That Perfect Ashlar

[whistler]

What Makes our Ashlar perfect?
What are the rules that define perfection.
Who made those rules
Who is the judge?

[Tamrin]

whistler said:

What Makes our Ashlar perfect?

Not comments such as:

whistler said:

Probably bought to Australia by a Convict

[hollandr]

>What Makes our Ashlar perfect?

It seems from the Mark ritual that we must know what our ashlar is intended to do in the building. And it looks like it helps if others know too so they do not reject our ashlar

[Tamrin]

hollandr said:

It seems from the Mark ritual that we must know what our ashlar is intended to do in the building. And it looks like it helps if others know too so they do not reject our ashlar

The Golden Legend

The Queen of Sheba features in the medieval "Golden Legend." The Mark° is reminiscent of that legend. In one version (Every, Christian Mythology, 1987, p.57), timber from the Tree of Life is rejected by the builders of the Temple and thrown among the rubbish and is then used to bridge a stream; the Queen of Sheba, recognising its virtue and destiny (to be used as the True Cross), refuses to step foot upon and desecrate it, (instead she walks through the stream). Following her advice, King Solomon orders the timber to be overlaid with gold and silver and placed as a lintel in the temple.

Also in the context of the Mark°, we should perhaps bear in mind Psalms 144:12, "... that our daughters may be as corner stones, polished after the similitude of the temple," the Latin Vulgate version of which was adopted as the motto of The Royal Masonic School for Girls.

School Crest

In another version of the legend, recorded in 1405 by Christine de Pizan, we read (II.4.3):

“Several writings mention this woman’s wisdom and prophecies. They relate that while she was in Jerusalem and Solomon was leading her to see the noble temple which he had built, she saw a long board lying over a mud puddle which served as a plank to cross this mire. Thereupon, seeing this board, the lady stopped and worshipped it saying, ‘This board, now held in such great contempt and set under foot, will, when the time comes, be honoured above all other pieces of wood in the world and adorned with precious gems from the treasures of princes. And He who will destroy the law of the Jews will die on the wood of this plank.’ The Jews did not take this pronouncement as a joke but removed the board and buried it in a place where they thought it would never be found. But what God wishes to save is well protected, for the Jews did not know how to hide it so well that it was not rediscovered during the time of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ. And it is said that from this plank the Cross was fashioned upon which our Saviour suffered His death and passion, and thus this lady’s prophecy was fulfilled.”

De Pizan, Christine, 1983 (org. 1405), The Book of the City of Ladies, Translated by Earl Jeffrey Richards, Picador (Pan), London

Christine de Pizan, the author of the 1405 work,
allegorically depicted with a trowel, building her City of Ladies,
under the direction of reason personified, with crown.

[maat]

I have often wondered about stories like this Tamrin.

Who in their right mind would treat an instrument of torture and death as sacred

Mind you I am still confused as to why people lay flowers at the tree or lamp post where people kill themselves in cars.

Maat

[maat]

Good questions whistler, perhaps first we might establish what the ashlar itself is or might be?

The Philosophers' Stone

members.ozemail.com.au/~clauspat/stone.htm#01

Good site for a quick understanding.

Maat

[whistler]

maat said:

Good questions whistler, perhaps first we might establish what the ashlar itself is or might be?

The Philosophers' Stone

members.ozemail.com.au/~clauspat/stone.htm#01

Good site for a quick understanding.

Maat

Perhaps we could also define perfection

[hollandr]

>Perhaps we could also define perfection

Perfection is presumably determined by the same 7 Masons who make a lodge perfect - if they visit

Perhaps the brother has to present his ashlar to those 7 Masons to see if it is acceptable for the temple in the heavens

[Tamrin]

maat said:

Who in their right mind would treat an instrument of torture and death as sacred

As with most cult heroes, the manner of his death was commemorated by his followers. A most peculiar death it was too, in terms of Jewish customs: The prohibition against leaving the bodies on their crosses (John 20:31) is said to be because of Deuteronomy 21:23, which refers to those hung upon a tree. Thus the cross was seen to be an emblematic tree, (a veritable ashera, and in conjunction with the others, a grove). Even more remarkably, the only others we read of being hung upon trees and removed at sunset are the Canaanite kings who oppossed Joshua's conquest (Joshua 8:29 & 10:23/27).

[Tamrin]

hollandr said:

Perhaps the brother has to present his ashlar to those 7 Masons to see if it is acceptable for the temple in the heavens

Please specify what YOU mean by "the temple in the heavens"

[hollandr]

>Please specify what YOU mean by "the temple in the heavens"

I mean whatever Masonry means

[Tamrin]

hollandr said:

>Please specify what YOU mean by "the temple in the heavens"

I mean whatever Masonry means

Which, in YOUR opinion, is what?

[whistler]

tamrin said:

whistler said:

What Makes our Ashlar perfect?

Not comments such as:

whistler said:

Probably bought to Australia by a Convict

Thank you Tamrin,
A good example.
What one Mason may consider perfect another doesn't.
Therefore Perfection in a total mankind sense is impossible because nobody knows what it is

[maat]

I'm thinking that there are degrees of 'perfection' and its perception is related to those that experience it. What makes perfect sense to me will not necessarily make perfect sense to you. My perfect partner will not be your perfect partner etc etc. Rather like our perception of time speeding up or slowing down. I believe in this case our perception is related to our metabolic rate at time of occurrence.

I have a hunch that ultimate perfection would be beyond anything that we could perceive because of the frailty/imperfecton of the human body.

Maat

[whistler]

Maat
I have a hunch that ultimate perfection would be beyond anything that we could perceive because of the frailty/imperfecton of the human body.

How can we reach something if we don't know what it is.
Don't you think that as you are the creation of the creator, you are perfect for what the Creator desired .

[maat]

whistler said:

How can we reach something if we don't know what it is.

How does a baby reach old age? Just comes naturally. Part of the plan.

Don't you think that as you are the creation of the creator, you are perfect for what the Creator desired

So Hitler was perfect for the Creators desire at the time?
(and therefore could be considered blameless? Judas likewise?)

My gut feeling is that we are perfect at one level, that there is a reason that we find ourselves where we are with our limitations, that Love will see that all turns out well for every particle of creation in the end. I can also see that this does not happen in one lifetime.

Maat

[maat]

whistler said:

What Makes our Ashlar perfect?
What are the rules that define perfection.
Who made those rules
Who is the judge?

These words caught my eye again as I was leaving the thread but superimposed over them was the picture of the Scales.

Balance makes for perfection.
Don't know who made the scales (lore says Isis (the Widow?) uses them)
The "who" in regard to judgement may not be a "who" may be an impersonal and impartial law.

? just thoughts ?

Maat

[sniffles]

whistler said:

What Makes our Ashlar perfect?
What are the rules that define perfection.
Who made those rules
Who is the judge?

Let me quote a portion of a lecture I like from one of our degrees first:

The Great Lights

"By the Bible, you are to understand that it symbolizes the only Law you ought to follow. It is that which Adam received at his creation, and which the Almighty engraved upon his heart. This Law my brother, is called Natural Law, and shows positively that there is but one God, and to adore him alone without any subdivision or interpolation.

"The Compass gives you the faculty of judging for yourself, that whatever God has created, is well, and he is the sovereign author of everything. Existing in himself, nothing is either good or evil; because we understand by this expression, an action done which is excellent in itself, is relative, and submits to the human understanding, or judgment, to know the value and price of such action; and that God, with whom everything is possible, communicates nothing of his will, but such as his great goodness pleases; and everything in the universe is governed as he had decreed it, with Justice, being able to compare it with the attributes of the Divinity.

"I equally say, that in himself there is no evil; because he has made everything with EXACTNESS, and that everything exists according to his will; consequently, AS IT OUGHT TO BE.

"The distance between good and evil with the Divinity, cannot be more justly and clearly compared than by a circle formed with a compass. From the points being reunited there is formed an entire circumference; and when any point in particular equally approaches or equally separates from its point, it is only a faint resemblance of the distance between good and evil, which we compare by the points of a compass forming a circle, which circle when complete is God."

The Rule of perfection is the order and harmony of Natural and this Cosmos, or the Law of Nature.

Perfect because everything that is, was created exactly the way it "ought to be."

The Square is an instrument of measurement. It is used to gage the accuracy of an angle. When an angle is Perfect and Right it is said to be "True... and Tried."

The Rough Ashlar is a brute, ignorant person. Barely indistinguishable from other stones or the rocky mass of mountain he came from.

He is Rough because he lives against the flow and harmony of Nature. Lost in the illusions of everyday city life - prison of steel and stone - he is emotionally separated from the rest of Nature and God. He then becomes arrogant and sets himself apart from the rest of Nature and struggles to conquer and dominate it, not understanding that he is a living part and piece of it, indivisible, but another animal under the care of Mother Nature.

It is by the Square that we make ourselves Right and True. To work on ourself to fit into that Cosmic Temple of Nature, which all works as it should - in Order and Harmony; our ignorance and arrogance alone keeping us from being a living part of this Temple; we remake ourselves a Perfect Ashlar, in tune and resonance to the the flow, rhythm, and harmony of Nature.

So we are raised by a Lion's Paw... King of the Jungle. A king's word and decree is Law in his domain. This Lion's law is the Law of the Jungle; of Nature. We are raised Perfect Ashlars to be fitted and returned into the bosom of our Mother Earth, to live as we did once before, Naturally, in innocence, as we did long ago, simply as her Children; and as living Ashlars in the Temple of the Cosmos. Our existence just as beautiful, as marvelous, and mysterious as everything else in the Universe.

[whistler]

So Hitler was perfect for the Creators desire at the time?
(and therefore could be considered blameless? Judas likewise?)
Maat the problem is if Hitler wasn't perfect for the Creators desire,
It is to suggest that the Creator can make a mistake.
I don't think that is possible.
If you ask me was Hitler good or bad - you are asking me to make a judgment that I could only make on the basis of my human experience.
Which would be wrong.
As the Creator was within each of Hitler's cells just as within yours as mine.
The very same creator.
Can't see how the Creator in Hitlers Cells can be in error and the Creator in mine not in error.
I wouldn't presume to judge the Creator - after all it is the Creators game we are all playing. When I look at the Hitler's of history I start with the perfection of the creator and then seek to understand the reason for the Hitlers.

[leonardo]

Does "free-will" play a part in this?