Skip to main content

Be Fair, Be Firm, Seek Justice (Begin Chapter 31 of Morals and Dogma)

 
    Greetings Everyone and Welcome to the 31st Chapter of Morals and Dogma. We are almost finished studying and opining this great work of Albert Pike.
 
        It has taken about 2 years to get this far in our study. Unfortunately, I lost much of the study (formerly at masonic me.com) due to using another blog site that demanded payments that I coud not afford due to paying for cancer treatments instead. 
 
   Many of those studies are written in The Working Tools Magazine, which I have copies of and will scan and transfer those lessons onto this site after we reach the end of Chapter 32.
 
      This time, we begin Chapter 31 as I mentioned, where Pike has written some very valuable lessons for all freemasons.
 
      All too often, I believe we forget our purposes as freemasons, where we get busy with Lodge business, and not busy enough with the obligation of being an instrument of morality and justice in our daily lives. 
 
        This Chapter will remind us all of our real duties, I am hopeful Pike’s words will help us to be inspired to fulfill them.
 
        And now, LET’S READ PIKE!
 
 
         

p. 825

MORALS AND DOGMA.

CONSISTORY.

XXXI.

GRAND INSPECTOR INQUISITOR COMMANDER.

[Inspector Inquisitor.]

To hear patiently, to weigh deliberately and dispassionately, and to decide impartially;--these are the chief duties of a Judge. After the lessons you have received, I need not further enlarge upon them. You will be ever eloquently reminded of them by the furniture upon our Altar, and the decorations of the Tribunal.

The Holy Bible will remind you of your obligation; and that as you judge here below, so you will be yourself judged hereafter, by One who has not to submit, like an earthly judge, to the sad necessity of inferring the motives, intentions, and purposes of men [of which all crime essentially consists] from the uncertain and often unsafe testimony of their acts and words; as men in thick darkness grope their way, with hands outstretched before them: but before Whom every thought, feeling, impulse, and intention of every soul that now is, or ever was, or ever will be on earth, is, and ever will be through the whole infinite duration of eternity, present and visible.

p. 826

The Square and Compass, the Plumb and Level, are well known to you as a Mason. Upon you as a Judge, they peculiarly inculcate uprightness, impartiality, careful consideration of facts and circumstances, accuracy in judgment, and uniformity in decision As a Judge, too, you are to bring up square work and square work only. Like a temple erected by the plumb, you are to lean neither to one side nor the other. Like a building well squared and levelled, you are to be firm and steadfast in your convictions of right and justice. Like the circle swept with the compasses, you are to be true. In the scales of justice you are to weigh the facts and the law alone, nor place in either scale personal friendship or personal dislike, neither fear nor favor: and when reformation is no longer to be hoped for, you are to smite relentlessly with the sword of justice.

There are many points to ponder in these very strong and passionate opening paragraphs, so we will spend our time today studying only these paragraphs because there is so much to be learned and reminded of before we go forward.

“To hear patiently, to weigh deliberately and dispassionately, and to decide impartially;—these are the chief duties of a Judge” 

  Are we true to these duties as Masons? Espeially as Masons who have leadership roles both inside and outside of our Lodges? 

 Human nature often gets the better of us in our judgements. Sometimes we “just don’t like” a person, and we immediately pass juudgements on the character of a person before we have even give them a chance. How often are we guilty of this?

  It takes patience and a willingness to admit our own errors to be able to correct our own behaviors before we can be impartial in our roles as leaders, which every Mason should aspire to lead and to show the world that we lead fairly and justly. 

Let’s read the next paragraph: “The Holy Bible will remind you of your obligation; and that as you judge here below, so you will be yourself judged hereafter by One who has not to submit, like an earthly judge, to the sad necessity of inferring the motives, intentions and purposes of men (of which all crime essentially consists) from the uncertain and often unsafe testimony of their acts and words; as men in thick darkness grope their way, with hands outstretched before them: but before Whom every thought, feeling,impulse and intentionof every soul that now is or ever was, or ever will be on earth, is, and ever will be through the wholeinfinite duration of eternity, present and visible."

 

  We are reminded in that paragraph that we should remember that we will be judged by the creator in the same manner we have judged here on earth. 

  “As above. So below.” 

   The creator does not listen to our mere words, half truths or versions of a truth, but rather the creator will judge us upon the facts of our actions according to the expectations we have obligated ourselves to as Masons.

   We should never forget that we are bearers of light that dispels the ignorances that darkness tries to hide. We stand for justice and fairness and we should not look the other way when injustices occur. That is our obligation to society and to humanity.

   We will be judged accordingly when we do not live up to our commitments as Masons.

   Let’s read the next paragraph together: 

The Square and Compass, the Plumb and Level, are well known to you as a Mason. Upon you as a Judge, they peculiarly inculcate uprightness, impartiality, careful consideration of facts and circumstances, accuracy in judgment, and uniformity in decision As a Judge, too, you are to bring up square work and square work only. Like a temple erected by the plumb, you are to lean neither to one side nor the other. Like a building well squared and levelled, you are to be firm and steadfast in your convictions of right and justice. Like the circle swept with the compasses, you are to be true. In the scales of justice you are to weigh the facts and the law alone, nor place in either scale personal friendship or personal dislike, neither fear nor favor: and when reformation is no longer to be hoped for, you are to smite relentlessly with the sword of justice.

 

   In this paragraph, we revisit the symbolisms of the working tools. Lets go over these one by one to renew our commitments to the use of these tools:

      Pike writes “ The Square and Compass, the Plumb and Level are well known to you as a Mason. Upon you as a Judge, they peculilarly inculcate uprightness, impartiality, careful consideration of facts and circumstances, accuracy in judgement, and uniformity in decision. As a Judge, too, you are to bring up square work and square work only."

   So we are reminded to act squarely in matters where we are judging in our leadership roles. What is a decision based on actions for one under your leadership, should be the very same decision we pass on another based on the same actions and circumstances. We should not let cronyism or favoritism decide for us the way we judge.

Pike writes next “ Like a temple erected by the plumb, you are to lean neither to one side or the other."

   In our roles as leaders, we must check ourselves for prejudices and not have any judgements based on our own biases. We remain impartial until the revelation of the FACTS.

  The next line: “ Like a building well squared and leveled, you are to be firm and steadfast in your convictions of right and justice."

  As Masons, we are students of morality veiled in allegory. We are students of what is culturally acceptable. When someting is not in place of the cultures in which we live and work, as leaders and as Masons, we are obligated to stand up for what is right and to report anything that does not follow suit with what is culturally acceptable.

 Next Pike writes: “ Like the circle swept with the compasses, you are to be true."

   To be true to ourselves is to be true to all. We must not let EGO blind us to our own shortcomings expecting more from others than we would do ourselves.

  Next line: “ In the scales of Justice you are to weigh the facts and the law alone, nor place in either scale personal friendship or personal dislike, neither fear nor favor: and when reformation is no longer to be hoped for, you are to smite relentlessly with the sword of justice."

     In our roles as leaders, we will ultimately come across an individual that cannot be trained to properly carry out their roles in the cutures in wheich we lead (work or Lodge). And it is often tempting to make the EASY choice to ignore the actions of that person. We may also try to COACH that person, but they may see no other way but their own way and the coaching has not been well recieved or ignored altogether. 

  We may desperately try to COUNSEL this person, BEG this person to listen and to understand they are not living up to what is culturally acceptable, but they may be defensive and argue that they are right and YOU are wrong.

  This is when we as Leaders, must take actions to be JUST and make the sometimes difficult choice to send them on their way, terminating their employment of cancelling their membership because it is the RIGHT thing to do based upon their lack of conforming to what is culturally acceptable.

  We cannot simply look the other way because it is not fair to others who have worked hard to conform and contribute to the cultures or work or Lodge.

  Our leadership duties are not always easy, rather, they are usually difficult. We must always be fair and true to our obligations in our roles as leaders.

 

    And, this is where we will end for today. 

 

     Thank you very much for reading along. I hope Pike’s words remain an inspiration for you to do what is right!

      We will continue with this chapter next time!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Albert Pike, Morals and Dogma and Lucifer?

Natural Law, the Law of Attraction and Freemasonry

    Greetings and welcome back to our study of Albert Pike’s Morals and Dogma as we continue chapter 31.     This time, we will join Pike as he explains natural law and the laws of attraction and how it pertains to freemasonry.     Thank you for joining in, now LET’S READ PIKE!   Everywhere in the world there is a natural law, that is, a constant mode of action, which seems to belong to the nature of things, to the constitution of the Universe. This fact is universal. In different departments we call this mode of action by different names, as the law of Matter, the law of Mind, the law of Morals, and the like. We mean by this, a certain mode of action which belongs to the material, mental, or moral forces, the mode in p. 828 which commonly they are found to act, and in which it is their ideal to act always. The ideal laws of matter we know only from the fact that they are always obeyed. To us the actual obedience is the only evidence of the ideal rule; for in respect to the

The Ancients and Astrology

Greetings Everyone, and welcome back to our weekly study and opinion of Albert Pike’s Morals and Dogma. We are continuing om with chapter 25 where Pike is writing about the ancients astrological beliefs. This section is more decriptive and not necessicarily giving me much room for much opinion. Pike is schooling us regarding what exactly was and not really leaving much to decipher. So, I will “get out of the way” as it is, and copy and paste just Pike’s text here for the next 4-5 paragraphs. Before I do so, let me relay some news from Universal Freemason. First, I am currently working on an app for your phones that will alert you when these lessons are posted, also there will be some very useful items for masons. Stay tuned regarding this development. Also, TODAY I will be casting the resin glow in the dark square and compasses and also some glow in the dark pentagrams. They will be up on eBay tonight, but if you are interested in purchasing either, or have suggestions or comments or q