SWEARING ALLEGIANCE TO WIDOW TWANKY
Alasdair Palmer goes on a guided tour of
the heart of freemasonry and is more amused than alarmed
'LET ME assure you,' said the genial guide, 'freemasonry has absolutely nothing to do with cannibalism, devil worship or anti-Semitism. And we are honestly not prejudiced against blacks or women.'
Well, that's a relief. It is ten years since freemasonry's Grand Master, the Duke of Kent, suggested that lofty silence — the traditional masonic response to inquiries about what masons do when they dress up and gather together — might not be the best way of dealing with public concern about the craft. Since then, the organisa- tion, rumoured to have tentacles every- where, has decided to open itself up. Freemasons' Hall, on the edge of Covent Garden, is available for inspection on a guided tour.
I3ut old habits die hard. The masons can't bring themselves to advertise the tour to the general public, and you won't find anything which informs you of its existence outside Freemasons' Hall, or, indeed, any- where else. But masons know about it. They have been able to take the tour since 1986. They still seem to be the only people who do so. The other five people on the tour I was on were all members of one lodge or another, although they looked like perfectly ordinary citizens. And there wasn't a funny handshake in sight.
`No,' repeated the guide with pained 'He's had a marvellous time with those chalks you bought him for his birthday.' emphasis, 'all allegations of cannibalism and prejudice are completely false.' He looked and sounded just like a retired con- stable wearily rebutting claims about the police beating confessions out of suspects. We had just entered the Grand Temple itself, through the huge doors, two tons each, yet 'so finely calibrated that a woman can push them open with her little finger'. The one woman on the tour was duly invit- ed to push the doors open, which she did with her little finger.
It is puzzling that the masonic architects should have thought it important to pro- duce doors which could be opened by a woman's touch, since the guide then went on to explain that no woman would ever be allowed inside the Grand Temple whenev- er it was used for official purposes. The woman, associated with a masonic lodge in Philadelphia in the United States, was taken aback. 'You mean women are never allowed here?' she asked. The guide's answer was emphatic: no, no women, ever. I asked what the reason for the exclusion order was. The guide lost his geniality. 'It's too complicated to explain,' he said, cross- ly. 'I mean, you're asking a question which goes to the whole heart of the philosophy of the masonic craft. I can answer ques- tions about the building, but not about the ethos of the craft.'
He went back to contemplating the mosaic ceiling, noting the number of tiles and explaining that 'wheat symbolised the bread of life, lotus the water of life, iris the spirit of life, and oak the remembrance of the second temple of Jerusalem'. All very interesting — the Grand Temple is huge and impressive, if a little reminiscent of one of Mussolini's monuments in design but the guide wasn't telling me what I wanted to know about freemasonry. The blindfolded, bare-chested initiate, with a noose round his neck, is supposed to promise to have his `throat cut, tongue torn out by the root and buried in the sand of the sea at low water' should he ever reveal the secrets of freemasonry. At higher lev- els, the penalties for spilling the beans become ever more elaborately unpleasant. Advanced masons promise to have 'my breast laid open, my heart torn therefrom, and given to the ravenous birds of the air, or devouring beasts of the field as prey' should they divulge anything about the order.
That may explain why the tour of Freemasons' Hall is not quite as informa- tive as one might hope. Even the other masons looked a little bored as the guide pointed out yet another depiction of the masonic square and compass. As the yawns became more prominent, the guide explained that, though he could not divulge the details of the rituals performed in the Grand Temple, he could reveal that the floor was cleaned daily by a team of 25 women. (It looked and smelt like it too.) The guide assured me that it was utterly untrue that masons were forced to swear sanguinary vows to keep silent about the secrets of masonry — the requirement to do so, he said, had been abolished in 1986. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't persuade anyone in Freemasons' Hall to tell me anything about masonry, as opposed to the structure of the building. No one would even explain the rule excluding women. 'It's not a question of philosophy, and it's definitely not misogy- nistic,' said the deputy librarian, defensive- ly, 'and, anyway, there are ladies' lodges. They are just not allowed in here.' Any reason? 'No.'
Unable to prise an answer to this deli- cate question from living masons, I turned to dead ones (there are plenty in the Freemasons' Hall museum: Edward Gib- bon, Jonathan Swift, George Washington and Winston Churchill are all claimed as past masters of the craft). In Mozart's magnificent masonic opera, The Magic Flute, the High Priest Sarastro explains that it is woman's duty to subordinate her- self to man. She is inferior, so she cannot be initiated into the highest mysteries of the universe. That may be the reason why the ladies are kept out of the Grand Tem- ple. But today's masons won't admit it. Perhaps the intimidating power of political correctness has got to them, too.
Those who have direct experience of masons doubt it, however. 'You couldn't get a nastier bunch of anti-Catholic arse- holes,' a former mason from Belfast told me. The masons cannot be that prejudiced, though, because the Grand Master's wife, the Duchess of Kent, has just embraced Catholicism. And, as the guide gleefully explained, there have been four Catholic Grand Masters. But the Belfast ex- mason's view is not untypical of those who have left freemasonry. Though ex-masons do not go so far as to allege devil worship and cannibalism, men who have fallen out of love with the organisation usually por- tray masons as selfish, stupid, prejudiced and ruthless. Naturally, their views are less than wholly objective, but the silence of the active masons ensures that it is only the ex-masons whose voices are heard.
The guide took us into what looked like a throne room. It is in fact the hall in which the most senior masons confer with the Grand Master. The walls are adorned with paintings of past Grand Masters, which include George IV and Edward VII (both stepped down when they ascended the throne). All of them look remarkably stupid. It is impossible to look dignified in a mason's apron, however elaborately embroidered, and the present Grand Mas- ter is no exception. Though it hangs in the centre of the Hall, the Duke of Kent's por- trait makes this serious and solemn aristo- crat look like Widow Twanky.
Between 50,000 and 500,000 men owe allegiance to the Grand Master. The exact number is a secret. The Grand Lodge keeps records of who belongs, but, of course, they're not telling. 'We have com- puterised our records, but we don't yet have a programme which can count the total number of masons,' the deputy librari- an responded when pressed. Masons have long been rumoured to be dominant in the police and the judiciary, 'fixing' trials for other masons, and preferring protecting the brotherhood to promoting justice. Local government corruption is often thought to have a masonic root. Concern about the network of masonic influence has led to at least two attempts at legislation to require public employees to state whether or not they belong to the organisation. Both have failed — not, it seems, because of a nefarious masonic network among MPs, but simply because they were not backed by the Government and ran out of parliamentary time.
Most of the victims of masonic perfidy have been other masons. Persistent attempts to uncover a gigantic masonic conspiracy within the British establishment have failed. That may be because the masons are so clever and all-pervasive that they can evade every attempt to uncover their activities. Or it could be because their activities are more silly than sinister. As I stood in the Grand Temple, imagining thousands of masons in aprons all swearing allegiance to Widow Twanky, the second possibility seemed more likely. It is worth going on the tour just to remind oneself of that fact.
Previous page
