Freemasonry and
Esoteric Movements
by Robert A. Gilbert, PPrSGD
A Lecture Delivered at the CMRC on 1 March 2000
We all know, of course, what Freemasonry is. The United Grand Lodge of
England, in a leaflet published by the Board of General Purposes in 1984,
defines it as:
One of the worlds oldest secular fraternal societies . a society of men
concerned with spiritual values. Its members are taught its precepts by a series
of ritual dramas, which follow ancient forms and use stonemasons customs and
tools as allegorical guides. The essential qualification for admission and
continuing membership is a belief in a Supreme Being. Membership is open to men
of any race or religion who can fulfill the essential qualification and are of
good repute. (What is Freemasonry?)
Now this is fine as far as it goes but we all know — or think that we know —
that there is more to it than this. Does not Freemasonry have an esoteric side
reserved for the elect?; are there not secret doctrines hidden within the
symbolism of the ceremonies?; are not the ceremonies of Initiation, Passing and
Raising quintessential rites of passage, with a basic structure having elements
in common with similar rituals of other cultures distant in both time and space
? To the last question I would answer yes, but to the others I give a decided
'No'.
Freemasonry is avowedly concerned with morality. Its symbols are interpreted
for the candidate in moral terms (thus, when the working tools are displayed in
the first degree, the candidate is told that 'we apply these tools to our
morals') and its ceremonies are effectively morality plays, stressing particular
virtues. Of course one can argue that the Third Degree is also a mortality
play, in that the candidate is reminded of his mortality when he is raised — he
is not symbolically resurrected from the dead, any more than Hiram
Abiff (whose sterling qualities of courage, integrity and steadfastness the
candidate is taught to emulate) is literally raised from the dead in the
traditional history that is related during the course of the ceremony. Hiram
Abiff is simply decently re-interred with the honour and respect due to him.
But what of the Tracing Boards ? Are there not esoteric interpretations of
the symbolism in these complex visual images ? Undoubtedly there are, but they
are not Masonic. The explanations given in the rituals of the three Craft
degrees relate solely to the legends of those degrees and to the symbols that
the candidate encounters in the course of the ceremonies (and here I fully
appreciate that I have put my audience in a 'Catch 22' situation; not all of you
are masons — or, at least, are not recognised as such by masons owing allegiance
to United Grand Lodge of England — and thus any mason who dissents from my
opinion cannot justify his dissent without breaching his various Obligations. Of
course he can, and probably will, take me up on the matter in private — but he
will still be wrong).
It is also possible to argue that what I am discussing is the Freemasonry of
1717 and afterwards, and that the esoteric wisdom of the pre-Grand Lodge era is
another matter. But is it ? Nowhere in the Old Charges — the manuscript
Constitutions of Masonry that predate, for the most part, the founding
of the Premier Grand Lodge — do we find any trace of secret doctrines. There are
Obligations to maintain secrecy, there are Catechisms, with explanations of the
signs, tokens and words, and unsophisticated rituals of the Craft degrees, but
that is all: secret teachings there are none.
If it is the case that Freemasonry is simply and solely a
system of moral teachings, inculcated in dramatic and catechetical form, then
how has it come to be so firmly linked in the popular mind with true secret
societies, and with the doctrines and practices of the myriad forms of occultism
? This state of affairs has come about, or so I believe, by misunderstanding and
by historical accident. Let us try to determine how.
As far as we can tell Freemasonry in its present form derives from a very
loosely associated group of masonic lodges that derived in turn, in form and
structure, if not in substance, and in a manner which we only imperfectly
understand, from associations of operative masons. These masonic bodies of the
mid to late 17th Century were not at all concerned with stone working; their
purpose seems rather to have been to practise and to promote mutual tolerance
between men who, for reasons of political and religious allegiance, might
otherwise have remained perpetually at a distance. [I should here point out that
other theories of the origin of Freemasonry have been advanced over the last two
hundred years. Some have argued for a derivation from ancient Egypt, others have
claimed that Freemasonry descends from the Knights Templar or from the
Rosicrucians, but none of those proposing these theories have offered any sound
evidence, documentary or otherwise] .The identity of their members remains
almost entirely unknown, and any solid proof of their ecumenical motives has yet
to be found. Even so, some significant concern with tolerance in a most
intolerant era seems to have been the driving force that motivated these
proto-masons. What ceremonies they observed, if any, we do not know — although
given the human psycho-spiritual need for ritual it is at least possible that
they sought to construct a secular substitute for the elaborate Catholic liturgy
that was lost at the time of the Reformation — nor do we know what symbols they
employed beyond those associated with building in general (the working tools)
and with one building in particular (King Solomon's Temple).
That they were all believing, orthodox Christians seems certain — there is no
evidence to the contrary — although they were probably drawn from the three
major divisions of the Christian faith then to be found in this country:
Anglican (or true in both doctrine and liturgical practice); Roman Catholic
(defective in doctrine); and Dissenting (defective in both doctrine and
practice) [You will rightly perceive that my qualifications reflect my own
preference for true Christianity ] Be that as it may, this proto-Masonry did not
include non-Christians: there were no Jewish brethren before 1721, and it
harboured neither pantheists, nor pagans, nor atheists. And if these men engaged
in philosophical speculation, then we have no record of it. What can be said,
and even this is no more than a strong probability, is that they sought to
ensure that England became and remained a cohesive and relatively tolerant
society at peace with itself (that in the early years of the Premier Grand Lodge
there were both Jacobite and loyalist freemasons tends to support this view).
Change came when Speculative Freemasonry was exported to the continent.
In France, in Germany and in the Habsburg Empire, Freemasonry was taken up
with gusto by the aristocracy but it was viewed in a different and very
un-English light. While for us it was an instrument of egalitarianism and social
cohesion, Freemasonry for continental aristocrats was to become a sign of their
elitism. Not content with simple morality plays, or with emulating artisans,
these European freemasons grafted on the ethos, legends and presumed rituals of
the old Orders of Chivalry. In this they had been inspired by the Oration of the
Chevalier Ramsay, first delivered in 1737.
Ramsay maintained that Freemasonry had descended not from operative stone
masons, but from knights returning from the Crusades — he did not attribute it
to the Knights Templar — and he offered no hint of any esoteric doctrines. He
may have hoped that this would make the Order acceptable to the papacy, but if
that was so then he signally failed: in 1738, after the promulgation of the
anti-masonic papal Bull, In Eminente, Ramsay's Oration was
publicly burned at Rome. After this event Ramsay disappeared from the masonic
scene, valuing loyalty to his Church above his enthusiasm for the Craft.
This attribution to Freemasonry of an elite origin, and the hostility of the
papacy (which had, four hundred years before, disbanded the Knights Templar and
burned their Grand Master) may have led some continental masons to
look upon Freemasonry as a suitable vehicle for transmitting secret doctrines of
their own devising. And given that a form of Rosicrucianism, the Brotherhood of
the Golden and Rosy Cross, based upon alchemical practices, was active in
Germany after 1710, it is possible that the Rosicrucian myth with its secret
vault and mysterious book, was grafted, in part if not in whole, upon some
altered, chivalric form of Freemasonry. Altered still further such a version of
Freemasonry may lie behind the establishment in England of either
or both the Royal Arch and the Royal Order of Scotland. If so, was this hybrid
still justly called Freemasonry, or had it become an esoteric movement?
Even if it had, its return to prosaic English society with its traditional,
robust form of Freemasonry would have strangled any tender, esoteric vine it
might have contained. What happened on the continent was another matter. Craft
masonry was both widespread and orthodox, but there was also a proliferation of
Hauts Grades, Higher Degrees that owed little to Masonry and much
to esotericism. Should these be categorised as esoteric movements, and did they
then or at a later date exercise an influence upon the ethos and practice of
true Freemasonry?
Before attempting to answer these questions it is about time that I defined
the term 'esoteric movements' I have deliberately avoided the more specific and
narrow terms of 'secret society' or 'Hermetic' or 'Esoteric Order', not so that
I can be like Humpty Dumpty and make the words mean just what I say they mean,
but in order to include institutions that are not predicated upon ceremonial
working as well as those that are. So, what is an esoteric movement ?
Essentially it is an institution (one of the 'instituted mysteries' in A. E.
Waite's words) that forms a legitimate part of the Western Mystery Tradition; in
other words, it is a communal spiritual path that seeks to undo the Fall of Man,
to return to the presence of God and to attain the union of the created with its
creator. Its doctrines are an exposition of the nature of the Fall and of the
Way of Return, while its practices are concerned with actively finding that Way.
A definition that I once gave of the secret part of the Mysteries of Eleusis,
will also fit the practices of most esoteric movements, which are
designed to bring the initiate to an awareness of the holy and of the
timeless state in which it exists, and for him to gain a secret wisdom which
must not be shared with the outside, uninitiated world (R.A. Gilbert,
Elements of Mysticism, 1991, pp4-5)
One might add that such secret wisdom entailed a means of access to a
gnosis, a secret knowledge that helped the initiate to understand the
mechanics of the fall (however it may have been expressed mythologically) and to
comprehend the relationship between the spiritual and material worlds, their
distinct natures, and the correspondences that exist between them.
Thus defined, Esoteric Movements could include such diverse institutions as
the Cathar Church of the early Middle Ages, which had doctrines and rituals
reserved for its perfecti; the Rosicrucian Fraternity, which may
never have had any outward, objective existence before 1710; the Philadelphian
Society of the late 17th Century, which was not a secret society, but whose
doctrines were secret by virtue of being incomprehensible to the uninitiated;
and the secret, esoteric Order par excellence, the Hermetic Order
of the Golden Dawn. But they could not include Freemasonry.
Freemasonry does not seek to dictate the faith of its members, and while it
offers the hope of a future life, it does not seek a return to, or attainment of
organic unity with God. Its ceremonies are designed to inculcate moral messages
in the candidate, not to stimulate a numinous experience. So were the
Hauts Grades esoteric or masonic? They seem to have been something of a
hybrid: leaning towards Freemasonry in form and structure, and towards
esotericism in substance, i.e. in their philosophical and
spiritual content. Out of such hybrids some true esoteric movements were
certainly born. Sigmund Richter's Gold and Rosy Cross of 1710 was reborn in
1757, with rituals clearly based on masonic forms but with a doctrinal content
that was wholly alchemical (in the sense of spiritual alchemy) and kabbalistic.
It survived until the end of the 18th century but never took root in this
country; indeed, English Masonry remained firmly prosaic throughout the
quarrels, divisions and final grand Union of its first one hundred years.
Such esoteric activity as took place in England in the 18th Century was
discreet and low-key, there were no obvious equivalents of the Hauts
Grades, no organised Rosicrucianism and no neo-gnostic Societies. Was
this because Freemasonry was more congenial to the English temperament ?
Possibly, but Britain was also one United Kingdom, without the plethora of petty
principalities and multiplicity of socially stratified courtiers. For the most
part only those who can afford to spend time on esoteric pursuits actually take
them up and in this country there were simply not enough educated and
financially independent men and women to engage in unorthodox spiritual paths.
As religious, political and social emancipation gradually progressed in the 19th
Century, but much faster than was the case in Europe, for all that it was
gradual, so were true esoteric movements established in this country.
Many of them, such as the Behmenist groups around James Pierrepont Greaves
and Edward and Anne Penny, had no ceremonial content and did not draw from
Freemasonry. Even for ceremonial magicians and practical occultists such as
Ebenezer Sibly and Frederick Hockley, there was no crossover between their
masonic and esoteric pursuits — and certainly no fusion of them.
Not until the dead hand of the Duke of Sussex was lifted from English
Freemasonry could any meaningful attempt be made to introduce the additional
degrees to this country. And when they were introduced, starting with the
Ancient & Accepted Rite in 1845, they remained firmly in orthodox masonic hands
and maintained a strict masonic ethos. Only with the founding of the masonic
Rosicrucian Society, the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia, in 1866 was there a
serious attempt to unite esotericism and Freemasonry; or rather there was in
1878 after the death of the Society's founder, Robert Wentworth Little. The
S.R.I.A. derived from a pre-existing Scottish Society which claimed descent from
a still earlier English Society that apparently flourished in the 1 850s and
that demanded no masonic qualification for membership, but Little had striven to
make it an adjunct of a purely masonic Order, the Red Cross of Rome and
Constantine. He had no great personal interest in occultism in general or
Rosicrucianism in particular, any more than did his co-founder, W.J. Hughan, who
was essentially an orthodox masonic historian with no great enthusiasm for
esoteric pursuits although he did contribute papers on early Rosicrucian texts
to the Society's journal, The Rosicrucian, Some early members,
notably Kenneth Mackenzie and F.G. Irwin, did lean more towards occultism than
to Freemasonry, but it was Little's successors in the office of Supreme Magus
who brought about a real change.
They, in the persons of Dr. William Woodman and William Wynn Westcott,
were dedicated ocultists for whom esoteric pursuits were more important
than masonic activities. Still, as its members will testify the S.R.I.A. clearly
owes much of its ritual structure to that of the masonic Ancient & Accepted
Rite. In like manner, when Westcott and Woodman, aided and abetted by Samuel
Liddell Mathers, also a prominent member of the S.R.I.A., founded the Hermetic
Order of the Golden Dawn in 1888 they accomplished a fusion of elements from
Freemasonry with those from more strictly esoteric Orders and Societies. The
ceremonial structure, layout of the Temple and Regalia of the Golden Dawn draw
heavily upon those of the masonic Royal Arch: for example, there are very close
similarities between the robes, sceptres and positions in the Temple of the
three Principals in a Royal Arch Chapter, and those of the Imperator,
Praemonstrator and Cancellarius of a Golden Dawn Temple. Those familiar with
both bodies will also note the parallels between the banners and the central
altar of each. But in terms of ethos and teachings the Golden Dawn was - and
presumably still is — essentially esoteric. So did the fusion of two disparate
types of institution work ? In pragmatic terms, yes, it did — but not because
there is any esoteric element in masonry, it worked simply because the
structural elements, the psycho-dynamics, of initiatic rituals are basically the
same wherever and whenever they are worked.
In any true ceremony of initiation most, if not all, of the following
elements will be present:
- The candidate will enter in darkness so that the unfolding ceremony brings
him into light.
- He (or she) will undergo a numerically significant symbolic journey
involving tests and trials; the ritual use of musical sound (usually the
unaccompanied human voice); and the stimulation of the senses of touch
(perhaps with a symbolic weapon) and smell (incense).
- He will give an Obligation to keep secret what he has learned and
undergone and to accept the responsibilities of his new situation [he is, of
course, unable to divulge the essence of his inner experience of
the ceremony as that is, by its very nature, incommunicable to another]
- He will be entrusted with secret knowledge (both practical in the form of
signs of recognition; and theoretical as he begins the process of acquiring
secret wisdom).
- He will be welcomed into his new peer group in sacramental form (usually
by sharing a sacred meal).
It will be immediately apparent to freemasons that the theoretical part of
element (4) and the whole of element (5) are absent from masonic rituals of
initiation, unless the purely social festive board is taken to represent a
shared sacred meal — a parallel difficult to justify for those with experience
of masonic dining.
What, then, can be deduced from this comparison of masonic and esoteric
institutions, and quick gallop through their respective histories ? We must
conclude, I maintain, that they are very different animals. There are indeed,
clear parallels and elements possessed in common: but any organisation must have
a hierarchy, if only for the sake of administration, while the working of
ceremonies — irrespective of their function -requires an established structure
and regalia to identify those taking part. Symbols that convey new or unfamiliar
concepts to the candidate in non-verbal form are the common currency of all
ceremonial, whatever the message that they are designed to convey. The
differences between the two are, however, more pronounced.
In Freemasonry the ceremonies are designed to convey a series of simple moral
precepts — nothing more and nothing less. There is no progressive unfolding of
secret knowledge, nor a progressive revelation through experience of the
rituals, and there is a metaphorical rather than an actual change of
psycho-spiritual state within the candidate (that is not to deny the possibility
that some initiates into Masonry may have experienced such a
change; for the generality this is not so).
There are also other significant differences. Freemasonry is essentially an
'open' organisation: it does not hide the fact of its existence or require its
members to conceal the fact of their membership; it openly declares its aims and
objects; it makes no secret of the fact that it works ceremonies of initiation
to inculcate and reinforce its moral message, and it simply keeps private the
specific content of the ceremonies; it has no secret doctrines and its only
'secrets' are the signs of recognition used in the ceremonial context; it does
not intrude upon or seek to change the belief systems or spiritual practices of
its members. To most of its members Freemasonry is a social club with charitable
aims that reinforces moral precepts with the aid of ritual. In short, it fulfils
a different need and performs a completely different function from that of an
esoteric movement.
Compared with Freemasonry esoteric movements are closed systems. Their
doctrines, practices and membership are reserved from the outside world, and
even their very existence may be kept secret. This secrecy is not for any
dubious reason, but to keep private what cannot manifest except in an enclosed
environment in which there can be an effective psycho-spiritual interaction of
the members of the Order or Society in question. There is also a progressive
unfolding of secret knowledge, or gnosis, which is made meaningful by way of
ritual experience and the discipline of private spiritual practice (e.g.
prayer, meditation and spiritual exercises such as those laid down by St.
Ignatius Loyola). In general terms esoteric movements are illuminating,
revelatory and spiritually revolutionary, whereas Freemasonry is prosaic and
representative of orthodoxy and the mores of the established social order.
The question remains, can they mix ? are they compatible ? Speaking from
personal experience, no, they are not. It would be invidious to identify the
bodies concerned, but I can emphasise the lack of compatibility between masonic
Orders and esoteric movements by the following examples. I have watched one
masonic body attempt to engraft esoteric principles and practices on to its
workings, with peculiarly disastrous results: the problem seems to be compounded
by the ritual ineptitude of most of the officers, but for the candidate (who was
not myself) the consequence was to nullify any psycho-spiritual effect that
there might have been. Similarly the intrusion of bovine 'knife and fork' masons
into a truly spiritual rite within Freemasonry is invariably an unmitigated
disaster. I have watched with dismay the erosion of its true ethos within one
masonic body that meets on the European mainland; it is chivalric in essence,
and its purpose is to guide candidates towards their own spiritual regeneration,
but when the numerical balance of members became weighted towards the 'knife and
fork' tendency, regeneration slid towards degeneration and the rite in question
— in this specific instance — has become a mere shell, devoid of meaning and
empty of any spiritual presence. Its secret word should now be 'Ichabod'
(i.e. 'The Glory has departed').
Perhaps Masonry has become too materialistic and Esoteric Movements have
become too idealistic, but whatever the reasons, the two paths are essentially
incompatible. One can walk down either on different occasions (I am happily
involved in many masonic bodies, and equally as many esoteric movements; and
with one exception I am happy to tell you — in private — what they are), but one
cannot ride both of these horses at the same time. Eventually one path loses its
attractions and the other beckons more enticingly: then it is time to decide
which path to follow. As with Lazarus and Dives in the parable (you will know
the story — the consequence of a rich man being unable to pass through the gate
of heaven just as his camel failed the needle's eye test) there is a great gulf
fixed between the two, but which of them is epitomised by Lazarus and which by
Dives, I cannot say. Or rather, diplomacy demands that I shall not.
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