Book Summary - Born in Blood: the Lost Secrets of Freemasonry



'Born in Blood: The Lost Secrets of Freemasonry' by John J. Robinson

In the book Born in Blood The Lost Secrets of Freemasonry by John J. Robinson, the Knights Templar didn't directly become Freemasons, but their legacy shaped the craft through a wild and violent chain of events. The Templars, founded in 1119, were warrior-monks protecting Christian pilgrims in Jerusalem. By the 1300s, they were controlling vast wealth from banking and trade. King Philip IV of France, drowning in debt to them, saw a chance to seize their assets. In 1307, he convinced Pope Clement V to accuse the Templars of heresy - spitting on the cross, worshipping idols, even sodomy. Grand Master Jacques de Molay was and many other Templars were arrested Friday October 13th, 1307 and he was burned at the stake March 18th, 1314, and the order was crushed. The book argues many Templars survived the purge, going underground to avoid execution. He claims they fled to places like Scotland, blending into local clans. Around 1312, Pope Clement suppressed the order, but their rituals and secrets didn't die. Robinson points to the 1399 Battle of Bannockburn in Scotland, where Templar knights allegedly fought alongside Robert the Bruce against the English assault of King Edward II with the Templars providing an effective fighting force leading to a victory and earning a safe haven. Around the same time in the 1300s: Scottish stonemasons, or operative masons, formed guilds to build cathedrals. These guilds were tight-knit, with oaths, symbols, and passwords. Robinson suggests Templar survivors joined these mason lodges for protection, carrying their Templar lore with them with secrets like sacred geometry, chivalric codes, and maybe even hidden relics-filtered into mason traditions.

The book details events of the Peasants Revolt of 1381 and how groups of well organized peasants were effective in the uprising maintaining secrecy and moving from town to town. It points out that church officials who had persecuted the Templars were sought out and killed during the uprising. By the 1600s, operative masons turned speculative, letting non-masons join for their higher education and social standing forming what became modern Freemasonry.

Robinson says the Templar connection was buried deep since the Church had arrest warrants out for all Templars and could arrest anyone suspected of heresy. Since the Templars had been betrayed and persecuted by the Roman Catholic Church they had to establish a new practice of the Christian faith outside of allegiance to the Church of Rome. This could account for why Masons are prohibited from discussing specifics of religion.

Freemasons kept Templar symbols like the cross and compass, and rituals echoing knighthood oaths, but scrambled them to dodge persecution. Robinson ties loose threads: Templars had vast knowledge of math, architecture, and mysticism, which masons used for cathedral-building and secret handshakes. He suggests Templars hid treasures, maybe even the Holy Grail, and Freemasons guarded those legends, turning them into moral allegories about truth and brotherhood.

By the 1700s, Freemasonry exploded across Europe, with Templar-inspired lodges popping up. Robinson's theory is speculative but he says it explains why Freemasons act like they're guarding ancient secrets and ways of identifying each other both in the dark and the light.

I highly recommend Born in Blood The Lost Secrets of Freemasonry by John J. Robinson for anyone interested in what happened to the Templars over the years after the 1307 arrests and the compelling and footnoted case for how the Templars evolved into Masonry.

By Rick Vance

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