Philosophy of the Medieval Knight-Monk Orders

 

This coupled with their legendary near autonomy, from secular control, granted by the establishing papal bull, reference their order, (Which provided a basis for the amass of wealth and power.) is the key....

 

best

CV

 

The demise of the Templars reflects in a way the end of the Crusades.  With the fall of Acre, 1291, there could be no more pretense of Europeans recovering the Holy Land.  

 

For some of the Orders, that originated because of the crusading efforts in the Levant, there was less reason to exist.  For others (St.John, Hospitalers), there was still purpose.  And the Orders in Spain and Portugal, and in east Europe were still viable.

 

The Templars had amassed wealth and become rather exclusive and aloof from other nobility and also somewhat from the Papacy.  The need of France's king for money, and the collusion of the puppet Pope (in Avignon) was a confluence of interests that caused the end of Templar influence, 1307.

 

The charges of heresy and all that were mostly trumped up. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes.

 

Please re-read the post, Denis.  Where was anything said about 'darned terrorists?'

 

If you misquote people and hijack threads on AE you will get into trouble.  Just some advice.

 

 

 

"Uh, excuse us all over the place, but I believe the mass murdering in Iraq is being done by Moslems, is it not?

 

It is difficult 800-900 years on to understand the attraction of vows of poverty and chastity, in combination with the privations of a military life far from home.  The only thing I can equate to such things is a sense of threat, outrage and zeal that is mostly absent from modern life - in the West anyway.

 

In the 11th and 12th centuries, there surely were material considerations involved such as the lack of opportunity at home for younger sons of noble birth, and the prospect of lands and wealth in other places, but still the religious aspect cannot be overlooked.  Why else would kings engage in crusading activity?

 

Another aspect of the crusading Orders is that of Iberia.  The Reconquista there was a crusade much more to drive out an invader than it was to be an invader.  Then as they developed, the Spanish and Portuguese military Orders were very important to the rise of exploration and the aggressive expansion of Europeans in the late 15th and the 16th century. 

 

By the mid 16th century, those Orders had become like the GAR or the VFW - the members were shadows of their former selves.  The decline of the Orders mirrors the decline of knights as the basis of military society.  The Reformation and the rise of state entities deprived them of their vitality.  Only the Turkish threat mitigated the decline, but even Christian state entities (France; the Dutch) made alliances with Turks and Moors as it suited their purposes.