The third degree, That's It?

 

The Third Degree, That’s It?

Finally, we made our lives a blank slate with the first degree, refined our lives with years of study to improve all aspects of our lives with the second degree.  Now we obtain the last and highest degree.

What do we learn?

In some crafts the working tools are the skiret, pencil, and compass.  In Kentucky, we learn the working tool of a Master Mason is a trowel.  The simple trowel.  Used to spread cement to bind stones together.

Symbolically it is to spread brotherly love and affection.  The principal of Masonry has always been to perfect the individual and to guide mankind toward a better, harmonious development.

In essence, we took a stone and made it into a rough ashler with the gavel and gauge, then in second degree made it into a perfect ashler with the plumb, square and level.  Now in the third, we find out where to place the stone for the builders use and set the stone in place.

Now that we have learned to better ourselves to help society with leadership, knowledge, skills, how can we best fit this in society?   What is it that we best can do?  Do you teach, manage, supervise, create?

Also, with the trowel that means we should make sure we are spreading out our skills to others with brotherly love and friendship.  We should be binding all the stones into something that will last.

Masons are bound together by certain common values and experiences.  Who does not remember the second section of the third degree?  That is a shared experience.

Shared Ideas help enrich the mind, and common experiences bind their spirits.

We also in the lectures learn about the tracing board, where the builder put his plans.  This is a reminder that as a ‘spiritual builder’ you should have a plan or ideal for your life.

When I joined the Knights of Columbus, one of the lessons was taking a string and breaking it.  However, by putting 3 together, it made it impossible to break.  That is the lesson of a brotherhood who stands together to accomplish great things. 

Unfortunately, too many Masons say they would like to do something constructive, but they are tied up do so many other things.  So another trowel lies uselessly in the masonic tool chest, meanwhile the Grand Architect cries for Master Workmen to build, but there is no one to mix the morter.

Indifference may be one of the greatest causes of illness in our fraternity.   We must learn to use the specialized trowels of kindness and gentleness, of compassion and service to all men, if they would spread the cement of genuine love and understanding.

Society has tried many methods to force men together through force, money, fear, superstition, etc.  Nothing has proved to be more effective that shown with 200 years of Freemasonry.