Hiram Abiff
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Hiram Abiff (also Hiram Abif or the Widow's son) is the central character of an
allegory As a List of narrative techniques, literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a wikt:narrative, narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a meaning with moral or political signi ...
presented to all candidates during the third degree in
Freemasonry Freemasonry (sometimes spelled Free-Masonry) consists of fraternal groups that trace their origins to the medieval guilds of stonemasons. Freemasonry is the oldest secular fraternity in the world and among the oldest still-existing organizati ...
. Hiram is presented as the chief
architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
of King Solomon's Temple. He is murdered inside this Temple by three ruffians, after they failed to obtain from him the Master Masons' secrets. The themes of the allegory are the importance of fidelity, and the certainty of death.


The Masonic legend of Hiram Abiff

The legend of Hiram Abiff as related in Anglo-American Masonic jurisdictions underpins the Third Degree and first appeared in the early 1720s. It generally starts with his arrival in Jerusalem, and his appointment by Solomon as chief architect and master of works at the construction of his temple. As the temple is nearing completion, three fellowcraft masons from the workforce ambush him as he leaves the building, demanding the secrets of a master mason. Hiram is challenged by each in turn and, at each refusal to divulge the information, his assailant strikes him with a mason's tool (differing between jurisdictions). He is injured by the first two assailants, and struck dead by the last. His murderers hide his body under a pile of rubble, returning at night to move the body outside the city, where they bury it in a shallow grave marked with a sprig of
acacia ''Acacia'', commonly known as wattles or acacias, is a genus of about of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa, South America, and Austral ...
. As the Master is missed the next day, Solomon sends out a group of fellowcraft masons to search for him. The loose acacia is accidentally discovered, and the body exhumed to be given a decent burial. The hiding place of the "three ruffians" is also discovered, and they are brought to justice. Solomon informs his workforce that the secret word of a master mason is now lost. He replaces it with a substitute word which is considered a secret by Masons. In
Continental Freemasonry Liberal Freemasonry, also known as Continental Freemasonry or Adogmatic Freemasonry, is a major philosophical tradition within Freemasonry that emphasizes absolute freedom of conscience, philosophical inquiry, and progressive social values. Libe ...
, the tale is slightly different: a large number of master masons, and not just Hiram, are working on the Temple, and the three ruffians are seeking the passwords and signs that will give them a higher wage. The result is the same, but this time, it is Master Masons who find the body. The secrets are not lost, but Solomon orders them buried under the Temple, inscribed on Hiram's grave, and the same substitution is made as a mark of respect. The secrets "lost" in the other tradition are here given to new Master Masons as part of their ritual. In this version, Hiram is often renamed Adoniram.


Historical origin of the legend

There have been many proposals for the origin of the Masonic Hiram Abiff story that are dismissed by most historical-critical Masonic scholars. The leading theory supported by many scholars of historical Freemasonry was advanced by the French masonic historian Paul Naudon who, in 2005, highlighted the similarity between the death of Hiram and the murder of
Renaud de Montauban Renaud (or Renaut or Renault) de Montauban (Modern ; ; ; or ) was a legendary hero and knight which appeared in a 12th-century Old French known as ''The Four Sons of Aymon''. The four sons of Duke Aymon are Renaud, Richard, Alard and Guiscard, ...
in the late 12th Century
chanson de geste The , from 'deeds, actions accomplished') is a medieval narrative, a type of epic poetry, epic poem that appears at the dawn of French literature. The earliest known poems of this genre date from the late 11th and early 12th centuries, shortly ...
, '' The Four Sons of Aymon''. Renaud, like his prototype Saint Reinold, was killed by a hammer-blow to the head while working as a mason at Cologne Cathedral, and his body hidden by his murderers before being miraculously re-discovered. In 2021, Christopher Powell published a paper in the journal of Quatuor Coronati Lodge, the ''Ars Quatuor Coronatorum'', which argues that
John Theophilus Desaguliers John Theophilus Desaguliers (12 March 1683 – 29 February 1744) was a French-born British natural philosopher, clergyman, engineer and freemason who was elected to the Royal Society in 1714 as experimental assistant to Isaac Newton. He had stu ...
likely authored the Hiram Abiff legend in the early 1720s and introduced it into the Master Mason degree. In his research, Powell notes how Desaguliers also introduced the "lost word" aspect of the Royal Arch degree which he likely read in a book he owned titled "The Temple of Solomon, portrayed by Scripture-light." If the word was to be found, it would need to be first lost, hence the Hiram Abiff story. According to Powell, Desaguliers as a Frenchman living in England, would have known the ''chanson de geste'' legend, and used it as a base for the legend of Hiram Abiff. However instead of being used as a ritual since the 12th century, Powell argues that Desaguliers used this existing myth to create a central story for the newly created Master Masonic degree, for which there is no evidence before 1720.


Hirams in the Bible

In the
Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Old Testament The Old Testament (OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew and occasionally Aramaic writings by the Isr ...
, there are three separate instances of people named Hiram that were involved in the construction of the temple of Solomon: * Hiram, King of the realm of Tyre (today, in the modern nation of Lebanon), is credited in 2 Samuel 5:11 and 1 Kings 5:1–10 for having sent building materials and men for the original construction of the Temple in Jerusalem. In the Masonic drama, "Hiram, King of Tyre" is clearly distinguished from "Hiram Abiff". The former is clearly a king and the latter clearly a master craftsman. They can be confused in other contexts. *In 1 Kings 7:13–14, Hiram is described as the son of a widow from the tribe of
Naphtali According to the Book of Genesis, Naphtali (; ) was the sixth son of Jacob, the second of his two sons with Bilhah. He was the founder of the Israelite tribe of Naphtali. Some biblical commentators have suggested that the name ''Naphtali'' ma ...
who was the son of a Tyrian bronze worker, sent for by Solomon to cast the bronze furnishings and ornate decorations for the new temple. From this reference, Freemasons often refer to Hiram (with the added Abiff) as "the widow's son." Hiram cast these bronzes in clay ground in the plain of the Jordan between Succoth and Zarethan/Zeredathah (1 Kings 7:46–47). * 2 Chronicles 2:13–14 relates a formal request from King Solomon of Jerusalem to King Hiram I of Tyre, for workers and for materials to build a new temple. King Hiram (Huram in Chronicles) responds "And now I have sent a skillful man, endowed with understanding, ''Ḥūrām 'āḇî.'' () (the son of a woman of the daughters of Dan, and his father was a man of Tyre), skilled to work in gold and silver, bronze and iron, stone and wood,
purple Purple is a color similar in appearance to violet light. In the RYB color model historically used in the arts, purple is a secondary color created by combining red and blue pigments. In the CMYK color model used in modern printing, purple is ...
and
blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB color model, RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB color model, RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between Violet (color), violet and cyan on the optical spe ...
, fine linen and crimson, and to make any engraving and to accomplish any plan which may be given to him, with your skillful men and with the skillful men of my lord David your father." The phrase italicised above is translated in the New King James Version as "Huram my master craftsman". Most translations of this passage take the "'ab-" in "'abi" as the construct state of 'abba, here translated as master. Older translations preferred to translate "'ab-" as father. The common translation of the -i suffix is "my", giving the problematic reading that Hiram was sending his own father, also called Hiram. This is found in the
Vulgate The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Bible translations into Latin, Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Diocese of ...
, the Douay–Rheims Bible and in Wycliffe's Bible. The other reading is as the old Hebrew genitive, and some variant of "of my father" is found in the
Septuagint The Septuagint ( ), sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy (), and abbreviated as LXX, is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Biblical Hebrew. The full Greek ...
, the Bishop's Bible and the Geneva Bible. In his 1723 "Constitutions", James Anderson announced that many problems with this text would be solved by reading "'abi" as the second part of a proper name, which he rendered as "Hiram Abif",Anderson's 1723 Constitutions, in Franklin's 1734 reprint
retrieved 14 September 2012
agreeing with the translations of
Martin Luther Martin Luther ( ; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, Theology, theologian, author, hymnwriter, professor, and former Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. Luther was the seminal figure of the Reformation, Pr ...
and Miles Coverdale's reading of 2 Chronicles 4:16.


Other accounts of a biblical Hiram

Flavius Josephus Flavius Josephus (; , ; ), born Yosef ben Mattityahu (), was a History of the Jews in the Roman Empire, Roman–Jewish historian and military leader. Best known for writing ''The Jewish War'', he was born in Jerusalem—then part of the Judaea ...
in his ''
Antiquities of the Jews ''Antiquities of the Jews'' (; , ''Ioudaikē archaiologia'') is a 20-volume historiographical work, written in Greek, by the Roman-Jewish historian Josephus in the 13th year of the reign of the Roman emperor Domitian, which was 94 CE. It cont ...
'' (Chapter 8:76) refers to Hiram as τεχνίτης, ''tekhnítēs'', artificer, craftsman. "Now Solomon sent for an artificer out of Tyre, whose name was Hiram: he was by birth of the tribe of
Naphtali According to the Book of Genesis, Naphtali (; ) was the sixth son of Jacob, the second of his two sons with Bilhah. He was the founder of the Israelite tribe of Naphtali. Some biblical commentators have suggested that the name ''Naphtali'' ma ...
, on his mother's side (for she was of that tribe); but his father was Ur, of the stock of the Israelites." The Targum Sheni, an
Aramaic Aramaic (; ) is a Northwest Semitic language that originated in the ancient region of Syria and quickly spread to Mesopotamia, the southern Levant, Sinai, southeastern Anatolia, and Eastern Arabia, where it has been continually written a ...
commentary on the
Book of Esther The Book of Esther (; ; ), also known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as "the Scroll" ("the wikt:מגילה, Megillah"), is a book in the third section (, "Writings") of the Hebrew Bible. It is one of the Five Megillot, Five Scrolls () in the Hebr ...
written sometime between the
fall of Rome The fall of the Western Roman Empire, also called the fall of the Roman Empire or the fall of Rome, was the loss of central political control in the Western Roman Empire, a process in which the Empire failed to enforce its rule, and its vast ...
and the
Crusades The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and at times directed by the Papacy during the Middle Ages. The most prominent of these were the campaigns to the Holy Land aimed at reclaiming Jerusalem and its surrounding t ...
, credits Hiram with the construction of a miraculous
throne A throne is the seat of state of a potentate or dignitary, especially the seat occupied by a sovereign (or viceroy A viceroy () is an official who reigns over a polity in the name of and as the representative of the monarch of the territory ...
for Solomon, which in Esther's time is being used by the descendants of
Cyrus the Great Cyrus II of Persia ( ; 530 BC), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Hailing from Persis, he brought the Achaemenid dynasty to power by defeating the Media ...
.


Later accounts of Hiram Abiff

The most elaborate version of the legend occurs in Gérard de Nerval's 1851 account, '' Voyage en Orient'', where he relates the tale, inserting all the masonic passwords, as part of the story of Balkis, the "Queen of the Morning" and " Soliman", Prince of the Genii. This is an elaboration of the second version above, where the Master Craftsman is named Adoniram. Before his death, he undergoes mystical adventures as his tale is interwoven with that of Solomon and Balkis, the Queen of Sheba. The ruffians who kill him are under the instruction of Solomon himself. De Nerval relates the story as having been told in an Eastern coffee house over a two-week period. A similar account is given in Charles William Heckethorn's ''The Secret Societies of all Ages and Countries'', where Solomon plots to destroy Hiram because of the mutual love between Hiram and the Queen of Sheba. Meanwhile, in 1862, the whole adventure of Adoniram's love for Balkis and his murder by three workmen in the pay of Solomon had been set to music in
Charles Gounod Charles-François Gounod (; ; 17 June 181818 October 1893), usually known as Charles Gounod, was a French composer. He wrote twelve operas, of which the most popular has always been ''Faust (opera), Faust'' (1859); his ''Roméo et Juliette'' (18 ...
's opera, '' La reine de Saba''.


Other theories


Seqenenre Tao II

According to authors Robert Lomas and Christopher Knight, the prototype for Hiram Abiff was the Egyptian king Seqenenre Tao II, who (they claim) died in an almost identical manner. This idea is dismissed by most Masonic scholars, some of whom have described the theory as "highly imaginative" but ultimately one with "no historical validity."


Dhul-Nun al-Misri

In his book '' The Sufis'', the Afghan scholar Idries Shah suggested that
Dhul-Nun al-Misri Dhūl-Nūn Abū l-Fayḍ Thawbān b. Ibrāhīm al-Miṣrī (; d. Giza, in 245/859 or 248/862), often referred to as Dhūl-Nūn al-Miṣrī or Zūl-Nūn al-Miṣrī for short, was an early Egyptian Muslim mysticism, mystic and ascetic.Mojaddedi, ...
might have been the origin of the character Hiram Abiff in the masonic Master Mason ritual. The link, he believes, was through the Sufi sect Al-Banna ("The Builders") who built the Jami Al-Aqsa and the
Dome of the Rock The Dome of the Rock () is an Islamic shrine at the center of the Al-Aqsa mosque compound on the Temple Mount in the Old City (Jerusalem), Old City of Jerusalem. It is the world's oldest surviving work of Islamic architecture, the List_of_the_ol ...
in Jerusalem. This fraternity could have influenced some early masonic guilds which borrowed heavily from the Oriental architecture in the creation of the Gothic style. Others, such as, German orientalist Annemarie Schimmel, are critical of the work of Shah. She has claimed that ''The Sufis'', along with his other books, "should be avoided by serious students".


Notes


References

* * * Domenico V. Ripa Montesano, Vademecum di Loggia, Edizione Gran Loggia Phoenix – Roma Italia 2009 {{Authority control Masonic symbolism Books of Kings people Solomon's Temple Fictional architects Fictional murdered people Allegory Hiram I