I recently created an issue of the Fraternal Review magazine on the subject of Freemasonry and the pagan revival. As far as I am aware, this is the first ever magazine issue dedicated to exploring this subject.
Published by the Southern California Lodge of Research, this issue of the Fraternal Review (available here) explores Wicca, neo-Druidry, the Galdragildi, the runes, and more.
To set the scene, in the first article, I explore connections between runes (letters of various ancient northern European alphabets and symbols) and stonemasonry in medieval England. I also claim that stonemasons likely had some Mystery or secrets, at that time, tied to the runes.
The issue then explores the 34th degree of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Freemasonry, which is a symbolic initiation by the god Odin (who is said to have discovered the runes in a vision).
We then explore historical connections between Wicca and Freemasonry and neo-Druidty and Freemasonry.
I also included an article, based on a previously unpublished interview I conducted with the head of the operative’ magical “gild” (a Middle English term for “guild”), the Galdragildi (“magical guild” or “magicians’ guild”) in 2007.
Lastly, I included extracts from several 19th-century Masonic and esoteric thinkers who believed that Freemasonry was derived from the northern Mysteries. I do not think their arguments are convincing (and we show much more credible evidence of connections between pre-Christian thought and stonemasonry (or proto-Freemasonry), though as an exploration of the history of ideas, they are well worth acknowledging. This is more than half a century before the emergence of Wicca and later pagan revivals.
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