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BACK NEXT Spring 2003 Issue 24 Letter from the Editor News Briefing News and Views On The Level International News Julian Rees An Egyptian Mystery The Whole Man From Fraternal Groups to Trade Unions Stone Poems Frontier Freemason Soundtracks of the Ancients Raised from Adversity Brother Lightfoote's Journal Letters to the Editor Review: What Went Wrong Review: Genealogy of the Sainteclaires of Rosslyn Review: The Social Impact of Freemasonry on the Modern Western World Review: On A Grander Scale Review: The Most Advanced Outpost Canon Richard Tydeman Copyright 1997-2008 FREEMASONRY TODAY Designed and Maintained by: Cyberpoint Limited

FREEMASONRY TODAY Spring 2003 - Issue 24 - Index Michael Baigent - Letter from the Editor Our civilisation is precious. We need to appreciate it, nurture it, protect it. Our civilisation is vulnerable, forming but a thin veneer over the chaos which waits unsleeping and unblinking beneath. The ancients knew this well. Perhaps because they lacked a concept of linear progress they felt nearer to their origins which they saw all about them. For those cultures, chaos was ever present and had to be constantly combated. The ancient Babylonians re-enacted the defeat of chaos each year during their great Spring Festival. This reminded every citizen of what had been necessary to build civilisation. The ancient Egyptians saw chaos as the realm of Seth; civilisation ... News Briefing Metropolitan Grand Lodge of London — Questions Over Masonic One-Day Classes in North America — Archbishop Withdraws from Interview — Consecration of Royal Arch Grand Chapter in Brazil — Welsh Assembly Continues Debate Over Freemasonry On The Level Art of the Apocalypse — Masonic Archives on the Internet — Newham Collects Underground — Haberdashers’ Donation — Charitable Cornish Bowlers — Degree of Success — Canonbury Masonic Research Centre — Centre for Research into Freemasonry, Sheffield University — The Cornerstone Society — Quatuor Coronati News and Views Giant Step for Freemasonry — Tribute at the Royal Masonic Variety Show — ‘Spectacular Meeting’s’ Charity Donations — London’s Festive Concert Brought Cheer — Support for the Gurkha Welfare Trust — Classic Cash for Whizz-Kidz — Opportunities for Charitable Funds — Yorkshire Strip Sponsors — Death of Longest-Serving Freemason — Clerkenwell Trio’s Spontaneous Collection — Grafton Rose Croix: A Riot of Colour — Yorkshire Masons’ Housing Scheme International News Farmer is New Zealand Grand Master — Joint Project to Aid East Timor — Connecticut: Warrant Withdrawn from Lodge Opposing One-Day Classes — Vanuatu: Lodge Destroyed by Fire — Anniversaries in District Grand Lodge of East Africa — Grand Lodge of Romania Celebrates First Ten Years Freedom in Trust I continue to be fascinated by this contradiction: before initiation we are a part of the bedrock, not yet removed from the quarry. As a result of initiation we become an individual, a rough ashlar. And yet initiation makes us part of the lodge, an element of the greater whole. A seeming paradox, this. Let me put this paradox another way. An initiation, although principally for the initiate, is not only for him. We all join in it with our hearts so that the brotherhood of the many can contribute to the enlightenment of the one, that second freedom which the initiate is about to experience. So it’s a collective endeavour. Yet it’s also an individual undertaking. The initiate takes the step freely ... An Egyptian Mystery There are three chambers within the Great Pyramid of the Pharaoh Khufu: the upper, placed in the centre of the pyramid, is called the King’s Chamber, and is entered by a passage-way leading off the end of the huge interior ‘Grand Gallery’. This Chamber is around 34 feet long, east to west, a little over 17 feet wide and 19 feet high. It is lined with well finished granite brought down river from Aswan, 500 miles to the south. Within the chamber stands ... The Whole Man There is not much difference between the philosophy of Alternative Medicine and the philosophy of Freemasonry.’ John Chapman quickly drew me into his train of thought. ‘How so?’ I asked. ‘Both look at the whole person. Alternative Medicine considers the whole person rather than individual symptoms; Freemasonry too concerns the whole person – viewing us as both a physical body and a spiritual being. Furthermore, Alternative Medicine aims to restore personal harmony; masonry seeks to do the same thing ...’ From Fraternal Groups to Trade Unions While we have at Freemasons’ Hall in London a public relations machine to combat ill-informed reports and to proactively promote Freemasonry, we still have a rather fixed view of masonic history: that is, the history written by Freemasons for Freemasons. In itself it is harmless enough but until quite recently this was also the only history available for non-masons to get any feeling about where Freemasonry came from. However good this history is ... Stone Poems The Land-mark A Time to Gather Stones Together The Gavel The Craftsman Samson Solomon A Time to Cast Away Stones From Labour to Refreshment Frontier Freemason Oklahoma City, September 9th, 1927. The body of Frank Canton, clothed in the full dress uniform of a United States Army General, was buried. Oklahoma City Freemasons, dressed in the sombre suits and aprons of American tradition, raised their hands to heaven in final honours to their departed brother. Frank Canton was finally resting from a turbulent life. Frank Canton had led a life embracing both crime and law-enforcement. No one knows ... Soundtracks of the Ancients Many of us like to visit the ruins of ancient monuments and temples, trying to picture what went on at these places. But it tends to be a silent movie running in our minds, one that does not tell us what these ancient sacred places sounded like. Fortunately, archaeologists are at last beginning to realise that sound was vital to the religious practices of ancient peoples and so, gradually, the various soundtracks of antiquity are beginning to be investigated ... Raised from Adversity Our visit to the Jersey Masonic Library and Museum, the fifth of the joint trips Michael Baigent and I have undertaken, was to prove enjoyable and instructive. The Channel Islands have a unique history, not least because they were the only part of British Territory occupied by the Germans in the Second World War ... Brother Lightfoote's Journal Caradoc! There indeed is a name with which to conjure images of a glorious past. I spent some of the happiest years of my boyhood in the county of Shropshire- Floreat Salopia! - and many of those were spent in careless play upon the slopes of that great Caer that bears the name of another Caradoc: a legendary chieftain who, the story goes, resisted the onslaught of the mighty legions of Rome. The saint's life also was not without incident. He was employed, as a lad, as a harper, in the service of Rhys ap Tewdyr, but blotted his copybook indelibly by ... Letters to the Editor Freemasonry and the Archbishop of Canterbury — University of Aston Lodge — Changes in the Royal Arch — Egyptomania — Police Masonic Display Team Review: What Went Wrong Review: Genealogy of the Sainteclaires of Rosslyn Review: The Social Impact of Freemasonry on the Modern Western World Review: On A Grander Scale Review: The Most Advanced Outpost Emulation I used to look across the chancel in St. Paul’s Cathedral to read the inscriptions on the stalls opposite, for each one is surmounted by the first words, in Latin, of one of the Psalms. One that intrigued me bears the opening words of Psalm 37: Noli emulari which, I suppose, could be loosely translated, ‘Have nothing whatever to do with Emulation’. Later, looking up the rest of the sentence, I find it reads, Noli emulari in malignantibus; the Authorised Version reads: ‘Fret not thyself because of evil-doers’, the New English Bible has, ‘Do not emulate those who do wrong’. This, then, accounts for what at first appears to be a paradox, for ‘emulation’ is defined in the dictionary as ‘the attempt...’   Issue 24, Spring 2003 © FreemasonryToday 1997-2008