Lizard ~ Prophets Chained for Burning Masks

Chapter Five

- chapter 5 index -
pg. 1 - Lizard | pg. 2 - Prince Rupert Awakes | pg. 3 - Tears of Glass | pg. 4 - Go Polonius or Kneel
pg. 5 - Rainbows' Ends and Gold | pg. 6 - Prophets Chained for Burning Masks
pg. 7 - Frederick II & The Cathars | pg. 8 - Bolero - The Peacock's Tale
pg. 9 - The Battle of Glass Tears | pg. 10 - Big Top

- page index -
Cathars

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Significantly, it is peacocks that bring messages to Prince Rupert. Peacocks symbolize the orient in this song, and, specifically, the land of Persia (modern day Iran). Persia was the Moslem kingdom overrun by the Mongols, in 1228, during the reign of Frederick II. This is the specific event Frederick (Rupert) is referring to in the opening line, "Farewell the temple master's bells".
Also, the court of Frederick II was known for its exotic animals, including peacocks, a fact referred to by Kantorowicz and in an historical novel published in 1962.

"In the beautiful, mosaic-colored octagon of the courtyard of Castel del Monte the fountain spurted and sent streams of water into the dark of the laurels...

On the broad, carved balustrades of the balconies stalked the Emperor's rare peacocks...

...In the corners of the yard some Saracens were in readiness to entertain the circle with their wondrous tales."

- The Emperor the Sages and Death by Rachel Berdach (p. 51)

"Walls and trumpets" allude to the biblical story of Jericho. Walls were falling in the Arab world, but not because of a religious or intellectual movement. The Great Khan and his Mongol horde caused the upheaval in the east.

"Prophets chained for burning masks"

This is the upheaval in the west. Frederick, who prophesied about his own messianic destiny, is pointing out that the Church is persecuting those who are attempting to introduce new ideas into Europe. These new ideas were based upon a very old idea, the doctrine of Emanations (also known as Averroism). For a description of Averroism, see chapter three page seven . The commentaries of Averroes were translated in the court of Frederick II who openly espoused the doctrines of Averroism.

"When these heterodox doctrines reached the West through Spain and through the court of Frederick II, who, attracted by Aristotle's scientific writings, supported two of the sons of Averroes, the authorities were alarmed."

- The Mission of St. Albert and St. Thomas

"Averrhoism was adopted by some of the foremost thinkers of the day. The Emperor Frederick II openly espoused it and was excommunicated from the Church as a result."

- Great Theosophists Roger Bacon

"Frederick II had fully adopted Averrhoism. In his "Sicilian Questions" he had demanded light on the eternity of the world, and on the nature of the soul, and supposed he had found it in the replies of Ibn Sabin, an upholder of these doctrines. But in his conflict with the papacy he was overthrown, and with him these heresies were destroyed."

- History of the Conflict
Between
Religion and Science

Prophets in the east had also been "chained for burning masks".

"Averroes, in his old age -- he died A. D. 1193 -- was expelled from Spain; the religious party had triumphed over the philosophical. He was denounced as a traitor to religion. An opposition to philosophy had been organized all over the Mussulman world. There was hardly a philosopher who was not punished. Some were put to death."

- History of the Conflict
Between
Religion and Science

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Among the prophets chained for burning masks in 13th century Europe were the Cathars or Albigensians.

"Supported by the leading nobility of the region, the Cathars' growing influence enraged the Church and its powerful pope, Innocent III, determined to flex its muscle after decades of weakness. Innocent resolved to eradicate what is now known as the Great Heresy. He recruited the forces of France, eager to expand her territory to the south, and they systematically exterminated the Cathars and their supporters in a series of crusades between 1209 and 1229. By the time the wars were over, the ancient social fabric of the Languedoc had been destroyed, the map of France redrawn, and a terrifying new force that would torment Europe for centuries — the Inquisition — unleashed across southern France."

- The Perfect Heresy

"The Albigensian Crusade amounted to an outright war, lasting 20 years from 1209 to 1229. The first purgings were carried out in Albi, a land of tolerance, to which the heresy and its subsequent repression sadly owe their names But it was in Béziers that the first great massacre of believers took place, in 1209."

- The Land of theCathars

"In 1209 AD, Pope Innocent III unleashed "orders of fire and sword" against a group of heretics throughout Europe, mostly remembered as Cathars. Of special note, at the great city of Beziers, France there was a terrible massacre of heretics."

- Church History: Kill Them All, Let God Sort Them Out

"On the 21st of July 1209, an army of some thirty thousand knights and foot soldiers from northern Europe descended like a whirlwind on the Languedoc - the mountainous northeastern foothills of the Pyrenees in what is now Southern France. In the ensuing war, the whole territory was ravaged, crops were destroyed, towns and cities were razed, a whole population was put to the sword. This extermination occurred on so vast, so terrible a scale that it may well constitute the first case of "genocide" in modern European history. In the town of Beziers alone, for example, at least fifteen thousand men, women, and children were slaughtered wholesale - many of them in the sanctuary of the church itself. When an officer, Arnaud of Citeaux, inquired of the Pope's representative how he might distinguish heretics from true believers, the reply was, "Kill them all. God will recognize his own." This quotation, though widely reported, may be apocryphal. Nevertheless, it typifies the fanatical zeal and bloodlust with which the atrocities were perpetrated. The same papal representative, writing to Innocent III in Rome, announced proudly that "neither age nor sex nor status was spared."

- Churches War on the Cathars

The policy set by Rome at that time is still in force doctrinally. This is known as "Nulla salus extra ecclesium" ("Outside the Church there is no salvation.") It was "open season" on those who taught any doctrine other than that which the Pope allowed and this made such people enemies of the Catholic Church.

The infamous phrase first uttered in Latin, "Neca eos omnes. Deus suos agnoset" or "Kill them all. God will know His own." ...was a misunderstood reference to 2 Tim. 2:19 which in part reads, "The Lord knoweth them that are his" (KJV).

- Church History: Kill Them All, Let God Sort Them Out

"After the death of Pope Innocent, Pope Gregory IX ordered the Dominicans to expunge the remaining Cathar sanctuaries. Over the next fifty years, the Inquisition burned perhaps 5,000 heretics, sometimes exhuming the bodies and publicly burning the bones of those lucky enough to have escaped the funeral pyre the first time."

- Dionysius the Areopagite

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