In 1881, the ninety degrees of the Rite of Misraim were united with the ninety-seven degrees of Memphis. Regular Freemasons generally treated MM, as they also treated the O.T.O. groups, as “fringe” or “irregular” Masonry. Even so, the originally regular Rite of Cerneau appears in this text. The tangled history of these innumerable rites and their interrelationships is, in reality, a depressing tale of disputes over legitimacy and, at times, money. Where the O.T.O. phenomenon itself is concerned, and where Bricaud omitted relevant information, my additions have been inserted in [square] brackets. Many of the principal figures mentioned here also appear in connection with the Gnostic Church.
Further reading
Aleister Crowley, 'The Equinox' I:10, 1919, pp. xix-xxxix.
Theodor Reuss's volumes of the 'Oriflamme'.
'Wiener Freimaurer-Zeitung' No. 5, May 1929, p. 12.
K.H.F. Frick, 'Licht und Finsternis' volume II, Graz 1978.
Ellic Howe, 'Fringe Masonry in England 1870-1985', in 'Ars Quatuor Coronatorum', pp. 242-275, London 1972.
G. Ventura, 'I Riti Massonici di Misraim e Memphis', Venice 1975.
Gerard Galtier. 'Maçonnerie Egyptienne', Editions du Rocher 1989.
Serge Caillet, 'Franc-Maçonnerie', Paris 1988.
Pierre P. Pasleau, 'Des Templiers aux Francs-Macons', Paris 1988.
All my facsimile books.
Chronology
1856 – [Memphis] Grand Hierophant Marconis set out [from France] for the USA, where on 9 November in New York he founded a Sovereign Grand Council of the 94°, with David MacLelland as Grand Master.1861 - Harry Seymour discharged MacLelland as Grand Master of the 'Sovereign General Council' of the USA.
1862 - On 30 April Marshal Maignan, Grand Master of the French Grand Orient, addressed a proclamation to all bodies under his obedience concerning a union of French Masonry. Due to a favourable report from Razy, member of a commission of inquiry, the Rite of Memphis was united with the Grand Orient. The lodges of the Rite of Memphis placed themselves under the control of the Grand Orient. In July, the Grand Hierophant [Marconis in Paris] presented a [96°] Warrant for America to Brother Seymour. The document was forwarded to the French Grand Orient and entered under the number 28,911 in its Great Seal Book. [21 July was given by Theodor Reuss and H.J. Metzger as the date of the O.T.O.'s foundation. On the basis of this warrant, the 'Symbolic Grand Lodge' of the Scottish Rite in Germany (AASR; 'Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite', of regular form with 33 degrees) - in other words Reuss - believed that he had the right to the first three degrees of the Scottish Rite of Cerneau. Harry J. Seymour was later struck from its list of members in good standing by the American Supreme Council, the ruling body of regular Freemasons the USA.]
To make the accord with the other degrees of the Grand Orient simpler, the [active] ninety-five grades of Memphis [in France] were temporarily reduced to thirty-three.
1869 - America's S[upreme] S[anctuary] broke with the French Grand Orient, because the latter had been granting lodge warrants in Louisiana without the permission of the Supreme Sanctuary; Grand Master Seymour announced the division to the Grand Orient on 20 March. Since the death of the Grand Hierophant [Marconis, in 1868], the 'Supreme Governorship'of the Rite of Egypt had passed to the Marquis de Beauregard as chief. [On 30 November 1870 the 'Supreme Council 33°' of the AASR expelled John Yarker (1833 - 20 March 1913). He had held the authority to confer the fourth through the thirty-third degrees of the irregular and reduced Rite of Memphis since 24 August 1871.]
1872 - On 4 June the [irregular] American Supreme Sanctuary granted Letters Patent to John Yarker [in Manchester], authorising him to establish a Supreme Sanctuary in England and Ireland. [If the first three degrees were revived, it is not mentioned; see 24 August 1871.] On 8 October this Supreme Sanctuary was formally constituted at Freemasons’ Hall in London (the seat of the Grand Lodge of England); its Grand Master General was John Yarker. The new Sanctuary appointed General Garibaldi as an honorary member, at the same time proclaiming its friendly relations with Sicily and Egypt.
[1891 - Gérard Encausse co-founded Martinism in France [3]. On June 24 June 1901 Theodor Reuss received a Martinist warrant from Encausse; in the same year Encausse was granted letters patent by Yarker to open the Swedenborgian Lodge INRI, this warrant being renewed on 20 March 1906 [4]. On 15 June that year Reuss was made a Master Mason, and 'A.M. 5663 33°' in Emanuel Lodge Nº 1, by Max Scheuer (of New York, 33°, 90°, 96°, Grand Commander of the Rite of Cerneau from 1900-1904). Encausse belonged to the Sovereign Grand Lodge of England, as did the coroner William Wynn Westcott (1848-1925) and W.H. Quilliams (33°, 95°); Reuss however did not [5].]
1902 - The [formerly] independent Rite of Misraim in France disappeared. John Yarker was Grand Hierophant, Oddis his successor [as universal Grand Hierophant]. [No. 0 of the Oriflamme of January 1902 makes no mention of Reuss as being in the English or Irish Grand Lodges in connection with the founding of the German 'Holy Grail Lodge and Temple No. 15', part of Yarker's Swedenborg Rite. German Freemasons who wished to affiliate with this lodge were supposed to make themselves known to Max Rahn, August Weinholtz, Franz Held, or Leopold Engel, according to the magazine].
The English Supreme Sanctuary constituted a German Supreme Sanctuary, and chose Theodor Reuss as its Grand Master. [This was on 24 September 1902. On 27 December 1903 Carl Kellner was appointed to the 33°, 90°, and 96° for England and Germany, and in 1904 he became 'Fraternal Representative' of the MM for America. Kellner's descendants have no documentation in their possession which would indicate whether Kellner was definitely a regular Freemason, in the sense of recognition by the Grand Lodge in London. [6] Reuss's association with the Theosophical Society is described by Ellic Howe (20 September 1910 - 28 September 1991), in an article in Theosophical History. [7]]
1905 - The Grand Master for Italy stepped down, and the Rite in Italy became dormant. [Carl Kellner died on 8 June 1905 from a heart attack, leaving his widow Marie Antoinette (originally from Trieste), and three children.]
[On 24 November 1905 Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) and Marie von Sivers (1867-1948), became members of MM, and received a warrant to work the 30°, 67°, and 89° from Reuss on 3 January 1906. On 21 June 1906 Reuss published the 'General Statutes of the O.T.O.' with the Lamen of the O.T.O. which Crowley later maintained [8] was entirely his own invention [9]. However this Lamen can already be found as part of Joseph Peladan's coat-of-arms in the 'Ordre de la Rose-Croix du Temple et du Graal' [10]. On 24 June Reuss severed Memphis from Misraim, and made the 33° independent from both. In 1907 his young O.T.O. became known as the 'Union for International Reconciliation' (Bund für Internationale Versöhnung).]
1908 - Following a congress of Spiritualists at the temple of the 'Droit Humain' lodge [founded 1893] in Paris, the Rite of Memphis-Misraim was newly constituted in France. The constituting Letters Patent were sent to Berlin from England on 24 June; they were signed (as 'Peregrinos') by Theodor Reuss, who had travelled to Paris for this purpose. Grand Masters for France [on 24 June [11]] were Gérard Encausse "Papus" [33°, 90°, 96° [12]] and Charles Détré "Teder" [33°, 97°, X° [13]]. ["Joyous Jubilation Reigns in the Camp of the Martinists" [14]]. The Mother-Lodge of the Memphis-Misraim Rite in France was the 'Humanidad' lodge, formerly in communion with the Spanish Rite. [On 15 March 1908 Arnoldo Krumm-Heller received a warrant for Mexico from Reuss, and on 7 April the same year additionally obtained a licence for a Supreme Sanctuary for Chile, Peru, and Bolivia, equivalent to 33°, 90°, 96°. Hans Rudolf Hilfiker, the highly conjectural later successor to Reuss in Switzerland, was mentioned on the front cover of the Oriflamme for December 1909 as an inactive Grand Inspector General. In the same number of the Oriflamme, Reuss announced an International Congress for Experimental Psychology to be held in Paris in 1910.]
[Yarker disagreed with Reuss and Encausse's activities in France, and nominated George Lagrèze in their place on 9 September 1909 [15]].
1910 - Eduardo Frosini, the Italian General Delegate for the Spanish Rite, founded the 'Rite Philosophique Italien' in Florence, devising seven grades for it, and uniting the Scottish, Memphis, and Misraim grades. [On 21 November 1910 Aleister Crowley was appointed to the 33° of the AASR; notwithstanding the fact that Yarker had been out of favour with the AASR ever since 1869.]
1911 - The Romanian Grand Master Constantin Moriou, the oldest founder-member (77 years) retired from his office; I.T. Ulic was his successor. [In November 1911 the O.T.O. was mentioned for the first time in the French occult journal Initiation. Bricaud's Gnostic Church and Encausse's Martinism entered into union.]
[On 21 April 1912 Crowley was elevated to the 33°, 90°, 95°, and X° for England and Ireland through Reuss. On the same day Reuss nominated Czesław Czyński "Punar Bhava" as X° for the Slavonic territories; [16] Czynski had been appointed by Encausse in 1910. Czynski was announced in the French periodical Mysteria (subtitled "the Organ of the O.T.O.") as the Legate of the Universal Gnostic Church in Russia [17]; he died in 1937. [18] On 25 October 1912 Frosini and Détré were made "gnostic legates of the Universal Gnostic Church". [19] The "first Grand Administrator-General" and "Past Grand Master" of the MM and O.T.O., Franz Hartmann "Emanuel", born on 22 November 1838, died on 7 August 1912. The 'Jubilee Edition' of the Oriflamme appeared shortly afterwards; it contained many photographs of the protagonists, a 'History Lection' on the origins of the O.T.O., and included a contribution from the 'Mysteria Mystica Maxima' (Crowley's English branch) on sex-magic.]
1913 - On the 20 March the Grand Hierophant John Yarker died. He was succeeded by Theodor Reuss. [20] After the death of Villarino del Villar, the Grand Master of the 'Spanish National Rite', this rite fused with the Catalonian 'Balearic Grand Lodge'. [Italy: after the death of Michele de Vicenzo Majulli (33°, 90°, 95°, VII°) [21] in the summer of 1912 Eduardo Frosini "Hermes" became 33°, 90°, 96° and VII° [22]. He had received MM-degrees already in 1909 by Yarker [23]. Also in Italy Arturo Reghini "Maximus" (12 November 1878 - 1 July 1946) was made 33°, VI°, and G. di San Fortunato was raised to 33°, 90°, 95° and VII°. [24] Frosini and Reghini are entered in Crowley's Golden Book [25] which only contains entries from 1912 to 1917. Encausse made Czesław Czyński 33°, 90°, 96°, VII° and 'Legate of the Universal Gnostic Church' for Russia [26]. On the 20 October 1913 Crowley was a founder-member of the 'Rite Philosophique Italien'. Reghini, of whom no more was heard to do with Martinism, was made VII° at the same time. [27]
Allegedly the Madrid Cardinal Mariano Rampolla di Tindaro (1843-1913), who was nearly elected as successor to Pope Leo XIII, was a member of this Spanish O.T.O. [28]]
1914 - The 'Rite Philosophique Italien' [founded 1910] was closed down by Frosini. [Reuss's Oriflamme published an historical summary of Leopold Engels' Order of Illuminati, as well as Crowley's 'Manifesto of the Mysteria Mystica Maxima', which was (with only trifling alterations) promulgated in 1919 as statutes of the O.T.O. with worldwide validity as Liber LII. Likewise Reuss again proclaimed the theme of the sexual act in his essay 'Parsifal and the Secret of the Holy Grail', and proposed his 'Plan of the New O.T.O. Temple' and its 'Cornerstone' [29].
1916 - The French Grand Master [each country had its own Grand Master] Gérard Encausse died on 25 October as a consequence of wartime illness [tuberculosis]. Charles Détré was his successor as Grand Master.
[In 1917 there appeared the Description and Constitution of the O.T.O. "Otherwise: The Hermetic Brotherhood of Light" [30], and the "Message from the Master Thirion" (sic); a postal address was given at Lugano in Switzerland.]
1918 - On 25 September Grand Master Charles Détré died. During the war, the Rite was concentrated in England, France, Germany, Romania, and Egypt. [Reuss supposedly granted a warrant on 10 November 1918 to Ida Hofmann and Clara Linke: 33°, 97°, and X°.]
1919 - A group of Masons belonging to the 'Rite Français' (Grand Orient), the Scottish Rite (Grand Lodge and Supreme Council), and at the same time the higher grades of the Rite of Memphis-Misraim, sought to revive the Memphis-Misraim Rite in France, whilst remaining loyal to their obediences, with the aim of working a purely initiatory Freemasonry. The 'Humanidad' Mother-Lodge was revived at Lyons in accordance with the 1908 [Reuss] warrant. Thus on 10 September Brother Joanny Bricaud was granted a warrant [through Reuss] to establish the French Sovereign Sanctuary of the MM [33°, 90°, 96°], and likewise, on 30 September, activated the French foundation of a "Supreme Grand Council of Confederated Rites, Early Grand Scottish Rite, Memphis and Misraim, Royal Order of Scotland" etc.)
[In May 1919 Hilfiker was raised to 33°, 95°, and VII° for Switzerland through Reuss. Brother Thomson ratified the 33° on the 29 August 1919. Joanny Bricaud augmented these offices to 90° on the 12 May 1920. In July 1920 Reuss called a World Congress of Freemasonry in Zurich, and announced the "Structural Programme of the Gnostic Neo-Christian O.T.O.", but at which Reuss’s experiment in gaining Masonic recognition for his O.T.O. and the MM finally foundered.]
1921 - In Italy the MM was reanimated with the aid of an Egyptian warrant; G. Macbean was Grand Master in Palermo. [In July of this year Harvey Spencer Lewis (1883-1936) was made 33°, 90°, 95°, and an honorary member of the O.T.O.. On July 31 July Carl William Hansen "Kadosh" received the 33° for Copenhagen from Joanny Bricaud, augmented by the X° from Reuss on 3 September. In the same year Heinrich Traenker became 33°, 90°, 96° and X° for Germany. Later on Spencer Lewis too was raised to the 97° [31]. Living at Cefalù in Sicily after 2 April 1920, Crowley noted in his diary on 27 November 1921 that he had selected himself as O.H.O. of the O.T.O..]
In 1923 the Grand Hierophant Theodor Reuss (Peregrinos) died [without naming a successor [32], which threw the legitimacy of all succeeding organisations into question].
[Original in French].
Notes, 1994
1. Rudolf von Sebottendorff, the founder of the Thule Order must nonetheless have joined the MM; see Ellic Howe: Rudolf Freiherr von Sebottendorff, MS., London 27.6.68, p. 39.
2. Complete text in AHA August 1991, p. 9 ff.
3. Frick, op. cit., Vol II, p. 404.
4. Galtier, op. cit., p. 297.
5. Nº 0 of the Oriflamme, supplement to Die Übersinnliche Welt, December (?) 1901.
6. Sigrid Plutzar, letter of 6.11.92.
7. Vol. III Nº 1, January 1990, Fullerton, p. 17.
8. Crowley to F.M. Spann, letter of 13.1.1936. Lamen illustrated in Der Kleine Theodor Reuss Reader, Koenig, 1993.
9. Aleister Crowley to Smith, letter of 3.1.1935.
10. For instance on the cover of Théâtre de La Rose + Croix - Babylone, Paris 1895. Literature in Gerard Galtier: Maçonnerie, p. 198.
11. 'Jubilee Edition' of the Oriflamme, Schmiedeberg 1912, p. 14.
12. Signature to the invitation to the 1908 Congress, and Initiation, Paris, October 1908.
13. Laban de Laban: Memorandum pour les Dames, 1918, in R.S. Clymer: Rosicrucian Fraternity in America Vol. II, Quakertown 1937, p. 317. The Oriflamme for December 1909 also credits Détré with the 33°, 90°, and 95°; see also Mysteria, January 1913.
14. Wiener Freimaurerzeitung 7/8, August 1929, p. 13.
15. Galtier, op. cit., p. 302, 336.
16. 'Jubilee edition' of the Oriflamme, Bad Schmiedeberg 1.6.1912, p. 14. Facsimile in AHA, September 1991, p. 22.
17. Nº 6 of June 1913, p. 191.
18. Rafal T. Prinke: Polnischer Satanismus und Sexualmagie, in AHA 9, Bergen 1991, p. 18ff.
19. Serge Caillet: Franc-Maçonnerie, p. 52.
20. The successor in England and Ireland was Henry Meyer 33°, 90°, 96°. Oriflamme, July 1913, p. 2.
21. Mysteria Nº 1, Paris January 1913, p. 83. Initiation, January 1911.
22. Mysteria Nº 2, Paris February 1913, p. 179.
23. Oriflamme, Schmiedeberg December 1909, p. 1.
24. Facsimile in AHA, September 1991, p. 21.
25. A list of all members with their dates, titles, duties, debts, and a description of their real value to the Order.
26. Mysteria Vol. 2 Nº 1, Paris 1913, p. 191.
27. Francis King: Magic, London 1975, photograph on p. 60.
28. Georges Virebeau: Prélats et Franc-Maçons, Paris 1978.
29. Reprinted in: Der Kleine Theodor Reuss-Reader, published by P.R. Koenig, Munich 1993.
30. On the 'Hermetic Brotherhood of Light', see Theosophical History, Vol. 2 Nº5, London 1988, piece by David Board on p. 149. Ibid., Vol. 3 Nº 3, Fullerton 1990, piece by Joscelyn Godwin on p. 66, and by the same author in Vol 3 Nº5, 1991, p. 137.
31. Signature in facsimile in: Clymer, op. cit., Vol II p. 391. The charter reproduced here closely resembles those that Crowley received from Reghini for the 'Ritus Philosophicus Italianus.'
32. Galtier, op. cit., p. 329; Howe & Möller op. cit., p. 251.
