Cook up your own Templar legend!

et's try our hand at creating a custom legend. I've outlined the steps that most people take. You are of course free to add or revise the steps, but these seem to provide enough gobbledygook to present the case in Usenet news.

tep One: Target

This is most important. Select a target organization that's both big and well known. It does not pay to say that the local congregation of elderly males in your hometown is derived from the Order. For the purposes of this presentation, I've chosen the US Marines. Everyone knows they're tough customers, and they're part of that big bad wolf, the US Military. In this case, by the way, bigger is better. Every conspiracy theorist's wet dream must be connecting the current Papal State with a clandestine derivative of the Knights Templar. I'll leave that to those better suited to daydreaming.

tep Two: Parallels

Another important point is that before doing anything else, find parallels between the Order and the target. It will not suffice to say that both are military in nature. You need to say that both are known for ferocity in battle, discipline of operation, exceptional loyalty to one's own organization, Latin mottos (Non Nobis cf. Semper Fi) and the like. The more you can dig up, the better. Geographical parallels are always welcome, while in this case the only one I can think of is the Beirut bombing. Oh well, it'll have to be enough. Stuff like "The headquarters of the Templars had a round tower and the headquarters of the Marines is in the Pentagon, which is a nearly perfect circle" will always be useful. The parallels need not be any closer than this, in fact, even less resonant examples have been seen.

tep Three: Wordplay

This seems to be the favorite of all conspiracy theorists. Wordplay has been the sole basis for a good many book, and the flesh around the bones for even more books. In wordplay, it is especially necessary to base it all on some obscure cipher or code, preferably one of your own invention, as no one can then claim to find bugs in your codes. You can find suitable examples of ciphers all over the WWW and also in respected books on cryptography.

Let us consider the example at hand. TEMPLAR and MARINE both have seven letters, except MARINE, which has only six. First, apply the code used by the brother-in-law of Abdullah al-Assam, the famous but little-known herb dealer who lived in Acre in 1234. In this code, always drop one letter from the first word (or add one, if necessary to make the numbers match). Thus you have TEMPLA and MARINE. Now, see that T and M are both consonants, E and A are vowels, and M and R again consonants, Thus, if you replace one with the another, TEM becomes MAR, and you're well under way. P and I are the tricky part, as they need to be exchanged consonant for vowels. P is the 16th letter of the alphabet, and I is the ninth letter and third vowel. Deduce seven (the magic number, remember?) from 16, and you're given the number nine, the number of I. Great - you now have MARI! The remaining LA to NE is easy, since LA is the sixth in the octave Do-Re-Mi-Fa-So-La-Si-Do, and NE is short for North-East, which is the sixth direction in the compass rose, if you start clockwise from S, which is almost the direction of Palestine as seen from France, the traditional headquarters of the Templars.

QED.

tep Four: Conjecture and implications

Here's where you need to fine-tune your language skills. Avoid simple sentences such as "Marines descend from Templars because there is a great conspiracy that I will now disclose in full with supporting documents." You should always say things like "it is now becoming apparent that there may indeed be in existence a secret organization, perhaps descended from the Knights Templar, and it may fully well have been instrumental in the birth of the organization we today regard as the US Marines." Never ever commit yourself fully to anything you write. Implicate, offer conjectures, propose, but never state with certainty. After all, someone on the Net is bound to come and crucify you for one sentence that states something that isn't true.

tep Five: Sources and Publishing

Now that you have your theory nicely outlined, fill in the nitty-gritty details. Book a trip to Paris and spend three weeks in the Bibliotheque National finding obscure titles, preferably published between 1801-1846, or better still not published at all, but deposited in the Archives of the venerable institute by someone working under an alias. List all such titles as have anything to do with Provence, Palestine, or the Solomon Islands for that matter (Hey, that's another parallel: the Templars were named after the Temple of Solomon, and the first offensive of the Marines in WW II was the attack on Guadalcanal, in the Solomon Islands! Must make a note of that.)

Remember that the less chance there is for anyone to find the same sources ever, the better your chances of defending your fine theory. Make sure all sources are labeled "SECRET". Never ever use such a source that can be found in the library down the block. When you have your list of sources ready, it's time to fill the remaining 325 pages of your 345 page book with material of the type discussed in Step Four. It should not take you more than six months to do that, if you were any good at writing essays in school. Then, just find a publisher. Given the amount of utter bullshit published in hardcover these days, it should not prove too hard.

nd there you have it - the perfect book that claims that US Marines are the current holders of the Treasure, Organization, and Virtues of the Order of the Poor Knights of the Temple of Solomon. Just give it a jazzy title, such as "From Acre to Iwo Jima - a thousand years' quest for the perfect war machine", or something like that. Be sure not to settle for anything less than 500,000 dollars in advance - such money has been paid for people who drew lines on maps on Rennes-le Chateau and found the side of a Provencal mountain with the lines.

h well. PT Barnum sure was right. I'll be waiting to review your book in the Library soon.

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