The Hailing Sign 1991
From th
From the Archives
The Hailing Sign: whence did it take its rise?
A Paper by Peter Hamilton Currie -1991, originally produced for
Prince George Duke Of Kent Court RMBI Home, Study Circle, Chislehurst
later revised for presentation to Queen's College Taunton Lodge No 6988 (Oxford Working)
Prince George Duke Of Kent Court RMBI Home, Study Circle, Chislehurst
later revised for presentation to Queen's College Taunton Lodge No 6988 (Oxford Working)
Practically without exception, the first introduction to the Hailing Sign is received from the Master of the Lodge in which Brethren have been passed to the second degree. The method described is virtually identical for all workings, with certain minor variations. The human body is only capable of holding a finite number of positions and consequently something resembling a FC sign can be found anywhere from Egyptian tomb paintings to the Mexico of Montezuma or the Arabian Bektashi ritual, quite without masonic context.
It is not, however, with the physical representation of the sign that we are here concerned, so much as with the explanation of the derivation of that sign. Whence did it take its rise ?
The 1904 Perfect Ceremonies of Craft Masonry, an Emulation text, tells us that:-
The first part of the t..e-f..d S is called the S. of F., and is given by &c., emblematically to shield the repository of your Ss. From the attacks of the insidious. The second part is called the H Sn or Sn of P., and is given by &c. This took its rise at the time that J. fought the battles of the the Lord, when it was in this ... he prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies.*
At this point in the text there is an asterisk for a footnote which runs as follows:-
The above is the "Emulation" form but another reading is this:- This is said to have been the S. used by Joshua when fighting the battles of the Lord "in the going down to Beth-Horon". In this position he spake these memorable words: "Sun stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou moon in the valley of Ajalon", And the sun stood still and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. See Joshua X: 11-14.
As can be seen from the two examples supra there is a substantial difference between the explanations for the derivations of the sign and if we examine Richard Carlile's 1825 exposure in The Republican, we will find several more. Carlile claimed to have before him, as he wrote his exposure, every version of the old workings of the Antient and Modern Grand Lodges, the works of Finch, Preston, Oliver, Hemmings and even William Williams, Provincial GM for Dorset who in addition to his membership of the Grand Stewards Lodge, had been a member of the Lodge of Reconciliation, the body responsible to the United Grand Lodge of England, for establishing the forms of openings, closings, obligations and ceremonies (my italics) consequent upon the Union of 1813. The exposure is actually dedicated to Williams!
Thus Carlile:-
[Ed.]It took its rise at the time when Joshua fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of Rephidim; and from the memorable event of Moses having his hands supported by his brother Aaron, whilst Joshua was fighting the Amalekites. It was also the position of Joshua, when he prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemy. And Moses also, when he came down from the mount, hailed his brethren with this double sign (the first and second part) in order to arrest their attention, as a signal for them to attend to what he was about to deliver, and as a pledge of his sincerity and truth, and also of the importance of what he was about to declare, - This was the origin of the sign, and on the morning that the foundation stone of the Temple was laid, King Solomon adopted the same double sign; the right hand as a token of the sincerity of his holiness and piety towards God, and the left hand as a token of an upright hand and heart, in earnest prayer, imploring the blessing of the Most High on their pious undertaking, in erecting the Temple of Jerusalem to his holy service……..
Of course, the foregoing was presented as part of an exposure and it may be that, as a consequence, the veracity of its author is open to question. Nevertheless since it was aimed at the craft in general and William Williams in particular, no good purpose would have been served by publishing material that any mason would have considered specious. There is no reason to believe that Carlile was writing other than the truth when he claimed Finch, Oliver et al as his sources. It is thus worthwhile examining versions from later ritual publications in order to see how faithfully they emulate those in The Republican. Here, for instance is a version from 1874:-
This is the Hailing sign or sign of Perseverance - (gives it), said to have been made use of by Joshua, when fighting the battles of the Lord in the Valley of Jehoshaphat....
and here, another in current use:-
and took its rise when J. fought the .... of the Lord before the City of .. he ... His ... Thus, as a signal to his men who lay in ambush to arise and act according to orders; and we are further told that he never withdrew his ... From this position until the whole was completed. It is therefore called the H. Sn. Or Sn. Of P.
This version can be found north of the border:-
this s. was made use of by M. while J. was fighting the A. in the valley of R., as we read it was in this position that his arm was supported "with the rod of God in his hand", so that "when M. held up his hand the I. prevailed, and when he let down his hand the A. prevailed"
and this from Northumbria:-
It took its rise at the time that J. fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of R., as it was in this position that M. had his .. upheld by his brother A., whilst J. contended with the As. It was also in this position , on another occasion that J. prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies.
and as a final example, a Bristol Ms ritual of 1878:-
The PM who is entrusting the Ce with the HS should say - "It alludes to the battle fought with Amalek in the Valley of Rephidim & the WM will read the passage from the SL. WM Turns to Ex17 : 9-14 and reads...
These examples are sufficient to illustrate the many variations extant, there being additional versions stemming from semantic progression, the corruptions inherent in aural tradition or simple typographical error. A study of the general contents usually establishes to which part of the family tree of ritual, a particular example belongs, and it is worth mentioning in passing, that, with the exception of Stability, most rituals currently in use share their explanations with one of the five cited by Carlile in 1825. The Stability explanation was said by Colin Dyer in his paper on William Shadbolt, to be a version connected with William Williams, and in his own words - "Carlile, claiming to follow Hemming, has the battle fought in the Valley of Rephidim". Carlile, however, did not simply content himself with Rephidim, as we know from the example cited earlier. It will be remembered that he claimed to have material from every important Masonic source before him as he produced his exposure. We also know that while deriding Finch as a source, he nevertheless made much use of him!
Here is Finch himself:-
"the r.h. of Moses, supported by his brother Aaron at the victory over the Amalekites"...
Oxford ritual is almost word for word as the footnote for early Emulation, citing another version, viz: the "going down to Beth-horon" &c. Craft Guide refers to Joshua fighting the battles of the Lord, albeit unspecified. Emulation has "that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies", where Craft Guide has "until he had completed the overthrow..." Taylors is word for word as Craft Guide. A current copy of Scottish ritual from GL in Edinburgh offers no explanation at all, but as we have already seen from an earlier example supra, reference was made to the supporting of Moses arm "with the rod of God in his hand" in the battle against Amalek. So which explanation, if any, is the "correct" one? Why are there so many different examples and from whence did they come?
Carlile claimed to have before him, as he wrote his exposure, every version of the old workings of the Antient and Modern Grand Lodges, the works of Finch, Preston, Oliver, Hemmings and even William Williams, Provincial GM for Dorset who had been a member of the Lodge of Reconciliation, the body responsible to the United Grand Lodge, for establishing the forms of Openings, Closings, Obligations and ceremonies consequent upon the Union of 1813. The exposure is actually dedicated to Williams!
Thus Carlile:-
[Ed.] It took its rise at the time when Joshua fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of Rephidim; and from the memorable event of Moses having his hands supported by his brother Aaron, whilst Joshua was fighting the Amalekites. It was also the position of Joshua, when he prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemy. And Moses also , when he came down from the mount, hailed his brethren with this double sign (the first and second part) in order to arrest their attention, as a signal for them to attend to what he was about to deliver, and as a pledge of his sincerity and truth, and also of the importance of what he was about to declare, - This was the origin of the sign, and on the morning, that the foundation stone of the Temple was laid, King Solomon adopted the same double sign: the right hand as a token of the sincerity of his holiness and piety towards God, and the left hand as a token of an upright hand and heart, in earnest prayer, imploring the blessing of the Most High on their pious undertaking, in erecting the Temple of Jerusalem to his holy service......
Here is a version from the 1874 version of "The Textbook of Craft Masonry".
...This is the Hailing sign or sign of Perseverance - (gives it), said to have been made use of by Joshua, when fighting the battles of the Lord in the Valley of Jehoshaphat.....
And here:- "The Standard Ceremonies of Craft Masonry as taught in the Stability Lodge of Instruction (sometimes known as the "Muggeridge working").
...and took its rise when J. fought the ...... of the Lord before the City of .. he .... his .... thus, as a signal to his men who lay in ambush to arise and act according to orders; and we are further told that he never withdrew his .... from this position until the whole was completed. It is therefore called the H. Sn. or Sn. of P.
A 1920 version of a Scottish ritual:-
...this s...was made use of by M... while J... was fighting the A... in the valley of R..., as we read that it was in this position that his arm was supported "with the rod of God in his hand", so that "when M... held up his hand the I... prevailed, and when he let down his hand the A... prevailed";........
The Castle Ritual by Northumbrian Past Masters (from 16th edn.)
...It took its rise at the time that J. fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of R..., as it was in this position that M... had his... upheld by his brother A..., whilst J... contended with the A..s. It was also in this position, on another occasion that J... prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies.......
The Scoones York MS Ritual (1878).
...The PM who is entrusting the Ce with the HS should say - "It alludes to the battle fought with Amalek in the Valley of Rephidim & the WM will read the passage from the SL WM Turns to Ex17 - 9 - 14 and reads.....
There are many other instances of variations of the above examples but these have usually been brought about by semantic progression, Chinese whispers style corruptions peculiar to an aural tradition or plain old printing errors. Given a study of the general contents, it is usually obvious to which part of the family tree of ritual a particular example belongs. For interests sake, it is worth mentioning that, with the exception of Stability, most rituals currently in use share their explanations from one of the five cited by Carlile in 1825. The Stabilty explanation is said by Colin Dyer (AQC 87, 1974) in his paper on William Shadbolt, to be a version connected with William Williams, and in Dyer's words..."Carlile, claiming to follow Hemming, has the battle fought in the Valley of Rephidim". Carlile, however, did not simply content himself with Rephidim, as we know from the example cited earlier. It will be remembered that he claimed to have material from every important Masonic source before him as he produced his exposure. We also know that while deriding Finch as a source, he nevertheless made much use of him.
Finch, himself gives:- ..."the r.h. of Moses, supported by his brother Aaron at the victory over the Amalekites"; in his "New Set of Craft Lectures", January 1, 1814 (AQC 102 pp 80). Oxford is almost word for word as the footnote from early Emulation, citing another version viz: the "going down to Beth-Horon" &c. Craft Guide refers to Joshua fighting the battles of the Lord, but unspecified. Emulation has "that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies", where Craft Guide has "until he had completed the overthrow..." Taylors is word for word as Craft Guide. My copy of the current Scottish ritual offers no explanation at all but I believe, despite a certain coyness from Grand Lodge in Edinburgh, that an explanation is given but simply not printed.
So which, if any, explanation is the "correct" one? Why are there so many different ones and where did they come from?
Who, you may ask, was Shadbolt, or Finch, or Hemming?
If I may beg the indulgence of those of you to whom the following information is familiar, let me attempt a very brief resume of the progress of Masonic ritual through the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
It is almost certain that prior to the formation of the first Grand Lodge of England in 1717, no 2nd degree was known and up to 1730, masonic ceremonies had been in the early formative stage - the tri-gradal system slowly emerging (Jackson, EME 1760-1769) This period culminated in the printing of Prichard's exposure "Masonry Dissected" which, it is said, so alarmed the Grand Lodge that to prevent penetration of the Lodges by Cowans, various steps were taken including the reversal of the degree words. The net result of these changes was that some lodges refused to recognise the Grand Lodge and others formed a schismatic Grand Lodge - the self styled "Antients" (since they claimed to adhere to the Antient landmarks of Masonry) under the secretaryship of Laurence Dermott, in 1751, the premier Grand Lodge being referred to as "the Moderns".
In France, Freemasonry taken there by Englishmen or Scots of high or noble birth from about 1725 onwards found fertile soil in which to flower. We know of several early French exposures of which the principal must be acknowleged to be L'Ordre des Francs-Macons Trahi of 1745, an English translation of which appeared in 1762 under the name of A Master Key to Freemasonry. A further crop of English exposures appeared between 1760 and 1769, the most important of which were Three distinct Knocks (1760) which is presumed to have followed the Antients mode of working, and Jachin & Boaz (1762) which initially followed the Moderns but was later adapted to cover the workings of both factions. Both TDK and J&B drew heavily on the Trahi and since they were both extensively used right up to the union in 1813 as aides-memoires it seems self evident that the contents were acceptable to English masons as being typical of the working practices of their lodges.
Notwithstanding the long running battle between these refactory Lodges and the Board of General Purposes who summoned their leaders to give account of themselves on numerous occasions, even demanding that they brought with them their minute books and Lodge warrants, a judicious act of compromise was entered into by the Lodge of Reconciliation and the six lodges reluctantly agreed to work the new system proposed by it.
In fact, had it wished, since under the terms of its original warrant ... "to declare the warrants to be forfeited, if the measures proposed shall be resisted"... the Lodge of Reconciliation could have demanded the warrants of the six and closed those Lodges. That it compromised by accepting almost every objection to the new system reflects closely the ethos under which the Duke of Sussex was attempting to steer the fragile boat of the newly effected union.
It was at one time thought that no notes were made by any member of the Lodge of Reconciliation concerning the new ceremonies, but this is now no longer true. Carlile, in the preface to his exposure claimed that he used the notes of both the Revd Samuel Hemming (the WM) and William Williams.
Fortunately for us, the All Souls Lodge No. 170 which meets at Weymouth, works its ceremonies by an unusual ritual which they claim was given to them by William Williams! Indeed in their minute book for the 23rd August 1816, there is a record of the book of the new ritual actually being presented to them by Williams himself.
One can presume that Williams was in a position to know what was approved by Grand Lodge at this time since the work on the ritual by the Lodge of Reconciliation had been completed and the forms demonstrated and approved by the Grand Lodge on 5th June 1816.
"It may seem strange that such a prominent Mason had the new ritual in a book when it was well known that, in those days, printing the ritual was severely frowned on. However, it was the printing of the ritual which was not permitted and may manuscript notes made at about that time, have survived". (The Williams-Arden MS, AQC 87,1974) In fact Bro Raymond Hill, a PM of All Souls found in the Lodge premises a brown book, marked Ritual 1817 in manuscript on the outside cover. Inside the cover is written the name of George Arden.
Bro Colin Dyer, after lengthy consideration of the provenance of this book has concluded that it was the actual book given to the Lodge by William Williams and thus we are able to examine the pertinent part of the second degree ceremony which deals with the derivation of the three fold Sn.
Before doing so, however, I must refer to Hemmming and Shadbolt. The Revd Samuel Hemming was RWM of the Lodge of Reconciliation while William Shadbolt who was a member of the Grand Stewards Lodge, was one of the five members of the Lodge of Promulgation who were also appointed to the Lodge of Reconciliation. He served three times as master of the lodge, eight as JW once as IPM and was present on three other occasions. He was also one of the members who visited the provinces, for from 21st to 23rd November 1814 he attended the Provincial Grand Lodge of Lancashire:-
"to give the new form of Opening, Closing and Initiation in the 3 degrees as adopted in the Lodge of Reconciliation".
In the Grand Lodge library in London, there were discovered a pencilled draft and a typed copy of a manuscript which claims to have been the property of Shadbolt. The third page of the pencilled draft contains a letter almost certainly from Dr Hemming to Shadbolt, on the back of which is a list of the working tools of a master mason. The contents, originally in cipher, are the basics of the new ritual, more or less in the order in which Grand Lodge finally approved them. The part with which we are concerned has two alternative versions for the whole FC ceremony but the explanation of the H Sn is the same although the second version stops at the word Joshua.
Now we are in a position where we have three separate workings which may be compared with each other - Williams (the book found in All Souls Lodge), Hemming (The working exposed by Carlile in The Republican) and Shadbolt (the pencilled draft found in the Grand Lodge Library). The most notable difference, according to Dyer, is in the origin of the second part of the three fold Sn. In both versions of Shadbolt, Joshua fought the battles of the Lord in the Valley of Jehosaphat. In Hemming the reasons are virtually word for word as reproduced in The Republican, while William Williams version contains no explanation in the text but there is a note to insert the story contained in Joshua VIII v.18, 19 & 26 at the end of the ceremony. This, you will recall concerns the destruction of Ai.
There is also a connection between Shadbolt and Williams, for on one of the scraps of paper among those of Shadbolt is a note - Joshua Ai and Bithel, which leads us to suppose that they may have discussed this particular point.
CONCLUSIONS
Brethren, where does our Beth-horon explanation fit in to all this?
Let me quote to you W. Bro J. Walter Hobbs section on Oxford Ritual from Masonic Ritual Described Compared and Explained. (The Masonic Record Ltd., London 1923)
OXFORD
We understand this to have been a form used in the Province of Oxford, it is said from the time of the Union, and to have been the subject of some MS. supposed to date back for many years, and to have been used by a brother who was Dep Prov GM of the province. It apparently came into more general use there about 1870, and is stated to be more free from grammatical errors than most other forms. It was, however, revised in 1903 by Bro Viscount Valentia, Dep Prov GM of the province and Bro the Revd D.H.W. Horlock PGChaplain and approved by Lord Jersey, the Prov GM Oxon. Such authority, therefore, as may proceed from these circumstances would appear to be local rather than general and to carry with it the acceptance of the statement that it is the form "Antiently practised in the Province of Oxford and elsewhere".
So the little black books that we ernestly spend so much time studying, may safely be assumed to be post Union ritual but derived from pre-Union practice - it was claimed from the Antients - and enhanced by the forms settled on by the Lodge of Reconciliation, while still preserving peculiarities special to Oxford.
In my opinion, every one of the explanations was in use around the country, prior to the Union. I believe the Lodge of Promulgation and latterly the Lodge of Reconciliation considered all of these and decided that each had equal validity, and were to be allowed to remain the individual choice of the lodges working the new ritual. Why else would Williams choose Ai for Weymouth, Shadbolt Jehoshaphat and Hemming, the cleric, go overboard with five different explanations? What I do not believe, is that our explanation is the result of one Oxford Lodge sending Thomas Wyatt up to London in 1814 and that he came back armed with complete and comprehensive notes on the new forms and that Oxford has been based on that ever since. It may be that he did do just that and that he heard the Beth-horon explanation in London, or even that he recognised it as the one already in use in Oxford and understood that he and his brethren would be allowed to keep to this "Antient" form of working contained in the new ritual, but I believe there is a more simple solution to the mystery. The solution lies in the printed ritual and how we come to have printed rituals when they were so long frowned upon by Grand Lodge.
The first printed ritual produced after the final meeting of the Lodge of Reconciliation was that of George Claret in 1838. His signature is to be found in the attendance register at the Lodge of Reconciliation and there is no doubt that he was most fervent in his attitude to the furtherance of the new ritual. So much so that he seemed to attract opposition wherever he went - both in his own Lodge, Ionic and Prudence, and in the Burlington Lodge of Instruction where he met Peter Gilkes who was later to found the Emulation Lodge of Improvement. Nevertheless his ritual was the first compilation of the new workings with any degree of Masonic respectability simply because, to quote Roy Wells, "he was the man on the spot, as it were, having been so involved with the work of the Lodge of Reconciliation; plus his connection with so many outstanding preceptors and teaching bodies in that period". (AQC 87, 1974).
Dr. E.H. Cartwright, a member of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge, had this to say about this ritual....
"After Gilke's death, George Claret printed a ritual which, with a degree of probability amounting to virtual certainty, presented Gilkes' working. (ie: in the Emulation Lodge of Improvement).....it is the earliest complete record of any post union working we have.......Claret's ritual and its numerous subsequent editions were effectively brought to the notice of the craft at large and, the usefulness of a printed ritual being quickly recognised, they found their way to all parts of the country. There can be no doubt that quite a number of provincial lodges, where copies had been introduced, brought their workings into accord with the version therein presented, in many cases, pretty certainly at the cost of dropping old and perfectly legitimate variants. It was thus that Gilke's rendering of the ritual became so widely known and adopted......The publication and widespread use of Claret's Ritual resulted in the disappearance of a large number of old workings and a much greater uniformity then ensued".
Of course this was only one of the paths taken by former members of the Lodge of Reconciliation. Philip Broadfoot and Thomas Satterly founded the Stability lodge of Instruction in December 1817 to instruct brethren in the new working. It could be said from this that the Stability ritual is thus the oldest post union working in existence since Peter Gilkes claimed only to have worked the lectures and not the ceremonies in the Emulation Lodge of Improvement. This, however was not good enough for the members of the Lodge of Stability No. 217, itself. Formerly No. 300 on the Atholl roll of Antient lodges, its members decided that they would form their own lodge of instruction since they did not agree with what was being disseminated in the Stability Lodge of Instruction, especially as no fewer than eight of their members had been members of the Lodge of Reconciliation.
By 1849 the Freemason's Quarterly Review was deriding Peter Thomson and Henry Muggeridge at the Stability Lodge of Instruction for teaching exactly what they themselves had been taught; viz: the teachings of Hemming and Broadfoot, yet in 1858, its successor the Freemason's Magazine took the opposite view and in an article on "Uniformity in Working", urged Stabilty and Emulation to get together and settle their differences - one of which, incidentally, was quoted as being the explanation of the H Sn!
In 1861 the Grand Stewards Lodge formed a committee to revise the lectures. Ultimately Grand Lodge took note and in 1869 appointed a committee of thirty nine brethren to go into the whole question of uniformity of Ritual. (Dyer, In Search of Ritual Uniformity, Prestonian Lecture, 1973).
John Havers, who had been trying since 1857 to bring just Stability and Emulation together pointed out the impossibility of the task, particularly with a committee of thirty nine, and the matter was dropped. Change won, as it always will, and by 1870 most of the variations had developed into recognisable workings. It is, of course, therefore unlikely that any of these variations retain, in their entirety, the forms which the Duke of Sussex tried hard to perpetuate.
Another important matter was the implied relaxation of the ban on printing and publishing of anything purporting to give information on Ritual forms. Thus although Claret had been vilified for printing a ritual apparently for his own profit, after 1869 with the failure of attempts to produce uniformity many different versions of the ritual, many with ammended grammar or varied to suit local preference, began to appear in print. Thus we have the appearance in 1870 of John Hogg's The Perfect Ceremonies of Craft Masonry which contains the footnote about the Beth-horon variant of which no trace exists from any extant records of the Lodge of Reconciliation.
If you cast your minds back to the J. Walter Hobbs book Masonic Ritual you will recall that the Oxford book was also first printed in 1870 and it is therefore my contention that the use of the Beth-horon variant dates from no earlier than this time although I will concede that it might have been in use before the Union in Oxford Lodges and it might have been brought back to Oxford by Thomas Wyatt from the deliberations of the Lodge of Reconciliation.
APPENDIX 1
THE BIBLICAL REFERENCES
EXODUS XVII vv 8-13.
8. Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim.
9. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek: tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand.
10.So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek: and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill.
11.And it came to pass, when Moses held up his band, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed.
12.But Moses hands were heavy; and they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.
13. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
JOSHUA VIII vv 18, 19 & 26.
18.And the Lord said unto Joshua, Stretch out thy spear that is in thy hand toward A-i; for I will give it into thine band. And Joshua stretched out the spear that he had in his band toward the city.
19.And the ambush arose quickly out of their place, and they ran as soon as he had stretched out his hand: and they entered into the city, and took it and hasted and set the city on fire.
and:
26.For Joshua drew not his hand back, wherewith he stretched out the spear, until he had utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of A-i.
JOSHUA X vv 11 - 14.
11.And it came to pass, as they fled from before Israel, and were in the going down to Beth-horon, that the Lord cast down great stones from heaven upon them unto Azekah, and they died: they were more which died with hailstones than they whom the Children of Israel slew with the sword.
12.Then spake Joshua to the Lord in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the Children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.
13.And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is this not written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
14.And there was no day like that before it or after it , that the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man: for the Lord fought for Israel.
Appendix II
The places in the various explanations and translation of the Hebrew.
1. Ai..................................A heap of ruins (a village to the east of Bethel)
2. Bethel..........................House of God (the Bithel of Shadbolt)
3. Rephidim....................Resting place
4. Amalek........................Dweller in a valley
5. Beth-horon................House of hollowness
6. Jehoshaphat.............JHVH has judged (Hutchison gives translation)
On a final note, I can do no better than to quote the very last part of the Second Degree section in Three Distinct Knocks...
NB. Some Masters of Lodges will argue upon Reasons about the holy Vessels in the Temple and the Windows and Doors, the Length, Breadth and Height of every Thing in the Temple, Saying why was It so and so? One will give one Reason; and another will give another Reason, and thus they will continue for Two or Three Hours in this Part and the Master-Part; but this happens very seldom, except an IRISHMAN should come, who likes to hear him-self talk, asking, Why were they round? Why were they square? Why were they hollow? Why were the Stones costly? Why were they hewn Stones and saw'd Stones &c. some give one Reason and some give another; thus you see that every Man's Reason is not alike. Therefore, if I give you my Reason, it may not be like another; but any Man that reads the foregoing and following Work, and consults the 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th Chapters of the first Book of Kings, and the 2d, 3d and 4th of the second Book of Chronicles, may reason as well as the best of them; for I have laid all the Rules down plain to go by.
It is not, however, with the physical representation of the sign that we are here concerned, so much as with the explanation of the derivation of that sign. Whence did it take its rise ?
The 1904 Perfect Ceremonies of Craft Masonry, an Emulation text, tells us that:-
The first part of the t..e-f..d S is called the S. of F., and is given by &c., emblematically to shield the repository of your Ss. From the attacks of the insidious. The second part is called the H Sn or Sn of P., and is given by &c. This took its rise at the time that J. fought the battles of the the Lord, when it was in this ... he prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies.*
At this point in the text there is an asterisk for a footnote which runs as follows:-
The above is the "Emulation" form but another reading is this:- This is said to have been the S. used by Joshua when fighting the battles of the Lord "in the going down to Beth-Horon". In this position he spake these memorable words: "Sun stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou moon in the valley of Ajalon", And the sun stood still and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. See Joshua X: 11-14.
As can be seen from the two examples supra there is a substantial difference between the explanations for the derivations of the sign and if we examine Richard Carlile's 1825 exposure in The Republican, we will find several more. Carlile claimed to have before him, as he wrote his exposure, every version of the old workings of the Antient and Modern Grand Lodges, the works of Finch, Preston, Oliver, Hemmings and even William Williams, Provincial GM for Dorset who in addition to his membership of the Grand Stewards Lodge, had been a member of the Lodge of Reconciliation, the body responsible to the United Grand Lodge of England, for establishing the forms of openings, closings, obligations and ceremonies (my italics) consequent upon the Union of 1813. The exposure is actually dedicated to Williams!
Thus Carlile:-
[Ed.]It took its rise at the time when Joshua fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of Rephidim; and from the memorable event of Moses having his hands supported by his brother Aaron, whilst Joshua was fighting the Amalekites. It was also the position of Joshua, when he prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemy. And Moses also, when he came down from the mount, hailed his brethren with this double sign (the first and second part) in order to arrest their attention, as a signal for them to attend to what he was about to deliver, and as a pledge of his sincerity and truth, and also of the importance of what he was about to declare, - This was the origin of the sign, and on the morning that the foundation stone of the Temple was laid, King Solomon adopted the same double sign; the right hand as a token of the sincerity of his holiness and piety towards God, and the left hand as a token of an upright hand and heart, in earnest prayer, imploring the blessing of the Most High on their pious undertaking, in erecting the Temple of Jerusalem to his holy service……..
Of course, the foregoing was presented as part of an exposure and it may be that, as a consequence, the veracity of its author is open to question. Nevertheless since it was aimed at the craft in general and William Williams in particular, no good purpose would have been served by publishing material that any mason would have considered specious. There is no reason to believe that Carlile was writing other than the truth when he claimed Finch, Oliver et al as his sources. It is thus worthwhile examining versions from later ritual publications in order to see how faithfully they emulate those in The Republican. Here, for instance is a version from 1874:-
This is the Hailing sign or sign of Perseverance - (gives it), said to have been made use of by Joshua, when fighting the battles of the Lord in the Valley of Jehoshaphat....
and here, another in current use:-
and took its rise when J. fought the .... of the Lord before the City of .. he ... His ... Thus, as a signal to his men who lay in ambush to arise and act according to orders; and we are further told that he never withdrew his ... From this position until the whole was completed. It is therefore called the H. Sn. Or Sn. Of P.
This version can be found north of the border:-
this s. was made use of by M. while J. was fighting the A. in the valley of R., as we read it was in this position that his arm was supported "with the rod of God in his hand", so that "when M. held up his hand the I. prevailed, and when he let down his hand the A. prevailed"
and this from Northumbria:-
It took its rise at the time that J. fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of R., as it was in this position that M. had his .. upheld by his brother A., whilst J. contended with the As. It was also in this position , on another occasion that J. prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies.
and as a final example, a Bristol Ms ritual of 1878:-
The PM who is entrusting the Ce with the HS should say - "It alludes to the battle fought with Amalek in the Valley of Rephidim & the WM will read the passage from the SL. WM Turns to Ex17 : 9-14 and reads...
These examples are sufficient to illustrate the many variations extant, there being additional versions stemming from semantic progression, the corruptions inherent in aural tradition or simple typographical error. A study of the general contents usually establishes to which part of the family tree of ritual, a particular example belongs, and it is worth mentioning in passing, that, with the exception of Stability, most rituals currently in use share their explanations with one of the five cited by Carlile in 1825. The Stability explanation was said by Colin Dyer in his paper on William Shadbolt, to be a version connected with William Williams, and in his own words - "Carlile, claiming to follow Hemming, has the battle fought in the Valley of Rephidim". Carlile, however, did not simply content himself with Rephidim, as we know from the example cited earlier. It will be remembered that he claimed to have material from every important Masonic source before him as he produced his exposure. We also know that while deriding Finch as a source, he nevertheless made much use of him!
Here is Finch himself:-
"the r.h. of Moses, supported by his brother Aaron at the victory over the Amalekites"...
Oxford ritual is almost word for word as the footnote for early Emulation, citing another version, viz: the "going down to Beth-horon" &c. Craft Guide refers to Joshua fighting the battles of the Lord, albeit unspecified. Emulation has "that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies", where Craft Guide has "until he had completed the overthrow..." Taylors is word for word as Craft Guide. A current copy of Scottish ritual from GL in Edinburgh offers no explanation at all, but as we have already seen from an earlier example supra, reference was made to the supporting of Moses arm "with the rod of God in his hand" in the battle against Amalek. So which explanation, if any, is the "correct" one? Why are there so many different examples and from whence did they come?
Carlile claimed to have before him, as he wrote his exposure, every version of the old workings of the Antient and Modern Grand Lodges, the works of Finch, Preston, Oliver, Hemmings and even William Williams, Provincial GM for Dorset who had been a member of the Lodge of Reconciliation, the body responsible to the United Grand Lodge, for establishing the forms of Openings, Closings, Obligations and ceremonies consequent upon the Union of 1813. The exposure is actually dedicated to Williams!
Thus Carlile:-
[Ed.] It took its rise at the time when Joshua fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of Rephidim; and from the memorable event of Moses having his hands supported by his brother Aaron, whilst Joshua was fighting the Amalekites. It was also the position of Joshua, when he prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemy. And Moses also , when he came down from the mount, hailed his brethren with this double sign (the first and second part) in order to arrest their attention, as a signal for them to attend to what he was about to deliver, and as a pledge of his sincerity and truth, and also of the importance of what he was about to declare, - This was the origin of the sign, and on the morning, that the foundation stone of the Temple was laid, King Solomon adopted the same double sign: the right hand as a token of the sincerity of his holiness and piety towards God, and the left hand as a token of an upright hand and heart, in earnest prayer, imploring the blessing of the Most High on their pious undertaking, in erecting the Temple of Jerusalem to his holy service......
Here is a version from the 1874 version of "The Textbook of Craft Masonry".
...This is the Hailing sign or sign of Perseverance - (gives it), said to have been made use of by Joshua, when fighting the battles of the Lord in the Valley of Jehoshaphat.....
And here:- "The Standard Ceremonies of Craft Masonry as taught in the Stability Lodge of Instruction (sometimes known as the "Muggeridge working").
...and took its rise when J. fought the ...... of the Lord before the City of .. he .... his .... thus, as a signal to his men who lay in ambush to arise and act according to orders; and we are further told that he never withdrew his .... from this position until the whole was completed. It is therefore called the H. Sn. or Sn. of P.
A 1920 version of a Scottish ritual:-
...this s...was made use of by M... while J... was fighting the A... in the valley of R..., as we read that it was in this position that his arm was supported "with the rod of God in his hand", so that "when M... held up his hand the I... prevailed, and when he let down his hand the A... prevailed";........
The Castle Ritual by Northumbrian Past Masters (from 16th edn.)
...It took its rise at the time that J. fought the battles of the Lord in the valley of R..., as it was in this position that M... had his... upheld by his brother A..., whilst J... contended with the A..s. It was also in this position, on another occasion that J... prayed fervently to the Almighty to continue the light of day, that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies.......
The Scoones York MS Ritual (1878).
...The PM who is entrusting the Ce with the HS should say - "It alludes to the battle fought with Amalek in the Valley of Rephidim & the WM will read the passage from the SL WM Turns to Ex17 - 9 - 14 and reads.....
There are many other instances of variations of the above examples but these have usually been brought about by semantic progression, Chinese whispers style corruptions peculiar to an aural tradition or plain old printing errors. Given a study of the general contents, it is usually obvious to which part of the family tree of ritual a particular example belongs. For interests sake, it is worth mentioning that, with the exception of Stability, most rituals currently in use share their explanations from one of the five cited by Carlile in 1825. The Stabilty explanation is said by Colin Dyer (AQC 87, 1974) in his paper on William Shadbolt, to be a version connected with William Williams, and in Dyer's words..."Carlile, claiming to follow Hemming, has the battle fought in the Valley of Rephidim". Carlile, however, did not simply content himself with Rephidim, as we know from the example cited earlier. It will be remembered that he claimed to have material from every important Masonic source before him as he produced his exposure. We also know that while deriding Finch as a source, he nevertheless made much use of him.
Finch, himself gives:- ..."the r.h. of Moses, supported by his brother Aaron at the victory over the Amalekites"; in his "New Set of Craft Lectures", January 1, 1814 (AQC 102 pp 80). Oxford is almost word for word as the footnote from early Emulation, citing another version viz: the "going down to Beth-Horon" &c. Craft Guide refers to Joshua fighting the battles of the Lord, but unspecified. Emulation has "that he might complete the overthrow of his enemies", where Craft Guide has "until he had completed the overthrow..." Taylors is word for word as Craft Guide. My copy of the current Scottish ritual offers no explanation at all but I believe, despite a certain coyness from Grand Lodge in Edinburgh, that an explanation is given but simply not printed.
So which, if any, explanation is the "correct" one? Why are there so many different ones and where did they come from?
Who, you may ask, was Shadbolt, or Finch, or Hemming?
If I may beg the indulgence of those of you to whom the following information is familiar, let me attempt a very brief resume of the progress of Masonic ritual through the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
It is almost certain that prior to the formation of the first Grand Lodge of England in 1717, no 2nd degree was known and up to 1730, masonic ceremonies had been in the early formative stage - the tri-gradal system slowly emerging (Jackson, EME 1760-1769) This period culminated in the printing of Prichard's exposure "Masonry Dissected" which, it is said, so alarmed the Grand Lodge that to prevent penetration of the Lodges by Cowans, various steps were taken including the reversal of the degree words. The net result of these changes was that some lodges refused to recognise the Grand Lodge and others formed a schismatic Grand Lodge - the self styled "Antients" (since they claimed to adhere to the Antient landmarks of Masonry) under the secretaryship of Laurence Dermott, in 1751, the premier Grand Lodge being referred to as "the Moderns".
In France, Freemasonry taken there by Englishmen or Scots of high or noble birth from about 1725 onwards found fertile soil in which to flower. We know of several early French exposures of which the principal must be acknowleged to be L'Ordre des Francs-Macons Trahi of 1745, an English translation of which appeared in 1762 under the name of A Master Key to Freemasonry. A further crop of English exposures appeared between 1760 and 1769, the most important of which were Three distinct Knocks (1760) which is presumed to have followed the Antients mode of working, and Jachin & Boaz (1762) which initially followed the Moderns but was later adapted to cover the workings of both factions. Both TDK and J&B drew heavily on the Trahi and since they were both extensively used right up to the union in 1813 as aides-memoires it seems self evident that the contents were acceptable to English masons as being typical of the working practices of their lodges.
Notwithstanding the long running battle between these refactory Lodges and the Board of General Purposes who summoned their leaders to give account of themselves on numerous occasions, even demanding that they brought with them their minute books and Lodge warrants, a judicious act of compromise was entered into by the Lodge of Reconciliation and the six lodges reluctantly agreed to work the new system proposed by it.
In fact, had it wished, since under the terms of its original warrant ... "to declare the warrants to be forfeited, if the measures proposed shall be resisted"... the Lodge of Reconciliation could have demanded the warrants of the six and closed those Lodges. That it compromised by accepting almost every objection to the new system reflects closely the ethos under which the Duke of Sussex was attempting to steer the fragile boat of the newly effected union.
It was at one time thought that no notes were made by any member of the Lodge of Reconciliation concerning the new ceremonies, but this is now no longer true. Carlile, in the preface to his exposure claimed that he used the notes of both the Revd Samuel Hemming (the WM) and William Williams.
Fortunately for us, the All Souls Lodge No. 170 which meets at Weymouth, works its ceremonies by an unusual ritual which they claim was given to them by William Williams! Indeed in their minute book for the 23rd August 1816, there is a record of the book of the new ritual actually being presented to them by Williams himself.
One can presume that Williams was in a position to know what was approved by Grand Lodge at this time since the work on the ritual by the Lodge of Reconciliation had been completed and the forms demonstrated and approved by the Grand Lodge on 5th June 1816.
"It may seem strange that such a prominent Mason had the new ritual in a book when it was well known that, in those days, printing the ritual was severely frowned on. However, it was the printing of the ritual which was not permitted and may manuscript notes made at about that time, have survived". (The Williams-Arden MS, AQC 87,1974) In fact Bro Raymond Hill, a PM of All Souls found in the Lodge premises a brown book, marked Ritual 1817 in manuscript on the outside cover. Inside the cover is written the name of George Arden.
Bro Colin Dyer, after lengthy consideration of the provenance of this book has concluded that it was the actual book given to the Lodge by William Williams and thus we are able to examine the pertinent part of the second degree ceremony which deals with the derivation of the three fold Sn.
Before doing so, however, I must refer to Hemmming and Shadbolt. The Revd Samuel Hemming was RWM of the Lodge of Reconciliation while William Shadbolt who was a member of the Grand Stewards Lodge, was one of the five members of the Lodge of Promulgation who were also appointed to the Lodge of Reconciliation. He served three times as master of the lodge, eight as JW once as IPM and was present on three other occasions. He was also one of the members who visited the provinces, for from 21st to 23rd November 1814 he attended the Provincial Grand Lodge of Lancashire:-
"to give the new form of Opening, Closing and Initiation in the 3 degrees as adopted in the Lodge of Reconciliation".
In the Grand Lodge library in London, there were discovered a pencilled draft and a typed copy of a manuscript which claims to have been the property of Shadbolt. The third page of the pencilled draft contains a letter almost certainly from Dr Hemming to Shadbolt, on the back of which is a list of the working tools of a master mason. The contents, originally in cipher, are the basics of the new ritual, more or less in the order in which Grand Lodge finally approved them. The part with which we are concerned has two alternative versions for the whole FC ceremony but the explanation of the H Sn is the same although the second version stops at the word Joshua.
Now we are in a position where we have three separate workings which may be compared with each other - Williams (the book found in All Souls Lodge), Hemming (The working exposed by Carlile in The Republican) and Shadbolt (the pencilled draft found in the Grand Lodge Library). The most notable difference, according to Dyer, is in the origin of the second part of the three fold Sn. In both versions of Shadbolt, Joshua fought the battles of the Lord in the Valley of Jehosaphat. In Hemming the reasons are virtually word for word as reproduced in The Republican, while William Williams version contains no explanation in the text but there is a note to insert the story contained in Joshua VIII v.18, 19 & 26 at the end of the ceremony. This, you will recall concerns the destruction of Ai.
There is also a connection between Shadbolt and Williams, for on one of the scraps of paper among those of Shadbolt is a note - Joshua Ai and Bithel, which leads us to suppose that they may have discussed this particular point.
CONCLUSIONS
Brethren, where does our Beth-horon explanation fit in to all this?
Let me quote to you W. Bro J. Walter Hobbs section on Oxford Ritual from Masonic Ritual Described Compared and Explained. (The Masonic Record Ltd., London 1923)
OXFORD
We understand this to have been a form used in the Province of Oxford, it is said from the time of the Union, and to have been the subject of some MS. supposed to date back for many years, and to have been used by a brother who was Dep Prov GM of the province. It apparently came into more general use there about 1870, and is stated to be more free from grammatical errors than most other forms. It was, however, revised in 1903 by Bro Viscount Valentia, Dep Prov GM of the province and Bro the Revd D.H.W. Horlock PGChaplain and approved by Lord Jersey, the Prov GM Oxon. Such authority, therefore, as may proceed from these circumstances would appear to be local rather than general and to carry with it the acceptance of the statement that it is the form "Antiently practised in the Province of Oxford and elsewhere".
So the little black books that we ernestly spend so much time studying, may safely be assumed to be post Union ritual but derived from pre-Union practice - it was claimed from the Antients - and enhanced by the forms settled on by the Lodge of Reconciliation, while still preserving peculiarities special to Oxford.
In my opinion, every one of the explanations was in use around the country, prior to the Union. I believe the Lodge of Promulgation and latterly the Lodge of Reconciliation considered all of these and decided that each had equal validity, and were to be allowed to remain the individual choice of the lodges working the new ritual. Why else would Williams choose Ai for Weymouth, Shadbolt Jehoshaphat and Hemming, the cleric, go overboard with five different explanations? What I do not believe, is that our explanation is the result of one Oxford Lodge sending Thomas Wyatt up to London in 1814 and that he came back armed with complete and comprehensive notes on the new forms and that Oxford has been based on that ever since. It may be that he did do just that and that he heard the Beth-horon explanation in London, or even that he recognised it as the one already in use in Oxford and understood that he and his brethren would be allowed to keep to this "Antient" form of working contained in the new ritual, but I believe there is a more simple solution to the mystery. The solution lies in the printed ritual and how we come to have printed rituals when they were so long frowned upon by Grand Lodge.
The first printed ritual produced after the final meeting of the Lodge of Reconciliation was that of George Claret in 1838. His signature is to be found in the attendance register at the Lodge of Reconciliation and there is no doubt that he was most fervent in his attitude to the furtherance of the new ritual. So much so that he seemed to attract opposition wherever he went - both in his own Lodge, Ionic and Prudence, and in the Burlington Lodge of Instruction where he met Peter Gilkes who was later to found the Emulation Lodge of Improvement. Nevertheless his ritual was the first compilation of the new workings with any degree of Masonic respectability simply because, to quote Roy Wells, "he was the man on the spot, as it were, having been so involved with the work of the Lodge of Reconciliation; plus his connection with so many outstanding preceptors and teaching bodies in that period". (AQC 87, 1974).
Dr. E.H. Cartwright, a member of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge, had this to say about this ritual....
"After Gilke's death, George Claret printed a ritual which, with a degree of probability amounting to virtual certainty, presented Gilkes' working. (ie: in the Emulation Lodge of Improvement).....it is the earliest complete record of any post union working we have.......Claret's ritual and its numerous subsequent editions were effectively brought to the notice of the craft at large and, the usefulness of a printed ritual being quickly recognised, they found their way to all parts of the country. There can be no doubt that quite a number of provincial lodges, where copies had been introduced, brought their workings into accord with the version therein presented, in many cases, pretty certainly at the cost of dropping old and perfectly legitimate variants. It was thus that Gilke's rendering of the ritual became so widely known and adopted......The publication and widespread use of Claret's Ritual resulted in the disappearance of a large number of old workings and a much greater uniformity then ensued".
Of course this was only one of the paths taken by former members of the Lodge of Reconciliation. Philip Broadfoot and Thomas Satterly founded the Stability lodge of Instruction in December 1817 to instruct brethren in the new working. It could be said from this that the Stability ritual is thus the oldest post union working in existence since Peter Gilkes claimed only to have worked the lectures and not the ceremonies in the Emulation Lodge of Improvement. This, however was not good enough for the members of the Lodge of Stability No. 217, itself. Formerly No. 300 on the Atholl roll of Antient lodges, its members decided that they would form their own lodge of instruction since they did not agree with what was being disseminated in the Stability Lodge of Instruction, especially as no fewer than eight of their members had been members of the Lodge of Reconciliation.
By 1849 the Freemason's Quarterly Review was deriding Peter Thomson and Henry Muggeridge at the Stability Lodge of Instruction for teaching exactly what they themselves had been taught; viz: the teachings of Hemming and Broadfoot, yet in 1858, its successor the Freemason's Magazine took the opposite view and in an article on "Uniformity in Working", urged Stabilty and Emulation to get together and settle their differences - one of which, incidentally, was quoted as being the explanation of the H Sn!
In 1861 the Grand Stewards Lodge formed a committee to revise the lectures. Ultimately Grand Lodge took note and in 1869 appointed a committee of thirty nine brethren to go into the whole question of uniformity of Ritual. (Dyer, In Search of Ritual Uniformity, Prestonian Lecture, 1973).
John Havers, who had been trying since 1857 to bring just Stability and Emulation together pointed out the impossibility of the task, particularly with a committee of thirty nine, and the matter was dropped. Change won, as it always will, and by 1870 most of the variations had developed into recognisable workings. It is, of course, therefore unlikely that any of these variations retain, in their entirety, the forms which the Duke of Sussex tried hard to perpetuate.
Another important matter was the implied relaxation of the ban on printing and publishing of anything purporting to give information on Ritual forms. Thus although Claret had been vilified for printing a ritual apparently for his own profit, after 1869 with the failure of attempts to produce uniformity many different versions of the ritual, many with ammended grammar or varied to suit local preference, began to appear in print. Thus we have the appearance in 1870 of John Hogg's The Perfect Ceremonies of Craft Masonry which contains the footnote about the Beth-horon variant of which no trace exists from any extant records of the Lodge of Reconciliation.
If you cast your minds back to the J. Walter Hobbs book Masonic Ritual you will recall that the Oxford book was also first printed in 1870 and it is therefore my contention that the use of the Beth-horon variant dates from no earlier than this time although I will concede that it might have been in use before the Union in Oxford Lodges and it might have been brought back to Oxford by Thomas Wyatt from the deliberations of the Lodge of Reconciliation.
APPENDIX 1
THE BIBLICAL REFERENCES
EXODUS XVII vv 8-13.
8. Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim.
9. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek: tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand.
10.So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek: and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill.
11.And it came to pass, when Moses held up his band, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed.
12.But Moses hands were heavy; and they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.
13. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
JOSHUA VIII vv 18, 19 & 26.
18.And the Lord said unto Joshua, Stretch out thy spear that is in thy hand toward A-i; for I will give it into thine band. And Joshua stretched out the spear that he had in his band toward the city.
19.And the ambush arose quickly out of their place, and they ran as soon as he had stretched out his hand: and they entered into the city, and took it and hasted and set the city on fire.
and:
26.For Joshua drew not his hand back, wherewith he stretched out the spear, until he had utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of A-i.
JOSHUA X vv 11 - 14.
11.And it came to pass, as they fled from before Israel, and were in the going down to Beth-horon, that the Lord cast down great stones from heaven upon them unto Azekah, and they died: they were more which died with hailstones than they whom the Children of Israel slew with the sword.
12.Then spake Joshua to the Lord in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the Children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.
13.And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is this not written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
14.And there was no day like that before it or after it , that the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man: for the Lord fought for Israel.
Appendix II
The places in the various explanations and translation of the Hebrew.
1. Ai..................................A heap of ruins (a village to the east of Bethel)
2. Bethel..........................House of God (the Bithel of Shadbolt)
3. Rephidim....................Resting place
4. Amalek........................Dweller in a valley
5. Beth-horon................House of hollowness
6. Jehoshaphat.............JHVH has judged (Hutchison gives translation)
On a final note, I can do no better than to quote the very last part of the Second Degree section in Three Distinct Knocks...
NB. Some Masters of Lodges will argue upon Reasons about the holy Vessels in the Temple and the Windows and Doors, the Length, Breadth and Height of every Thing in the Temple, Saying why was It so and so? One will give one Reason; and another will give another Reason, and thus they will continue for Two or Three Hours in this Part and the Master-Part; but this happens very seldom, except an IRISHMAN should come, who likes to hear him-self talk, asking, Why were they round? Why were they square? Why were they hollow? Why were the Stones costly? Why were they hewn Stones and saw'd Stones &c. some give one Reason and some give another; thus you see that every Man's Reason is not alike. Therefore, if I give you my Reason, it may not be like another; but any Man that reads the foregoing and following Work, and consults the 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th Chapters of the first Book of Kings, and the 2d, 3d and 4th of the second Book of Chronicles, may reason as well as the best of them; for I have laid all the Rules down plain to go by.
Copyright © 1991 Peter Hamilton Currie - Reproduced here by the SRA with kind permission
© Stability Ritual Association
