Fringe Masonry existed. By examining it in a rational manner and in the context of its time we can defuse it and render it worthless as a weapon of attack on mainstream Freemasonry.
John Hamill. Transactions of Quatuor Coronati Lodge. Vol. 109. p. 214.
Fringe Masonry encompasses those regular freemasons whose interest in mysticism and the occult led them to such organizations as the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (HOGD) and the Ordo Templi Orientis. Neither of these organizations was ever recognized by any regular masonic body. The Golden Dawn had no masonic pretensions but the fact that the founders of the OTO made such claims opened it to accusations of being clandestine or irregular Freemasonry. Since 1919 (Equinox Vol. III, No. 1) they ceased to claim being or having any authority regarding Freemasonry. Currently most masonic Grand Lodge jurisdictions are unaware of, or indifferent to, the existence or history of the OTO.
It must be stressed that although Freemasonry recognizes many of these men as freemasons, no recognized masonic body, and few freemasons, endorse their opinions and conclusions as an accepted extension or interpretation of the teachings of Freemasonry. Their published works have had no positive or lasting impact on Freemasonry. In fact their writings are more often quoted, out of context, by anti-masons attempting to link masonic teachings with these individuals’ opinions.
These authors do not, in any fashion, represent the teachings or beliefs of recognized Freemasonry. |
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 Biographies
Charlatans
Cagliostro
Esoterica
Paul Foster Case
Manly P. Hall
Eliphas Lévi
Roy Matthew Mitchell
Fringe freemasons
Edward George Earle Bulwer-Lytton
Frederick L. Gardner
Gerald Brosseau Gardner
Francis George Irwin
Robert Wentworth Little
Samuel Liddel MacGregor Mathers
Theodor Reuss
Arthur E. Waite
William Wynn Westcott
William Woodman
John Yarker
Irregular freemasons
Annie Besant
Aleister Crowley
C. W. Leadbeater
Non-masons
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky
William Butler Yeats |
