There is no "Masonic god" known as "The Great Architect of the Universe"; it is simply a way of referring to the Creator. This phrase was first used by John Calvin, the Protestant reformer whose teachings form the core of Presbyterianism, "Calvin repeatedly calls God the Architect of the Universe, and refers to his works in nature as 'Architecture of the Universe' ten times in the Institutes of the Christian Religion alone." Wallace McLeod, "The Great Architect of the Universe," The Grand Design (Highland Springs, Va.: Anchor Communications, 1991), p. 108. James Anderson, a Presbyterian minister, edited the Grand Lodge constitutions in 1723 and incorporated this phrase. It has been used ever since to celebrate the creative and constructive powers of God. It seems appropriate as the allegories of freemasonry refer to the construction of stone buildings. We are all working on the building of the same master builder. Are Boy Scouts worshiping a scouting god when they offer their prayers in the name of The Great Scoutmaster ? Pronouncing the name of God in 1st century Palestine constituted blasphemy and brought the death penalty. In the Hebrew text of scripture the "Name of God" YHWH carries such an awesome mystique that it cannot be pronounced. Jesus taught his disciples to pray to God as "Father" in the Lords Prayer. The meaning of "Lead us not into temptation" is the most difficult to understand. The difficulty lies in the translation of the Aramaic Nesiona to the peirasmon of the Greek text. It was a simple daily petition for God to "not allow us to enter into wrongful thinking (testing)," the Aramaic verb in the Hafel form signifying a causative sense. back to in the news . . .
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