Freemasonry is a post-collegiate mostly-all male fraternity dedicated to the social development of the member to form a broader sense of the self and their community.
Observations on the esoteric from author Greg Stewart (Masonic Traveler) about the fraternity of Freemasonry, its impact on civil society and contributions to the material culture.
The question above is a tier two question. It isn’t a topic that is given as a charge in the degrees of Freemasonry, but rather seems to come up in the broader connectivity of the craft to other systems. Its in these secondary connections that most confront and work with as they start to put the fraternity into a historical context of understanding.
Before we can adequately talk about this though, it may be necessary to define what occult means. In contemporary society, the term occult is an immediate watch word for Satanism, or the study by some nefarious cult. The pejorative aspect if it’s meaning, derived to give credence to the user’s opinion, brands it with only one aspect of its meaning.
The definition of the occult does not relate to Freemasonry per-se, but we find that it is in the study of the obscure and less obvious that we can link meaning and practice. Specifically in the study of things hidden or shut off from view. Often we rely on the term “esoteric” to be less socially offensive.
But I question if esoteric is really an accurate definition for what the study entails.
In my opinion, the esoteric idea is a broad one that encompasses much by way of subjects not often spoken of. Whereas, the word occult is a particular area of study, an area or topic out of the mainstream because it encapsulates an area of study that was at one time found to be counterintuitive to the acceptable line of thought.
Perhaps this is still the case.
I raised this same discussion in a forum that I frequent and from it came two interesting results. The first throught was:
As broad and diverse that the practice of Freemasonry encompasses, that there was nothing prohibitive to the study of the Occult to the Freemason, but that the requirement of its study was not linked to the craft.
Simply that the two are not linked except in the interest of study by the student.
The second idea said:
Confusion arises when the study of the subject becomes its practice. In this instance the study of the occult in Freemasonry becoming the practice of the fraternity in its day to day operation.
Where I see this come full circle is that the question is still overshadowed in how others perceive the work. Do we shirk away when the accusation is made that we study occulted topics, or can we affirm the work that we do, despite the proposers insinuation of what is “acceptable”?
More still, do our minds immediately go to the negative meaning of the word occult when someone asks us if it is a part of our study?
Is it acceptable in Freemasonry to be open about the study of the occult? Is the occult a negative word?
Is there a better word to define the study that Freemasonry embarks in?
Join Greg and Dean in this episode, recorded on April 26, 2009, as they delve into the distant cousin of Freemasonry—the OTO. For the show, they’re joined by Frater Hrumachis who was the Former Public Information Officer for the U.S. Grand Lodge of the Ordo Templi Orientis.
This was a particularly rough episode, for a variety of reasons. On its surface, the episode had more than a few audio issues (sorry for all the popping). This was also a hard subject to explore for the hosts. I’ll let you listen to see how that evolved in the show. And then this was one of those “lost” episodes that only resurfaced a decade after it was recorded.
We plan to discuss the Order’s history including its early Masonic roots in European Freemasonry as well as the Order’s modern operations of philosophy and its path of esoterica and fraternity under the teachings of Thelema.
Most importantly, we want to explore what the Thelemic practice is, what it isn’t, and why its relevant to the OTO and how it applies to each of us.
This subject came to mind as I had the unique opportunity recently to attend a Gnostic Mass with LVX Lodge of the O.T.O. a short time back. The mass is presented as an open ceremony that is the public face to the orders otherwise private activities.
For those unfamiliar with the O.T.O., it is a separate philosophical system from Freemasonry whose origins are tied to some late 19th century founder, Karl Kellner, who had feet firmly planted in Freemasonry. In Kellner’s original formulation, the O.T.O. was to serve as a Masonic Academy of sorts that would enable all Freemasons to become familiar with all of the Masonic degrees.
In lieu of a broader exploration, essentially the Ordo Templi Orientis (Order of Oriental Templars) was an esoteric order founded on the idea of re-instilling the esoteric ideas of magik (self development, not hocus pocus) and mysticism into a system that at that time had essentially excised out most of its esoteric leanings. Essentially, it formed and took shape in the absence of these things in the preeminent system of the age, especially as Aleister Crowley took over after his introduction to it in 1910.
It seems to me that in its original context this system was it adopted as a similar practice of the craft and only later did it evolve into their present participatory rites.
I think we may be surprised how many similarities we share and the few differences between one another. For those who have never before heard of the OTO, this program will be an excellent primer to open that door, and for those who have crossed paths with the order, this will be an excellent rediscovery of a past member of the Masonic family and put to rest some of the misconceptions that may exist.
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to participate in a Multiple Sclerosis 5k Walk-A-Thon here in Los Angeles. My family worked to raise a modest amount of money for the fight against MS and we wanted to walk to show our dedication to the cause. We walked because we cared.
The event was early with a 9am check in and a 10am start. There were a lot of free bagels, free t-shirts, and participants, a lot of participants. I thought I overhead the number as 16,000 participating in the regions events and with a column of people nearly a mile long where I stood. It felt like a big event.
Being amongst such a large group allowed me to make some mental notes and draw parallels to other aspects of my life that I find myself in the company of people of similar ideals. The event gave me pause to stop and contemplate the awesome power of Masonic Charity. That in amongst this retinue of walkers, with their team shirts and color coordinated bandanas, that to see a troop of Masonic walkers with a banner in the air to rally the team spirit of the crew and lead the fellowship of the dedicated would be a sight to behold.
But, then I started to think about how asking for charitable contributions in lodge for Non Masonic recipients is against our rules, and that the measure of Masonic charity is in the volume of monies raised to beat another lodge in how much was given to the homes fund. That the idea of Masonic Charity is the institutional brand of what that charity means… not in what worthy causes we find or believe we should levy our oratory skills to convince others. That, unless it’s an “official” charity, its not of value to elicit the help of our local lodge. And, I don’t even know how to approach the changing of the will of the lodge to even contemplate doing something like this.
It started to occur to me that Masonic Charity was a myth. That we are told to be charitable, and then guided in what works to be Charitable towards, but to leave our specific cause or need at the door so as not to offend the membership in yet another request of money.
Thinking about Masonic charity as a myth started to open up the whole field of Masonic education. Is it something we were taught or something we do because we are told to? What was Brotherly Love, Relief, and Truth anyways? And, in the early morning hours of the Walk with so many others who obviously were expressing their idea of “relief”, what made my Masonic ideal any loftier than theirs? Obviously they were up, and out, and had raised a sum of money to help fight to relieve the illness of M.S. Was my conception of “Charity” any better than theirs? Was it just different?
How do we envision our aspect of Charity? I can go into the argument of our charity truly being an agape form of loving others rather than the expression (giving) of it, but we measure the giving today not the volume of how much we love. Is it fair to hold Masonic Charity up to be measured against the temple?
Join us on this episode of Masonic Central as we meet and talk with Brother John Nagy who is the author of the new book “Building Hiram – Uncommon Catechism for Uncommon Masonic Education“.
This new book is a feast for any Mason wanting to embark on a most Uncommon Masonic Education experience. “Building Hiram – Uncommon Catechism for Uncommon Masonic Education” is 12 unique catechisms designed to bring about a deeper understanding of the connections provided throughout the three degree rituals, lectures, and catechisms. Intended to be read one chapter at a time over the course of a year to elicit discussion and reflection on the degrees and their meaning.
Join us as we talk with Br. Nagy and talk about the how this book came about and why its so important to Masonry today.
And, if were not careful, we may learn a thing or two…
The website has no information on the formation or history of Freemasonry in Arizona. Some of what I found on my excursion there:
The site at first approach is very impressive. The URL is catchy and relevant to the site it represents: http://www.azmasons.org. Entering the URL, the splash page opens with a panorama of images of the state (the Grand Canyon, cactus, state flower), which then fade into images of Freemasonry. Behind the images is an impressive score of music to usher in the site. It is a bit surprising, given the volume the music starts at (and that I had my volume turned way up), the auto start music definitely caught my attention.
The site meets the user with a very clear top and bottom layout. The top header is the anchor art with the navigation sub bar with color coordinated sub menus for the site menus. This is a straight forward arrangement and navigation and a very simple format to expand as data is added.
The Grand Lodge of Arizona website
On the front page there is a clear mission statement of the Fraternity, but without any attribution from where it originated. Reading it left me unclear if this was the statement of Arizona Masonry or of Freemasonry in general. There are two calendar entries right on the front page to relevant events, though one was already expired, but only by a few days of my visit.
The site does offer a lot of choices in the navigation. Six main tabs (including a Home tab) with several pages beneath each option, the navigation also repeats on the pages visited on the left side. All of the major navigation is text (HTML) and easily scalable as updates and additions are made.
Additionally, all of the sites in the navigation go to text based pages without any cumbersome PDF’s or Word docs, which is good, but delving into the data, the pages also seem to be free of unique information to the state. I will commend them in that all of the navigation stays in site, which keeps the visitor engaged in the content. Also, there is a very functional calendar with a lot of valuable Grand Lodge data.
Informational Content:
When looking at the site from an informational stand point, I found that it was very light. With every page filled with content, I found very little of it relevant to someone with an interest in becoming an Arizona Mason. It did include entries in their about section on myths and misconceptions, the fraternities history, but that was it. There was no mention of what Arizona Masonry was about. It also includes a page on “How to Join” which does a very good at talking about joining, but without any means to take the reader to the NEXT STEP. Ultimately the site does nothing to help convert the viewer into a lodge visitor, let alone a petitioner. There is no off link to “contact us for more info”, “submit your name and info on line”, or even a phone number for someone to call with questions. It was disappointing that there was no provision in place to convert the visitor in ANY way on the “How To Join page. I do want to say that there is a lodge locator page which would be a good next step link with instructions to contact a lodge for more info. This may be a good interim solution, but would in turn layer more clicks into the visitation process. There is also a contact us page, with the address of the Grand Lodge (and number) and a contact form for all of the Grand Lodge officers, but again, its disassociated from the “How to Join” page.
As with Alaska, there is a certain presumption that there is an infrastructure in place to field those contacts and manage them as they are received. This again speaks to the broader organization and the back end of the site (and Grand Lodge) management. It again raises the question, what is the emphasis of the site: members or prospective members/general public? Perhaps a clearer idea purpose is needed to define who it is to address.
One item of concern I found was in the about us section; it indicated that Masonry in the state is over 11,000 members which must be old data when compared to the date from the 07 MSANA. It may seem a clerical over site, but it does seem to link the site to old information on cross reference.
Also, I found a good many of the links on the sites link page to be broken or connected to non existent pages.
Look and Feel:
The colors choices for the site are very powerful and very Masonic, which I like, but from a non Masonic user, they almost feel overpowering. Dominate Blue and Purple with yellow accents is very strong, and always runs the risk of being TOO powerful. The balance is meaningful content.
The Arizona Grand Lodge site is definitely content driven and not based on images and art. The opening header is excellent as it highlights Arizona Masonry, but there is little to follow it up to show some Masonic activity in the state. Images, I want to stress, are not a mandatory inclusion, but they are an excellent way to tell a story and add value so long as they are relevant. When you couple the lack of images with the generic content it loses its ability to engage the viewer with any relevant message giving it a “work in progress” flavor.
Overall:
The site looks every bit what one would expect a Grand Lodge website to look like. But when you drill down into the pages the visual cohesiveness becomes diluted and difficult to associate with the state it is said to represent. Taking it in a overall context, it feels incomplete. The form is in place, but it seems to be waiting for the fine hand to weave into it the meaningful (and relevant) images and content. Or even for an attentive hand to manage the links so as their connections are relevant.
From a visitor stand point there are lots of questions I’d like to find out about by coming to the site: “When did Arizona Masonry begin”? “What do Arizona Masons do”? “Why would a young Arizona man want to be a Mason”? And “How would he best do that”? These questions are all left unanswered when a visitor comes to the Grand Lodge of Arizona site. By not answering those questions, it leaves a lot of leads (and conversions) unanswered and potentially result in even more turned off and disinterested visitors.
Lineage in 6 minutes. Its not so much a deep discovery, but there are enough familliar names in here to be followed and tracked down to get a good perspective of the Hermetic philosophy.
Its a possibility according to Ralph Semb, chief executive officer of Shriners Hospitals for Children in an article by the AP out of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Speaking on the shrinking revenue and increased costs:
“Unless we do something, the clock is ticking and within five to seven years we’ll probably be out of the hospital business and not have any hospitals”
This is something reported on by Freemasons for Dummies just recently and on the Masonic Blog too. They both had interesting things to say about the threatened closures, but reading the story from the AP, and seeing the reality so close at hand, it makes one wonder if there really is any hope for the widow’s son on this one.
Has the fraternl arm of Freemasonry gotten longer than what it can sustain?
The AP story does say that donations only make up a small percentage of their operating costs, with the remainder coming from the past endowment that has taken a substantial hit in the economic down turn. It also asks the question towards the end about being saved by its forbearers. Melissa Brown, who is the associate director of research for The Center on Philanthropy says that health care giving is down, and that:
“the aging of once-prominent fraternal organizations might be affecting their ability to grow donations. “It could be that what they are seeing is a generational shift,”.
Its the last statement that takes us to Freemasonry. Bro Mark Koltko-Rivera in this piece speaks to the idea that The Shrine has, in a sense, disassociated with the notion that a developed Freemasonry leads to a developed Shrine. Did they perhaps see their role diminished in their namesake charity? Or was there still an active engagement of what has been going on to asses the present situation. This will be interesting to see how it works its way through the Imperial Council Session in June. At the present burn rate of $1 million a day from the endowment (of $5 Billion) to cover operating costs, they still have some time, but thats with the presumption that the economy (and the stock market makes a turn).
So what does it mean, what does it foretell? Thats hard to say. It does seem to be a physical manifestation of the shrinking fraternity that we can bare witness to and take heed from. That as the numbers continue to diminish, the failure to engage the community meaningfully, and the active dis-engagement of society persists, more of the institutional edifices created will fall away… Unless we do something about it.
The possible collapse of the Shrine are the rocks in the river ahead that we can see. Let’s learn from them and do things differently before the Associated Press article is about the closing and selling of Grand Lodge buildings, and its become too late to navigate.
This week on Masonic Central, we have the chance to talk to Martin Faulks who is the colorful and vibrant marketing director of Lewis Masonic publishing.
Join us as we welcome him to the program to talk about the Masonic publishing business (and Lewis Masonic), English Masonry, his work with Lewis and the art of esoteric literature, and life as the “Masonic Ninja”.
Missed the Live Program, Listen now!
[podcast]http://www.blogtalkradio.com/Masonic-Central/2009/04/13/Martin-Faulks-on-Lewis-Masonic-Publishing.mp3[/podcast]
Lewis Masonic was founded in 1801, and is the largest and oldest Masonic publisher in the world. Well-known to the English Freemasons, Lewis produces many of the ritual books used by United Grand Lodge of England lodges and Holy Royal Arch Chapters. Lewis is today opening up shop here in the American market with a new on line store featuring their exciting collection. you can find the U.S. store at LewisMasonic.us.
Its sure to be a fun conversation and insightful in all things Masonic with maybe a bit of conversation about ninja throwing stars…
Listen to the LIVE program at 6pm PST / 9pm EST, and join the conversation from at our new home at Blog Talk Radio, or you can listen from the player widget on FreemasonInformation.com. To participate live, dial into the show to listen and interact with the guests. You can also join our interactive show chat at Masonic Central on BTR!
I just found confirmation that Masonic Central, since its move to Blog Talk Radio, is now back up on ITunes!
How to find it? Your first option is to go to ITunes, and in the search box, do a search for Masonic Central. What you’ll find is the past Masonic Central Pod cast stream, and the NEW Masonic Central Blog Talk Radio Stream.
Or, you can follow this link:
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=311776560 which will open the page in the I tunes app.
Thanks for pulling for listening to the program, and look for lots more coming up!
And, please let me know if you can’t find the show. I’ve had some reports that the Blog Talk Radio Version isn’t available in Canada on Itunes, but I’m curious if its available now.
Greg – Masonic Central!
I just tested it on a 2nd machine, and it comes up, as well as had Dean test from Halifax (CA) earlier today, and he was able to pull it up. So the show is there, waiting to be found!
