Stepping into Freemasonry

Online Course on Freemasonry

Costs: trial version will be by donation
current enrolment: now closed

The course comprises of seven pdfs following a preliminary introductory pdf (for a total of eight). Each pdf is sent at approximately six-weekly intervals over the course of a year.

Subscription/enrolment

Subscription is now closed. Masonic affiliation is not required.

Existing subscribers may unsubscribe at any time (only your subscription email is required to unsubscribe).

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N.B.: some feedback, including participation in the survey listed below, is a requirement: .

Please provide your name (first name only is sufficient). Your name may be visible to other subscribers, so if you would prefer anonymity, please use instead an online pseudonym of your choice.

Requirements

Age: enrolment presumes that you are at least 21 years of age. Please do not subscribe unless this is the case.

Participation in each module is required before access is given to the ensuing pdf. Participation includes contributing your views to the specific points raised in each module/pdf. Failure to do so results in being removed from the subscription list. Be aware, however, that such contribution need not be extensive: rather, a minimal amount of reflection showing that you have indeed read the material is what is looked for. Furthermore, disagreement with anything I present is of course perfectly fine!

'About you' survey: In order to ascertain the range of participants, the following questions (and only those) will be asked via a survey on Polldaddy.com. Please do not subscribe if you are unwilling to answer these honestly.

• age range
  1. less than 35
  2. 35-70
  3. over 70
• gender
  1. Male
  2. Female
• Freemasonic affiliation
  1. none
  2. masculine
  3. feminine
  4. co-masonic
• location (see this page for more detail)
  1. Africa (North) & Middle East
  2. Africa (sub-Sahara)
  3. Central & South America
  4. North America
  5. Asia (mainland)
  6. Asia (island nations)
  7. Australasia, Oceania, Pacific and Indian Ocean nations/states

This pdf-course and the 218 Certificate and Diploma courses

Given my involvement in Masonic education via the Victorian Lodge of Research (218), it's important to realise that this course is neither based nor similar to either the Certificate nor the Diploma courses the Lodge offers.

Rather, this course was in development prior to the introduction of the Certificate course and, apart from some inevitable overlap in some historical material, both focus and structure are essentially different.

Course as book

It is anticipated that the course materials will, with some minor alterations, be available in bookform in the next few years.

PDF-based course

What you will need

The course assumes that you will have access to the internet and some books on Freemasonry (whether electronic or printed volumes). Given that each 'chapter' is pdf-based, it is suggested that a full pdf reader, such as Adobe Reader, be used. Many other pdf readers do not have the full functionality that Adobe provides and that may be used in the linked documents.

• Preliminary notes and resource suggestions

1. Historical Survey and Watersheds


2. Landmarks and Essence of Freemasonry


3. The Freemason, the Lodge, and Grand Lodge


4. The Three Fundamental Degrees


5. Freemasonry as Secular Impulse


6. Degree Structures: a three-fold form


7. The Future Beckons