Guide
The Two Pillars, Boaz and Jachin
· 2 minute read
Two bronze pillars stood at the porch of King Solomon's Temple, and the First Book of Kings gives their names. The one on the right was called Jachin and the one on the left Boaz. Every Masonic lodge room has a pair of them, usually flanking the entrance or standing in the west, and they appear on more Masonic art than any symbol except the square and compasses.
The names
Boaz is usually read as in strength, and Jachin as he will establish. Read together the names make a promise: in strength it shall be established. Masonic teaching takes the pillars as figures of strength and establishment, the two things a building, and a life, need before anything else can be raised on them.
The Bible describes their chapiters, the capitals at the top, as worked with lily work and rows of pomegranates. Masonic art usually keeps the pomegranates, and the network and lily work sometimes survive as ornament, but the most visible addition is Masonic and not biblical.
The globes
Lodge pillars carry two globes, a celestial globe on one and a terrestrial globe on the other, with the constellations on the one and the map of the world on the other. There were no globes on the temple. They came into Masonic use in the eighteenth century and they stand for the universality of Masonry, that the Craft extends over the whole earth and under the whole heavens.
On our Two Pillars plate the globes are drawn as an engraver of the period would have drawn them, the celestial one dark with its stars and the terrestrial one in relief.
The pillars in the degrees
The pillars belong to the first two degrees. The Entered Apprentice is introduced to them at the porch, and the Fellow Craft passes between them on his way to the winding staircase and the middle chamber. They are the threshold of the temple, and in the lodge they mark the threshold of the work.
In our designs
The Two Pillars plate frames the square and compasses between Boaz and Jachin on the chequered pavement, with the winding staircase behind and the globes on the capitals. The Temple plate shows the whole building with the pillars at its porch. The Entered Apprentice plate in the Square and Compasses collection marks them J and B at the door.
Questions
- What do Boaz and Jachin mean?
- Boaz is usually read as in strength and Jachin as he will establish. They are the names of the two bronze pillars at the porch of Solomon's Temple, and lodges take them as figures of strength and establishment.
- Why are there globes on top of Masonic pillars?
- The celestial and terrestrial globes are a Masonic addition, not a biblical one. They stand for the universality of Masonry, that the Craft extends over the whole earth and under the whole heavens.
