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Jews in regular English Freemasonry

From Aubrey Newman:


Some forty-five years ago John Shaftesley published papers in the Transactions of the Jewish Historical Society of England (1965) and in Acta Quatuor Coronati (Masonic research journal) on Jews in English Freemasonry up to 1860, identifying a number of Jews who were members of English Lodges in the period before the immigration of large numbers of Russian Jews.

 

Since then Acta Quatuor Coronati has published a few studies of Jews and Freemasonry in the north-east of England and in west Lancashire, while one or two papers have been published elsewhere on a very local basis. But more recently, the digitisation of Lodge membership registers has made possible a more extensive analysis of this element of membership of Freemasonry.

 

It has become clear that in the period of mass migration, into and through the British Isles, a number of Jews sought membership of English Lodges, and many of those Lodges were prepared to accept them. Obviously, the first stages of such membership were that the would-be Freemasons wished to join the Craft and that existing members were prepared to accept them.

 

The purpose of such studies would be to identify the steps whereby the new arrivals were becoming fully accepted into English society at a time when Freemasonry itself was becoming much more popularly based.

 

The area to be studied need not be in an area of relatively high Jewish population. Letters, for example, between the Deputy Provincial Grand Master of Leicestershire and the Grand Secretary’s office in 1869, asking Grand Lodge about possible modifications of ritual in order to initiate a possible candidate who was a Jew, show a willingness to accept him on the part of the Province and at the same time indicating that such an event had not happened before. 

 

In this context I would be very interested in knowing how much interest there would be in opening a project investigating Jewish membership both in London and in the Provinces. If anyone wishes more information please get in touch with me at my email address, new@leicester.ac.uk

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