Pythagoras, Geometrician and Philosopher

Not only was Pythagoras one of the foremost of the ancient Greek philosophers and geometricians, but his work figures importantly in that of the Craft. The Royal Arch, itself has to do with geometric forms such as the square, the right angle, the triangle, the circle and the cube. Our work also refers to the five regular Platonic bodies: the tetrahedron (or pyramid), the hexahedron (or cube), the octahedron, the dodecahedron and the icosahedron, figures of 4, 6, 8, 12 and 20 sides Born at Samos in about 568 BC, he distinguished himself early-on in the Olympic Games, winning a prize for wrestling. In later travels around the eastern Mediterranean to learn philosophy ad religion, he met with the prophet Ezekiel and may have met with Daniel as well. Upon his return to Greece, Pythagoras established himself as an educator at his own academy. Aspiring pupils faced a difficult examination and were made to deposit all of their worldly property in the common fund of the society. The apprenticeship was a five-year period, after which there were three degrees to be taken: the Acousmatici, the Mathematici and the Pythagoreans. On completing the final degree, the graduate was clothed in a white garment and fully instructed in the secret doctrine of a Pythagorean. Not unlike Freemasons, Pythagoras students were distinguished for their reverence for the deity and their love for their fellow human beings. Their assemblies were arranged due East and West. And they knew their fellow Pythagoreans wherever they went by a system of signs of recognition. Among his many fields of endeavour, geometry is the one for which Pythagoras is best remembered. He believed in the universal influence of numbers, and explained the principal geometric figures in relation to numbers: The point is represented by one, the line by two, the plane by three, and the solid by four. His fascination with numbers even led him to an important revelation in one of the other liberal arts and sciences, that of music, where he discovered the relationship of musical intervals to the lengths of strings of the same tension. The symbols adopted by Pythagoras in his secret instruction were principally derived from geometry. The right angle was an emblem of morality and justice. The equilateral triangle was a symbol of God, the essence of light and truth. The square referred to the divine mind. The cube was the symbol for the mind of man, after it had been purified by piety and acts of devotion. The point within a circle was a symbol of the universe. All of these are so familiar as Masonic symbols that it is no wonder that Pythagoras is often referred to by Freemasons as an ancient Brother.

Sources: Castells, F.deP. 1927. Antiquity of the Holy Royal Arch: The supreme degree in Freemasonry. Encyclopaedia Britannica. 1963. MacKey, Albert G., 1949. Lexicon and History of Freemasonry. __________ From an address to Manoah Lodge No. 141, by RWBro. John McIntosh, 10 April, 1999