In the not so distant past, Grand Masters, Grand Wardens and other elected officials were selected by Past Grand Masters and then revealed at the Grand Communication.  In recent years, that process has become more transparent and the membership has a greater say in the outcome.

The selection of District Deputy Grand Masters and Grand Lodge Staff Officers was a little more bizarre. In days gone by, if there were 12 lodges in the district,  a rotation system was established so that each lodge would get a DDGM or GLSO about every 6 years. The downside to this process was that the selected Lodge would put up their next available candidate without regard to his qualifications or record.  The end result was that most that filled these offices were mediocre at best.

The Grand Lodge of NY recognized the problem and in the mid 90’s they developed a plan based on qualifications rather than seniority or favoritism.  Candidates for these positions had to “apply” listing their qualifications, vision, and agenda.  They also had to meet certain requirements such as completing the MDC (Masonic Development Course) and the “Road To The East”, a course designed to help members while traveling to mastership of their Lodge.

This process was very successful for a number of years. However, in recent years, new challenges have arisen.  As lodges and districts lose membership, leadership pickings have become scarce and members move to the east by jumping chairs only to crash and burn after they are masters.  A new phenomenon is that members are actually jumping from lodge to lodge to see where they can sit in the East the quickest, and others are jumping from district to district for an earlier Right Worshipful appointment. This certainly was not the intent of the original program.  The original program was designed to select the best candidates for the jobs they were best suited within the district.

Politics and political maneuvering have no place in the Fraternity. Men do not ascend to the Grand East because they are ambitious or greedy.  They get there because they work hard for many years in their lodges and districts, they love the Fraternity and believe that it should survive, and they are firm in their convictions and integrity.

So who is to blame? Look around, Brothers, we are at fault.  We do nothing to inspire leadership in our lodges and districts.  In NY, the terms begin and end on even years so the next term is 2014-2016 which mimics the Grand Masters term of office. Now is the time that we should be looking for candidates for the 2016 term, not in 2015. A mentor should be selected for each potential candidate, much like the Lodge mentor for new members in Lodge.  These individuals should commit to working with them for 2 years, making sure that they meet all requirements and posses the knowledge necessary to become a Grand Lodge Officer.

Keep in mind that just as every member is not entitled to be master of his lodge, so not every Past Master is entitled to be a Grand Lodge officer.  We should strive for quality and not just a live body to fill the position. Look around, Brothers.  Leadership abounds, you just have to draw it out.

So I was watching a special program on the Science cable channel about Secret Societies and I was left wondering where they get their information from.  The program covered a few of the groups that the conspiracy nuts love to talk about including OTO (Ordi TempliOrientis), Bilderbergs, and of course, the Freemasons.

During the Freemason segment, which was the largest segment of the program, they interviewed a supposed 32nd Degree Mason.  His first point was regarding the disgust that overwhelmed him during his first degree. Before I get into the meat of the discussion, one must raise the question if he was disgusted by the first degree, why did he continue with the other 31?

Anyway, his first complaint was during the preparation for the first degree, he was divested of all metallic substances, even his wedding ring and his crucifix. His argument was that if Freemasonry holds family and religion in such high esteem, why remove those objects? One only has to listen to the lectures in the second section of the degree to understand the purpose of that exercise. In those lectures, it explains that metal tools were not used in the construction of King Solomon’s Temple, and secondly that you might not bring anything offensive or defensive into the lodge. More importantly, the lack of any metal teaches the feeling of complete destitution and it demonstrates the need to help our fellow man in like destitute conditions. It was obvious that this individual was asleep during those lectures.

His went on to say that when he was received into the lodge they drew blood and that the obligations were nothing more than “blood” oaths. I was totally amazed that the Science Channel would allow this misinformation to be broadcast.  Our Degree rituals do nothing more than teach us life lessons to be carried to the outside world.  There is no hazing or levity and the degrees are serious ceremonies interlaced with symbols and allegories. True, some men don’t get it, and that is why there are so many training courses like the Masonic Development Course to explain these symbols.

The final blow came when this supposed “Mason” explained that in the ritual of the 32nd Degree that is spells out that the goal of Freemasonry is to rule the world.  Somehow, I must have missed that degree because I have no recollection of that line in the ritual in any degree.

The Science Channel is part of the Discovery Network.  Normally I tend to watch programs about nature or ancient history.  After watching this particular program, I’m beginning to wonder how accurate their other programs are, if they allow these falsehoods to be broadcast? What kind of research goes into programs? Do they broadcast these segments without doing any research into the credentials of the guests or validity of the topic?

Their website does not allow contact or comments so if you’ve read this article, please pass it on.  Maybe someone from that network will pick it up and investigate.  I, for one, will not be wasting my time on the Discovery Network if I can’t be sure that their facts are accurate.

Before proceeding any further, we must address two things:

• The acronym “LPR.”  Pronounced “leaper,” it stands for Letter Perfect Ritualist.  A LPR is a Brother who has mastered the memorization and performance of Masonic ritual.  Candidates may have no idea whatever that the ritual they are hearing is being performed from memory due to its surpassing delivery, and perhaps think that they are enjoying an impromptu speech by an accomplished orator.

• It must be said that I hold LPRs in very high regard.  Such Masons are a splendid asset to their lodges; indeed, it takes no small measure of  talent to memorize expansive tracts of ritual and deliver the same verbatim. Ritual performed with such skill only serves to heighten the hearers’ experience. Ritual performed poorly, suffering from pauses, replete with mispronounced words and more-than-occasional interjections from a prompter is distracting and hard to follow.

LPRs keep all t’s crossed and i’s dotted in ritual!

In many lodges, LPRs are touted as successful, accomplished Masons.  Newly made Masons, upon learning that the ritual that so captivated them was performed from memory, are rightly impressed by the LPRs proficiencies, and may even seek to emulate them.  They do well in this given that The Craft needs Brethren possessed of such skills.

I write this post due to my concern for two groups:  those new Brother Masons who might look upon the wonderful skill of the  LPRs in their lodge and conclude that joining their ranks is the summit of our profession, and for those LPRs who themselves feel that their considerable ritual performance skills have placed them atop the apex of the mountain of Masonic endeavor.  While I write this post to disabuse both groups of these notions, I target it chiefly toward the former cohort.

I am fond of likening the receipt of superbly performed ritual to the receipt by a builder of the choicest building materials.  Just as the builder must endeavor to arrange his materials into an edifice, so too must the metaphysical timbers, blocks, etc., put forth in the ritual be fashioned into a spiritual edifice.  Permit me a further analogy: the spiritual edifice built solely of the “immaterial materials” of ritual (even if delivered with the exacting precision of the LPR) is like a building that, having a completed exterior, lacks a finished interior.  Such a building lacks light fixtures, plumbing fixtures, appliances, flooring, a furnace, and the like, and is therefore uninhabitable; it is merely a husk.  To make such a place suitable for living, we must obtain the sundry articles it lacks.

Where shall we go to lay hold of that which will complete our building – to secure those things which shall enrich our construction and make of it a fitting dwelling place? We must look beyond the practical teachings of the ritual for these things.  The reader does well to here recall that it has been said that Freemasonry is “a peculiar system of morals, veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols.”  In that brief definition, we have bottled the answer – we must travel beyond the veil and we must study the symbols.

Indeed, the point-within-a-circle teaches that we ought circumscribe our desires, and never suffer them to move beyond the pale!

Yes, the square of virtue reminds us to square our actions!

Verily, the twenty-four inch gauge offers a valuable, practical lesson in the proportionate use of time!

You will be presented with all of the foregoing in the ritual, and if you are fortunate enough to be the beneficiary of the work of a LPR, you will have cleanly received every word of the lectures.  You will know of the circumpunct, the square, the level, and of the gavel; you will know of the beehive and acacia sprig and the All Seeing Eye, and even of King Solomon’s Temple.  After a time and with practice, you too may very well become a LPR yourself, and perhaps enrapture scores of new Brothers, their attentions held captive to your piquant orations.  Some time later, however, reflecting  upon the lot of The Craft’s symbols, you might find what you’ve received concerning them (and what you’ve repeated to others with commendable performances) to be rather obvious and simple, and you may awaken to a day wherein what you’ve known of these symbols, ritualis solus, does not satisfy you.  In that moment, the walls of your edifice may seem bare, and common necessities may seem lacking.

You may seek out others in your lodge – perhaps fellow LPRs, perhaps the Worshipful Master – and inquire of the deeper meaning of our symbols.  It is with chagrin that I tell you that the odds of receiving a meaningful answer are not in your favor, and you will perhaps be confronted with a stark reality: very often LPRs, held widely to be learned concerning The Craft, cannot offer you more than you can read in your ritual book.  And, I’m afraid, you will find that perhaps with equal frequency the senior officers of a lodge – up to and including its Master – can do little more than regurgitate the ritual’s explication or refer you to your Grand Lodge’s reading program.

When struck full-on by this revelation, may you come to realize a signal truth: your improvement in Masonry, i.e., the spiritual alchemy you must undertake to become that which the Ancient Mysteries – and The Craft – contemplates, is roundly dependent on the search you undertake yourself.  You must take those first trembling steps toward the East; you must study, and contemplate, and meditate, and put into practice, and discuss.  You must remedy your deficient house.  Do not fall prey to the absurd notion that your claim upon the title of Master Mason and your ritualistic perfection have transferred to you, through some mysterious osmosis, the knowledge of great Masonic minds.  You must, with abandon, dive headlong into the great pool of knowledge that is very readily available; he who merely wets his feet will gain but little.  Count yourself learned in your profession when you are intimate with its vital moment, not merely its rudiments.

I enjoin you my friends: beware the letter, for as a Master has taught us – the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life!

Copyright (c) 2012 Anthony Mongelli, Jr. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in whole or in part without the express written consent of Anthony Mongelli, Jr.

NOTE: This article was originally published in the December 2012 issue of The Working Tools Masonic Magazine.  It is posted here through the kindness of Bro. Cory Sigler, the magazine’s owner and editor.

EACH OF THE THREE DEGREES of Craft Masonry introduces the initiate (or Brother, as the case may be) to a set of “working tools” – implements of operative Masonry that have been “moralized” and are now employed in the Speculative strain of the Art that they might teach certain elementary moral principles. Of the working tools, Albert Mackey, in his Encyclopedia of Freemasonry, writes: “With these the Speculative Freemason is taught to erect his spiritual Temple, as his Operative predecessors with the same implements so constructed their material Temples.” Blackmer offers this: “[The emblematical allusion of the tools] demonstrates that the tools and implements of the operative Mason’s Art are to be sanctified and dedicated to the veneration of God and the erection of a spiritual temple in the heart…” (THE LODGE AND THE CRAFT, page 77).

As it does with many symbols and emblems of The Order, the ritual itself provides us with a simple, superficial explanation of the tools’ relevance within Freemasonry. Know that more recondite meanings present themselves upon inspection.

The working tools of the Entered Apprentice degree are generally two: the twenty-four inch gauge (hereinafter “the gauge”) and the common gavel. Some jurisdictions teach three Entered Apprentice working tools – the gauge, the common gavel and the chisel. This article shall explore some of the deeper meanings of the gauge, while the gavel and the chisel will be treated together in a forthcoming piece.

The gauge is typically represented as a long and thin measuring stick, divided into three equal sections of 8 inches each. The three sections are linked by two joints permitting them to be extended in a single span of 24 inches; these joints also permit the sections to be folded one upon the other, making the tool more compact and less unwieldy.

The ritual of the Entered Apprentice Degree speaks this of the gauge (New York working):

“The Twenty-four Inch Gauge is an instrument used by operative masons to measure and lay out their work; but we, as Free and Accepted Masons, are taught to use it for the more noble and glorious purpose of dividing our time. It being divided into twenty-four equal parts, is emblematical of the twenty-four hours of the day, which we are taught to divide into three equal parts, whereby are found eight hours for the service of God and a distressed worthy Brother, eight for our usual vocations, and eight for refreshment and sleep.”

In expounding on the gauge, most authors have done little more than either regurgitate verbatim (or nearly so) the text above, or craft some paraphrasing of identical flavor. Amongst those few who ventured a bit from the ritual’s explanation we find these: Albert Pike writes that the force of the gavel is “regulated and guided by…” the gauge (MORALS AND DOGMA OF THE ANCIENT ACCEPTED SCOTTISH RITE, page 4.) After noting that the three sections of the gauge can be manipulated to form an equilateral triangle, George Steinmetz goes on to state that “here in this one instrument is the entire teaching of Masonry: the progress from the material man to the perfect divine man, made in God’s own image.” (FREEMASONRY: ITS HIDDEN MEANING, page 87).

In considering the gauge numerologically, it can very simply offer the value of 6 when we sum the digits of its length – 24 = 2+4 = 6.) Let us endeavor to lay bare any occulted correspondences to the gauge’s value of 6; we will seek after them in the Torah, in the Qabalah and finally in the Tarot.

IN THE TORAH

The sixth character of the Hebrew alphabet is “vav” (ו). “Vav” literally means a hook, or peg, and is used in this way in Exodus 27:10, regarding the drapings or hangings of the Tabernacle of the Israelites: “And the twenty pillars thereof and their twenty sockets shall be of brass; the hooks of the pillars and their fillets shall be of silver.”

A particular “vav” character – larger in size than the surrounding characters for emphasis – occurring in the Book of Leviticus, in verse 11:42, is at the very center of the Torah, i.e., to the left and to the right of this particular “vav” character, we shall be able to count an equal number of Hebrew characters. Accordingly, it can be said that the Torah is balanced around this central “vav“. Note the correspondence: the gauge, whose exoteric lesson is one concerning a judicious (we may say a balanced) use of time, can have a numerological value of six, while the Hebrew character about which we may say the entire Torah is balanced – the “vav” – also has a numerical value of six.

Proceeding further, let us note that this central “vav” character (the balancing point of the Torah) occurs in the Hebrew word “gachown” (גָּחוֹן ) defined by Strong’s Concordance (H1512) as “belly of reptiles.” “Gachown” (and its central “vav” character) appear in Leviticus 11:42 (King James Version):

 “Whatsoever goeth upon the belly, and whatsoever goeth upon all four, or whatsoever hath more feet among all creeping things that creep upon the earth, them ye shall not eat; for they are an abomination.”

Reptiles that “goeth upon the belly” are snakes. The word “gachown” (גָּחוֹן ) is also given in Genesis 3:14, in which verse God curses the serpent for its Promethean transgression (King James Version):

“And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:”

It shall not strain our imaginations to see that the gauge, long and thin as it is, appears snake-like.

IN THE TORAH

It is well to offer some basic information concerning the Qabalah’s Tree of Life (Otz Chiim) for those readers who may not be wholly familiar with it. The Qabalistic Tree of Life is a diagrammatic representation of the pathway to Deity, and of the process via which Deity – Our Supreme Architect – created all that is out of that which was not, i.e., the procession of the created world out of nothingness, through a series of emanations. These emanations are collectively known as sephiroth (singular = sephira), of which there are ten. It is only through the sephiroth – as manifestations of Deity – that we can know attempt to approach the unknowable First Cause.

The ten sephiroth are arranged on the Tree across three pillars. The left pillar is called the Pillar of Severity, the right the Pillar of Mercy; between these two is found the eponymous Middle Pillar. It is in the Middle Pillar that the aspects of the Severity and Mercy Pillars – opposites – find resolution and balance. The Middle Pillar may perhaps be likened to the inexpressibly keen edge of a blade atop which opposite forces meet. Here, Severity meets Mercy and their balanced interplay results in Justice. Here is the point at which hard transmutes into soft. Here is the preternatural point at which the flow of past time becomes the flow of future time.

The sixth sephira on the tree demands our attention. Lying on the Middle Pillar, it is known as “Tipareth.” In her seminal work on the Hermetic Qabalah, THE MYSTICAL QABALAH, British occultist Dion Fortune tells us that Tipareth “is the centre of equilibrium of the whole tree, being in the middle of the Central Pillar” and that it “is the point of transmutation between the planes of force and the planes of form.” (THE MYSTICAL QABALAH, page 188). Fortune further states that “The meaning of the Hebrew word Tipareth is Beauty; and of the many definitions of beauty that have been proposed, the most satisfying is that which finds beauty to lie in a due and just proportion, whatever the beautiful thing may be, whether moral or material. It is interesting, therefore, to find the Sephirah of Beauty as the central point of equilibrium of the whole Tree, and that one of the two Spiritual Experiences assigned to Tiphareth is the Vision of the Harmony of Things.” (ibid, page 203).

The Craft’s gauge, numerologically equivalent to six, bears an emblematical message of balanced usage of time – a message much further developed and splendidly enriched when the sixth sephira is considered.

THE TAROT

Though they are most familiar as an apparatus of augury, the cards of the Tarot are a useful contemplative tool that I maintain suffers abuse when employed merely for divination. A standard Tarot deck will consist of 78 cards, of which 22 are known as “major arcana” (the major arcana are those most familiar to the casual observer, and include infamous cards like The Devil and Death.)

We are, of course, here concerned with the sixth major arcana card of the Tarot (the card bearing the number “6″): “The Lovers.” The card displays a nude man and a nude woman standing beneath a radiant angel, itself hovering beneath a resplendent sun. The woman stands abreast a fruited tree about which a serpent coils, while the man is near to a tree bearing tufts of flame; both figures stand on either side of a mountain. The man gazes at the woman, while she in turn looks skyward at the angel and the Sun.

The symbolism of the card speaks of balance and the union of opposites – the male and female. The tree near which the woman stands – akin to Eden’s Tree of Knowledge (and therefore reason) is in opposition to the flaming tree – representative of the passions – near to the man. Reason and passion can be brought into balance in the perfected Man – the Man who has transmuted from lead to gold. The path of ascension is symbolized by the mountain, which recalls the shape of an upward pointing triangle, and is therefore indicative of the climb upward toward the Almighty. This climb is analogous to the climb up the Tree of Life, through each sephirothic consciousness. “Balance the opposites,” it seems to teach, “and you may ascend.”

A 15th century Italian version of “The Lovers”, from the Visconti Tarot, makes the idea concerning the union of the male and female poles upon the middle, harmonizing point even more explicit – a man and a woman clasp hands in front of a tent in which a central support-pole is visible. The pole is analogous to the Middle Pillar.

Owing to the intimate link between the Qabalah and the Tarot, we must make a return to the sixth sephira Tipareth. Tipareth, like all of the sephiroth, enjoys astrological associations; it is associated with the Sun. The seventh sephira, Netzach, is associated with the planet Venus (female), while the eighth sephira, Hod, is associated with the planet Mercury (male). Proceeding through the tree starting at Tipareth, the sixth sephira, and moving next to Netzach, the seventh sephira, then to Hod, the eighth, and then back to Tipareth, describes the shape of an equilateral triangle. To state it differently, in traveling from the Sun (Tipareth, 6) to Venus (Netzach, 7) and then across to Mercury (Hod, 8), and back to Tipareth we have taken a triangular path. We begin at the Sun – a symbol of Deity, shedding its life-giving, fecundative rays upon this lower plane – and move to the “female pole” and thence to the “male pole”, and finally back the Sun.

The triangle thus described not only links Tipareth, Netzach and Hod on the Tree of Life, but if it and the three sephiroth we have connected with it are superimposed upon “The Lovers” card, it also links the angel and the Sun to the man and the woman. Thus placed, Netzach (Venus – female) falls atop the man, and Hod (Mercury – male) falls atop the woman; the opposites are paired.

Recall that, of the triangle, Steinmetz writes that it may be formed by manipulating the three sections of the gauge. This triangle is representative of “the progress from the material man to the perfect divine man, made in God’s own image” (FREEMASONRY: ITS HIDDEN MEANING, PAGE 87), i.e., the regenerate Man in whom the male and female aspects have been harmonized upon the Middle Pillar, as they are in the Deity. To this effect, The Zohar states that “And therefore are all things established in the equality of male and female; for were it not so, how could they subsist?”, and S.L. Macgregor Mathers wrote, “”Insomuch that through that Tiphereth, Beauty, Adam becometh in one body, Male and Female” (KABALLAH UNVEILED, Chapter 40, no. 949).

MISCELLANEY

It is interesting to note that of the number six, occultist William W. Westcott relates that the ancient Greek mathematician Nicomachus wrote that it was “the fabricator of the Soul, also Harmony.” (NUMBERS – THEIR OCCULT POWER AND MYSTIC VIRTUES, page 66).

Note also that the hexalpha, or six-pointed star (the Star of David), is emblematic of the Hermetic concept of “Quod est inferius est sicut quod est superius, et quod est superius est sicut quod est inferius” – “as above, so below.” It is comprised of two equilateral triangles pointing in opposite directions – one points up towards the heavens – the plane of spirit – and the other points downward to the earth – the material plane. The two triangles are in balance, and represent the harmonization of these planes.

The gauge provides but a single example of the deep complexity that underlies many of The Craft’s symbols. While its exoteric exhortation to a right use of one’s time is a valuable, practical instruction, it points us toward a hermetic teaching of balance and the harmonization of opposite forces. In doing so, it ushers us toward the kernel of this Royal Art, while affording us yet another example of the connection between Freemasonry and the Qabalah.

Copyright (c) 2012 Anthony Mongelli, Jr. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in whole or in part without the express written consent of Anthony Mongelli, Jr.

Indeed, the obligations of The Craft are the cords that bind us both to The Order and to each other.  Every man that has approached our portals, passed through the Pillars and, on bent knee, obligated himself, has forged an ethereal chain that lashes him to all those who have gone that way before and all that shall come that way tomorrow.  This ligature is beyond the bounds of time and space (hence it is termed “the mystic tie”); As Masons, we are pulled together by it into that certain House Not Made With Hands.

This post was originally published as an article in the November 2012 issue of Living Stones Masonic Magazine.  It is published here with the kind permission of the owner and editor Living Stones Magazine, Brother Robert Herd.

Let us begin our discussion with three quotes that frequently find their way into discussions concerning The Craft and Lucifer:

“How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!”

-ISAIAH 14:12 (KJV)

“Lucifer, the Light-bearer! Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of Darkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! Is it he who bears the Light, and with its splendors intolerable, blinds feeble, sensual, or selfish souls? Doubt it not!” 

-ALBERT PIKE in MORALS AND DOGMA OF THE ANCIENT ACCEPTED   SCOTTISH RITE

“When the Mason learns that the key to the warrior on the block is the proper application of the dynamo of living power, he has learned the mystery of his Craft. The seething energies of Lucifer are in his hands, and before he may step onward and upward, he must prove his ability to properly apply energy.”

-MANLY P. HALL in THE LOST KEYS OF FREEMASONRY

Combining the essences of the three quotes, we arrive at something like this: Lucifer (popularly regarded as Satan) fell from Heaven, bears the “Light” and the controlling of Lucifer’s (the Devil’s) energy is the Mystery of The Craft. This results from perfunctory examinations of these three quotes; a considered study of them (and a few more lines previous to them in their respective texts) can help to cure this myopic ignorance.

A charge frequently made against The Craft is that it is involved in evil doings, including the worship of The Devil (or Lucifer, in this case). The Internet does not suffer a lack of anti-Masonic websites advancing this line of thought; Pike’s quote (as well as the fictions of Leo Taxil) is usually given pride of place; Manly P. Hall’s less so. But both are often given as proof of The Craft’s “devil worship.”

We cannot too quickly fault those who assume that the mention of Lucifer either in connection with The Craft (as in Manly Hall’s quote) or by a noted Freemason (Albert Pike) indicates that our Order is something nefarious. After all, Lucifer is simply another name for Satan, isn’t it? In popular parlance, yes, Lucifer is a synonym for Satan; less commonly, Lucifer is a distinct entity from Satan.

In the main, I wish for my readers to know that:

• The Lucifer of the Bible is not The Devil, and
• The Craft should rightly venerate Lucifer.

In translating the Hebrew Tanakh into Latin (The Latin Vulgate), St. Jerome, in the Book of Isaiah, rendered the Hebrew word “heylel” (meaning “day star” amongst other things) into the Latin “Lucifer.” “Lucifer” comes from the Latin words “lux” (meaning “light”) and “ferre” (meaning “to bear.”) The Septuagint renders the word as the Greek “heosphoros.” Jerome, recognizing that the word “heylel” in the Hebrew Tanakh and “heosphoros” in the Septuagint both referred to the morning star, or Venus, quite reasonably rendered them as the word “Lucifer” – the Latin name for Venus.

Most modern translations of Isaiah 14:12 do not use the word “Lucifer” at all; the New International Version instead gives us “morning star”, the New American Standard Bible offers “star of the morning”, and Young’s Literal Translation uses “shining one.”  It is noteworthy to mention that even the King James Version of 1611 affords us this note concerning “Lucifer” in the margin: “Or, O daystarre.”

Importantly, Jerome did not confine his use of “Lucifer” to Isaiah 14:12, wherein the word refers to a fallen and prideful Babylonian king; see this entry under “Lucifer” from the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia:

The name Lucifer originally denotes the planet Venus, emphasizing its brilliance. The Vulgate employs the word also for “the light of the morning” (Job 11:17), “the signs of the zodiac” (Job 38:32), and “the aurora” (Psalm 109:3). Metaphorically, the word is applied to the King of Babylon (Isaiah 14:12) as preeminent among the princes of his time; to the high priest Simon son of Onias (Ecclesiasticus 50:6), for his surpassing virtue, to the glory of heaven (Apocalypse 2:28), by reason of its excellency; finally to Jesus Christ himself (2 Peter 1:19; Apocalypse 22:16; the “Exultet” of Holy Saturday) the true light of our spiritual life.

Here are two of the above cited verses from the Vulgate with their King James Version concordances:

In Revelation 22:16, Jesus refers to himself as the “bright and morning star.”  I think it reasonable to suggest that He could have called himself “Lucifer.”

Note further:

Fourteenth century English philosopher and theologian John Wycliffe advocated for the translation of the Bible into the common tongue. Here is Job 38:32 from the “Wycliffe Bible:” “Whether thou bryngist forth Lucifer, that is, dai sterre, in his tyme, and makist euene sterre to rise on the sones of erthe?” (“Whether thou bringest forth Lucifer, that is, day star, in season, and makest evening star to rise on the sons of earth?”)

and

Augustine of Hippo, writing in the 4th century A.D., gives us this in On Christian Doctrine:“…the Romans made an attempt to dedicate the star which we call Lucifer to the name and honor of Cæsar. And this would, perhaps, have been done, and the name handed down to distant ages, only that his ancestress Venus had given her name to this star before him…”

Considering all of the above – the meaning of the Hebrew word “heylel,” contemporary translations, the explanatory note of the 1611 KJV, Wycliffe’s translation, and the commentary of Augustine (but one of several early Christian writers that referred Lucifer to the morning star) – it ought to be plain that “Lucifer” is the day or morning star, and therefore the planet Venus.  It is incorrect to synonymize the Lucifer of the Vulgate and Satan.  This error arose when Jesus’ words in the text of Luke 10:18 (“I saw Satan fall like lightning from Heaven”) became linked to the Vulgate’s translation of Isaiah 14:12, which seemingly describes the same event.  Isaiah 14:12 describes the fall of a prideful Babylonian tyrant; Luke 10:18 the fall of or victory over “ha-Satan,” the accuser and opposer of mankind.  “Lucifer,” having enjoyed multiple utilities, should therefore be considered more a descriptor and less a proper name.

Having, I think, provided sufficient evidence that “Lucifer” of the Bible is not The Devil, let us then ask just who (or what) Pike claims “bears the Light” and just whose “seething energies” Manly Hall claims the Mason can possess in his hands.

Since Lucifer is the “Light Bearer,” let us examine the concept of “Light” in Freemasonry.  Here are some comments by other writers on it:

“Light is an important word in the Masonic system. It conveys a far more recondite meaning than it is believed to possess by the generality of readers..it contains within itself a far more abstruse allusion to the very essence of Speculative Freemasonry…Freemasons are emphatically called the Sons of Light, because they are, or at least are entitled to be, in possession of the true meaning of the symbol; while the profane or uninitiated who have not received this knowledge are, by a parity of expression, said to be in darkness.” 

-ALBERT MACKEY in ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FREEMASONRY, page 446

 “To the Ancients, Light was the cause of life; and God was the source from which all light flowed; the essence of Light, the Invisible Fire, developed as Flame manifested as light and splendor.”

-ALBERT PIKE in MORALS AND DOGMA OF THE ANCIENT ACCEPTED SCOTTISH RITE, page 13

“So important , indeed, is it (Light), and so much does it pervade with its influence the whole Masonic system, that Freemasonry itself anciently received, among other appellations, that of Lux, or Light, to signify that it is to be regarded as that sublime doctrine of Divine Truth by which the path of him who has attained it is to be illuminated in his pilgrimage of life.”

-ALBERT MACKEY in THE SYMBOLISM OF FREEMASONRY, page 148

 “Light is the key which opens the door to our mysteries, and it is the same Light which ‘shines in every letter of the Koran,’ and is the Light of Mithra, who is the light of Ahura-Mazda. It is the same Light from which Moses shaded his eyes when it appeared to him in the bush…It is that Light of which it is written in our Scriptures that ‘the Light shineth in the Darkness and the Darkness comprehended it not.’ “

-J.S.M. WARD in FREEMASONRY AND THE ANCIENT GODS, pages 61-62

 “The true Mason is not creed bound. He realizes with the divine illumination of his lodge, that as a Mason his religion must be Universal. Christ, Buddha or Mohammed. The name means little, for he recognizes only the light and not the bearer.”

-MANLY P. HALL in THE LOST KEYS OF FREEMASONRY, page 64

Of The Light I have written on my blog, The Blazing Star, that “once the Light has worked itself upon the soul, it shall, like the incense, smolder, become rarified and rise up and out of that which contains it; unfettered, it climbs to heights unimagined and finds Deity, for the Light has severed decisively the chains of materiality that bound it.” (http://www.theblazingstart.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-pot-of-incense-some-brief-comments.html)

THE LIGHT IS THE SUPREME ARCHITECT OF THE UNIVERSE AND HIS SUBLIME POWER. It is the Logos, the Word of God, set ablaze and delivered to mankind by, to the Christian, the Holy Spirit. The Light, to speak Qabbalistically, is that which flows into the first sephira (Kether) and thence through the other sephirot; it is the “pressure” which forces this flow.  The Light is Truth. The Light is Knowledge, and self-Knowledge.  It is gnosis in its most complete sense.  The Light is perfect balance; it is everything and no-thing all at once.  The Light is the Blazing Star set on the field of black-and-white checkerwork.  Know it by its antitheses: ignorance, malice, envy, imprudence, impurity, unforgivingness, selfishness, sensuality, and materiality.  Union with the Light was the First State of man, and it is the whole aim and business of this earthly existence to establish again ourselves in that lofty realm.  In ancient days, this was the operation and purpose of the Mysteries; a shade of such persists in our day as Freemasonry.

Very well for the Light…but who is Lucifer?  Lucifer is MOSES.  Lucifer is JESUS.  Lucifer is PROPHET MOHAMED.  Lucifer is SIDDARTHA GAUTAMA and the subsequent BUDDHAS.  Lucifer is GURU NANAK and the GURUS that followed him, and so on.

Thus should Lucifer be venerated, not reviled.

“Lucifer” is the archetypical Light Bearer – a soul that has shed Truth upon mankind; it is not the name of an hubristic angel cast out of Heaven, but rather an honorific, a title rightly belonging to the great teachers of our race – those who have been bridges between the Spark of Deity entombed within us and the ineffable fury that is Deity. In this sense, these Great Ones are avatars of the Light.

Now, for a bit of mysticism.  As earlier discussed, the Hebrew word translated by Jerome into “Lucifer” is “heylel.” (H1966 in Strong’s Concordance).  “Heylel”is הֵילֵל in Hebrew.  These Hebrew characters (from right to left) are He, Yud, Lamed, and Lamed.  Gematriacally (as each Hebrew character also has a numerical value) we have (again, from right to left) 5+10+30+30 = 75.  Refining the numerical value further, let us sum the digits (7 and 5) and arrive at 12…the sum of whose digits leaves us with the number 3 – three being the number of Deity (the Triune God to Christians).  It is noteworthy that the third card of the Tarot is the Empress, which, in the “B.O.T.A. Tarot Deck” (B.O.T.A. stands for “Builders of the Adytum – a school of the Western Mystery Tradition founded by occultist Paul Foster Case.  The B.O.T.A. Tarot Deck revealed the Golden Dawn’s Tarot-card-and-Hebrew-character associations) bears the Hebrew character “daleth” – thought to be a pictogram of a door.  Does Lucifer present us with a door – a door to gnosis?

Returning full-circle:

“When the Mason learns that the key to the warrior on the block is the proper application of the dynamo of living power, he has learned the mystery of his Craft. The seething energies of Lucifer are in his hands, and before he may step onward and upward, he must prove his ability to properly apply energy.”  

Given what we now know of the Light and of Lucifer, let us revise somewhat Hall’s comment by replacing a few select words:

“When the Mason learns that the key to the warrior on the block is the proper application of the dynamo of [Light], he has learned the mystery of his Craft. The seething energies of [Jesus, Mohamed, Buddha, etc.,] are in his hands, and before he may step onward and upward, he must prove his ability to properly apply energy.” 

Replacing but a few words yields a powerful, innocuous and altogether truthful statement.

On to Albert Pike: adding the lines previous and subsequent to the usually-quoted words of Pike, we have:

“The Apocalypse is, to those who receive the nineteenth Degree, the Apotheosis of that Sublime Faith which aspires to God Alone, and despises all the pomps and works of Lucifer. Lucifer, the Light-bearer! Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of Darkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! Is it he who bears the Light, and with its splendors intolerable, blinds feeble, sensual, or selfish souls? Doubt it not! for Traditions are full of Divine Revelations and Inspirations: and Inspiration is not of one Age nor of one Creed. Plato, and Philo, also, were inspired.”

Pike tells us that “The Apocalypse” (the Book of Revelation) is the Apotheosis, that is, the deification or sanctifying, of a faith which seeks only God but yet despises “the pomps and works of Lucifer.”  Here Pike is sarcastic and incendiary simultaneously, marveling that any faith seeking God could despise the work of Lucifer – of our Avataric Lucifer who dispenses Light to mankind.  Further he points to the irony of calling the Spirit of Darkness, i.e., Satan, by the name Lucifer – the “Light Bearer,” and rightly states that the Light born by Lucifer is incomprehensible and enfeebling to minds and hearts ill-prepared to receive it.   Finally, Pike echoes Hall’s sentiments by rebuking the premise that Light belongs to but a single faith.

And just as surely as the Avataric Lucifer has not been nor will be the jewel of a single age, people or creed, neither is the Light it bears exclusive to a single age, people or creed.  As Manly Hall said, “The name (of the Light-bearer) means little, for he (the Mason) recognizes only the light and not the bearer.”

Behold! I tell you a mystery (to borrow a few words from Paul in First Corinthians): our purpose is to slip the surly chains of flesh and this earthly plane, to ascend ever higher to the First Cause, the Almighty Architect of the Universe. Indeed, the one who achieves this has become a blazing torch, that “shining city on a hill.”  Such a one can claim the mantle for himself: such a one can be Lucifer.  And such a one is worthy of veneration.