Symbolisme
June 1933 - This edition of Symbolisme has an article by Oswald Wirth with the excellent title 'L'Erreur occultiste' [The Occultist Fallacy], which is the one we ourself considered using for a book that would have paralleled our The Spiritist Fallacy, but which circumstances have prevented us from writing. Unfortunately, the title offers more than is delivered by the contents of the article, which amount to vague generalities that prove nothing, except that the author has an idea of initiation which, while different from that of the occultists, is not much more accurate; he even goes so far as to write that 'the first initiate must have initiated himself,' evincing complete ignorance of the origin and 'non-human' nature of initiation. - Remarkably, he weakens his own case in his following
article (July issue), entitled 'Le Virtu des Rites' [The Virtues of Rites], where he states quite clearly that 'initiation is human and is not conferred as a divine institution'; and in order to show even more clearly that he does not understand the first thing about the subject, he says again that 'the initiatic rites are secular'(!), which however does not prevent him a few lines later from adding without concern for contradiction, that 'priestly initiations played an important role in the past'. Furthermore, he thinks that the 'Great Mysteries' of antiquity were 'those of the beyond', which looks a little too much like spiritism, and that, at Eleusis, it was a matter of 'greeting the soul after death', which, without even speaking of the anachronism of the expression, is solely the affair of exoteric religion. He again confuses magic and religion, two things that are in no way connected, and also seems to confuse 'priesthood' with 'clergy', which after all is perhaps his best justification.... We would like to stress even more that what is said of initiatic transmission and of 'spiritual influence' shows a lack of understanding that it would be difficult to carry further; there are negations which are truly terrible . . . but only for their author. In reading certain phrases on the 'secular rites accomplished' (we willingly translate: 'accomplished by the ignorant', which, alas! would also conform to the truth of the original meaning of the word), we cannot stop ourselves from thinking that Homais is not dead!
December 1946 to May 1947 (excepting that for March, which is entirely devoted to the memory of Oswald Wirth) - These issues of Symbolisme include serialized segments of the study 'Le Triangle et l'Hexagramme' signed 'Maen-Nevez, Maître d'Oeuvre'. These include observations of uneven importance, the most interesting in our opinion being those that deal specifically with both Operative symbols and those of the Compagnonnage. The author reproduces a stone cutter's mark found at Vitré that depicts the 'quatre de chiffre' [sign of four] which we have discussed elsewhere, [9] but he seems to have made no attempt to delve deeper into its meaning, although he takes this mark as a starting-point for discussions, of which some relate only indirectly to the matter at hand. However, he has at least succeeded in 'placing' the mark in question on one of the graphic 'grids' employed for that purpose by the ancient guilds of builders. We should also point out that the reflections set forth in the course of this work on construction in wood and stones, especially in
Nordic architecture, are comparable to what we ourself have said here on this subject with reference to other traditions (Maçons et charpentiers, in the issue for December 1946). [10] Concerning 'Trinitarian' symbols, there is a curious picture deriving from the Compagnonnage formerly reproduced in a special issue of Voile d'Isis (November 1925). That this figure resembles the three-headed Gaelic God is incontestable, but the author, who is evidently interested in a most particular way in Celtism, wishes to draw too many conclusions. In any case, there is something else rather strange in the picture, which we do not believe anyone has ever noticed: the design in question is exactly similar to certain paintings from Mount Athos (except that in the latter the inscriptions are naturally Greek instead of Latin), which, it seems, are used by the Greek monks as a support for contemplation. This fact that could perhaps throw an unexpected light on certain 'affinities' of the Compagnonnage. From another point of view, we should mention a slight inaccuracy: it is not Shiva, but Brahmā, who is represented with four faces in Hindu iconography; in contrast, there are figures of Shiva with three faces (in connection with the 'triple time'), [11] which would have been more appropriate to mention in this connection. The remarks on the hexagram which follow are inspired largely by the works of Matila Ghyka and call for only one observation: it is quite true that the right-angled triangle and the inverted triangle correspond respectively to fire and water, of which, moreover, they are the alchemical symbols; but this is only one application among many others, and the author envisages it much too exclusively. We are not acquainted with the work of R.-J. Gorsleben to which he refers, but judging from the citations he gives, it does not appear that it can be used without caution, for it is to be feared that his interpretation of symbols contains some rather fanciful 'modernizations'.