This article is taken from the April 2019 issue of Fraternal Review titled, “Sacred Geometry II”.
In the master’s lecture of the Fellow Craft degree, we are told that “Geometry, the first and noblest of sciences, [is]... the basis upon which the superstructure of Freemasonry is erected.” By the time we reach this lecture in our Masonic journey, we probably have figured out that the medieval stonemasons from which our fraternity evolved used geometry to design and erect the structures on whose construction they were employed. At this point in the lecture, we expect additional instruction on the symbolism inherent in the builder’s trade. Instead, the master throws us a curve: He tells us that geometry can help us trace nature to her most concealed recesses in order to discover the power, wisdom, and goodness of the Great Architect of the Universe.
But what does Geometry have to do with God?
Geometry is mathematics. Builders use it to resolve questions of shape, size, and relative position of the parts of a structure.
The master then states that through geometry we can “discover how the planets move in their respective orbits” and “account for the return of seasons, and the variety of scenes which each season displays to the discerning eye.” More confusion. How do the movements of planets and the change in seasons help us learn how to do good and be better men? The master continues: “Numberless worlds are around us, all framed by the same Divine Artist, which roll through the vast expanse, and are all conducted by the same unerring law of nature.”
What is the master’s message?
The reference to the “unerring law of nature” is an important hint. Geometry is a Masonic symbol but its symbolism goes far beyond the lessons of the builder’s trade. It is much more profound. Geometry relates to the nature of God, or the Supreme Being as we Masons refer to the divine. This symbolism is designed to help us better understand the nature of the divine and what is expected of a moral life.
Most of us would probably agree that God is not a person sitting on a Carnelian throne with wheels of fire. God has been referred to in that fashion, but we understand the reference to be symbolic. We cannot see God—we can only know God by what God does.
This is nature’s role.
The planets move predictably in their orbits, and seasons change in a repeating cycle. There are forces in nature, sometimes violent, which can disturb the predictability of life. Yet, all things return to a pattern we recognize. The world may change, but a certain balance or harmony always reemerges. Nature has a way of correcting the forces that disturb its predictability, and we can count on that.
Quantum physics helps the scientist understand the most elemental nature of our physical existence, and even at the subatomic level we find laws that cannot be violated. In them, Masons are invited to find equilibrium, harmony, and evidence that God exists. We are invited to find God by what God does.
How does geometry fit in?
Geometry helps the astronomer predict the movement of planets. It helps the meteorologist predict the return of the seasons by charting the sun. Geometry helps the botanist find symmetry in plants. In other words, geometry proves that there is a repeating pattern in nature, and this is our evidence that God exists, as the creator and sustainer of that harmony. Geometry is therefore shorthand: It refers to the work of God and therefore God itself.
Understanding this relationship between geometry and God helps us understand not only what we need to do as Masons, but also who can become a Mason. We require an applicant for the degrees to affirm a belief in a Supreme Being. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, among other religions, include such a belief.
But geometry encourages us to take a broader view of God than is often found in the teachings of any specific religion. It encourages us to find the Supreme Being in the harmony of nature—that religion in which all men can agree, as Rev. James Anderson wrote in his Constitutions of 1723. It is only logical that a man who finds the Supreme Being in the harmony of nature can be a Mason, too.
Geometry is about morality, the values and principles of right conduct, because it gets to the root of what morality is: harmony. If God is about harmony, then we should be, too.
[R. Steven Doan, PGM, “Moral Advantages of Freemasonry,” California Freemason, Volume 63, Number 1, October/ November 2014, 7-8.]