Definition
The Master of the Temple is the title of the chief ecclesiastical minister of the Temple Church in London. The position is historically rooted in the spiritual leadership of the Knights Templar order, whose founders and successors bore the Latin title Magni Templi Magistri (Masters of the Great Temple). When the Templar order was dissolved, the Temple Church — located in the Inns of Court district and still used by the legal profession — retained its own ecclesiastical head, who came to bear the anglicized title.
As a legal term, the Master of the Temple appears principally in historical English law in two distinct but related contexts:
1. Ecclesiastical office. The chief minister of the Temple Church in London, who exercises spiritual jurisdiction over the church and its congregation, which has historically included members of the Inner and Middle Temple legal societies.
2. Historical military-religious office. In earlier usage, the title referred to the head of the Knights Templar order itself, whose authority over the Temple precincts gave rise to the ecclesiastical succession described above.
Common Confusion
The term "master" in English legal usage carries many meanings — master in chancery, special master, master of a vessel, schoolmaster, and various Crown officers bear the designation. The Master of the Temple should not be confused with the Masters of the Common Law Courts, a distinct category of court officers that included the Queen's Coroner and Attorney, the Master of the Crown Office, record and writ clerks, and associates. These were procedural officers of the royal courts with no ecclesiastical function. The shared word "master" is the only connection.
Why It Matters in Research
This term is primarily a historical curiosity rather than an operational legal concept, but researchers encounter it in several contexts that require care:
Ecclesiastical law vs. court officer confusion. Historical English legal texts frequently use "master" as a title for officers of wildly different types. When scanning digests or indexes covering pre-twentieth-century English legal materials, a reference to the Master of the Temple may appear adjacent to entries about court officers of the same period. Confirm context before assuming the passage concerns court procedure.
Inns of Court history. Because the Temple Church sits within the precincts of the Inner and Middle Temple, references to the Master of the Temple can surface in legal histories, biographies of barristers, and records concerning the governance of the Inns. Researchers working on English legal education, bar history, or the history of the Inns of Court may encounter the title in that administrative context rather than in a purely ecclesiastical one.
Knights Templar succession. Legal and historical scholarship on the dissolution of the Templar order, the subsequent ownership and governance of the Temple precincts, and the rights of the Inns over that property will use the term in its older military-religious sense. Bouvier's reference to Dugdale's Warwickshire (Dugd. War. 706) and Jacob's Law Dictionary points researchers toward historical property and ecclesiastical records where the lineage of the title is discussed.
No modern procedural relevance. Unlike many historical English legal officer titles that migrated into American jurisprudence (special masters being the most prominent example), the Master of the Temple did not cross the Atlantic in any operative legal sense. American researchers will not encounter this office in domestic court procedure.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary and Bouvier's Law Dictionary agree on the core description: the Master of the Temple is the chief ecclesiastical officer of the Temple Church in London, and that title descends from the leadership of the Knights Templar order. Bouvier provides the more complete historical account, tracing the Latin title Magni Templi Magistri to the order's founders and explaining how the spiritual guidance role was inherited by the church's subsequent minister. Black's confirms the basic ecclesiastical function without elaboration.
Both sources treat the term briefly, reflecting that it was already a historical artifact even at the time of their compilation. Neither source attempts to assign the office any contemporary procedural significance, and neither addresses the office's relationship to the governance of the Inns of Court in detail.
What the historical sources do not address: the precise terms of appointment to the office, the relationship between the Master of the Temple and the governing bodies of the Inner and Middle Temple, and the ecclesiastical jurisdiction questions that arose after the dissolution of the Templar order. Researchers needing that level of detail should consult Dugdale directly and period treatises on English ecclesiastical law.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
The historical English office of Master of the Temple has no direct procedural analog in American federal practice, but researchers interested in court-appointed officers exercising quasi-judicial functions may consult: Receivership and Appointment of Special Masters — Rule 53 (The Law Mind Civil Procedure & Evidence Encyclopedia), which covers the modern American institution of the special master, a functionally distinct but conceptually related category of court-appointed officer.