The Gods of the Lodge

by Reginald Haupt Jr

  Thus, you have the beginning of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Throughout the Greek and Roman worlds they were held in especial veneration. Cicero, writing in the century before Christ, says: “Nothing is higher than these mysteries. They have sweetened our characters and softened our customs; they have made us pass from the condition of savages to true humanity. They have not only shown us the way to live joyfully, but they have taught us how to die with a better hope.”

  Out of these mysteries came the Greek god, Dionysus, also known as Bacchus, according to the Romans. He was the god of wine and was considered the most important of the gods of Greece. Many books are written of this wine god, and some college courses are based upon him for some strange reason. Why and what makes him so important to our lives and that of the Masons? To answer these questions I have chosen a book written by Edith Hamilton entitled Mythology. She wrote at page 73:

  “Under his influence courage was quickened and fear banished, at any rate for the moment. He uplifted his worshipers; he made them feel that they could do what they had thought they could not. All this freedom and confidence passed away, of course, as they either grew sober or got drunk, but while it lasted it was like being possessed by a power greater than themselves. So people felt about Dionysus as about no other god. He was not only outside of them, he was within them, too. They could be transformed by him into being like him. The momentary sense of exultant power wine-drinking can give only a sign to show men that they had within them more than they knew; they could themselves become divine.’”

  The Greeks celebrated him with a festival that lasted five days. During those days joy and peace prevailed. All ordinary business stopped, no one could be put in jail, and those in jail were released to join in the celebration. Unlike other celebrations of other gods where unabashed orgies prevailed, this festival was held in a theater, and the ceremony was the performance of a play. The greatest poetry of Greece was written in honor of Dionysus. The performances were sacred, and the spectators, writers and the actors were all engaged in an act of worship.

  Edith Hamilton’s Mythology at pages 74 and 75 express the admiration and worship given to Dionysus by the Greeks:

  “It is clear, therefore, that the idea of the god of holy inspiration who could fill men with his spirit to write gloriously and to act gloriously became far more important than the earlier ideas of him. The first tragic plays, which were among the best there are, never equaled except by Shakespeare, were produced in the theater of Dionysus. Comedies were produced there, too, but tragedies far outnumbered them, and there was a reason why.

  “This strange god, the gay reveler, the cruel hunter, the lofty inspirer, was also the sufferer. He, like Demeter, was afflicted, not because of grief for another, as she was, but because of his own pain. He was the vine, which is always pruned as nothing else that bears fruit; every branch cut away, only the bare stock left; through the winter a dead thing to look at, an old gnarled stump seeming incapable of ever putting forth leaves again. Like Persephone Dionysus died with the coming of the cold. Unlike her, his death was terrible: he was torn to pieces, in some stories by the Titans, in others by Hera’s orders. He was always brought back to life; he died and rose again. It was his joyful resurrectionthey celebrated in his theater, but the terrible deeds done to him and done by men under his influence was too closely associated with him ever to be forgotten. He was more than a suffering god. He was the tragic god. There was none other.

  “He had still another side. He was the assurance that death does not end all. His worshipers believed that his death and resurrection showed that the soul lives on forever after the body dies. This faith was part of the mysteries of Eleusie. At first it centered in Persephone who also rose from the dead every spring. But as queen of the black underworld she kept even in the bright world above a suggestion of something strange and awful: how could she who carried always about her the reminder of death stand for the resurrection, the conquest of death? Dionysus, on the contrary, was never thought of as a power in the kingdom of the dead. There are many stories about Persephone in the lower world; only one about Dionysus—he rescued his mother from it. In his resurrection he was the embodiment of the life that is stronger than death. He and not Peresphone became the center of the belief in immortality.”

  From this you can see that Dionysus, like Osiris, was killed, torn into pieces, put back together, and rose again to become a god. The figurative death and resurrection—rebirth—is the heart of the Eleusis and its greatest god, Dionysus. This, again, was “initiation,” the gift of the Instituted Mysteries.

  What importance does Masonry place on this ridiculous fairy tale? Look on page 238 of the Freemason’s Encyclopaedia for this answer.

  “In the year 1850, and in England, an explanation of the Mysteries was offered.... The Initiations are described as—the beginning of a life of reason and virtue, leading up to the hope of a blessed immortality hereafter, founded on a participation attained already therein.”

  And on page 237:

  “The Eleusinia therefore were above all things sacred, as an inward heart of religion, and here is the first note which calls to be registered concerning them... there would seem but one answer to the question whether the traditional beatitude and wisdom of the Mysteries were communicated in the symbolism of ceremonial act and in the allegory of verbal discourse, or whether the candidates came into the hands of such wise and illuminated Masters that they passed under their influence into a spiritual and interior state, in which—for the time being—they attained experience at firsthand of the Blessed Life and Divine Communion. I have suggested that there is but one answer on the faith of all the evidence, and the first alternative is affirmed thereby; but as it happens that in several modern schools—mostly of the occult kind—the second has been maintained in one or another form, it intervenes here for consideration, since it is obviously an important issue. As between the Rites of Eleusis and the Rites of Emblematic Freemasonry, it postulates unawares precisely that kind of distinction which would subsist between the Lord’s Supper commemorated in a Protestant Church of the old type and an archnatural Mass celebrated in the Mystical Sanctuary of Eckartshausen or Lopukhin.”

  In other words, the meaning remains the same, only the place and ceremony differs. The attainment of the “Blessed Life and Divine Communion” of the Rites of Eleusis is the same as is attained in the Rites of Freemasonry. Both symbolizes “initiation” and the attainment of “Divine Wisdom” and life eternal through figurative death, burial and resurrection. And, this is true without having to accept Jesus Christ as one’s personal Savior. As immortality was gained through the wine god, Dionysus, the Mason’s claim the same through the Rites of the Third Degree as previously discussed. The “initiated” attain life eternal. Consequently, Dionysus and the Eleusian Mysteries loom large in the claimed history and origins of Masonry.

  In a work published by Random House entitled The Occult written by Colin Wilson, Dionysus and his worshipers are linked to black magic and Satan:

  “Dionysus is fundamentally the god, or patron saint, of magic. The spirit of Dionysus pervades all magic, especially the black magic of the later witch cults, with their orgiastic witch’s sabbath so like the orgies of Dionysus’s female worshipers, even to the use of goats, the animal sacred to Dionysus. [Is it not also significant that Dionysus is a horned god, like the Christian devil?]”

  Wilson further details a religion under Dionysus that spread like wildfire throughout Greece in the seventh century B.C.:

  “It became a religion of orgies; women worked themselves into a frenzy and rushed about the hills, tearing to pieces any living creature they found. Euripides’ play ‘The Bacchae’ tells how King Pentheus, who opposed the religion of Bacchus [Dionysus], was torn to pieces by a crowd of women, which included his mother and sisters, all in ‘Bacchic frenzy.’ In their ecstasy the worshippers of Bacchus became animals, and behaved like animals, killing living creatures and eating them raw.”

>   Is it fair to say that Dionysus either symbolizes, or is indeed, Satan? Is this a part of the genealogy of Freemasonry? Does the death, burial and resurrection of a wine god, and the god of magic, mock the Cross of Jesus Christ? I submit that it does. I further submit that any doctrine that teaches the Instituted Mysteries as a substitute for the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a deadly false one. Dionysus, Osiris and a god I am about to discuss has nothing in common with a Christian.

  Orphic Mysteries

  These mysteries concern a pagan god named “Orpheus.” The Freemason’s Encyclopaedia on page ix describe him as “the father of pagan theology and the founder of the mysteries.” Before we discuss his death, burial and resurrection as a much honored god in Masonry, I have taken the picture below from the Mason’s Encyclopaedia, Volume II, page 250. Take a look at Orpheus.

  In discussing Orpheus you must first understand that the Mason’s believe that “all of the Instituted Mysteries end—and must end—in attainment.” Attainment of “perfection,” “Divine Communion,” “rebirth,” “immortality,” or what we have been discussing, “initiation.” A good explanation of this “attainment” is found on page 249 of the Freemason’s Encyclopaedia, Volume II. You will also find the following comment concerning Orpheus:

  “In Heaven, on Earth and in Hades we know that ecstasy suspended all who heard the lyre of Orpheus.”

  According to this same Masonic authority in the same discussion above, Orpheus merged into the symbolism of the Mysteries when he was torn to pieces by the Thracian (Greek) women, resurrected, receiving divine honors, and his lyre was translated into the sky and became one of the constellations. He attained! Or so the Masons say. Again, on page 249:

  “The Orphic Rites... derived their true source in the world of the Delta. Those initiated therein were required to abstain from flesh meat and every bloody-sacrifice. The god of these Mysteries was represented as having wielded the sceptre of the universe, and according to Proclus he would resume his’ empire, so that he who was the first sovereign would be also the last. The doctrine like the Rites ended therefore in attainment.”

  To keep some kind of order in this work on the Instituted Mysteries, Orpheus carried the Rites of attainment from Egypt to Greece. Dionysus carried it from Greece to Rome where his name was changed to Bacchus.

  Although there are other Mysteries contained in the Masonic authority that I have quoted at length such as the Hermetic, Phallis and Kabbalic, I would like to close this chapter without having to expound on these Rites as they would add nothing to what has been said concerning attainment or initiation in Masonry. However, I believe that I should touch on the Mysteries of Mithra for reasons that will be obvious, and because the Rite itself will alarm the Christian, or at least make him search for the truth of what he has sworn allegiance to.

  Rites or Mysteries of Mithra

  The following information comes from pages 366 to 367 of the Freemason’s Encyclopaedia, Volume II:

  “Mithra was originally the God and Lord of Heavenly Light and is represented on the monuments as a young man who, with face averted, plunges his sacrificial knife into the heart of a bull.

  “It appears... that the Mithriac Mysteries depicted the descent of souls into generations and their emancipation of ascent therefrom, by which they were delivered from the law of metempsychosis, one of the doctrines being that human souls ‘are clothed in bodies of every kind.’ Such an ascent connotes readily enough the idea of regeneration, which has been called the Secret of the Rites. These were celebrated in caves, considered as the image of the world, and hence having two gates. That on the northern side symbolized the way of coming in, namely, by the law of regeneration; that on the southern side represented the way of going out and following a path of ascent from the life of humanity on earth to the life of the celestial gods.

  “Celus... speaks of souls going down and up through the planetary spheres and says that in the Mithriac Initiation this is represented by ‘a ladder with seven gates and at its summit an eighth gate,’ corresponding Saturn, Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, Moon and Sun, the eighth and last being presumably that of the souls deliverance.”

  The candidate for initiation went through seven degrees, being (1) Raven, (2) Griffin, (3) Soldier, (4) Lion, (5) Persian, (6) Runner of the Sun, and (7) Father, through which the soul attained the Region of the Blessed. There was purification by water, fire and fasting at the beginning of the ordeals. The remaining stages of the initiation I wish to quote verbatim from page 367:

  “St. Gregory Nazianzus speaks of... a kind of baptism—involving complete immersion—and a seal set in the forehead; of a crown presented at the point of a drawn sword, but this was to be rejected by the Candidate with the words: ‘My crown is Mithra’; of anointing with oil; and finally of investiture with armour and a wreath of olive.”

  Does this remind you of Revelation and an accurate description of what the Antichrist will require? Is this not another mockery of the Savior of this world? Yet, this ritual is recognized in Masonry. Thus you see why I had to include Mithra.

  Allow to me close this discussion on the Instituted Mysteries by simply saying that all recognized Masonic authorities over the past 200 years have adopted these Mysteries as the origin or genealogy of Freemasonry. Modern Masonic Rites and Ceremonies presently reflect something from each, and its doctrine of “initiation” was birthed on the Delta in the shadows of Egypt.

  By reading and studying their books and lectures, I am firmly convinced that the Masons can claim Egypt as its roots, and can refer to their Craft as ancient and pre-dating the New Testament. Unfortunately, this claim should not render the Christian Mason proud. I would be extremely distressed to learn that I have taken an oath that I have been taught to be unbreakable and eternal to a god with the head of a hawk. And if you will recall from the Funeral Ritual in the chapter devoted to him, he has other names. These names are revealed in the Instituted Mysteries as Osiris, Adonis, Tammuz, Dionysus, Bacchus, Orpheus, Mithra, and, last, but certainly not least, S A T A N!

  Chapter 9: Masonry as a Philosophy

  Perhaps it is time to determine just what Freemasonry is. Is it a philosophy? A religion? A social organization? Or, is it just an elementary code of morality that functions in our churches, banks, judicial systems, local and national governments, and economical spheres? First, let’s discuss Masonry as a philosophy.

  The meaning of the term philosophy is defined by Funk and Wagnalls Standard Dictionary as “the love of wisdom as leading to the search for it; hence, knowledge of general principles—elements, powers or causes and laws—as explaining facts and existences.” Certainly, Masonry is a quest or search for wisdom, and teaches knowledge of the elements and powers. But, in keeping with my first promise to seek the answers through Masonic authorities only, I turn again to Wilmshurst beginning at page 54:

  “Signs are not wanting that a higher Masonic consciousness is awakening in the Craft. Members of the Order are gradually, and here and there, becoming alive to the fact that much more than meets the eye and ear lies beneath the surface of Masonic doctrine and symbols. They are beginning to think of themselves instead of taking the face-value of things for granted, and, as their thought develops, facts that previously remained unperceived assume prominence and significance. They discern the Masonic system to be something deeper than a code of elementary morality such as all men are expected to observe whether formally Masons or not. They reflect that the phenomenal growth of the Craft is scarcely accountable for upon the supposition that modern speculative Masonry perpetuates nothing more than the private associations that once existed in connection with the operative builders’ trade [by ‘operative’ is meant real masons that work with bricks and stones]. They recognize that there can be no peculiar virtue or interest in continuing to imitate the customs of ancient trade-guilds for the mere sake of so doing; or of keeping on foot a costly organization for teaching men the elementary symbolism of a few working tools, supplemented by a cons
iderable amount of social conviviality... It maybe urged that we have our great charity system and that the social side of our proceedings is a valuable and humanizing asset. Granted, but other people and other societies are philanthropic and social as well as we; and a secret society is not necessary to promote such ends, which are merely supplemental to the original purpose of the Order. The discernment of such facts as these, then, suggests to us that the Craft has not yet entered into the full heritage of understanding its own system, and that side matters connected with Masonry which we have long emphasized so strongly, valuable in their own way as they are, are not after all the primary and proper work of the Order. The work of the Order is to initiate into certain secrets and mysteries and obviously if the Order fails to expound its own secrets and mysteries and so to confer real initiations as distinguished from passing candidates through certain formal ceremonies, it is not fulfilling its original purpose whatever other incidental good it may be doing.”