“The name Hiram Abif — sometimes given as Adoniram — is the Hebrew form of the Greek Hermes. Hermes was the son of the All-Father (Zeus) and the messenger and intermediary between the gods and men. His role was to show men how to live and give them safe conduct through death. In Greco-Alexandrian scriptures he is called both Hermes and Thoth (the Divine Thought or Creative Mind) and appears as teh great Initiator and Teacher of hidden knowledge. Hermes is also mentioned in some old Masonic charges. Modern Masons, who honour Hiram Abif as their Grand Master and exemplar, would profit enormously by studying the large body of Hermetic (Hiramitic) literature available. This includes the great treatises upon initiation: The Divine Pymander of hermes Mercurius Trismegistus, G.R.S. Mead’s great studies entitled Thrice-Greatest Hermes, and The Shepherd of Hermas, the latter a work of inspired instruction to mystical Masonry.”
- from Robert Lomas’s The Secret Science of Masonic Initiation
Your present character, your dominant tendencies are the net product of everything you have done and thought. You are today what you have made yourself by your past actions. Your future destiny is moulded by your present conduct and thoughts. We are all, at every moment, silently building our inner spirit.
Freemasonry likens this work to the job of erecting King Solomon’s Temple.
- from Robert Lomas’s “The Secret Science of Masonic Initiation”
