FIAT LUX - SOME THOUGHTS ON MASONIC LIGHT

by John W. Alexander, WM (Britannia Lodge No. 18)


I ought to begin this paper by stating that what follows is the
fruit of my own personal search and no brother is obliged to
accept it.  For that matter, he is not obliged to accept the
findings of any other brother.  He cannot even say, ever, that
he, himself, has discovered the last word on the meaning of any
symbol or allegory, for the tapestry of Freemasonry is so rich
and so vast that no one man's lifetime is long enough to
comprehend all of it.

Masonic research can be divided into two broad categories:
Historical Masonry and Symbolic Masonry.  Now I have the greatest
respect for the Masonic archaeologists.  Their painstaking work
is slowly, but surely, filling in the blanks in our knowledge of
Masonry's origins.  However, fascinating as the development of
the Gentle Craft undoubtedly is, I am rather less concerned with
where we came from than with where we are going.  And where we
ought to be going can best be found, I feel, from a thorough
understanding of the lessons Freemasonry has to teach us.  For
that reason, my major interest lies along the Symbolic branch of
the research tree.

I have always felt that, for a Lodge of Research, this Lodge is
very appropriately named.  And so, when Worshipful Brother Jones
asked me to make a presentation, it didn't take me long to come
up with a topic.  Fiat Lux! - Let There Be Light! Three times we
hear that proclamation on our journey from the Neutral World to
the High and Sublime Degree.  A sure sign that the anonymous
brethren who compiled our ritual believed that the acquisition of
Light was the highest activity in which a man could engage.  In
keeping with this belief, therefore, I would  like to share with
you  this afternoon, some thoughts on Masonic Light: what it is,
where we can find it and how we benefit from it.

WHAT IS LIGHT?

At first glance it would appear that we should begin by asking
"What is Light?"  Over the seven years that I have lived in
Alberta, I have come to love the Ancient York Rite.  I will
strive to the utmost to defend it for I believe that it contains
the last existing vestiges of the work of our ancient Operative
brethren.  Nevertheless, I have to concede that it does have one
glaring omission.  One that our Canadian Rite brethren will
instantly recognize.  Every other ritual for the High and Sublime
degree that I have ever read or seen worked, contains the
statement: "I beg you to observe that the Light of a Master Mason
is Darkness Visible." The  Light of a Master Mason is Darkness
visible.  I put it to you, Brethren, that this is the most
accurate description of Masonic Light that you will ever find.

In keeping with our normal Masonic practice of burying our
important truths deeply, the ritual sets out immediately to
disguise this truth by speaking of in terms appropriate to
physical light: "Yet even by this feeble ray . . . etc." But, if
we interpret the statement in the light of our understanding of
the symbolic meanings of Light and Darkness, we find that, far
from being a "feeble ray," it is, in fact, a veritable
searchlight aimed at Truth.  The extent of our enlightenment is
determined by our ability to recognize ignorance or error.  So
our first question ought, more appropriately, to be not "What is
Light?" but "What is Darkness?"

For primitive man, the absence of light, by impairing his ability
to see, seemed to plunge the world into nothingness.  Thus, even
from the earliest times, we find darkness, as the negation of
light, regarded as a cause of fear and, therefore, of evil.  The
Ancient Mysteries, which coexisted with and underlay the
conventional religions of those far-off times, developed the idea
of Light as a symbol of Knowledge and Truth.  Thus we find that
they all regarded its opposite as representative of Ignorance and
Error.  It is in this form that Freemasonry, the heiress of all
the Systems of Initiation, has received the concept.

Our candidate, like those of the Ancient Mysteries, enters the
lodge room enshrouded in darkness. This is not to hide anything
from him.  After all, once he has assumed the necessary
obligations, he will be shown everything.  No, it is to impress
him with the idea that he is blind in spirit, that he lacks
knowledge, that he is in a State of Darkness.  Hopefully he comes
to understand that it was not the lodge which was darkened but he
himself and will realize the truth that he brought his own
darkness in with him! The item that we use to blindfold him is
called, Masonically, a hoodwink.  But a hoodwink means more than
a simple blindfold.  The Peerage Reference Dictionary defines the
verb 'to hoodwink' as 'to deceive' thus the candidate's condition
on entry is considered to be that of a man deceived.  Deceived by
Ignorance.

From Masonry's point of view, Ignorance is a sin. (1) It is a sin
because it promotes human unhappiness.  It is responsible for
most of the tension and unrest in the world.  Men fear what they
do not know and they hate what they fear.  Political leaders,
more interested in maintaining their positions than in promoting
peace, use their lack of knowledge to justify belligerent stances
that will encourage votes instead of going to the bargaining
table which might cost votes.  Parents, uncaring, perhaps even
unaware that parenthood is a vocation, produce undisciplined
children barely able to keep their passion in check.  Inattentive
and frequently disruptive in school, they emerge in their turn
semi-literate, bigoted, the ready targets of the next generation
of demagogues who will prey on their fears and prejudices to
foment religious and racial strife.  All the while, they produce
children of their own to perpetuate the dismal situation. 
Suspicion, dislike, envy, intolerance and a host of other
detrimental emotions are all the bitter fruit of Ignorance.

Often you'll hear them attempt to justify their lack of knowledge
with claims like "I had no opportunity to learn." or "My parents
didn't care," or "I had to leave school early." Balony! In 1826,
the great Scottish missionary doctor and explorer, David
Livingstone - and there's a name for Masons to conjure with -
went to work in a spinning mill as a 13 year old boy.  He used
his first week's wages to buy a Latin Grammar.  Propping it up
beside his machine, he taught himself Latin as he worked.  Today
we have evening classes, correspondence courses, why, you can
even get yourself a university degree without having to interrupt
your earnings.  There is no excuse for Ignorance and the only
possible reason for it is lack of application.


(1) Harry L.  Haywood,  The  Great  Teachings  of Masonry
Explained,  (Macoy Publishing, 1971) 143.

The LIght of a Master Mason is Darkness Visible.  If he can see
the effects of malice, envy and self-seeking, the corroding
influence of prejudice and intolerance, if his search for the
Lost word serves increasingly to show how much he, himself, still
has to learn, he will retain his enlightenment.  He will also
augment it.

WHERE DO WE FIND LIGHT?

The first time I spoke in this Lodge, was to make a remark to a
presentation by Brother Love who was then the worshipful master. 
Brother Love was replying to a question from the Question Box
which asked what books a new Mason could read in order to learn
about Masonry.  The tenor of my remark was that Jones, Carr,
Claudy, Haywood and Pike notwithstanding, the most important book
any new Mason could read is the one we give him when we raise
him.  It is the one which has the central position in any lodge -
The Great Light in Masonry.  The name we have given it indicates
the opinion we have of it as a source of instruction.

The Worshipful Master tells the new-born Entered Apprentice that
within the covers of the Holy Bible are contained those
principles of morality which lay the foundations upon which to
build a righteous life.  Quite properly, he does not go on to
enumerate those principles.  That isn't his business.  Nor is it
Masonry's.  Each brother must find the Lost Word for himself. 
The best he can receive from his brethren is a Substitute Word. 
However, that Substitute Word would be valueless if it did not,
at least, point the brother in the right direction, if it did
not, at least, move him one more step along his way.  That is why
we refer our new brethren to the Bible from the very beginning of
their Masonic lives.  That is our Substitute Word for them.

It has often been pointed out that the Bible is not one book, but
many. So it is.  And it was written by many people, each with his
own imagery and his own style.  John was a mystic, Moses a
lawyer, Ezekiel a dreamer and David a poet. But they all had this
in common: they were the protagonists, not spectators. Each page
in their stories was lived before it was written. Actually,
this diversity of authorship is crucial to the Bible's
credibility. Had it been written by one man only, all we would
have been able to say is that what he had written was his own
opinion.  But soldiers and statesmen, priests and sinners, kings
and shepherd boys, the  obedient and the rebellious, each living
his own life in his own way, learned the same lesson and, in
learning it, points it out to us: a man reaps what he sows,
whether the harvest be for weal or for woe.  Even  when the
harvest is sorrowful, the fact that it always comes confirms the
conclusion.

1 Hosea 6: 6
2 Jeremiah 31: 3
3 1: 5

As we read these accounts of those ancient, long-dead lives, we
become conscious of a sense of kinship with the protagonists. 
For we have known those same emotions in our own lives. Joy is
joy, pain is pain, fear is fear and death is death in every land
and in every age.  And so we conclude that if we are their kin,
if their emotions are ours, then, if we live our lives the way
they lived theirs, their rewards will be ours too.  Yet this
lesson of the iron law of destiny is suffused with reassurance. 
It comes to us as a gentle warning from a kind Father, not as an
implacable threat from an inflexible Judge. Again and again, He
sends us this message of hope: "I desire mercy, not
sacrifice."(1) "Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love."
(2) "I will not fail thee nor forsake thee." (3) And so we come
away from the Bible not with a catalogue of moral precepts, but
with a glimpse of the everlasting truth of one God who is Love
and who requires men to act justly, be merciful, keep themselves
untainted by evil and walk humbly before Him.
  
Men are said to be in pursuit of knowledge.  They are said to
search for knowledge. They are said to be on a quest for
knowledge. They describe themselves as seekers after knowledge. 
All these idioms suggest the same thing: that the knowledge
already exists but men haven't found it yet.  No man ever says he
has created knowledge, for, of course, he cannot. What he does is
to observe certain facts.  He then draws conclusions from these
facts, tests the conclusions in practice and, when they are
proven to be true, he calls the conclusions knowledge.  Our
ritual tells us that knowledge is obtained by degrees and that
wisdom dwells in contemplation.  This tells us straight away that
there is a distinction between the two.  Of course, we could work
that out for ourselves anyway.  After all, it was knowledge that
gave us the use of tobacco.  Given its effects on our hearts and
lungs, by no stretch of the imagination could it be called
wisdom.  Knowledge taught us to refine iron and then to smelt it,
to make steel.  But steel can be used as readily to make swords
as to make ploughshares.  And the same principles of aerodynamics
that keep a 747 in the air, kept the Lancaster bomber there, too. 
Knowledge is not an unmixed blessing.  It blesses or curses us
according to how it is used.  And the discoverer is not always
the eventual user.  Moreover, the uses to which his work is put
are not always what the discoverer intended.  Einstein is reputed
to have said that had he known that the Theory of Relativity
would have been helpful in making an atomic bomb, he would rather
have been a locksmith than a physicist.

Knowledge, you see is only half the story.  It is only the
awareness that certain facts are true.  The other half - the more
important half - is the understanding of the implications of that
awareness; the understanding of how the data are connected; how
the facts relate to one another, how they affect one another and
how their application will affect men and their environment. 
This understanding is what we call wisdom.  It can be measured by
the use to which knowledge is put, the user showing more or less
wisdom according to whether his use of the knowledge helps or
harms his fellows.

If this is true of physical knowledge, how much more so is it
true of spiritual knowledge or enlightenment.  A wise brother
describes wisdom in this way: "Merely to know certain facts about
the hidden side of life profits nothing, unless the knowledge is
allowed to influence and adapt our method of living to the truths
disclosed." Then the knowledge becomes transmuted into wisdom.(1)

(1) Walter L. Wilmshurst, The Meaning of Masonry, (Bell
Publishing Company, 1980), 182.

The Light of a Master Mason which is Darkness Visible will enable
us to measure how much or how little progress we have made in
allowing our lives to be adapted and influenced by the message
about God's requirement of us which we found in the Bible.

THE BENEFITS OF LIGHT

Brotherly Love is the Principal Tenet of our Profession.  It is
the subject of the first instruction every Freemason receives. 
It is also one of the Great Truths, which can be deduced by the
fact that the ritual disguises it; in this case by speaking of it
in terms of alms-giving.  Charity has nothing to do with
alms-giving.  It comes from the Latin word "caritas" which means
"Love." Caritas is also the root of our verb "to care."
Alms-giving may, from time to time, be a part of loving or caring
but it is never the whole of it.

More than half of the New Testament comes from the pen of an
itinerant Jewish tent-maker called Paul of Tarsus.  There can be
no doubt that he was an initiate of one of the Great Mysteries
because even the most casual scan of his writings reveals that
they are peppered with allusions to Initiation symbolism.  If you
require further confirmation, read the Epistle to the Ephesians
in the light of your understanding of the symbolic meanings of
Light and Darkness.

For our purposes, this afternoon, I would like you to consider
the thirteenth chapter of his first Epistle to the Corinthians. 
How many of us have come away from Paul's great exposition of
Love with the feeling that stately, almost musical, even, as the
English may be, it describes an ideal impossible to achieve?

I put it to you, Brethren, that this conclusion arises from the
fact that few of us understand what Love really is.  For most of
us, it means the pink-clouds-bells-and-rosy feeling we experience
when we discover that the word 'girl' can also be spelled with a
capital 'G.' To use psychological language, this condition arises
from a spontaneous collapse of the ego boundaries, and
psychologists call it 'cathexis.' Sooner or later, the ego
boundaries reestablish themselves.  When that  happens, the
unenlightened may feel that he has "fallen out of love." Since
most marriages and other similar liaisons nowadays are contracted
on the basis of cathexis rather than love, this may be the reason
why so many of them end in more or less acrimonious separation. 
But, until the ego boundaries are back in place, the effect of
their absence is to foster the belief that one can take the
cathected object - usually another person - inside oneself, to
contain them, as it were.  This is where cathexis differs from
Love.  If something is contained, enclosed, it cannot grow.  And
growth is the birthright of every living creature.  If I contain
another person, I prevent that person from developing spiritually
except, perhaps, in a manner or direction that is acceptable to
me.  And that might not be acceptable to them.

With this in mind, let's reread Paul's thesis.  This time with
Love shorn of its romantic trappings.  Now we see that the
descriptive clauses are not things to be felt, but things to be
done.  Love is not a feeling, not an emotional experience, but an
act of will.  Love is the will to extend oneself for the purpose
of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth. (1) The
desire to contain another, the characteristic of cathexis, is the
antithesis of Love.

God works for man through man and seldom, if at all, in any other
way. (2) The facile explanation that we give the Entered
Apprentice in the North East Corner, that he is deprived of
minerals and metals to remind him of his poor and penniless
situation when approached by another for assistance, is true only
at the shallowest level of understanding.  There is another,
deeper, lesson here.  He is deprived of material wealth to teach
him that, despite what he lacks, he still has himself to give. 
And the gift of himself is the best gift he can give.  Material
poverty is of no consequence.  A man who is broken-hearted, who
is spiritually destitute, is in the most abject poverty
regardless of how much material wealth he commands.  And, if a
loving brother gives himself to the comfort of such a man, he has
given a greater gift than all the treasure of SKI and HKT
combined.

We cannot be unjust to someone we love.  It is impossible to be
unmerciful to someone we love.  We will automatically subordinate
our own needs and desires for the promotion of those of someone
we love.  So we may conclude that Justice, Mercy and Humility are
attributes of Love.  They are also attributes of God, even
humility, which He shows in His offer to us of kinship with Him. 
Notice, further, that we learned in the last section that God
desires us to display these God-attributes in our dealings with
our fellows.  These are the qualities they desire Him to show to
them so what He is doing is offering us the chance of doing His
job, of being partners with Him in running the universe.  He is
also asking us to be God-like ourselves.  And since we know that
He would never expect us to do anything we were not capable of,
we have to conclude that it is possible for us to be God-like.

To carry out this work, we have to Love our fellows, that is, we
have to extend ourselves for the purpose of nurturing their
spiritual growth.  Remember that this is an act of will,
Brethren, not one of emotion.  Nevertheless, we still have to
achieve a personal transformation.  The Lecture of the First
Degree tells us that Love is the greatest rung on the Symbolic
Ladder. Why? Faith can be lost in sight.  Once we have assurance,
we no longer need faith.  Hope can end in fruition. Once we have
achieved our desire, we no longer need to hope for it.  Faith and
Hope imply a desire to get something.  Love, on the other hand,
requires that we give something.  As we achieve the
transformation, as we cease to be creatures of getting and become
creatures of giving, our understanding of each other grows, our
fear and suspicion of each other departs, our differences
diminish and we realize that we are one, that we are united and
that we always have been.  And so, as we participate in the
spiritual growth of our fellow men, we grow spiritually ourselves
and we prove that in giving we have received.  In dying to our
own personalities we become one with the life of the universe. 
As the Lecture puts it, Love extends beyond the grave through the
boundless realms of eternity.


(1) M. Scott Peck M.D., The Road Less Travelled (Simon & Shuster,
1987), 81.

(2) Alphonse Cerza, A Masonic Thought for every day in the Year
(The Missouri Lodge of Research, 1972), 6.

The Light of a Master mason, which is Darkness Visible once again
shows us how well we have achieved the personal transformation by
revealing how much justice, mercy and humility we still have to
achieve in our dealings with our fellow men.

Moses Maimonides was a rabbi who lived from about 1131 till about
1209 of the Christian Era.  We don't know if he was a Mason, but
given the antisemitic prejudice of those days and the exclusively
Roman Catholic character of the Operative Craft, it is very
likely he was not.  Nevertheless, speaking of profound religious
truths in the Mishne Torak, which he wrote, he describes the germ
of the Masonic method of teaching:

"The sages of old have directed that no one shall expound these
subjects except to a single person, who must also be wise and
intelligent by his own knowledge; and after that, we may only
give him the outlines, and convey to him mere hints on the
subject, and he, being intelligent by his knowledge, may become
acquainted with the end and depth of the matter." (1)

Although there is more than one person here, I believe I am being
true to that ancient injunction by submitting this paper to
Masonic Brethren, I thank you for your patient hearing and hope
that I may have inspired you to set your Fellowcraft tools to the
perfecting of this rough ashlar.


(1) Robert Race, "Genuine Ancient Landmarks" in British Masonic
Miscellany Vol. I (David Winter and Son, 1917), 134.


Bibliography

Mackey, A. G. Encyclopaedia of Freemasonry.  Chicago: The Masonic
History Company, 1927.

Haywood, H. L. The Great Teachings of Masonzy Explained.
Richmond: Macoy Publishing, 1986.

Hammond, W. E. What Masonry Means. Richmond: Macoy Publishing,
1975.

Wilmshurst, W. L. The meaning of Masonry. New York: Bell
Publishing Company, 1980.

Cerza, Alphonse. "A Masonic Thought for Every Day in the Year."
The Missouri Lodge of Research, 1972.

---British Masonic Miscellany. Vol. I. Dundee: David Winer and
son, 1917.

Peck, M. Scott. The Road Less Travelled.  New York: Simon &
Shuster, 1978.

Jampolsky, G. G. Love is Letting go of Fear. New York: Bantam
Books, 1985.

---Holy Bible, King James version.

---Peerage Reference Dictionary. London: Octopus Books Ltd., 
1986.

TRAVELLING MASONS

One of the members of FIAT LUX Lodge of Research is the subject
of the following news item.

August 29, 1987 will be recorded as a day of a unique event in
the history of Freemasonry in Tasmania.  At the semi-annual
Communication held in Hobart, four brethren received their
commissions as Grand Representatives of other jurisdictions. One
was V. W. Bro.  John L. Girard, who received his commission as
Grand Representative of the Grand Lodge of Manitoba, at the hands
of R. W. Bro.  Brian Roundtree of our Mystery Lodge No. 174, who
personally presented it to him.

Bro. Rountree is in Tasmania on a Teacher Exchange Program for
1987.  He is teaching Grade 4 at Rocherlea Primary in the city of
Launceston.  He has enjoyed the opportunity of visiting the many
lodges in the area,  having attended 12 of 15 city lodges and
seven in towns outside the  city. Bro. Rountree has been invited
to speak to five lodges about Masonry in Canada, and particularly
Manitoba.  He tells us that many of the concerns in Manitoba
(membership, funds), are evident in Tasmania.  He will be
returning to his teaching post in Thompson MB in January 1988.

From "Masonry in Manitoba."



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