Who is Baphomet? And why is he mentioned so regularly in conjunction with pop culture? In this article we uncover the ancient history of Baphomet and ask why he’s cropping up so much these days. We also discuss whether you should be worried?
Anyone who’s ever read any of the internet’s dirge of tripe about the Illuminati will have probably seen the name Baphomet pop up. If Jay-Z or Beyonce ever decide to feature a goat in their videos or on their clothing designs, the Illuminati watchers will screech “BAPHOMET!” at the top of their keyboards. So I thought I would produce this short introduction to the origins of this Baphomet figure.
Everyone in the music industry wants to be seen with Baphomet, it seems. Even the globally impossible-to-ignore pop-hag Madonna is a fan:
More recently, Kendall Jenner (whoever she is) got a (non-permanent) tattoo of Baphomet (or a goat?) on her finger. I decided to plump for an image that informs you what nail colour she used, just in case you were interested…
Baphomet refers to an idol that the Knights Templar (a powerful and rich Christian military group in medieval times) were accused of worshiping. Baphomet was mentioned by name in the trial papers of the inquisition of the Knights Templar in the early 14th century.
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To understand why Baphomet is still talked about, and how his appearance was settled on, we have to follow two separate courses. First, we’ll have a look at where the image of Baphomet came from and then we’ll move on to the origin of his fame and the word “Baphomet” itself.
Baphomet’s goat-like appearance (above) didn’t raise its shaggy head until 1856 when it was first drawn by Eliphas Lévi, a French occult author and ceremonial magician (below). He featured the image in his book Dogmas and Rituals of High Magic in 1861.
Levin himself waxed lyrical about the Baphomet drawing he had lovingly created:
The goat on the frontispiece carries the sign of the pentagram on the forehead… his two hands forming the sign of Hermeticism… This sign expresses the perfect harmony of mercy with justice. His one arm is female, the other male like the ones of the androgyn of Khunrath, the attributes of which we had to unite with those of our goat because he is one and the same symbol. The flame of intelligence shining between his horns is the magic light of the universal balance…
The ugly beast’s head expresses the horror of the sinner… The rod standing instead of genitals symbolizes eternal life, the body covered with scales the water, the semi-circle above it the atmosphere, the feathers following above the volatile. Humanity is represented by the two breasts and the androgyn arms of this sphinx of the occult sciences.
Phew, that was intense. There are other theories about the possible origin of the image we now know as Baphomet. One possible candidate is Cernunnos (below), the name given to one of the Celt’s gods. His antlers might have been an early version of the horns we know and love today. We actually have no idea of Cernunnos’ real name or significance in Celtic religions, he’s little mentioned in their texts at all.
This is a carving of Cernunnos from the ornately decorated Gundestrup cauldron (c. 200 BC–300 AD):
Another contestant in the predecessor to Baphomet race is the Greek goat-legged fella – Pan:
Or, contender number three – was it Robin Good-Fellow (Puck)? This mischievous character was prevalent in English folklore for a good long time before Baphomet’s face was first realised by Levi. This is a drawing of Puck featured in a 1629 publication called Robin Goodfellow: His Mad Pranks and Merry Jests:
However the imagery came into being, Baphomet has been adopted hook, line and sinker into occult and satanic circles; probably because he looks all cool and evil with the goat horns and everything.
So, the next question is how did he get so famous, and why is he still mentioned at all? It’s not like we regularly hear the name of Pan or Zeus in modern culture today. Why has Baphomet persisted? For that, we have to shoot back to the 1300’s…
The medieval order of the Knights Templar was brutally suppressed by King Philip IV of France, on October 13, 1307. Philip liked neither their secrecy nor their riches. He tortured and killed many of the order. The charges laid against them were heresy, spitting and urinating on the cross, and sodomy.
The Knights were accused of worshiping idols, one of which was Baphomet. Confessions and descriptions of Baphomet were extracted under the pains of torture but these forced descriptions varied wildly with no agreement on his looks at all. Among other things, Baphomet was described as a severed head, a cat, or a head with three faces, others still denied all knowledge of him. It’s almost as if confessions under torture aren’t very reliable at all. Someone should tell the CIA.
Above and below are paintings of some of the poor Knights being killed.
Some modern historians think there is little evidence that Baphomet was ever worshiped by the Knights Templar at all. It’s possible that Baphomet was a complete fabrication, created to provide an excuse to put to death the troublesome gang of Knights. Either way, Philip purged the order and forced Pope Clement V to disband them in 1312.
The Knights Templar, at their peak, were a large group; they numbered in the tens of thousands, so when they suddenly disappeared from culture without a trace, conspiracy rumours abounded. Most of the head honchos were killed, and the lesser members were absorbed into other orders or left the country for good.
How and why would such a big powerful movement suddenly disappear? The associated conspiracy theories never fully died away.
Lastly, we’ll try and find out where the actual word ‘Baphomet’ came from.
Some scholars argue that the word Baphomet could have been derived elsewhere: ‘Baphomet’ = Mahomet = Muhammad. The Knights Templar were stationed in the Middle East for many years and it’s quite possible that some had converted to Islam and that Baphomet was just an Old French corruption of Muhammad. Muslims were falsely assumed to worship idols, so this is a possibility.
Other theories posit that Baphomet had his origins elsewhere. Some say the name derived from Manichaean Gnostics (an Iranian religion that denied god’s omnipotence).
Another theory goes that Baphomet was formed by writing this backward: tem. o. h. p. ab, an abbreviation of templi omnium hominum pacis abbas – ‘father of the temple of peace of all men.’ That last theory comes from Eliphas Lévi mentioned earlier.
So Baphomet’s not some kind of prehistoric, or even particularly ancient, being. He was invented by an angry French King as an excuse to get rid of the Knights Templar and then popularised by some mad French occult magician. Levi’s popularisation and Alistair Crowley’s later use of his image ensured that this weird goat creature would remain in the public consciousness.
His image has almost become interchangeable with the image of Satan, for instance on tarot cards (below) and by modern-day Satanists.
(As an aside: I once had a long conversation with a white witch and a Satanist. They were both perfectly nice people and it was only after an hour or so that they told me about their beliefs. I asked them what they personally got out of their beliefs, how did they benefit? They had no response.)
But, complicated history aside, Baphomet seems to just be little more than a drawing, and if Jay-Z puts it on a T-shirt, you probably won’t get possessed by a demon.
THE END
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