The Templar Degree

The Origins

The Knights Templar (The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon) were founded in 1118 to protect pilgrims heading for Jerusalem and the Christian Holy places, where the small band of warrior monks established a headquarters.

In the year 1118 AD King Baldwin II granted the Templars quarters on the Temple Mount and this forms the link to the Royal Arch.

Many men, of noble birth, joined the ranks of the Templar Order. Those who were unable to join often gifted the Templars with land and other valuables.

Modern Masonic association with these Medieval defenders of the Christian Holy Places is linked by the ceremony of Installation in which the Candidate takes the part of a Pilgrim who, by symbolically embarking on a Crusade, is elevated to Knighthood.