Hitchhiker's Guide to Religion
Masonic

James Anderson

The Constitutions Author

Masonic Codification, Religious Tolerance, Mythological History
Attribute Value
Combat
ATK 40
DEF 65
SPR 75
SPD 50
INT 90
Rank Scottish Presbyterian minister / Compiler of the Constitutions (1723)
Domain Codification, Religious Tolerance, Mythological History
Alignment Masonic Sacred
Weakness His "history" of Masonry from Adam through Solomon is largely invented; later editions contradict the first
Counter Historians (his fabricated genealogy has been demolished by serious Masonic scholarship since the 19th century)
Key Act Compiled and published the *Constitutions of the Free-Masons* (1723), establishing the Supreme Being requirement and the non-sectarian charge
Source *The Constitutions of the Free-Masons* (1723, revised 1738)

Lore: Anderson was a pragmatist. He knew the Premier Grand Lodge needed a foundational text, that such texts needed ancient pedigrees, and that ancient pedigrees in 1723 were largely self-invented. So he wrote one: Masonry descended from Adam through Noah, Nimrod, Moses, Solomon, Pythagoras, Vitruvius, the Roman collegia, medieval cathedral guilds, to the Premier Grand Lodge. None is true as history. All is true as ritual orientation. His durable gift: the religious clause—belief in a Supreme Being required, the Supreme Being’s identity unspecified. This clause grounds every regular Masonic jurisdiction worldwide.


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Combat Radar

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