Jacques de Molay, thou art avenged." While Templars were harassed in other parts of Europe, they did not suffer the same persecution as in France. Persecution in England was rather mild, and Scotland offered many Templars protection. Many scholars trace some of the ideas of Freemasonry to the influence of the Templars. In Portugal, the Templars were renamed the Knights of Christ, and included among their membership explorers Vasco de Gama and Prince Henry the Navigator. And when Christopher Columbus, who was married to the daughter of a member of the Knights of Christ, sailed to the New World, he was under the white banner and red cross of the order. And in Germany, the Teutonic Knights, who had been spawned by the Knights Templar, gave active assistance to a rebel monk named Martin Luther. And at the Templar ruins in Languedoc, locals report strange lights and dark figures have been known to frequent the area when the thirteenth day of the month falls on a Friday ("The Templar Revelation," Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince, Touchstone, 1997). For more information about the Templars, check out the resources in your local library.

Fear of Friday the 13th may have roots in historical event

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