Theos-Talk Archives (May 2003 Message tt00164)

H.P. Blavatsky in her "Collected Writings," Vol. XI, p. 78 wrote 
about the "oblong square":

". . . the same reverence is paid in Christian and Masonic 
architecture to the Orient (or the Eastern point) as in the days of 
Paganism. Ragon described it fully in his destroyed volumes. The 
princeps porta, the door of the World, and of the 'King of
Glory,' by whom was meant at first the Sun and now his human
symbol, the Christ, is the door of the Orient, and faces the East in 
every church and temple. It is through this 'door of life' —
the solemnpathway through which the daily entrance of the luminary 
into the oblong square** of the earth or the Tabernacle of the Sun is 
effected every morning - that the 'newly born' babe is ushered, and 
carried to the baptismal font; and it is to the left of this edifice 
(the gloomy north whither start the 'apprentices' and where the 
candidates got their trial by water) that now the fonts, and in the 
days of old the well (piscinas) of lustral waters, were placed in the 
ancient churches, which had been pagan fanes." 

Peter Merriott comments as follows:

"The words 'oblong square' are italicized in the above article which 
suggests HPB wished to draw our attention to its special 
significance. The footnote to the text suggests that while there may 
be a literal significance to this term it also has a much deeper 
meaning. In reference to, 'oblong square', HPB writes in the footnote:
**'A Masonic term; a symbol of the Arc of Noah, and of the Covenant, 
of the Temples of Solomon, the Tabernacle, and the Camp of the 
Israelites, all built as 'oblong squares'. Mercury and Apollo were 
represented by oblong cubes and squares, and so is Kaaba, the great 
temple at Mecca.'" (Collected Works, Vol. XI, p.78fn)

"So there are also 'oblong cubes' used in the symbolism as well 
as 'oblong squares'. Clearly then, this is no mistake, no idle phrase 
or term that HPB is using in the Voice. So again, one might ask why 
[did Judge] change it in the Voice Of The Silence, why remove the 
word 'squares' to leave the phrase 'thin oblongs'? For to do so is to 
delete something very important in the text, or so it seems to me."
Quoted from:
http://www.teosofia.com/Docs/vol-2-10.pdf

Whatever reason Judge had for changing the text, this is a good 
example of an "editor" changing Blavatsky's ORIGINAL and not alerting 
the reader that a change has been made.

Daniel H. Caldwell
BLAVATSKY STUDY CENTER/BLAVATSKY ARCHIVES
http://blavatskyarchives.com