Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Headstone in Castleton Churchyard, Derbyshire

Photo of Star of David, pentagram, Lily and other symbols on a Headstone in Castleton Churchyard, Derbyshire is courtesy of evissa who published it on Flickr and wrote to me:
I've no idea why this headstone has all this Masonic symbolism - I can only presume that the deceased was very involved with the freemasons.

1 comment:

zeevveez said...

JewishEncyclopedia.com, entry:Freemasonry, By: Cyrus Adler & Joseph Jacobs
The institutions, rites, and principles of a secret society devoted to the promotion of fraternal feeling and morality among the members of the order. In its modern form it appears to have arisen in London in 1717, and thence spread through the British Isles to the Continent, reaching North America about 1729… The technical language, symbolism, and rites of freemasonry are full of Jewish ideas and of terms like "Urim and Thummim," "Acharon Schilton," "Rehum," "Sephirot," "Jachin," "Ish Chotzeb", but these may have been derived, without any Jewish intermediation, from commentaries on the Old Testament. Many of these terms are derived from the Biblical account of the building of Solomon's Temple (I Kings v. et seq.), and the two pillars Jachin and Boaz take a predominant position in Masonic symbolism. In the Scottish Rite the dates of all official documents are given according to the Hebrew months and Jewish era, and use is made of the older form (Samaritan or Phenician) of the Hebrew alphabet. The impostor Cagliostro appears to have introduced some of the terms of the Cabala into his "rite of Misraim," but this again might have been derived from the Christian Cabala. The following [excerpts from] list contains the chief technical terms of freemasonry which are connected with Jewish ideas and expressions:
Adonal
Cedars of Lebanon.
Cherublm.
Cohen.
Emeth.
Enoch.
Ephraimites.
Jachin.
Jacob's Ladder.
Jah.
Kabbala.
Kamea
Lebanon.
Levites.
Sabbaoth.
Sanhedrin.
Seal of Solomon.
Sephiroth.
Shaddai.
Shield of David