phil
Member
Just me all at sea
Posts: 209
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Post by phil on Mar 21, 2006 13:06:08 GMT
I too received the “Old Penalties” when I took my obligations some 30 odd years ago. I see no harm in them even if they are rather drastic and maybe, as has been said, against the formal law of the land. They are simply to emphasize the seriousness of what we promise; but, should we adhere to our obligations simply because the penalties are severe?
A true and upright Mason will remain worthy even if nobody is looking. He/she should not remain honourable simply because of possible repercussions should he/she get found out. It is his/her moral duty to uphold his/her (oh! To hell with it ladies, I’ll just use the masculine without intentionally leaving you out), to uphold his obligations simply because he made a promise. It he cannot do that, then he is not a worthy brother --- penalties or no penalties!!!!!!!!!!!
As to the disillusionment of our dear Brother Gladiator, I would like to say to him, please air your grievances and disappointments. As our dear Cora said, we want to hear them and discuss them.
I take my hat off to you that you are sufficiently dedicated, despite the attitudes that seem to pervade your lodge. But then again, it is those attitudes that are a challenge to you. After all, if we all thought alike, acted alike and had the same opinions, there would be no point in using Freemasonry to improve ourselves because nobody would disagree and, consequently, nobody would learn anything new from his fellow brethren.
You, my dear Gladiator should be true to your name and be prepared to battle for your lodge and for your principles and talk to the brethren who do not take their masonry seriously. Maybe, some of then have good reason not to attend while others may respond to your counselling and return to become truly active members. Remembers, we can all make a difference, however small it may be!!
As Cora has said “Let your light shine out” and use it to illuminate the way for those who have lost the path.
I wish you the strength and wisdom to stand fast in your convictions and your devotion to the craft and hope that you can encourage more of your brethren to do the same.
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Post by maat on Mar 21, 2006 21:40:59 GMT
Here in Florida USA we have all the penalties in all three degrees with no hint of them being symbolic. Hi Capquest ALL of Freemasonry is allegory and symbol !!! It is easy to forget that, isn't it. Thanks for the info on dreadlocks - I didn't know that. I don't know much about the Rastafarians either...must check them out. mb-soft.com/believe/txo/rastafar.htmMaat
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Post by windtimber on Mar 21, 2006 22:50:56 GMT
In South Dakota [North Central USA - just a North Dakota width south of Canada] we have all the "blood curdling" penalties in each degree. Some years back a GM decreed that, during his term, the word "symbolically" would be inserted before "binding myself to no less an obligation than...". As was discussed in a Board of Custodians of the Work meeting a few months ago, that only lasted for the year of that GM's decree. Now we're doing the work without the "symbolically" included.
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giovanni
Member
odi profanum vulgus, et arceo
Posts: 2,627
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Post by giovanni on Mar 21, 2006 22:55:22 GMT
Brethren all,
do you realize that if they were not symbolical we all could run the risk to go into jail?
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Post by hollandr on Mar 23, 2006 22:25:37 GMT
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Post by maat on Mar 23, 2006 22:29:28 GMT
But what IF there are REAL PENALTIES attached to inappropriate behaviour? Not of the blood curdling variety - but just as real physically & psychologically! Scientists are now coming to the realisation that we have two brains... the one we usually equate with which resides in the cranium and the other, wait for it ... which resides in the heart! And is brought into play when positive, non aggressive thinking comes into play. LOVE. To become perfect men we must establish and maintain this Heart/Mind connection. ..the penalities are not inflicted by anyone else but ourselves. So be careful lest you cut your connection. Because I think it important that we understand that there are very real penalties and that they should not be overlooked in our ceremonies in an idle moment I was pondering whether the Heart/Mind connection with regards to enlightenment was 'demonstrated' in other religions and philosophies. The Sign of the Cross would indicate not only the Heart/Mind connection but also the balancing of the Polarities (our Pillars). The hands joined in prayer start at the heart and point up to the brain area, if not beyond. This also is a balancing sign - left, right coming together and meeting on the centre. The sign you see the Arabs perform when approaching the Caliph or whatever.etc in the old movies.. hand starts at the heart, comes up to the brow and out.. again you see the Heart/Mind and the Centre. The traditional Indian greeting (Namaste) with the prayer hands almost physically connecting the heart and Mind. I am sure there are tons more. But for me, anyway, I can see the Heart/Mind connection reiterated in other philosophies and I can understand the reason for giving warnings of the penalties. Maat
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Post by maat on Mar 24, 2006 0:29:29 GMT
....another synchronistic happening on this Forum. I have just noticed that Giovanni has posted a paper on Heart and Mind in the Articles and Papers section. Have not had time to read it yet, but look forward to doing so - perhaps it is timely that we shift all further discussion on whether there is a connection or not to that thread.
Can anyone think of any other examples in other philosophies that might demonstrate a connection? Answers to Gio's thread please.
Cheers Maat
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Post by corab on Mar 24, 2006 20:04:52 GMT
I am the only active one out of four EAs at the moment and we have no FCs, so I find myself literally the Benjamin amidst MMs, each and every one of whom is an Officer. I could feel over-awed by that, but my Lodge is a warmhearted, loving Lodge, and so I feel very cherished with all these experienced men and women willing to guide me. This is a perfect example of the Heart/Mind connection! Wonderful Cora! Yep - that's my Lodge ;D ;D ;D Well, the good news is that one of them still has the benefit of a Lodge - she's moved up North and can no longer make the journey down South but thankfully we have a Lodge near her, too. Like the thought - sent you an email on this. Cheers, Cora
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ruffashlar
Member
Lodge Milncroft No. 1515 (GLoS), Govanhill Royal Arch Chapter 523 (S.G.R.A.C.S.)
Posts: 2,184
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Post by ruffashlar on Mar 24, 2006 21:14:26 GMT
Gio' writes: do you realize that if they were not symbolical we all could run the risk to go into jail?
I severely doubt that. It's one thing to swear on oath to do something, but entirely different to actually carry that out. Just look at the wording of the marriage vow.
Maat writes: another synchronistic happening on this Forum. I have just noticed that Giovanni has posted a paper on Heart and Mind in the Articles and Papers section.
I don't think it's the least bit synchronistic - we all talk about more or less the same things on here, have more or less identical preoccupations, and are likely to post on similar subjects at any time.
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Post by maat on Apr 26, 2007 0:37:12 GMT
I read a wonderful piece last night which pointed out that the S... for the 2nd is signifying Love and Reason. These being the lessons to be learned in the SE.
Alchemically speaking, Air and Earth represent the earthly parts of us. Are the ancient 'penalties' only indications of what we risk losing if we don't come to some appreciation of the value of Love and Reason? I would take this example to mean that we are hindered (waste a lifetime) if we ignore the lesson.
Given the fact that Fire and Water figure prominently in other penalties, might not the meaning of the lessons be lost if we did away with the 'penalties'?
Maat
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imakegarb
Member
One wee, sleeket, cowran, tim'rous beastie
Posts: 3,573
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Post by imakegarb on Apr 26, 2007 14:36:10 GMT
I was initiated with the p*nalties and was a bit schocked when I discovered the UGLE did away with them in 1985. But, well, to each their own.
I'm (nervously) glad to still have them as I find them to be instructive. In many, many ways.
Ma'at, where did you read this? I'd like to read more.
It's been suggested to me that the p*nalties, on their face, are, effectively hell. Bearing in mind what happens to you (in the first, placed where you can move neither forward or backward; in the second, an important part of you, effectively, scattered to the four winds and four corners), I've thought it amounts to a Masonic Hell.
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Post by hopefulmason on Apr 26, 2007 18:43:12 GMT
My lodge still states the penalties. Obviously they are not carried out (at least I hope so for the unfaithful) lol. But someone made a good point earlier. We need not follow the rules because they are the rules. We do it because it is the right thing to do. Thats part of what makes up a "superior" group.....in my opinion.
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Tamrin
Member
Nosce te ipsum
Posts: 3,586
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Post by Tamrin on Apr 26, 2007 21:26:26 GMT
When I was initiated, passed and raised the Ancient Penalties were still a part of the Obligations. While my former Obedience no longer has them in that part of the Rituals, I would not say it 'did away with them,' as they are still described in as much detail as when I first heard them.
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Post by maat on Apr 26, 2007 23:02:14 GMT
Ma'at, where did you read this? I'd like to read more. A paper written by a 33 Deg mason. I will email it to you if you are interested. May take a week or so, I will have to retype it for you in my spare(?) time which I am more than happy to do. I came to pretty much the same conclusion before reading the paper by contemplation. Heart Mind/Brain Mind - connection and disconnection, the two should agree. Maat
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imakegarb
Member
One wee, sleeket, cowran, tim'rous beastie
Posts: 3,573
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Post by imakegarb on Apr 27, 2007 0:30:26 GMT
PMed
Thank you!! ;D
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Post by keith on Apr 27, 2007 22:37:11 GMT
I sent this to Imakegarb but then thought everyone would find it interesting
ORIGINS OF THE PENALTIES OF THE THREE DEGREES
Bro. Vibert states that the Penalties remind us of the ancient treason penalties of the English Admiralty Courts. He points out that death was the penalty for an enormous number of offences; and in prescribing penalties for treason the English legislators of the period seem to have laid themselves out to add to the mere loss of life every circumstance of horror and ignominy they could think of. Their penalties were of their own framing, however at all events in cases where, for instance, they allude to a burial between high and low tide mark, for tide is a conspicuous feature in British seas only.
In discussing the origin of the present practices, i.e., which are survivals of the Operative Craft and which are introductions, Bro. Vibert states: “Our Penalties are almost certainly introductions for the very reason that no Craft would trouble to talk about penalties it could not inflict; its objects were practical and its rules were such as it could enforce”.
1) In connection with the Penalties of the First Degree the following quotations are of interest: (a) From “Old Time Punishments” by D. Andrews F.R.H.S.: “In the curious ordinances which were observed in the reign of Henry IV for the conduct of the Court of Admiralty for the Humber, are enumerated the various offences of the maritime connection, and their punishment. In view of the character of the Court the punishment was generally inflicted at the low water mark, so as to be within the jurisdiction of the Admiralty, the chief officer of which, the Admiral of the Humber, being from the year 1451, the Mayor of Hull. The Court met, and ‘consisting of Masters, Merchants and Mariners, with all others that do enjoy the King’s stream with hook, net or engine’ were addressed as follows: ‘You Masters of the quest, if you, or any of you, discover or disclose any of the King’s counsel (for the present you are admitted as King’s Counsellors), you are bound to be and shall be, had down to low water mark, where must be made three times, Oh yes! For the King, and then there this punishment prescribed by the law shall be executed upon them, that is their feet and hands bound, their throats cut, their tongues pulled out and their bodies cast into the sea”. Miscellanea Latomorum quotes this extract from “The Kentish Coast” by Charles Harper, 1914: “The Court of Shepway was the chief legislative body of the Cinque Ports . . . Convicted disturbers of the King’s peace, debasers of coin, and plunderers of ships’ gear to the value of twenty pence were at once drawn round Shepway on hurdles and afterwards hanged. An even more terrible fate awaited any jurat disclosing the King’s counsel, his fellow’s or his own. He was bound hand and foot to a stake set upon the seashore where the tide ebbed and flowed, his throat was cut and his tongue torn out through the slit.”
2) In “The Crime and Punishment” by Margaret Wilson, the following extract is quoted from a speech by Romilly in the House of Commons in 1781, in support of a bill for the abolition of certain treason punishments: “I do not foresee that in an English House of Commons in the nineteenth (?eighteenth) century one voice would have been heard in defence of a law which requires the tearing out of the heart and bowels from the body of a human being, while he is yet alive and burning them in his sight.” An old form of Penalty in the Second Degree given in some of the Exposures is “my h—t t—n from under my n.l.b and given to the vultures of the air as prey”. This suggests that the compilers of this version were familiar with the Legend of Prometheus whose penalty in the classic Hell was to have his liver devoured by a vulture every day, the organ in question growing again every night.
The references to the birds of the air may be derived from the English custom of hanging criminals sentenced to death on a gibbet often situated on a lonely heath, the body afterwards being fastened in chains or in an iron frame to prevent it from falling down so that it would remain there as long as possible, as an example to others. When the ravening birds of the air had finished with it, there would only be a bleached skeleton.
In “The Crime and Punishment” the following is stated: “Men convicted one day were hung the next. This was according to the law of George II which also directed that the body of the killed should either be dissected or hung in chains in view of the public until the last bit of it had disappeared.”
3) To know something of the Penalties of the Third Degree requires us to study certain aspects of the ancient treason penalties of the English Law under which the criminal was hung, drawn and quartered. These are stated in the Encyclopaedia of the Laws of England as follows: The traitor was taken down while still alive, disembowelled and his entrails burned before his eyes. The body was then to be beheaded and the trunk divided into four quarters, to be disposed of according to the pleasure of the Crown. Women were to be burnt. In 1790 hanging was substituted for burning in the case of women and in 1870 hanging was provided as the penalty for men, in place of the savage penalties above mentioned. The penalties in substantially their present form, are found in the Exposures from 1723 onwards. The First Degree Penalty appears in the Edinburgh House MS 1696 “Under no less a penalty than having my t . . . cut out from under my chin and of being buried within the floodmark where no man shall know.”
In Prichard’s “Masonry Dissected”, 1730, the Tennessee MS, 1742 and “Solomon in all his Glory”, 1766, the three Penalties are combined in one Obligation, that of the First Degree.
Many Grand Lodges, possibly most, including those of New Zealand and England, have of recent years introduced changes in the wording of the Penalties to make it clear that they are of historical and traditional importance only. In New Zealand, for instance, at the appropriate places the words “ever bearing in mind the traditional penalty on the violation of any of them, of having . . .” has been introduced.
From the Transactions of the Masters’ and Past Masters’ Lodge No. 130, Christchurch, New Zealand
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Post by hopefulmason on Apr 30, 2007 15:33:54 GMT
Thanks for sharing the paper with us all.....It was an excellent paper.
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Post by wayseer on May 2, 2007 11:01:51 GMT
Thank you Keith - excellent material.
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