Vocabulary of freemasonry

The vocabulary of the Freemasonry form often a specific, not very comprehensible jargon for a public not initiated.

Reunions

Divide of a cold or hot collation in the wet room , between masons. This time of meeting and division, at the conclusion of the behavior is the prolongation of the work which has just been carried out. It is one very convivial moment where the word is completely free, in the respect of others and its ideas, and which allows the brothers to better know. It can be one gastronomical moment according to the talents of the Master of the Banquets charged to work out the menu.

Workshop

Generic name gathering various kinds of cabins: triangles (cabins in gestation), cabins symbolic systems (most current) or cabins of top-ranks (various denominations: " cabins of perfection; chapters , learned assemblies , etc)

Contacts

Ways of being made recognize like freemason. Vary according to the degrees.

Banquet

Banquet of order: Ritual meal organized at the time of the summer and winter solstices (Jean the Baptist) (Jean the Evangelist).

Capitation Contribution

In fact, in Freemasonry, the words " capitation " and " contribution " are both used, but they do not have the same direction .

A member pays each year with his cabin a " cotisation" a part is transferred with obedience: the " capitation". The " capitation" is used for the Authorities which direct obedience to financially manage the life and the activities of this association.

With this " capitation" what must pay each member, the same one for all because its amount is voted by the annual general meeting called " Convent" , each cabin adds a fascinating sum of account the specific expenditure to which it has to face. This specific share varies from one cabin to another.

It is the addition of the " capitation" and of the specific share which forms the " cotisation". It is what explains why inside the same obedience, the contribution varies from one cabin to another following the particular budget that the latter establishes annually.

Chain union

Ritual of commemoration carried out by the masons at the end of a held .

Columns

Located outside the temple of Solomon, they show, although some the " visualisent" inside, that the cabin meets outside the Temple under the starry vault . They symbolize also the two spans of North and the South.

The knowledge of their name is one of oldest the secret maconnic, since it is attested as of the 17th century. It is however only about one secrecy symbolic system (that the adversaries of freemasonry sometimes called a “An open secret ”), since he is written in all letters in the Bible.

Compass

Belong to the 3 great lights with the square and the Volume of the Crowned Law .

General assembly of Freemasons

General meeting of a maconnic Obedience.

Cord

Hack carried at the time of the held , drifting of the cross-belt which maintained the sword, privilege of the nobility under the Ancien Mode. The cord is more or less richly decorated reasons symbolic systems.

Cordonite

Ironic term: Imaginary disease of which its reached fond of delicacies freemasons of honors and ranks, which collect and are posted readily with the cords and others corresponding decorations .

Roofer

Officer who keeps the door of the temple during the held . Very often it is about old the worthy of the cabin . It is located at the Occident of the Cabin, vis-a-vis the East which it has just left, if it were Vénarable before; it thus leaves the most eminent station for the humblest station. At the beginning of the behavior (meeting) it checks if entering them are well masons and know the password of the moment. Throughout the behavior, it ensures, by its presence, the finitude of the bond which links the Brothers and the energy harmony of the Temple. It must bring, like all the Officers, his assistance with Worthy, extremely of its last experiment; it is alone with being able to directly ask the word the East.

Decorations

Vestimentary elements symbolic systems carried in held (apron, gloves, cords, etc).

Debhir

Hebrew name of the third part of the temple of Solomon.

Luminous delta

Triangle luminous, or decorated luminous rays, often decorated of an eye, which overhangs the Orient .
It is a symbol which is not specifically maconnic since it appears in very many churches and vaults, in particular in the style Baroque. One also finds it on the pediment of certain churches of Venice or above the Autel in the Chapelle of the castle of Versailles.

() To reveal

Any person has right, in France, with the respect of her convictions and their private nature. Thus, no mason can reveal the membership of a third to Freemasonry, i.e. to reveal it. That is valid besides for all the citizens when the philosophical convictions of such or such are not public notoriety. Naturally each one is free to make share or not with which it hears it its convictions. The objective is as many to preserve didactures (cf 1939) to avoid the demonstrations of pride.

Degrees

Ranks , stages in a rite given. Freemasonry counts three degrees known as symbolic systems: apprentice, companion and Master. Degrees higher than the third, known as " tops grades" , are different according to the rites.

Square

With the compass and regulates it, corresponds to the fundamental tools of the freemasons. Fact part of the three great lights which are the square, the compass and the Volume of the Crowned Law ).

Fraternity

The freemasons recognize themselves between them for brothers and mutually thus name themselves. This fraternity is not that symbolic system, it is felt sincerely by all.

Gloves

Obligatory in held .

Ranks

See Degrees.

Large Expert

Officer in charge of the good progress of the ritual.

Hekkal

Second part of the temple of Solomon.

Hiram

According to the Bible, the craftsman bronzier who created all the bronze works of the Temple of Solomon. The maconnic legend makes the architect of the Temple of it.

Initiation

Ceremony and process of passage of the state of individual say layman to that of initiate with whom opens a new life. By tests symbolic systems and conditionings, impétrant it is brought to go back in prospect and to make choices. The applicant can constantly give up this process and put an end to it.

Landmark

In English, the word landmark indicates a benchmark. In freemasonry, mainly in the obediences of the USA, there exist various lists of landmarks which are as many as a basis criteria being used for the recognition between obediences. The plain Big room of England strictly speaking does not have a landmarks , but a list of BASIC principles . Other obediences define lists of criteria called rules (often in 8 or 12 points). Others finally, mainly in Europe, do not define any.

maconnic Cabin

Resulting from the English term lodge itself resulting from French who indicates originally a shelter. The workmen of the franc-trade of construction (the operative freemasons ) installed against or near the building (religious generally) in building site this hearth which accommodated their meetings.

The cabin indicates in speculative freemasonry a whole of freemasons who meet regularly, without more indicating the building which one calls temple .

Place/blue freemasonry

Freemasonry symbolic system, i.e. relative to the three first degrees.

Place mother

The cabin mother is that in which the freemason was initiated. The cabin is the place of the meetings (held) of the freemasons, by analogy with the cabin of the builders of cathedrals, modest and provisional building where the Masters, companions and apprentices met.

The maconnic cabin however is inspired much in its decoration by the elements symbolic systems of the temple of king Solomon, unfinished after the disappearance of Hiram Master, architect of the building.

the Cabin mother is also the title of a text of Rudyard Kipling, speaking about its Indian cabin whereas it is in England.

Place adoption

These workshops was created to accommodate the wives of the freemasons. They were not maconnic cabins strictly speaking, and the ritual were very specific.

In 1901, the Big room of France reactivates its cabins of adoption disappeared at the end of the XVIIIe century and gives them a clean constitution. In 1935, the GLDF encourages its cabins of adoption to be constituted in female obedience maconnic. It will be thing made in 1945, year of foundation of the Female Big room of France.

See also: Amorce=Voir the article:, Women in freemasonry

Master of the ceremonies

Officer who directs displacement ritual in cabin.

Noachite

A Religion paramount, universal and without Dogma.

Obediences

Maconnic organizations gathering several cabins. They are either or of the federations of cabins, or, more rarely, of the federations of rites.

Generally, obediences, stricto-sensu , manage only the cabins of the three first degrees and must be completely independent of the “jurisdictions” which manage the High ranks maconnic. It is the second “basic principle besides” so that an obedience can be recognized like regular by the group of obediences of the plain Big room of England. But there exist notable exceptions, such as the Human right or the Grand the East of France.

Occident

West of the cabin where officiate the First Supervisor , the Couvreur and, according to the rites , the Second Supervisor .

Order

Sign symbolic system of membership of the freemasonry which punctuates the ritual of a held .

The East

Left the temple located at the east. Symbolic system place where officiate the Vénérable , the Speaker and the Secrétaire .

Also " district" maconnic (the East of Le Havre, the East of Valence…).

Parvis

Precede Oulam, first part of the temple of Solomon.

Mosaic sett paving

Black rectangular paving and white which recovers the ground of the permanent temples maconnic. It is frequently tiny room to a rectangular checkerwork placed at the center of the cabin. It is one of oldest symbols the maconnic. Engravings of Gabanon show that it was already present in 1745 on the carpets of cabins used at that time.

Board

Conference presented in cabin .

Rite

In freemasonry, together coherent of ritual symbols and associated with different ones degrees organized in gradual progression.

Ritual

Together of actions and words accompanying unfolding by a stage given of a held . Example: the ritual of opening of work.

Wet room

Place nonopen to the laymen and where the reunions occur.

Secretary

He consigns the events of the held .

Signs of recognition

Gestures or postures making it possible a freemason to be made recognize as tel. Vary according to the degrees.

Supervisor

Two, each one directs a column (a group of masons) during work of the workshop .

Apron

Part of silk or skin symbolically evoking the aprons of skin of the stone masons. Its ornaments and the manner of carrying it vary according to the degrees and the circumstances.

Table or Carpet of cabin

Table representing the most important elements symbolic systems of the degree (apprentice, companion or Master) practiced in the cabin at a given time, it is unrolled on the ground at the beginning of the ceremony and is folded up at the end.

Used as of the origins of freemasonry, at one time when the cabins did not have permanent temples and where maconnic meetings held in inns, living rooms or anterooms, they are always used nowadays in many rites and many cabins.

The word Tableau of cabin is also employed, in a different direction, to indicate the list of the members.

Behavior

Meeting of the workshop / cabin in a temple.

Temple

Place where are held the held ritual. Evocation of the temple of Solomon, it is organized and decorated in manner symbolic system in order to cause the reflection.

Layout

Report written of a held written by the secretary .

Worthy

Master mason elected by his pars to direct the workshop . This election is renewable each year, for three years maximum, which is of a great wisdom, since it is not possible of " installer" at this station, contrary to the political world where the goal is often to be made re-elect more the possible for a long time. The three years limit for a post of officer applies to all the stations. The obligatory return to less prestigious stations is excellent a school of humility.

Volume of the Crowned Law

In the maconnic cabins of the 18th century, metaphor indicating the Bible.

The use of the Bible was introduced in freemasonry into the Rite of the Word of mason, origin calvist, in Scotland, in first half of the 17th century. To the same time, in the Rite of the Old Duties, the novel members not lent oath on the Bible, but on the payments of the trade.

Starting from the end of the 19th century, part of freemasonry déchristianisa gradually its ritual. In the cabins of this type, the “Volume of the Crowned Law” can take the shape of other religious books (Coran, Upanishad, etc), of a superposition of several of these books, of one white paper, to be replaced by a rule, or to disappear.

The question of the obligatory or only optional presence of a Bible open in the temple is one of the principal points of disagreement between the maconnic obediences in the conflicts treating of the maconnic Régularité.

Starry vault

Ceiling symbolizing the sky.

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