Esther M. Zimmer Lederberg: Prince Hall African Freemasonry

Considering the corruption found in the Catholic churches, many people post Reformation viewed Catholicism as irreversibly corrupt (the Holy Inquisition didn't help change this view). For example, Charles Dickens (living in Protestant England) held decidedly negative views of Catholicism). However, one must recall that while the Protestant sects did not strongly oppose African slavery, many people did not look favorably upon Protestantism, either. Circa 1776, African slavery was at its peak. When it became clear that "Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité" would not extend to the freedom of Black slaves in Haiti, the Haitain slaves created a revolution that resulted in the defeat of the French military invading army and NAVY in 1801-1803. Obviously, Black slaves would not be viewed as human beings: hatred still ran rampant. The "Hep! Hep!" pogroms of 1815-1819 ¹ against Jews, and the The Dreyfus Affair in France in 1894-1906 proved that the end of the corruption of the Holy Inquisition was yet premature. On July 15, 1834, the Spanish Holy Inquisition seemed to be going out of vogue, but that was only an apparent illusion. The long term effects of discrimination against women, Jews, and African slaves, and the religious genocides that targeted New World Amerindians still left their cultural residues of hatred in the enlightened West. Thus it comes as no surprise that in the new Free Masonry, women were not fully accepted. Black people were also not fully accepted into the Freemasons. Freemason idealism could not free itself from the old hatreds. Gender discrimintion, antisemitism and racism still (21st century) run riot, indeed, these hatreds still exist in the 22nd century.

To this day, both Catholicism and Protestantism oppose Freemasonry, as would be expected, as Freemasonry exposes the moral backwardness of racist religions.

Prince Hall, a free Black man, attempted to become a member of the Freemasons during the period of the American Revolution. He was not accepted, as free or not, he was a Black man. Hall was persistent. If he could not be accepted as a Freemason in the new United States, he could appeal to become a Freemason, appealing to the highest Freemason Lodge in England. Hall was accepted as a Grand Master, satisfying all "secret" guild codicils (the Freemasons were a mason's craft guild: the secret codicils called mestier, métier, ministerium, or mistery) into a Freemason Lodge for Black people (based upon English Freemasonry), but in the new United States. These secret codicils, thought to be Egyption in origin by the Freemasons, appear in Mozart's "Magic Flute".

Various schemes by African American Masons to join with White American Masons failed: White Freemasonry could not transcend racism, no matter what its principles claimed. African American Masons attempted to support a "Back to Africa" view, but this failed. Given the activities of Blacks in Haiti (Toussaint Louverture), attempts were made for African Americans to emmigrate to Haiti and establish businesses there, but this failed too. ^{2, 3, 4, 53}

Prince Hall was a former slave, literate and property owning. ⁵ After several appeals for independent Masonry status, there was no alternative for Prince Hall Freemasonry but to strike out for independence from White Freemasonry racism. Thus it was clear that White Freemasonry was overwhelmingly rascist. ^{6, 7}

"... Hayden lambasted white American Masons for continuing to adhere to the idea that an initiate had to be freeborn." ⁸

Why this focus upon Freemasonry? Lets gather loose strands. This brief study of the meaning of a Macaroni in a small British colony has turned up a connection to laws having as their basis biblical connections found by John Locke and used to justify seizure of Amerindian land, leading directly to genocide of Amerindians. Then this study focused upon homosexuality. After homosexuality, views about homosexuality having their origins in ancient Greece, and ancient Rome. This led to Renaissance art focusing upon Ganymedes, etc. A quick examination of paintings and works of art, mostly of aristcratic families with their toy Black servants and slaves, and many works of art depicting maccaronis. The laws established during the Renaissance led to a loss of rights for women, and a general view of mysogeny. An examination of mysogeny led to a history of women fighting for their rights when women attempted to join the Freemasons (The Order of the Eastern Star, an appendant part of the Freemasons for women) and women involved in their attempts to gain rights during the French Revoltion. Further research led to a study racist views expressed in poetry (especially blazons and counterblazons in the rhetoric of sonnets by such salesmen as Shakespeare), then in the rhetoric of theatre, based upon "Blackness" such as in Ben Jonson and Inigo Jones, and racism directed against Moors, expressed in guild mistery pageants, and as African slavery expanded, especially in the New World colonies led back to "Prince Hall Freemasonry" and a connection to a part of the French Revolution: the uprising of Black slaves under Toussaint Bredé Louverture in Haiti. Thus a cycle of repeated focus upon colonialist racism: European culture! This focus upon Colonialism and racism and mysogeny was not something that was "searched" for: it was discovered.

Esther M. Zimmer Lederberg
Prince Hall: African Freemasonry in the U.S.

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