Fold a 20 dollar bill like so and ...

more conspiracies show

Stefan Lovgren in Los Angeles
for National Geographic News
November 19, 2004
Imagine this: Centuries ago an order of European knights amassed a huge treasure of priceless artifacts from around the world.
The loot was later brought to the United States by the Freemasons, a secret society. Determined to keep it out of the hands of the British during the American Revolution, Benjamin Franklin and other Masons hid the treasure in a secret location but left clues to its whereabouts in famous American landmarks.
Now, the great-great-great-great-great-grandson of a carriage boy who learned the secret vows to find the treasure. The clues lead him to an invisible map hidden on the back of the U.S. Declaration of Independence.
Preposterous? Absolutely.
But the plot of National Treasure, the adventure yarn starring Nicolas Cage that opens in U.S. movie theaters today, is also irresistible fun.
It's become a bona fide recipe for success: Invent an old-fashioned treasure hunt, fill it with conspiracies and secret codes, and set it against a backdrop of real history.
When Dan Brown cooked up a similarly far-out plot in his runaway bestseller The Da Vinci Code—about a 2,000-year-old secret it claimed has been concealed by the Catholic Church—readers flocked to religious and historical texts to learn more about what really happened.
Will National Treasure do the same for moviegoers?
"I hope it gets people interested in the past," said Jim Kouf, who co-wrote the screenplay. "After seeing the movie, my daughter grabbed a copy of the Declaration of Independence and brought it to school with her. That was very exciting."
Freemasons
For an indication of the public's fascination with secret societies and conspiracy theories, jump on to the Internet, where thousands of wild Web sites claim that shadowy alliances do everything from running international affairs to managing interplanetary treaties.
Perhaps the most famous secret society is the Freemasons, a medieval guild of stonemasons that formed in England in the early 18th century and developed into a powerful fraternity.
The Freemasons have enjoyed a reputation as influential politicians, scientists, and artists whose works and charities have enhanced the world. Some Christian leaders, however, have called it a secret society bent on spreading evil.
Of the 55 men who signed the Declaration of Independence, at least 9 are said to have been Freemasons. President George Washington was also among its members.
In the new movie the Freemasons are seen in a positive light.
"The Masons were founded on pretty solid principles, and a lot of those held for the Founding Fathers and probably influenced them a great deal toward democracy at the time," said Kouf, whose grandfather was a Freemason. "When Washington had trouble raising his army, he called upon his Masonic brothers, because he knew he could count on them."
There is a tenuous link between the Freemasons and the Knights Templar, a mysterious order of knights founded in 1119 to protect Christian pilgrims on their way to the Holy Land. Many Freemasons today say they are the spiritual descendants of the knights.
According to legend, the Knights Templar discovered the greatest treasure in human history buried beneath the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem. What is true, scholars say, is that the knights became wealthy and powerful, and they may have rivaled the influence of some European kings.
"They're mysterious because they were so sensationally successful," said Lisa Bitel, a history professor at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. "The idea behind lots of these conspiracy and treasure stories is that any individual could happen upon a forgotten relic of the past, join with other like-minded mavericks, and use this relic for personal redemption or universal good."
But in the early 1300s, the knights were suppressed and executed. Whether they found Solomon's treasure is not known. No treasure map has ever been found.
Spoiler warning: Do not read on if you prefer not to learn a key plot development in the The Da Vinci Code.
Raising Questions
Although the medieval knights also feature prominently in The Da Vinci Code, it was that novel's main plot twist—that Jesus Christ married Mary Magdalene—which stirred up real controversy. Could this be true?
"There's no evidence for it in any text," said Joseph Kelly, a professor of religious studies at John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio, who has given numerous public lectures disproving the "secrets" in Brown's novel.
Kelly says many people are disappointed when he tells them that the marriage never happened. Yet the academic says there are many things in the book that are historically accurate, and he believes the novel serves a valuable purpose.
"Brown tells people something they never knew—that the early history of Christianity was much more complicated than anybody thought," he said.
Kouf, the movie scribe, sees little danger in weaving together fiction and history.
"If we were laying it out as a true story, then I'd agree that we're taking too many liberties," he said. "But because it's set out in an adventure mold like Indiana Jones, I think we're OK. People know some of this stuff didn't happen."
Still, Kouf, who considers himself a "history nut," said he tried to include as many references to U.S. history—and use as many real locations—as possible.
"Mostly we set out to have a rollicking good time," he said. "But if it gets people to also look at history differently and pick up a book about the Founding Fathers, that's great."

The grimore of incantations

written by King Solomon??

THE KEY OF SOLOMON
BOOK I

CHAPTER I

CONCERNING THE DIVINE LOVE WHICH OUGHT TO PRECEDE THE ACQUISITION OF THIS KNOWLEDGE NOTES:
Solomon, the Son of David, King of Israel, hath said that the beginning of our Key is to fear God, to adore Him, to honour Him with contrition of heart, to invoke Him1 in all matters which we wish to undertake, and to operate with very great devotion, for thus God will lead us in the right way. When, therefore, thou shalt wish to acquire the knowledge of Magical Arts and Sciences, it is necessary to have prepared the order of hours and of days, and of the position of the Moon, without the operation of which thou canst effect nothing; but if thou observest them with diligence thou mayest easily and thoroughly arrive at the effect and end which thou desirest to attain.

1. 1202 Lansdowne MSS. omits the concluding part of this sentence.

The most commonly available text of the keys, are admittedly bastardized, but many many such translations have been made, some less biased than others. Taken as a whole, its reasonable to say that Solomon was its author, poor translations not withstanding but take a tour of some of those translations and you will see they all agree on some basic points. There are still arguments being tossed about today as the historic community cannot seem to settle down to a definition they all agree on...:) Nothing unusual there.
The historic war of theology between scholars is however, mostly about what is said and the quality of the translation, not.. who wrote it...on this, they almost all attribute the work
to Solomon...proof ?
We may never have any that we can agree on, because we must depend on translations
and any translation is subject to error and one must keep that in mind.
Most of the old texts in question here were in Latin, which has only one saving grace, in that its a dead language meaning its semantics have do not change due to common and changing usage, which is why its often used for such work. Any living language is subject to semantic changes in what a word means, but like all translations is subject to error and bias on the part of the translator since no one DOES speak it anymore,
its a catch 22.
Such as with MacGregor, he was foremost person, in his day to translate Latin, he was also a magician ,so any translations he made, are admittedly biased, ( there are many theological arguments based on what he left out of his translations, mainly dealing with women ) but as I said above, others have found the same reasoning, but often they translated it into a more modern Christian slant, based on their own bias, which is also incorrect.
There are many wars of theology over this simply because it challenges concepts many tend to hold about themselves, so it will be denied as valid by those sectors for as long as said faiths deny their own roots of magick, in my opinion. But even most of the Hebrew scholars admit the Keys origins to be from Solomon, even if the texts ( there are many others than the keys) are in of themselves, translations of texts, often long gone to oblivion. Again this is not absolute, as there are arguments on that too.
With the exception of the Essene Dead sea scrolls, which are originals, they tend to back up the keys of Solomon regarding the keys origins and validity in many ways. I personally studied the Dead sea scrolls with a gentleman who was there when they were dug up and who helped to translate them.
He got special dispensation to teach this one and only class, as he was way beyond retirement age at the time. We had long conversations on just this issue and many others regarding the scrolls contents, and I consider myself most fortunate to have had such first hand information. He left the project of translators, mainly due to the fact his contemporaries wanted to sit on the information, as they have largely done, as very few of them have been made public, but they were translated long ago.
The reason for this is simple, they challenge the currently held beliefs of many and my teacher would have no part in such wholesale hypocrisy. And he shared with we few who took his class, concepts and translations that only scholars get to see, if at all and had the benefit of his personal wisdom on what they meant.
While I do believe that the most popular version of the Keys, is corrupted by other texts and ideas, the basic concepts which I have laid out here are agreed on by almost all persons who have translated it , to be the work of Solomon the wise,
including my teacher of the Essence scrolls.
But make the study yourself and see what you think :)