Tales from the Lodge: Unearthing the Spectral Secrets of Freemasonry
Feb 28, 2024Episode 1
Melissa
Have you ever felt a chill creep down your spine as you stepped into a room with a storied past? That's exactly what gripped us at an old Masonic Lodge in Brookston, Indiana, where Kristina and I, alongside Dawn's group, the Ghost Whispers, embarked on an exploration of the secretive and supernatural. With Kristina's research illuminating the hidden corners of Freemasonry and my own hair-raising encounters, we peel back the layers of history since the lodge's establishment in 1848. The rules are peculiar, the penalties severe, and the air is thick with the gravity of rituals long past. An audio clip sends shivers down our spines as it whispers of the brutal consequences for breaching Masonic silence.
Then, the night took a turn for the bizarre. Imagine waking to an inexplicable cold, a wetness clinging to your skin, and the terrifying sensation of an unseen force gripping your throat. I recount this personal haunting in vivid detail, connecting it to the enigmatic atmosphere of the Masonic Lodge we investigated. These spectral experiences have Kristina and I determined to return, to unearth what else lurks within the lodge's walls. Join us for a journey where history and the paranormal intertwine, and where every shadow could tell a thousand stories.
Have you ever felt a chill creep down your spine as you stepped into a room with a storied past? That's exactly what gripped us at an old Masonic Lodge in Brookston, Indiana, where Kristina and I, alongside Dawn's group, the Ghost Whispers, embarked on an exploration of the secretive and supernatural. With Kristina's research illuminating the hidden corners of Freemasonry and my own hair-raising encounters, we peel back the layers of history since the lodge's establishment in 1848. The rules are peculiar, the penalties severe, and the air is thick with the gravity of rituals long past. An audio clip sends shivers down our spines as it whispers of the brutal consequences for breaching Masonic silence.
Then, the night took a turn for the bizarre. Imagine waking to an inexplicable cold, a wetness clinging to your skin, and the terrifying sensation of an unseen force gripping your throat. I recount this personal haunting in vivid detail, connecting it to the enigmatic atmosphere of the Masonic Lodge we investigated. These spectral experiences have Kristina and I determined to return, to unearth what else lurks within the lodge's walls. Join us for a journey where history and the paranormal intertwine, and where every shadow could tell a thousand stories.
Hey everyone, it's your host, melissa at Strange, strange Beyond Insane. So today I want to cover a location that we were invited to, christina and I with Dawn's group, the Ghost Whispers, and this was in Brookston Indiana, and this was an old Masonic Lodge that is now a appliance business. So we at least me, I went in blindfolded. Christina is our little researcher, right. So she, like really looked into this and she found a lot of cool stuff. And you know, I've always heard all these rumors and these different stories about, you know, freemasonry and what they did and the rituals and all these, I guess, scary stories, right. So before I, you know, wanted to play all the evidence from this place, I kind of wanted to go over with everybody just some few basic things about Freemasons, okay, so, again, this was a Masonic Lodge in Brookston Indiana and it was established in 1848. All right.
Speaker 1:
So the biggest question what do they do it in Masonic Temple? It's very basic, at least to front it, it is right Wink, wink. So it's just used for usage through Masonic Temples and their most basic definition is the fact that they just serve as a home to one or more Masonic lodges and bodies. They can also serve many other purposes as well. Smaller Masonic Temples will often consist of nothing more than a meeting room with a kitchen and dining area with a bar attached, all right. So through these little like um internet I guess you will internet um phrases, I kind of try to come up with something fun, and so there's like a lot of ritual words and there's a lot of rules that go into Freemasonry. So I want to start with this Um, it says from the United States, it's an A to Z poem about Freemasons, all right.
Speaker 1:
So it says we should know every letter in our craft's alphabet, and some of them are better than others are, and yet each one as an initial, some phase of brotherhood may show as beneficial, and all of them are good. If we would praise be earning, we'll let our brother see we have sufficient learning to go from A to Z. Then let us all work harder, show how we really feel. Yes, let us start with Arter and let us end with zeal. Okay. So I don't know if that, if that's like, did they chant that? Did they just say it in like prayer form? I'm sure, um, it's all different across the board, right, cause I know something that I read that it's not all the same in all the different Freemason groups.
Speaker 1:
Okay, and here are some weird facts. I guess rules, if you will, so Freemasons cannot talk about religion or politics at the meetings. You cannot bring your outside status inside the lodge. Now, this is what freaks me out, because this is what Christina was looking up after we had got back from this place. And if you guys listen to the evidence and I know some of it's hard to like hear because it you know there's a lot of chaoticness going on and also some parts we were sleeping, so there is some snoring, but you can hear knocking and you can hear moving and you can even hear like something or someone dragging things. But what really stood out to me was the knocking, and the knocking of three times. Now, tom Dowling, someone who has been on this podcast many, many times, another ghost guru, if you will, the main emperor at Eloise. You know he's always there, he's always on here talking, but anyways, Tom taught me that three knocks is never a good thing because in the Catholic religion that's like mocking the Holy Trinity. So Christina did look into that.
Speaker 1:
Now, as far as free masonry, these are some secret handshakes, knocks and passwords and these are lodge specific. Okay, so getting in to group, like into the secret society, involves death and resurrection, but that's just the first step. Once you advance enough, you will get to learn God's secret name. The basic rules of conduct go back to the Justinian code and they are actually based in the Justinian code. That's a codification of Roman law that was ordered by Emperor Justinian in the sixth century. So this is. This goes back a long time. Several various offenses include slander, sharing masonic secrets and excess of any kind. Excess of any kind by far was the biggest no-no, and the biggest no-no, of course, is sharing the secrets of freemasonry. So any of these offenses carried very harsh, harsh penalties, and right now I want to play for you guys some fact-based that I found the type of penalties. Alright, let's get this set up.
Speaker 3:
Let's do the three and then we'll talk about matter of reading our three. The need to tell me penalty. We in each of us covenant and promise that we will not reveal any of the secrets of this. Should we do so, we agree that our throats be cut from ear to ear and our tongues torn out by their roots. The miscellaneous position of movement, the explanation of the entered apprentice sign is draw the right hand rapidly across the neck, as represented, and drop the arms the side. This action shows the penalty of having throat cuts and the tongue ripped out.
Speaker 2:
I'll just quickly say number one, that's super violent and the God would be requiring this or endorsing. It is weird. And then the other thing I'm gonna say is I did that for for many, many years. I would make the hand motion of slitting my own throat using my thumb. I did that. I was a part of it, so it's disturbing. The God would, would endorse something so violent. I did it, and this is identical to the Masonic.
Speaker 3:
We should say, we should say that the end position, or essentially, you will end up still, by implication, taking upon these penalties. Yes, we'll get to.
Speaker 2:
It was originally revelation, part of God's Holy Scripture, and then we was taken out. But we'll get to that too.
Speaker 3:
Okay. So having your heart plucked out, this is penalty number two. Right yeah, having my left breast torn open, my heart plucked out and given to the wild beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, the neodowment penalty. We in each of us do covenant and promise that we will not reveal the secrets of this. Should we do so, we agree to have our breasts cut open and our hearts and vitals torn from our bodies and given to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field. And then the position of movement. The explanation of the fellow craft sign is the action of cupping one hand over the left breast and it drawing quickly across the body signifies the heart being ripped out if the candidate should violate his fellow craft obligation.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and again super violent. Again I did this and again it's in the exact same sequence. So you the first one is your slit your throat and the second one is you do the hand most of cutting out your own heart. I did it and it was in this exact sequence.
Speaker 3:
Number three having your bowels burned to ashes. The Masonic penalty. To have my body cut into, my bowels, removed and burned to ashes, which are then to be scattered to the four winds of heaven. The endowment penalty. We in each of us do covenant and promise that we will not reveal any of the secrets of this. Should we do so, we agree that our bodies be cut asunder in the midst of and all our bowels go out. The Masonic position of movement is the explanation. The sign is made by drawing the thumb quickly across the waist to the right hip, then dropping the hand to the side. This action shows the stomach being ripped open. These bounties were mostly removed in 1990 after a 1988 temple survey about the experience of members was conducted.
Speaker 1:
Okay, so you guys can hear for yourselves. That's pretty fucking serious if you break the rules. Now my question is if you could play like an actor or an actress and either a go back in time into one of these lodges or present time now, would you act upon it like? Act like you were going to be a member just to see if this shit is legit? I'm gonna have to say no, I will not take my chances.
Speaker 1:
However, in the evidence that you guys hear when we are sleeping, you can hear me moaning a lot, and I do want to point out that my phone was not right with me. My phone was on the ground, it was on the floor and it was about three feet away from our air mattress. I don't know who the fuck was breathing in there and my phone. I don't know why it was moaning like that. It sounded like I was in pain.
Speaker 1:
But I can remember at certain times waking up feeling fucking ice cold, like drenched in ice cold, like liquid, because I did wake up kind of like wet, like around my shoulders, my armpits, my stomach. I also had a hard time breathing. I was. I woke myself up coughing and I did feel like a choking feel I did tell Christina the next morning that I really couldn't smoke any kind of cigarettes or anything because my throat had hurt so bad. It felt like like I had like just something was over it or whatever, like it was very, very sensitive, and I remember one time waking up and feeling like something that choked me. Yeah, so I did not sleep good there at all, but I just kind of wanted to tie this into the evidence, give you guys like a basic idea of what freemasonry was. The Masonic Lodge, at least in Indiana. We will definitely be going back there for more investigations because that place was just filled with action. Thank you guys for listening. Tune in for the next episode.