Guide
What a Past Master Is
· 2 minute read
Every lodge is governed by a Master, elected by the brethren for a term of a year. When his year ends and his successor is installed, he becomes a Past Master, and the title is his for life. It is one of the few Masonic distinctions that is earned by serving rather than conferred by a degree, which is why brethren attach weight to it.
Worshipful
The Master of a lodge is addressed as Worshipful Master, and the word trips up everyone outside the fraternity. It has nothing to do with worship in the religious sense. It is old English for honourable, the same usage as the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths or a mayor being addressed as the Right Worshipful. A Past Master is a Worshipful Brother by the same convention.
The jewel
A lodge gives its retiring Master a jewel, and the design of the jewel is where American and English practice part company. In most American jurisdictions the Past Master's jewel is a pair of compasses opened to sixty degrees on a quadrant, the arc marked in degrees, often with a sun at the centre. In England the jewel carries the forty seventh problem of Euclid, the proof with its three squares. Both are worn on the collar or the apron at lodge, and both say the same thing: this brother has governed a lodge and knows how the work is done.
What a Past Master does
He keeps the lodge's memory. Past Masters sit together in many lodges and are consulted on ritual, on custom and on the things that never got written down. Some jurisdictions require a Past Master for certain offices, and a lodge in trouble usually finds it is a Past Master who sorts it out. He may also serve his Grand Lodge, which is how many Grand Masters begin.
Past Master and Grand Master
A Master governs one lodge. A Grand Master governs a Grand Lodge, which is every lodge in a state or a country, and he is addressed as Most Worshipful. A Past Grand Master has held that office. The words are similar and the scale is not.
In our designs
The Past Master Jewel plate in the Square and Compasses collection draws the American jewel on its collar, with the quadrant behind the compasses and a chain of office and wax seal in the margins. The Forty Seventh Problem plate in the Archives draws the English one. Either is the shirt to give a brother the night he steps down from the east.
Questions
- What does Worshipful mean in Freemasonry?
- It is an old English form of respectful address meaning honourable, the same usage as a Worshipful Company or a Right Worshipful mayor. It has nothing to do with religious worship.
- What is a Past Master's jewel?
- The jewel a lodge gives its retiring Master. In most American jurisdictions it is a pair of compasses opened on a quadrant, and in England it carries the forty seventh problem of Euclid.
