The Practice of Freemasonry – P1

I. The Center

The point within a circle is a core masonic symbol, tracing its origins back to ancient esoteric systems rooted in Egyptian thought.

This symbol – bracketed by two tangential and parallel lines, and topped by the book of sacred law – has been explored extensively by scholars elaborating on its meanings, beginning with the ritual book morality to developing the idea into the esotericism of freemasonry.

This article will briefly trace those explanations; however, primary emphasis will be on the esoteric meaning of the center as it pertains to its significance as the focal point of the practice of freemasonry relative to the path that needs to be traveled from the rough ashlar to the perfect ashlar.

In its simplest and most evident meaning, the point represents the individual man or mason. The circle represents the boundary line of his conduct towards God and man.

This boundary is bordered by the two tangential perpendicular lines representing patron saints of speculative freemasonry and the book of sacred law on the top, thus teaching the mason that as long as he keeps his passions and acts within these limits, he cannot err.

Additional exoteric explanations can be found in “Facts, Fables and Fantasies of Freemasonry,” (1968, 5th Edition, 1993, by Rt. Ex. William Adrian Brown, Missouri Lodge of Research).

At the level of the first degree, the point within the circle teaches us to control our emotions and tame them from extremes. This is aligned with the view of freemasonry as a system of morality.

It is usually a straight interpretation of the ritual, and the first step of bodily purification in any initiatory system, be it an ancient one or freemasonry.

Further delving into this symbol, we can view the point and the circle as indicating the sun and the universe respectively. [1]

The sun is a source of light, and light is the goal of a man or mason searching to be enlightened. Viewed as the light, the point can point us to knowledge, education, and the path to higher state of mind and spiritual development.

The point within the circle is also its center. Thus, the second degree will lead to the intellectual discovery of the existence of our own Center, “where truth abides in fulness” [2] , which is a point within ourselves.

The circle being ourselves, consequently, the reason we can never err in the search of our Center is that once we realize through the second degree that we should be searching for light by self-improvement, there is no way we can stumble, as our Center is within ourselves.

Knowing something is not the same as living or experiencing it. To reach our Center and discover the truth, which is the true nature of ourselves, we must travel the path of initiation, to be mentored and shown the way, and to work on ourselves.

This path will necessarily require us to go through trials and tribulations, self-sacrifice, the shedding of our attachments to our emotions and the material world, the passage through the valley of the shadow of death, of darkness, and our symbolic awakening to the realization of the ultimate truth of our true nature.

Thus, the third degree teaches us that to reach our Center, we must persist through certain experiences not only through reasoning and intellectual knowledge.

The concept of the Center is the core of Freemasonry’s esoterisms. Like ancient esoteric systems and teaching, esoteric Freemasonry is an initiatory system guiding its apprentices to the discovery of the Truth which already exists in the Center of each one.

That Center is the Perfect Ashlar, innate goodness, universal to all humans, and the secret within us. The universality of Freemasonry rests on every mason working to reach his Center and to recognize that every human being is also endowed with their own Center which is a Perfect Ashlar.

The reason we are working our way from the Rough Ashlar to rediscovering the Perfect Ashlar within us is because we lost our Center. We have lost the Truth; we have lost the Word; we have lost our Center because we have fallen away from our Center towards the circle, victims of our emotions and attachments to the material world.

From birth, we sense our world through our physical senses, and every second since our birth, we are perceiving and manipulating the world around us with our senses and reacting to our world with our emotions.

Every second since our birth, we are further obscuring our Center with our physical experiences to the extent that we no longer recognize that there exists within us a pure and Perfect Ashlar, the essence, Truth, and the true nature of ourselves.

This concept of a pure Center and a fall away from it is paralleled in the Christian religion by the doctrine of “the Kingdom of God is Within you” [3] and the fall of man from paradise.

Similarly, it is paralleled in Buddhism by the doctrine of “Buddha nature” and “Klesha”. Kabbalah or Jewish mysticism is also based on the journey of the kabbalist to know himself and the Universe as an expression of God, and to make the journey of Return by stages charted by the Sephiroth, until he has come to the realization that within the soul of every individual is a hidden part of God that is waiting to be revealed, “the essence of divinity is found in every single thing.” [4]

In Islam, in each of us exists a spark of the Divine, the “Nūr” or “Light” of enlightenment to which we seek to return: “We are from God’s light and our followers are from us” [5], “us” standing for the Imam; “with the help of the Imam we return to that light.” [6]

Ancient Egyptian mysteries inform us that “the Kingdom of Heaven is within you , and whosoever shall know himself shall find it.” [7]

The fall is our journey away from our Center brought onto us by the physical world, the attachments to the experiences of the senses, materialistic living, ignorance, ego, and emotions.

The Center – Kingdom of God/Heaven – Buddha Nature – Nūr – exists in all humans. Whence we came is from the Center and Wither we are traveling, is to rediscovering our Center.

To rediscover our Center, we endeavor to embark on a journey of cleansing and rediscovery of oneself which will lead us to enlightenment, the Truth, and the true nature of ourselves.

The journey is a self-exploration of our personal experience and our constant self-improvement in our practice of four foremost creeds:

Brotherly Love (BL), Relief (R), Truth (T), and the Cardinal Virtues (CV) of the Perfect Points of our Entrance. This journey can be fully experienced and progress on our own path can be made if we believe that “the Center” is universal to all human beings.

The second part of this article will expand on the exercise of the BL foundational creed. Parts three, four, and five will respectively expand on the exercise of R, T, and CV.

II. Brotherly Love (BL)

BL, the ritual tells us, regards the human race as one family, upholding the concept of equality among all humans regardless of wealth, social status, country of origin, race, sect, or opinion, advocating that we should help, support, and protect each other, and promoting “True Friendship”.

BL is fundamental to our relationships with others and for a life of integrity in words, thoughts, and actions.

BL relies on our firm belief in the purity of the Center of each human being, and permeates our exercise of the other foremost creeds, R, T and CV. BL is not an occasional feeling or attitude, but is unshakably bound to our hearts and minds.

It is who we are; it embodies and shapes all our interactions at all times, all places, and throughout all of our experiences. Developing our aptitude of abundance of BL facilitates the abundance of R, T and CV.

To improve ourselves in BL necessitates a sweeping shift in our understanding and way of being, and requires our ongoing commitment to exercising BL.

BL progresses our hearts and minds from greed and ill-will to a state of awakened hearts and minds, where there is an abundance of genuine love, kindness, peace, happiness, awareness, and mindfulness in all moments and circumstances towards ourselves and others.

To illustrate the exercise of BL, we will use four scenarios of increasing difficulty, giving you an opportunity to gauge yourself on your personal path of BL.

1. The brother in your lodge whom you know well, and you get along with.

Scenario: When you regularly attend your lodge meetings, you get to know the regular brothers and develop friendships and camaraderie through the interactions at the meetings, collations, and social and other events. Think of one of those brothers.

BL exercise: If you think about the brother in your lodge whom you know well and get along with, can you wish him well? Can you extend to him feelings of kindness, peace, happiness, and love? Can you wish him clarity of mind, awareness, and mindfulness?

If you are able to do so, that is wonderful, and you can continue to think about other brothers in your lodge and wish them the same.

If not, you can either pick another brother or a person with whom you can exercise BL, such as your child, spouse, or parents. Practice BL with the people you can, and in the future, try again with the brothers in your lodge.

Once you are able to exercise BL with people you know and get along with, you can move on to scenario 2.

2. A brother you don’t know well, but you may have met few times.

Scenario: Sometimes you may attend district meetings or visit other lodges and you meet new brothers who are regulars at those events. This is someone you have met few times, but are not very close to yet.

BL exercise: If you think about a brother you don’t know well but have met few times, can you wish him well? Can you extend to him feelings of kindness, peace, happiness, and love? Can you wish him clarity of mind, awareness, and mindfulness?

If you are able to do so, that is wonderful, and you can continue to think about other brothers you don’t know well but have met a few times and wish them the same.

If not, you can either pick another brother or a person you don’t know well but have met a few times. You can exercise BL with people such as a doorman, a barista at your local coffee shop, or a fellow dad at the playground or the dog park. Practice BL with the people you can, and in the future, try again with the brothers you don’t know well but have met a few times.

Once you are able to exercise BL with people you don’t know well but have met a few times, you can move on to scenario 3.

3. A boisterous brother in your lodge.

Scenario: Sometimes we encounter in our lodges a boisterous brother disrupting the harmony and testing everyone’s patience, doing things such as challenging every proposal and idea presented, asking questions outside of the current discussion topics, or constantly interrupting others.

BL exercise: If you think of that boisterous brother, can you wish him well? Can you extend to him feelings of kindness, peace, happiness, and love? Can you wish him clarity of mind, awareness, and mindfulness?

If you are able to do so, that is wonderful. That means you recognize his Center as pure and perfect even though you don’t sanction his behavior. That means you can see the true nature of this brother. Your awakened heart and exercise of BL toward this brother will eventually permeate your outward behavior towards that brother, who may eventually be influenced by you and possibly change his behavior. Now imagine that all the brothers of your lodge can have an open, loving heart and exercise BL towards the boisterous brother, and that all of the brothers’ outward behavior towards that brother imperceptibly shifts positively. This may make him become aware and mindful of his negative actions, resulting in him getting the love and action he might be seeking through those actions, leading to a change in his behavior. Exercising BL towards someone does not mean you support, agree, or endorse their behaviors, words or actions; it simply means that you have an open, loving, awakened heart, and that you are able to project your BL to their true nature, their Center, which you know is pure and perfect.

If not, you can choose a brother or a person whom you see from time to time but you don’t know well, such as a doorman, a barista at your local coffee shop, or a fellow dad at the playground or the dog park. Practice BL with that person and, in the future, try again with the boisterous brother in your lodge.

Once you are able to exercise BL with such people, you can move on to scenario 4.

4. The drum-playing neighbour.

Scenario: Imagine you have a neighbor who plays the drum at 11 pm every night just across from your bedroom when you are ready to go to sleep. You tried to speak to your neighbor to raise your concern, but it was to no avail. You may even have called the authorities a few times because his late night drum-playing habit is violating the peace and quietness of the neighborhood.

BL exercise: If you think about that drum-playing neighbor, can you wish him well? Can you extend to him feelings of kindness, peace, happiness, and love? Can you wish him clarity of mind, awareness, and mindfulness?

If you are able to do so, that is wonderful. That means you recognize his Center as pure and perfect even though you don’t sanction his behavior. That means your awakened heart and mind are able to suppress your emotions of anger and frustration. This is not an easy feat, nor is it the reaction of an entered apprentice. This means you have made real and tangible progress in your exercise of BL where it is possible for you to separate peoples’ behaviors from their true nature and to maintain your fundamental belief in the goodness of everyone and your capacity of abundance of BL.

If not, you can choose a person towards whom you have mild to moderate negative feelings. Practice BL with such a person and, in the future, try again with someone towards whom you have significant negative feelings.

The work and the challenges do not end. Improving ourselves in BL requires us to continuously exercise BL on people around us: on those we know and those we don’t know; on those we agree with and those we disagree with; on those who are kind to us and those who are not; on our friends and nemeses; on people who may have caused us hardship or harm, or who may have caused hardship or harm to others.

We continue the exercise of BL until BL is embodied in our hearts, minds, and every cell of our body; until it is the automatic reaction we have without thinking; until we can exercise BL reflexively, not just sometimes, but often or even constantly; until it is our primary automatic constant permeating behavior; until we are the Perfect Ashlar of BL.

Part 2 of this article will develop the exercise of; Relief, Truth, and Cardinal Virtues (CV) of the Perfect Points of our Entrance.