Secrecy and Fidelity

grandsecretary · 03-18-2008, 04:42 AM

I am greatly troubled.

On this and other Forums, there is displayed not only snippets of the Moderns form of Masonic rituals, including their secret passwords, but their entire initiation ceremonies for all to read.

The fact that this is the case leads me to ask a very serious question:

Where there is no Secrecy and no Fidelity, is there any Freemasonry?

D. W. Brown · 03-18-2008, 10:26 PM

Peter, I know I've seen certain post, usually on the alt.freemasons usergroup (unmoderated) stating to be rituals but most I have seen when you read them aren't even close. At least not what I know of to be rituals within any " Antient" lodge I've been in.

grandsecretary · 03-19-2008, 05:24 AM

This is a constant problem on all of the forums Dale. Snippets of the rituals used to illustrate points, and on some, entire tracts including the passwords.

There is no point in having signs, tokens and words (the sole purposes of which are to prove those attending a Masonic Lodge and to exclude the profane world who may seek admission in order to discover our secrets) if we allow the ritual itself to be available in the public domain.

All I would hope is that the forums that are properly moderated by Freemasons will not allow this to happen when it is pointed out to them and will erase any such references.

jpeffer2007 · 03-20-2008, 02:08 PM

If there are passwords listed on the site please let Bro. Dale know where so he can remove them.

D. W. Brown · 03-20-2008, 02:45 PM

I just removed some yesterday (not passwords) but one line from a ritual. Yes please let me know if you see any, it is impossible for me to monitor every word that crosses the site.

grandsecretary · 03-20-2008, 04:18 PM

Thank you, I am very grateful.

Mystic knight · 07-18-2008, 03:20 PM

Signs of recognition are secret. ESPECIALLY PASSWORDS. In the West, it is frowned upon to leak ritual work, whereas in England that seems to be okay as long as you keep your membership in Masonry secret.

To use one word of say the EA ritual to argue against a great wrong seems permissible to me as long as there are no signs of recognition given away. I never show my black book to cowans and keep it safe. To leak whole passages of ritual seems wrong, especially for no reason. I have been told that only signs of recognition are secret, but I feel that ritual and what happens in open lodge is only the business of brethren. The problem is sometimes we want to share what happened in lodge with brethren here and not everyone here are Masons.

chgregory · 08-07-2008, 08:43 AM

My Brothers,

If you happen to belong to the Nevada Grand Lodge, you can download all three rituals from their site, to help in study. In that environment, how can we possibly guard against release. In other jurisdictions you can buy books of complete ritual and even CD of all rituals. Keeping your word has nothing to do with holding the "secrets" back from the outside world who has them available in many forms. It is about keeping your word. I promised to withhold the secrets of each degree from all but those who are entitled to them.

I agree with the Grand Secretary that we as manons must keep our word, if something slips in in the heat of an agruement, we should delete it. If someone usese a secret password, they should be told it was not proper.

We are after all men and masons.

S&F