The Universal Language of Freemasonry - ArchiMeD - Johannes ...

Chapter 10 - Conclusion 827
discussion on the merits or otherwise of a particular ritual when talking
to English Freemasons. 2010
Concerning the verbiage of the ritual, the following quote by an American
Mason mirrors the self-evident fact that people who have learned precisely the
same text will report it in different ways. He had heard about seven or eight
District Lecturers in one State, who had been taught exactly the same forms of
rituals and expression, and after a few years not two of their lectures were
identical:
Now if seven or eight men, selected for the power and accuracy of their
memories, can not retain this "verbal accuracy" for even a few years,
how are hundreds and thousands of lodges all over the world expected
to work exactly alike, even supposing they had received the same work
at first? No man with the slightest modicum of sense would expect it.
2011
We want to illustrate the variations of rituals worked in different countries
using the example of Mark Masonry. Here, not only the verbiage, but the
contents differs in a striking point: When comparing an American, an English
and a Scottish Mark ritual, we find that in the American ritual, the lost keystone
was wrought by the Grand Master Hiram Abiff himself, who was slain before he
could give orders to have it carried up. 2012 The keystone, which was already
marked with Hiram's mark, was found by a young craftsman in the quarries of
Tyre. "He had the ambition to produce this stone to the inspecting Mark Master
as a work of his own." 2013 When the keystone was rejected because it was neither
oblong nor square, "[t]he young man then frankly told the Master that the work
was not his own, but that he was induced to bring it up on account of its perfect
workmanship, which he thought could not be equalled [sic]." 2014 All in all, the
American ritual gives us the impression that the young craftsman was not very
honest, but rather a cheat.
The English Mark ritual, on the contrary, relates in its legend how an
ingenious and intelligent F.C., who has either seen "the perfect plan" or formed a
good idea, "[p]robably thinking to gain honour to himself by displaying superior
knowledge, [...] immediately commenced blocking out such a stone; and after
spending much time and labour, ultimately finished it by putting his mark upon
it." 2015 Thus, although the plans were not his own, at least the young craftsman
has not stolen the stone but works on it with all his strength, and marks it as his
2010
Henderson and Pope, vol. II, p. 107.
2011
Moore, Masonic Review, N° 35, 1869, letter to the editor by M.M., p. 303.
2012
Cf. Duncan's Ritual, p. 180.
2013
Ibid, p. 182.
2014
Ibid.
2015
Mark Rituals, No. 1 (1920; London), p. 7.