Wednesday, January 18, 2006
MASONRY, B'NAI B'RITH, AND THE ADL
It doesn’t take much poking around conspiracy websites to find the claims that Freemasonry and Jews are in league to establish the One World Order. While I tend to stay out of those sites, the charge is made so often that I've sometimes wondered whether there is any substance to it.
Until just recently, what I found while researching Freemasonry was that Jews were excluded from the Lodge until some time around the mid-point of the last century. Apparently, though, that is not the case, as recently accessed Masonic websites indicate that Jews were in fact members of the lodge. At the website of "California Freemason" Paul Bessel has an exploration of "Judaism and Freemasonry" online which indicates that there have been periods of anti-Semitism in the lodges, particularly in Germany. That perhaps explains in part why I had concluded that Jews were not accepted in the lodge. Germany and France were the two main sources of the occultism of the 1800s.
Along with the charge made by the conspiracy theorists of Jewish-Masonic plotting comes the claim that B’nai B’rith is Masonic. That was another charge I tended to set aside until the other night while surfing the Mill Valley (California) Lodge, I came across the history of B’nai B’rith.
It can be found in the extensive paper titled “Marin County Fraternal History” linked on the home page. There you can read:
B'nai B'rith was founded in the lower East Side of New York City on October 13, 1843 by twelve founders, all German émigrés in their twenties or thirties. They were Henry Jones (who originated the idea), Isaac Rosenbourg, William Renau, Reuben Rodacher, Henry Kling, Henry Anspacher, Isaac Dittenhoefer, Jonas Hecht, Michael Schwab, Hirsch Heineman, Valentine Koon and Samuel Schaefer. The founders were primarily shopkeepers who had been unacquainted before 1843, but apparently met through mutual membership as Freemasons, Odd Fellows, or other secret benevolent societies. Their purpose for organizing yet another fraternal group was to end, or at least reduce, the chaos and anarchy in Jewish life-or, as one of the founders put it, of "uniting and elevating the Sons of Abraham." (B'nai B'rith - The Story of a Covenant, by Edward E. Grusd, Appleton-Century, New York 1966, pp. 12-15, hereinafter cited as "Grusd".)
There is a persistent legend that B'nai B'rith was founded because Jews were barred from membership in the Masonic orders and the Odd Fellows. As the memoirs of Jones, Rosenbourg, and Renau attest, that was not the case, since several of the Order's founders were themselves members of those organizations. (Id.) Additionally, the nascent fraternity of B'nai B'rith found its first home in Masonic quarters. The Masonic Hall, at the corner of Oliver and Henry Streets, was rented for two dollars a night, and on November 12, at 8 P.M., the first meeting of the first B'nai B'rith lodge was called to order by Henry Jones as temporary chairman. It was named New York Lodge No. 1 and from it the order rapidly grew, spreading across the country and eventually overseas.
The article goes on to give the history of the organization, indicating that its structure is quite similar to the structure of Freemasonry and that officers were often members of Masonic lodges. It also indicates that B’nai B’rith established the Anti-Defamation League in 1913.
Interestingly enough, Catholic League cited the ADL's "December Dilemma", featured on their website, as one source of the anti-Christmas sentiment that was floating around our malls when we did our Christmas shopping not long ago:
Posted on the website of the Anti-Defamation League are guidelines called "December’s Dilemma." Essentially, the ADL proposes to public school administrators, teachers and parents guidelines that in essence banish virtually any mention of Christmas. These guidelines have absolutely no legal standing and turn the First Amendment on its head. "December Dilemma" is the product of ADL’s own philosophy that would ban any expression of religious belief in public schools.
Not mentioning in polite company anything associated with religion is one of the main rules of the Masonic Lodge. The ADL might not be Masonic in fact, but in philosophy they compare nicely. The Lodge, oddly enough, does not ban the use of the word "Christmas," however. Google turns up several lodges with Christmas parties, and Christmas food drives. The Lodge that claims to honor no specific religion but respect all of them seems to find that philosophy compatible with a celebration of Christmas.
