russellholland wrote:Unforgiven wrote:...
Hence my questions are, how can we be sure which Egyptian story is valid? How did it become part of our rituals?...
There are many logical problems but most of those can be bypassed by the use of Google. There are images from Egyptian times that clearly show Masonic signs.
Similarly a search of Sumerian and Chinese imagery will also provide much of interest.
Happy searching!
I concur with your comments about logical problems. And indeed Google is a useful tool to find 'possible' answers to those questions. Perhaps I have interpreted this site incorrectly. For myself, I look at these discussions as part of our personal obligations, to further our Masonic Knowledge. The tools we are advised to use to do this are the Seven LIberal Arts and Sciences. The first three of those, as we are aware, Grammar, Logic and Rhetoric. The classic purpose of these three is to understand language, to process the meaning of that language and then hold the ability to express the thoughts produced by that language in the purest way possible. The importance of them was for the classical concept of debate, for two parties to express their view point, sometimes to an audience, to present a question for the other to answer.
Some of us may even remember the school debating concepts.
It is helpful being directed to various google searches, some of them I was already familiar with, and I appreciate them. But reading material is only a small part of the educational system, if we just accept what is presented to us, without question, we cannot expect to progress. For example, many are still under the impression 'For He is a Jolly Good Fellow', is a masonic song, but no actual evidence exists for it. That Yankee Doodle was an American Tune. That Ring-a-Ring-Roses was composed because of the Great Plague. All aspects that people have accepted as fact, but actually do not seem to be.
I remember as a child reading Eric von Daniken, he showed a carving of a character with a circle on the figures chest, with a further collection of circles inserted within that original circle. He argued that the figure must have been a Spaceman, as the device looked like a telephone dial. It did, but I read the book when these dials were replaced by push buttons, which made me smile as a child, as obviously an alien of the 70's (a child's logic).
Indeed, I have read of gloves and aprons being found in tombs. Pharoahs also wore kilts, does that make them scottish? I am not mocking, but pointing out to accept one as evidence, we most also, at least review the balance.
As for the guestures in carvings. Out of the millions of various carvings of figures, in different positions, how do we know those were meant to prepresent a particular ceremony, which has survived to this modern age? How do we ignore that our girps and passwords, like our ceremonies, have also changed...even today when I visited different lodges, I saw different variations of signs...and I know of at least two Lion-paw grips.
My step father was interested in ley-lines, being a scientist, he devised a program to test the theory. He placed all the churches in his area on a virtual map and ran the program, and found a multitude of patterns of churches constructed in lines. But being a scientist, he tested the discovery, so also entered all the public telephone boxes in the same area and again a virtual equal number appeared to be on similar straight lines? Unless sacred grounds and the British telephone company have a grand design for us all - it does encourage us to test what we read.
I thought this was a place where reading was not simply the plan, that perhaps debate. Debate isn't a harsh word, it is a place of education. I am (hopefully) so willing to enter that education. I am happy to put my thoughts on the table to have them ripped apart, as they hold no value but to be thoughts. For me debate can improve my thoughts.
