Robert Lomas

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Robert Lomas is a British writer and business studies academic. He writes primarily about the history of Freemasonry as well as the Neolithic period, ancient engineering and archaeoastronomy. Lomas regularly lectures at the Orkney International Science Festival. ^[1]

Contents 1 Background 2 Synopis of Some Books 2.1 Biography of Nikola Tesla 2.2 The Hiram Key 2.3 The Second Messiah 2.4 The Book of Hiram 2.5 Turning the Hiram Key 3 Controversy 4 Inspiration of fictional work 5 Works 5.1 Writing Alone 5.2 With Geoffrey Lancaster 5.3 With Christopher Knight 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Background

Lomas gained a First Class Honours degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Salford before being awarded a Ph.D. for his research into solid state physics and crystalline structures.^[2]

While Lomas' chief areas of research is on the subject of Freemasonry, he also lectures on science. According to his website, Lomas is a regular supporter of the Orkney International Science Festival having lectured there, chaired sessions and taken part in the schools support sessions over a period of eight years.^[1] He also writes on the Neolithic period and archaeoastronomy, ancient mysteries, stone monuments and megaliths, and on both astronomical and astrological data.

In April 2007 Lomas was invited to deliver the Wednesday evening Public Lecture at Gresham College.^[3], a private institute which exists to offer free lectures to the public. He was asked to speak about his historical research into part played by Sir Robert Moray in founding of the Royal Society, which held its first meeting at Gresham College in 1660. ^[4]

Whilst writing The Book Of Hiram and as part of his on-going research into the cultural origin of scientific ideas, Lomas established an electronic database of Masonic material^[5], as part of the University of Bradford's Special Collections Library. ^[6] Lomas has also made available an online version of William Preston's Illustrations of Masonry.

In the past, Lomas has worked on electronic weapons systems and emergency services command and control systems. ^[7] He currently lectures on Information Systems at the University of Bradford's School of Management, one of the UK's leading business schools.^[8]

[edit] Synopis of Some Books

[edit] Biography of Nikola Tesla

Lomas wrote a biography of scientist Nikola Tesla (1856-1943) entitled The Man Who Invented the Twentieth Century:Nikola Tesla, Forgotten Genius of Electricity, that was published in 1999. In it he argued that Tesla was the person who actually discovered modern three-phase electricity which made the present wide-scale distribution of electricity possible. He also contends that others, in particular Thomas Edison, falsely took credit for parts of his work on DC generators and motor while some of Tesla's business associates, including J. Pierpont Morgan, took advantage of him and exploited and ruined him. He argues that Tesla's electrical inventions, such as the AC current and the Tesla coil, are what made our society what it is like today and that he is therefore, in Lomas's phrase, "the man who invented the twentieth century".

[edit] The Hiram Key

In The Hiram Key Lomas and his co-author Christopher Knight claimed that they had used a Masonic folktale about a man called Hiram Abiff to create a new key to the origins of civilization and of Christianity. Knight and Lomas claimed that the Masonic story of Hiram Abiff is based on an ancient Egyptian pharaoh who was murdered under similar circumstances. They claimed to have discovered that the ancient Egyptian pharaohs had living and dying resurrection ceremonies and that this and their belief system, which was called Ma'at were copied by Jesus and his followers. Knight and Lomas claimed that they had discovered that the Roman Catholic Church had distorted the true story of Jesus, which the Gnostics, the Knights Templar, and the Masons all knew, and that this is why the Catholic Church so passionately opposed these groups. They claim that Jesus did not actually resurrect people from the dead, but that it was an initiation ceremony for his Jewish religion, and that it was a common practice for Jewish religions at the time to call their members the living, and the uninitiated the dead. And Knight and Lomas claimed that the term messiah originally merely meant a Jewish patriot who would liberate his people, not a god, and that the Christian understanding of the term is completely alien to the Old Testament.

They came to the conclusion that the story of Jesus was partially based on pagan stories such as that of Osiris. They said that Jesus organized his Jewish religion, the Jerusalem Church, into a secret society and had secret initiation ceremonies. They claim that Nazareth did not exist at the time and that Jesus of Nazareth is a mistranslation of Jesus the Nazarene. And that at the time the term Nazarene referred to Jesus and his followers the Jerusalem Church, rather than having anything to do with a city.

They said that they believed Masonry evolved out of the Knights Templar, a Roman Catholic military religious order. They said that the Knights Templar developed heretical beliefs because they were developed by Jews descended from the leaders of the Jerusalem Church who knew the true teachings of Jesus. This was why the Roman Catholic Church suppressed the Knights Templar. The Knights Templar then escaped from France to England, Scotland, and Ireland and became a secret society called the Masons.

[edit] The Second Messiah

In a sequel called The Second Messiah the authors continue their claims about the Knights Templar and Freemasonry. They claim to have discovered that the Turin Shroud is actually an image of Jacques de Molay, not of Jesus Christ. They claimed that the Knights Templar denied that Jesus was god in their initiation ceremonies because they were descended from the original Jewish followers of Jesus and therefore knew that he was a Jewish freedom fighter not a god. And they claimed that while the Roman Catholic Church chose St. Peter as its first pope there was another branch of Christianity that remained Jewish that chose St. Mary Magdalene as its first pope. They claim that this secret truth is encoded in tarot cards, which is why one of them has a female pope on it, according to the authors.

[edit] The Book of Hiram

In The Book of Hiram: Freemasonry, Venus, and the Secret Key to the Life of Jesus the authors go further about Hiram Abiff. They then investigate the story further and say that the Hiram Abiff who built King Solomon's Temple was involved in astrology. Because the ancient Jews believed in astrology and this was connected with the way King Solomon's Temple was specifically constructed.

[edit] Turning the Hiram Key

Most recently Lomas has continued his research into Masonic history, separately from Knight. In Turning the Hiram Key Lomas claimed that he had found a way to use that key to unlock the door of the secrets. In the book Lomas, who is also a scientific historian, connects Masonry with neurological science and expressed his belief that what Masonry is about is what is inside human souls individually and collectively.

[edit] Controversy

Lomas's theories about the origins of Freemasonry have caused controversy among Masonic historians. The romantic nature of his writings are reminiscent of other famous masonic authors such as the late J. S. Ward and Arthur Edward Waite. The Grand Lodge of British Columbia and Yukon is particularly critical of Lomas's work, as is Quatuor Coronati Lodge (The lodge of research attached to the United Grand Lodge of England), dubbing it "pseudo-history" and even "fiction". On the other hand, many Masons find Lomas's work interesting and worthy of further study. For example, the Grand Lodge of Queensland, Australia asked him to write a history of Freemasonry for its Masonic Training Module.^[9]

[edit] Inspiration of fictional work

According to an interview with Martin Faulks of Lewis Masonic, it is thought by some freemasons that Lomas might be the inspiration for the character of Dr. Robert Langdon, in Dan Brown's thriller, The Da Vinci Code. ^[10]

[edit] Works

[edit] Writing Alone

• Turning the Templar Key: The Secret Legacy of the Knights Templar and the Origins of Freemasonry.Fair Winds Press(October 25, 2007).ISBN 978-1592332793

Turning the Templar Key: The Secret Legacy of the Knights Templar and the Origins of Freemasonry.Lewis Masonic(October 13, 2007).ISBN 978-0853182863

• Turning the Solomon Key: George Washington,the Bright Morning Star and the Secrets of Masonic Astrology.Fair Winds Press (September 1, 2006).ISBN 978-1592332298
• The Secrets of Freemasonry: A Suppressed Tradition Revealed.Constable and Robinson (May 4, 2006).ISBN 978-1845293123
• Turning The Hiram Key: Making Darkness Visible.Lewis Masonic (April 1, 2005).ISBN 978-0853182399
• Freemasonry and the Birth of Modern Science.Fair Winds Press (March 2003).ISBN 978-1592330119
• The Invisible College: The Royal Society, Freemasonry and the Birth of Modern Science.Headline Book Publishing (January 7, 2002).ISBN 978-0747239697
• The Man Who Invented The Twentieth Century: Nikola Tesla, Forgotten Genius of Electricity.Headline Book Publishing (January 1999).ISBN 978-0747275886

[edit] With Geoffrey Lancaster

• Forecasting for Sales and Materials Management.Palgrave Macmillan (April 29, 1985).ISBN 978-0333365830

[edit] With Christopher Knight

• The Book Of Hiram: Freemasonry, Venus and the Secret Key to the Life of Jesus.Element Books Ltd. (January 25, 2004).ISBN 978-0007174683
• Uriel's Machine: The Ancient Origins of Science.Century (June 10,1999).ISBN 978-0712680073
• The Holy Grail, part of Mysteries Of The Ancient World: The Mysteries of the Ancient World Explored and Explained, June 1998. ISBN 0-297-82433-3
• The Second Messiah: Templars, The Turin Shroud and the Great Secret of Freemasonry, April 1997 ISBN 0-7126-7719-4
• The Hiram Key: Pharaohs, Freemasons and the Discovery of the Secret Scrolls of Jesus.Century, London (1996).ASIN B000VZPSSS ISBN 0-72126-8579-0

[edit] See also

• Freemasonry
• Rosslyn Chapel
• Christianity
• Lewis Masonic
• Uriel's machine

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Robert Lomas' official website
• Knight & Lomas official partnership website
• The Web of Hiram
• Grand Lodge of British Columbia and Yukon Article on The Hiram Key