THE SHORT TALK BULLETIN |
...The Masonic Altar...
Masonic Lodge is a symbol of the world as it was thought to be
in the olden times. Our ancient Brethren had a profound insight when they saw
that the world is a Temple, over-hung by a starry canopy by night, lighted by
the journeying sun by day, wherein man goes forth to his labor on a
checker-board of lights and shadows, joys and sorrows, seeking to reproduce on
earth the law and order of heaven. The visible world was but a picture or
reflection of the invisible, and at its center stood the ALTAR of sacrifices,
obligation, and adoration.
While we hold a view of the world very unlike that held by our ancient Brethren
- knowing it to be round, not flat and square - yet their insight is still true.
The whole idea was that man, if he is to build either a House of Faith or an
order of Society that is to endure, must imitate the laws and principles of the
world in which he lives. That is also our dream and design; the love of it
ennobles our lives; it is our labor and our worship. To fulfill it we, too, need
wisdom and help from above; and at the center of our Lodge stands the same Altar
- older than all temples, as old as life itself - a focus of faith and
fellowship, at once a symbol and shrine of that unseen element of thought and
yearning that all men are aware of and which no one can define.
Upon this earth there is nothing more impressive than the silence of a company
of human beings bowed together at an Altar. No thoughtful man but at some time
has mused over the meaning of this great adoring habit of our humanity, and the
wonder of it deepens the longer he ponders it. The instinct which thus draws men
together in prayer is the strange power which has drawn together the stones of
great cathedrals, where the mystery of God is embodied. So far as we know, man
is the only being on our planet that pauses to pray, and the wonder of his
worship tells us more about him than any other fact. By some deep necessity of
his nature he is a seeker after God, and in moments of sadness or longing, in
hours of tragedy or terror, he lays aside his tools and looks out over the far
horizon.
The history of the Altar in the life of man is a story more fascinating than any
fiction. Whatever else man may have been - cruel, tyrannous, or vindictive - the
record of his long search for God is enough to prove that he is not wholly base,
not altogether an animal. Rites horrible, and often bloody, may have been a part
of his early ritual, but if the history of past ages had left us nothing but the
memory of a race at prayer, it would have left us rich, And so, following the
good custom of the men which were of old, we set up an Altar in the Lodge,
lifting up hands in prayer, moved thereto by the ancient need and aspiration of
our humanity. Like the men who walked in the grey years gone, our need is for
the living God to hallow these our days and years, even to the last ineffable
homeward sigh which men call death.
The earliest Altar was a rough, unhewn stone set up, like the stone which Jacob
set up at Bethel when his dream of a ladder, on which angels were ascending and
descending, turned his lonely bed into a house of god and a gate of heaven.
Later, as faith became more refined, and the idea of sacrifice grew in meaning,
the Altar was built of hewn stone - cubical in form - cut, carved, and often
beautifully wrought, on which men lavished jewels and priceless gifts, deeming
nothing too costly to adorn the place of prayer. Later still, when men erected a
Temple dedicated and adorned as the House of God among men, there were two
altars, one of sacrifice, and one of incense. the altar of sacrifice, where
slain beasts were offered, stood in front of the Temple; the altar of incense,
on which burned the fragrance of worship, stood within. Behind all was the far
withdrawn Holy place into which only the high priest might enter.
As far back as we can go the Altar was the center of human Society, and an
object of peculiar sanctity by virtue of that law of association by which places
and things are consecrated. It was a place of refuge for the hunted or the
tormented - criminals or slaves - and to drag them away from it by violence was
held to be an act of sacrilege, since they were under the protection of God. At
the Altar marriage rites were solemnized, and treaties made or vows taken in its
presence were more holy and binding than if made elsewhere, because there man
invoked God as witness. In all the religions of antiquity, and especially among
the peoples who worshipped the Light, it was the usage of both priests and
people to pass around the Altar, following the course of the sun - from the
East, by way of the South, to the West - singing hymns of praise as a part of
their worship. Their ritual was thus an allegorical picture of the truth which
under lies all religion - that man must live on earth in harmony with the rhythm
and movement of heaven.
From facts and hints such as these we begin to see the meaning of the Altar in
Masonry, and the reason for its position in the Lodge. In English Lodges, as in
the French and Scottish Rites, it stands in front of the Master in the East. In
the York Rite, so called, it is placed in the center of the Lodge - more
properly a little to the east of the center--about which all Masonic activities
revolve. It is not simply a necessary piece of furniture, a kind of table
intended to support the Holy Bible, the Square and Compasses. Alike by its
existence and its situation it identifies Masonry as a religious institution,
and yet its uses are not exactly the same as the offices of an Altar in a
cathedral or a shrine. Here is a fact often overlooked, and we ought to get it
clearly in our minds.
The position of the Altar in the Lodge is not accidental, but profoundly
significant. For, while Masonry is not a religion, it is religious in its faith
and basic principles, no less than in its spirit and purpose. And yet it is not
a Church. Nor does it attempt to do what the Church is trying to do. If it were
a Church its Altar would be in the East and its ritual would be altered
accordingly. That is to say, Masonry is not a Religion, much less a sect, but a
Worship in which all men can unite, because it does not undertake to explain, or
dogmatically to settle in detain, those issues by which men are divided. Beyond
the Primary, fundamental facts of faith it does not go. With the philosophy of
those facts, and the differences and disputes growing out of them, it has not to
do. In short, the position of the Altar in the Lodge is a symbol of what Masonry
believes the Altar should be in actual life, a center of union and fellowship,
and not a cause of division, as is now so often the case. It does not seek
uniformity of opinion, but it does seek fraternity of spirit, leaving each one
free to fashion his own philosophy of ultimate truth. as we may read in the
constitutions of 1723:
"A Mason is obliged, by his Tenure, to obey the moral Law; and if he rightly
understands the Art, he will never be a stupid Atheist, nor an irreligious
Libertine. but though in ancient times Masons were charged in every Country to
be of the religion of that country or Nation, Whatever it was, yet 'tis now
thought more expedient only to oblige them to that Religion in which all men
agree, leaving their particular Opinions to themselves; that is, to be good Men
and true, or Men of Honor and Honesty, by whatever Denomination or Persuasions
they may be distinguished; whereby Masonry becomes the Center of Union, and the
Means of conciliating true Friendship among Persons that must have remained at a
perpetual Distance."
Surely those are memorable words, a Magna Charta of Friendship and fraternity.
Masonry goes hand in hand with religion until religion enters the field of
sectarian feud, and there it stops; because Masonry seeks to unite men, not to
divide them. Here, then, is the meaning of the Masonic Altar and its position in
the Lodge. It is, first of all, an Altar of Faith-- the deep, eternal faith
which underlies all creeds and over arches all sects; faith in God, in the moral
law, and in the life everlasting. Faith in God is the cornerstone and the
key-stone of freemasonry. It is the first truth and the last, the truth that
makes all other truths true, without which life is a riddle and fraternity a
futility. For, apart from God the Father, our dream of the Brotherhood of Man is
as vain as all the vain things proclaimed of Solomon--fiction having no basis or
hope in fact.
At the same time, the Altar of Masonry is an Altar of Freedom--not freedom from
faith, but freedom of faith. Beyond the fact of the reality of God it does not
go, allowing every man to think of God according to his experience of life and
his vision of truth. It does not define God, much less dogmatically determine
how and what men shall think or believe about God. There dispute and division
begin. as a matter of fact, Masonry is not speculative at all, but operative, or
rather co-operative. While all its teaching implies the Fatherhood of god, yet
its ritual does not actually affirm that truth, still less make it a test of
fellowship. Behind this silence lies a deep and wise reason. Only by the
practice of Brotherhood do men realize the Divine Fatherhood, as a true-hearted
poet has written:
"No man could tell me what my soul might be;
I sought for God, and He eluded me;
I sought my Brother out, and found all three."
Hear one fact more, and the meaning of the Masonic Altar will be plain. Often
one enters a great Church, like Westminster Abbey, and finds it empty, or only a
few people in the pews here and there, praying or in deep thought. They are
sitting quietly, each without reference to others, seeking an opportunity for
the soul to be alone, to communicate with mysteries greater then itself, and
find healing for the burisings of life. but no one ever goes to a Masonic Altar
alone. No one bows before it at all except when the Lodge is open and in the
presence of his Brethren. It is an Altar of fellowship, as if to teach us that
no man can learn the truth for another, and no man can learn it alone. Masonry
brings men together in mutual respect, sympathy, and good will, that we may
learn in love the truth that is hidden by apathy and lost by hate.
for the rest, let us never forget--what has been so often and so sadly
forgotten--that the most sacred Altar on earth is the soul of man--your soul and
mine; and that the Temple and its ritual are not ends in themselves, but
beautiful means to the end that every human heart may be a sanctuary of faith, a
shrine of love, an altar of purity, pity, and unconquerable hope.