Desaguliers' Code

[Tamrin]

Grove

(1.) Heb. 'asherah, properly a wooden image, or a pillar representing Ashtoreth, a sensual Canaanitish goddess, probably usually set up in a grove (2 Kings 21:7; 23:4). In the Revised Version the word "Asherah" (q.v.) is introduced as a proper noun, the name of the wooden symbol of a goddess, with the plurals Asherim (Ex. 34:13) and Asheroth (Judg. 3:13). The LXX. have rendered _asherah_ in 2 Chr. 15:16 by "Astarte." The Vulgate has done this also in Judg. 3:7.
(2.) Heb. 'eshel (Gen. 21:33). In 1 Sam. 22:6 and 31:13 the Authorized Version renders this word by "tree." In all these passages the Revised Version renders by "tamarisk tree." It has been identified with the Tamariscus orientalis, five species of which are found in Palestine.
(3.) The Heb. word 'elon, uniformly rendered in the Authorized Version by "plain," properly signifies a grove or plantation. In the Revised Version it is rendered, pl., "oaks" (Gen. 13:18; 14:13; 18:1; 12:6; Deut. 11:30; Josh. 19:33). In the earliest times groves are mentioned in connection with religious worship. The heathen consecrated groves to particular gods, and for this reason they were forbidden to the Jews (Jer. 17:3; Ezek. 20:28).

Bibliography Information
Easton, Matthew George. M.A., D.D., "Definition for 'Grove' Eastons Bible Dictionary".
bible-history.com - Eastons; 1897.

[Gaslight]

May 20, 2009 7:23:45 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

Given the controversial, dangerous and even heretical nature of Desaguliers' Code, in its day, only those Brethren open to or deemed to be suitable for assistance toward the solution are likely to have found the key. Among those not privy to the "genuine secrets," whisperings of the importance of the "grove" in the Sanctum Sanctorum appear to have led to dreadful confusion rather than enlightenment, as with the illustration below, featuring a literal grove in the deep darkness of the sanctuary, in which the artist either maintained the deceptive veil or himself failed to penetrate it.

Is this comment your own, or taken from MacNulty? I'm guessing it's the former, but wanted to make sure.

The trees in the Sanctum Sanctorum certainly make you stop and think. Wasn't it an enclosed space into which only the High Priest could venture, and only at certain times?

And as I type this, a dim recollection is flickering in my mind. I read somewhere that, at least in the early days, the SS contained a gross image not altogether unconnected with procreation. Can't for the life of me remember where or when I read that.

[Tamrin]

May 20, 2009 13:43:52 GMT 10 Gaslight said:

May 20, 2009 7:23:45 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

Given the controversial, dangerous and even heretical nature of Desaguliers' Code, in its day, only those Brethren open to or deemed to be suitable for assistance toward the solution are likely to have found the key. Among those not privy to the "genuine secrets," whisperings of the importance of the "grove" in the Sanctum Sanctorum appear to have led to dreadful confusion rather than enlightenment, as with the illustration below, featuring a literal grove in the deep darkness of the sanctuary, in which the artist either maintained the deceptive veil or himself failed to penetrate it.

Is this comment your own, or taken from MacNulty? I'm guessing it's the former, but wanted to make sure.

The trees in the Sanctum Sanctorum certainly make you stop and think. Wasn't it an enclosed space into which only the High Priest could venture, and only at certain times?

And as I type this, a dim recollection is flickering in my mind. I read somewhere that, at least in the early days, the SS contained a gross image not altogether unconnected with procreation. Can't for the life of me remember where or when I read that.

They were my own words. While MacNulty's work lends itself to the theory I propose, in my reading of his work, I haven't found him be all that specific, in that direction.

As for the tradition of the SS being restricted to the HP, even taking a fundamentalist approach and disregarding the historical and biblical confusion presented in our ritual, we find that restriction would not have been the case prior to the dedication of the temple, when masons would have had to be present, as they are said to have been present during Josiah's repairs.

The gross image and "image of jealousy" were hostile, pejorative references to the image or emblem of Asherah (she was associated with abundance or plenty). Consider how many Hindu temples still contain emblems representing the lingam and yoni as objects of pious, even somewhat prudish, veneration.

[Tamrin]

May 20, 2009 13:43:52 GMT 10 Gaslight said:

I read somewhere that, at least in the early days, the SS contained a gross image not altogether unconnected with procreation.

Apart from the asherim there were also the cherubim which were represented differently in different periods. Turning to Dr. Raphael Patai's The Hebrew Goddess (I highly recommend it), we read (pp.84/5):

As late as the 3rd and 4th centuries C.E., the memory of the original function and the significance of the Cherubim in the Sanctuary survived among the Babylonian Talmudic masters. According to one of them, a certain Rabh Qetina, who flourished in the late 3rd and early 4th century,

When Israel used to make the pilgimage, the [i.e., the priests] would roll up for them the Parakhet [the Veil separating the Holy from the Holy of Holy], and show them the Cherubim which were intertwined with one another, and say to them: "Behold! your love before God is like the love of male and female!"

Rashi, the 11th-century commentator, explains the passage: "The Cherubim were joined together, and were clinging to, and embracing, each other, like a male who embraces the female."

Whether the above tradition referred to the First or the Second Temple, was no longer clear to the Babylonian teachers. Some held that it must have referred to the First Temple, because in the Second there were no Cherubim: others, like Rabh Aha, son of Jacob (a contemporary of Hana bar Qetina), argued that it referred to the Second Temple and that the Cherubim discussed in it were those painted or engraved on the wall.

Yet another detail concerning the Cherubim is given by Rabbi Shimeon ben Laquish (ca. 200-275 C.E.), an outstanding Palestinian teacher:

When strangers entered the Sanctuary, they saw the Cherubim intertwined with eaxch other; they took them out into the marketplace and said: Israel, whose blessing is [reputedly] a blessing and whose curse is a curse, should occupy themselves with such things!" And they despised them, as it is written, "All that honored her, despise her, because they have seen her [shameful] nakedness."

The same tradition is contained in several Midrashim with a few added details:

When the sins caused that the gentiles should enter Jerusalem, Ammonites and Moabites came together with them, and they entered the House of the Holy of Holies, and found there the two Cherubim, and they took them and put them in a cage and went around with them in all the streets of Jerusalem and said " You used to say that this nation was not serving idols. Now you see what we found and what they were worshipping!"

[Tamrin]

The corroborating testimony of a hostile witness, the Bible:

Groves

• Antiquity of.

  Genesis 21:33And Abraham planted a grove in Beersheba, and called there on the name of the LORD, the everlasting God.

• Often on tops of hills.

  1 Kings 14:23 For they also built them high places, and images, and groves, on every high hill, and under every green tree.
  
  Hosea 4:13 They sacrifice upon the tops of the mountains, and burn incense upon the hills, under oaks and poplars and elms, because the shadow thereof is good: therefore your daughters shall commit whoredom, and your spouses shall commit adultery.

• Often used as resting places.

  1 Samuel 22:6 When Saul heard that David was discovered, and the men that were with him, (now Saul abode in Gibeah under a tree in Ramah, having his spear in his hand, and all his servants were standing about him;)
  (marg.)

• Idols were worshipped in.

  Deuteronomy 12:2 Ye shall utterly destroy all the places, wherein the nations which ye shall possess served their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every green tree:

• Not to be planted near God's altar.

  Deuteronomy 16:21 Thou shalt not plant thee a grove of any trees near unto the altar of the LORD thy God, which thou shalt make thee.

• Of Canaanites, to be destroyed.

  Exodus 34:13 But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves:
  
  Deuteronomy 7:5 But thus shall ye deal with them; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire.
  
  Deuteronomy 12:3 And ye shall overthrow their altars, and break their pillars, and burn their groves with fire; and ye shall hew down the graven images of their gods, and destroy the names of them out of that place.

• FOR IDOL WORSHIP PLANTED
  • By Ahab.

    1 Kings 16:33 And Ahab made a grove; and Ahab did more to provoke the LORD God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him.

  • By Manasseh.

    2 Kings 21:3 For he built up again the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; and he reared up altars for Baal, and made a grove, as did Ahab king of Israel; and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served them.

  • By Israelites.

    2 Kings 17:16 And they left all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made them molten images, even two calves, and made a grove, and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served Baal.

• Fondness of Israel for.

  Jeremiah 17:2 Whilst their children remember their altars and their groves by the green trees upon the high hills

  .
• Punishment for making and serving.

  1 Kings 14:15 For the LORD shall smite Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water, and he shall root up Israel out of this good land, which he gave to their fathers, and shall scatter them beyond the river, because they have made their groves, provoking the LORD to anger.
  
  Isaiah 1:28-29 And the destruction of the transgressors and of the sinners shall be together, and they that forsake the LORD shall be consumed. For they shall be ashamed of the oaks which ye have desired, and ye shall be confounded for the gardens that ye have chosen.

• DESTROYED BY
  • Gideon.

    Judges 6:25-28 And it came to pass the same night, that the LORD said unto him, Take thy father's young bullock, even the second bullock of seven years old, and throw down the altar of Baal that thy father hath, and cut down the grove that is by it: And build an altar unto the LORD thy God upon the top of this rock, in the ordered place, and take the second bullock, and offer a burnt sacrifice with the wood of the grove which thou shalt cut down. Then Gideon took ten men of his servants, and did as the LORD had said unto him: and so it was, because he feared his father's household, and the men of the city, that he could not do it by day, that he did it by night. And when the men of the city arose early in the morning, behold, the altar of Baal was cast down, and the grove was cut down that was by it, and the second bullock was offered upon the altar that was built.

  • Hezekiah.

    2 Kings 18:4 He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down the groves, and brake in pieces the brasen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it: and he called it Nehushtan.

  • Asa.

    2 Chronicles 14:3 For he took away the altars of the strange gods, and the high places, and brake down the images, and cut down the groves:

  • Jehoshaphat.

    2 Chronicles 17:6 And his heart was lifted up in the ways of the LORD: moreover he took away the high places and groves out of Judah.

  • Josiah.

    2 Kings 23:14 And he brake in pieces the images, and cut down the groves, and filled their places with the bones of men.
    
    2 Chronicles 34:3 For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father: and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images.
    
    2 Chronicles 34:7 And when he had broken down the altars and the groves, and had beaten the graven images into powder, and cut down all the idols throughout all the land of Israel, he returned to Jerusalem.

• God promised to wean Israel from.

  Isaiah 17:7-8 At that day shall a man look to his Maker, and his eyes shall have respect to the Holy One of Israel. And he shall not look to the altars, the work of his hands, neither shall respect that which his fingers have made, either the groves, or the images.

[Tamrin]

May 20, 2009 19:35:32 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

The gross image and "image of jealousy" were hostile, pejorative references to the image or emblem of Asherah (she was associated with abundance or plenty). Consider how many Hindu temples still contain emblems representing the lingam and yoni as objects of pious, even somewhat prudish, veneration.

To give the current Pope his due, I welcomed his first encyclical letter, Deus caritas est, in which he said the love of god (Agape) had a sensuous aspect (Eros).

[Tamrin]

Definition of Asherah[/url][/size]

Rakefet

Asherah 'asherah (Hebrew) A Syrian goddess of fortune having close similarities with the Roman divinity Venus, and connected by analogy of attributes with Ashtoreth or Astarte, another Syrian divinity.

Also a sacred wooden pole or image standing close to the massebah and altar in early Shemitic sanctuaries, part of the equipment of the temple of Jehovah in Jerusalem till the Deuteronomic reformation of Josiah (2 Kings 23:6). The plural, 'asherim, denotes statues, images, columns, or pillars; translated in the Bible by "groves." Maachah, the grandmother of Asa, King of Jerusalem, is accused of having made for herself such an idol, which was a lingham -- for centuries a religious rite in Judaea. Sometimes called the Assyrian Tree of Life, "the original Asherah was a pillar with seven branches on each side surmounted by a globular flower with three projecting rays, and no phallic stone, as the Jews made of it, but a metaphysical symbol. 'Merciful One, who dead to life raises!' was the prayer uttered before the Asherah, on the banks of the Euphrates. The 'Merciful One,' was . . . the higher triad in man symbolized by the globular flower with its three rays" (TG 37). See also ASTARTE

Please note the association with the "tree of life" and the, 'Merciful One, who dead to life raises!' prayer.

[Tamrin]

ASHERAH

[Excerpt - Merlin Stone, 1984, Ancient Mirrors of Womanhood: A treasury of
goddess and heroine lore from around the world, Beacon Press, Boston, p.119 (emphasis added)]

From ancient settlements along the waters, the Tigris, the Euphrates, and the Jordan, Semitic peoples spread across the Levant, often calling upon the Holy Mother as Asherah, Highest Queen -- knowing Her as Lat, Elat or Elath, Exalted Mother, Goddess. She was the Holy Lady Who Walked the Sea, remembered even in Arabia, and at Mesopotamian assur, where the most ancient shrine was the sacred Asheritu.

Mother of all Wisdom, Her ancient oracles of prophesy renowned, She gave the knowledge to diviners, helping them to see far into the future, while they remembered that She alone gave birth to the Seven Deities of Heaven. In her sacred groves, they knew Her as She Who Builds, providing the timber of Her trees. Teaching Her people the art of carpentry. On the flatness of the land, they knew Her as She Who Builds, providing the clay of the earth, teaching Her people the knowledge of the bricks. So it was that Asherah taught those who revered Her how to build shelters from the heat and cold, and how to build the sacred shrines in which they called upon her name.

[Tamrin]

May 22, 2009 7:11:11 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

From ancient settlements along the waters, the Tigris, the Euphrates, and the Jordan, Semitic peoples spread across the Levant, often calling upon the Holy Mother as Asherah, Highest Queen...

"Highest Queen" or "exceeding queen" is also said to be the import of the Egyptian name "Au Set" (archaically "Ashesh") of the goddess whom the Greeks called "Isis."

[Gaslight]

May 22, 2009 7:22:39 GMT 10 Tamrin said:

"Highest Queen" or "exceeding queen" is also said to be the import of the Egyptian name "Au Set" (archaically "Ashesh") of the goddess whom the Greeks called "Isis."

I've been reading with interest your recent posts on the Mother Goddess in her various incarnations, but losing track of the connection with your initial idea that Desaguliers deliberately included hints in the ritual that would illustrate religious intolerance.

The weight of material you're presenting on the Mother Goddess could be construed as an indication that this was Desaguliers' aim: to remind brethren of the old Mother Goddess religion. The crushing of that religion would be secondary.

This is sheer conjecture, but if I had to imagine something hidden away in the Masonic ritual, my first candidate would be references to the Gnostic tradition. This would, in a way, fit in with the overall Masonic emphasis on sets of three, and something that was lost. Not references to Asherah, but to maybe Barbelo or Sophia.