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Why is the north a place of darkness?

coachn

Coach John S. Nagy
Premium Member
And how does that answer my question?
It doesn't. It's just unfounded and immature bovine output.

The three GMs of Freemasonic lore were put forth within allegory. They were not actual or real men. They were personified concepts/ideals/characters. That's how allegory works. It's not factual. It not historical. It's not even fiction as we usually understand fiction. Allegories are stories denoting veiled concepts that will only be understood at the mentality, development and maturity of the person listening, reading and, in my area, experiencing it.

In this case, believing they were real, that they all knew all the secrets alluded to within the allegory and that they were required to fly around the world overseeing every building being build reflects an understanding that is simply uncultivated enough to accept anything metaphoric, symbolic or figurative.

In other words, such a view reflects a deficit of Trivial proportions, if you catch my drift.

Fellow Craft Work my good Brother. Do its Work and you understand how sophists flourish in kingdoms where the ignorant feast upon rubbish.
 
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dfreybur

Premium Member
Real or fiction, the question remains why is the story told how it is....

Allegories are not about real people but they do teach truths about human nature. The separability of inspiration, wealth and knowledge. Rending unto God *, rendering unto Caesar, serving society. All more extreme principles than we see in most people but we should recognize all three types of excellence when we encounter them.

Also notice that Tyr was a foreign country. In an era between wars we find cooperation. Opponents turned to allies, allies turned to friends, friends turned to brothers. All in a process that a couple of generations before had run the other direction and that a couple of generations later would run the other direction. Back and forth across history back and forth together and apart. But the greatest achievement happens when together.

One of the meanings I learned for Free in Free Mason was free to cross borders to do the work. The physical work, the mental work, the social work. So here we have two men called Hiram who crossed the border to do two types of work together with the local named Solomon. And three men from the same point of origin with other names who ended up doing a different type of work.

Edit - I just noticing my typo of the word "rending" that should have been "rendering". It's too strange a reference to the variety of human nature for me to correct it. I have no idea what it means to "rend unto God" but whatever it means I'm going with it.
 
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coachn

Coach John S. Nagy
Premium Member
If Freemasonry were a science we would be able to test this proposition - for example, by using the working tools in a moral sense.
You should work on that trivial stuff dude. It is not a science. It is theater and art. There is no "if".

BTW - The statement "They were not actual or real men." is not a proposition AS IT APPLIES TO THE ALLEGORY presenting them as such. This is a FACT of allegory and the allegory. Allegory uses known characters from history and literature, but allegory itself is not presented as factual. Hence, the characters of the story, no matter HOW real their historical or literal references might be, are still not real or actual people, within the context of the allegory.

Studying, learning and applying the Trivium eliminates such speculative nonsense and is a good indicator that people putting such nonsense forth are in a fantasy land.

Of course, your mileage may vary.
 

Elexir

Registered User
I know at least 5 brethren that can use some of the "working tools" in a "moral" sense to measure who is true to what.

Which is literal and which symbolic is very often a problem for the speculative Freemason.

Good for them.

The problem is that morality can not be messured objectivly as morals change with the times.
 

SimonM

Registered User
How do we know that it is allegory rather than an actual event reformulated for a Masonic context?

I would say the first step would be to go back to earlier sources and see if the stories and text are actually there or if they are a more recent addtion.
For example, we have ritual texts (at least fragments) from around 1740 in Swedish and French. From them we can study the development of the SweR and see what was added, parts that was moved around and what have been with us from the beginning.

Alot of what you would think is old is more recent additions that have improved on the ritual. But since almost all masonic authors like to imply that they have ancient material they dress up their inventions so it looks like its from another era. Then, 250 years later it can be hard to see what was invented and what was not.
 

coachn

Coach John S. Nagy
Premium Member
How do we know that it is allegory...
That is the question to ask.

When you have studied, learned and applied the Trivium, all the evidence is there to be known. It's not rocket science.

When you realize Freemasonic "rituals" are fabricated script by multiple playwrights that have been adopted, adapted and adjusted for about 300 year old, the only history you become interested in as far as these scripts are concerned is who changed/added/adjusted/deleted what when and why.

The "why" and "when" the most interesting of them all though since they pursue "reason" and "historical influence"; why did the playwright insert/change/remove what he did and what was going on at the time that influenced the change? There are several things sewn within Ritual that are influenced by the time they were added.

However, there's a cross section of individuals who get caught up with, who get swept away and who promote fantasy in relation to Freemasonic Ritual and Lore. They are easily spotted due to their lack of Trivial training along with the nonsense put forth.

(As an aside, Bro. Anderson borrowed and fabricated much of his materials from old manuscripts for entertainment purposes. The challenge is not taking all this too serious and just do the Work to which alludes.)
...rather than an actual event reformulated for a Masonic context?
Because surrounding literature, Freemasonic references-terms-allusions, common sense and simple sanity tells us that it is allegory, which by its very nature may use actual events and people, but is itself not actual events or people.

Once again, when you do the Trivial Work, this doesn't have to be explained and questions and statements such as yours become seen for what they are. It is why Ritual points to Trivial Studies so that members come to realize what its plays are making effort to do: Transform the consciousness of members who do the Work so that they don't come across like idiots and fools to those who have actually done the Work and so that they can participate in truly productive discourse.
 
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Warrior1256

Site Benefactor
Studying, learning and applying the Trivium eliminates such speculative nonsense and is a good indicator that people putting such nonsense forth are in a fantasy land.
The problem is that morality can not be messured objectivly as morals change with the times.
However, there's a cross section of individuals who get caught up with, who get swept away and who promote fantasy in relation to Freemasonic Ritual and Lore. They are easily spotted due to their lack of Trivial training along with the nonsense put forth.
So we should be obsessed with the moral, not the literal since the literal does not exist.
 

coachn

Coach John S. Nagy
Premium Member
So we should be obsessed with the moral, not the literal since the literal does not exist.
No. We should pursue what our hearts ask of us, but only after we have done the Apprentice Work to bring Order to Chaos of the heart so we don't pursue things that are nonsense, superfluous or harmful.

You can tell by a man's pursuits the Work he has done and the Work he has yet to do.
 

Warrior1256

Site Benefactor
No. We should pursue what our hearts ask of us, but only after we have done the Apprentice Work to bring Order to Chaos of the heart so we don't pursue things that are nonsense, superfluous or harmful.

You can tell by a man's pursuits the Work he has done and the Work he has yet to do.
Good advice coachn, thanks. I'm here to learn.
 

pointwithinacircle2

Rapscallion
Premium Member
No. We should pursue what our hearts ask of us, but only after we have done the Apprentice Work to bring Order to Chaos of the heart so we don't pursue things that are nonsense, superfluous or harmful.

You can tell by a man's pursuits the Work he has done and the Work he has yet to do.
Just to follow up, and not to disagree at all, does one focus on the "Work to bring Order to Chaos of the heart" or is their another type of, or focus to, our work which brings this about as a side benefit?
 

coachn

Coach John S. Nagy
Premium Member
Just to follow up, and not to disagree at all, does one focus on the "Work to bring Order to Chaos of the heart" or is their another type of, or focus to, our work which brings this about as a side benefit?
Not too clear as to what you are asking here.

The Work brings about the Order.

That Order is a benefit and result.

The Goal is to mature youths to adulthood. That takes Work.

The focus however is knowing thyself and taming the beast of self.

I call it training the dog. ;-)
 
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