(Eliphas Levi's drawing of Baphomet, the god of the Knights Templar)

Baphomet was the name given to an idol supposedly worshipped by the Knights Templar, an order of Christian knights charged with protecting the lives and property of Christian pilgrims traveling to and from the Holy Land. Its existence came to light during interrogations of the knights after the Order was accused in 1307 by King Philip IV of France of heresy. Twelve of the 231 knights examined admitted to the existence of the idol, which was described in various conflicting ways. It was purported to be a brazen head with a long beard and sparkling eyes; or a human skull; or the painted image of a man; or a gilded figure make either of wood or metal; or a head with three faces; or a head painted black on one side and white on the other; or a bearded, silver-headed idol with four feet, two in front and two behind.

The conflicting descriptions of the image might be interpreted two ways: either the knights were merely saying what they believed their interrogators wished to hear and had no firsthand knowledge of Baphomet; or there were different images and statues of Baphomet in various meeting places of the Templars and these images varied from each other in minor degrees.

One interpretation of the testimony about this idol of the Templars asserts that Baphomet was a corruption of the name Mahomet or Mohammed -- there is certainly a similarity between the names. A Templar from Florence testified overhearing one of his brothers say to another during the adoration of the idol, "Adore this head. This head is your God and your Mahomet." However, such testimony must be viewed with suspicion since it was the purpose of the Inquisitors of the Templars to prove heresy, and the worship of an idol dedicated to Islam would constitute ideal proof.

Levi's conception of Baphomet, which Levi described as "the Sabbatic Goat or Baphomet of Mendes," is not intended to be an accurate recreation of the Templars' idol, but a symbolic amalgamation from four sources: the infernal goat supposedly worshipped by witches at their sabbats; the idol of the Templars; the phallic goat worshipped as a fertility god at Mendes, Egypt; and the demonic image on the traditional Marseilles Tarot trump, The Devil. Levi evidently intended that his image replace the Marseilles image of the trump, The Devil. He wrote:

"We recur once more to that terrible number fifteen, symbolized in the Tarot by a monster throned upon an altar, mitered and horned, having a woman's breasts and the generative organs of a man -- a chimera, a malformed sphinx, a systhesis of deformities. Below this figure we read a frank and simple inscription -- the Devil. Yes, we confront here that phantom of all terrors, the dragon of all theogonies, the Ahriman of the Persians, the Typhon of the Egyptians, the Python of the Greeks, the old serpent of the Hebrews, the fantastic monster, the nightmare, the Croquemitaine, the gargoyle, the great beast of the Middle Ages, and -- worse than all of these -- the Baphomet of the Templars, the bearded idol of the alchemist, the obscene deity of Mendes, the goat of the Sabbath."

Given the broad scope of Levi's description, his Baphomet evidently means whatever we wish it to mean, provided we wish evil. Although he characterized Baphomet in this negative way, Levi intended his figure to represent a real set of potencies in the universe, the primitive urge to create and to procreate, to burst forth, to live and to dominate. It expresses the most physical and material aspects of the life-force. It is not so much evil as it is indifferent to morality. It is the power that causes life to cyclically rise up from the mud, and to dissolve back into the mud when its will is spent. Levi did not intend to represent a demon, but rather a philosophical concept. Even so, Baphomet must be classed as demonic when viewed by the Christian standards that defined the other demons of the infernal regions.