‘Freemasonry as a Way of Awakening’

    

Through the kind offices of Bro. Michael Arce and the team at Craftsmen Online, my review of Rémi Boyer’s Freemasonry as a Way of Awakening appears in that website’s blog section as of yesterday, and I reprint it here today. Make sure you peruse the entire site. The podcast episodes are essential listening. My thanks to the principals for welcoming my attempted writing.

FREEMASONRY AS A WAY OF AWAKENING

BY RÉMI BOYER

ROSE CIRCLE PUBLICATIONS 2020, 142 PAGES, PAPERBACK, $19.95

France’s Rémi Boyer has immersed himself for decades in studying philosophies and initiatory rites, among other things, and has authored a book for understanding Freemasonry. His knowledge and experience lead him to see Masonic initiation as metaphysical, and his prose is patient and instructive, but while Freemasonry as a Way of Awakening presents brilliantly conceived and stated ideas, it may confound Freemasons of the Anglo-American tradition—that is to say, most of us.

The first two paragraphs prime the reader:

“From the outset, let’s state the paradox. Initiation is not thought of, it manifests itself, it is realized, outside of all linearity conducive to thought in which the person de-realizes himself. Initiation is ‘unstoppable’ only in a state of non-thought. Silence is required. The more the literature devotes pages to the subject, the more the so-called initiatory orders multiply and the less they encounter, not only ‘initiates,’ but the ‘initiatables,’ who themselves are rare. Time is confusing while the initiatory ushers in fusion with Being. 

“Initiation is by nature indefinable, elusive as the Spirit. Always, it is an initiation to one’s own original nature or ultimate reality, to the Real, to the Absolute, to the Divine, to what remains, no matter the words, since, precisely ‘there,’ there are no words.”

So, you see, 2B1ASK1 is not a consideration here. Boyer writes of and for the Egyptian Rite.

Likewise, our notions of receiving Light and of “making good men better” are blurry in Boyer’s vision. It’s not that they are contrary or unimportant goals, but this author likens initiation to art. He sees those two as avenues for “controlled madness, madness that allows the overcoming of the limits of the conditioned person.”

Masonic initiation, as Boyer recommends, is comprised of seven stages: the request for initiation; analysis of the request; passage under the blindfold; initiation instruction and orientation to the tradition; the “first” initiation; the initiatory work; and evaluation. As a blindfold conjures a familiar image and key aspect of our own rituals, I’ll skip to No. 3 and explain what Boyer intends. Employing the blindfold is not so much to keep the candidate in a state of darkness until the moment comes to bring him to Light; the blindfold here indicates “a plunge conducted by the candidate into the darkness of self.” It is akin to the alchemical decomposition of raw matter, and the unmasking heralds the start of awakening. “It must leave a slight crack in the continuity of the person” so that initiation will “turn this slight crack into a fissure” and the deeper the fissure, the deeper it descends into the depths of the psyche, and the more it allows the radiance of the light of Being.”

To be sure, there are passages of this book that ring clearly to the Anglo-American Masonic ear. Chapter 8 is titled “Dysfunctions in the Initiatory Process,” and it begins with a description familiar to many of us: “Internal struggles, competitions between organizations, the ‘professionalization’ and ‘commodification’ of initiation are commonplace. They reflect the radical break with traditional rules and principles and the lack of initiatory work by the leaders of these organizations more concerned with their careers than with their awakening.” Still, even these disappointments can be overcome, Boyer explains, by those on a quest who can see beyond the habits of fallible people.

Where our Freemasonry prescribes moral lessons to make a good man better, Boyer shows us a different way down the Masonic path. Actually, there isn’t a single path, as “the initiate is always at the center of an infinity of possible paths.” It’s about psychology, and the context of everything must be respected. The potential candidate for initiation must not be regarded only as someone seeking admittance, but he has to be considered as a person with a psyche shaped by age, social and economic status, family life, any traumatic past experience, and other factors that cause the interviewer “to harmonize himself” with the petitioner. Even the generations and geography are significant (time and space are important understandings in this book), as the author plainly points out how seeking Masonic membership in Paris today is very different from when the city was held by Nazi forces during World War II.

The lengthiest, by far, and possibly most illustrative chapter of the book is devoted to questions that you might have for the author. In fact, they are questions put to Boyer in seminars he conducted in Europe. From “What is the ultimate function of ritual?” to “What is the true nature of the work of a venerable master?” and fifteen others all serve to enlarge finer points from the main body of the text. And then follow nearly fifty pages of appendices that, sometimes, might qualify as Too Much Information!

Freemasonry as a Way of Awakening, published in English for the first time, truly can rouse the Brother Mason of the Preston-Webb-Cross tradition to see how some brethren in Europe tend to their labors. It’s never a question of one way is superior to another. As always with Boyer, context is crucial, as “initiation in a lake village does not rely on the myths that underlie a mountain initiation.”

     

‘Review: The Contemplative Lodge’

     

Through the kind offices of Michael Poll, editor in chief of The Journal of the Masonic Society, my review in the current issue of Chuck Dunning’s latest book appears here too.

The Contemplative Lodge: A Manual for Masons Doing Inner Work Together by C.R. Dunning, Jr.

Stone Guild Publishing, 2021, 312 pages, paperback, $14.95

 

This reviewer must begin with a disclaimer: He purported to speak to Masonic audiences in recent years on mindfulness techniques for lodge life, but he would have been far better equipped had he been able to digest the contents of this brand new book.

 

The Contemplative Lodge by C.R. “Chuck” Dunning is a companion to his Contemplative Masonry from 2016.Where the latter guides a Freemason on how to adapt Masonic ritual and symbol for personal meditative purposes, the new book serves as a lodge of instruction,uniting groups of brethren in prayer, meditation, breathing exercises and other mindfulness habits conducive to Masonic labors. Dunning has been writing on these subjects for decades. In his professional career in higher education and mental health, as well as in Freemasonry, he teaches meditation techniques to groups and individuals. He was raised to the Sublime Degree in 1988, and he is very well known around the United States as a Masonic educator and author.

 

The Contemplative Lodge is understood in two denominations: First, its three chapters, spanning about 100 pages, beautifully explain how and why Masonic lodges can add a previously unknown reward to their work by embracing meditative techniques. It’s not that the author reinvents Masonry as meditation class as much as he directs our attention to what already is in the language and symbols we know so well. The ensuing two-thirds of the book offer four appendices that provide the actual instruction on meditation, chanting, energy work, and more.

 

The opening chapter forcefully argues the belief that Masons are taught repeatedly to work together. Dunning quotes from the three degrees and from authors of classic and contemporary books not to point out the obvious, but to find context for his vision of the lodge as a contemplative group. He cautions us against overzealousness in advocating for contemplative practices; admonishes us to not see these practices as hallmarks of an elite Freemasonry; and reminds us that every Mason is to be respected and loved even if these meditative techniques do not interest him. In short, he says, proper applications of the Compasses, Level, and Trowel.

 

One of the highlights of the second chapter is in Dunning’sexplanation of Masonic ritual work as a group contemplative act. “The entire process of preparing for and opening a meeting or ceremony is a series of exercises in establishing a proper atmosphere and attitude for each participant to become more fully aware of the ritual’s multilayered symbolism in words, images, and actions,” he writes. “In turn, the specific form of a given meeting or ceremony makes use of numerous methods to draw attention to particular focal points, stimulating the psyche to dwell on their potential meanings in one’s life.” While a certain kind of Mason would say “Yes, of course,” it is true that most Masons would find that statement revelatory.

 

Chapter Three is for the Master of the lodge. Dunning acknowledges the need for common sense management of our fraternity’s worldly business, but his trestle board really teaches how a Worshipful Master’s duties are mentoring as an initiator, mentoring as a teacher, and mentoring as a companion. Familiar concepts, yes, but he presents them in an alternative understanding.

 

Those four appendices contain the marrow, giving step-by-step instruction for the willing lodge. If the reader accepts Dunning’s proposition that the Masonic lodge’s speculative teachings and ritualized activities are meant for more than memorization and even study for comprehension, then it becomes plain to see how speculation and reflection produce a “focused, peaceful, and harmonious state of mind” in the present moment.

 

One section presents Eight Steps of Guided Meditation, useful whether addressing one individual or a group. There also are various scripts one may follow to facilitate group meditations. These center on very familiar Masonic symbols and other elements, such as the Gavel, the Blazing Star, the Mystic Tie (naturally), and Jacob’s Ladder.

 

Pages are devoted to Silent Sitting, which is not as simple as you might think. Conversely, the Chanting Meditations set certain melodic words to labor as intonations that can only cure any emotional or psychological mood that otherwise may spoil a brother’s time in lodge. (Your reviewer can vouch for this thanks to work in an esoteric order where this sort of chanting induces a gentle euphoria. He is smiling involuntarily now merely from thinking about it.)

 

I would prefer to quote extensively from The Contemplative Lodge, but I’ll just delve into Energizing the Plumb Line on Page 251: First, extensive breathing exercises defeat any tension there might be throughout the body until a rhythmic respiration calms the mind. Then, the participants are instructed to “imagine a plumb line, a small straight line of brilliant white light running into the top of your head from the highest heavens, and down through your body into the depths of the Earth…like a magnetic or electrical current flowing…. Feel the pure white light as warm, cleansing, healing, and energizing.” After further instruction, participants are to “stop circulating the energy and breathe naturally, continuing to imagine the brilliant white plumb line running through your body between the highest heavens and the center of the Earth. Attend to any effects this work has on your body, emotions, and thoughts.” You may never see the jewel of the Junior Warden, who governs the time of refreshment, quite the same way again.

 

For the Freemason who views his Craft as a mystery school, The Contemplative Lodge delivers essential vindicating reading, while the brother for whom Masonry is a fraternity can enhance his profit and pleasure through Dunning’s instructive emphasis on how brethren can achieve inner work together. All the brethren can dwell together in unity.

      

‘How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll’

     
My review, in the December issue of The Working Tools magazine, of Season of the Witch: How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll by Peter Bebergal and published by Tarcher/Penguin.

A significant anthropological weight is found in the pages of Peter Bebergal’s new book, Season of the Witch: How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll. Naturally, the thesis lends itself to all kinds of potential exploitation—of which there are ample risks in the art of the dust jacket, with its headshots of David Bowie, Ozzy Osbourne, and Jimmy Page surrounded by various op-art and mystical geometric designs—but the author adheres to a factual chronology of impressive scope. It is worth noting Peter Bebergal’s explanation of what inspired his work; I imagine readers age 40 and up can only smile and nod in remembrance and approbation.

“In 1978 my older brother had just joined the Air Force, leaving me access to the mysteries of his room. Some other secret thing was beckoning. I had caught glimpses when I heard the music coming from his room, so different from my own small collection of Bay City Rollers and Bee Gees 45s. The record collection was a lexicon of the gods: the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, Arthur Brown, King Crimson, Hawkwind, Yes, Black Sabbath, and Pink Floyd.”

Then in six chapters of cogently organized narrative, albeit from secondary sources, Bebergal renders both a history of rock music and a quick study of alternative religions and occultism. As he puts it: “I also hope to reveal that these musicians are human after all and their magical and mystical aspirations are a microcosm of a greater American spiritual hunger.”

We know what rock and roll is, but the term “occult” poses a challenge because of its true definitions and popular usages. From Western Mystery Traditions to witchcraft, and from Eastern faiths to New Age practices, the word is an abused catch-all, which is unfortunate, but the author sticks to a clear meaning without judgment: “A set of practices and beliefs—some stretching back to antiquity, others of a more recent vintage—that attempt to understand reality (spiritual or otherwise) in a way traditional religious practice cannot or chooses not to explore.” That established, Bebergal decodes the varied clues found in the recorded music, packaging art, and live performances of rock and roll bands that have been so important to so many. Freemasons and music fans can delight in seeing the intersections of favorite songs and spiritual paths.

Speaking of intersections, perhaps the legendary crossroads where bluesman Robert Johnson was said to have made his Faustian deal is the starting point, but while Johnson’s meeting with the devil is the best known, it is merely a landmark in a trans-Atlantic journey. The flow-chart begins with Africa before and during the slave trade where, the author explains, “the power of the spirit world is most dramatically revealed in the African traditions that allowed the faithful to be overtaken—possessed—by the gods. Percussion and dance are the means by which the spirit reveals itself, and since each spirit had its own name and personality, the style of dance is a clue as to which spirit had manifested. The shouting and dancing are a result of the worshipper being ‘mounted by the god.’ When the deity inhabits the person, his or her own identity is subsumed.” Having a more direct relationship to the subject at hand is Eshu, “a West African Yoruba god” who can bestow supernatural powers on a musician. Evolving in Haiti is Papa Legba, a deity in the vodou tradition. The imposition of Christianity upon slaves from Africa led to the transformation of these figures to the devil of Western belief. Simultaneously, as the slaves in the New World were prohibited from using drums, percussion was provided by clapping hands and stomping feet, while singing embraced complementary cadences, most notably the back-and-forth of “call and response” and The Shout. Such musical expression was one limited measure of freedom permitted to slaves, but it would produce a global popular culture of shed inhibitions and uncontrolled creativity. The midwife was, of all things, Christianity.

“The post-Civil War African-American churches saw the devil everywhere,” Bebergal explains. “Secular music and dancing were particularly questionable. But in an effort to keep the devil at bay, congregations still used the methods of worship adopted by slaves, what the historian Eileen Southern calls ‘the hand clapping, foot stomping, call-and-response performance, rhythmic complexities, persistent beat, melodic improvisation, heterophonic textures, percussive accompaniments, and ring shouts.’” The author does note the irony of how these musical releases of religious zeal managed to migrate to white people’s churches. For brevity, it is necessary to fast forward to the 1950s, when Elvis Presley first appears on The Ed Sullivan Show, and the director had to censor the singer’s carnal gyrations for fear of corrupting American youth. At issue for the author actually is the irony of how the Pentecostal Church—an offshoot of which was the Presley family’s church—led the charge against Elvis and his music, while Pentecostalism is known for its own music, dance, and speaking in tongues to make a direct connection to God. “The devil should not be allowed to keep all this good rhythm,” one Pentecostal leader is quoted saying. For his part, Presley would explain in interviews how the church protests against him, which included public burnings of his records, were senseless since his music was inspired by the church worship of his youth. Concurrently, Little Richard, a Seventh-day Adventist, excelled in a flamboyant showmanship that made Presley’s sensuality look sleepy.

Of course the title of this book is lifted from the Donovan song released in 1966. The Scottish singer is best known as a folkie who crafted catchy pop songs, but this tune has a dark countenance flavored with a pre-Christian paganism and a hypnotic rhythm. Years later, he would call it “Celtic-rock.” Led Zeppelin would make the most of this theme, producing music both of primal 12-bar blues and elegant acoustic tones with lyrics evoking “Tolkien, Arthurian lore, and Celtic mythology” all presented to the listener in packaging that employs esoteric symbols. It wasn’t a veneer of pretense; this is the band which the author described in a recent radio interview as “the 800-pound gorilla” to be reckoned with when examining occultism in rock music. Guitarist Jimmy Page ostensibly was a follower of Aleister Crowley, collecting rare books authored by the infamous mystic, and even purchasing a mansion Crowley once had owned. If you have an old LP of Led Zeppelin III, look for the Crowley quote inscribed in the lead-out area of the vinyl. Rosicrucians of all stripes could have an appreciation for the title of Zep’s fifth record, Houses of the Holy. And of course an entire chapter could be written about the untitled fourth record—the one with “Stairway to Heaven;” the one with gatefold art unquestionably borrowing from the Hermit card of the Rider-Waite tarot deck; and the one labeled with runes, one chosen as a personal symbol by each of the four band members.

Most readers attracted to this book probably would know that already. Season of the Witch provides more that probably is less celebrated. Theatric singer Arthur “god of hellfire” Brown employed make-up, wardrobe, lighting and props on stage that the author likens to initiation into a magical order, like Golden Dawn. Hawkwind, more of an English eccentricity than a major act that filled football stadiums, excelled in music and live performance that evoked “science-fantasy mythology.” Their second album’s songs “tell tales of journeys into the psyche.” Sun Ra, the avant-garde composer and bandleader, fashioned a musical identity that tapped into “Kabbalah, numerology, and science fiction” that, among other things, pined for a home for African-Americans on another planet to escape oppression. Closer to earth, the artist Roger Dean, famous for his spellbinding album covers for Yes in the 1970s, is shown telling an admirer that his artwork is to be appreciated for masterful form, not mystical function. The newly disillusioned fan replies “What do you know? You’re just the artist!”

It is not enough to have performers exhibiting degrees of occult knowledge in their acts. What of the effects on the fan? David Bowie has reinvented his persona so many times that it is difficult today to appreciate what he portrayed 40 years ago, but Bebergal takes us back.

“In the history of rock, there is likely no truer magician than Bowie, as he has come to personify how magic works. As noted, in stage magic those in the audience allow themselves to be tricked, to be seduced by the illusion, just as in ritual and ceremonial magic, where a similar phenomenon is at play and is an important effect in conducting the events and rituals within the context of a group, community, or fraternity. There is a shared, often tacit, language agreed upon by the group; its power evident in the way a neophyte will accept the language or other coded acts implicitly, such as when an apprentice Freemason is given the first handshake, or ‘grip,’ and without hesitation accepts it so.”

It is not contradictory to the book’s thesis to say this, but the reasonable conclusion the reader will draw is that overall, the many esoteric spiritual and metaphysical sources discussed in these pages had no lasting effects on the artists themselves. I do not say that, for example, George Harrison lacked sincerity in his embrace of Eastern spirituality, or that Elvis was phoning it in on his gospel records, but we’re mostly talking dabbling here. I am sorry to report there is no group of Freemasons or Rosicrucians or what-have-you that was devoted to espousing the tenets of any particular system of hidden wisdom. There are influences, but they generally are shallow and temporary, and they competed with countless other forces that inspired these musicians. The gods of rock mostly were attracted to mystical iconography more than to the esoteric teachings and practices the symbols represent. I would have loved to learn that King Crimson derived its name from alchemy, but that is a question unanswered and unasked despite the print devoted to the group and its music. Still Season of the Witch is a valuable catalog of many favorite musicians and their respective curiosities about occult beliefs. If you lived youth in the late twentieth century and devoured rock music in orthopraxy, and then grew up and found credible sources of hidden wisdom and spirituality, then Peter Bebergal’s book is a colorful connector of dots. Enjoy the reminiscence and the novel point of view.
     

‘Book review: Brothers of a Vow’

     

Through the kind offices of Bro. Cory Sigler, editor and publisher of The Working Tools magazine, my review of Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch’s Brothers of a Vow appears in the August issue and here too. It took me four years to get this done (long story) and into print, so I offer it here for Flashback Friday.


Brothers of a Vow: Secret Fraternal Orders and the Transformation of White Male Culture in Antebellum Virginia
By Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch
The University of Georgia Press, 2010
ISBN-13: 978-0-8203-3227-7
181 pp.


In a concise history of only 123 pages (with another 56 for Appendix, Endnotes, and Bibliography) researcher Dr. Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch, History Department Chair of University of Michigan-Flint, focuses on a specific, but hugely revealing aspect of fraternal life in America. She illustrates what it meant to be a member of an exclusive fraternal order in Virginia during the decades leading to the U.S. Civil War, a period of great socio-economic and political change that recast white masculine identity in the South’s largest slave-based economy. By delving into membership records of Freemasonry, Odd Fellows, and Sons of Temperance, as well as historical archives and news accounts of the Old Dominion in the early nineteenth century, the author shows how fraternal life within the lodge and daily life without dramatically influenced each other, giving rise to a civil society striving for modernity. Brothers of a Vow is presented in three parts. First comes the context of white male society in antebellum Virginia. It’s not what you may think. Economic opportunity, civil rights, and advantageous social status were enjoyed nearly exclusively by the propertied, wealthy elites. Secondly, she assesses the force that fraternities there exerted in society by imparting their values and conferring measures of status on their members. The secret societies created a reality wherein one’s character and conduct could win him a better life, infusing momentum into the parchment promises of all men being equal. In the third act, Pflugrad-Jackisch reconciles those two dynamics to show the emergence in the 1850s of a new Virginia driven by increased prosperity and liberalized civil rights, and a return to the public square of fraternal orders’ proud brethren. The significance of her findings is impressive, especially since the reader knows of the disaster looming in the ensuing decade.

Antebellum Virginia’s socio-economic transition is key to the story. Fraternity members today tend not to think how the world outside impacts their lodges, except in extreme upheavals like the Morgan Affair and economic collapse, but changes in civil society affect secret societies. An Indiana Freemason may grumble about the fraternity’s prohibition of alcohol, without realizing the Grand Lodge enacted the rule at a time in the late nineteenth century when the temperance movement swayed millions to shun liquor. Your lodge may opt for electric tapers about the altar not from aesthetic ineptitude, but because the fire marshal or the insurance agent says so. Your lodge’s tax status is the result of the Internal Revenue Code of the United States, not your treasurer. So too in pre-Civil War Virginia, forces beyond any man’s or group’s control decided the futures of Freemasonry, Odd Fellowship, and the Sons of Temperance.

“If Virginia had remained a primarily agrarian society throughout the antebellum era,” the author postulates, “perhaps the herrenvolk democracy [government by ethnic/racial majority] that proslavery advocates envisioned would have fostered harmony among white men. During the 1840s, however, the state underwent a series of important social, economic, and political transformations that altered the nature of its society, hastened its transition to a market economy, and engendered the growth of towns and cities.” During the 1830s, about 80 percent of white, male Virginians were employed in agriculture, but change, driven by construction of roads, canals, railways, and other infrastructure, created a new economy. Virginia’s cities became interconnected, and trade with Washington, Philadelphia, and Baltimore became common for merchants. Communications with cities further north was inevitable. Upward mobility allowed some artisans and mechanics to quickly improve their standings by becoming shopkeepers and factory owners. The middle class. “Between 1830 and 1850, urban centers across the state expanded, and the free white populations of Richmond and Petersburg doubled as young white male cabinetmakers, carriage makers, blacksmiths, hatters, and other artisans moved to cities in order to fulfill the growing needs of middle-class consumers. Work for skilled tradesmen abounded in urban areas as new warehouses, marketplaces, and other physical structures had to be constructed to keep pace with the new market economy in Virginia. Skilled white laborers also found work in small factories, flour mills, and iron foundries, and as overseers in tobacco factories, while a new class of merchants, shopkeepers, agents, clerks, and other businessmen grew up around the state’s expanding commercial sector.” Those who did not prosper in the new market economy included many white men who were relegated to unskilled labor and to competing with slaves who were hired out by their owners to fill specialized labor tasks. Whichever fate one faced, what was inevitable was the closing window of opportunity to become a property owner through farming and slave-owning. The new Virginia white male depended less on prestigious family name and title to land, and more on his own wits, industry, and moral fiber.

In this social and economic revolution, with thousands of men leaving their hometowns for the promise of better days in cities, these rootless strangers were compelled to make their own identities in ways as virtuous as possible. A man’s word was his bond in personal and commercial matters, making his cultivation of reputation essential for success anywhere. The lodge, Masonic or other, was a force for ensuring the quality of men. The process for joining a Masonic lodge then was much as it is today, although with tougher scrutiny of who eventually would be initiated. “Investigations and those who vouched for the character of applicants were asked to consider whether or not they would feel comfortable lending the applicant large sums of money, if they could trust him to protect and ‘intermingle’ with their families in times of crisis (particularly their wives and daughters), and if, upon their death, they would trust the applicant to visit their bedside or oversee their funeral arrangements.”

This quality control paid dividends, as lodge brothers, without necessarily knowing each other, were confident in one another’s stability and reliability because their fraternal orders were based on equality and merit. Simultaneously, in the fraternities’ interactions with the public, it was made clear that the selective nature of lodge membership meant that lodge members constituted a choice stratum of society. “The fraternities stressed the importance of a man’s integrity rather than his economic status” and served as social levelers, bringing together men who otherwise would not have had chance to know each other. In the new Virginia, it was lodge, not land, that placed value on upwardly mobile white males, and it was an identity many men craved.

Other benefits of fraternal life, of course, included the charity extended to distressed brethren, and shows of fraternal identity in public. “Sick and death benefits were another new feature of antebellum fraternalism,” says Pflugrad-Jackisch, reminding us that what we often take for granted today was not always so. “In the post-Revolutionary era, the Freemasons had provided special money to help brothers in need, raised funds to educate Masonic orphans, and buried deceased brothers. However, it was during the antebellum period that the Masons created a more centralized system for the collection and distribution of charitable funds. The Odd Fellows were the first to combine a centralized mutual benefit system with secret fraternal rituals in the late 1830s, and other newly created antebellum orders quickly followed suit.” These systems of assistance no doubt contributed to the growth of these fraternal orders at a time in history before charitable institutions and, certainly, government agencies became the vehicles for helping the needy we know today. It simply was a huge deal for a respectable, but not particularly wealthy, middle class man to have a large showing of regalia-attired mourners performing his funerary rites in full view of the public at the church graveyard, something once reserved for military figures and other honored citizens.

With this new society on the rise, it would not be possible for public laws to remain as established in the original Virginia of the early American republic and previously. The right to vote was held by those who owned land, called freeholders. Wherever you live, there is a good chance the elected legislators of your county are called freeholders, a title that dates to the time in American society when only property owners could vote and steer the power of government. But, “by creating a network of white neighborhoods, the fraternities constructed a space outside the political arena where white men could envision an alternative definition of white male independence based on men’s moral conduct rather than on the ownership of land or slaves.” The status quo in 1829 denied suffrage to white men universally because men who worked for a living “were comparable to slaves” in that both groups were “subject to the will of others for their own subsistence.” The “peasantry” could not be entrusted with political affairs. It wasn’t only about electing politicians; the right to vote decided how public monies were spent on infrastructure, resulting in the aristocratic east of Virginia benefitting from public works that made life and commerce easier. “By 1849, the calls for a new state constitution had become deafening” and the legislators of Virginia soon elected to extend suffrage to “every white male citizen of the Commonwealth of the age of twenty-one years.” The meritocracy of the lodge, where leaders were elected according to their abilities and virtues (and where discussion of partisan politics was forbidden), had been translated into basic rights for lodge members in their cities and towns.

In closing, it is necessary to explain that this book is not about slavery nor the advent of freed slaves or otherwise free black people; nor is it about the rise of Prince Hall Masonry, but obviously these racial realities figure substantially in the history of Virginia and the fraternal orders that prospered there during this specific period. Prince Hall Masonry is discussed for several pages. It is said to have existed in Virginia as early as 1845 in the form of Universal Lodge No. 1 in Alexandria, although the law clearly prohibited secret societies for black men.

This reviewer has been saying for years that some of the best books investigating Freemasonry have come from the labors of scholars outside the fraternity, and Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch’s very thoughtful analysis of antebellum Virginia is among the best even though Masonry is not its sole focus. The author has lectured for Masonic audiences in recent years, including the Scottish Rite (Northern Masonic Jurisdiction) New Perspectives on American Freemasonry and Fraternalism symposium in 2010 in Massachusetts, and the International Conference on the History of Freemasonry in 2011 in Virginia. I strongly encourage any or all of Virginia’s five lodges of Masonic research—particularly Civil War Lodge of Research No. 1865—to invite this professor to speak.
     

‘Observing the Craft’

    
Retrieved recently from a dead PC is my review of Bro. Andrew Hammer’s terrific book Observing the Craft written for The Journal of the Masonic Society. I didn’t know Hodapp already had written a review for the publication, so this review might as well have been lost in a hopelessly infected and disabled computer. But it was resurrected, with some other files, by a wizard earlier this spring, just in time to submit to Cory Sigler for his first issue of the new The New Jersey Freemason magazine, which arrived in the brethren’s mailboxes a week ago. I only had to dust it off, trim a few words, and click send.


Now, if I can get my thousands of JPGs off that computer, I’ll be a happy man.




Observing the Craft: The Pursuit of Excellence in Masonic Labour and Observance

By Andrew Hammer

Mindhive Books, 2010, 145pp.

Click here to order your copy.

Not to be confused with either Traditional Observance lodges or the Rite of Strict Observance, Andrew Hammer’s book has us cast our eyes to the East to observe his trestleboard for Masonic labors. Observing the Craft briefly and boldly reaches two key objectives: First, to show Freemasons that the rituals and symbols of the lodge impart all the Light Masonry intends, and secondly to convince the Mason that the lodge ought to be cherished, that it is worthy of his time and talents. Along the way, Hammer unflinchingly redefines Masonry’s numerous appendant, concordant, and affiliated fraternities as “distractions” that deprive lodges of the brethren’s attention; and he provides a simple formula for improving the lodge experience so that Masons can enjoy the excellence they expect and deserve. He gets that and much more done in only 145 pages, perhaps unsurprising for a Mason who shares the name of a tool made to deliver sudden, forceful impacts.

For context, it should be understood that Bro. Hammer is not a typical American Mason. A native of the United Kingdom (which explains his book’s British spelling), he is a Past Master of Alexandria-Washington Lodge No. 22, which meets inside the George Washington Masonic Memorial in Alexandria, Virginia. The ethos he helped bring to this historic lodge in the previous decade is summarized in a plain statement to prospective petitioners. I paraphrase: “The question is not ‘Can I become a Mason?’ There are many lodges in the area that will be glad to have you. The question is ‘Can I become a Mason in Alexandria-Washington Lodge?’” This is not arrogance, but it is a reason why his lodge was dubbed the Grand Lodge of Northern Virginia, a sobriquet bestowed unkindly by Virginia Masons who instead should have been taking note of A-W’s revival under the leadership of Hammer and his colleagues. In the revitalization of Masonic lodges taking place across the country in recent years, Hammer’s touch is felt thanks to his leadership in the Knights of the North think tank, The Masonic Society educational fraternity, other organized proponents of Masonic renaissance, and of course this book.

Observing the Craft is audacious in its phrasing, but its thinking is so fundamental as to be irrefutable. It is, after all, paraphrasing the teachings of the lodge. When Hammer challenges the flawed belief that more men equals a stronger fraternity, which leads to mass initiations, he says “The very essence of membership in the Craft is not about bringing people in, for whatever reason… the essence of membership in the Craft is that it must be sought.” He essentially is reminding us of the Entered Apprentice Charge, which urges us to be cautious in recommending a man to the lodge because it is the mysteries of Masonry that distinguish us from the rest of the community. And where that charge warns us against arguing with the ignorant that ridicule Masonry, Hammer insists “If we are to be consistent in that charge, then we must also not suffer ourselves to placate prying eyes or the mindless paranoia of philistines.” Not a motto for Square and Compass Day.

Addressing charity, the author describes it as “the perfection of every virtue,” something with which we all can agree, but he is fearless in making the distinction, long forgotten in Masonry, that “Masonic charity is not material benevolence. Rather, it is the spiritual and philosophical awakening which motivates it.” Does not the lecture of the First Degree instruct us, on the subject of Relief, in acts of emotional and psychological kindness?

The author also writes at length on tangible aspects of lodge life, namely dining, dress, and ritual. Of the first item, Hammer takes us to the Festive Board, a stylized Masonic meal (not to be confused with the Table Lodge) that follows the tiled meeting, but continues the decorum of that meeting. “The guiding idea is that the food should be of the same quality one would find in any fine restaurant, and it should be presented and served in a way that conveys dignity even if served on paper plates.” In ambiance, the Festive Board is a place of good cheer, where the brethren may speak candidly, offer toasts, and basically balance the solemnity of the lodge meeting with the joy of fellowship.

As regards dress, Hammer explains that attire is nothing less than a Mason’s “physical manifestation of his effort to bring his mind and soul to a state of excellence.” The specifics are best left to the lodge, but “No one should dress differently for lodge than they would to attend their house of worship or take part in any other important event in their lives.”

On ritual, it is “perhaps the single most important aspect of observing the Craft” and “what transforms a room into a lodge, the men in that room into Masons, and the profane into the sublime.” It goes without saying, so Hammer gently reminds that the performance of our rituals to the highest levels of proficiency is the primary goal, but his larger point concerns ways to “excite the curiosity of all observant Masons.” Urging us all to always work within the guidelines of our respective jurisdictions, the author suggests the following:

• Confer the degree on one man only so he makes an individual journey, and is the center of the lodge’s attention.

• Employ music to “elevate the assembly of minds gathered together” and to accentuate different aspects of ritual work at specific times. Conversely, use silence to remove all distractions from the sense of hearing. Obviously, this means no chatting on the sidelines, but also much more for the benefit of everyone’s state of mind.

• To further assist the focusing of the mind, light and darkness must be properly managed. “Darkness, like silence, concentrates the mind by removing all other distractions” and the light revealed to the candidate when the hoodwink is removed should be only “a simple flame,” so no other “competing visual images” enter his mind. That’s the moving flame of the candle, mind you, and not the kitschy “Masonic light bulb.”

• Appealing to our sense of smell, Hammer praises incense. The sense of touch can be addressed through what is called the Chain of Union, the interlocking of arms and clasping of hands to achieve “psychological and physical union” around the entire lodge room.

Clearly, to Andrew Hammer, Freemasonry is a verb. To observe the Craft is to take up the Working Tools and thoughtfully go about our labors in self-improvement, but doing so harmoniously together. It’s all explained in our rituals, lectures, charges, and other orations. The trick is to not be content with merely memorizing and reciting all that inspiring literature, and instead to animate it by doing what it advises. In his concluding paragraphs, Hammer explains “This book was written in an attempt to call the Craft from refreshment to labour. That labour involves confronting our fear with dignity; it involves standing up for the ideas of free thought and free association in the face of those who would demand we eviscerate our mysteries before their altars of cloying superficiality; it involves respecting ourselves enough to say that we must not be afraid to reach for more light within ourselves, that light of the contemplative spirit within each of us that cannot be meted out to curious bystanders just because they want to see it.”

It is the blueprint – if you will, the designs upon the trestleboard – for a successful lodge of skilled craftsmen. How many of us will heed the sound of the gavel?

    

Book Review: ‘The Masonic Myth’

           
In the latest issue of The Journal of the Masonic Society is my review of Bro. Jay Kinney’s new book.

 

In terms of book publishing alone, the past five years have been amazing for Freemasons and their fraternity. The quality even of “introductory” books (Cooper’s Cracking the Freemasons Code, Hodapp’s Freemasons for Dummies, Morris’ The Complete Idiot’s Guide, et al.) truly is outstanding for their outpouring of sober-minded facts, and causes one to ponder what might have been had these titles been around twenty years ago. And joining their ranks is another splendid book by Masonic Society Member Jay Kinney titled The Masonic Myth: Unlocking the Truth about the Symbols, the Secret Rites, and the History of Freemasonry. Kinney’s approach has a subtle difference. Where previous authors rendered a dizzyingly confusing topic approachable even to those who are not Masons, Kinney announces from the beginning in his title that misconceptions that have misinformed Masons and others for generations need to be demolished. The Masonic Myth strips the varnish off the fraternity’s history, legends, rituals, and even treasured “famous Masons.”

These confusions include many simple points of history that are misunderstood even by Masons today considered well educated.

The rise of the second English grand lodge, nicknamed the Antients, often is described as being created in a schismatic departure from the Premiere Grand Lodge. Not so. While there was interaction and intervisitation, etc. on the part of individual brethren from both camps, the lodges of Antient Masons were not part of the London-based Grand Lodge of England, and when they elected to form their own grand lodge, they did so on their own. No schism, just a rival start-up group, Kinney rightly says.

In 1737, a Scotsman living in France named Andrew Ramsay prepared a speech to deliver before the Grand Lodge of France. Known as “Ramsay’s Oration,” this piece of literature is the basis for Freemasonry’s “high grades” of knighthoods, and the inexplicable belief held by so many even today that the medieval Knights Templar are the ancestors of Freemasonry. Kinney explains that not only is the content of this oration laden with factual inaccuracies, but it also isn’t even an oration because Ramsay never delivered it orally. You see, Ramsay was a Roman Catholic convert, and when Cardinal Fleury, the cardinal minister to King Louis XV, used the police to ban all meetings of Freemasons, our dauntless hero Ramsay went as far as to withdraw from the Craft. In Kinney’s telling, Ramsay’s stay in France coincided with the exile of the Stuarts, the royal family of Catholics succeeded on the English throne by the Hanovers from Protestant Germany, and so Ramsay had hoped to build a coalition of Freemasons, Jacobites, and the Catholic Church. “An attractive marketing angle,” writes Kinney. Fleury “was having none of it” and his ban on Masonic meetings predates even Pope Clement XII’s infamous bull that proscribed Masonic membership for Roman Catholics.

Of course these obstacles did not prevent the births of numerous rites and degrees in France. “Eccosais (Scottish) Masonry became synonymous with degrees and rites that purported to be the oldest or the highest. Whether such degrees actually originated in Scotland is something else again,” Kinney writes. Indeed he distills to two sentences the growth of Masonry from Britain to Europe:

    

“Espousing universal brotherhood is one thing, but practicing it is something else again, and it is difficult to imagine the bewigged brethren of the French aristocracy and intelligentsia sitting in lodge with anyone too far beneath them in social standing. Indeed, Masonry on the Continent rapidly expanded from merely honoring the symbolic meaning of stonecutters’ tools and customs into a whole new universe of armchair chivalry, “higher” degrees soaked in mystical and esoteric symbolism, and grandiose titles accompanied by ornate regalia and jewelry.”

I love the term “armchair chivalry.”


It is tempting to walk you all the way through Kinney’s plain-spoken Masonic history, but that may deprive you the pleasure of reading his book. And if you are unacquainted with Bro. Kinney, please do not think he is immune to the mystique of genuine symbolism and esoterica; in fact he is world renowned for his scholarship, and he is esteemed as having been the publisher of the sorely missed Gnosis magazine, the journal of Western inner traditions, published bi-annually, then quarterly, from 1985 to 1999. Most issues are available here. In 2005 he was made a Fellow in the Scottish Rite Research Society and was awarded that prestigious group’s Albert Gallatin Mackey Award for excellence in Masonic scholarship. He knows of what he speaks. And writes.


Kinney’s mission is not to denude Freemasonry of the respect it has earned; he wants to help all concerned to understand that the best way to honor Freemasonry is to learn the truth about it. Legendary histories and misunderstandings of rituals, no matter how time-tested they may be, still obscure truth. This book serves like the focus ring on a camera lens: It eliminates blur while allowing the viewer to choose depths of field. As one example of a close-up, the author explains autobiographically:
    

“It was my good fortune to join a lodge that prided itself on performing excellent ritual, and there was something very touching in realizing that these men, some of whom had been Masons for as long as fifty years, had gone to the trouble of practicing these rituals and delivering whole lectures from memory, all for the sake of giving candidates – including me – a memorable initiation. Further, the realization that generation after generation of Masons had been doing this for some three hundred years or more established a palpable link with the past, a sense of roots that is scarce in today’s attention-deficient culture.”

Bringing Masonry’s future into view, Kinney lauds the power and success of the internet. “The growth of the Web enabled both individual lodges and grand lodges to hang out their shingles, and thousands of Masonic Web sites rapidly appeared. This increased Masonic visibility tenfold. Meanwhile, the growing public interest in certain threads of ‘alternative spirituality,’ such as Gnosticism, the Divine Feminine, the mysteries of Egypt, secret societies, and the Knights Templar, has pulled Freemasonry into the mix, feeding romantic notions of Masonic significance. This, in turn, has caused a new generation of men to come knocking at Masonry’s door, curious to see whether it might be worth their time and interest.” How does one define what’s worthy? Kinney bluntly dismisses that potential for romantic fancy, instead advocating “the potential for ‘more light’ and initiatory growth,” adding “if the inertia in the older lodges is just too great to provide what younger men are looking for, the fraternity should constitute new lodges with space for new (or self-consciously ‘traditional’) approaches and let them flow forth as a parallel stream.”