The Second Messiah
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The Second Messiah is a 1997 book by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas. The book discusses the Knights Templar, the Turin Shroud and freemasonry.
[edit] Synopsis of the book
The epic story behind the shroud begins with the crucifixion of Jesus when, as the authors show, his hidden teachings were driven underground. Following the destruction of the Jerusalem Church and the slaughter of the Jewish nation in AD 70, a few surviving priests from the smouldering city of Jerusalem headed to Europe to await the moment of return prophesied in the Gospel of St. John. Precisely one thousand years later their bloodline descendants re-entered the holy city to claim their ancient heritage and form a new order of the priests of the Temple- the Knights Templar. There they recovered the lost teachings hidden below the tumbled ruins and devised elaborate Tarot cards with cryptic meanings to protect their secret cult.
But their secret could not be contained forever and in 1307 they were arrested. Their last leader was crucified in a bizarre parody of the crucifixion of Jesus, and the image of his suffering slowly materialized on the cloth that had once swathed him...The Turin Shroud. As the Black Death devastated Europe the Church reached the lowest point of its existence, and the desire for a new saviour, prophesied since ancient times, gripped the minds of people.
And now they had the image of their new saviour, the Second Messiah.
In solving the riddle of the shroud this book unravels a far deeper mystery: how the medieval artefact links directly to Jesus.
The guardians of this great secret tried to hide it from the world and even their own members. But they failed to destroy the evidence...hidden in the abandoned rituals of Freemasonry.
[edit] Theories
Among the book's many interesting conclusions are that the old English folk tale about King Arthur is really drawn from real-life Templar activities.
Another far more controverisial conclusion that the authors reach is that Jesus Christ was not God but only a martyred prophet. The authors reached their conclusion from deciphering the tarot cards of the Knights Templar. The book also claims that the Turin Shroud is not an imprint of Jesus Christ, but Jacques de Molay, the last (known) grand master of the Knights Templar. The authors assert that Jacques de Molay was the "second messiah". They claim that today's Christian Church, the Roman Catholic Church, is not the true representation of Christianity. Instead, Freemasonry and what the Templars believed is the "truth".
The Knights Templar, during the Crusades, had found the Holy Grail, the Ark of the Covenant and secret scrolls. The book hints at or claims that the Templar's rediscovered lost truths changed their beliefs, such as their belief in Jesus Christ and the way they interpreted Christianity.
The authors claim that the Templars took these treasures to Rosslyn Chapel in Scotland and buried them beneath the Cathedral.
During the Seventh Crusade, Louis IX's battle force was forced to submission and he himself was ransomed for an enormous sum. The Templars were asked to pay the sum, which they did with great reluctance. Louis IX's grandson, Philip IV of France or Phillip the Fair, was deeply inflicted by the Templar's reluctance to pay the ransom. Thus, he launched his plan to destroy the Templars when he became king in 1285 at the age of seventeen. In 1307, he launched the trial of the Templars.
The Knighthood was devastated as French officials brutally tortured and crucified the members of the order. Not all of the Knights were killed, however, because some learned of their possible fate and quickly fled from France to Scotland, where Robert the Bruce, an already excommunicated King was ready to accept them. There they created Freemasonry (because many of the Templars were Masons who constructed magnificent cathedrals and chapels throughout Europe). The authors claim that their findings will be validated by an excavation at Rosslyn Chapel in Scotland.
