Pillars of the Portico

Saturday, March 6th
- Michelangelo, the Italian Renaissance painter, sculptor, architect, poet, engineer, and — next to Leonardo Da Vinci the quintessential Renaissance man, is born in 1475.
- Elizabeth Barret Browning, one of the most prominent poets of the Victorian Era, is born in 1806.

Sunday, March 7th
- Piet Mondrian, Dutch painter and spiritual seeker, is born in 1872.
- Joseph-Maurice Ravel, the French composer of Impressionist music is born in 1875. He is best known for his work “Bolero” (1928) which has been described as “a piece for orchestra without music.”
- John Herschel, an English mathematician, astronomer, chemist, experimental photographer, and inventor, is born in 1792.

Monday, March 8th
- St. John of God, the Portuguese born friar and saint and who would become one of Spain’s leading religious figures is born in 1495.

Tuesday, March 9th
- Samuel Osborne Barber II, the Pulitzer prized composer, is born in 1910. His piece, “Adagio for Strings” is widely considered to be a masterpiece of modern classical music.

Wednesday, March 10th
- Tibetan Uprising Day is observed. It commemorates the 1959 Tibetan uprising against the People’s Republic of China. The failure of the uprising led to a violent crackdown in Tibet and the the flight of the Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, into exile.

By Bro. Ben Williams 

It is interesting to note that in Platonic Theology the lower worlds in which we live (that physical world stretched through four dimensions) reflect the higher worlds. Matter is the plane of this mirror, and in its mottled surface the image of the perfect is rendered imperfectly.

So it is that the natural world organizes itself according to spiritual necessities, or reasons, if you will. These reasons, or principles (what Plato might term Ideas) come into being as part of the divine hierarchy simply because they extend from each other. The one informs the other, and delimits the infinite in possibility. The analogy of the circle is a popular one: the dot becomes the circle, through the extension of the radius. And a radius is first a line, and a line first a point. You cannot, therefore, draw a circle until you have drawn the line, and you cannot draw the line until you have drawn the point. Thus the one informs the other. The point is the secret of the circle, and the circumference is its emanation.

 In this chain of becoming, the former precedes the latter. But it also engenders it. This is a fitting analogy to describe how the worlds come into being, and how the natures are born. In this way the possible fills the heaven, radiating from the First, the Supreme Cause (as Plato might term it). And the natures come into being.

What are the natures? The natures are forms, but not bodies. They have been called Ideas and archetypes. Wills and gods. An example is the nature of charity. What is charity? In order to exist in the infinitude of the possible, radiating from the Supreme Cause (that eternal limitlessness that precedes all creation or beginning) charity must be bestowed. Yet how can God bestow to Himself? That which is already all requires nothing. Indeed, how can God give to Himself, when He is everywhere? Yet, in order to not be limited, that which we imperfectly call ‘God’ must allow space for charity to exist. Without charity, or hunger, or mercy or might, the infinite is not infinite. And if not infinite, it must therefore be limited. But God is illimitable. It is for this reason that the natures spring into being, and also that they are a plurality, even while the totality is always Unity.

Another way to look at this is the idea of motion. God is immoveable. Infinite in expression, if God were to move, where could He move to? God, therefore, is the mover.

The point of this is to illustrate how, from the observation of the natural world and human society (which often appears unnatural), we can come to know much about the higher worlds.

Here is an example.  There are boundaries between worlds, just as there are boundaries between nations or territories marked by animals.  Yet the infinite is unbounded.  We can look at these boundaries like kingdoms, like gates between states of being.  There are doors in the house, yet the rooms still comprise one house.  These boundaries are necessary for the locus of the limited to be moved between states.  So it is knowledge becomes possible.  And, ultimately, so knowledge of the Divine can be shared among itself.  To reveal its own majesty, the All is veiled in flesh.

But think of a human border, between countries.  It is built up and delineated.  Marked out in certainty.  There is a slowing.  A waiting.  A checking and scrutinizing.  Many are turned back.  Others are approved, and crossover.  Isn’t this like death, crossing the boundary between worlds?  Enter into an unfamiliar kingdom and you might get robbed.  You might lose your way.  Animals mark their boundaries just as their bodies bound their being.  The land of the tiger is in the tiger, and the tiger is in the land.  They are not separate.  Their natures belong to each other.  The one is the other’s secret, the other the emanation.  This is why an animal in a zoo is not the animal.  It is a prisoner, and its nature is lost.

The idea of a dwelling is like the first day. And it is also like the seventh day, that day of rest. The road is like the week. A hotel is like a graveyard, or an oasis. A bird is like a good idea, it shines from it.

Everything we do, then, resonates through the natures. Displaying the True nature, that nature that informs the others (which is love) brings us closer to understanding Deity. Love is an endless giving. The more it gives, the greater it becomes. Deity is like the circle of circles, whose innermost center is at once it’s endless extremity. This is the tree of love, which is itself contained in the smallest seed at the end of its own branch.  Love is a good way to think about Deity.

Therefore, be lovely. Set your captives free. Give endlessly. Pour forth an abundance of love and become like the Sun. For the beginning of God is the end of God. And this is best exemplified by  Love.

Understanding the Islamic religion requires a careful look at its history.  Islam has been fraught with conflict since the death of its prophet some 1,378 years ago.  The problems began when Muhammad (may Allah love and bless him!) passed in 632 CE and didn’t indicate his successor.

On the one hand, his father-in-law and good friend, Abu Bakr, claimed the position of Caliph, and was elected by the faithful.  However, many believed that Ali ibn Abi Talib, the prophet’s cousin and son-in-law, should naturally fulfill the role.  Ali had been raised in Muhammad’s household since the age of 5, and was the very first convert to Islam.  Ali had served the prophet in all capacities, proving himself a wise religions leader and tenacious warrior for the cause.

This early split formed the two major branches of Islam, the Sunnis, (from the Arabic word Sunnah, meaning ‘example’) and the Shiites (from the Arabic Shiiatu Ali, meaning ‘the party of Ali’).

Broadly speaking, the Sunnis believed, and continue so to do, that Muslims should elect their spiritual leaders.  Islam is a Theocracy, giving complete spiritual and practical leadership to one person.  Whereas the Shiites believe that a direct descendent of the prophet must fill the role.  This they call Imam, the spiritual leader who alone has the wisdom to interpret the Divine law.

The Sunnis and Shiites have a common history, and agree on the first four Rashidun, or “Righteously appointed Caliphs”.  Whereas the Sunnis recognize Ali as the fourth Rahsidun, the Shiites recognize him as the first Imam, and the other three Caliphs as imposters.  This has created tension between Muslims for a millennium.  This was exacerbated in 680 CE when the Sunni Caliph Yazid marched with 4,000 troops into Karbala and massacred Ali’s younger son, Husayn, and all his family, wives, children, and 71 closest companions.  This drama is reenacted annually by devout Shiites and has come to represent the resistance of truth to materialistic tyranny.

Things are further complicated in that the passing of the nass, or the spiritual authority to rule the religion, is often contested.  Thus we have Caliphs suppressing Shiite movements, murdering Imams to protect their rule, and the splitting of the Shiite sect into a number of sub-branches as different Shiites rallied around different descendents of the prophet, each recognizing their own as the righteous inheritor of the faith, and the others as imposters.  So it is that the Shiite sect split into Twelver and Sevener Shiites, the former recognizing twelve Imams, all of which were killed (mostly poisoned) by rival Caliphs excepting the last Imam, Muhammad ibn al-Hasan who went into hiding in the 9^th century awaiting his reappearance at the end of the world with the Christ during the second coming.  Whereas the Seveners believe that the seventh Imam was Ja’far al-Sadiq’s elder son, Ismail, not his younger son, Musal al-Kazim.  (It is argued that Ja’far had apparently disinherited his elder son at some point.)

This gave rise to the Ismailis, of which the Nazari Ismailis are familiar to Masonic history as the order of the Assassins who had interactions, both positive and negative, with the Templars.

Shi’a Islam has long been suppressed, and often forced into hiding.  The Imam is not a ruler in the overt sense, but a master in the esoteric, occult sense.  So it is that Shi’a Islam generated the doctrine of Taqiyya, the use of deceit and cunning to hide one’s faith within the mainstream.  Shi’a syncretized and absorbed mystical parts of other religions, practiced in secret.  They proselytized in secret, requiring complex initiation rites to protect their dias, or messengers.  Deep, spiritual resistance and martyrdom are thusly integral to many forms of Islam, and although not required of its followers, such acts of suffering are celebrated historically.  Thus, as a breeding ground for fundamental ideals which presage terrorism, Islam presents a system honed through the centuries, able to touch people in secret, brandishing a message of freedom from material excesses – even if the religion itself is not ultimately intended as such a tool.