When Scotland Was Jewish by Elizabeth Caldwell Hirschman

Author:Elizabeth Caldwell Hirschman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General Fiction
Publisher: McFarland
Published: 2012-12-19T05:00:00+00:00

In addition to the stunning list given above, there were also several preceptories in Scotland and Ireland, which were dependent on the Temple at London.5 Addington summarizes:

The annual income of the order in Europe has been roughly estimated at six millions sterling! According to Matthew Paris, the Templars possessed nine thousand manors or lordships in Christendom, besides a large revenue and immense riches arising from the constant charitable bequests and donations of sums of money from pious persons....

The principal benefactors to the Templars amongst the nobility were William Marshall,6 Earl of Pembroke, and his sons William and Gilbert; Robert, Lord de Ross;7 the Earl of Hereford; William, Earl of Devon; the King of Scotland; William, Archbishop of York; Philip Harcourt, dean of Lincoln; the Earl of Cornwall; Philip, Bishop of Bayeux; Simon de Senlis, Earl of Northampton; Leticia and William, Count and Countess of Ferrara; Margaret, Countess of Warwick;8 Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester; Robert de Harecourt, Lord of Rosewarden; William de Vernon, Earl of Devon, etc.

As the reader gathers from this lengthy enumeration of holdings and privileges, the Knights Templar were an enormous, extraordinarily rich and very powerful organization. In essence, they were the first multinational corporation—one over which no court or tribunal had jurisdiction. The seal of the brotherhood featured “a man’s head, decorated with a long beard, and surmounted by a small cap, and around it are the letters Testis V. Magi” (Addington 1892, p. 106). At this time, Templar masters in England included persons named William de La More and Amadeus de Morestello. Clearly, Muslims, as well as Jews, were in England.

From Addison’s (1892) account, we now turn to that of Piers Paul Read, who wrote a critically acclaimed history of the Templars in 1999. Read’s work is very well researched, and he delves into the ancient origin of the group, predating the Crusades. He starts by recounting the history of the Jewish people. At the point when King David reconquers Palestine from the Jebusites, we are given great detail concerning David’s assembling of materials for a Jewish worship center, the First Temple, built by David’s son Solomon around 950 B.C.E.

After Solomon’s death, the Jewish state went into decline and was conquered by several eastern nations in succession. In 586 B.C.E., King Nebuchadnezzar, a Chaldean, destroyed the Temple of Solomon and enslaved the Jewish population, taking many of them (including those of Davidic descent) to Babylon. However, by 515 B.C.E., the Persians under their king Cyrus had defeated the Chaldeans and permitted the Jews to return to Judea, where they rebuilt their temple. By the fourth century B.C.E., the Macedonian Greeks under Alexander the Great had swept through the Persian empire and conquered Judea. Upon Alexander’s death, his empire was divided, and the Jews were permitted a hereditary high priest, who served both as a secular and spiritual ruler.

In 167 B.C.E, Jews under three Maccabean brothers successfully revolted against the Seleucid government that controlled Judea and founded the Hasmonean dynasty in the land of Israel.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.