Lineage of Darkness -- from Hidden in Time by Michael Phillips

Found in Michael Phillips' book, Hidden in Time,

sequel to A Rift in Time -- The curtain is drawn back

to reveal mysterious beginnings of the milennia-long

occultic control of economic, social, governmental affairs.

L i n e a g e of D a r k n e s s

Bern, Switzerland, A.D. 1467

In a room, dimly lit, nine men sat in solemn counsel.

They represented the most powerful families on the European continent.

Their names, however, were not so widely known as the Habsburgs, Wittelsbachs, Viscontis, and Luxembourgs, who contested for the crowns of their fragmented nations. The secret bonds which drew this alliance together originated in another realm than earthly thrones. Ultimately, however, their influence in world affairs had proved, and would continue to do so, more pervasive and permanent than that of all princes and queens, kings and popes, put together.

They had come together on this day to widen the scope of their mutual and clandestine heritage. They had just sealed a bond yet deeper and more mysterious than that which had been sworn beneath Solomon's temple mount, and from which their high standing in the world had come.

The pact begun with their predecessors and now deepened between themselves would dominate the politics and religion of the world in the five centuries that followed in more widespread ways than even any of the nine could imagine. The murkiness of the age overspread their schemes for the future exploitation of nations not yet in existence. A druidic occultism had grown to dominate the concealment of many branches and offshoots, which extended outward from their beginnings in a web of hidden vows, pledges, and rites.

The Renaissance had come to Italy. The Templar antecedents of these nine had in no small measure been responsible. A similar awakening showed signs of spreading northward into the German states. Rightly had they divined that great change was about to sweep across the continent, from England to Moscow. They could use it to either strengthen their grip on European affairs or watch that power gradually diminish.

They had chosen the former.

The number of the highly secretive Templar Grand Council had not increased in more than three hundred years. Their forebears had discovered in Jerusalem's temple vault the mysteries of the ancients which imbued them with tremendous power. Several from that group were included in this new and even more select fraternity. The line of Hughes de Payns' lineage remained at the core of its powerful leadership, possessing the greatest among many Templar secrets, and passing it down through the generations from father to son. There were also represented Freemasons, Rosicrucians, and members of various other guilds, orders, and brotherhoods -- every one cloaked in secrecy.

From Templar roots these nine had gathered to give birth to an even more powerful organization, gaining potency from the mystical Egyptian and Babylonian secrets that de Payns and his eight comrades had discovered.

In time they would spread out to surpass the achievements of the original Templars, and eventually encompass the whole of society.

Now these most influential men of their generation, all with Templar pedigree, had come together to form an alliance linking financial empires. This loose and undercover society would be known as the Illuminare, for they spoke of illumination from higher sources.

The true Light of Life, however, was their enemy.

v v v

The genesis for this new Templar tributary, destined to become its most powerful, came from the Illuminated Ones founded by Joachim of Floris in the eleventh century, who, like the Templars, disguised illuminism behind a thin veil of Christianity. The Alumbrados of Spain, the societies of enlightenment in other countries, grew out of these beginnings, claiming mystic knowledge from secret sources. Gradually had the similar movements -- templarism and illuminism -- fused.

One force alone held the potential to threaten their objectives. That was a reawakening of the spiritual vitality of the true religion out of which they had come, to which only faded memory linked them. Yet curiously - a dichotomy to which deception is prone - they claimed the very attributes that were in fact their opposites. Rooted in darkness, they took unto themselves the label of illumination. How could anything but blindness result, for they had chosen to look away from truth. Their very name exposed the falsehood ensnaring them. Their master was the eternal enemy of Light. Mysticism and secrecy remained the cornerstones of their creed.

Where shadows reign, Light is barred entrance. Private revelation is the soil which breeds witchcraft and sorcery. Cults, at root, originate as nothing more than closed societies where confidential disclosures, presumably from "higher powers," are the binding force of relationship.

The Power of Light, on the other hand, never works to hide and exclude, but always to reveal and draw all men and women, regardless of station, toward the truth of universal, not private revelation.

v v v

The nine were discussing their future.

"We should be twelve in number," said their leader, eighty-nine-year-old Christian Rosenkreuz, founder of the Society of Rosicrucians forty-five years earlier. He had journeyed to Damascus, Arabia, and Egypt early in life, where the mysterious wisdom of alchemy and ancient metallurgical arts had been revealed to him. Returning to Germany and imparting his findings to others, the society of the Rose and the Cross was born.

"Why not nine?" asked one. "We here present are nine."

"The number nine has always been sacred to Templar foundations," rejoined Rosenkreuz. "It is the perfect number, the number of mystery, of wonderfully symmetric divisibility. I propose, however, in sealing this new pact, which will add to and strengthen what our fathers began, that the time has come for an expansion of those threefold threes, to four."

"On what grounds?"

"That our number will be yet more highly symbolic. It will represent the conveying of our power to the uttermost ends of the earth."

"Twelve," repeated another with a smile. "It is indeed fitting."

"A Council of Twelve."

"Twofold sixes? Why not threefold, as has been prophesied?" queried another.

The question hung heavy in the air.

"That number is not for this time," replied Rosenkreuz. His voice was soft and sounded from another realm. "The season for that number of power shall indeed come. But such a time lies outside our hands."

Every man among them knew well enough to what he referred. A yet lengthier silence followed.

"Then a Council of Twelve it shall be," said an Englishman at length,

a Plantagenet, whose distant cousin was King Edward IV of England, and whose ancestor Comte d'Anjou was among the first Templar recruits beyond the original nine.

"And it shall not be increased again," added Rosenkreuz, "until that new age which has been foretold, the age when the completion of our domination shall be at hand."

v v v

Like their predecessors of the temple in Jerusalem, these nine, soon to be increased to twelve, were driven by temporal motives. Spiritual awakening was their enemy. If true belief ever took hold among the masses, or in society in general, their power in politics and finances would necessarily diminish.

Faith, therefore, must be kept distant, impersonal, and knotted in tradition rather than personal vibrancy. They could not, at this early point in their history, foresee the approaching Reformation.

The discussion among them spread to the ancient relics of their common religion. Knowing the formidability of such artifacts to stimulate the hearts and minds of common men, they were concerned lest their power be broken.

One of their number spoke. "At all costs we must prevent Messiah myths from springing up."

"The ancient legends are mere fancies."

"Perhaps, but containing potency. The religious myths of our past are full of

substance. There is the sacred book, the temple, and other artifacts.

The people hold them in high honor."

"The temple is no more."

"Prophecies say it will be rebuilt."

"Where? Jerusalem is again in the hands of infidels. The crusades which gave rise to our power failed in their larger design."

"There are other artifacts, perhaps yet more powerful."

A hush came over them.

"Such as?

"You know to what I refer. The ark, and the tablets it contains. Our forebears found neither."

At the words, a shudder ran through each of the men's frames. Of nothing were they more afraid than that mysterious vessel of Exodus 25, lost to the eyes of history from the days of Jeremiah. Intuitively they knew that when the receptacle of the commandments was found, the day of the Messiah would be at hand.

"I do not believe such a thing exists," said one. "Our ancestors discovered what was far more valuable -- the secrets of the knowledge and wisdom of Egypt and Babylon."

"There are rumors that the original nine learned something of the ark's whereabouts."

"We have heard such rumors. There are no facts to substantiate them."

"The ark exists," repeated another, "however lost to history it may be.

Whether they discovered clues of its movements, I cannot say. But I tell you, it holds a key more important than the temple itself."

"Then it must not be found. On the day the ark is discovered, came the prophecy, will the veil be lifted. Then will the people of the covenant recognize their Anointed One."

"Which covenant?"

"All the covenants. Then will the time be fulfilled. Our age of power will be at an end."

"Then indeed . . . it must not be found -- not now . . . not ever."

published by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois]