The Gothic Constitutions, including those of Anderson, suggest an astonishing origin of the Fraternity,
connecting it closelz with the main characters of the Hebrew Bible, from Adam to Zerubabbel,
but also with great figures of the Greek-Latin world, such as Thales, Pythagoras, Euclid, Archimedes,
Octavian Augustus or Vitruvius.
Special season: The Lost Word
Episode 03: Anderson's Constitutions
In this remarkable history, the Masonry is mentioned as Geometry, and the beginning of Anderson’s Constitutions
of 1723 sheds light on this aspect: ‘Adam, our forefather, created in the image of God,  the Great Architect
of the Universe, must have had imprinted in his soul the craft of the liberal arts, especially of geometry’.
At one point in the 18th century, in England, a Freemasonry current known as ‘antediluvian’ appeared,
whose manuscript claims to draw its science from the two columns that Lamech and his followers
would have written all the science of the world, to save it from distruction.
(The Gothic Legend states that Lamech did not know how the end will come, weather through fire or water,
thus he created two column, one fireproof, and the other resistant to water).
It is interesting to note that the first Gothic Constitutions did not refer to the Solomon’s Temple
as the ideal edifice, but instead to the Tower of Babel. We stumble upon the Tower of Babel
from the oldest document of the Gothic Constitutions, also known as the Regius Manuscript:
You may hear as I do read,/ That many years after, for great dread/ That Noah’s flood was all run,/
The tower of Babylon was begun,/ As plain work of lime and stone,/ As any man should look upon;/
So long and broad it was begun,/ Seven miles the height shadoweth the sun./ King Nebuchadnezzar let it make/
To great strength for man’s sake,/ Though such a flood again should come,/
Over the world it should not nome;/ For they had so high pride, with strong boast,/
All that work therefore was lost;/ An angel smote them so with divers speech,/
That never one knew what the other should reche.
The term ‘landmark’, famous in the Fraternity, designates a delimitation made out of stone of the agricultural
properties in England. The term is also associated with inheritance, tradition, inviolable property and essence.
It appeared rather late in the Mason literature, being used only by Anderson in 1723,
in article 39 of the General Regulations found within the Constitutions he drafted.
The passage, famous today, sound like this:
Every Annual Grand Lodge has an inherent Power and Authority to make new Regulations, or to alter these,
for the real Benefit of this ancient Fraternity; Provided always that the old Land-Marks be carefully preserved.
The Article 39 however, sparked a heated debate within the First Grand Lodge, and the result was that no annual
General Assembly has approved it. The question at hand, however, concerned the authority make changes,
as the Grand Lodge of London, hereafter referred to as the Great Lodge of England,
had made and continued to make changes, until it eventually triggered, after 1751,
the powerful reaction of the Ancients – Masons bound to the ancient traditions of the Fraternity.
When Anderson drafted the second version of the Constitution, in 1738,  he modified Article 39 as follows:
All the Alterations, or new Regulations above-written are only for amending or explaining the old Regulations for
the Good of Masonry, without breaking in upon the ancient Rules of the Fraternity; still preserving
the old Land-Marks; and were made at several Times, as Occasion offer’d by the Grand Lodge,
who have an inherent Power of amending what may be thought inconvenient,
and ample Authority of making new Regulations for the Good of Masonry
As such, the notion of Landmark becomes often tied with ancient customs, a very important element
for the authenticity of the Masonic approach. A word that invokes the integrity of a tradition is
a very noble thing, but rather difficult to define in exact coordinates. This is precisely the situation
of the Landmarks, which everyone consider them immutable, but they are described in various ways.
In 1774, 51 years after the first Masonic documentation, the term Landmark is again thrown into battle.
William Preston dealt extensively with it, in Illustrations of Masonry, but not with the scope of legitimizing
the changes, but to claim prerogatives in the name of tradition. Thus, the term Landmark
gets its second balance sheet: it can become a weapon of tradition’s response to change.
In this way, both the Moderns (who legitimized the new) and the Ancients (who demanded a return to tradition)
could have used it with equal zeal. However, it rarely appeared in the 18th century literature, excepting William Preston.
At the beginning of the 19th century, the question of landmarks became a problem related to conscience,
and the Moderns, those who had generated the term as a cover for change, now feel the backlash.
The Landmark becomes the champion of tradition.
In 1809, under the pressure of this champion and ready to acknowledge the righteousness of the Ancient position,
the Moderns set up the Lodge of Promulgation, with the purpose of revealing the Ancient Land-marks of the Craft.
This is a special moment because for the first time there is hope for clarification on the meaning of the term.
On October 19th , 1810, almost a year after its establishment, the Lodge of Promulgation concludes the following:
the ceremony of Installation of Masters of Lodges is one of the two Landmarks of the Craft
Throughout the 19th century, the Americans show up and proclaim themselves as great specialist in Landmarks.
The first Grand Lodge to deal with this problem was the Grand Lodge of Missouri.
This lodge appoints a committee, under the leadership of a valuable author
J.W.S. Mitchell, who will publish in 1850 a statement identifying the Landmarks with the Ancient Charges
of Anderson’s Constitution, 1723 edition. Six years later,
the Grand Lodge of Minnesota chooses to define the Landmarks as a list of 25 principles and practices.
Thus, lists of Landmarks began to be drawn up, the best known being elaborated by Albert G. Mackey in 1858.
All made reference to the reality established in 1717 and contained significant differences in organization,
ritual and religious faith in the Gothic Constituions.
The Landmarks of Freemasonry, as compiled by Albert Mackey in 1858:
1. The modes of RECOGNITION.
2. THE DIVISION OF SYMBOLIC MASONRY INTO THREE DEGREES.
3. The Legend of the THIRD DEGREE.
4. THE GOVERNMENT OF THE FRATERNITY BY A PRESIDING OFFICER called a Grand Master.
5. The prerogative of the Grand Master to preside over every assembly of the craft.
6. The prerogative of the Grand Master to grant Dispensations for conferring degrees at irregular times.
7. The prerogative of the Grand Master to give dispensations for opening and holding Lodges.
8. The prerogative of the Grand Master to make masons at sight.
9. The necessity of masons to congregate in lodges.
10. The government of the craft, when so congregated in a Lodge by a Master and two Wardens.
11. The necessity that every lodge, when congregated, should be duly tiled.
12. The right of every mason to be represented in all general meetings of the craft and to instruct his representatives.
13. The Right of every mason to appeal from the decision of his brethren in Lodge convened, to the Grand Lodge or General Assembly of Masons.
14. THE RIGHT OF EVERY MASON TO VISIT and sit in every regular Lodge.
15. No visitor, unknown as a Mason, can enter a Lodge without first passing an examination according to ancient usage.
16. No Lodge can interfere in the business of another Lodge, nor give degrees to brethren who are members of other Lodges
17. Every freemason is Amenable to the Laws and Regulations of the masonic jurisdiction in which he resides.
18. Qualifications of a candidate: that he shall be a man, unmutilated, free born, and of mature age.
19. A belief in the existence of God.
20. Subsidiary to this belief in God, is the belief in a resurrection to a future life.
21. A "Book of the Law" shall constitute an indispensable part of the furniture of every Lodge.
22. THE EQUALITY OF ALL MASONS.
23. The secrecy of the institution.
24. The foundation of a Speculative Science, for purposes of religious or moral teaching.
25. These Landmarks can never be changed.
What is interesting to note from this list is the point 25 which states that These Landmarks can never be changed.
But they can be and they have been. It is true that real landmarks ought not be changed.
But who is to say what these are?
