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by Bro. Robert Guffey
In 1933 Past Master Alfred Dodd published a book
that purported to contain evidence linking William Shakespeare with the
creation of Freemasonry, an international secret society built around an
interest in esoteric knowledge, including the ancient art of alchemy. In the book, Shakespeare: Creator of Freemasonry, Dodd focuses on
the Masonic symbolism in two plays, Love’s Labours Lost and The
Tempest. Except for two brief references he ignores Macbeth, an indispensable play in establishing
Shakespeare’s ties to Freemasonry. The entire play appears to have been written as an allegory for the bloody murder
of Hiram Abiff, the core figure of Masonic ritual.
Upon reaching the third degree the Masonic
initiate is led through the mock ritual killing of Hiram Abiff, one of three
original Grand Masters of Freemasonry. According to legend, Abiff had promised his architects that he would
reveal to them all the secrets known by a Master Mason once the construction of
Solomon’s Temple was completed. Three
of the builders—Jubela, Jubelo, and Jubelum—were too impatient to wait and
attacked Abiff, demanding to hear “the Master’s Word” immediately. Abiff refused, after which the three
“unworthy craftsmen” committed the ultimate betrayal by killing their Master
(Robinson 218, 219).
From the previous paragraph alone one might
notice the uncanny recurrence of the number three in Masonic ritual. In addition, not only are there three
original Grand Masters, three assassins, and a total of thirty-three degrees of
the Masonic hierarchy, but there are also three Principal officers, three
symbolic steps “from this life to the source of all knowledge” (Downward
“Sorcery” 81), three obligations, three lights upon the Altar, three “pillars”
that support the Lodge, and three knocks that gain the candidate admission into
the Lodge, followed by three more knocks to summon the Brethren (Pike
548). This last example is paralleled
in Act Two, Scene Three, in which three knocks are continually repeated
until the porter allows entrance to Macduff, the future murderer of the
“unworthy” Macbeth.
Both the number three and the concept of alchemy
play an integral role in the story of Macbeth’s downfall. In Act One, Scene One, we are introduced to
three witches who utter the words, “Fair is foul, foul is fair” (1110). James Shelby Downward has pointed out that
this is a well known principal of alchemy. Just as lead can be transformed into gold, the ostensibly noble Macbeth
and his wife can be transformed into serial murderers by greed and
ambition. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth
might be seen as deliberate representations of the mystical nagari, an
androgynous dragon that symbolizes the alchemists’ ultimate goal of separating
“the cosmic she and he” (Downard “Call to Chaos” 309). Certainly, the Macbeths might be viewed as a
warning to those who would take this separation to an extreme.
The number three appears again in relation to
Hecate’s appearance in Act Three, Scene Five. Though some scholars attribute the authorship of this scene to a
writer other than Shakespeare, nevertheless it’s interesting to note that in
classical mythology Hecate has three roles—some of them infernal, some of them
divine. Downward writes, “. . . she is
Diana on Earth, Luna in Heaven, and Hecate in Hell” (“Sorcery” 63). This parallels the triune godhead
Jah-Bul-On, an entity mentioned prominently in the thirteenth degree of the
Scottish Rite, whose name is said to be comprised of Jahweh, Baal, and Osiris
(Knight 236). The melding of the
positive and the negative are common elements of both alchemy and the
Brotherhood. As Grand Commander Albert
Pike has written, “The true name of Satan, the Kabalists say, is that of Yahveh
reversed; for Satan is not a black god . . . . For the initiates this is not a Person, but a Force, created for good,
but which may serve for evil.” (102). “The conviction of all men that God is good led to a belief in a Devil,
the fallen Lucifer or Lightbearer, Shaitan the Adversary, Ahriman and Tuphon,
as an attempt to explain the existence of Evil, and make it consistent with the
Infinite Power, Wisdom, and Benevolence of God” (Pike 324). “Man is a free agent, though Omnipotence is
above and all around him. To be free to
do good, he must be free to do evil. The Light necessitates the Shadow” (Pike 307). In other words, “Fair is foul, foul is fair.”
Macbeth can easily be viewed as a mingling of
these forces. He is a bundle of
paradoxes: nobleman and murderer,
murderer and coward, coward and warrior. He is the perfect vessel for Shakespeare’s retelling of the ritualistic
killing inherent in the third degree, for the three “unworthy craftsmen”
possess many of the same contradictory traits.
In Act Two, Scene Three, Shakespeare presents a
subtle analogy to a fragment of the Hiram story. According to the ritual, confusion erupted among Hiram’s
architects after his murder, for only the Grand Master knew the location of the
building’s plans. Without these the
architects could not finish constructing the Temple of Solomon, which was to
have been the masterpiece of Hiram Abiff. Instead it remained half-completed for a long time, and eventually
deteriorated into ruins. It was not to
be finished until years later, by architects who had no knowledge of Abiff’s
original intentions. Essentially, the
life had been stolen from the building by the “unworthy craftsmen.”
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Similarly, confusion abounds when
the noblemen learn about the death of King Duncan. In feigned surprise Macbeth yells “horror” three times in
a row, followed by these lines:
Confusionnow hath made his masterpiece:
Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope
The Lord’s annointed temple and stole thence
The life o’ th’ building! (1118)
The parallels between the Abiff legend and these lines are obvious. Shakespeare further extends the Abiff
metaphor only a few lines later when Macbeth describes what the King looked
like in death:
His silver skin laced with his golden blood;
And his gashed stabs looked like a breach in nature
For ruin’s wasteful entrance . . .” (1118)
Of course, silver and gold are colors
respectively attributed to the moon and the sun, both of which are prominent
alchemical symbols. According to Albert
Pike they also “correspond to the two columns of the [Masonic] Temple, Jachin
and Boaz” (776). Reinforcing this
connection, Shakespeare uses an evocative simile to describe Duncan’s
wounds. The word “ruin’s” brings to
mind the dilapidated state of an old building—no doubt the unfinished “anointed
temple” of Solomon.
Perhaps the most blatant parallel between the
death of Abiff and Shakespeare’s tragedy occurs during the next murder
scene. Haunted by the witches’ prophecy
that Banquo would be “father to a line of Kings,” Macbeth hires a pair of
assassins to exterminate Banquo and his son Fleance. In the following scene, this pair mysteriously transforms into a
trio. To the uninitiated this might
seem like a discrepancy. However, after
all the evidence presented so far it becomes obvious that Shakespeare is
purposely waving a red flag in order to attract the reader’s attention to this
“irrelevant” detail. For the Bard’s
“fellows” it would have been immediately obvious that the three assassins were
to be associated with Jubela, Jubelo, and Jubelum. Certainly it’s no coincidence that the assassins kill Banquo in
Act Three, Scene Three. As stated before, there are thirty-three degrees in Freemasonry. To underscore the symbolism, Shakespeare
begins the very next scene with these words, “You know your own degrees”
(1122).
In scenes like these Shakespeare is constantly
toying with figure and ground. The
figure is the plot itself, while the ground is the mystical symbolism fueling
the direction of the plot. For example,
on the surface “You know your own degrees” simply refers to the revelers at
Macbeth’s banquet measuring how much they can eat and drink, but beneath the
surface lurks the true, symbolical meaning. Another example of this occurs in this very same banquet scene when one
of “night’s black agents” returns to inform Macbeth of Banquo’s murder. To Macbeth’s question, “Is he dispatched?”
the assassin replies, “My lord, his throat is cut:/That I did for him.” Relieved, Macbeth says, “Thou are the best
o’ th’ cutthroats” (1122). The figure
here is a mere plot device, a continuation of Macbeth’s killing spree. The ground is something quite different, a
subtle reference to the oath of the first degree in which the slitting of the
throat plays a significant role (Morgan 22).
Like light melding with shadow, figure and
ground perform a delicate dance throughout the entire play. Sometimes, however, the symbolism subsumes
both figure and ground. When Macbeth
confronts the witches a second time, for example, he is assailed by three
apparitions. These apparitions cannot
be interpreted on a rational, surface level. The first one, described as “an Armed Head,” is clearly symbolic of the
first Sephiroth of the Kabalah. As
Albert Pike has written, “First of these [ten Sephiroth], in each, is Kether,
the Crown, ring, or circlet, the HEAD” (768). Freemasons believe that Hiram Abiff’s “Word,” lost upon his death, can
only be found “in certain great texts known to scholars under the generic name
of Kabalah” (Waite 417). The search for
the Lost Word is a central goal of Freemasonry.
The second and third apparitions are
inextricably tied together. The second
takes the form of a bloody child, while the third appears as “a Child Crowned,
with a tree in his hand” (1126). This
recalls the Mysteries of Samothrace, one of many ancient cults upon which the
Freemasons based their hierarchical system of degrees. On the island of Samothrace very young
children were initiated into the Mysteries. They were presented with the sacred robe, the crown of olive, and
directed to sit upon a throne. Pike
describes the details:
In the ceremonies was represented the death of
the youngest of the Cabiri, slain by his brothers, who fled into Etruria,
carrying with them the chest or ark that contained his genitals: and there the Phallus and the sacred ark
were adored. Herodotus says that the
Samothracian Initiates understood the object and origin of this reverence paid
the Phallus, and why it was exhibited in the Mysteries (427).
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The second apparition represents the object of
the mimed ritualistic sacrifice, the Hiram Abiff of the Samothracian Mysteries,
while the third is to be identified with the Initiate himself, holding aloft a
tree that is both phallic and reminiscent of the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, thus
connecting the final apparition with the first. Of all the symbols in Macbeth these are the most overt,
and at the same time the most obscure. Appropriate for a play filled with paradoxes.
The preceding has merely been a brief fraction
of the Masonic symbolism that can be found in Macbeth. Any of these examples viewed in isolation
would not mean much. However, as in
alchemy, when the various elements are combined, something strange and
unexpected rises to the surface. Though
new, one feels as if it has always been there, just out of sight.
The idea of Shakespeare having been a Freemason
will probably be a controversial theory to literary scholars, but then again
anything not generally known since before the Cretaceous Period is
controversial to literary scholars. Meanwhile, most mainstream historians believe that Freemasonry was
founded in 1717, long after Shakespeare’s death. Other, more esoteric authors trace the origins of the Brotherhood
all the way back to Ancient Egypt. True
or not, neither theory erases the fact that obvious Masonic symbolism is woven
into the tragedy of Macbeth, written over a hundred years before traditional
history says that such symbolism ever existed.
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GLORIA DEI EST CELARE VERDUM.
Works Cited
Dodd, Alfred.Shakespeare: Creator of Freemasonry. London: Rider & Co., 1933.
Downward, James
Shelby. “The Call to Chaos.” Apocalypse Culture. Ed. Adam Parfrey.
Portland: Feral House, 1990. 307-27.
---. “Sorcery, Sex, Assassination and the Science
of Symbolism.” Secret and
Suppressed:
Banned
Ideas & Hidden History. Ed. Jim
Keith. Portland: Feral House, 1993. 59-92.
Knight,
Stephen. The Brotherhood. New York: Dorset Press, 1986.
Morgan,
William. Illustrations of Masonry. Batvia, NY: Miller, 1827.
Pike, Albert. Morals and Dogma. Richmond: L.H. Jenkins Inc., 1948.
Robinson, John J. Born in Blood. New York: M. Evans & Co., 1989.
Shakespeare,
William. Macbeth. The Pelican Shakespeare. Ed. Alfred Harbage. New York:
Viking,
1977.
Waite, Arthur
Edward. A New Encyclopedia of
Freemasonry. New York: Weathervane Books, 1970.
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