Lectures and Charges
of the Odd Fellow Degrees
Backmatter
Three Commentaries
About the Source
The source of these lectures and charges is the newest treasure of
Barnum Lodge No. 7. It came to us from the Eddy family via Rebekah Past
Noble Grand Maggie Sweetin, to whom it was referred by people because of
her Eastern Star connections. The people concerned felt it should be
returned to the Odd Fellows. Alpha Rebekah Lodge No. 34 presented this book
to Barnum Lodge No. 7 in September 1998.
True to its title, as only befits The Odd Fellows Pocket Manual, the
source could easily travel in a pocket. It is the size of a common note card
, three and one-half inches by five inches, and an inch thick. It weighs
slightly less than half a pound. Its cover is cloth over cardboard, and
is light-medium tan in color. There is a design stamped into both covers and spine.
Slight traces show it was once pressed in gold, and must have had at its
making a handsome appearance. Having traveled its time, little of the
design has escaped being pressed back flat. The pages are now uneven, but
the reddish tinges on their edges suggest they were once gilded as well.
The lectures and charges are one part of a fairly comprehensive survey
of what a dedicated member of the Order would need. Its table of contents
generally:
- an introductory explanation of Odd Fellowship,
- the lectures and charges of Odd Fellowship,
- explanation of the systems and duties,
- regulations, rules, ceremonies, &c for the Order,
- an essay to the uninitiated,
- an appendix listing all the Lodges and Grand Lodges, and,
- a manual of practice for the guidance of officers and Lodges.
Curiously, the preface is signed THE AUTHOR, who is not otherwise identified,
and there is no printer's mark or indication of where it was published. The
engraved illustrations, quaintly termed "embellishments", are signed by
Roberts.
It is also a challenge to the eyesight: the main text is set in six point type,
and the lists of Lodges etc. are set in four point!
The book itself is clearly identified as once being property of Israel
F. Eddy, the namesake of Eddyville (located between Corvallis and the Coast.
) Israel Eddy was the postmaster there. A half-remaining stamp states "Eddyville, Benton Cy., Oregon". (Eddyville
is now in Lincoln County.) Eddy has signed the front in pencil in a beautiful
round hand signature.
On the Influence of Sweedenborg
The influence of Sweedenborg upon the Degrees {as comprehended in the source} is unmistakable.
In their entirety, the Degrees present a coherent esoteric theosophy. This is
turn was constructed from Sweedenborg's description of the cosmos, physical
and spiritual. By this theosophy, early American Odd Fellows created a Biblically-inspired natural and universal
religious framework. Central ideas presented; several of which still feature in our work are:
- the belief in human perfectibility and the necessity of self improvement,
- human virtue as the imitation or replication of the Divine nature,
- the symbolic rather than the literal interpretation of the Bible, and the use of symbols generally,
- an emphasis on constant readiness for death, and the passage of time.
Sweedenborg is not a well-known name even among the educated. In the early
part of his career, a lack of worldly fame was a major frustration. He
would perhaps be satisfied to know that his spiritual writings have had far
more influence than the fame his worldly pursuits could have brought him.
Parsed from the eleventh Britannica:
Sweedenborg's theosophic system is most briefly and comprehensively
presented in his Divine Love and Wisdom. The point of view
from which Divinity
must be regarded is that of Being the Divine or perfect Human. The esse of Divinity
is
infinite love; with the manifestation, form, or body of infinite wisdom.
Divine Love is the self-subsisting life of the universe. From Divinity
emanates a
divine sphere, which appears in the spiritual world as a sun, and from the
spiritual sun again proceeds the sun of the natural world. The spiritual
sun is the source of Love and intelligence, or life, and the natural sun
the source of nature or the receptacles of life: the first is alive, the
second dead. The two worlds of nature and spirit are perfectly distinct,
but are intimately related by analogous substances, laws and forces.
Each has its atmospheres, waters and earths, but in the one they are natural
and
in other spiritual. In Divinity there are three infinite and three created
"Degrees" of being, and man and all things the corresponding three Degrees,
finite and created. They are Love, wisdom, use; or end, cause and effect.
The final ends of all things are in the Divine mind, the causes of all
things are in the spiritual world, and their effects in the natural world.
By a love of each degree humans come in conjunction with them and the worlds
of nature, spirit and Divinity. The end of creation is that humans may have this
conjunction and become the image of their Creator and creation.
On the Holy Name
This symbolic design is used in the feminized lectures and elsewhere to represent
Divinity, and is based upon the TETRAGRAMMATON to honor the Storehouse of Symbols and
the traditions from which it came. The design also incorporates other images from
various traditions to represent the angelic hosts, and the thesophy manifest in
the lectures. It is intended to represent, as a symbol, all the many names
by which humans address Divinity.
The TETRAGRAMMATON is literally the four-lettered name; called the Holy Name of God, also referred to as the Covenant Name, it first appears in the Scriptures in Exodus 15:2. Prior to this, names based on "' El" are used, such as "'El Shaddai", usually translated "God Almighty."
The four letters are:
first, yod, the tenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, sounded like English "y";
second, he, the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, sounded like English "h";
third, waw, the sixth letter the Hebrew alphabet, sounded like English "w"; and
fourth, he again.
The symbolic significance of the TETRAGRAMMATON is at least as significant as
its literal meaning. It is the Name of Names, the Name that should never
be used except in reverence. To keep its sacredness, those of its mother
tradition will not pronounce it even in prayer. A title of honor ['Adonai,
meaning ruler] was used in its place: when the text came to the Holy Name,
the title was what was pronounced.
The western church, alienated by prejudice from its mother tradition, attempted to approximate the pronunciation of the TETRAGRAMMATON. Ignorantly believing that the title of honor was a guide to the vowels, the name and its substitute were co-mingled, producing "Jehovah."
This clumsy effort is ascribed to one Petrus Galatinus, confessor of Leo X, around 1500. Poor as it may be in terms of scholarship, Jehovah was passed into common usage by the King James Version. It now stands as a conventional name for Divinity. This error seems wholly of later western orthodoxy: Clement of Alexandria rendered it as "iaoue" and Theodoret as "iab{v}e". The true pronunciation of the TETRAGRAMMATON remains a topic of scholarly dispute. The most commonly accepted pronunciation is denoted in English as "Yahweh."