people are not the same and, therefore, should be treated differently. If Masonry has been conflated with certain minor aspects of philosophy in the minds of certain outsiders, then we may understand the “idea” of supposed, but not actual, sun worship by the initiates. Of course, Reason cannot conclude that the planets are deities and worthy of worship.
With Masonry’s many emblems and depictions of astronomical objects (the sun, the moon and the blazing star), we can understand how certain individuals outside of the Brotherhood may easily misunderstand the correct meaning of these depictions. We caution the Gentle Reader that natural objects will have certain or universal meanings, whereas man made object can only offer ambiguous meanings according to time and place.
From multiple misunderstanding of the Masonic astronomical emblems is a short, albeit illogical, jump from sun worship to the worship of Satan. We are amused by the idea of the “Satanic” influence in the lodge; amused and disappointed that some opinionated people are so easily convinced of this “fact”, based on no evidence, but a plethora of suppositions , innuendos and questionable conclusions.
Although Yours Truly has never been a member of the esteemed Brotherhood (therefore, I remain unconstrained and free to speculate), I find it unreasonable that such men as the Mozarts, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin belonged to an organization that, along with promoting the high ideals of the Enlightenment (such as: we are brothers below with one Father above), also understood and taught that the planets are gods worthy of worship along with the one Father, the Great Architect of the Universe, where the Great Architect is to be correctly understood as none other than Lucifer himself. This contradiction is the result of an attempt to reconcile two opposite ideas (reason and unreason). The contradiction indicates that there is either an innocent misunderstanding regarding the purpose of the lodge or a willful denial of the lodges’ explicit statements.
Although I caution my Apprentices that the “good stuff” is never written down, I have serious reservations that the thousands of degrees and tens of thousands of hours of workings of those degrees that are either based on Biblical personas or historical periods hold one sublime spoken secret teaching that can be only be related in a hushed voice: “Secretly, we worship Satan.” or as is sometimes abbreviated, SWWS.
Excursion:
Imagine that the nth degree has been completed and select members form a circle around the one individual who shows great promise and he is to be let in on Masonry’s greatest secret. “Brother N., you have made great progress in your workings, and now we feel it is the time to tell you truth regarding your Brothers: Secretly, we worship Satan. And since we told you the greatest secret of the Lodge, you must promise not to tell anyone.”
This scenario is not reasonable; it is ludicrous and laughable.
In conclusion to the fraudulent claims regarding secret Satanic worship in Freemasonry, it is highly probable that the unenlightened feeble, sensual and selfish souls who have reached the conclusion of “Luciferian” worship, did so through willful misinterpretations.
We doubt it not.