Freemasonry and Caodaism

Freemasonry is a social fraternity that studies morality through ritual, symbol and allegory; its main tenets are faith, hope and charity and focuses on the development of a man's moral and spiritual character. It is not a religion, so what religious path a mason chooses is his own affair. A deeper interpretation of the craft and its allegory, ritual, signs and symbols, allude to a more spiritual or esoteric undertone to the catechism of the fraternity. Thus, it can be assumed that the true masonic experience is not on the surface, but veiled underneath and leads to an inner mystical life journey. The Grand Lodge of Ohio states: " As a fraternal organization, Freemasonry unites men of good character who, though of different religious, ethnic, or social backgrounds, share a belief in the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of mankind. The traditions of Freemasonry are founded upon the building of King Solomon's Temple, and its fraternal ceremonies use the working tools of the stonemasons to symbolize moral lessons and truths. For example, Masons are reminded at Lodge to "meet upon the level of equality, act by the plumb of uprightness, and part upon the square of virtue." The degrees of freemasonry retain the three grades of medieval craft guilds, the Entered Apprentice, journeyman or fellow (now called Fellowcraft), and Master Mason. On becoming a Master Mason today, one is eligible to expand his knowledge in concordant bodies, which expound on the foundation provided by the three main degrees. While the actual origin of the craft is somewhat obscure, many believe it to cover three phases. First, the emergence of organized lodges of operative masons during the Middle Ages, then the admission of lay members as "accepted" or speculative masons, and finally the evolution of purely speculative lodges, and the emergence of Grand Lodges to govern them. As said on Wikipedia of the origin of Freemasonry:

This paper is about the emergence of Freemasonry with special reference to the American and French Revolutions.

Set of works by Spanish historians in the history of Freemasonry, education and culture on various topics. The book is published in two editions (Spanish and English).

Revista de Estudios Históricos de la Masonería Latinoamericana y Caribeña, 2016

Resumen Si la masonería belga era una sociabilidad a problemática durante una gran parte del siglo XVII, esta dinámica se transformó a partir de la anexión de Bélgica a Francia y a los Países Bajos a finales del siglo XVIII y durante las primeras décadas del XIX. Un conjunto de nuevas logias con una gran cantidad de nuevos miembros, principalmente burgueses generaron progresivamente una masonería que iba a ser cada vez más anticlerical y políticamente abierta como el núcleo duro del partido liberal del país. En este artículo muestra cómo durante la secularización de sus discursos y prácticas, el Gran Oriente belga estaba a la vanguardia de lo que comúnmente se llamó la masonería "latina". Sin embargo, aprincipios del siglo XX, cuando la democracia de masas cambió la identidad del país y las primeras simpatías socialistas se desarrollaron en las logias, se inició un proceso de despolitización, más o menos completado, después de la Primera Guerra Mundial. La configuración masónica belga entonces tendió a la fragmentación. Este proceso se inició a principios del siglo XX y continuó hasta los inicios del XXI, donde los debates sobre la cuestión de la regularidad y aún más por la impugnación de la exclusividad de género de las grandes logias masculinas por las masonerías mixtas o femeninas. Si bien se rompió la antigua unidad organizativa, sin embargo, se pudo desarrollar una convivencia relativamente benigna.

The Caodaism that appeared in Việt Nam in the 1920s has been the subject of several studies by foreign historians and anthropologists. But its early break-up into many branches and the secret of the practice of its esotericism were barriers to a true understanding of this new religion. Most of the texts of the foreign researchers focused on the Caodaism of the Tây Ninh branch, the only one to have owned an army and to have been involved in the war of independence against the French colonizer and that against the Vietnamese communists. This Caodaism has become under the pen of many "the" Caodaism. While there are still many other branches and organizations whose activities have always been purely religious and the fundamentals are what was revealed during the first years of the birth of this religion, far from the pantheon of "saints" venerated only in Tây Ninh: Victor Hugo, Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm, SunYat Sen,... This article is the result of the research of a caodaist from a family of caodaists, therefore bathed in this religion since his childhood. Its objective is to make Caodaism better known, to bring it out of interpretations that are far from reality. Are exposed here the spirituality, the organization, the history of this religion.

The humanism of the European Renaissance, the scientific revolution of the early modern period and the pre- Enlightenment’s sparks of free thinking, projected an image of energy and optimism in 17th century’s Europe, which had a deep impact on the evolution of the Craft. This paper is a brief introduction to the research of the origins of the "revolutionary" tendencies of Freemasonry. The main intention is to present the influence of the Rosicrucian vision of the "Universal Reformation of Mankind" on Freemasons and how this influence evolved and reflected in the work of three prominent Freemasons: Chevalier Ramsay’s, Adam Weishaupt and Nicolas de Bonneville.

2015

Ritual, Secrecy, and Civil Society, 2020

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