THY NEIGHBOR’S LANDMARK
“Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark, which they of old
have set in thine inheritance, which thou shalt inherit in the land
the Lord thy God hath given thee (Deuteronomy XIX:14).
The Masons “of old time set thine inheritance” (Masonry) certain
fundamental principles which are named as “Landmarks” as early as the
Constitutions of 1723.
Men have quarreled about the stone markers set up as boundaries for
land ever since sections of the earth were claimed as property; in
like manner have Masons differed about what are and what are not
Landmarks of the Order. In this country particularly, with forty-
nine Jurisdictions, each sovereign within its own territory,
arguments about Landmarks are never ending.
This Bulletin attempts not to settle any of these numerous
controversies, but only to bring before the average Lodge Member some
of the reasons why his neighbor’s Masonic Landmarks may differ from
those his own Grand Lodge may have set up for him to follow.
In 1858 Albert Gallatin Mackey, the great Masonic jurist and
authority, listed twenty-five fundamental principles as the true
Landmarks of Freemasonry. Although critical scholarship has since
riddled the list as to accuracy, Mackey’s ideas of what constitute
the essential qualities of a Landmark - antiquity, universality and
irrevocability - are still respected. This definition excludes from
the classification of Landmarks any principle which is any two of
these but no the third, It is by his own standards that many critics
have measured Mackey’s Landmarks and found them wanting.
As an example of what is meant; it is “ancient,” in the sense that it
was recognized in the “Constitutions” of the Grand Lodge in 1723,
that a Grand Master appoints own Deputy Grand Master. But the
practice is by no means universal. Lodges are now universally
governed by Grand Lodges, but the practice has antiquity of only two
hundred and sixteen years. According to Mackey’s dicta, neither the
manner of creating a Deputy Grand Master not the fundamental
governing body of the Craft can be considered as Landmarks.
A few principles are so universally recognized that they are freely
admitted to be essentials, even in Jurisdictions which have no
pronouncements as to the Landmarks. Belief in a Supreme Being, the
Volume of sacred Law as a necessary part of the furniture of the
Lodge, that a Masons must be a man are essentials all over the world,
though not necessarily listed in all Jurisdictions.
On the validity of certain principles all authorities agree, but
differ as to their antiquity, universality and irrevocability. A
substantial minority of American Grand Jurisdictions have Officially
adopted Mackey’s twenty-five Ancient Landmarks, but a majority either
follow other compilations, use other Old Charges, or decline to
specify what are and what are not the Landmarks of the Craft.
The right and power of any Grand Lodge to determine for itself just
what is and what is not “law” in its Jurisdiction is unquestioned.
Therefore, when a Jurisdiction sets forth any list of Landmarks in
its Code, they have all the force of Ancient Landmarks in that
Jurisdiction, whether they are actually so or not.
“Actually so” refers to inherent nature; that which cannot be altered
by law, no matter what the lawmaking authority. The National
Legislature has the undoubted “right” to enact a law that unsupported
objects must fall. “Per contra,” it then has the right to repeal the
law of gravity, and forbid things to fall when no longer supported.
But it has not the “power” to enforce, change or suspend the law of
gravity! A Grand Lodge which says “Thus and such is an Ancient
Landmark “in that Jurisdiction,” give that pronouncement the full
force and effect of an Ancient Landmark “in that Jurisdiction, but
its edict does not “actually” make it such.
One Jurisdiction follows Lockwood’s list of nineteen landmarks, of
which number 8 reads: “That every Lodge has an inherent right to be
represented in Grand Lodge by its first three officers, or their
proxies.”
This is good Masonic law in most Jurisdictions, but not all; the
Mason from this Jurisdiction (Washington, D.C.) who moves to New York
or Texas and there affiliates finds that this is not a Landmark in
either of these Jurisdictions, since neither New York not Texas admit
Wardens to Grand Lodge.
In the General Assemblies of Ancient times each Mason, Craftsman or
Entered Apprentice, represented himself. In Grand Lodges Masons are
represented by their officers. Evidently a change has been made in
the manner of governing the Craft. As a Landmark is not subject to
change, this particular principle of law does not conform to Mackey’s
definition of a Landmark.
No wonder his neighbor’s landmark is a matter of confusion to
brethren from neighboring but differing Jurisdictions!
Mackey’s fourteenth Landmark asserts that every Mary Mason has the
right of visitation. Just what is a “right?” Until that word is
defined this so-called Landmark cannot be discussed intelligently.
If it here means “power superior to all other powers,” then it is
merely nonsense. If it here means “privileged until a higher
privilege overcomes it,” how may it be considered to conform to the
requirements of a Landmark?
Even so, how can the word “right” be translated “privilege?” A
privilege may be withdrawn; an inherent right cannot! as many
Jurisdictions rule on the “right of visit” in different ways - even
those which have adopted Mackey’s list - it can hardly be considered
a true Landmark, “if” we judge by Mackey’s own pronouncement on what
constitutes a Landmark and “if” the word “right” means what it says.
In some jurisdictions a Mason cannot visit without a good standing
card; in others any member may object to any visitor and the Master
must exclude; in still others, some Masters close the doors of their
lodges to all visitors on election nights, and so on.
Occasionally there is a conflict between ritual and Landmarks as
adopted. A certain Jurisdiction lists fifty-four Landmarks, of which
Number 18 reads: “Every Lodge, Grand or Subordinate, when lawfully
congregated, must be regularly clothed, tyled and opened before it
can proceed to work.” Many other Jurisdictions agree that it is a
Landmark that a Lodge must be “duly tiled.”
Our ancient brethren met on high hills and low vales to observe the
approach of cowans and eavesdroppers. Did they “truly tile?”
California Lodge No. 1 of the District of Columbia was chartered to
go to California during the gold rush of 1849. Had that Lodge (now
California No.1 on the register of the Grand Lodge of California)
been wrecked going around the horn; had only the members of the
Lodge, with their charter, been saved upon an otherwise uninhabited
island; if they then held meetings with no tiler - since there were
no cowans or eavesdroppers against whom to tile - would they have
violated the so-called Landmark?
Many rituals give “three” as the irreducible minimum for a Master
Mason’s Lodge; a Lodge must have a Master and two Wardens. If under
some strange circumstances, three and only three met as a Lodge, what
becomes of the so-called Landmark which requires a Tiler?
Secrecy undoubtedly conforms to the classification of the three
essentials of a Landmark; but about “the means” of securing secrecy
is at least room for argument.
Other Masonic laws, good where in force but not necessarily
Landmarks, are Mackey’s 8th: “The prerogative of the Grand Master to
make Masons at sight” and the 11th Landmark of a Western Grand Lodge
which reads: “Every person, to be made a Mason must be a man of
lawful age, free born and; hale and sound, as a man ought to be.”
Several Grand Jurisdictions have enacted legislation preventing a
Grand Master from convening an Emergent Lodge for the purpose of
Making a Mason “at sight.” Others consider that it is an inherent
right of Grand Masters to convene Emergent Lodges (that is, give a
certain number of brethren a dispensation to hold a Lodge) and that
no law can take this right from him.
If a Landmark cannot be changed, and this “has been” changed, is it
truly a Landmark, or merely a matter of common law?
All will agree that no woman can be made a Mason. But what becomes
of the “lawful age” provision in the face of the fact that Washington
- and many another man - was made a Mason before he was twenty-one?
He would be a daring debater who argued that the Father of His
Country was not regularly and legitimately initiated. The “hale and
sound” provision is by no means universal; many Jurisdictions stick
to the strict letter of the “doctrine of the perfect youth” while
others admit the lame and the halt under a Grand Master’s
dispensation, Worshipful Master’s judgment or even Grand Lodge law
relaxing restrictions in favor of men of the Army or Navy who had
arms or legs shot off in the war!
A number of Grand Jurisdictions have never adopted any list or
classification of Landmarks. The thought back of such absence of
legislation may be understood from the following, from R.W. Charles
C. Hunt, Grand Secretary and Grand Librarian of the Grand Lodge of
Iowa.
“We hold that the power of the Grand Lodge of Iowa in the
Jurisdiction of Iowa is limited only by the Ancient Landmarks. We do
not attempt to make a list of the Landmarks.
“We believe it as unnecessary to adopt an official list of scientific
laws, such as the law of gravitation. The Landmarks. like scientific
laws, are valid only in so far as they are true and their adoption by
any so-called body has no effect whatever on their validity.
Individual scientists may list what they conceive to be the laws of
nature, but no scientific society would undertake officially to adopt
these laws as the official laws of the science in which they are
interested.
“The very definition of a Landmark is a fundamental law or principle
of Masonry which no body of men or Masons can change or modify.
Anything that can be adopted can be repealed. If a Grand Lodge has
the power to adopt, it has the power to modify or repeal. It is the
very fact that they unalterable that makes them similar to scientific
laws which cannot be changed or altered by any man or body of men.”
Some authorities have attempted to formulate lists of Ancient
Landmarks which no Mason would question. For instance, one very old
Jurisdiction states that the Landmarks are:
a. Monotheism, the sole dogma of Freemasonry.
b. Belief in immortality.
c. The Volume of Sacred Law, an indispensable part of the furniture
of a Lodge.
d. The legend of the Third Degree.
e. Secrecy.
f. The symbolism of the operative art.
g. A Mason must be a freeborn male adult.”
But then adds “The above list of Landmarks is not declared to be
exclusive.”
Dr. Joseph Fort Newton suggests five fundamentals on which all Masons
can agree: “The Fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, the moral
law, the Golden Rule and the hope of a life everlasting.” Those who
question these as Landmarks usually qualify by agreeing that they are
teachings of the Order, but are in doubt as to just how old all of
them may be, as such.
Dean Roscoe Pound, whose “Masonic Jurisprudence” is generally
considered to be among the most profound analyses of Landmarks,
thinks seven are unquestionable:
(1) Belief in God;
(2) Belief in
the persistence of personality;
(3) a Book of the Law as an
indispensable part of the furniture of every Lodge;
(4) The legend of
the Third Degree;
(5) Secrecy;
(6) The symbolism of the operative
art; and,
(7) That a Mason must be a man free born and of age.”
Of thirty-nine Jurisdictions of our forty-nine, eighteen either have
adopted, recognized or follow Mackey’s list of twenty-five Landmarks;
two use the Old charges, or Old Charges and General Regulations as
Landmarks; eight have adopted, recognized or follow lists of
Landmarks of their own, and eleven either have not adopted, do not
recognize, or do not follow any special compilation of Landmarks,
preferring to leave the question untouched.
Reduced to a percentage basis, Mackey is followed in 46.1% plus of
these thirty-nine Jurisdictions; Old charges and Regulations in 5.1%;
own Landmarks in 20.5% plus and no special list in 28.2% plus.
Obviously there is no universality of opinion as to what is and what
is not a Landmark, and yet all Jurisdictions agree there “are”
Landmarks.
Many “Laws of Nature” recognized in former times are believed in no
longer; knowledge of science and of nature is in a state of flux.
What appears to be the truth today may be the error of tomorrow.
Possibly this is true also of our conception of the ancient
Landmarks, and that no list of all those fundamentals of the Craft
which are “actually” Landmarks is possible.
Both that statement and this bulletin are without prejudice to the
undoubted fact that in those Jurisdictions which have adopted any
list of Landmarks, whether all inclusive or not, the principles there
denominated as Landmarks have the force of Landmarks within the
borders of those Jurisdictions.
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