Index: The three Thresholds of Initiation, from the Lesser to the Greater Mysteries / Part 1 - The many languages of the lesser initiate - History and artificial languages of the Lesser Adepts
The three Thresholds of Initiation, from the Lesser to the Greater Mysteries / Part 1
In the previous chapter we mentioned the meanings “that cover” every level of Masonic knowledge. Perhaps this statement deserves an explanation.
The Archaic Science tells us that every thought and knowledge (be it white or black) creates and impresses on the “Cloth” (the Mental and Astral Body) of man an image and a color visible to the eye of the Initiator. As well as all good and evil impress the same things on the physical-energetic “Cloth” (the Ethereal Body), in a mobile and changeable way.
In current non esoteric terms we are talking about “radioactive” fields emanated by the various energies that activate man and that man activates.
The lesser initiate who, although living his own Form, works from the plane of the Abstract Mind, impresses on his “Clothes” synthetic images and colors, i.e. Symbols, in a more lasting way (it depends on one’s own rhythm of advancement and evolution).
In the Initiate those “Symbols” become permanent on the “Clothes” of the Superior Bodies (of the Triad and the Monad) and are the “Pass Mark” (the Image-Sound, similar to the “Pass Word” used on the exoteric plane) for a very special category of “Tylers with the Flaming Sword”, the Triads or Solar Angels.
Symbols, Signs and Colors used on the (Sacred and Ritual) clothes, paraments and furnishings by the Lesser Brothers are the memory of those “Energetic Geometries” that will be revealed to any “Man”, once he has passed the Threshold of the greater Initiation.
We talked about Threshold of Initiation rather than Door; let’s try and understand why.
In the Initiatory Schools it is taught that there isn’t a Door (obstacle) to Initiation; the only Door (obstacle) for the man who starts this journey is himself.
The only true obstacle is the inability (Profane) or the relative ability (lesser initiate) to expand in order to “comprehend” the sense of reality (universality of conscience).
This passage of the sentient conscience of man through the Threshold from unreal to real, following the impulse of the Triad, is followed by the opportunity to live as an observer of the truth of the Plan of the Work of the Great Architect (Occult Instruction) and then become an operator in the Work of Service (to the Humankind) in the Hierarchy of the Pyramid of the Order.
Whoever offers himself the “opportunity” to consider as achievable goals the teachings that have always been visible to the eyes of the man in search of the “Truth”, is guaranteed not to be disappointed in this act of trust; all his efforts will not be in vain but, as he will discover, they are a precious investment today for his future wellbeing.
The first Threshold of Initiation is certainly the hardest to find and recognize for man and it is faced with his request to access the Temple.
At the entrance in the Order, the first re-orientation will necessarily be of an emotional nature; therefore great responsibility falls on the master that proposes himself as a guide to those Brothers who turn to him completely defenseless and ready to assimilate whatever he will offer Them, in quality and quantity.
By following the process known by the technical term of “imprinting”, this master will have the chance to introduce, in those innocent minds and consciences still completely free from the power to discriminate, all those “seed” thoughts that his ability and experience will be able to place, but always remembering that if the bud and the flowering that will follow will not be the result of a well done Work, it will be his fault.
An ancient Commentary says on the subject:
...and on his Cloth descended the sign of shame.
The second Threshold of Initiation relates to the Lesser Mysteries
The many languages of the lesser initiate
Of course the Lesser Mysteries are not a prerogative of Freemasonry only, but although expressed in many different languages they have always been the backbone of the Initiatory System that works in the Universal Temple.
Of course by language we don’t mean the language used by a people, but we imply the “coloring of Aspect”; energetic and psychological coloring of the thought, used to build and define the exterior Form of those meanings up to creating the diversity of ideologies in the lowest levels.
The ideologies and any diversity that arises because of them are a result of the distortion caused by any mind that is not well developed (because of deflection of reality) in recognizing only part of the seven primary idioms accepted by the human psyche. It must be absolutely clear that although it only has 7 Aspects, languages or sounds, the human Psyche “is preset to adapt”, this seven-fold range of sound-light-color must be considered “total” only for the microcosmic man; whilst it is bigger in its (energetic) macrocosmic reality.
I would like to be clearer by gradually introducing along the journey elements useful to the recognition and usage of those 7 Aspects, or more simply, the 7 energetic “languages” that we have already started considering in the previous chapter with the characteristics of the 7 sacred Planets.
Freemasonry works in the interaction of three aspects of thought and as a consequence it identifies itself in its language of (Aspect) Wisdom, of (Aspect) Force and of (Aspect) Beauty.
But like any advanced Initiate knows, this three-fold manifestation of aspect hides the dynamic emanation of the Will Aspect (I Cosmic Aspect).
This is why it has always been that this System (the Sephirotic Tree) is the “School of Power”.
Reflecting on this statement (and warning!) of Brothers much more advanced than us, we will be able to understand how brothers who are (initiatorily) totally uneducated, but who are influenced by the I Aspect (which on a lower level of manifestation is called “Destroying Aspect”) that invisibly permeates the Masonic Order, can cause the damages that we know very well to themselves and others.
And this is another factor that contributes to the issue of counter-initiation.
In Freemasonry, although the lesser initiate will try and establish himself on the language that he considers more appropriate (certainly because similar to the one used in his profane sphere), he will be “forced” by his instruction to assimilate the four lesser Aspects of the Initiatory language (the VII, the VI, the V and the IV) up to recognizing through: the Power of Discriminating (of the Inquisitor of Justice of the XXXI degree), the possession of the Keystone (of the Prince “holder” of the Real Secret of the XXXII degree) that allows the access to draw from the ( Light) Will Aspect (the Greater Initiate of the XXXIII degree), the synthesis in the One of the three higher languages (III, II and I Cosmic Aspects).
For the master (magister vitae) though, this means to measure himself in working with competence in all the Paths (the many cultures of profane people) that have been prepared for men of other languages.
Amongst men many Paths towards lesser initiations are evident.
One of the most obvious examples comes to us from the devotional language and from the men that belong to that Aspect (the VI).
Churches and Armies belong to that Devotional and passive Aspect, where men ‘obey in silence’ for the supreme goodness of their ideals.
Mystic Orders are only apparently similar to the previous ones; they move following the impulse of the II Aspect of Love and Wisdom, where men who experience them with the strength of their will look for the meeting, active this time, with the Spiritual (metaphysical or super-mundane).
In the field of Education we can easily recognize the drive of the V Aspect of Concrete Science that poses itself the purpose, in Schools and Universities, of the development in man of concrete mind (rationality) first and abstract mind (logics) later.
The people that work within international politics (see for example the U.N.) obviously evolve on the Path of the III Cosmic Aspect, that of Intelligent Activity, whilst national and separating policies filled with selfishness manifest the intricate aspect of that Activity.
Artists, with their Corporations and their many expressive activities, manifest, without any doubt, the journey on the Path of the IV Aspect of Harmony and Beauty.
By carrying on, we would take into consideratino all the aspects of the social activities of man because they are the natural and manifested expression of his mind, created to reflect in the World of Form through its activity (Motion, 3rd Aspect), the seven Energetic Aspects (3 + 4) that permeate our Universe (The Solar System).
These seven (psychological) languages of the Aspect produced in the mental prism of man many ramifications (reflexes or hues from that prism) of sub-languages (the Biblical Babel’s Tower) marked as 76 in the Archaic Science and then up to 100 and above, as stated by the Brotherhood of the Rose and Cross in 1640.
But all the lesser languages that, going back up to their origin, lead to the Paths of the Four Lesser Aspects (see the table in Imago Templi 5.1 where the Sevenfold Energetic Manifestation is represented) and precisely at the VII (Ceremonial), at the VI (Devotional) at the V (Science) and at the IV (Harmony and Beauty), converge through the “motion” of the Intelligent Activity of the III Aspect to the central point of synthetic knowledge represented by the II (Wisdom) and the I Aspects (Will).
Thinkers of every School and language, once reached that point (within themselves) of knowledge, had the perception of transcendence.
At the apex of his studies, Einstein cried out: “…and beyond there is God” when he reached that point.
C. G. Jung as well perceived (within himself) that divine presence that “modestly in public” he called the Superior Ego.
But rather then contents, I would like to talk about the general system, the methods and who those languages are necessary to.
History and artificial languages of the Lesser Adepts
Before dealing with this other part of initiatory culture, the Brother who doesn’t want to experience his being a Mason with the head in the sand of his own indifference must open himself, although cautiously, to the comprehension of certain realities inherited by the Order he belongs to.
Freemasonry, a strictly western phenomenon, was born for the effect of two diametrically opposed drives between the two domes of Initiatory Power that claim their prevalence on what is called the Holy Science or Path of Initiation: the Great Hebrew Lodge and the Western Church.
The Masonic esotericism born through the heritage of the Templar fragments, mostly passed on through the work of the Mason Monks and the impact between those two Powers in the European area, has lived despite the lack of culture and initiatory independence shown by many affiliates, of the force of those three drives that coexisted within its Body. The result has been the affiliation to Masonic Lodge of elements that belonged to those different cultures, and therefore they wanted to keep their own personal, historic, symbolic and ritual culture in a Temple that appears to be strictly Hebrew to a superficial observer; these elements have always carried out attempts to intervene from the outside and inside of the Institution, with either persuasive or intolerant methods, depending on the historical and political moment, in order to lead the freedom of thought and the free will of the Freemason Brothers and the universality of the Masonic philosophy to identify itself or to “subject itself” to a particular doctrine, separating itself from the context of existence and research of all the others. Many Freemasons, but most of all Free Thinkers, preferred to be broken rather than accepting the “Caudine Forks” imposed to Them by the violence of the secular branches. And it didn’t matter if those arms of a hierarchy indoctrinated to the pragmatism of separating and even fratricidal doctrines wore black, red or whatever color shirts; they have always aimed not to Man’s freedom but to obtain the monopoly of His conscience through the annulment of His inner Identity.
All this happened under the sleepy and unaware eyes of those who never understood the reason of such hatred towards their Institution: …where after all nothing illicit or extraordinary happened.
Freemasonry will continue to exist in this Initiatorily unconscious way until those forces will oppose each other within It, which is a neutral but dangerously autonomous territory.
But if an exoteric Force prevailed, vehicle of an infectious view of profane social climbing and materialistic ambition, Freemasonry, forgetful of the Tradition of its own Power of thought and of the freedom of its own Initiatory Culture, would disappear without many of Its Lesser Adepts understanding why or finding a reason for it.
In order to guarantee Freemasonry not to survive but to live its own future, in the full dignity that it deserves as an Initiatory Order for the benefit of Man, it is necessary that the Members of the Lesser Brotherhood become aware of their own role, their own responsibilities towards their own past, which they represent, and towards their own future, which they have the duty to build in all the steadiness that their minds are able to. Of course this would have to happen in their role of Initiates for the good of the Order (the Force) and for the good of the Humankind (Love and Wisdom) and absorbing with geometric zeal the teachings hidden in the ‘Cloth’ of the Pyramid up to the High Degrees, carrying out that little Great key of the Work, that the Great Hebrew Lodge dropped a long time ago and that the Western Church hasn’t picked up yet:
The Universality of the initiatory Principles and of the equal rights of every Man and Woman in front of the Great Architect of the Universe.
On the contrary of those forms of power that invisibly oppose and contrast each other and at the same time invite to separation between men and between men and women ‘in God’s grace’, the Mason holds the germ and the Key of that Universality since His second birth in the Temple.
To develop that germ and to use that Key for a Master Mason doesn’t only mean to get rid of the power of those two drives in a mutual action of separation but to be able to join them within himself, making them his own without any need for intermediaries, up to consciously tie himself up in the universal relation that also involves the Chorda of the Eastern Brothers. On the other hand this is also highlighted in the XVIII Scottish Degree placed at the entrance of the Rose and Cross Philosophy: XVII Degree of the A.A.S.R.: Knights of the East and the West and this is the only passage that introduces to the Brotherhood of Rose and Cross.
The Templar Baphomet
This was the project of the Order of the Temple that seven hundred years ago scared the exoteric and temporal Power so much, to the point that their two branches were consolidated in a common project aimed at burying that Order in its own good faith and perhaps candor.
But the true candor was that of the people who thought that it was a match to be played without leaving traces. Indeed, there were other observers who kept a full memory of what happened and they have never stopped working since, in order to support the Brothers for the achievement of the same common goals.
As it will be demonstrated shortly, a little work and not much commitment would be enough for any Brother to be convinced of this.
Artificial languages or Codes arose from the memory of ancient ideograms, thanks to the Adepts of the Order because of the need for secrecy in communicating with other people belonging to the Brotherhood in the various levels of the Initiatory Hierarchy.
The creation of those Codes or languages can reveal to the eyes of the scholar the historical and cultural origin of the people who thought of them. Those Codes were sometimes entrusted the task to preserve certain archives from profane eyes. 
