Transactions of the Discovery Lodge of Research No. 971, United Grand Lodge of New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory direct descendant of the Research Lodge of New South Wales and the Sydney Lodge of Research The lodge generally meets in the Sydney Masonic Centre on the first Thursday of alternate months March (Installation), May, July, September & November, at 7 pm. Dress: lounge suit, lodge tie, regalia. Master WBro Ewart Stronach Secretary VWBro Neil Wynes Morse, KL PO Box 7077, Farrer, ACT 2607 ph. H (+61) (2) 6286 3482, M 0438 288 997 email: [email protected] website: http://www.discoverylodge.org/ Foundation member of the Australian & New Zealand Masonic Research Council website: http://anzmrc.org/ Volume 4 Number 1 March 2012 How the medieval way of life affected our Masonic rituals 20 September 2011 by RWBro Rodney Grosskopff, KL (South Africa) Religion Religion played an enormous part in the life of medieval society; however, it had none of the freedom we enjoy today. There was one established Church and you belonged to it, or died. It was as simple as that. Heresy Heretics were not tolerated; they were put to death in the most painful ways. That great sixteenth-century intellectual, Sir Thomas More, put the matter very clearly. He believed that heretics should be burned alive, that ‘Princes should punish them according to justice, by a most painful death’, both as a punishment for heresy and as a deterrent to others.1 In England, being burnt alive at the stake was considered a sufficient punishment for a heretic.2 Later Henry VIII thought being hung, drawn and quartered was more appropriate. His daughter Elizabeth was not sure, but reluctantly accepted the advice of her secretary of state, Lord Burghley, when he assured her that with an efficient executioner, death by hanging, drawing and quartering could be very painful and prolonged.3 In Spain they were more imaginative. In the Prado museum in Madrid there is a painting called ‘St Dominic converts a heretic’ by an anonymous painter; there we see the saint himself, halo and all, with a burning torch under the poor heretic’s privates. In those days you could be branded a heretic for reasons that to us appear to be stupid, for instance: If you thought priests should be able to marry. Being a follower of Calvin and Luther, because they believed that salvation came by faith, not—as the established Church did—by good works. Of course, the best of those good works was undoubtedly to give money to the Church so that priests could pray for you. It was dangerous to follow Calvin and Luther. Disagreeing on the meaning of communion and who could take it. The Catholics branded anyone who did not agree with them as heretics, especially the Protestants. The Church of England, when it came to their turn, branded as heretics those Papists who would not acknowledge the king as head of the Church. The Protestants, when they got to power in the Low Countries, tortured the Papists. Basically, you could be accused of heresy if you questioned anything. The first charge imposed on the masons by their guilds required them to do their duty to God by avoiding all heresy. I think you could conclude that the Church had their serious attention. Masonry has often been accused of being a religion or making a substitute religion or trying to combine religions. You will agree that in the early days they would look at the religion as the basis of their practice; however, you will also see that they would flee from any thought of practicing an alternate religion. You will easily see how the blood-curdling penalties used by the masons for disclosing their secrets would have been included in early rituals. In fact the Masonic penalties were quite tame in comparison with everyday occurrences. 1 Ridley, p10. 2 op cit, p11. 3 Bardon Papers 45. 2 Religious involvement You will agree that the established Church had some hefty ammunition to bring one to heel. Some individuals had their own beliefs but kept their disagreement quiet, some only confessing it on their deathbeds, or in letters to their heirs. So everyone believed and belonged to the established Church; they attended church regularly and certainly believed its teachings without question. All the livery companies belonged to the church, not the least of which were the masons. The church became their main preoccupation, its festivals were the highlights of their lives. Other than a bit of good wassailing now and again, and the odd market day, the church was their entertainment, their education, and would have absorbed all of their free time. The Masons Company of Newcastle annually acted the mistery play ‘The Burial of Our Lady the Virgin’ on Corpus Christi Day. The Masons Company of Chester acted with the Goldsmiths Company in ‘The Destroying of the Children by Herod’.4 You must also appreciate that the main source of employment for the masons was the Church, followed closely by the Crown—an added incentive not to rock the boat. Their employment on church buildings was usually at the behest of an enthusiastic cleric who expected them to be caught up in the fire of his divine endeavour—often his personal ambition. They were in a church environment; they would have thrown themselves totally into its activities. Where there was no church yet, they would have taken it with them, in the sense that they would have continued its practices and festivals on their own. They would have also used its teachings in their own practice. Isolation The masons were often isolated by society and geography, which drew them into a tight community of their own. Socially the local townsfolk would have regarded them with suspicion; inevitably their stay would be limited and they would move on, which turned them into outsiders and interlopers. Even today in England and Europe, particularly in little towns, one is regarded as a foreigner for decades. Recently I was in Bath, staying in a cute little hotel run by a South African; she had been there for six years and greeted us as fellow aliens. In medieval times it must have been much worse. The masons often found themselves out in the countryside, whether by impressment at a minimum wage, being forced to work for the good of the country—for example: Henry VIII’s fortifications on the Kent Coast or his Nonsuch Palace in Surrey;5 Edward’s forts along the Scottish borders; Cardinal Wolsey’s Cardinal College (later King’s College and now Christ Church) at Oxford—or simply because the work was out in the country, and they went there of their own free will to work on great country houses for noblemen as well as princes of the Church—such as Cardinal Wolsey’s Hampton Court; castles and manor houses for the nobility; Longleat, for Sir John Thynne; Warkworth Castle for the Duke of Northumberland; Tattershall Castle for Baron Cromwell, Lord High Treasurer to Henry VI;6—or numerous churches in little towns, which later became cathedrals around which large towns grew. Whether it was in the town or out in the country, it is virtually certain that in those days they would have been forced into their own company. They were forced to govern themselves; an indiscretion by one of their number would affect them all. They were also forced to look out for one another, to educate their children, to look after the injured and indigent, to look after the families of those who died. This led to an organisation which disciplined, taught and cared for its members. The Church’s social control The Church then was different from the church we know today. For centuries the Christian Church upheld the class structure of society, teaching men of all social classes that they were equal in the sight of God. Yet, in his infinite wisdom, God had ordained that some of his beloved children should be princes and rulers, whilst others whom he loved just as much, should be subjects, some should be rich 4 Ridley, p9. 5 Treasures of Britain, p27. 6 Fletcher, p398. 3 and some poor, some masters and slaves; the rulers should however realise that their privileged position had been given them by God, and should humble themselves before God. So for centuries Christian kings had crept to the Cross on Good Friday, advancing on their knees to a statue of Christ, and they washed the feet of beggars on Maundy Thursday.7 This unequal equality has found its way into our Freemasonry. We know we are all equal yet somehow we have created a body so full of ranks that outsiders have difficulty grasping it, and even our newly admitted brethren need time to work it out. We welcome aristocratic brethren with obsequious flattery; we promote our members, some of humble backgrounds, and treat them as aristocrats. Equality speaks of democracy, yet we have virtually no democracy, and it all works because we train all our members to be aristocrats. Enlightenment The ability to read was confined to the Church and the aristocracy; it was convenient to tell the people what they should believe. Even such literacy as existed was made more difficult by being in Latin. Translations of the Bible were burned. Sir Thomas More and other official prosecutors were concerned that if people read the Bible they would regard the Bible, not the Church, as the authority which they must obey.8 Clearly, the medieval mason was a regular churchman, and could not exist without the Church (whether he agreed or not).