The Nature of Freemasonry.

By Hubert S Box

Printed: 1952

Publisher: Augustine Press.London

Edition: First edition

Dimensions 15 × 22 × 2 cm
Language

Language: English

Size (cminches): 15 x 22 x 2

£54.00
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Item information

Description

In the original dustsheet. Red cloth binding with gilt title on the front board.

F.B.A. provides an in-depth photographic presentation of this item to stimulate your feeling and touch. More traditional book descriptions are immediately available.

red & gilt lettered cloth hardbound 8vo. ~ 8º (octavo).  first edition . nice copy of a scarce item.

Dr. Box is a scholar of repute whose book will be keenly read by those who have followed his campaign in the Convocation of Canterbury for an inquiry into the theological implications of Freemasonry. His criticisms of the Craft were described by a Priest and a loyal Mason in a letter to the Church Times (Dec. 14, 1951) as “penetrating and commendable. on which, as a Christian, I congratulate him”. The Nature of Freemasonry analyses with great learning the Masonic mythology; it follows the death~and~vengeance motif from the Craft through the lesser~known “higher degrees” of whose rituals the author has made a profound study. He draws striking and inescapable parallels between modern Freemasonry and the ancient mystery~religions. The author maintains that while there are many secrets which are legitimately private, so that it would be an act of impertinent aggression to attempt to pry into them, the secrets of Freemasonry are not of this sort. The innermost of them is concerned with the nature of God, and the others serve to safeguard this one by forming a protective fence round it. But to teach men about the nature of God is properly the responsibility of the Church, by virtue of its divine commission, so that the Church, being aware that some of its members are receiving instruction on the nature of God within the barricaded secrecy of a rival teaching body having no divine commission to exercise such a function, has the right to make inquiries as to the sort of instruction they are receiving. The reader is left in a state of complete bewilderment as to why the Church of England has so long tolerated Masonry unquestioned in her midst.

Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities and clients. Modern Freemasonry broadly consists of two main recognition groups:

Regular Freemasonry insists that a volume of scripture be open in a working lodge, that every member profess belief in a Supreme Being, that no women be admitted, and that the discussion of religion and politics not take place within the lodge.

Continental Freemasonry consists of the jurisdictions that have removed some, or all, of these restrictions.

The basic, local organisational unit of Freemasonry is the Lodge. These private Lodges are usually supervised at the regional level (usually coterminous with a state, province, or national border) by a Grand Lodge or Grand Orient. There is no international, worldwide Grand Lodge that supervises all of Freemasonry; each Grand Lodge is independent, and they do not necessarily recognise each other as being legitimate.

The degrees of Freemasonry retain the three grades of medieval craft guilds, those of Entered Apprentice, Journeyman or fellow (now called Fellowcraft), and Master Mason. The candidate of these three degrees is progressively taught the meanings of the symbols of Freemasonry and entrusted with grips, signs, and words to signify to other members that he has been so initiated. The degrees are part allegorical morality play and part lecture. These three degrees form Craft (or Blue Lodge) Freemasonry, and members of any of these degrees are known as Freemasons or Masons. There are additional degrees, which vary with locality and jurisdiction, and are usually administered by their own bodies (separate from those who administer the Craft degrees).

Due to misconceptions about Freemasonry’s tradition of not discussing its rituals with non-members, the fraternity has become associated with many conspiracy theories.

Condition notes

Dustsheet worn

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