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Sacred Forests of Asia: Spiritual Ecology and the Politics of Nature Conservation (The Earthscan Forest Library)
by Chris Coggins Bixia ChenPresenting a thorough examination of the sacred forests of Asia, this volume engages with dynamic new scholarly dialogues on the nature of sacred space, place, landscape, and ecology in the context of the sharply contested ideas of the Anthropocene. Given the vast geographic range of sacred groves in Asia, this volume discusses the diversity of associated cosmologies, ecologies, traditional local resource management practices, and environmental governance systems developed during the pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial periods. Adopting theoretical perspectives from political ecology, the book views ecology and polity as constitutive elements interacting within local, regional, and global networks. Readers will find the very first systematic comparative analysis of sacred forests that include the karchall mabhuy of the Katu people of Central Vietnam, the leuweng kolot of the Baduy people of West Java, the fengshui forests of southern China, the groves to the goddess Sarna Mata worshiped by the Oraon people of Jharkhand India, the mauelsoop and bibosoop of Korea, and many more. Comprising in-depth, field-based case studies, each chapter shows how the forest’s sacrality must not be conceptually delinked from its roles in common property regimes, resource security, spiritual matters of ultimate concern, and cultural identity. This volume will be of great interest to students and scholars of indigenous studies, environmental anthropology, political ecology, geography, religion and heritage, nature conservation, environmental protection, and Asian studies.
Sacred Geographies of Ancient Amazonia: Historical Ecology of Social Complexity (New Frontiers in Historical Ecology #3)
by Denise P SchaanThe legendary El Dorado—the city of gold—remains a mere legend, but astonishing new discoveries are revealing a major civilization in ancient Amazonia that was more complex than anyone previously dreamed. Scholars have long insisted that the Amazonian ecosystem placed severe limits on the size and complexity of its ancient cultures, but leading researcher Denise Schaan reverses that view, synthesizing exciting new evidence of large-scale land and resource management to tell a new history of indigenous Amazonia. Schaan also engages fundamental debates about the development of social complexity and the importance of ancient Amazonia from a global perspective. This innovative, interdisciplinary book is a major contribution to the study of human-environment relations, social complexity, and past and present indigenous societies.
Sacred Geometry of the Earth: The Ancient Matrix of Monuments and Mountains
by Catherine Young Mark Vidler Rand Flem-AthIdentifies the patterns of our planet’s design within the natural landscape • Explains the geometry inherent in the mountains and coasts on all continents • Reveals how ancient monuments were built to reflect and enhance the Earth’s design, often connecting sites around the world • Includes detailed maps that show the simple geometrical relationships among the world’s mountains, coastlines, islands, and ancient monuments From continent to continent across the globe, Mark Vidler and Catherine Young reveal that order is everywhere on Earth. On remote islands, soaring summits, and level deltas, they unveil natural topographic patterns related to pi, the golden ratio, and right-triangle geometry. And as the planet’s design emerges, it becomes clear that this hidden order in nature decided the location of ancient monuments the world over. Through detailed maps, Vidler and Young show how the locations of megalithic monuments reflect and enhance a natural pattern on the Earth that connects its major features. The rows of standing stones at Carnac in France, for example, point to the summits of Mount Everest and K2, and Angkor Wat in Cambodia is on a straight line joining Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa and the tip of Cape Comorin in India. The authors examine the geography of many islands and each continent, including Antarctica, to show how the highest peak on each landmass falls on a line connecting coastal extremes. They reveal how circles of standing stones and man-made mounds mark intersections of these lines. They explore the connection between the Nazca lines in Peru and the Amazon, Nile, and Ganges deltas and explain how the locations of the Giza pyramids, Stonehenge, and Machu Picchu are integrated into the natural design on Earth. As they uncover geometric patterns on the Earth line by line, point by point, the authors reveal how the world’s ancient monuments represent a form of transglobal communication that far predates the written word.
Sacred Heritage: Monastic Archaeology, Identities, Beliefs
by Roberta GilchristRoberta Gilchrist critically evaluates the concept of sacred heritage. Drawing on global perspectives from heritage studies, archaeology, museology, anthropology and architectural history, she examines the multiple values of medieval Christian heritage. Gilchrist investigates monastic archaeology through the lens of the material study of religion and reveals the sensory experience of religion through case studies including Glastonbury Abbey and Scottish monasticism. Her work offers new insights into medieval identity and regional distinctiveness, healing and magic, and memory practices in the sacred landscape. It also reflects on the significance of medieval sacred landscapes as contested heritage sites which hold diverse meanings to contemporary groups. This title is also available as Open Access.
The Sacred Hoop: Recovering the Feminine in American Indian Traditions
by Paula Gunn AllenAlmost thirty years after its initial publication, Paula Gunn Allen&’s celebrated study of women&’s roles in Native American culture, history, and traditions continues to influence writers and scholars in Native American studies, women&’s studies, queer studies, religion and spirituality, and beyond This groundbreaking collection of seventeen essays investigates and celebrates Native American traditions, with special focus on the position of the American Indian woman within those customs. Divided into three sections, the book discusses literature and authors, history and historians, sovereignty and revolution, and social welfare and public policy, especially as those subjects interact with the topic of Native American women. Poet, academic, biographer, critic, activist, and novelist Paula Gunn Allen was a leader and trailblazer in the field of women&’s and Native American spirituality. Her work is both universal and deeply personal, examining heritage, anger, racism, homophobia, Eurocentrism, and the enduring spirit of the American Indian.
Sacred Instructions: Indigenous Wisdom for Living Spirit-Based Change
by Larry Dossey Sherri MitchellA narrative of Indigenous wisdom that provides a road map for the spirit and a compass of compassion for humanity Drawing from ancestral knowledge, as well as her experience as an attorney and activist, Sherri Mitchell addresses some of the most crucial issues of our day, such as environmental protection and human rights. Sharing the gifts she has received from elders around the world, Mitchell urges us to decolonize our language and our stories. For those seeking change, this book offers a set of cultural values that will preserve our collective survival for future generations.
Sacred Interests: The United States and the Islamic World, 1821-1921
by Karine WaltherThroughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as Americans increasingly came into contact with the Islamic world, U.S. diplomatic, cultural, political, and religious beliefs about Islam began to shape their responses to world events. In Sacred Interests, Karine V. Walther excavates the deep history of American Islamophobia, showing how negative perceptions of Islam and Muslims shaped U.S. foreign relations from the Early Republic to the end of World War I. Beginning with the Greek War of Independence in 1821, Walther illuminates reactions to and involvement in the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, the efforts to protect Jews from Muslim authorities in Morocco, American colonial policies in the Philippines, and American attempts to aid Christians during the Armenian Genocide. Walther examines the American role in the peace negotiations after World War I, support for the Balfour Declaration, and the establishment of the mandate system in the Middle East. The result is a vital exploration of the crucial role the United States played in the Islamic world during the long nineteenth century--an interaction that shaped a historical legacy that remains with us today.
The Sacred Landscape of the Inca: The Cusco Ceque System
by Brian S. BauerThe ceque system of Cusco, the ancient capital of the Inca empire, was perhaps the most complex indigenous ritual system in the pre-Columbian Americas. From a center known as the Coricancha (Golden Enclosure) or the Temple of the Sun, a system of 328 huacas (shrines) arranged along 42 ceques (lines) radiated out toward the mountains surrounding the city. This elaborate network, maintained by ayllus (kin groups) that made offerings to the shrines in their area, organized the city both temporally and spiritually. From 1990 to 1995, Brian Bauer directed a major project to document the ceque system of Cusco. In this book, he synthesizes extensive archaeological survey work with archival research into the Inca social groups of the Cusco region, their land holdings, and the positions of the shrines to offer a comprehensive, empirical description of the ceque system. Moving well beyond previous interpretations, Bauer constructs a convincing model of the system's physical form and its relation to the social, political, and territorial organization of Cusco.
Sacred Landscapes, Indigenous Knowledge, and Ethno-culture in Natural Resource Management: Understanding Multiple Perspectives of Nature Conservation (Advances in Geographical and Environmental Sciences)
by Suresh Chand Rai Prabuddh Kumar MishraThis book examines the relationship between sacred landscapes, indigenous knowledge, ethno-culture, and natural resource management. The volume contributes to the existing literature on landscape studies and cultural geography by examining local perceptions toward multiple aspects of sacred landscape and ethno-culture under changing social and economic contexts, with case studies from diverse cultural and geographical areas worldwide. The book is useful for undergraduate and graduate students, policymakers, planners, park managers, and government officials to understand the needs for and natural resources of an area as well as the effect of park policies on people to establish their mutually beneficial relationships. Readers learn how to integrate the concept of sacred landscapes, indigenous knowledge, ethno-culture, and natural resources management to improve human resilience to global environmental change, and to assess the proper development program in resource-deprived areas.
Sacred Landscapes of Imperial China: Astronomy, Feng Shui, and the Mandate of Heaven
by Giulio MagliThis book analyses the magnificent imperial necropolises of ancient China from the perspective of Archaeoastronomy, a science which takes into account the landscape in which ancient monuments are placed, focusing especially but not exclusively on the celestial aspects. The power of the Chinese emperors was based on the so-called Mandate of Heaven: the rulers were believed to act as intermediaries between the sky gods and the Earth, and consequently, the architecture of their tombs, starting from the world-famous mausoleum of the first emperor, was closely linked to the celestial cycles and to the cosmos. This relationship, however, also had to take into account various other factors and doctrines, first the Zhao-Mu doctrine in the Han period and later the various forms of Feng Shui. As a result, over the centuries, diverse sacred landscapes were constructed. Among the sites analysed in the book are the “pyramids” of Xi’an from the Han dynasty, the mountain tombs of the Tang dynasty, and the Ming and Qing imperial tombs. The book explains how considerations such as astronomical orientation and topographical orientation according to the principles of Feng Shui played a fundamental role at these sites.
The Sacred Language of the Abakuá
by Lydia CabreraIn 1988, Lydia Cabrera (1899–1991) published La lengua sagrada de los Ñáñigos, an Abakuá phrasebook that is to this day the largest work available on any African diaspora community in the Americas. In the early 1800s in Cuba, enslaved Africans from the Cross River region of southeastern Nigeria and southwestern Cameroon created Abakuá societies for protection and mutual aid. Abakuá rites reenact mythic legends of the institution’s history in Africa, using dance, chants, drumming, symbolic writing, herbs, domestic animals, and masked performers to represent African ancestors. Criminalized and scorned in the colonial era, Abakuá members were at the same time contributing to the creation of a unique Cuban culture, including rumba music, now considered a national treasure. Translated for the first time into English, Cabrera’s lexicon documents phrases vital to the creation of a specific African-derived identity in Cuba and presents the first “insider’s” view of this African heritage. This text presents thoroughly researched commentaries that link hundreds of entries to the context of mythic rites, skilled ritual performance, and the influence of Abakuá in Cuban society and popular music. Generously illustrated with photographs and drawings, the volume includes a new introduction to Cabrera’s writing as well as appendices that situate this important work in Cuba’s history. With the help of living Abakuá specialists in Cuba and the US, Ivor L. Miller and P. González Gómes-Cásseres have translated Cabrera’s Spanish into English for the first time while keeping her meanings and cultivated style intact, opening this seminal work to new audiences and propelling its legacy in African diaspora studies.
Sacred Marriages: A Discourse Analysis (Routledge Studies in the Sociology of Religion)
by David F. MullinsThis book represents a new direction in the study of religion and marriage by using a postmodern theoretical framework focusing on gendered discourse and culture, to examine the meaning of sacred marriage within social contexts. Drawing upon data from in-depth interviews of couples in long-term, sacred marriages living in the American Midwest, together with an analysis of Christian marriage advice manuals, Sacred Marriages explores how couples use religious and nonreligious discourses and cultures to give their marriages meaning, and how those sacred meanings are used in their daily lives and the spaces that they embody. The study shows how religious and secular beliefs are combined to formulate cultural strategies for approaching the sacralization of marriage, and how religious and nonreligious discourses and cultures are ordered, depending on circumstances and social contexts. This often results in other relationships being subordinated in favour of the sacred bond believed to exist between husband and wife. The book argues that sacred marriage is a malleable concept, as people bend religious culture to form new and altered sacred marriages during emotional extremes. A thoughtful examination of long-term Christian marriages, this volume will appeal to scholars of religion and sociology with interests in marriage and the family.
Sacred Matters: Celebrity Worship, Sexual Ecstasies, the Living Dead, and Other Signs of Religious Life in the United States
by Gary LadermanA powerful case to embrace a broad view of religion as genuinely religious practices can be found in the unlikeliest of places - science labs, sports games, cinemas and concerts. Religion scholar Laderman shows readers how pilgrimages to Graceland, for example, don't just seem religious, they are religious - enacting traditional, ritualistic patterns of Christianity. In a dramatic reframing of the sacred and the secular, an American landscape blooming with devotions and mythologies is exposed.
Sacred Men: Law, Torture, and Retribution in Guam (Global and Insurgent Legalities)
by Keith L. CamachoBetween 1944 and 1949 the United States Navy held a war crimes tribunal that tried Japanese nationals and members of Guam's indigenous Chamorro population who had worked for Japan's military government. In Sacred Men Keith L. Camacho traces the tribunal's legacy and its role in shaping contemporary domestic and international laws regarding combatants, jurisdiction, and property. Drawing on Giorgio Agamben's notions of bare life and Chamorro concepts of retribution, Camacho demonstrates how the U.S. tribunal used and justified the imprisonment, torture, murder, and exiling of accused Japanese and Chamorro war criminals in order to institute a new American political order. This U.S. disciplinary logic in Guam, Camacho argues, continues to directly inform the ideology used to justify the Guantánamo Bay detention center, the torture and enhanced interrogation of enemy combatants, and the American carceral state.
Sacred Mobilities: Journeys of Belief and Belonging (Current Developments In The Geographies Of Leisure And Tourism Ser.)
by Avril Maddrell Alan TerryThis collection draws on the Mobilities approach to look afresh at notions of the sacred where they intersect with people, objects and other things on the move. Consideration of a wide range of spiritual meanings and practices also sheds light on the motivations and experiences associated with particular mobilities. Drawing on rich, situated case studies, this multi-disciplinary collection discusses what mobility in the social sciences, arts and humanities can tell us about movements and journeys prompted by religious, more broadly ’spiritual’ and 'secular-sacred' practices and priorities. Problematizing the fixity of sacred places and times as territorially and temporally bounded entities that exist in opposition to ’profane’ everyday life, this collection looks at the intersection between the embodied-emotional-spiritual experience of places, travel, belief-practices and communities. It is this geographically-informed perspective on the interleaving of religious/ spiritual/ secular notions of the sacred with the material and more-than-representational attributes of associated mobilities and related practices which constitutes this volume’s original contribution to the field.
Sacred Mushroom of Visions: A Sourcebook on the Psilocybin Mushroom
by Ralph MetznerOver 30 contributors share their expertise on the chemical, biological, cultural, psychological, and experiential dimensions of psilocybin mushrooms• Describes in vivid detail the consciousness-expanding experiences of psychoactive mushroom users• Provides firsthand accounts of the controversial Harvard Psilocybin Project, including the Concord Prison and Good Friday studiesTeonanácatl was the name given to the visionary mushrooms used in ancient Mesoamerican shamanic ceremonies, mushrooms that contain psilocybin, the psychoactive agent identified by Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann, the discoverer of LSD. The rediscovery of these visionary mushrooms by the Mazatec healer Maria Sabina and mycologist R. Gordon Wasson ignited a worldwide mushroom culture that inspired the consciousness revolution of the 1960s.This book describes in vivid detail the consciousness-expanding experiences of psychoactive mushroom users--from artists to psychologists--and the healing visionary inspiration they received. It provides firsthand accounts of studies performed in the controversial Harvard Psilocybin Project, including the Concord Prison study and the Good Friday study. It describes how the use of the psilocybe mushroom spread from the mountains of Mexico into North America, Asia, and Europe by seekers of consciousness-expanding experiences. It also details how psilocybin has been used since the 1960s in psychotherapy, prisoner rehabilitation, the enhancement of creativity, and the induction of mystical experiences and is being studied as a treatment for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).
Sacred Narrative: Readings in the Theory of Myth
by Alan DundesAlan Dundes defines myth as a sacred narrative that explains how the world and humanity came to be in their present form. This new volume brings together classics statements on the theory of myth by authors such as William Bascom, Jan de Vries, G. S. Kirk, James G. Frazer, Theodor H. Gaster, Mircea Eliade, Bronislaw Malinowski, C. G. Jung, and Claude Lévi-Strauss. Rather than limiting this collection to classical Roman and Greek mythology, Dundes gives the book a worldwide scope. The twenty-two essays by leading experts on myth represent comparative functionalist, myth-ritual, Jungian, Freudian, and structuralist approaches to studying the genre.
Sacred Places: American Tourist Attractions in the Nineteenth Century
by John F. SearsTourism emerged as an important cultural activity in the United States in the 1820s as steamboats and canals allowed for greater mobility and the nation's writers and artists focused their attention on American scenery. From the 1820s until well after the Civil War, American artists, like Thomas Cole and Frederic Church, depicted American tourist attractions in their work, and often made their reputations on those paintings. Writers like Irving, Cooper, Hawthorne, and James described their visits to the same attractions or incorporated them into their fiction. The work of these artists and writers conferred value on the scenes represented and helped shape the vision of the tourists who visited them. This interest in scenery permeated the work of both serious and popular writers and artists, and they produced thousands of images and descriptions of America's tourist attractions for the numerous guidebooks, magazines, and other publications devoted to travel in the United States during the period.
Sacred Places, Emerging Spaces: Religious Pluralism in the Post-Soviet Caucasus (Space and Place #17)
by Tsypylma Darieva Florian Mühlfried Kevin TuiteThough long-associated with violence, the Caucasus is a region rich with religious conviviality. Based on fresh ethnographies in Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and the Russian Federation, Sacred Places, Emerging Spaces discusses vanishing and emerging sacred places in the multi-ethnic and multi-religious post-Soviet Caucasus. In exploring the effects of de-secularization, growing institutional control over hybrid sacred sites, and attempts to review social boundaries between the religious and the secular, these essays give way to an emergent Caucasus viewed from the ground up: dynamic, continually remaking itself, within shifting and indefinite frontiers.
Sacred Places Tell Tales: Jewish Life and Heritage in Modern Cairo (Jewish Culture and Contexts)
by Yoram MeitalCairo’s synagogues shed new light on the transformation Egyptian society and its Jewish community underwent from 1875 to the presentSacred Places Tell Tales is the previously untold history of Egyptian Jewry and the ways in which Cairo’s synagogues historically functioned as active institutions in the social lives of these Jews. Historian Yoram Meital interprets Cairo’s synagogues as exquisite storytellers. The synagogues still stand in Cairo, and they shed new light on the social, cultural, and political processes that Egyptian society and the Jews underwent from 1875 to the present. Studying old and new synagogues in the Egyptian capital, their locations, the items they stored, and the range of religious and nonreligious activities they hosted reveals the social heterogeneity and the diverse ways in which modern Jewish sociocultural identity was constructed within Cairo’s Sephardi, Ashkenazi, and Karaite communities. Meital contends that studying the congregations and the social services provided in synagogues reveals the local Jewish community’s customs, cultural preferences, socioeconomic gaps, and class divisions.Sacred Places Tell Tales narrates not only the past but also the unprecedented transformations that have occurred in recent years in Egypt. While only a handful of Jews live in Egypt, the preservation of Jewish heritage, first and foremost synagogues and cemeteries, enjoy a growing interest in public discourse and popular culture. This new desire to preserve Jewish heritage is inseparable from the ongoing public debate about Egyptian society, its characteristics, and its identity, past and present. By contextualizing Jewish heritage preservation in a longer Egyptian and Jewish history, Meital opens a window into one of the most significant political discussions dividing Egyptian society today.
Sacred Plant Initiations
by Carole GuyettA practical guide to connecting with plants through ceremony - Explains how to commune with plants and their spirits through the traditional shamanic method of "plant dieting" to receive their teachings and guidance - Details 8 ceremonial plant initiations centered on common, easily recognized plants and trees such as primrose, dandelion, oak, and dog rose - Provides instructions to develop your own sacred plant initiations and make ceremonial plant elixirs - Includes four audio journeys to facilitate plant initiations In this guide to sacred plant initiations, medical herbalist and shamanic practitioner Carole Guyett explains how to commune with plants and their spirits through the traditional shamanic method of "plant dieting. " A plant diet involves ingesting a particular plant over a period of time so you regularly receive the plant's vibratory energy as well as its medicinal actions. Adding a ceremonial element to plant dieting offers a sacred initiation by the plant world, allowing you to connect deeply with all aspects of a plant, receive its sacred teachings, and forge a relationship for guidance and healing, benefitting both yourself and others. Each of the eight ceremonial plant initiations detailed in the book was personally developed by the author through extensive work with her ceremonial groups. They each center on an easily recognized plant or tree such as primrose, dandelion, oak, and dog rose. These common plants have powerful teachings and healing guidance to share with those who communicate with and honor them. The initiations, for both individuals and groups, work with the Wheel of the Year, honoring each plant's sacred timing and connecting with one of the eight Celtic and Pre-Celtic Fire Festivals--the solstices, equinoxes, and the holy days of Beltane, Lughnasadh, Samhain, and Imbolc. Offering practical instructions so you can develop your own sacred plant initiations, the author also include access to 4 audio journeys to facilitate the initiations in the book. She also explains how to make plant elixirs for use in plant diets and for healing. She shows how connecting with plants allows us to deepen our relationship with Nature, access higher levels of consciousness and spiritual realms, and facilitate the full flowering of human potential.
Sacred Plant Medicine: Explorations in the Practice of Indigenous Herbalism
by Stephen H. BuhnerIn Sacred Plant Medicine Stephen Buhner examines how indigenous peoples throughout the world learned the use of plant medicines. He explores the sacred dimension of plant and human interactions--a territory where humans experience communications from plants as expressions of Spirit. Indigenous peoples were clear, and Buhner's firsthand accounts bear this out, they did not learn the uses of plant medicines through trial and error but directly from the plants themselves. Sacred Plant Medicine develops a map of the territory of plant intelligence and the human interaction with it by focusing on the earliest and most basic human form of that contact between differing intelligences. For each healing plant described in the book, he presents medicinal uses, preparatory guidelines, and ceremonial elements such as prayers and medicine songs associated with the use of the plant. Each of us can communicate with the plants and become one with them.
Sacred Pleasure: Sex, Myth, and the Politics of the Body
by Riane EislerRiane Eisler shows us how history has consistently promoted the link between sex and violence--and how we can sever this link and move to a politics of partnership rather than domination in all our relations.
Sacred Science: An Ancient Healing Path for the Modern World
by Nick PolizziIn 2010, Nick Polizzi did something unimaginable. He assembled a group of eight desperately ill patients from around the world and brought them into the heart of the Amazon rainforest to put the mysterious medicines of native shamans to the test.The healing journey that unfolded would change their lives —and his own —forever.In The Sacred Science, we join Nick as he explores these primordial traditions and learns firsthand what it takes to truly heal ourselves of physical disease, emotional trauma, and the sense of "lostness" that so many of us feel in these modern times. We venture into a place where the ordinary rules we live by, even survival instincts, don’t apply —where "the only thing to do is to step forward and be ready for anything."Nick is not a guru or shaman; he is an ordinary guy who pieced together an illuminating journey, one experience at a time. In this riveting true story, we’re shown the many layers that must be peeled away in order for us to find the truth of who we are and why we’re here.This book is a bridge between the flashy, fast-moving modern world and the forgotten ways of a healthier, earth-connected ancestral past. You’ll find practices and principles of native wisdom that you can put to use in your own life, and you’ll gain a new understanding of what it means to heal.In the end, what will become of the eight patients who set out on this path with Nick? Will the exotic jungle medicines and harrowing rites of passage destroy them or give them a new lease on life?Five will return with remarkable healing results. Two will return disappointed. One won’t return at all.
Sacred Secrets: Freemasonry, the Bible and Christian Faith
by Mike NevilleWho were Tubalcain, Aholiab and Zabud and what is their significance for the Freemason? There is a general interest in the rituals of Freemasonry, generated in part by the apparently obscure references they contain. This is the only book that offers a guide to the stories used in Masonic ritual and their links to the Bible and Christianity. The new Mason is directed to a ‘serious contemplation of the Volume of the Sacred Law’ — but that is easier said than done without a grounding in the Scriptures, something that fewer and fewer people have. The historical and geographical setting of the Bible is explained here, making such contemplation easier for Mason and non-Mason alike.Mike Neville has systematically cross-referenced the most influential Chapters of the Bible to the ceremonies. It is his intention to get Freemasons to understand the ritual — not just to memorise and regurgitate — as well as to elucidate for the non-Mason. Sacred Secrets will aid the clergy, theologians and any other person interested in Freemasonry to see the links between ritual and scripture.