Originally posted by greenmansmind
What keeps coming to me is what "secret" the Templars held so precious and were so persecuted for.
The Templars were persecuted because of greed. It's as simple as that. It was a very wealthy organisation and had power over land and people that the politicians (kings) of the time, envied and coveted.
They were destroyed so that financial debts could be absolved and their assets could be seized. One word describes the cause of their downfall - money. It had become such a wealthy organisation it was only a matter of time before those who controlled the masses turned against it.
The conspiracy surrounding some long forgotten secret knowledge has evolved from the lies concocted by those who destroyed the Order. They created a propaganda accusing the Templars as heretical merely so that the masses would agree to having the Order destroyed without questioning the financial motives. If the people had realised that the kings were only after the Templar's money, they would never have gone along with the plan.
It's a ploy that has been tried, tested and perfected over history before and since. The Church used it against so-called witches. Adolf Hitler used the same method to destroy the Jews. Pol Pot copied it to destroy the intelligensia whom he deemed threatened his plan. The Chinese used it in the Cultural Revolution. Middle East governments use it to control their people and keep the mullahs, emirs and sultans in power. Western governments use it to control their people and keep them docile. They have all created a mindset in the masses that casted or casts a conspiracy on the deemed enemy - they send out a basic propaganda at the masses.
Aim that propaganda at the masses and they will swallow anything if the message is powerful and simple enough. What you are suffering from is an echo of propaganda passed down through history and it's very hard to shake it out of the system. It was powerful enough to control whole nations, whole religions and whole societies. It takes centuries to dissipate. The only way to dispel it is through knowledge of how it works.
Take a look at Hitler's book "Mein Kampf" and you can see how it is employed in it's various guises. It's no coincidence that the "white nationalists" of today seem to be of low intelligence - they still swallow propaganda aimed at the masses over 50 years ago!!! They may be able to recite that propaganda word for word, and they may even be able to adapt it for usage today, but they can never add to it. It therefore stagnates and they have to rely on the emotion of hatred to reinforce it.
www.hitler.org...
Hitler stated that propaganda can be aimed at the masses but not at the intelligensia and should never be aimed at both. If there is propaganda aimed at the masses on a subject, realise that it is probably not the whole story or even the truth. It can't be as the masses are deemed unable to understand the complexities of what is going on, or if the plan is insidious, they can't be allowed to find out it's true motives. The propaganda has to be short and simple and, because of this restriction the whole story can never be told at once. The intelligensia will realise what is occuring though. They are free from that propaganda. They aren't subjected to the brainwashing as it isn't aimed at them. They are free to look behind the propaganda at the true story. Sometimes they will make mistakes in defining that story and that is how conspiracy theories begin - they theorise when they should be actualizing. Recognise propaganda for what it is and you are halfway to getting the answer for anything which involves politics. Consequently, try to actualize and you might get the truth.
One recent example of this concept at work is to be found in the reasoning given for and against the war in Iraq. If you take a look at both sides you can see that they both put out propaganda for the masses. One side used WMD as the reason to attack and the other used the greed for wealth (ie Oil) as the opposing argument. Both are simple propagandas that hit home hard and were swallowed by the masses and both have been shown to be false reasons for and against the invasion - no WMDs were found and no wealth has been generated from oil. Those who were intelligent enough to realise that this was mass aimed propaganda are now looking for other reasons. These people are the intelligensia of today although some of them can't shake all of the propaganda surrounding the issue and therefore become conspiracy theorists.
The Knights Templars are victims of this theorising. People are more well informed nowadays and subconciously realise that the propaganda aimed at the Order was false. The problem is that sometimes the theorist has a hard time letting go of that propaganda. He's normally more educated and more informed than the original recipient of that propaganda, but it still creates a confusion in his mind. To add to this confusion, the propaganda hasn't been updated in centuries so it's message has become garbled. In the case of the KT, the theorist realises that they probably weren't heretics (he has more information at his disposal and less of a restricting propaganda) so he looks for other reasons behind their demise. But because he is theorising and because there is a seed of the old propaganda left in his mind, he cannot actualize. When studying subjects that were victims of propaganda you have to recognise that propaganda exists in the first place and then look for what truth it was trying to hide.
In the case of the Knights Templar the truth behind their destruction was nothing more than the greed of a king. It's just hidden behind centuries old propaganda.
[edit on 9-2-2005 by Leveller]
