Exhibiting, Understanding and Transmission

We use other words today. Alchemy branched out into chemistry, psychology, natural philosophy and then philosophy with a dash of science and belief. Today, men approach the Order of Freemasons in an elipitcal, spectrums of understanding on steroroids.  Understanding isn't a competion.  It is nice to quote ritual but it is not a reflection of understanding the ideas it contains. Efforts to educate brethren have great variations.  In my location, the first consistent impression is desparation. Learning is codified into a motivation of success and compliance. To do this, a connection with psyche and individual deeper meaning has to be ignored. The way to do that is not fully understood.  One way is to make philosophical injunctions appear elitist. This is a crude idea that ignores the actual humble context of Greek thinkers. The asthete Diogenes lived in a barrel. Socrates ignored popularity, dressing in simple, thread bare robes. He held court in public with students joining as they felt. Plato told us 'I know that I know nothing'. Without hubris. Emphasis was on the heart and mind of the willing student of life, a man who wanted to know if he was a moral creature, if his principles of life were truth or illusion?  And so they asked uncomfortable questions and for that they were condemned as being overbearing and dangerous. Masonry guides us toward inner wisdom, to look for what is good in another man, encouraging such positivity with an influence that counteracts mistrust. The real world teaches division, competition and mistrust. Men do not drop their guard easily. They need to feel the consistency and benefit of understanding by receiving it from us. Can you and I access this knowledge? There is one way to know.  Todays message has been unpopularly benefical for thousands of years. It will be there for us when we knock. When I am straight, then maybe I can expect that of others. Time tells.