Baphomet; The Sabbatic Goat

This article involves that great and oft misunderstood religious figure of Baphomet. I wasn't able to find too many good sites on the infamous figure, the wikipedia site will lead you to many good books on the subject. The name Baphomet first appears in the writings of the Inquisition papers against the Knights Templar. Baphomet, as accused by King Phillip IV of France, was a heretic idol worshiped by the mysterious group, and was used as one of the pieces of evidence that eventually brought about the downfall of the Templar. The odd thing about this was that the charge of "worshiping Baphomet" was a charge leveled uniquely at the Templars. Phillip IV threw heretic charges at many during his reign, but not until the Templars did the idol of Baphomet come up. To historians, this usually means something isn't quite as it seems. Many have postulated that "Baphomet" is actually an Old French mispronunciation of "Mahomet", Muhammad. The Templar were formed as a group to guard Crusaders on their way to the holy land, so they spent much of their time in Muslim areas. So it could be deduced that Phillip was in fact accusing the Templar of converting to Islam.
The Goat we all know and love didn't really exist in its current form until the 19th century when the occultist Eliphas Levi wrote Dogmas and Rituals of High Magic. In this tome he included an illustration (shown) that would shape the look of "The Sabbatic Goat" we still see today. Levi considered the figure of Baphomet to be the "absolute in symbolic form".
Aleistor Crowley appropriated the figure of Baphomet as a figure of fertility. To Crowley, the androgyny of the "Goat Head" fit well into his beliefs concerning dualism. The Baphomet represented the self, and the demon brother or Holy Gaurdian Angel all in one. Crowley so revered the Baphomet that he chose it as his name when he rose to the appropriate rank within the Ordo Templi Orientis.
Today Baphomet is misunderstood by a large population. Like Evangelist Jack Chick who uses false information to tell his followers that Baphomet was a demon worshiped by the Freemasons. And it doesn't help that both Levi's and Crowley's Tarot decks include the visage of the Baphomet on the "devil" card, and Anton LeVey's official symbol for his Church of Satan is the "Sigil of Baphomet". I hope that this will shed some light on this important historical symbol of duality, not of evil.