Rebuilding Solomon's Temple.

[Dashinvaine (GN)]

I came across an extraordinary allegation against Freemasonry on an Islamic website http://www.islamonline.com/cgi-bin/news ... ice_id=365 , saying that Freemasonry secretly wishes to demolish the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and to rebuild the Jewish Temple of Solomon. It seems a bit paranoid to me (and the site in general seems hardly remarkable for its tolerance or broad-mindedness)... Has anyone else heard of this particular suspicion?

[Templario]

Nope. It's news to me!

[Stephen Dafoe]

Yah its an old conspiracy theory.

Freemasonry today has enough trouble keeping the lights on in its lodges and deciding who will man the next fish fry, let alone undergoing such an extensive construction project.

Demolishing a holy place of any religion would be contrary to all the Freemasonry stands for.

[Vortex]

Just more propoganda from people not in the know, not in the craft and believing everything they've read from ex-masons and proported ex-masons.

Just more hot air.

[Dashinvaine (GN)]

Indeed. I would have thought that if anything the Al Aqsa mosque would be rather revered by Freemasons as the old home of the Templars...

Those fish fries sound nice.

[Stephen Dafoe]

Indeed. I would have thought that if anything the Al Aqsa mosque would be rather revered by Freemasons as the old home of the Templars...

There are three schools of Freemasons with regard to the Mason / Templar connection.

1/ Those who argue tirelessly that we evolved from the KT. They quote Knight and Lomas, Baigent and Leigh and other popular writers.

2/ Those who argue tirelessly that we did not evolve from the KT. They quote nobody really but do a lot of arguing about Michael Ramsey being a nutter.

3/ Those who wouldn't know a Knight Templar or the Al Aqsa Mosque if they tripped over it.

I would suggest group three represent the majority of Masons.

[Templario]

[Red Knight]

Firstly no Freemason (proper one at least!) would want to destroy it. As for Templars, I recall reading in a true history of the order, how a Brother Knight recently arrived in the Holy Land took umbrage at a Muslim praying towards Mecca in the Mosque that was then Tempalr HQ. He roughly re arranged the Muslim at his prayers, to the UMBRAGE of a Brother Knight who had been "In country" for some time. The latter Knight apologised to the Moslem and instructed the European Brother on proper Holy Land Etiquette! So perhaps if the antis in the Moslem world would like to study THEIR history tehy would be better off!

[Dashinvaine (GN)]

Indeed. I would have thought that if anything the Al Aqsa mosque would be rather revered by Freemasons as the old home of the Templars...

There are three schools of Freemasons with regard to the Mason / Templar connection.

1/ Those who argue tirelessly that we evolved from the KT. They quote Knight and Lomas, Baigent and Leigh and other popular writers.

2/ Those who argue tirelessly that we did not evolve from the KT. They quote nobody really but do a lot of arguing about Michael Ramsey being a nutter.

3/ Those who wouldn't know a Knight Templar or the Al Aqsa Mosque if they tripped over it.

I would suggest group three represent the majority of Masons.

Indeed, but as you of course know there are some side degrees of certain rites of Masonry which were inspired by the Templars. For that reason I made the point. Clearly one does not need to believe in direct links between the two brotherhoods to suppose that Masons might have particular respect for buildings with Templar connections.

[Dashinvaine (GN)]

Firstly no Freemason (proper one at least!) would want to destroy it. As for Templars, I recall reading in a true history of the order, how a Brother Knight recently arrived in the Holy Land took umbrage at a Muslim praying towards Mecca in the Mosque that was then Tempalr HQ. He roughly re arranged the Muslim at his prayers, to the UMBRAGE of a Brother Knight who had been "In country" for some time. The latter Knight apologised to the Moslem and instructed the European Brother on proper Holy Land Etiquette! So perhaps if the antis in the Moslem world would like to study THEIR history tehy would be better off!

This comes from the account of the Syrian Muslim merchant Usama ibn Munqidh, who visited Jerusalem and who referred to the Templars in his account as his friends. He said they let him go and prey in a little mosque adjoining the Al Aqsa mosque which the brotherhood occupied. It was not, I don't think, a new Templar who harassed him and tried to turn him from Mecca, but a newly arrived Frankish man (it was not stated that he was a member of the Order as such). The Frank who Usama calls 'a devil of a man' took such umbrage (lovely word!) at the site of man praying to Mecca that his face changed colour and he shook with rage. The Templars, when they saw, ejected the Frankish man, and appologized to Usama, explaining that the man was new to the Levant and unaccustomed to seeing anyone praying in any direction but east.

This behaviour demonstrates that the Templars could be respectful and diplomatic. They were the defenders of Christianity and the Holy Sites, but not fanatical or bigoted enemies of Islam.

[Anonymous]

Actually I have heard that a compromise has to be reached because apparrently Lambert and others have decided that the original Solomon Temple lied between the Dome and the Mosque, meaning, a 3rd Temple can be rebuilt, if the Covenant of Daniel is signed.

And that might be why Blair is getting the Conference for Palestine arranged as we speak.

Without a Covenant quaranteeing security, they won;t build, with a quarantee, they will build and its part of PROPHECY

IMO

David

[Vortex]

Actually I have heard that a compromise has to be reached because apparrently Lambert and others have decided that the original Solomon Temple lied between the Dome and the Mosque, meaning, a 3rd Temple can be rebuilt, if the Covenant of Daniel is signed.

That's odd, becuase a few news stations, CNN, BCC, had articles about the dome of rock's collapsing wall, and had a bit in there about how scholars have no real clue where the Temple of Solomn was even located. Was it on the rock, next to the rock, away from the rock, some even debate if there even was a 1st temple...or if it even existed at all. Not to mention no one has any idea of what the temples even looked like.

With the current political situation in the Holy City and the constant fighting and war over holy land and who has claim to it. I don't think anything will be built there anytime soon.

Besides if I remember my history right...I don't recall anything being said that the 3rd temple had to be built on the exact same site...but I could be wrong. I never paid much attention in bible class.

[Stephen Dafoe]

Unless I am mistaken, it was not the Dome of the Rock that was in danger of collapsing, but the mosque built in what was referred to as Solomon's Stables.

This was broadcast just prior to Ramadan.

[Vortex]

Very well could have been. I thought they made mention about the dome of the rock and a wall giving way, due to the Muslims building mosques below and the amount of people in and on the mosque.

But it any case, there's structural issues, and should be for a site that well over 800+ years old.

[Dashinvaine (GN)]

When the Israelis captured Jerusalem in the 1960s they cleared the area below the Western Wall to make a court for Jewish worshippers (destroying much medieval architecture in the process, it seems). They also carried out excavations around the perimeter of Temple Mount and there were fears (justified or otherwise) at the time that they might undermine the stability of the Al Aqsa Mosque above. Israeli archiology has been criticized for its politicized nature, it has allegedly attempted to sweep away the relics of Christian and Islamic civilization in the region, wiping out everything later than Herodian times.

Israel has regularly treated non-Jewish historic sites with contempt. Who can forget, a few years ago, the scenes of the Israeli army shelling the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem? And since then they have done far worse in Nablus. http://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/art ... dart=10291.

Meanwhile President Sharon (who, while a General had massacred defenceless Palestinian women and children in refuge camps in Lebanon) deliberately provoked the latest round of violence with his unnecessary walkabout on Temple Mount. Bearing the bloody consequences of that in mind, I can think of nothing more provocative than this talk of rebuilding the Temple on its original site. It is made much of by both extremist Zionists and Jihadists who have no interest in a peaceful settlement to the troubles in that benighted place the 'Holy Land'.