Freemasonry: A Historical Account Quiz

Answer: Michelangelo

It has been said that as you look at the hands of God and Adam as they approach each other, you will notice both figures hold their ring and middle fingers together allowing the pointer and pinky fingers to be spread further apart. This creates, on both figures, the letter "M" which is used to represent Masonry. Michelangelo's own signet ring is said to contain a carving of a piece from the Sistine Chapel. Remarkable; or just coincidence?

Answer: Brussels

This walking tour begins at the Grand'Place, before taking you past the Saint Michael & Saint Gudula's Cathedral, the Park of Brussels, the Place Royale, the Place du Musée, Mont des Arts and the Galleries Royales Saint-Hubert to the Place de la Monnaie and the Place des Martyrs.

Interesting enough, the guides who currently provide the tour, Louis Berkowicz and Jeannine Vanden Broeck, go out of their way to tell you that the secrecy of the CURRENT Freemason members and their rules will not be discussed.

Answer: 34 - 40

A Masonic Service Association study in the 1940s claimed that a total of 34 US Supreme Court Justices had been members. Another study by Paul M. Bessel, using the MSA study plus other sources, suggested the figure to be 40.

Answer: Benjamin Franklin

At the time, Franklin was not himself yet a Freemason. It wasn't until February of 1731 that he supposedly became a member. After only a year and a half, Franklin became Master of his lodge, and during this time produced the oldest draft of the American Mason Lodge By-Laws. They are still in existence today.

Answer: Scottish Rite

Celtic Rite is a term typically used pertaining to the various rites used in Great Britain, Ireland, Brittany, and Northern Iberia, and in the monasteries which resulted from the Irish missions of St. Columbanus. Even though there were Christians in Ireland before Saint Patrick, we really don't know how they worshipped, and their existence is ignored by the "Catalogus Sanctorum Hiberniae".

The Ambrosian Rite is from Milan, Italy and is named after St. Ambrose.

Some say the name "York Rite" should be eliminated and the name English Rite substituted. But what constitutes a Rite? Americans are more likely to be found practicing an American system of the English Rite; not an American Rite as it is frequently and falsely represented and used today.

Answer: MAFIA

Mazzini's group "...supported themselves by robbing banks, looting or burning
businesses if protection money was not paid, and kidnapping for
ransom. Throughout Italy the word spread that "Mazzini autorizza
furti, incendi e attentati," meaning, 'Mazzini authorizes theft,
arson, and kidnapping.' This phrase was shortened to the acronym,
M.A.F.I.A. Organized crime was born." (John Daniel, "Scarlet and the
Beast," Vol. I., pages 330-331).

The 1960s TV show "Get Smart" featured Don Adams as Maxwell Smart, Agent 86, Barbara Feldon as Agent 99, and Edward Platt as the chief of CONTROL, a secret American government counter-espionage agency and KAOS was the international organization of evil formed in Bucharest, Romania.

RICO is an acronym for The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act and is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization. The MAFIA certainly were a target of the RICO Acts.

Answer: 12:00 noon

Although initiation rights can differ somewhat from lodge to lodge, Masonic ritual concurs that the sun, since it is a fixed object, "and the earth continually revolving about the same on its own axis, and Freemasonry being a universal science, diffused throughout the hole of the inhabited globe, it necessarily follows that the sun must always be at its meridian with respect to Freemasonry." Today, Freemasons claim always to meet symbolically at noon on the basis that Freemasonry is a worldwide organization and therefore 'the sun is always at its meridian with respect to Freemasonry'. Masonic reference to God as 'the most high' is therefore a description of Re, the sun god in his ultimate position, the zenith of the heavens at noon.

Funny though, that in the USA, Masonry initiations are generally held at night.

Answer: take holy communion

"The Vatican, clarifying its position on membership in Masonic lodges, said that Catholics who join such organizations commit 'grave sin'. The new reminder, in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, appeared to be aimed mainly at Catholics in the United States, where some have interpreted recent church statements as relaxing the 247-year-old ban on Masonic membership imposed by Pope Clement XII.

A new code of Canon Law outlined on Nov. 25, 1983, omitted membership in the Masons in the list of offenses that incur automatic excommunication." - (UPI) Southern Baptists also agree with the new Canon Law codes.

Answer: The Ancient and Accepted Rite of the Thirty-third Degree

The Ancient and Accepted Rite of the Thirty-Third Degree is the only cohesive masonic group run on truly international lines. "The 'Masters', who form the largest proportion of Freemasons, are in most cases quite unaware of the thirty superior degrees to which they will never be admitted, nor even hear mentioned. This is the real picture, with the three lowly [Craft] degrees governed by a Grand Lodge and the thirty higher degrees governed by a Supreme Council."

The Grand Orient of France is considered a very secretive society according to many Grand Lodges simply because of a major revision of the Constitution of Freemasonry. In 1877, they removed the requirement for belief in a Supreme Being and for belief in the immortality of the soul. This was done on the basis of Freemasonry's lack of status as a religion.

Members of the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles the Mystic Shrine for North America (AASONM), or the "Shriners" are the wealthiest 'charity' in America. Its assets for 1984 were estimated by the internal Revenue Service at $1.979 billion. That's almost twice as much as the second richest charity, the American Red Cross, with assets of $1.07 billion, and four times as much as the American Cancer Society which takes third place, with $446.8 million in assets.

In 1740, the Grand Master of the Order of Malta caused the Bull of Pope Clement XII to be published on that island, and forbade the meetings of the Freemasons. On this occasion several Knights and many citizens left the island; and in 1741, the Inquisition persecuted the Freemasons at Malta.

Answer: blue

The term Blue Lodge is one that seems to be a North American colloquial term that many Freemasons wish would become extinct. Most Masons agree it the name comes from the color of the apron during initiations, although others suggest it is due to the blue-painted ceiling of the lodge. Blue Lodge Freemasonry relates to the first three degrees of Freemasonry. These three initial Blue Lodge degrees, which are extremely elaborate and highly ritualistic in their character, are solemn fearful events for the nervous candidate. They come within the general overall Masonic Lodge degree structure at the bottom of the ladder and are normally worked quite standard throughout the world.

The Royal arch degree is usually refered to as "Red Lodge" from the color of the trim on the aprons. A "Red Lodge", or "Red Apron Lodge" is the slang name for those few (mainly older) UGLE lodges that are designated Grand Stewards Lodges. Unlike other Masons, members of Grand Stewards Lodges have aprons trimmed in a maroon colour, rather than the usual light blue. They act as Stewards in Grand Lodge, where they also wear a Steward's Collar which is maroon in colour, to match the aprons.

As far as I know, there are no gold or green lodges.