Historians must be cautious about many well-known
"facts." George Washington chopped down a cherry tree when a boy and
confessed the deed to his father. Abner Doubleday invented the game of
baseball. Freemasons inserted some of their emblems (chief among them the
eye in the pyramid) into the reverse of the Great Seal of the United
States. These historical "facts" are widely popular, commonly accepted,
and equally false.
The Great Seal
The eye in the pyramid (emblazoned on the dollar bill,
no less) is often cited as "evidence" that sinister conspiracies abound
which will impose a "New World Order" on an unsuspecting populace.
Depending on whom you hear it from, the Masons are planning the takeover
themselves, or are working in concert with European bankers, or are
leading (or perhaps being led by) the Illuminati (whoever they are). The
notion of a world-wide Masonic conspiracy would be laughable, if it hadn't
been repeated with such earnest gullibility by conspiracies like Pat
Robertson.
Sadly, Masons are sometimes counted among the gullible
who repeat the tall tale of the eye in the pyramid, often with a touch of
pride. They may be guilty of nothing worse than innocently puffing the
importance of their fraternity (as well as themselves), but they're guilty
nonetheless. The time has come state the truth plainly and simply.
The Great Seal of the United States is not a Masonic emblem, nor
does it contain hidden Masonic symbols.
The details are there for anyone to check, who's
willing to rely on historical fact rather than hysterical fiction.
• Benjamin Franklin was the only Mason on the first
design committee, and his suggestions had no Masonic content.
• None of the final designers of the seal were
Masons.
• The interpretation of the eye on the seal is
subtly different from the interpretation used by Masons.
• The eye in the pyramid is not nor has been a
Masonic symbol.
The First Committee
On Independence Day, 1776, a committee was created to
design a seal for the new American nation. The committee's members were
Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams, with Pierre Du
Simitière as artist and consultant. Of the four men involved, only
Benjamin Franklin was a Mason, and he contributed nothing of a Masonic
nature to the committee's proposed design for a seal.
Du Simitière, the committee's consultant and a
non-Mason, contributed several major design features that made their way
into the ultimate design of the seal: "the shield, E Pluribus Unum,
MDCCLXXVI, and the eye of providence in a triangle." The eye of providence
on the seal thus can be traced not to the Masons, but to a non-Mason
consultant to the committee.
"The single eye was a well-established artistic
convention for an 'omniscient Ubiquitous Deity' in the medallic art of the
Renaissance. Du Simitière, who suggested using the symbol, collected art
books and was familiar with the artistic and ornamental devices used in
Renaissance art." This was the same cultural iconography that eventually
led Masons to add the all-seeing eye to their symbols.
The Second and Third Committees
Congress declined the first committee's suggestions as
well as those of its 1780 committee. Francis Hopkinson, consultant to the
second committee, had several lasting ideas that eventually made it into
the seal: "white and red stripes within a blue background for the shield,
a radiant constellation of thirteen stars, and an olive branch."
Hopkinson's greatest contribution to the current seal came from his layout
of a 1778 50-dollar colonial note in which he used an unfinished pyramid
in the design.
The third and last seal committee of 1782 produced a
design that finally satisfied Congress. Charles Thomson, Secretary of
Congress, and William Barton, artist and consultant, borrowed from earlier
designs and sketched what at length became the United States seal.
The misinterpretation of the seal as a Masonic emblem
may have been first introduced a century later in 1884. Harvard Professor
Eliot Norton wrote that the reverse was "practically incapable of
effective treatment; it can hardly, (however artistically treated by the
designer,) look otherwise than as a dull emblem of a Masonic fraternity."
Interpreting the Symbol
Eye In The Seal
Eye In The Seal
The "Remarks and Explanations" of Thomson and Barton
are the only explanation of the symbols' meaning. Despite what anti-Masons
may believe, there's no reason to doubt the interpretation accepted by the
Congress. "The Pyramid signified Strength and Duration: The Eye over it &
the Motto allude to the many signal interpositions of providence in favor
of the American cause."
The committees and consultants who designed the Great
Seal of the United States contained only one Mason, Benjamin Franklin. The
only possibly Masonic design element among the very many on the seal is
the eye of providence, and the interpretation of it by the designers is
different from that used by Masons. The eye on the seal represents an
active intervention of God in the affairs of men, while the Masonic symbol
stands for a passive awareness by God of the activities of men.
The first "official" use and definition of the
all-seeing eye as a Masonic symbol seems to have come in 1797 with The
Freemason's Monitor of Thomas Smith Webb—14 years after Congress
adopted the design for the seal. Here's how Webb explains the symbol.
"And although our thoughts, words and actions, may
be hidden from the eyes of man, yet that All-Seeing Eye, whom
the Sun, Moon and Stars obey, and under whose
watchful care even comets perform their stupendous revolutions,
pervades the inmost recesses of the human heart, and will reward us
according to our merits."
The Eye in the Pyramid
Besides the subtly different interpretations of the
symbol, it is notable that Webb did not describe the eye as being in a
triangle. Jeremy Ladd Cross published The True Masonic Chart or
Hieroglyphic Monitor in 1819, essentially an illustrated version of
Webb's Monitor. In this first "official" depiction of Webb's
symbol, Cross had illustrator Amos Doolittle depict the eye surrounded by
a semi-circular glory.
All Seeing Eye
The all-seeing eye thus appears to be a rather recent
addition to Masonic symbolism. It is not found in any of the gothic
constitutions, written from about 1390 to 1730. The eye—sometimes in a
triangle, sometimes in clouds, but nearly always surrounded by a glory—was
a popular Masonic decorative device in the latter half of the 18th
century. Its use as a design element seems to have been an artistic
representation of the omniscience of God, rather than some generally
accepted Masonic symbol.
Its meaning in all cases, however, was that commonly
given it by society at large—a reminder of the constant presence of God.
For example, in 1614 the frontispiece of The History of the World
by Walter Raleigh showed an eye in a cloud labeled "Providentia"
overlooking a globe. It has not been suggested that Raleigh's History
is a Masonic document, despite the use of the all-seeing eye.
The eye of Providence was part of the common cultural
iconography of the 17th and 18th centuries. When placed in a triangle, the
eye went beyond a general representation of God to a strongly Trinitarian
statement. It was during this period that Masonic ritual and symbolism
evolved, and it is not surprising that many symbols common to and
understood by the general society made their way into Masonic ceremonies.
Masons may have preferred the triangle because of the frequent use of the
number 3 in their ceremonies: three degrees, three original grand
masters, three principal officers, and so on. Eventually the all-seeing
eye came to be used officially by Masons as a symbol for God, but this
happened towards the end of the eighteenth century, after congress had
adopted the seal.
A pyramid, whether incomplete or finished, however, has
never been a Masonic symbol. It has no generally accepted symbolic
meaning, except perhaps permanence or mystery. The combining of the eye of
providence overlooking an unfinished pyramid is a uniquely American, not
Masonic, icon, and must be interpreted as its designers intended. It has
no Masonic context.
Conclusion
It's hard to know what leads some to see Masonic
conspiracies behind world events, but once that hypothesis is accepted,
any jot and title can be misinterpreted as "evidence." The Great Seal of
the United States is a classic example of such a misinterpretation, and
some Masons are as guilty of the exaggeration as many anti-Masons.
The Great Seal and Masonic symbolism grew out of the
same cultural milieu. While the all-seeing eye had been popularized in
Masonic designs of the late eighteenth century, it did not achieve any
sort of official recognition until Webb's 1797 Monitor. Whatever
status the symbol may have had during the design of the Great Seal, it was
not adopted or approved or endorsed by any Grand Lodge. The seal's Eye of
Providence and the Mason's All-Seeing Eye each express Divine Omnipotence,
but they are parallel uses of a shared icon, not a single symbol.
Note. This essay first appeared in The Short
Talk Bulletin for September 1995, published by the Masonic Service
Association of North America, Silver Spring, Maryland.
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