The Level in Freemasonry

While the Perpendicular - symbolic working tool of the Junior Warden - mainly concerns the Entered Apprentice, who needs to understand verticality and discover his own verticality, the Level is rather associated with the Fellowcraft, who opens up to the horizontality of the world around him. The Level becomes therefore naturally the symbolic working tool of the Senior Warden, who oversees the Fellowcraft’s quest for Knowledge. In some Masonic rituals, the Level is one of the working tools that the future Fellowcraft carries during his Five Symbolic Journeys. And to emphasize that the Level characterizes the Fellowcraft as the Perpendicular do the Entered Apprentice, Masonic rituals often state that the Fellowcraft has passed from the Perpendicular to the Level.

The Level completes the Perpendicular

The Level completes the Perpendicular, because it is based on the same basic principle (i.e. the search for the vertical), but adds the horizontal line. Concretely, the Masonic Level can take two forms. The most common form of the Level in continental Freemasonry is that of a square whose two arms are connected by a crossbar, thus forming a capital A, with a plumb line suspended at the angle. In Anglo-Saxon Freemasonry, it rather affects the shape of an inverted T. In both cases, the horizontal is fixed and the vertical, indicated by the plumb line, is mobile.

The Level cannot precede the Perpendicular, because the horizontal that it virtually traces obviously depends on the straightness of the vertical. From a symbolic point of view, it seems logical that the Perpendicular is the prerogative of the Entered Apprentice and the Level that of the Fellowcraft. The Entered Apprentice need to descend into himself and discover the verticality to eventually be able, as a Fellowcraft, to open up to the horizontality of the world. Initially focused on self-knowledge, the Freemason cannot stop at that point and must open his arms in order to act in the world. The crossing of the vertical and horizontal thus provides the symbolic image of a Man with his arms apart, like Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvius Man. This crossing also produces a Cross, a universal symbol which doesn’t belong to Christianity alone.

The Level encourages us not to put the cart before the horse! Wanting to act and to serve one’s fellow men is very good. But if the foundation is not correct, if it is not defined first by the vertical (which represents our right place in the world), our arms will not be square, our horizontality will be illusory and our action ineffective.

The Level, symbol of Equality

As early as the 18th century, Masonic rituals approached the Level from another angle, which is not strictly speaking symbolic but rather allegorical: the Level would represent Equality. But this Equality was still mousy and theoretical, and scarcely concerned the Freemasons: in the Lodge, all members were equal and the aristocrat was no longer distinguished from the commoner. In France, this Masonic Equality was signified by the wearing of the sword by all the Master Masons, a privilege reserved for nobles in civil society. But outside the Lodge, Equality most often remained a dead letter. It was only in the 19th century that Freemasons, especially in France, took the idea of social equality seriously and engaged in causes that could be described as socio-political.

Is the Masonic Level an incentive to social or even political action? Some Freemasons have understood it this way. But not everyone will agree to understand Freemasonry in this way.

Then, what is the Equality that the Masonic Level could symbolize? Certainly not a naive and general Equality, which is only an unfounded abstraction. In Humanity, as in the animal kingdom in general, there is no natural equality: some are strong, some are weak, some are predators, some become preys... But Humanity doesn’t abide such situation: aware of sharing the same destiny, the members of the human family have, to varying extents, developed a certain sense of Justice, Equity and therefore Equal rights and treatment.

Equality, which is so important for Freemasons, is a never ending construction, an ideal towards which they tend but which always comes up against the natural selfishness of individuals. Equality is not an impersonal and dehumanized leveling, which would make everyone robots without any personality, but much more the realization of a deep sense of universal Fraternity (and Sorority). In Masonic terms, the Equality expressed by the horizontal of the Level can only be found if the vertical has been clearly defined by the Perpendicular. Thus, we can say that all those who are aligned according to the Perpendicular can meet at the same Level.