[Paleopsych] Policy Studies J.: Religion, policy, and secrecy: the Latter Day Saints and masons.

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Religion, policy, and secrecy: the Latter Day Saints and masons.
Policy Studies Journal, Nov 2003 v31 i4 p669(10).
Paul Rich and David Merchant

AB On a vanished secret order: "Had politics, as in Masonry, been its main
   object, it would have held on with tenacity to its principles, as to the
   threads of life, and, disregarding its departure from sound morals, or
   patriotism, would still have contended, with the infatuation of a Mormonite,
   for the enjoyment, in secret, of that which in the eye of the public would
   overwhelm its members in confusions." "A Traveller in the United States", A
   Ritual and Illustrations of Free-Masonry and the Orange and Odd Fellows'
   Societies, Accompanied by Numerous Engravings, and a Key to the Phi Beta
   Kappa, S. Thrne, Devon (Shebbear, near Hatherleigh, England), 1835, 251.

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The spectacular growth of the Mormon denomination has been accompanied by 
church-state policy disputes, ranging from the rights of pro choice groups in 
the central square in Salt Lake City to the views of the Mormon hierarchy on 
gays in the military. For academics, how to handle the interface of policy 
issues with organized religions to which their students or colleagues may 
belong are a challenge. Secrecy is a particularly troublesome question.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the Mormons, has a long 
history of conflict with other groups in America over public policy issues. The 
most celebrated was the nineteenth century confrontation over polygamy. Of all 
the issues that have arisen, perhaps the least discussed is the fact that 
Mormonism is in some respects a secret society and was strongly influenced by 
Freemasonry. The founding prophet of Mormonism, Joseph Smith, wrote in his 
History of the Church, "The secret of Masonry is to keep a secret." (Vol. 6, p. 
59) (1)

Even in this new millennium, both the Mormons and the Masons feel uncomfortable 
when their secrets are discussed. (2) But their views of the sanctity of 
secrecy are much further apart than they were a century ago. (3) (For the 
purposes of this discussion, the Salt Lake City branch of the Mormon church, 
which is the principal one, is being focused upon. However, there are a number 
of other Mormon sects.) (4) These days, American Masons are less secretive than 
they once were. For the Mormons, the secrecy of their temple activities remains 
one of the ingredients of what is a highly successful and rapidly growing 
movement, while for the Masons, secrecy is regarded increasingly as an 
albatross that helps account for a steep membership decline.

That the subject of secrecy with regard to the Church of Jesus Christ of Later 
Day Saints and with Freemasonry is still contentious is remarkable--it would 
seem an issue which would belong to a much earlier era which enjoyed covert 
ritualism. (5) For one thing, secrecy today is a public relations problem for 
any organization that wishes to grow in a twenty-first century environment of 
full disclosure and exposure. Moreover, the disenchanted have filled many 
library shelves with their exposes of both Masonry and Mormonism. (6) Neither 
movement really has secrets if its ceremonies are being discussed.

Attitudes towards secrecy as practiced by a religion or lodge are ambiguous. 
What should public policy be towards secretive groups? Of course, we believe in 
policies favorable to freedom of association, and yet we are not quite sure 
that such freedom should include the existence of societies that may make what 
appear to be extreme demands on their members and that conduct their affairs in 
a covert fashion. (7)

The confusing civil libertarian sentiments involved in tolerating such groups, 
which is the price we must pay for preserving a pluralistic and open society, 
are treated by Joseph Bensman and Robert Lilienfeld in their study Between 
Public and Private: The Lost Boundaries of the Self: "The double nature of 
voluntary associations is apparent in the fact that, while Masonry and all 
voluntary associations emphasize the freedom of their members from both 
narrower (the family) and wider (the state, the church, and the firm) 
institutions, they make demands for peer loyalties upon their members and 
subordinate them to a rich hierarchy of ritual and leadership within their own 
organization sphere." (8) The same observation might be made about Mormonism. 
(9)

Secrecy then is an aspect of human behavior and especially of political 
behavior which we feel perpetually unsure about. It receives limited attention 
from policy journals, although "Secrecy touches our lives more than we 
generally like to admit. Most of our thoughts do not immediately get uttered. 
Some are simply forgotten, but others we purposely suppress. These are the 
secrets--perceptions, gossip, memories, dreams--that we keep back until time 
and audience are right. Some of these secrets contribute to a positive sense of 
self and to the harmonious continuation of our communities. Others create 
debilitating suspicions and uncertainties in self and society." (10)

In considering policies towards secrecy, there is a danger of being a voyeur, 
inviting titillations over Mormon temple undergarments and Masonic aprons. We 
do well to keep in mind that it is not just Mormons and Masons who have 
secrets, for secrecy would seem to be part of everyone's personality, and in 
fact secrecy may be an essential part of a balanced personality. Kittredge 
Cherry remarks, "We all keep secrets. From neighborhood gossip to government 
scandal, the power of secrets is deeply woven into our culture. Some people 
disguise their age, hide their poverty or their wealth; other cover up illness, 
or the fact that they are in therapy. Deciding the best ways to share 
knowledge--when to hide and when to speak--is everybody's lifelong challenge." 
(11)

The fact is that policies supporting secrecy are not always a bad thing. The 
confidentiality of the confession, or of discussions with a doctor or lawyer 
are guarded legally in many societies, as are exchanges between a married 
couple--and indeed, clinical psychologists have sought to extend such 
protection to their discussions with their clients. Psychologically, the 
experience of secrets is part of maturing. A pro-secrecy authority remarks, 
"Children take a big step toward psychological maturity and identity when they 
first learn to keep a secret ... We also express our identity as much in what 
we hide as in what we reveal about ourselves." (12) Still, it is considered 
axiomatically a character defect to be a too private and circumspect an 
individual; in the extreme case such as the billionaire Howard Hughes or the 
actress Greta Garbo (famous for her remark "I want to be alone."), the desire 
for personal secrecy slips over a line into what some regard as pathological 
behavior.

Where do we get our attitudes that ultimately influence our support of policies 
towards secrecy and learn its uses? For some individuals, secrecy is largely 
learned in the family unit. But for others, their experience with secrecy is 
partly learned by joining a group such as the Mormons or the Masons, where 
solemn vows of secrecy are given. The group maintains its identity by sharing 
secrets amongst its members, but perhaps a neglected aspect is that it also 
cultivates the individual's sense of secrecy as a value and as a means of 
empowerment. (13)

So possibly Mormonism and Freemasonry have been criticised too much for their 
secrecy. We can remember the delight in childhood of having secrets. The fact 
is that most of us still do enjoy the mystery of concealment. It still is an 
ingredient of our society, though abused, and much of the thoughtful 
psychological literature on the topic suggests that having secrets is part of a 
healthy personality. While not always appropriate, it is not the terrible thing 
that it has been made out to be, and we ought to think twice about treating it 
like a wayward relative.

Ironically, there has been considerable contention between the Mormons and the 
Masons that is centered around the groups' secret rituals. Both movements have 
a history of exacting oaths of secrecy from their followers. Few if any 
organizations have been more adept at reconstruction in the face of adversity, 
and at creating another world and a magical empire, as have the Mormons and the 
Freemasons,--and to an outsider their tempestuous relationship might seem more 
that of rival siblings than deadly rivals than has been understood. Like the 
Black Muslims, Mormonism is a religion which owes a great deal in its rites to 
Masonry. The qualification should be that it is not the Masonry of London 
coffee houses which became intertwined with Mormonism, but the lush ritualism 
of nineteenth-century American Freemasonry, which is another matter.

Consider the ethos of nineteenth-century America when Mormonism made its 
appearance. While a number of recent studies call attention to the historical 
contributions of fraternal orders in the United States, including orders that 
did exist then such as the Odd Fellows, and Red Men, it is Masonry which was 
the pre-eminent secret society. At the very start of the nineteenth century, 
most Masonic lodges were relatively simple affairs, both in architecture and in 
ritual. It might be argued that, until that time, lodges had been more 
concerned with the world of ideas rather than of ceremony. Authorities such as 
Margaret Jacob in studying their influence have shown that the Masonic lodges 
of that earlier seventeenth and eighteenth century period were indeed 
intellectual and in some ways the progenitors of civil society despite their 
secrecy and their gender and social bias.

However, the nineteenth century that gave birth to Mormonism also saw the 
creation of an enormous number of additional Masonic degrees and side 
organizations promising to confer more exalted honors and communicate ever more 
esoteric secrets. Much of this was deliberately arcane. For example, the Masons 
often turned to Egypt for a leitmotif, both for their dramas and for their 
buildings. (14) This is at variance with the British experience, and the 
British actually imported from America a number of the rites such as the 
Cryptic and Scottish.

So it was in 1823 during a period of considerable interest in the cabalistic 
aspect of Masonry, and particularly in the Royal Arch degrees, that the brother 
of the Prophet Joseph Smith, Hyrum Smith, was initiated in Mount Moriah Lodge 
in Palmyra, only two miles from the Smith farm--the same year that the Prophet 
was first visited by an angel. The events surrounding the disappearance of 
Captain William Morgan, who had threatened to publish the secrets of the 
Masonic degrees, took place in 1826 in Batavia and Canandaigua, just fifteen 
miles from the farm. Henry Dana Ward published his expose of Freemasonry in 
1828, some months before the appearance of the Book of Mormon. The book was 
reviewed in the Wayne Sentinel, the newspaper published in Palmyra. In nearby 
Canandaigua, William Wines Phelps was publishing an anti-Masonic paper, the 
Ontario Phoenix. (15)

The numerous exposes of the period would make general knowledge the stories in 
the Masonic degrees such as the discovery of the golden plates in the vault 
under the temple. The use by the Masons of cyphers would be familiar, as would 
the idea of revelations hidden and then discovered. If one is looking for a 
secular origin of the story of Smith's discovery of golden plates, the Royal 
Arch degree of Masonry is suggestive.

While Mormon temples are closed to non-Mormons and the activities that take 
place are protected by a veil of secrecy, in the Book of Mormon there is a 
great deal of negative comment about secrecy. Secret groups are seen as an 
affront to the Lord They are oath-bound and of the devil. They can be 
interpreted as anti-Masonic but since Joseph Smith later became a Mason, the 
evidence of his early knowledge of Freemasonry is contradictory. John Thompson 
comments, "While it would be folly to make entirely too much out of this, it 
must be said that if the early Mormons were viewed by their contemporaries as 
overwhelmingly antimasonic, the language of the Book of Mormon and other early 
writings of the Prophet must have tended to substantiate the charge. At the 
same time, we must not forget that, even in the very early stages of the 
church's life, there were men like Hyrum Smith and Herbert C. Kimball in places 
of real authority and ministry in the Church, who were still, as far as anyone 
can tell, in good standing with the Craft. Without ever renouncing or seceding 
(in an age famous for both, these men were attracted to a Church that 
apparently had an antimasonic slant and yet, were accepted for what they had to 
offer." (16)

Scholars who are Mormons are restrained by the teachings of their denomination 
in the areas which they can question. In contrast, while there was a great of 
bogus Masonic history created in the nineteenth century that sought to 
legitimatize the ceremonies, but eventually a more scientific spirit competed 
with the folkloric views and some Masons, though certainly not all, became 
sharp critics of their own past. Writes Dr. Brent Morris, "The pathetic irony 
is that only one group today believes the tall tales ...--not the Grand Lodges, 
not the Scottish Rite, but the antimasons." (17) One must compare that view 
with the view that much Masonic writing still is of a low value and accepts a 
great deal of crude mythology about the origins of the fraternity and the 
necessity for secrecy.

As late as the 1960s, a Masonic authority would warn against open discussion of 
the similarity of Mormon and Masonic secret rituals: "Any discussion, in print, 
of esoteric Masonic material is prohibited by the Grand Lodge of Washington. 
Any detailed discussion of differences and/or similarities between the 
so-called secret ceremonies of the Mormon Church and those of Masonry must be 
within the tiled recesses of the Lodge." (18) Still, in contemporary 
Freemasonry, the questioning of origins and the study of ritual change is now 
quite permissible.

The results may upset some Masons, but it would be unthinkable for a Mason to 
be suspended or dropped from membership for investigating Masonic degrees and 
believing that they had relatively modern origins. The same is not the case 
with Mormonism, where a member must believe in the divine origins of the 
scriptures discovered by Joseph Smith and in the secret rituals which he 
mandated for the Mormon temples. A history professor at Brigham Young 
University writes, "My name is David C. Wright ... I am NOT the David P. Wright 
who believes the Book of Mormon is a novel. I believe in and proclaim the 
historicity of the Book of Mormon. I believe there really was a Nephi, a 
Moroni, and yes, I believe that physical gold plates really existed and that 
Joseph Smith translated them by the gift and power of God." (19)

The idea of rooms closed to the public where secret rites are practiced is part 
of both Masonry and Mormonism. Recently Masonic temples have been opened to the 
public. In an effort to improve public relations, there are open house 
functions when non-Masons can tour and be given an explanation of what goes on. 
Mormon temples, on the other hand, unlike local Mormon churches, are not open 
to the public.

The popularity of Freemasonry was partly because in nineteenth-century America, 
fraternalism was a way by which men escaped from the profanum vulgus: once the 
lodge door was guarded, another world opened. This was a serious world. There 
is considerable difference in sophistication between the ritualistic activities 
of Victorian lodges and Hollywood depictions of fraternity initiations. The 
lodge in the nineteenth century was not a place for comic hijinks, but for the 
enactment of serious dramas teaching moral precepts.

In 1842, the Prophet had led his flock to Nauvoo in Illinois and announced that 
a number of secret rites would be practiced in the newly-constructed temple. 
These included washings and anointings, the giving of a new and secret name to 
the candidate, the conferring of specially blessed undergarments, oaths of 
nondisclosure, and ritual dramas. (20) At the same time he and many Mormons 
became members of the Masonic lodge. The iconography of Mormonism began to 
include numerous Masonic symbols: "It is ironic that the Craft which did not 
obtain the beehive as a symbol from ecclesiastical sources, should have given 
it to a church--'given' only in the sense that the Craft venerated the beehive 
long before the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormon) adopted it 
as one of their principal symbols. The Mormon history includes the Nauvoo, 
Illinois, episode, in which the Grand Lodge of that State first granted and 
then revoked the charters of lodges composed of Mormons. Doubtless that 
experience was at the root of Mormonism taking so much from Freemasonry, basing 
its Temple ceremonies upon the degrees and embracing so many Masonic symbols, 
including the beehive." (21) joseph Smith had moved over the years from 
obliquely criticizing Freemasonry to using it as a source for Mormon rituals. 
An example of the Masonic affinities of the temple rites is the following, 
based on the revised 1990 ceremonies now used in the temples:

"PETER: By our giving unto you the token and sign you received in the garden of 
Eden.

ADAM: (grasping Peter by the right hand.) What is that?

PETER: The First Token of the Aaronic Priesthood.

ADAM: Has it a name?

PETER: It has.

ADAM: Will you give it to me?

PETER: I cannot, for it is the New Name, and I have made a covenant not to 
disclose it, but this is the sign (Peter raises his right arm to square.)

ADAM: Now I know that you are true messengers sent down from Father. (Adam 
turns and looks into the camera, addressing the patrons, while Eve stands 
smiling at his side). These are true messengers, I exhort you to give strict 
heed to their counsel and teaching, and they will lead you in the way of life 
and salvation." (22)

Temple activities were and are, even as revised, strikingly similar to Masonic 
ones. John Brooke remarks in his important study of the origins of Mormonism, 
The Refiner's Fire: "Throughout the temple rituals themselves there were 
striking similarities with Masonic symbolism, especially those of the York 
rite, which was established at the Nauvoo Lodge. The temple garments, very 
similar to Masonic ceremonial garb, included an apron with the Masonic compass 
and square, which was also among the emblems of the temple veil. The language 
of the tokens and penalties of the Mormon priesthoods had exact parallels in 
freemasonry, progressing from parallels with the first three degrees of Entered 
Apprentice, Fellow Craft, and Master Mason to parallels with the Royal Arch and 
the higher degrees. Among these parallels to the first three degrees were the 
signs of the "five points of fellowship," the penalties for disclosure of 
secrets, and priestly handgrips and bodily signing ... ". (23)

This has led to extensive discussion among Mormons as to whether there were 
common origins, i.e. that perhaps the Masons had a position similar to 
Catholics and the Mormons were group that had restored the pure ancient 
traditions. A Mormon Internet discussion group participant asks, "I have heard 
speculation that the Masons' ceremony has been passed down since the time of 
King Solomon's Temple. Any thoughts on this?" The reply is, "There continues to 
be speculation to this end within LDS circles. In part due to there being some 
evidence that Joseph Smith made similar statements. For example, there are 
personal letters and journal entries from Hebert C. Kimball and Benjamin 
Johnson claiming that Joseph taught them that "Masonry was taken from the 
Priesthood but has become degenerated. But menny [sic.] things are 
perfect"--and "freemasonry was the apostate endowment as sectarian religion was 
the apostate religion.... Shortly after Joseph's death, being a practicing 
Mason became grounds for excommunication ... and continued for many decades. 
Likewise Mormons were forbidden from membership of many Masonic Lodges." (24)

Another way in which Masonry has diverged from Mormonism in its practices is 
its inclusiveness. Masonic growth was accompanied by a growing disposition by 
the Masons for religious universalism, a heretical stance that was taken 
seriously by orthodox Christian critics and which again placed the Craft in 
opposition to the Mormon church with its assertions about being the reformed 
and reorganized true version of Christianity. The suggestion has been 
repeatedly made that Masonry offered a more satisfactory spiritual experience 
for some men than did conventional religion, and enabled them to be religious 
while asserting their masculinity. That open acknowledgment of this at the time 
would have been disastrous to Masonry is an argument of Professor Mark C. 
Carnes of Columbia University in his book Secret Ritual and Manhood in 
Victorian America. Universalism continues to be a problem between Masonry and a 
variety of religions, including Catholicism and Mormonism.

In summary, in the United States, Masonic policies have evolved and gradually 
moved away from the secrecy and pseudo-historical claims that once 
characterized the society. Secrecy was not abandoned, but it became less 
important. On the other hand, for members of the Church of Later Day Saints, 
both the genuine historical truth of the revelations received by the Prophet 
and his successors, and the secrecy and validity of the temples have remained 
cornerstones of faith. It is no wonder that devout Mormons continue to have 
considerable difficulties when confronted by Masonry, because it touches on 
precious theological precepts. A Masonic critic writes, "... the Church cannot 
tolerate any tarnishing of its spernal aura by a shadow cast by such a common, 
ordinary, mortal social entity of the world as freemasonry. Hence, its goal is 
to expunge any trace of the Ancient Order from every page of its history." (25)

There are many examples of the problems when religious organizations surround 
their activities with a wall of sanctity. The right to secrecy is one. So is 
the right of the academy to investigate religion in a scholarly way. The case 
of the Masons and the Mormons is a good illustration of just how complex these 
matters are and.

Notes

(1.) ct. Mervin B. Hogan, "Utah Masons Among the Mormons", Southern California 
Research Lodge. f.& A.M., n.d., 1.

(2.) Rich has on at two occasions had Mormon academics come up after a paper 
and suggest that it was not appropriate to discuss Mormon temple rites in 
public:

A lady who was a devout church member added that certainly Masonry had 
originated in the time of Solomon and that there was ample evidence. Her 
position was strikingly like that of a Roman Catholic defending a Protestant 
churchman's position about the Divinity of Christ, while disagreeing with most 
other statements that the Protestant had made.

On the other occasion, two Mormon academics who attended a panel came up 
afterwards to state quite definitely that there were things that should not be 
talked about because they were intensely personal, and among those things there 
was the endowment service in the temple.

(3.) This group used to be called the * Reorganized * Church of Jesus Christ of 
Latter-day Saints. I am not sure if they called themselves reformed. But it is 
true that they have moved a good deal towards a sort of "generic" protestant 
flavor.

They were originally founded after Joseph Smith Jr's murder by his widow (first 
wife) Emma Smith and her son Joseph III, and for a very long time--still?--the 
presidency of the Church was held by a lineal descendant of Smith (a practice 
based upon the text of a blessing he had given Joseph III promising him the 
mantle of prophecy or words to that effect) But in 1995 there was no male heir 
and Wallace B. Smith named W. Grant McMurray as his successor (there had been 
some talk, I think, of naming a female successor but I may mis-remember). A 
similar crisis of descent happened in the LDS Church when the office of Church 
Patriarch was done away with because there was no lineal male descendant of 
Hyrum Smith. Joseph Jr's brother and fellow martyr, whose line had 
traditionally held the office. The RLDS eschewed polygamy (and do not 
officially commit themselves on the historical question of whether it was 
practiced). They built no temple until the 1980's though, as was mentioned in 
another response, they do own the site of the original LDS Temple in Kirtland. 
This Temple however was somewhat different than every later Temple beginning 
with the one in Nauvoo Illinois, which later burned down. I believe it was in 
Nauvoo that the first Endowments were performed, and, coincidentally or not (I 
think not), it was also Nauvoo where Smith and others ascended the ranks of 
Scottish rite freemasonry, which contributed a hit of ceremonialism to the 
Temple service.

The RLDS never went for these aspects of Smith's esotericism and seem to have 
quietly dropped them, and their Temple now is more or less a large meeting 
hall-I do not believe it has any particular liturgical function. However they 
do continue to consider the Book of Mormon as scripture, as well as a number of 
revelations received by Joseph Smith Jr. and later RLDS presidents.

I hadnt known the Strangites even still existed, much less that a rapprochement 
had occurred between them and the RLDS. There were a number of other splinter 
groups, and still are. Some died out or were reabsorbed; but to this day there 
are indeed various sects of polygamous Mormons who live in

(4.) a sort of detente with the rest of Utah's LDS population. Contrary to the 
impression the press might give, they are not all deranged practitioners of 
"blood atonement". They tend to aspire to a kind of communal living dictated by 
the "Law of Consecration," after the example of Acts 2.

(5.) "Young Protestant middle-class men [in nineteenth-century America] sought 
their rituals not only in the fraternal and beneficiary lodges, but also in 
scores of voluntary associations with primarily religious, reform, political, 
or economic objectives. College fraternities are an obvious example, but they 
involved few men and their initiations were brief and underdeveloped. Fraternal 
initiation was more important in Mormonism, temperance societies, the 
Know-Nothings and the Knights of the Golden Circle, the Grange, labor and 
veterans' organizations, and the life insurance industry. Historians of each of 
these subjects have commented on the peculiar role of initiation, which they 
generally have attributed to shield members from blacklisting, and fraternal 
life insurance firms used ritual to remind members to pay premiums. What is 
less appreciated is the extent to which founders and members regarded ritual as 
important in and of itself." Mark C. Carnes, Secret Ritual and Manhood in 
Victorian America, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1989, 6. See 
also Lynn Dumenil, Freemasonry and American Culture, 1880-1930. Princeton 
University Press, Princeton (New Jersey), 1984, 221.

(6.) A point by point comparison of Mormon and Masonic rituals can be found at 
the "helping Mormons" website at http://www.helpingmormons.org/masendow.htm

(7.) See Fritz Steele, The Open Organization: The Impact of Secrecy and 
Disclosure on People and Organizations, Addison-Wesley, Reading 
(Massachusetts), 1975, passim.

(8.) Joseph Bensman and Robert Lilienfield, Between Public and Private: The 
Lost Boundaries of the Self, The Free Press, New York, 1979, 86.

(9.) Of course, I am aware that terms such as Mormon and Mormonism are 
informal, but they are used here for convenience.

(10.) William W. E. Slights, Ben Jonson and the Art of Secrecy, University of 
Toronto Press, Toronto, 1994, 4.

(11.) Kittredge Cherry, Hide and Seek, HarperSanFrancisco, 1991, 19.

(12.) Cherry, 23.

(13.) "We have a tremendous sense of belonging when we share hidden knowledge 
with another person or a select group ... Even the most mundane organizations 
may have secret handshakes and other codes so members can identify who falls 
within the boundaries of the group." Cherry, 25.

(14.) While the inspiration for this has been credited to the presence of 
Masons on the Egyptian campaign of Napoleon Bonaparte and the discovery of the 
Rosetta Stone, as well as to the influence of Judaism--witness the synagogue 
designed by the Mason William Strickland for Philadelphia in 1825--it also is 
sometimes attributed to the enthusiasm aroused by the creation early in the 
century of two new Masonic organizations, the Rite of Mizraim (Mizraim simply 
being the plural of Egyptian) and the Rite of Memphis. Mizraim was organized in 
Milan in 1805 and moved to Paris by 1812. It has ninety degrees, and although 
claiming to perpetuate the lost tradition of Egyptian hermetics is a confusing 
collection of rituals partly based on the kabalah and alchemy as well as the 
so-called Scottish Rite, Mizraim and Memphis were merged in Italy in 1881 by 
the famous Italian patriot Giuseppe Garibaldi, but are now practiced both by 
separate and unified organizations. (Acetates of Misraim and of Memphis.) In 
England, John Yarker (1833-1913), who served Garibaldi as the grand chancellor 
in his confederation of Masonic degrees, introduced or re-introduced the Rite 
of Mizraim as well as other degrees with Egyptian themes, like Garibaldi 
attempting to combine Mizraim with Memphis. Other sources include Mozart's 
Magic Flute (1791) which in the production by Karl Friedrich Schinkel in Berlin 
in 1815 was given a fully Egyptian staging that would influence subsequent 
productions. One could go further back in history and assert that the interest 
in Egypt was prompted by Biblical studies or by the classical tradition and by 
claims that Greece and Rome were primarily indebted to Egypt.

(15.) John E. Thompson, The Masons, the Mormons and The Morgan Incident, Iowa 
Research Lodge No.2, Ames (Iowa), c.1982, 1-12.

(16.) Thompson, 16-17.

(17.) S.Brent Morris, "The Letter 'G', The Plumbline, Scottish Rite Research 
Society, Vol.1 No.3, September 1992, 2.

(18.) Harry L. Steinberg, "Mormonism and Masonry", Masonic Papers, Walter F. 
Meier Lodge of Research, Seattle (Washington), Vol. IV No.8, August, 1969, 101.

(19.) Re: LA TIMES ARTICLE at IN%"MORMONL%BYUVM.BITNET at CMSA.BERKELEY.EDU" 
"(MORMON LIST)" 20-JUN-1993

(20.) Occultic and Masonic Influence in Early Mormonism, n.a., Institute for 
Religous Research, 1996, 2.

(21.) "Symbol of Industry", n.a., The Short Talk Bulletin, Vol.xxxv No.12, 
December 1957, The Masonic Service Association of the United States, 5.

(22.) From "Temple ceremonies" at 
http://pages.ripco.net/~mattl/TempleCeremonies.htm

(23.) John L. Brooke, The Refiner's Fire: The Making of Mormon Cosmology, 
1644-1844, Cambridge University Press, 1994, 249.

(24.) Re: temple text, copyright, Masons, etc. IN%"bunner at macc.wisc.edu" 
6-JUL-1993

(25.) Hogan, 6.

Paul Rich
The Hoover Institution and University of the Americas-Puebla

David Merchant
Archer Huntington Fellow, Library of Congress