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Baphomet (bæ
·fomet). [a. F. Baphomet; cf. Pr. Bafomet,
OSp. Mafomat.] a. A form of the name Mahomed used
by mediæval writers. b. Alleged name of the idol which
the Templars were accused of worshipping. (According to l'Abbé
Constant, quoted by Littré,1
this word was cabalistically formed by writing backward tem.
o. h. p. ab., abbreviation of templi omnium hominum pacis
abbas, 'abbot' or 'father of the temple of peace of all
men.') Hence Baphomet·ic a.
1818 Hallam Mid. Ages (1872) I. 140
Baphomet is a secret word ascribed to the Templars. 1855
Milman Lat. Chr. _VII._ xii. ii. 278 The great stress ..
in the condemnation of the templars is laid on the worship of
Baphomet. The talismans, bowls, symbols, are even called
Baphometic. 1831 Carlyle Sart. Res. II. vii, My
Spiritual New-birth, or Baphometic Fire-baptism.
Oxford
English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984
(23rd Printing) p. 659.
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The Baphomet is not a masonic symbol, nor is
it worshiped by freemasons. It has no traditional relation to
the pentagram, nor the Goat of Mendes, nor Pan, nor the Green
Man. The name seems to have first appeared in twelfth century
France and its image first appeared in 1855. Then Anton Szandor
LaVey and his atheistic Church of Satan adopted it in 1966. But
it all starts with the Roman Catholic Inquisition and the
Knights Templar.
16
Established in 1118 by Hugh de
Payen and André de Montbard
2,
the Knights Templar — from September 13, 1128, properly styled
Pauperes commilitis Christi et Templi Salomonis — are
forever linked to the history of the Baphomet. But of 231
knights examined by the pope’s Commissioners in Paris, only 12
admitted, under torture, to knowing anything about the icon, as
against 183 who confessed that they renounced Christ and 180 who
confessed to defiling the cross in various ways.3
The term’s identification
with Mahomet appears to be derived from its usage in Provence.
This had been the centre of the Cathar Church in France, until
the Albigensian Crusade of 1209-1229 killed its protectors and
the nascent Inquisition killed or silenced any survivors.
Montague Summers4
suggested, without proof, that the name was a combination of two
Greek words (baphe and metis) and meant 'absorption into
wisdom.'15
It should be noted that the
term
Baphomet is not to be found in King Philippe’s grounds for
arrest, issued September 14th, 1307, the 127 articles of
accusation drawn up on August 12th, 1308, nor in any of the
papal bulls issued by Pope Clement V. The articles of accusation
refer to the adoration of idols: a cat or head, sometimes having
three faces. The descriptions revealed during the trials varied
but generally were of a "head with one face or two faces,
sometimes bearded and sometimes not, made of silver or of wood,
a picture of a man or of a woman, an embalmed head that glowed
in the dark or a demon."5
The trials say little of the actual head, but there are some
textual accounts of it. Guillame de Arbley who was the preceptor
of the Templar house at Soissy in the diocese of Meaux testified
on October 22, 1307 that he had seen the bearded head twice,
which he claimed was gilded and made of silver and wood.6
Although modern writers will occasionally
refer to the Templars' use of the pentagram, or five-pointed
star, they fail to provide examples. The
seals of the Masters generally depicted crosses, castles,
fish, lambs, lions and the like. The plans of their
castles and strongholds — those few they constructed — in
Europe were dependent on topography and sightlines, not sacred
geometry.14
![[Baphomet]](levi-lucifer.jpg)
Éliphas Lévi |
What does
this have to do with Freemasonry, or more
particularly, anti-masonry? The presumed link is the
pentagram. Over six hundred years after the suppression of
the Knights Templar, one
Éliphas Lévi took it upon himself to determine the value of
the pentagram and equate it with the Baphomet. He termed the
Baphomet, "the Goat of Mendes" and included a fanciful
illustration of it as a frontispiece to his Doctrine and
Ritual of High Magic in 1861.7
Although his frontispiece illustration depicts a one-point-up
pentagram, he is also credited with being the first to arbitrate
that the one-point-down image represented the Baphomet.8
No known graphical illustration associating the pentagram with
evil appears before this. Michael Howard claims that Lévi based
the illustration on a gargoyle that appears on a building owned
by the Templars; the Commandry of Saint Bris le Vineux.9
The Catholic Inquisition of the early 1300s does not appear to
have made a connection between the Templars' alleged worship of
the Baphomet and the pentagram. Goldberg’s Sacred fire : the
story of sex in religion depicts an image that could act as
a link between the Templars and Lévi. But there is no mention in
the text and no source is cited.10
The next similar depiction
appears in 1894 when
self-confessed fraud
Leo Taxil incorporated a similar figure into his attacks on
Freemasonry.11
These three images, and
subsequent imitations,19
constitute the complete catalogue of images purporting to
represent the Baphomet. They have no historical precedent. They
have no existence other than in the imaginations of their
authors. And the point cannot be made too strongly — they have
nothing to do with Freemasonry.
It is a literary and historical curiosity that
masonic author,
Albert Pike quoted extensively, and apparently uncritically,
from the writings of Éliphas Lévi. He writes: "Hierogliphically
to express this law of prudence, they gave their mercury,
personified in Egypt as Hermanubis, a dog’s head; and to their
Sulpher, represented by the Baphomet of the Temple, that goat’s
head which brought into such disrepute the occult Mediaeval
associations." "The Gnostics held that it composed the igneous
body of the Holy Spirit ; and it was adored in the secret rites
of the Sabbat or the Temple, under the hieroglyphic figure of
Baphomet or the hermaphroditic goat of Mendes."
18
It is clear that Pike’s authority was Lévi, who had no
authority.
Placing the image of a goat face inside a five-pointed star
appears to be the inspiration of Paul Jagot, in his Science
Occulte et Magie Pratique (Paris : Editions Drouin, 1924, p.
172). It incorporated an open star, not a pentagram, and Jagot
provided no citation.
The image next appeared in The Handbook of Magic & Witchcraft
by Charles W. Olliver (London : Rider & Co., 1928, p. 47). As
reproduced at the top left of this webpage, the head is now
contained in a pentagram, with the addition of the words
"Samael" and "Lilith". Olliver also failed to provide citation.
In 1931 Oswald Wirth included the goat head and pentagram in his
La Franc-Maçonnerie Rendue Intelligible à ces Adeptes,
Deuxième Partie: "Le Compagnon," (Paris: Derry-Livres, 1931,
p. 60). Again, the image was uncited.
Maurice Bessy provided an illustration of the goat head and
pentagram inside two circles, with the word "Leviathan" written
between the lines in Hebrew, in his A Pictorial History of
Magic and the Supernatural (London :1964, p. 198). He also
provided no source.
Only in the later twentieth century, with the
creation of the American Church of Satan, did the inverted
pentagram, with or without the goat head, become a popular
symbol for Satan. Their source appears to be Oswald Wirth and
Maurice Bessy, neither of whom identified it with the Baphomet.12
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1.Littré,
Emile, (1801-1881) Dictionnaire de la langue francaise :
contenant ... la nomenclature ... la grammaire ... la
signification des mots ... la partie historique ... l'etymologie
/ par E. Littre. Paris : Librairie de L. Hachette, 1863- [v
in ; 33 cm] Note that he is quoting
Éliphas Lévi as Constant.
^
2.William
of Tyre Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum
The Council of Troyes, where the Rule of the Temple was drawn
up, began on January 13, 1128. Note: xii. 7, in Recueil des
historiens des croisades: historiens occidentaux, i (Paris,
1844), 520. Other twelfth-century accounts: Chronique de
Michel le Syrien, xv. ii, trans. J. B. Chabot, iii (Paris,
1905-1910), 201-3, and Walter Map, De nugis curialium, i.
18, ed. T. Wright (Camden Society, 1850), pp. 29 ff.
^
3.Found
at
thestargoddess.net/baph.htm
^
4.Rev.
Alphonsus Joseph-Mary Augustus Montague Summers (1880-1948)
British priest and man of letters; editor and compiler of The
History of Witchcraft and Demonology 1926, and The
Geography of Wichcraft1927. Also see Francis King,
Sexuality, Magic and Perversion. New English Library, Times
Mirror. 1972. 174 p., p. 87 : "Joseph Von Hammer... considers it
to simply be the Greek word metis, wisdom... He considers
that the name Baphomet is derived from the Greek words Baphe
Metis, i.e. the baptism of Metis...."
^
5.Edward
Burman Supremely abominable crimes : the trial of the Knights
Templar London : Allison & Busby, 1994. 304 p. ISBN:
0749002689
^
6.Reference
from Stephen Dafoe, found at
templarhistory.com/head.html
^
7.Baphomet
illustraton from Dogme et Rituel Haute Magie par Éliphas
Lévi. Paris: Germer Bailliele, 1861. Art and Symbols of the
Occult. Vermont: Destiny, 1993. p. 70
^
8.Image
shown top left. Éliphas Lévi, Transcendental magic, its
doctrine and ritual. trans.
Arthur Waite 438p illus. ii, p. 55.
^
9.Howard,
Michael, (b. 1948) The occult conspiracy : the dark side of
politics from ancient Egypt until today. London : Rider,
1989. 196p,[8]p of plates : ill : 1facsim, ports ; 25cm. ISBN:
0712622403
^
10.B.
Z. Goldberg, (Ben Zion Goldberg) b. 1895 The Sacred Fire: The
Story of Sex in Religion. London : Jarrolds, 1931. 287 p.
24cm. illustration entitled: "Idol" of Knights Templar, showing
semitic influences (p 177).^
11.Frontispiece
engraving with text from Leo Taxil’s "Le Mystères de la
Franc-Maçonnerie - Le Mysteres de la Franc-Maçonnerie Dévoilés -
La Franc-Maçonnerie Dévoilée et Expliquée" Dessins de Méjanel -
Gravures de Pannemaker, Édition de Propagande Populaire, Manuel
résumé du grande ouvrage, Engraving signed: P. Méjanel: Letouzey
& Ané, Éditeurs, 17, Rue du Vieux-Columbier Paris^
12.
Oswald Wirth, La Franc-Maçonnerie rendue intelligible a ces
adeptes II, "Le compagnon," Paris: Derry-Livres, 1931, p.
60.. Maurice Bessy, Histoire en 1000 Images de la Magie,
Editions du Pont Royal, 1961.^
13.
Malcolm Barber, The Trial of the Templars. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1998 c. 1978 ISBN: 0 521 45727 0
pbk, 312 p.
Piers Paul Read, The Templars. London: Weidenfeld & 1999.
ISBN: 0-297-84267-6. 350 p.
J. Michelet, Les Procès des Templiers, 2 vols. (Collection
de Documents Inédits sur l'Histoire de France), Paris,
1841-51 [ notarial record of Paris hearings, October and
November 1307 and hearings of papal commission between 1309 and
1311, based upon the copy deposited at Paris at the close of the
papal commission.
14.A.
J. Farey, Templars in the Corona de Aragon. London:
Oxford University Press, 1973. ISBN: 01 97131379. Appendix IV,
p. 453.^
15.Cf.
Hugh [Joseph] Schonfield (1901-1988), The Essene Odyssey.
Appendix A, "The Essenes and the Templars", 1984. Dr. Schonfield
used the atbash, an Hebrew substitution cypher, to translate
"Baphomet" as "Sophia", the Greek goddess of wisdom and
theorized that the Templars had been influenced by the Cathars.
^
16.Cf.
<templarhistory.com/baphomet.html>.
^
17.de
la Rive, Abel Claren. [b. 1855] La Femme et l'Enfant dans la
Franc-Maçonnerie Universelle. Paris & Lyon: Delhomme &
Briguet, Editeurs, 1894. cover art detail.^
18.Morals
and Dogma, Albert Pike. Charlestion : Supreme Council
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![[Baphomet]](baphomet01.gif)