Book summary[edit] The authors begin by quoting Henry Ford, who was a Mason, saying all history is bunk. They express the belief that, though Fords statement may be abrupt, it is accurate, as history is often not a completely accurate and comprehensive account of facts, but only what the victor in any given situation has recorded for posterity. They argue in the book that the foundations of the Christian religion are a distortion by the early Roman Catholic Church of the teachings of the real Jesus and his followers. They claim to have found in Masonry a new key to unlock the secrets of civilization. This key is also the key to the origins of Christianity and, they assert, proves that many of the beliefs of modern Christianity are erroneous. They state that one of the main motivations in writing the book stemmed from a desire to ascertain the origins of Freemasonry. Was it just founded in London in 1717, when the Grand Lodge of England was founded as most historians believe, or was it older? A common theory is that Freemasonry evolved out of guilds of stonemasons. Masonic ritual claims that one of the first Freemasons was Hiram Abiff, a widows son from the tribe of Naphtali, who built King Solomons Temple. His name has never been recorded as such historically, although there is a similar character in the Old Testament of the Bible, who is described as a widows son but not named in the First Book of Kings. In fact, although not apparently named in some translations of the bible, others, such as the Coverdale translation and the original Martin Luther translation do indeed refer to him as Hiram Abiff or as Huram Abi. The word abi is translated as father or my father in other translations whilst the translations named treated it as a personal name. The Jewish Study Bible suggests that word father is an honorific title applied to a skilled craftsman. The use of abu meaning father as an honorific is still seen in the Middle East today, hence Abukir named after Father or Saint Cyril. They claim that the stonemason origin theory was wrong because it had so many obvious fallacies. Why would powerful and rich people have been attracted to join a fraternity that came from simple poor stonemasons guilds? The theory of Freemasonry originating in London in 1717 was also unlikely, because there were much earlier mentions of Freemasonry. The authors decided eventually that Freemasonry was actually as old as it claimed in its ritual, dating back to the building of King Solomons Temple in Jerusalem. They claim that they rigorously analysed the Bible, including the New Testament, ancient Jewish texts, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Gnostic Gospels, and Masonic rituals to support the conclusions they came to. They decided that the story of Hiram Abiff was actually based on the initiation ceremonies of the ancient kings of Egypt. They also came to the conclusion after analysis of the New Testament, the Gnostic Gospels, and Masonic ritual that Jesus and the original Christians were thoroughly different from what the Roman Catholic Church and orthodox Christianity has taught they were. The authors believe that Jesus did not claim to be divine, but was merely a messiah in the Jewish sense of the term, a good man and a freedom fighter trying to help liberate the Jews from Roman occupation. Jesus did not claim to be a miracle worker, according to the authors. When he said that he raised Lazarus from the dead, it was an allegorical reference - followers were referred to as the living and others were referred to as the dead in certain Jewish esotericism of the time. Similarly, Jesuss turning water into wine merely meant elevating people to a higher status within the framework of the sect. The authors believe that Jesuss ultra-Jewish sect, the Jerusalem Church, operated some kind of quasi-Masonic initiation ceremonies and say that Jesus was thus, in some sense of the term, a Mason. They wrote in the chapter entitled Jesus Christ: Man, God, Myth, or Freemason, We realize that this is a statement that will offend many Christians, and particularly many Roman Catholics, but that the conclusion was inevitable that Jesus was a Mason. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hiram_Key
Posted on: Wed, 31 Dec 2014 14:37:29 +0000
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