Special thanks to George Helmer FPS

FREEMASONRY AND THE MEN'S HOUSE

BY BRO. H.L. HAYWOOD

THE BUILDER - 1923

Part 2 of 2

These initiations differ strikingly among themselves,
nevertheless they one and all have certain fundamental
features in common.  In one paragraph of a brilliant treatise
on Initiation, in Hasting's Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics
(Vol. VII, p. 317), Count Goblet d'Alvielia, who stands so high
among European Masonic scholars, furnishes a list of these
features:

"The formalities of initiation, whether its dominant function is
magical or religious, present striking resemblances.  Andrew
Lang notes the following general characteristics: (a) mystic
dances; (b) the use of the turndun, or bull-roarer; (c) daubing
with clay and washing this off; (d) performance with serpents
and other 'mad doings.' To these we might add: (e) a
simulation of death and resurrection; (f) the granting of a
new name to the initiated; (g) the use of masks or other
disguises.  In any case, we may say that initiation
ceremonies include: (1) a series of formalities which loosen
the ties binding the neophyte to his former environment; (2)
another series of formalities admitting him to the
superhuman world; (3) an exhibition of sacred objects and
instruction on subjects relating to them; (4) re-entry or
reintegration rites, facilitating the return of the neophyte into
the ordinary world.  These rites, especially those of the first
three divisions, are found fulfilling a more or less important
function in all initiation ceremonies, both savages and
among the civilized."

Whence came these secret clubs? Did they all originate from
one center? N.W. Thomas, writing in Volume XI of Hasting's
Encyclopedia, page 297, offers a reply with which most
authorities would agree:

"We may perhaps sum up the position by saying that to trace
all secret societies to a single origin, is probably as mistaken
as to trace all forms of religion to a single source or to seek
to unlock all the mythologies by a single key.  It seems clear
that age grades, burial clubs, initiation schools, religious
confraternities, occupation groups, and magical societies
have all contributed to the mass of diverse elements
grouped under secret societies; it cannot be definitely laid
down that any one of these took an earlier type as a model;
as we find all in their rudimentary stages in various parts of
Africa, we must, unless we suppose that these rudiments are
derived from the fully developed societies of other tribes,
suppose that they are the seed from which, in other areas,
secret societies have been evolved and that all are equally
primitive, though not necessarily equally old."

III - DID FREEMASONRY EVOLVE FROM THE MEN'S
HOUSE?

When secret societies appear among barbarian and half
civilized peoples they retain many of the fundamental
features described in the above pages, but at the same time
become strikingly different and often are used for entirely
different purposes.  All readers of Masonic literature are
familiar with the story of the Druids, the Druses, the Culdees,
the Assassins, etc. etc.: also the numberless secret societies
of China, which, it appears in the majority of cases, are
political in character rather than moral or religious.  These
barbarian, or semi-civilized organizations, have their grades,
signs, secrets, pass-words and initiation ceremonies, as
have all the others, and there is no need in this connection
that we particularize among them or pay them any further
attention.

The reader will already have noted a certain similarity
between some of these associations and our own.  In some
cases these similarities are so striking that they almost
amount to identity, as when one of our Masonic signs is
found in the possession of some savage cult. Tales of how
Masons have saved their lives or gained other advantages
among savage peoples through use of one of the Masonic
signs, have been among the stock stories of our literature for
many years.

A sensational use of these facts has been recently made by
Brother J.S.M. Ward in his Freemasonry and the Ancient
Gods, published in 1921.  Brother Ward boldly takes the
position that the primitive secret societies such as those
described above are to be considered an integral part of
Freemasonry, or vice versa.  He makes this position plain in
the following words: "Boldly this is my contention, that our
present system is derived originally from the primitive
initiatory rites of our prehistoric ancestors.  I base this
contention on the fact that many of our most venerated signs
and symbols, grips and tokens, are used today by savage
races with precisely the same meaning as with us.  I cannot
agree with those who would contend that it is either a matter
of coincidence or else that they are purely natural signs
which express simple elementary sentiments." This
statement appears on page 119 of his book.  On 123 he
repeats it in other words: "My contention, then, is that
Freemasonry derives originally from those primitive rites
which first taught a boy whence he came, then prepared him
to be a useful member of society, and finally taught him how
to die and that death did not end all.  On these primitive rites,
I consider, man built up the mysteries and the various
religious faiths of the ancient world some of which have
survived to the present day, while others have developed
into other religions, Christianity included." The thesis is
developed in still other words on page viii of his Preface
where he says: "Briefly, the theory I venture to propound is
that Freemasonry originated in the primitive initiatory rites of
prehistoric man, and from those rites have been built up all
the ancient mysteries, and thence all the modern religious
systems.  It is for this reason that men of all religious beliefs
can enter Freemasonry; and, further, the reason we admit no
women is that these rites were originally initiatory rites of
men; the women had their own.  These, for sociological
reasons perished, while those of the men survived, and
developed into the mysteries."

If Brother Ward could make good his thesis, he would bring
about a complete revolution in anthropology.  A secret
society that has existed in all parts of the world through all
the many centuries of history, would be the most stupendous
facts known to sociology and would necessitate a complete
revision of our social theories.  The thing is too stupendous
to have happened.  In order to make out that Freemasonry
as we now know it is in solidarity with all these other secret
fraternities, it is necessary to stretch the facts at almost
every point; to fill in the gaps with guesses and hypotheses;
and to read into the ceremonies of the primitive tribes many
meanings and purposes that they have never been capable
of entertaining.

It was made abundantly plain in the quotations given above
from various authorities that all secret societies have a
culture in common and in the nature of the case inevitably
make use of signs, symbols, ceremonies, degrees, lodges,
initiations, etc., so that if a new secret society comes into
existence, created ab initio by its own members, it will
necessarily have many features in common with other
similar organizations, so that always a little imagination will
make it easy for men to believe that what has been recently
created has existed elsewhere for many centuries.  Nothing
is easier than to create traditions and ancient history for a
secret cult; and that because it is furnished with the many
usages that other secret cults have employed in past times.
Freemasonry is no exception to this rule.  Almost everything
in it can be paralleled in the possessions of similar societies
that existed hundreds of years ago and always there is the
temptation to borrow the authority and prestige of antiquity.
Oftentimes one finds attributed to a very ancient day
symbols that were created, according to our positive
knowledge in recent times.  "The Virgin Weeping Over A
Broken Column is a case in point here.  It was devised by
American Mason about one hundred years ago, but only
recently I read a learned article which sought to show that
this symbol had been borrowed by Freemasonry from the
Ancient Mysteries.

Brother Ward tries to prove that the Higher Grades are as
ancient as the Craft Degrees.  To an American reader,
familiar with the history of the Scottish Rite, his case is not
fortunate.  We know that Albert Pike himself, alone and
unaided created a great deal of the lofty and beautiful
structure of the Scottish Rite ritual, so that it has been said of
him that he found the Scottish Rite a log cabin and left it a
marble palace.  But there are many things in the Scottish
Rite ceremonies older than history, someone may argue.
Truly enough, but we know how they came there: Albert Pike
took them from his own great learning of the ancient books.
Much of the material is very old but the structure into which it
is built and the use to which it is put, date from the labours of
Albert Pike, or else from his immediate predecessors.

The real crux in all this discussion may be thrown into the
form of the question, How old is Masonry? This question
never loses its vitality and seems to hold an inexhaustible
fascination for Masons.  The answer depends upon the
meaning we attribute to the word Masonry.  If by Masonry
we mean any kind of secret organization, then it is as old as
the world.  If it is used of any secret society that employs
some of our signs or symbols, then it may be traced here
and there into many lands and through many centuries.  If it
is used in the strictest sense to indicate a man that has been
initiated into a regular lodge of symbolical Freemasonry
working under the authority of a regular Grand Lodge, then
Freemasonry is only two hundred years old.  If it is to be
used of organizations with which this modern speculative
Freemasonry can trace an undeniable historical continuity,
then it may be dated from the twelfth or thirteenth centuries.
Of one thing we can be sure, the men's house, a lodge in
which brethren meet behind tiled doors, is not a modern,
artificial thing but springs out of human nature itself, to
satisfy the needs that have been felt ever since man began
to be.

| top | back |