Symbols - What does heaven look like
Mason, the
The symbolism of the Mason derives from the meaning of the Palace or Temple as a religious system or set of religious beliefs.
Whereas cities are symbolically civilian systems, systems of governance or industry, the Mason is both the creator symbolically of a new Order of religious or spiritual beliefs [for example, the Fifth Temple] or the destroyer or the maintainer and repairer of an existing Order.
We can see this in the passage below, all of which is symbolic and has some interesting implications.
King Jehoash came to power ‘In the seventh year of Jehu’ and he reigned for 40 years in Jerusalem. He turned out to be a good king “And Jehoash did that which was right in the sight of the Lord all his days wherein Jehoiada the priest instructed him.”
But he noticed that despite the presence of the Temple and the priests, the religious systems were deteriorating and people were starting to ignore them. It is noticeable in this passage that the priests had done nothing to stop this rot, just collected the money.
So King Jehoash first summoned his priests and said – ‘no more money as you have failed at your job and give me what you have so that I can employ people who are more able than you’. Then he summoned his ‘masons’ to repair the gradually crumbling edifice that is this religion.
And the over-powering message that comes across in this quote is that the masons proved honest, wasted not a penny on pointless frippery and “dealt faithfully”.
2 Kings 12:1-18 King James Version (KJV)
4 And Jehoash said to the priests, All the money of the dedicated things that is brought into the house of the Lord, even the money of every one that passeth the account, the money that every man is set at, and all the money that cometh into any man's heart to bring into the house of the Lord,
5 Let the priests take it to them, every man of his acquaintance: and let them repair the breaches of the house, wheresoever any breach shall be found.
6 But it was so, that in the three and twentieth year of king Jehoash the priests had not repaired the breaches of the house.
7 Then king Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest, and the other priests, and said unto them, Why repair ye not the breaches of the house? now therefore receive no more money of your acquaintance, but deliver it for the breaches of the house.
8 And the priests consented to receive no more money of the people, neither to repair the breaches of the house.
9 But Jehoiada the priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid of it, and set it beside the altar, on the right side as one cometh into the house of the Lord: and the priests that kept the door put therein all the money that was brought into the house of the Lord.
10 And it was so, when they saw that there was much money in the chest, that the king's scribe and the high priest came up, and they put up in bags, and told the money that was found in the house of the Lord.
11 And they gave the money, being told, into the hands of them that did the work, that had the oversight of the house of the Lord: and they laid it out to the carpenters and builders, that wrought upon the house of the Lord,
12 And to masons, and hewers of stone, and to buy timber and hewed stone to repair the breaches of the house of the Lord, and for all that was laid out for the house to repair it.
13 Howbeit there were not made for the house of the Lord bowls of silver, snuffers, basons, trumpets, any vessels of gold, or vessels of silver, of the money that was brought into the house of the Lord?
14 But they gave that to the workmen, and repaired therewith the house of the Lord.
15 Moreover they reckoned not with the men, into whose hand they delivered the money to be bestowed on workmen: for they dealt faithfully.
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