Freemasonry: A Very Short Introduction - Andreas Önnerfors 2017

Historical legacies

There is no coherent ideology or doctrine of freemasonry. Rather, the fraternity is characterized by a considerable conceptual inclusiveness promoting an ethics of action; that is, an ethics of application rather than theory. Another joint feature of the ideas in freemasonry is that they all aim to promote processes of real and imagined community building, establishing bonds between individuals, and across nations and epochs historically. Throughout the centuries, freemasonry has absorbed concepts of the past as much as those of its present age. Thus a unique eclectic mix has been established that embraces central ingredients of Western thought and appears in multiple layers. Ideas in freemasonry are mainly manifested through the live performance of ritual and a specific visual culture whereby ideas are expressed through symbols, emblems, and interior design. The idea of the secret and of secrecy is of paramount importance in freemasonry, both as an organizing principle and in the transfer of knowledge. Over the centuries, masonic ideas have also been set out in writing—in books, orations, and songs as well as in an abundance of sources in the periodical press.

The first of these layers of ideas has a strong medieval connection in two peculiar regards, one imagined and one real. Modern freemasonry inherited its organizational structures, symbols, and mythologies from medieval craft guilds, tying it directly to the unified and holistic worldview of the Middle Ages. This worldview is essentially Christian in character, meaning that human or secular events and actions are placed within a divine or sacred framework of explanations which are represented as being the outcome of ’intelligent design’ (see Figure 3). Apart from this strongly religious commitment, which particularly influenced the master builders of European cathedrals, medieval craft guilds composed their own mythological histories. The master topic of masonic mythology was the Temple of Solomon in the Old Testament, since it provided a sacred biblical reference to the building profession.

3. God as the architect of the world (1400s).

The second medieval connection was constructed in retrospect during the 18th century, and comprised a presumed link to the orders of knighthood in general and to the Knights Templar (disbanded in 1307—14) in particular. This imagined genealogy has proved to be extremely powerful within freemasonry and has indeed fired the imagination of external viewers. The idea that freemasonry represents a continuation of medieval knighthood can be understood on several levels: as a playground for fanciful imagination, as a sign that Enlightenment elites feared loss of social status, or as the development of a new utopian and self-conscious elitism in opposition to those of Crown and Church.

However, the question of how far freemasonry represents or ought to represent explicit Christian references was and still is a matter of debate, since professing to belong to a particular denomination would collide with the universal, tolerant, and inclusive ethos of the fraternity. When it comes to religion, three directions developed during the past few centuries, in principle. Some grand lodges and rites require a confession of Christian faith, some require belief in an unspecified supreme being (and hence some form of religious confession), and some do not ask their members for any specific belief (leaving the matter of belief in a supreme being or god entirely to the individual conscience). To these general positions, it must be added that at the turn of the 19th century, freemasonry developed a considerable interest in theosophy and pagan religious traditions, not least inspired by a surge of interest in Egyptian and Indian religions.

During the Renaissance, the unified worldview of the Middle Ages was slowly replaced with a new appreciation of Europe’s classical past, bringing back Greek and Roman philosophy to form the core of intellectual culture in general, and of the arts and aesthetics in particular. The Renaissance also opened up an appreciation for what we would today call ’esoteric’ practices; making them an integrated part of a general culture of knowledge rather than keeping them separate from what modernity defined as pure sciences.