Subject: RE: Friday Reading No. 9
frere mason is supposed to be an old French words meaning brother mason
which became free mason during early translation to English per John Robinsons
“Born in Blood.”
‘Saw
the movie “National Treasure” last night and for once this movie did not
portray us as the bad guys. Some Grand
Lodges might not agree with the idea of Freemasonry is the offshoot of the
Knights Templar but might like the idea that the Craft is/was the holder of the
“secret of the Truth.” The movies’
“Truth” is the usual
The
National Treasure is a good PR for the Fraternity and it’s a welcome addition
to the Man Who Would Be a King movie.
The movie doesn’t have the drama of the Man Who Would….. No self righteousness dilemma within the main
characters. It also, depicted a modern
phenomenon within the Craft, that non Mason “scholars” knew more of the Craft
than the Masons themselves. In a real
life example, I find it hard to believe that after delivering a third degree
lecture in long form, the Master of the Lodge commented at the closing about
this “scholar” who knew more about Freemasonry than anybody in the Lodge. That is a different subject altogether.
The
movie might generate some interest to the public and consequently result in
increase petition for degrees. Despite
of many of Grand Lodges says about membership---I always believe that we don’t
need quantity but quality. And to all
Brothers who might be ask by interested party--- remember your Charge…. “By
refusing to recommend anyone to a participation to our
privileges, unless you have strong reasons to believe that by similar fidelity,
he will ultimately bring honor to our Institution.”
F/
Rudy
-----Original Message-----
From: Rivera, Ernesto (NSFDG N9) [mailto:RiveraE@dg.navy.mil]
Sent: Sunday, November 21, 2004 8:33 PM
To: BRO ALLEN ANDREWS (E-mail); BRO ANGEL ABELLADA (E-mail); BRO Armando
C. Limcangco PM (E-mail); BRO ARMIN Santos (E-mail); BRO BEN B. Gorospe
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Subject: FW: Friday Reading No. 9
Bros,
forwarded for your reading
pleasure.
also welcoming WB Jun
Quijano, PM-Pinatubo Lodge #52 to the circulation, who happened to find me
through the GLP web site thus extending him the other end
of my cable tow.
FY/
Bro. Ernie P. Rivera
NAVY
Engineering Technical Support - PORTOPS
PSC 466, Box 06
FPO AP
96595-0006
DSN
370-4312/4305
246 370
4312/4305
Other e-mail add: moonie@cwnetdg.io; ernieprivera@yahoo.com
-----Original
Message-----
From: Tony Limpoco [mailto:Tony.Limpoco@dhl.com]
Sent: Friday, November 12, 2004 4:40 PM
To: VW Marc Laya; Abner de Guzman; Adriano Delorito; Agustus S. Novero;
Alfredo Bitor; Alvin Yater; Arnie Bautista; Atienza, Joseph; Ben Cariaga;
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Subject: Friday Reading No. 9
Curious Masonic Words
Author unknown
Freemasonry
has many curiosities, and indeed, many mysteries as yet unsolved. Among the
former are several often misunderstood words with odd or involved meanings.
ABIMAN REZON is the title still used by
It was the title given by Dermott to the Book of Constitutions of the Grand
Lodge (Ancients) of
Scholars also dispute the pronunciation. Ah-HIGH-man REE-zon is common, but the
better scholarship seems to indicate that properly the second word should be
pronounced with the accent of the second syllable--Re-ZON
LEWIS is an iron tool inserted in a cavity in a large stone, which expanded as
it is pulled upwards, holds the weight of the stone firmly as it is swung
through the air by a derrick so its position in the wall of a building. Both
the term and the invention are very old.
In
The Classic instance of a lewis being initiated in this country is George
Washington, who was only twenty years and some months of age when he became an
Entered Apprentice in "The Lodge at Fredericksburgh" (Virginia),
November 4,1752
In France the term is not lewis but louveteau, but has the same meaning.
The ABIF of Hiram Abif does not appear in the Bible. The word Abi or Abiw or
Abiv is translated in the King James version both as "his father" and
"my father" - using the word "father" as a term of respect
and not as denoting a parent. Hiram, the widow's son of the tribe of Naphtali,
was "my father" in the same sense that Abraham was "my
father" to members of the tribes of
The thought that the two syllables are a surname is obviously in error. The
legend gains, not loses, in appeal when Abif becomes a title of honor. Just
when and how it came into the Masonic terminology is still a moot point; it
does not appear in the Regis document (oldest of our Constitutions, dated
approximately 1390) but does appear - only as one name among many - in the
Dowland manuscript of 1550. Apparently the term was not in common use until
after the King James Bible (1611) had become familiar in Masonic circles.
The story of Hiram Abif as told in the Masonic tale is not found in the Bible,
nor is there any meaning in the word which can be construed as port of the
story as Masons tell it, except that of veneration.
DUE GUARD is two words, forming one, which scholars fight over and Masons
accept as a matter of course.
Every Mason knows what it is. None apparently, really knows where it came from.
Mackey says that it is a contraction of "duly guard". According to
the great authority it is an Americanism and not used abroad now to mean what
we mean, even though two hundred years ago it was the name given to a sign.
Some who dare to raise their small voices against the thunder of the great
Mackey are convinced that the words are a ontraction or alteration of
"Dieu-garde" -- "God guard" -- of the french. Haywood gives
both Mackey and the immediately foregoing as a choice; Dr. Pease is wholly on
the side of Mackey. Authorities with less fame still cling to a derivation from
the French words, probably because of their poetic content more than any
etymological foundations.
Universally in this country a ritualistic difference is perceived between the
due guards and the signs, but as a matter of actual practice a due guard is a
sign and cannot be taken from the category of signs by a mere definition; even
the ritualistic definition of a sign does not preclude the due guard from the
classification.
COMPASSES-COMPASS. From the standpoint of the
dictionary, these are two words with totally different meanings. A COMPASS is a
suspended magnet so balanced that it may turn upon its pivot and orient itself
with the North magnetic pole and thus (with the aid of tables and mathematics),
point out the true North.
COMPASSES is the word used to describe that instrument which draws circles
and/or measures small distances; sometimes
COMPASSES are called dividers. Like trousers and scissors,
COMPASSES is always plural when meaning the instrument-except in six Grand
Lodges of the
COMPASS is form the Latin Com (with) and passus (a step) --an instrument which
is used "with a step"-- in other words, dividers. Masonically, it
appears to be more a measuring than a circle drawing instrument, although
reference to its Masonic use includes "circumscribe desires." But its
position, open sixty degrees upon a quadrant, as in the symbol of a Past
Master, would seem to indicate that it is more as dividers than as an
instrument to draw arcs of circles, that it is important Masonically.
With the square it forms two of the three Great Lights of Masonry, and has
become so universally recognized as a symbol of Freemasonry that courts have
forbidden its unauthorized use or its being
copyrighted or trademarked for commercial purposes.
Few wholly Masonic words have been so much talked about and so little
understood by the average Mason as "COWAN". Every one understands
that it is a term of contempt; that it denotes some one wholly without the
Masonic circle; but just what its real meaning may be, where the word came
from, how it came into our system, is disputed to this day by Masonic scholars.
It is generally - not wholly - agreed that it has a Scotch ancestry. certain old Scottish books lend color to the theory.
according to these tomes a COWAN is a man who builds walls without mortar-as
any farm hand in America may do, piling into a wall the stones from nearby
streams or turned up in ploughing. From this the term cane to be used as
meaning an uninstructed Mason, a self-taught builder, one not of the trade.
Apparently its earliest appearance is in the Schaw Manuscript, dated 1598. It
appears in the second, or 1738 edition of
Whence came the word? A Greek work KUON means dog, and
in early church days infidels were called dogs, probably because of such passages
as Matthew 7:6-"Give not that which is holy unto the dogs." old
Swedish KUJON means a silly fellow. The French word COYOU means a coward, a
base person.
Mackey had a different theory; that COWAN was either a derivation of, or the
ancestry of the English word "common". Old English spelled the word
both coen and comon. If this is correct, COWAN, meaning common, is still a term
meaning the lesser, vide "common people," also the English
"House of Commons" as distinguished from the House of Lords.
However derived the word is now wholly the property of the Fraternity, not
otherwise used, and means to moderns an uninstructed and ignorant person, one
not of the Fraternity, just as eavesdropper means to us one who attempts to
gain the secrets of Masonry unlawfully.
Moderns do not go as far as bloodshed over the word "HELE"
(pronounced HAIL), but in spite of the determinations of philologists and
Masonic authorities who may well be considered final, now and then some more or
less learned Freemason wishes to change either the meaning of the word or its
pronunciation, or its spelling, or any two, or all three!
HELE is almost invariable associated with the word "conceal" (as it
should be) and "HELE and conceal" may be translated by
transposition-"conceal and HELE". "HELE" is old Angle-Saxon
belan, meaning to conceal. "Conceal" is
To the objections of those who contend that "HELE" should be
pronounced "heel" because it rhymes with "conceal and
reveal" the answer is that in the early days of the language, our
"conceal" was pronounced "consayle" and our
"reveal" was pronounced "revayle".
The word "HELE" (meaning to hide) has no connection with the word
"heal", meaning to make whole again, or Masonically, make legitimate,
nor with the word "heel", meaning part of the foot, or with the word
"hale", meaning in good health, or the word "hail", meaning
to call to, or greet.
Few words are more wrongly used, at least in Masonic circles, that
"oath".
A candidate takes upon himself a solemn obligation to do certain things and to
refrain from certain actions. the word
"OBLIGATION" is from the Latin-of (to) and ligare (to bind). It is a
tie, a bond, an agreement, a profession of intention, a responsibility, a duty agreed upon, a constraint of action, a pledge, an
acknowledgement of promises made.
In no such definitions can be found any similarity to the meaning of the word
"oath", which is the concluding phrase by which the assumer of the
OBLIGATION calls upon that which he holds sacred to witness his vow.
In a court of law the witness swears to tell the truth, the whole truth and
nothing but the truth. That is an assumed OBLIGATION. He ends "So help me,
God" which is the oath, attesting to the sincerity of his OBLIGATION. In
taking both OBLIGATION and attesting it by the oath, the witness is required to
raise his right hand, a curious throwback to ancient days in which a man
offered his right hand to be cut off if his oath was broke,. Still more an
oddity is the small boy's attestation "by golly" made without knowing
that he is offering the ancient "gol"(hand) if he tells not the
truth!
The Masonic OBLIGATIONS are high-minded duties voluntarily assumed by
candidates as their part in becoming brethren of the Ancient Craft. the oath which they take is their attestation of the
validity of the covenants the thus make. To speak of the whole as a Masonic
"oath" is to name the whole for a minor part.
Words change in meaning as the centuries pass. The classic examples are the
word "hell" and "hellfire" which in the King James Version
(Mark) mean a place where refuse and garbage are burned and in more modern
eschatology becomes a place of punishment, somewhat worse than the sheol of the old testament.
Among words much used in Masonry two-PROFANE and LIBERTINE - have changed in
meaning with the passage of the years. Anciently "PROFANE" came from
"pro" (without) and "fanum" (temple) and signified one
uninitiated, not within the circle of the Craft. "LIBERTINE" was once
a free thinker, one who did not subscribe to the doctrine of the church ". "PROFANE" in common parlance is now one given to
taking the name of God in vain and the "LIBERTINE" is a licentious
person.
Masonically a profane is merely one not initiated, and an "irreligious
libertine" is an agnostic or an atheist, and not a man of promiscuous
habits.
Anciently the word "TOKEN" (from the Anglo-Saxon tacn, a gesture, a
sign and art) was properly used as we use it Masonically.
But through the years it has changed, in common parlance; now may be an
offering of flowers to a lady or a box of cigars to a man. In Biblical days the
word was used to signify a memorial or other reminder of a covenant or promise
as the rainbow was "a TOKEN of a covenant".
In Freemasonry the TOKEN is never a thing, always an act.