Cryptic Rite Degrees
The following is intended to furnish information of
the Cyrptic Rite Degrees or The Mysteries of the Secret Vault to Royal
Arch Masons.
There are three Degrees, viz.: Royal Master, Select Master
and Super-Excellent Master.
The historical setting of the Royal Master degree
is just before the completion of the Temple and chronologically precedes
the degree of Master Mason. The chief personages therein are our three
Ancient Grand Masters and a Fellowcraft in search of and making his
demand for that reward which was to elevate him to the rank of a Master
Mason. The seeker for more Light, for more Masonic knowledge, will find
the Royal Master the answer to the startling assertion of our Grand
Master: “I fear the Master’s Word is forever lost.”
This degree is preparatory to and intimately connected with that of the
Select Master and contains most valuable information necessary to
understanding correctly all the proceeding degrees. It also presents one
great Masonic idea - that of the laborer seeking his reward. That idea
is most beautifully symbolized in the degree of Royal Master, and is
appreciated by all candidates. It will actuate all Royal Arch to the
proficiency, fervency and zeal that should characterize those who have
been exalted to the august and sublime degree of Royal Arch Mason.
The historical setting of this degree and its
symbolism are intimately connected with the Royal Arch. It is the
symbolic golden chain that binds the Master’s degree to the Royal Arch
and without it the mystery, and unsolved riddle of the Recovery remains
in darkness. It is the great. historical and symbolic bridge that spans
the golden age of the Hebrew Nation and the sad days of its
captivity—from the completion of the first Temple to the building of the
second Temple. Truth seemed lost, yet it was not lost, but only hidden,
until that generation should come which, by its perfect and unselfish
labors, would restore it and bring to light the ineffable secret to
guide men in the paths of perfect peace into the seat of the Holy of
Holies. The Select Master degree is the most interesting degree in
Ancient Craft Masonry, without a knowledge of which the history of the
Royal Arch degree is not complete nor is a man a Master Mason in deed
and in truth until he is in possession of the Royal Master and Select
Master degrees. The latter degree rationally accounts for the
concealment and preservation of those essential secrets which were
buried in darkness for the period of four hundred and seventy years from
the Masonic eye, but brought to light at the building of the second
Temple. And a knowledge of those essentials is necessary to clearly
comprehend all the preceding degrees, and complete the circle of Masonic
science. This degree explains why King Solomon selected twenty-four
true, tried, and trusty, skilled craftsmen, together with the three
Grand Masters (making twenty-seven and no more) to complete an important
part of King Solomon’s Temple.
This degree is, without doubt, the most dramatic
and impressive of all degrees of the York Rite. Historically it deals
with the destruction of Jerusalem in B.C. 586, and the carrying away of
the Hebrew people into Babylonian captivity. The characters represented
in the drama are: The Great Chaldean monarch, Nebuchadnezzar; the
treacherous and faithless Zedekiah, the last of Judah’s Kings; the
melancholy but zealous Jeremiah, the Prophet; the faithful Gedeliah;
Belshazzar, the profane King; Daniel, the master of the magicians, the
astrologers and sooth sayers; and the unswerving Prophet Ezekiel. The
interesting and absorbing lesson is Fidelity to Vows, and that the
Kingdom of God is not in kings, in ostentation, or in national glory,
but that His Kingdom shall he in the hearts of men.
The whole history of Masonry, both real and
legendary, has centred around a single Word.
The candidate, when he receives the degree of Master Mason, learns that
the “Word” for which he has searched is lost, and he receives only a
“Substitute”. In the Royal Arch Degree, the ‘Word”, long lost, is found.
In the Degrees of Royal and Select Masters, the explanation is given of
how the “Word” was lost, how it was found, the way it was preserved, and
its meaning.
The process by which the restoration of the ‘Word”
was accomplished is known only to those who have received the Degrees of
Royal and Select Masters. There are many missing links in the great
chain of Masonic History and symbolism which are found only in the
Council. Therefore the work of both the Lodge and the Chapter is
incomplete without the degrees of the Council. The whole structure
generally referred to as Ancient Craft Masonry, embracing the Lodge,
Chapter and Council, shows mutual dependence and inter-connected unity.
From the first degree of Entered Apprentice, to the last degree of
Select Master, each degree is linked to the others.
Quotes
Bro. Mackey, widely known as the author of
the Encyclopedia of Freemasonry, has this to say of the Cryptic Degrees:
“Let us suppose that the science of Freemasonry, or, in more definite
words, the science of Masonic symbolism, is represented by a circle.
This circle will be divided into three portions or arcs. One will be
occupied by the degrees of the Lodge, or Ancient Craft Masonry; another
by the degrees of the Chapter, or Royal Arch Masonry; and the third by
the degrees of the Council, or Cryptic Masonry. Now, if a neophyte
begins at any point of the circle, and passes over one-third of its
circumference, he will arrive at the Master’s Degree, and will then
discover that, so far, the consummation of his Masonic labor is to know
only that, that for which he has been striving has been lost, and
instead of the key to all Masonic science, he receives only a Substitute
for truth. Dissatisfied with this, let him, in his further search,
proceed through another arc, or third of the circumference of the
Masonic circle, and he will arrive at the Royal Arch Degree. Here, in
this second arc, that key which has been lost in the first arc is found.
But the circle has not yet been completed.
It is true that the lost has been found, but the process by which the
restoration was accomplished is still unknown to him, and all the events
of Masonic mythical history, which form the links between the loss and
the recovery, and all the sublime symbolism which is connected with
these events, are withheld from him. He knows what he has obtained, but
he knows not why nor how he obtained it. To acquire this knowledge he
passes through the remaining arc, and, by arriving at the degree of
Select Master, consummates and perfects his knowledge of - the
representative symbol of Divine Truth, and thus passes the circle of
perfection in Masonic Science.”
Nyles, in 1817, wrote: “We have no degree
in Masonry that has a more needful, or more important Connection with
another, than the Select Master with the Royal Arch. It fills a chasm,
which every intelligent Royal Arch Mason has observed, and without it,
it seems difficult, if not impossible, to comprehend clearly some of the
mysteries that belong to the august degree of Royal Arch.”
“It is strange, and it is also unfortunate, that
very few have received the useful knowledge made known in the Select
Master, and, indeed, such is the nature of the degree that we cannot
feel free to allude to the nature of its secrets. We may, however,
pronounce it the key to the Arch.”
The Degrees
The degrees as conferred in the Lodge, Chapter and
Council are a modification of the English or Ancient York Rite,
consisting of nine degrees, as now constituted, and present an exact
circle of Masonic science which, from the Apprentice’s Degree to the
Select Master’s Degree, begin and end in the search for the True Word.
We trust the foregoing has aroused your interest in “The Cryptic Rite”.
Meetings at which the degrees are conferred are conducive of firmer
friendships and a closer spirit of brotherly love.
The noble heritage of Masonry is yours to take—-not
that decorations may be proudly worn; not that you may be known as a
Mason of “high” rank,--- but that you may the more abundantly realize in
your own life the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man. We
invite you to claim this heritage.
|