Stephen of La Ferté

Stephen of La Ferté († 1130) was Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem.

Stephan was abbot of the monastery of Saint- Jean-en -Vallee at Chartres and a cousin of King Baldwin II of Jerusalem.

After the Patriarch of Jerusalem, Garamond of Picquigny, beginning in 1128 had died, his successor was Stephan. King Baldwin II hoped that his relatives that this support his policy, but was soon disappointed. Shortly after its establishment brought Stephan an agreement between Godfrey of Bouillon and the patriarch Dagobert from the year 1099 to the language by which the still belonging to the royal domain cities Jerusalem and Jaffa should be under the direct rule of the patriarch and insisted on its implementation. Godfrey's successors, the kings Baldwin I and Baldwin II had ignored the agreement and its implementation always denied. Relations between patriarch and king gradually deteriorated to an open rupture between Church and State was it only failed because Stephan died after a short illness in the spring of 1130. His friends suspected poisoning. His successor was William of Messines, a devout man, who did not argue Baldwin's policy.

During his tenure at the Council of Troyes in 1129 the rules of the order of the Knights Templar has been adopted. In the opening credits Patriarch Stephan is mentioned as the one who should decide in the case of a loophole, since he was more familiar " with the affairs of the East and the Poor Knights of Christ " as Pope Honorius II