The Adept and the Salmon
By Athos A. Altomonte

Analogy with a living symbol

The proofs are round the corner, especially the invisible ones. Even the man who has eyes to see ‘observes and measures' them.

Masonic acceptance is like ‘a Christmas crib'; everybody can ‘buy' one. Real initiation is another thing, though.

To understand ‘how to achieve it' is another essential trial of the postulant. To understand means to embark on our journey with the right abilities. Without abilities nobody has ever been accepted in the initiatory ranks.

The Rule says: by recognizing you will be recognized.

Decision is everything. The man who doesn't decide postpones; who postpones is not an active subject. A Master doesn't know what to do with a ‘passive' instrument, unless he is a swindler who needs a devout audience to satisfy his ‘small ego'.

We need to understand in order to decide and to decide in order to do. We must not turn back and pay attention to the ‘wayfarers' that bivouac at the side of the Path. It is essential that the Noble Traveller is not tempted by the fire of their ‘bivouacs'. Indeed he aims to the goal, not to rest at any crossroad (two, three or four paths that meet are metaphors of the decisions that the Traveller must make in order to go through the levels of conscience). Esotericism hides its truths in metaphors.

We should then study them and penetrate their occult meaning.

Old Commentaries often use metaphors of animals to express particular abilities.

The Lion is an example; it is used to symbolize the boldness and the fighting courage.

Some Masters have veiled important teachings in images , using animals such as the Elephant, the Tortoise, the Eagle, the Tiger, the Seagull, the Gazelle, etc.

In this tradition the image of the Salmon indicates the man who ‘searches'; like the others, it veils the sense of the initiatory postulate.

The salmon is a fish that like the adept, ‘searches by going up', courageously facing the difficulties of a journey (Water element) that seems against all logic.

The adept as well faces a countercurrent journey; he rejects the outside in search of the inside. He will only come out to offer himself for an altruistic service. The inner way is considered nonsense and condemned to disbelief in the common view.

In the action of this animal we can see many analogies with the strong-willed adaptability of the man who ‘dares' going to the Threshold of Initiation.

The researcher should reflect on the meanings of the text and draw its esoteric sense. This exercise is made easier by the fact that an exclamation mark is placed next to each key word.

In old Commentaries all symbolical words were spread among others of a discursive kind. The person who could recognize them was able to extract them from the literal context and use them as ‘seed-thoughts'. This kind of ‘initiatory transmission' still occurs today.

The seed-thoughts are words or images that develop their meanings through meditation and their visualization makes them alive; this is true knowledge.

The transmission of the initiatory knowledge originates the ‘vivifying thoughts' that open the mind of the physical conscience on the most complex and deep aspects of the initiatory way. Otherwise these meanings appear mute to the eyes of the people who are not introduced to the mysteries.