ADAM.
The name of the first man. The Hebrew word, ADaM, signifies man in a generic sense, the human species collectively, and is said to be derived from , ADaMaH, the ground, because the first man was made out of the dust of the earth, or from A DaM, to be red, in reference to his ruddy complexion. Most probably in this collective cense. as the representative of the whole human race, and, therefore, the type of humanity, that the presiding officer in a Council of Knights of the Sun, the Twenty-eighth Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, is called Father Adam, and is occupied in the investigation of the great truths which so much concern the interests of the race. Adam, in that degree, is man seeking after divine truth. The Cabalist and Talmudists have invented many things concerning the first Adam, none of which are, however, worthy of preservation (see Knight of the Sun). Brother M cClenachan believed the entered Apprentice Degree symbolizes the creation of man and his first perception of light. The argument in support of that belief continues: In the Elohist form of the Creation we read, ''Elohim said, 'Let us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, and let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, over the fowls of the air, over the cattle, and over all the aerth, and over every reptiele that creeps upon the earth' And Elohim created man in His image ; in the image of Elohim He created him ; male and female He created them. . . . And Yahveh Elohim formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed in his nostrils the breath of life, and man was made a living being."
Without giving more than a passing reference to the speculative origiu and production of man and to his spontaneous generation, Principe Générateur, as set forth by the Egyptians, when we are told that "the fertilizing mud left by the Nile, and exposed to the vivifying action of heat induced by the sun's rays, brought forth germs which spring up as the bodies of men," accepted cosmogonies only will be hereinafter mentioned ; thus in that of Peru, the first man, created by the Divine Omnipotence, is calied Alpa Camasca, Animated Earth. The Mandans, one of the North American tribes, relate that the Great Spirit molded two figures of clay, which he dried and animated with the breath of his mouth, one receiving the name of First Man, and the other that of Companion. Taeroa, the god of Tahiti, formed man of the red earth, say the inhabitants; aud so we might continue.
But as François Lenormant remarks in the Beginnings of History, let us confine ourselves to the cosmogony offered by the sacred traditions of the great civilized nations of antiquity. "The Chaideans call Adam the man whom the earth produced. And he lay without movement, without life, and without breath, just like an image of the heavenly Adam, until his soul had been given him by the latter," The cosmogonic account peculiar to Babylon, as given by Berossus, says: "Belos, seeing that the earth was uninhabited, though fertile, cut off his own head, and the other gods, after kneading with earth the blood that flowed from it, formed men, who therefore are endowed with intelligence, and share in the divine thought," etc. The term employed to designate man, in his connection with his Creator, is admu, the Assyrian counterpart of the Hebrew Adam (G. Smith, Chaldean Account of Genesis). Lenormant further says that. the fragments of Berossus give Adoros as the name of the first patriarch, and Adiuru has been discovered on the cunerform inscriptions
Zoroaster makes the creation of man the voluntary act of a personal god, distinct from primordial matter, and his theory stands alone among the learned religions of the ancient world.
According to Jewish tradition in the Targumim and the Talmud, as also to Moses Maimonides, Adam was created man and woman at the same time, having two faces, turned in two opposite directions, and that during a stupor the Creator separated Hawah, his feminine half, from him, in order to make of her a distinct person. Thus were separated the primordial androgyn or first man-woman.
With Shemites and Mohammedans Adam was symbolized in the Lingam, whilst with the Jews Seth was their Adam or Lingam, the masculine symbol, and successively Noah took the place of Seth, and so followed Abraham and Moses. The worship of Adam as the God-like, idea, succeeded by Seth, Noah, Abraham, and Moses, through the symbolism of pillars, monoliths, obelisks, or Matsebas (images), gave rise to otber symbolic images, as where Noah was adored under the emblems of a man, ark, and serpent, signifying heat, fire, or passion.
Upon the death of Adam, says traditional history, the pious Gregory. declared that the "dead body should be kept above ground, till a fulness of time should come to commit it to the middle of the earth by a priest of the most high God.'' This traditional prophecy was fulfilled, it is said, by the body of Adam having been preserved in a chest until about 1800 B.c., when "Melchizedek buried the body in Salem (formerIy the name of Jerusalem), which might very well be the middle of the habitable world."
The Sethites used to say their prayers daily in the Ark before the body of Adam. J. G. R. Foriong, in his Rivers of Life, tells us that ''It appears from both the Sabid Aben Batric and the Arabic Catena, that there existed the following 'short litany, said to have been conceived by Noah.' Then follows the prayer of Noah, which was used for so long a period by the Jewish Freemasons at the opening of the Lodge :
'' 'O Lord, excellent art thou in thy truth, and there is nothing great in comparison of thee. Look upon us with the eye of mercy and compassion. Deliver us from this deluge of waters, and set our feet in a large room. By the sorrows of Adam, the first made man ; by the blood of Abel, Thy holy one ; by the righteousness of Seth, in whom Thou art well pleased ; number us not amongst those who have transgressed Thy statutes, but take us into Thy merciful care, for Thou art our Deliverer, and Thine is the praise for all the works of Thy hand for evermore. And the sons of Noah said, Amen, Lord.'"
The Master of the Lodge would omit the reference to the deluge and add the following to the prayer:
"But grant, we beseech Thee, that the ruler of this Lodge may be endued with knowledge and wisdom to instruct us and explain his secret mystéries, as our holy brother Moses did (in His Lodge) to Aaron, to Eleazar, and to Ithamar (the sons of Aaron), and the several elders of Israel."
ADAM KADMON.
In the Cabalistic doctrine, the name given to the first emanation or outflowing
from the Eternal Fountain. It signifies the first man, or the first production of divine energy, or the son of God, and to it the other emanations are subordinate.
ADAMS, JOHN QUINCY.
Sixth President of the United States, who served from 1825 to 1829. Adams, who has been very properly described as "a man of strong points and weak ones, of vast reading and wonderful memory, of great credulity and strong prejudices," became notorious in the latter years of his life for his virulent opposition to Freemasonry. The writer already quoted, who had an excellent opportunity of seeing intimately the workings of the spirit of Anti-Masonry, says of him : "He hated Freemasonry, as he did many other things, not from any harm that he had received from it or personally knew respecting it, but because his credulity had been wrought upon and his prejudices excited against it by dishonest and selfish pollticians, who were anxious, at any sacrifice to him, to avail themselves of the influence of his commanding talents and position in public life to sustain them in the disreputable work in which they were enlisted. In his weakness, he lent himself to tham. He united his energies to theirs in an impracticable and unworthy cause" (C, lV. Moore, Freemasons magazine, volume vii, page 314).
The result was a series of letters abusive of Freemasonry, directed to leading politicians, and published in the public journals from 1831 to 1833. A year before his death they were collected and published under the title of Letters on the Masonic Institution, by John Quincy Adams (published at Boston, 1847, 284 pages).
Some explanation of the cause of the virulence with which Adams attacked the Masonic Institution in these ietters may be found in the following paragraph contained in an Anti-Masonic work written by one Henry Gassett, and affixed to his Catalogue of Books on the Masonic Institution (published at Boston, 1852) : "It had been asserted in a newspaper in Boston, edited by a Masonic dignitary, that John 11. Adams was a Freemason. In answer to an inquiry from a person in New York State, whether he was so, Mr. Adams replied that 'he was not, and never should be.'
These few words, undoubtedly, prevented his election a second time as President of the United States. His competitor, Andreuw Jackson, a Freemason, was elected."
Whether the statement contained in the italicized words be true or not, is not the question. It is sufficient that Adams was led to believe it, and hence his ill-will to an association which had, as he supposed, inflicted this political evil on him, and baffled his ambitious views.
Above reference to Adams being a member of the Craft is due to a confusion of the President's name with that of a Boston printer, John Quincy Adams, who w.as proposed for membership in St. Johns Lodge of that city on October 11, 1826. He was admitted on December 5.
But on the latter date the President was busily engaged at W'ashington as may be seen by reference to his Memoirs. This diary' also shows (on page 345, volume vii, Lippincott edition), a statement by Adams himself which settles the question. He says "I told Wilkins he might answer Tracy, that I am not and never was a Freemason."
ADAR.
Hebrew, pronounced ad-awr; the sixth month of the civili and the twelfth of the ecclesiasticaI year of the Jews. It corresponds to a part of February and of March. The word has also a private significance known to advanced Brethren.
AD AREL.
Angel of Fire. Referred to in the Hermetic Degree of Knight of the Sun. Probably from ... pronounced eh-der, meaning splendor, and .., El, God' that is, the splendor of God or Divine splendor.
ADRRESSES, MASONIC.
Doctor Oliver, speaking oi the Masonic discourses which began to be published soon after the reorganization of Freemasonry, in the commencement of the eighteenth century, and which he thinks were instigated by the attacks made ou the Order, to which they were intended to be replies, says : "Charges and addresses were therefore delivered by Brethren in authority on the fundamental principles of the Order, and they were printed to show that its morality was sound, and not in the slightest degree repugnant to the precepts of our most holy religion. These were of sufficient merit to insure a wide circulation among the Fratemity, from whence they spread into the world at large, and proved decisive in fixing the credit of the Institution for solemnities of character and a taste for serious and profitable investigations."
There can be no doubt that these addresses, periodicalIy dellivered and widely published, have continued to exert an excellent effect in behalf of the Institution, by explaining and defending the principies on which it is founded.
Not at all unusual is it now as formerly for Grand Lodges to promote the presentation of such addresses in the Lodges. For example, the Grand Lodge of Ohio (in the Masonic Code of that State, 1914, page 197, section 82), says of the several Subordinate Lodges: "It is enjoined upon them, as often as it is feasible, to introduce into their meetings Lectures and Essays upon Masonic Polity, and the various arts and sciences connected therewith."
The first Masonic address of which we have any notice was delivered on the 24th of June, 1721, before the Grand Lodge of England, by the celebrated John Theophilus Desagullers, LL.D, and F.R.S. The Book of Conslitutions (edition 1738, page l13), under that date, says "Brother Desaguliers made an eloquent oration about Masons and Masonry." Doctor Oliver, in his Revelations of a Square (page 22), states that this address was issued in a printed form, but no copy of it now remains---at least it has escaped the researches of the most diligent Masonic bibliographers.
On the 20th of May, 1725, Martin Folkes, then Deputy Grand Master, delivered an address before the Grand Lodge of England, which is cited in the Freemason's Pocket Companion for 1759, but no entire copy of the address is now extant.
The third Masonic address of which we have any knowledge is one entitied "A Speech delivered to the Worshipful and Ancient Society of Free and Accepted Masons, at a Grand Lodge held at Merchants' Hall, in the City of York, on Saint John's Day, December 27, 1726, the Right Worshipful Charles Bathurst, Esq., Grand Master. By the Junior Grand W'arden. Olim meminisse juvabit. York: Printed by Thomas Gent, for the benefit of the Lodge."
The Latin words Olim meminisse juvabit, as given on the above copy of the title page of this printed address, are taken from the works of the Roman epic poet Vergil, Who writes thus : Forsan et haec olim meminisse juvabit meaning Perchance even these things it will be hereafter delightful to remember.
The author of the above address was Francis Drake, M.D., F.R.S., who was appointed Junior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of All England at York on December 27, 1725 (see Drake, Francis). The first edition of the speech bears no date, but was probably issued in 1727, and it was again published at London in 1729, and a second London edition was published in 1734, which has been reprinted in Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints (American edition, page 106). This is, therefore, the earliest Masonic address to which we have access. It contains a brief sketch of the history of Freemasonry, written as Masonic history was then written. The address is, however, remarkable for advancing the claim of the Grand Lodge of York to a superiority over that of London, and for containing a very early reference to the three degrees of Craft Masonry.
The fourth Masonic address of whose existence we have any knolledge is "a Speech Deliver'd to the Worshipful Society of Free and Accepted Masons, at a Lodge, held at the Carpenters Arms in Silver-Street, Golden Square, the 31st of December, 1728. By the Right Worshipfut Edw. Oakley, Architect, M.M., late Provincial Senior Grand Warden in Carmarthen, South Wales." This speech was reprinted by Cole in his Ancient Constitutions at London in 1731.
America has the honor of presenting the next attempt at Masonic oratory. The fifth address, and the first American, which is extant, is one delivered in Boston, Massachusetts, on June 24, 1734. It is entitled "A Dissertation upon Masonry, delivered to a Lodge in America, June 24th, 1734. Christ's Regm."
This last word is doubtless an abbreviation of the Iatin word for kingdom. Discovered by Brother C. W. Moore in the archives of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, it was published by him in his magazine in 1849. This address is well written, and of a symbolic character, as the author represents the Lodge as a type of heaven.
Sixthly, we have "An Address made to the body of Free ànd Accepted Masons assembled at a Quarterly communication, held near Temple Bar, December I1, 1735, by Martin Clare, Junior Grand Warden."
Martin Clare was distinguished in his times as a Freemason, and his address, which Doctor Oliver has inserted in his Golden Remains, has been considered of value enough to be translated into the French and German languages.
Next, on March 21, 1737, the Chevalier Ramsay delivered an oration before the Grand Lodge of France, in which he discussed the Freemasonry and the Crusaders and traced an imaginary history of its course through Scotland and England into France, which was to become the center of the reformed Order.
Ramsay and his address are discussed at length in Doctor. Mackey's revised History of Freemasonry. A report of this speech is to be found in the Histoire &c. de la tre ven. Confratenité des F. M. &c. Traduit par 1e Fr. de la Tierce. Francfort, 1742. This French title means History of the very Worshipful Fraternity of Freemasons, etc. Translated by the Brother of the Third Degree. Frankfort, 1742. An English version of this much discussed address by the Chevaller Ramsey is given in Robert F. Gould's History of Freemasonry, vo1unle 3, pages 84-9 (see Ramsay).
After this period, Masonic addresses rapidly multiplied, w that it would be impossible to record their titles or even the names of their authors.
What Martial (1, 17), in the first century, said of his own epigrams, that some were good, some bad, and a great many middling, may, with equal propriety and justice, be said of Masonic addresses. Of the thousands that have been delivered, many have been worth neither printing nor preservation.
One thing, however, is to be remarked : that within a few years the literary character of these productions has greatly improved. Formerly, a Masonic address on some festal occasion of the Order was little mor than a homily on brotherly' love or some other Masonic virtue. Often the orator was a clergyman, selected by the Lodge on account of his moral character or his professional ability. These clergymen were frequentiy among the youngest members of the Lodge, and men who had no opportunity to study the esoteric construction of Freemasonry. In such cases we will find that the addresses were generally neither more nor less than sermons under another name.
They contain excellent general axioms of conduct, and sometimes encomiums or formal praises on the laudable design of our Institution.
But we look in vain in them for any ideas which refer to the history or to the occult philosophy of Freemasonry. Only in part do they accept the definition that
Freemasonry is a science of morality, veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols. They dwell on the science of morality, but they say nothing of the symbols or the allegories. But, as has been already said, there has been an evident improvement. Many of the addresses now delivered are of a higher order of Masonic literature. The subjects of Masonic history, of the origin of the Institution, of its gradual development from an operative art to a speculative science, of its symbols, and of its peculiar features which distinguish it from all other
associations, have been ably discussed in many recent Masonic addresses. Thus have the efforts to entertain an audience for an hour become not only the means of interesting instruction to the hearers, but also valuable contributions to the literature of Freemasonry.
Masonic addresses should be written in this way.
All platitudes and old truisms should be avoided.
Sermonizing, which is good in its place, is out of place there. No one should undertake to deliver a Masonic address unless he knows something of the subject on which he is about to speak, and unless he is capable of saying what will make every Freemason who hears him a wiser as well as a better man, or at least what will afford him the opportunity of becoming so. |
