Closed, Cloistered, Secret Sect or Open, Fraternal, Society Partner
April 13, 2009 by BeeHive
Filed under The Bee Hive
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Interesting essay. I can’t help but wonder whether Freemasonry mirrors the culture in which it is found.
Some rhetorical questions.
Are Europeans, by nature, more philosophically inclined? Are Brits, by nature, accepting of the compartimentalisation, and its inherent privacy, of a class structure and thus comparatively private about their membership? Are Americans, by nature, simply using their Revolutionary-fought right of freedoms for all to be freely open about their membership? And where the family structure is more important than a class structure, and thus is born the concept of a Masonic family? And are Canadians, who still have influences from both the United States and England, by nature, still reserved about changing traditions but desirous of some aspects of the openness of American Masonry?
Justa
Justa,
Great observations! Thanks for the comment. Maybe others will add to the mix here.
Article reprinted here: http://www.phoenixmasonry.org/closed_cloistered_secret_or_open_fraternal_social_partner.htm
The phiolsophical is all well and good. The historical is all well and good. The fraternal is all well and good. I would ever dare to say that the political and even the political radical is all well and good. What is missed most often however is the operative (aka the Magickal) whithout it the others mean nothing. With only the speculative and without the operative magickal day to day workings in the lives of Freemasons the best one can hope for is to be a knowledgable pretender, not a true Craftsman.
is it enough to learn from a book or ritual with the application of those thechniques? can those techniques be applied who does not understand what they are?
My answer is no, this is the reason why even the most learned Freemasons is most often just doing the big boy version of “make believe.”
We need to build Craftsman.
A car with a world class body and chassis means nothing without a strong engine to motivate it.
This comment came in from a reply on the RSS feed:
In answer to the question ; what is more important, what we believe or
what we do? I would say the answer is a balance between the two. What
you believe in & what you do can only be separated by the
hypocritical.
A.B.
Ah, but there are some who say that if you are not believing correctly no matter what you do is wrong and evil. Only when you accept the correct dogma can your actions be acceptable.
Thus in the Christian debate over salvation by grace/faith or works we see this scenario acted out. For if you do not first believe in Christ then all your works are interpreted by some to be worthless because they are not done in the name of Christ.
Is Freemasonry getting like this?