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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] Jacques de Molay Biography MOLAY, JACQUES DE (c.1243-1314). The last Grand Master of the Templars. He was a native of Burgundy, and entered the Order of Templars in 1285, and was elected Grand Master in 1297. About this time Philip IV of France (1285-1314) undertook to carry out the project which he had formed to destroy the order, chiefly because the French monarchy was in sore financial straits and the Templars were wealthy. There was at this time constant talk of a new crusade, and Clement V called the Grand Master of the Templars to Europe. The call was answered by Molay, who appeared in France in the fall of 1306, accompanied by a chosen hand of distinguished knights of the order. He repaired to Poitiers in 1307 to render his allegiance to the Pope, and was there informed of serious charges against the order. He went away believing that he had cleared the order and remained in high honor with the King. But the latter was working secretly through the officers of the Inquisition in France and procured the arrest of every Templar in France on Oct. 13, 1307; Jacques de Molay was seized in the house of the Temple and taken before special commissioners of the Inquisition. Although the Pope was indignant at this action on the part of Philip, and suspended the powers of the Inquisition in France, the King finally induced him to take part in the action. Molay was examined repeatedly by papal commissions, confessed the truth of some of the charges, and finally on March 18, 1314, he was condemned to perpetual imprisonment. He, however, immediately retracted all he had said, and thereupon was burnt the same evening, protesting the innocence of the order. Consult: F. Gmelin, Schuld oder Unschuld des Tempelordens (Stuttgart, 1893); Ernest Lavisse, Histoire de France, vol. iv, part ii (Paris, 1901); H. C. Lea, History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, vol. iii (new ed., New York, 1906). The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. XVI (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 99. |