Eleusis to secrecy
The St. John's Lodge Eleusis for Secrecy is a humanitarian (i.e. religiously neutral ) Masonic Lodge in Bayreuth and belongs to the Grand Lodge of the Old Free and Accepted Masons of Germany .
The Eleusis emerged from the two lodges that had been founded by Margrave Friedrich von Brandenburg-Bayreuth in 1741 as a palace lodge (January, French-speaking, registration number: 6) and as a city lodge (December, German-speaking) and is part of the Absalom lodge three nettles in Hamburg (1737, matriculation number: 1), the box to the three swords and Asträa zur greening diamond in Dresden (1738, matriculation number: 3) and the box Aux trois Globes in Berlin (1740, matriculation number : 5, from which the Great National Mother Lodge “To the Three Worlds” developed) one of the oldest still working Masonic lodges in Germany.
The Eleusis for secrecy now has more than 80 members (brothers).
Presence / activities of the lodge
The following can be read on the Eleusis confidentiality website :
"Every Freemason feels addressed by the Kantian demand" Have the courage to use your intellect! " Thinking free of dogmas and overcoming the barriers and prejudices that often exist, that is what we Freemasons strive for.
As a group of men of all ages, different origins and different opinions, we try to achieve for ourselves what was asked of visitors to the classic Apollo temple in Delphi two and a half millennia ago: know yourself . "
As a result, the brotherhood meets regularly for lecture evenings (in which not only Masonic topics are dealt with, but philosophy, ethics, history, religions, psychology, culture, environment and nature also serve as objects of consideration) with subsequent exchange of ideas, joint reflection and fraternal conversation , so to speak, thinking out loud with the friend , as well as the ritual Masonic work .
Both, the lecture evenings and the ritual work, serve the Masonic self-education , which begins with oneself and is then supposed to work outwards, into human society. This self- education is an open process, a culture of life that develops gradually.
As a member of the Grand Lodge of the Old Free and Accepted Masons of Germany, the Eleusis for Secrecy is one of the humanitarian Masonic lodges in terms of its philosophical orientation and its Masonic teaching . “Humanitarian” in the sense of religiously neutral does not mean anti-religious or atheistic ; rather there is no commitment to any particular religion or denomination; The individual ideas of God may all be different, every Freemason brother should be able and allowed to live the faith that appears to him to be right , and he should also tolerate his brother in his faith.
Therefore Freemasonry as such cannot be a religion or a substitute for religion, it does not want it and it is not. Freemasons recognize in the world, in everything living and in the moral consciousness of people, a creative spirit full of wisdom, strength and beauty, a world- ordering principle that each brother can fill individually.
In the lodge as a friendship alliance, the brothers organize cultural, social and sporting activities together (excursions, bike tours, summer parties, ...).
Humanity award
The Freemason Lodge Eleusis for Secrecy awards the "Humanity Prize" worth € 3,000 to people or organizations in the city and district of Bayreuth who are distinguished by their above-average commitment to their fellow human beings. Their actions must be committed to human dignity and the common good.
The award is not only intended to honor and support humanitarian commitment, but also to promote fundamental social values and to show what humanitarian commitment can look like in individual cases.
- 2018: Bayreuth women's shelter , which takes care of abused and threatened women and their children with a wide range of offers and exemplary human commitment and offers them protection and help.
history
1741–1791: Margravial period
On January 21, 1741, Margrave Friedrich von Brandenburg-Bayreuth donated a French-language castle box in Bayreuth and raised it to the status of a grand mother's box. The margrave was and remained its master of the chair until his death. In the same year, on December 4, 1741, a city box working in German was installed. Both lodges were given the nickname Zur Sonne by the margrave and both worked on the ritual of the simple old English system from the start ; later the castle lodge worked for a few years in a French high degree system with 15 degrees (following a temporary preference of the margrave).
Due to a castle fire in 1753, the castle lodge lost its lodge. Depending on the sources, both lodges then worked closely together, with Margrave Friedrich paying 60 Reichsthalers a year as rent for the use of the lodge premises to the city lodge and the palace lodge after the death of Margrave Friedrich in 1763 in the city lodge ("with transfer of all rights") , or both lodges merged with each other for the Midsummer Festival in 1753, whereby the master of the chair of the city lodge continued to be the master of the chair of the united lodge and Margrave Friedrich remained the grand master of the great mother lodge . Either way, the only lodge from now on was called the Freemason Lodge Zur Sonne in Bayreuth.
From 1763 to 1769, Friedrich Christian , Friedrich's uncle , ruled Bayreuth as margrave. He was considered a religious fanatic and was suspicious, his official business was confused. On December 29, 1764, the Lodge adopted the strict observance system . Since the brotherhood had decided to do this (at the personal instigation of the incumbent Grand Master and under external pressure?), But did not agree with this assumption and the associated central control by the Old Scottish Directory, the ritual work and formal activities were from July 1765 to Discontinued January 1779. Although the brothers held meetings in secret, they no longer kept a record of them. From 1779 the lodge worked again officially and regularly according to the old English regulations. However, the Margraviate of Bayreuth fell to Ansbach in 1769 , the local Margrave Alexander moved the Bayreuth officers of the Guard - and thus many brothers in leading lodge functions - to Ansbach, while only a few brothers remained in Bayreuth.
1791–1810: Under Prussian obedience
With the sale of the Margraviate of Ansbach-Bayreuth to Prussia in 1791, Bayreuth came under Berlin rule. Following the Royal Prussian Edict of October 20, 1798 , according to which all lodges within the Prussian territory had to submit to one of the three recognized Berlin mother lodges, the Zur Sonne lodge in Bayreuth joined the system of the Great Lodge of Prussia on July 4, 1800 "Royal York for Friendship" . She also adopted the Feßler system , which had been created by Johann Gottlieb Fichte and Ignaz Aurelius Feßler for the Great Lodge of Prussia called "Royal York for Friendship".
In 1806 the former Margraviate Bayreuth was occupied by French troops and in 1807 it was annexed to the French Empire in the Peace of Tilsit, which interrupted the existing connections to Berlin. Since it was foreseeable that Franconia would no longer return to Prussia, the Zur Sonne lodge in Bayreuth entered into confidential agreements with the Morgenstern lodge (founded in 1799) and the Golden Libra lodge (founded 1804), both in Hof, and the lodge zur Truth and Friendship (founded 1803) in Fürth undertook to reactivate the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne . On December 4, 1807, the Zur Sonne lodge was also issued a constitutional patent as a large provincial lodge by the Great Lodge of Prussia called "Royal York for Friendship" and was sent on February 6, 1808, in the event that the Franconian lodges of Berlin would have to separate.
This then happened in 1810, when the former Principality of Bayreuth fell to the Kingdom of Bavaria and was taken over by the latter on June 30 of the same year. As a consequence, the Lodge Zur Sonne in Bayreuth loosened its ties to the Great Lodge of Prussia called "Royal York for Friendship" on July 20, 1810.
1810–1933: In the Great Provincial Lodge / Grand Lodge Zur Sonne
The Lodge Zur Sonne in Bayreuth was established on September 27, 1810 as the Large Provincial Lodge Zur Sonne , citing the patent granted by the Large Lodge of Prussia called "Royal York for Friendship" and founded the early 1811 with the lodges in Hof and Fürth large Provinzialloge Zur Sonne .
Since the newly founded Grand Lodge took over the name of the Bayreuth Lodge, it now needed a new name. The Bayreuth brothers chose Eleusis to maintain secrecy .
By royal decree of September 13, 1814, all civil servants were banned from membership in secret societies . As a result, Eleusis lost about 50 brothers to secrecy , u. a. the reigning master from the chair and a large part of the officials.
On September 29, 1829, the Great Provincial Lodge at Zur Sonne changed its status and name from a Great Provincial Lodge to a Grand Lodge and, with the recognition of the German Great Lodges, resumed its old rights under the name Grand Lodge Zur Sonne .
In 1849 the Eleusis withdrew to secrecy , and with her the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne , its own lodge house, the former margravial chicken hatchery. This house was demolished about 30 years later to make way for a new building. This new lodge building was inaugurated in August 1881.
At the request of the Bayreuth Lodge Eleusis on secrecy in the conference of the Great Lodge on December 28, 1862, the rituals and laws of the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne were revised by Brother Johann Caspar Bluntschli from Heidelberg and used from 1868.
In 1902, at the suggestion of the Bayreuth bookseller and brother Georg Niehrenheim, today's German Freemason Museum was founded in the Eleusis lodge house to maintain secrecy , using the Masonic objects collected there as the basis. Bernhard Beyer took over the management of the museum in 1913 and began to expand it. He also initiated the Masonic Library and in 1921 the historical association for historical research into Freemasonry of the Masonic Museum of the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne , which is regarded as the forerunner of the Masonic Research Society Quatuor Coronati , founded in 1951 .
During the First World War , German Freemasons founded the field box at the Iron Cross in Liège. Adolf Hetzel and Heinrich Cahn, who were members of the Eleusis for secrecy , visited the lodges of the Belgian Greater East in Liège together . The author Friedrich Hasselbacher took this visit in his book, High and State Treason of the Field Lodges in the World War , as an occasion to suggest that the Freemasons lack national awareness and membership of Jews in their ranks (see also: Field lodges in the context of the stab in the back ).
1933–1945 / 1947: " Dark " time
From the second half of the 1920s, there were repeated hostilities against Freemasonry in society. B. by the German Noble Society, by the German fraternities or by so-called Völkische groupings. One of the main agitators here was the former General Erich Ludendorff .
Due to the increasing pressure and to forestall a ban on Freemasonry by the National Socialist rulers, the last ritual work took place on April 14, 1933, when after 192 years the lights were extinguished and the box closed . The Eleusis for secrecy as a civil society dissolved itself on April 18, 1933 (less than four weeks after the Enabling Act of March 24, 1933) or renamed itself to Gesellschaft zur Heimatpflege e. V. , in which women could also become members. This “new” society only existed until March 6, 1934.
On September 2, 1936, the National Socialist rulers made the official declaration that all 11 grand lodges and 33 similar associations had been dissolved.
In September 1933 the lodge house was looted by the National Socialists. In 1935 the lodge house was formally expropriated and left to the National Socialist People's Welfare (NSV).
1945/1947 until today: reactivation in the grand lodge of the AFuAMvD
In July 1945 there were first efforts to reactivate the Bayreuth Masonic Lodge. On December 2, 1945 the Eleusis was then (unofficially) reconstructed for secrecy ; The Bavarian Ministry of the Interior (or the American military authority ) did not approve the establishment of lodges until December 7, 1946, with the guidelines being announced later, in April 1947. The formal licensing of the lodge then took place on January 14, 1948. In May 1947 the lodge again had 56, in September 1948 84 brothers.
Also for the revival of the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne was Bernhard Beyer in September 1945, American occupation authorities a detailed plan in the form of a Bavarian Grand Lodge presented, but not granted the license in a timely manner; the grand lodge was (only) officially reactivated on January 21, 1948 as grand lodge Zur Sonne for Bavaria , to which the Eleusis for secrecy and all other Bavarian lodges belonged as daughter lodges.
The Grand Lodge Zur Sonne for Bavaria opened on June 19, 1949 together with its member lodges in the United Grand Lodge of Germany , today's grand lodge of the Old Free and Accepted Masons of Germany .
In August 1948 the US authorities returned the lodge house to the lodge, and the first ritual work took place there on September 14, 1948.
In 1960 the Eleusis Lodge helped American Freemasons, who were stationed as soldiers or civilians at the military training area in Grafenwoehr and at the American weapons school in Vilseck, to establish their own lodge, the Pyramid Lodge ( American Canadian Grand Lodge ).
In 1991 the 250th anniversary was celebrated with a big ceremony in the Margravial Opera House.
The Bayreuth box house with the Freemason Museum
The first lodge restaurants were the Old Palace for the palace lodge from 1741 to 1753 and the “Zum Goldenen Adler” inn for the city lodge from 1741, and from 1758 to 1779 the “Bavarian House”. After the Strict Observance , the work took place from 1779 to 1792 in the premises of the new castle (which had to be vacated after the sale of the Margraviate of Ansbach-Bayreuth to Prussia to make room for an archive). In the following years the lodge did not have a permanent lodge location. From 1800 to 1849 they met at the “Zur Sonne” inn.
In 1849 the lodge was able to take over its first own house, the old margravial chicken hatchery, in the courtyard garden. But soon this house was too small for the box and the grand box.
On August 28, 1881, after the chicken hatchery was demolished, the current box house was inaugurated on the same spot, designed by the Bayreuth master builder and architect Johann Carl Wölfel and built from 1880 to 1884 (Carl Wölfel was also responsible for building Richard Wagner's house , the so-called Villa Wahnfried , which is in the immediate vicinity of the Logenhaus).
This new building was financed by a building fund initiated by the Bayreuth magistrate and brother Jacob Krück.
Entrance from the courtyard garden
Direct view
The portal
View from the Hofgarten in April
Direct view
Direct view
On the Grand Lodge Day in Constance in May 1902, the master's suggestion from the chair of the Bayreuth Lodge, the bookseller Georg Niehrenheim, was accepted and approved to found the Bayreuth Grand Lodge Museum , today's German Freemasons Museum , in the Bayreuth Lodge House ; the 168 Masonic objects of daily use / Masonica from earlier times that were collected there served as the basis.
Through a lively exchange of gifts with all German boxes and requests for gifts for the museum, the collection already had 650 exhibits in 1903.
On the initiative of Bernhard Beyer , in addition to the expansion of the museum, the Masonic Library followed in 1913 and, in 1921, the Historical Association for historical research into Freemasonry of the Masonic Museum of the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne , which is considered the forerunner of the German Masonic Research Society Quatuor Coronati , founded in 1951 .
After the self-dissolution of the Masonic Lodge Eleusis for Secrecy and the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne , the lodge house (including museum, archive and library) was plundered by the National Socialists in September 1933, later confiscated and expropriated in 1935. Then the house was used by the National Socialist People's Welfare (NSV).
After the war, the lodge house was used as a housing office and was returned to the lodge by the US authorities in August 1948. The German Freemasons Museum has also been open to the public again since 1955. In 1959 the holdings of the Bayreuth Freemasons Library were sold to the Grand Lodge and the museum.
The Logenhaus is now a monument recognized by the Bavarian State Office for the Preservation of Monuments .
Master from the chair
The sources on which the list given here is based provide partially contradicting information (e.g. spelling of names or individual years). In the following, an attempt was made to reproduce a consistent and uniform presentation.
Since in Freemasonry as a friendship alliance all members meet as brothers on the same level, the following list deliberately refrained from naming titles of nobility and academic degrees , following the quotation given here:
“Leave rank and pride and positions of honor, gold, conceit, splendor and happiness before you step on these sacred thresholds, back at the door!
And do not hope for any other privilege than that which virtue promises you. "
Castle box
- 1741–1763: Friedrich III. from Brandenburg-Bayreuth
City Lodge / Masonic Lodge Zur Sonne
- 1741–1756: Friedrich Wilhelm von Gleichen-Rußwurm
- 1756–1762: Johann Friedrich Wilhelm von Metzsch
- 1762–1763: Johann Anton von Meyern
- 1763–1765: Johann Friedrich Wilhelm von Metzsch
- 1765–1779: Johann Friedrich Wilhelm von Metzsch, as old Scottish head master ( strict observance )
- 1779–1787: Dietrich Ernst Georg Spiegel von Pickelsheim
- 1787–1788: Carl Friedrich Wilhelm von Völderndorff and Warein
- 1788–1790: Carl Christoph Ernst von Giech
- 1790–1791: Johann Friedrich Wilhelm von Metzsch
- 1791–1797: Carl Christoph Ernst von Giech
- 1797–1800: Friedrich Ernst von Schirnding
- 1800–1803: Carl Friedrich Wilhelm von Völderndorff and Warein
- 1803–1806: Carl Christoph Ernst von Giech
- 1806–1810: Caesar Ludwig Zacharias Schunter
Eleusis to secrecy
- 1810–1815: Caesar Ludwig Zacharias Schunter
- 1815–1819: Johann Georg Franz Simon
- 1819–1820: Johann Carl Heinrich von Paschwitz
- 1820–1821: Phillip Eisenbeiß
- 1821–1837: Friedrich Carl Münch
- 1837–1839: Friedrich Christian Birner
- 1839–1848: Johann Andreas Schneider
- 1848–1851: Friedrich (von) Feustel
- 1851-1856: Carl Kolb
- 1856–1857: Friedrich (von) Feustel
- 1857–1858: Johann Georg Lauterbach
- 1858–1861: Wilhelm Ludwig Albert Redlich
- 1861–1862: Friedrich (von) Feustel
- 1862–1868: Wilhelm Ludwig Albert Redlich
- 1868–1869: Alexander Pushkin
- 1869–1872: Johann Georg Lauterbach
- 1872–1875: Wilhelm Ludwig Albert Redlich
- 1875-1881: Carl Kolb
- 1881–1884: Carl Hahn
- 1884–1886: Julius Bayerlein
- 1886–1887: Carl Schüller
- 1887–1894: Johann Friedrich Engel
- 1894–1895: Carl Hahn
- 1895–1896: Johann Friedrich Engel
- 1896–1900: Heinrich Behr
- 1900–1902: Georg Leberheim
- 1902–1905: Johann Friedrich Engel
- 1905–1908: Alexander Schilling
- 1908–1911: Carl Kesselring
- 1911–1917: Wilhelm Brunner
- 1917–1919: Wilhelm Ficht
- 1919–1923: Hans Weiß
- 1923–1927: Alfred Seeberger
- 1927–1929: Ludwig Keil
- 1929–1930: Christian Wörrlein
- 1930–1933: Karl Dürr
- 1933–1945 / 1947: - - -
- 1945 / 1947–1956: Alfred Seeberger
- 1956–1958: Walter Winckelmann
- 1958–1959: Alfred Seeberger
- 1959–1961: Bernhard Eichner
- 1961-1963: Adam Hereth
- 1963–1967: Bernhard Eichner
- 1967–1969: Alfred Gabler
- 1969–1975: Karl-Ernst Ritter
- 1975–1979: Axel John
- 1979–1982: Lothar Wolters
- 1982-1984: Axel John
- 1984–1990: Ludwig Seeliger
- 1990–1996: Claus Peter Klier
- 1996–1999: Thomas Kaulbach
- 1999–2002: Claus Peter Klier
- 2002–2005: Rudi Birkle
- 2005–2010: Dieter Heinold
- 2010–2012: NN
- 2012–2014: NN
- 2014–2018: Stefan Kunnert
- 2018–2020: NN
Known members
The list given here does not claim to be complete, the order was made according to the year of birth. Here, too, an attempt was made to reproduce a uniform and consistent representation from the various sources.
- Daniel de Superville (born December 2, 1696 in Rotterdam; † November 16, 1773 ibid): Physician and first chancellor of the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg
- Joseph Saint-Pierre (* around 1709; † July 21, 1754 in Bayreuth): French architect and Bayreuth court building inspector
- Friedrich III. of Brandenburg-Bayreuth (born May 10, 1711 in Weferlingen, † February 26, 1763 in Bayreuth): Margrave of the Franconian Principality of Bayreuth
- Carl Philipp Christian von Gontard (born January 13, 1731 in Mannheim; † September 23, 1791 in Breslau): architect
- Johann Maximilian von Streit (* 1752 in Creußen; † May 9, 1833 in Weißenfels): Military
- Johann Salomo Christoph Schweigger (born April 8, 1779 in Erlangen, † September 6, 1857 in Halle an der Saale): German physicist and chemist
- Sophian Kolb (* July 14, 1793 in Bayreuth; † October 13, 1866 there): entrepreneur, founder of the flax spinning mill in Laineck as a state-sponsored Bavarian model institute , leading figure in connecting Bayreuth to the rail network
- Carl Kolb (* July 14, 1824 in Bayreuth; † November 28, 1895 ibid): Entrepreneur and founder of a number of welfare institutions (dining house, kindergarten, social housing, pension fund, savings bank), as well as the " Höhere Töchterschule " (today's Richard-Wagner -Gymnasium )
- Friedrich (von) Feustel (born January 21, 1824 in Egern am Tegernsee, † October 12, 1891 in Bayreuth): German banker, member of the Reichstag and important sponsor of the Bayreuth Festival
- Gottfried Joseph Gabriel Findel (born October 21, 1828 in Kupferberg; † November 23, 1905 in Leipzig): (Masonic) writer and publisher
- Julius Bayerlein (born January 23, 1838 in Bayreuth; † May 24, 1899 there): entrepreneur and member of the German Reichstag
- Carl Schüller (born March 16, 1847 in Munich, † August 14, 1923 in Bayreuth): banker, chairman of the Chamber of Commerce and co-founder of the Neue Spinnerei
- Carl Heinrich Theodor Burger (born March 14, 1848 in Bayreuth; † February 9, 1915 there): businessman and councilor; On his initiative, the Bayreuth telephone network was set up in July 1891.
- Leopold von Casselmann (born June 29, 1858 in Fischbeck (Hessisch Oldendorf), † May 23, 1930 in Bayreuth): Lord Mayor of the City of Bayreuth, member of the Reichstag and Landtag
- Bernhard Beyer (born May 31, 1879 in Laage; † May 31, 1966 in Bayreuth): neurologist; he justified u. a. the research company or the research lodge Quatuor Coronati e. V. in Bayreuth
- Konrad Pöhner (born July 24, 1901 in Bayreuth; † September 24, 1974 there): Minister of State, owner of construction business, sponsor of Bayreuth University
Web links
- Eleusis' website for secrecy
- The Eleusis on secrecy in the Masonic Wiki
- The Grand Lodge Zur Sonne in the Freemason Wiki
- Internet presence of the German Freemason Museum in Bayreuth
- Internet presence of the Grand Lodge of the Old Free and Accepted Masons of Germany
- Internet presence of the United Grand Lodges of Germany
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Eleusis' website on secrecy : https://www.eleusis-zur-verschwiegenheit.de/ , accessed on November 23, 2014
- ^ A b Albert Redlich: History of the Grand Lodge to the Sun , Part 1, in: Die Bauhütte , May 5, 1866, No. 19, IX. vintage
- ↑ Gottfried Joseph Gabriel Findel: History of the Grand Lodge to the Sun in Bayreuth , Leipzig 1897
- ↑ a b Dieter Heinold: The history of the grand lodge “Zur Sonne” , lecture on April 2, 2004 in the lodge “Zum Morgenstern” in Hof
- ^ Peter Nemeyer: Chronicle of the jewels of the daughter boxes of the grand lodge "Zur Sonne" , Bayreuth 2007
- ↑ a b c Albert Redlich: History of the Grand Lodge to the Sun , Part 2, in: Die Bauhütte , May 12, 1866, No. 20, IX. vintage
- ^ Robert Freke Gould: Gould's History of Freemasonry throughout the World , 1882-1887, Vol. III, Ch. III Freemasonry in the German Empire , Sec. VI The Grand Lodge Sun at Bayreuth
- ↑ a b Dieter Heinold: History of the Bayreuth Freemason Lodge "Eleusis for Confidentiality" , lecture on January 25, 2001 as part of a joint event of the Frankenbund and the historical association
- ↑ Albert Redlich: History of the Grand Lodge to the Sun , Part 4, in: Die Bauhütte , May 26, 1866, No. 22, IX. vintage
- ↑ Internetloge : http://www.internetloge.de/ , accessed on January 19, 2015
- ↑ a b c d Eleusis on Secrecy (Red.): Festschrift for the 250th Foundation Festival of the Masonic Lodge Eleusis on Secrecy No. 6 iO Bayreuth , Bayreuth 1991
- ↑ a b Peter Nemeyer: Masonic search for traces in Bayreuth , Bayreuth
- ↑ a b Rudi Birkle: Biographies of well-known Freemasons of the Bayreuth lodges , Bayreuth 2012
- ↑ Eleusis on secrecy: lodge-internal directories