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Mestopotamian Idol!

 
     Greetings Everyone!
 
          It is good to be back after healing from some pretty severe tendinitis in both wrists. The tendinitis started in my right wrist and then after over using my left hand to compensate, my left wrist went haywire, too!
 
    I took some treatments from a physical therapist and took it easy on the keyboard for awhile, and now I am feeling much better and ready to resume this work.
 
    This time we will resume with Pike writing about the concept of idol worship, both real and perceived, and the consequences of such.
 
     Now, after this long delay, LET’S READ PIKE!
 
 
       

[It is absurd to suppose that men of intellect adored a monstrous idol called Baphomet, or recognized Mahomet as an inspired prophet. Their symbolism, invented ages before, to conceal what it was dangerous to avow, was of course misunderstood by those who were not adepts, and to their enemies seemed to be pantheistic. The calf of gold, made by Aaron for the Israelites, was but one of the oxen under the laver of bronze, and the Karobim on the Propitiatory, misunderstood. The symbols of the wise always become

p. 819

the idols of the ignorant multitude. What the Chiefs of the Order really believed and taught, is indicated to the Adepts by the hints contained in the high Degrees of Free-Masonry, and by the symbols which only the Adepts understand.

 And, once again we find a mention of Baphomet within the auspices of masonic study. But this time this is not the result of masons being accused of Baphomet worship.

  In this paragraph, Pike is conveying the idea that certain idol worship was not intended for the intellectual, but rather for the masses. 

   Pike relays that the intellectuals in ancient times hid their true beliefs in symbolisms, as freemasonry does today. Masons learn the meanings of certain symbols as they pass through the rituals of the degrees as a mason is found worthy to receive them, usually. In modern masonic temples, very often masons are rushed through some degrees without much study as a means to pad membership numbers as masonry, especially in the United States, is finding a decline in numbers for a number of reasons. 

  There IS hope. The modern mason has many venues in which to study symbolisms without the sometimes arduous commitments a lodge would expect, so the modern mason should take time to learn the symbolisms of masonry in his own time to ensure he is getting the maximum enlightenment of the degrees.

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[The Blue Degrees are but the outer court or portico of the Temple. Part of the symbols are displayed there to the Initiate, but he is intentionally misled by false interpretations. It is not intended that he shall understand them; but it is intended that he shall imagine he understands them. Their true explication is reserved for the Adepts, the Princes of Masonry. The whole body of the Royal and Sacerdotal Art was hidden so carefully, centuries since, in the High Degrees, as that it is even yet impossible to solve many of the enigmas which they contain. It is well enough for the mass of those called Masons, to imagine that all is contained in the Blue Degrees; and whoso attempts to undeceive them will labor in vain, and without any true reward violate his obligations as an Adept. Masonry is the veritable Sphinx, buried to the head in the sands heaped round it by the ages.]

"The seeds of decay were sown in the Order of the Temple at its origin. Hypocrisy is a mortal disease. It had conceived a great work which it was incapable of executing, because it knew neither humility nor personal abnegation, because Rome was then invincible, and because the later Chiefs of the Order did not comprehend its mission. Moreover, the Templars were in general uneducated, and capable only of wielding the sword, with no qualifications for governing, and at need enchaining, that queen of the world called Opinion." [The doctrines of the Chiefs would, if expounded to the masses, have seemed to them the babblings of folly. The symbols of the wise are the idols of the vulgar, or else as meaningless as the hieroglyphics of Egypt to the nomadic Arabs. There must always be a common-place interpretation for the mass of Initiates, of the symbols that are eloquent to the Adepts.]

  These paragraphs are often used as a means to decry freemasonry and accuse masons of something worse than devil worship. But, written here is a bit of a play on words.

   Pike is conveying the idea that the symbols of the blue lodge (the first three degrees of masonry) are multi-faceted and will have more than one meaning. The symbols are designed to have special meaning to each initiate as each initiate will bring into masonry his own set of beliefs and masonry is designed to enhance whichever religious belief the individual espouses to. There are some concrete meanings to some symbols, but other symbols are subject to the views of the individual.

  Masons will also witness more in depth meanings of the early symbols as he passes through the 4-32nd degrees, if he CHOOSES or is found worthy to explore those degrees, that is. In reality, the third degree, or master mason degrees, is the highest degree in freemasonry with the “higher” degrees meant to be a means to further the masons’ education, and sometimes also pad his ego (though not purposefully). 

  I do not intend to mock the higher degrees with these statements, rather I am pointing out that sometimes it is the easiest thing that grows a persons ego, such as accruing a “high number” of degrees, when the opposite is intended to happen. The higher degrees teach the mason to be more humble abd to be willing to be of service to his community, not the community, or lodge members, serving HIM. We get this wrong as humans all of the time. The more you KNOW, the more we should TEACH and find ourselves humbled that the pupil seeks our input.

Next

 

  

Hughes de Payens himself had not that keen and far-sighted intellect nor that grandeur of purpose which afterward distinguished the military founder of another soldiery that became formidable to kings. The Templars were unintelligent and therefore unsuccessful Jesuits.

"Their watchword was, to become wealthy, in order to buy the world. They became so, and in 1312 they possessed in Europe

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alone more than nine thousand seignories. Riches were the shoal on which they were wrecked. They became insolent, and unwisely showed their contempt for the religious and social institutions which they aimed to overthrow. Their ambition was fatal to them. Their projects were divined and prevented. [Rome, more intolerant of heresy than of vice and crime, came to fear the Order, and fear is always cruel. It has always deemed philosophical truth the most dangerous of heresies, and has never been at a loss for a false accusation, by means of which to crush free thought.] Pope Clement V. and King Philip le Bel gave the signal to Europe, and the Templars, taken as it were in an immense net, were arrested, disarmed, and cast into prison. Never was a Coup d’Etat accomplished with a more formidable concert of action. The whole world was struck with stupor, and eagerly waited for the strange revelations of a process that was to echo through so many ages.

"It was impossible to unfold to the people the conspiracy of the Templars against the Thrones and the Tiara. It was impossible to expose to them the doctrines of the Chiefs of the Order. [This would have been to initiate the multitude into the secrets of the Masters, and to have uplifted the veil of Isis. Recourse was therefore had to the charge of magic, and denouncers and false witnesses were easily found. When the temporal and spiritual tyrannies unite to crush a victim they never want for serviceable instruments.] The Templars were gravely accused of spitting upon Christ and denying God at their receptions, of gross obscenities, conversations with female devils, and the worship of a monstrous idol.

"The end of the drama is well known, and how Jacques de Molai and his fellows perished in the flames. But before his execution, the Chief of the doomed Order organized and instituted what afterward came to be called the Occult, Hermetic, or Scottish Masonry. In the gloom of his prison, the Grand Master created four Metropolitan Lodges, at Naples for the East, at Edinburg for the West, at Stockholm for the North, and at Paris for the South." [The initials of his name, J∴ B∴ M∴ found in the same order in the first three Degrees, are but one of the many internal and cogent proofs that such was the origin of modern Free-Masonry. The legend of Osiris was revived and adopted, to symbolize the destruction of the Order, and the resurrection of

p. 821

[paragraph continues]Khu_ru_m, slain in the body of the Temple, of KHU_RU_M ABAI, the Master, as the martyr of fidelity to obligation, of Truth and Conscience, prophesied the restoration to life of the buried association.]

"The Pope and the King soon after perished in a strange and sudden manner. Squin de Florian, the chief denouncer of the Order, died assassinated. In breaking the sword of the Templars, they made of it a poniard; and their proscribed trowels thence-forward built only tombs."

In these paragraphs, we learn that the templars, once accused and arrested and jailed were plotting lodges to continue after their demise. 

 Modern masons, whether they realize it or not, are the recipients of the ancient knowledge of the Templars, and are rewarded with the fruits of their labor whenever the modern mason opens a lodge in ancient form. 

The modern mason is also the recipient of the ancient accusations that the Templars were branded with: Baphomet worship! We just have never been able to escape it, even though masonry is built upon the individual seeking the highest morality of his conscience, and the betterment of the society in which he lives by means of enhancing whatever religious ideals he holds. 

 

     And this is where we will close for today. 

 

      Thank you for reading along, and for being patient while I have healed….again. 

 

       Have a great week, I will post again next weekend. ALSO keep an eye out in this space as I will be scanning in my articles I wrote for The Working Tools Masonic Magazine! I enjoyed wroting for TWT, and I wish it were still being published. Those articles will cover the earlier chapters of Morals and Dogma.

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