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Temple > Ritual > Origin Whence and Whither
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Quest 2 How many points of the fellowship are ther Ans fyve viz foot to foot Knee to Knee Heart to Heart, Hand to Hand and ear to ear. Then mak<e> the sign of fellowship and shake hand and you will be acknowledged a true mason. The words are in the I of the Kings Ch 7, v, 21, and in 2 chr: ch 3 verse last. |
To simplify, as British Freemasonry absorbed the legend about Hiram Abif's untimely demise at the hands of three ruffians (beginning in rudimentary form by ca. 1720s) "hand to hand" emerged as "hand to back," now for propping up the raised initiate (a.k.a. the deceased Hiram Abif). "Heart to heart" became "breast to breast," "ear to ear"/"cheek to cheek" eventually became "mouth to ear," and the embrace title was standardized to "the five points of fellowship." Only two of the five Points survived from late-1600s to early-1800s unmodified: "foot to foot" and "knee to knee."
William Morgan documented the Masonic FPoF contemporary with Joseph Smith:
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[The Master Mason] proceeds to raise the candidate, alias the representative of the dead body of Hiram Abiff. He (the candidate) is raised on what is called the five points of fellowship, which are foot to foot, knee to knee, breast to breast, hand to back and mouth to ear. This is done by putting the inside of your right foot to the inside of the right foot of the person to whom you are going to give the word, the inside of your knee to his, laying your right breast against his, your left hands on the back of each other, and your mouths to each other's ear (in which position alone you are permitted to give the word), and whisper the word Mahhahbone ... [which] signifies marrow in the bone. |
An illustration of two Freemasons engaged in the embrace accompanies Morgan's description (Fig. 1).
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![[[ Depiction of the FPoF, 1827 ]]](image/5pof.jpg "[[ Depiction of the FPoF, 1827 ]]")
Mormon Trajectory
The antebellum FPoF emerged from a rich historical evolution. From this Masonic trajectory, Smith copied the FPoF into his temple ceremony:
The Five Points of Fellowship are 'inside of right foot by the side of right foot, knee to knee, breast to breast, hand to back, and mouth to ear.'
As in the Masonic rite, the "name" associated with the Mormon FPoF also included the phrase "marrow in the bones."
Smith's adaptation isn't too astonishing since he adamantly affirmed that Masonry preserved authentic ancient ritual. Smith was wrong. Indeed, Smith's weaving of the Masonic threads is more like a patchwork quilt than a seamless garment—ideational aporias are evident throughout the LDS ritual. For instance, the phrase "Five Points of Fellowship" with all its Masonic nuances carries no real meaning in Smith's Endowment. And the "name" ("word" in Masonry) associated with the FPoF is the definition of the name in lieu of the name itself.
In April 1990 the LDS hierarchy removed the FPoF (along with other Masonic elements) from the temple Endowment, thus ending the Points' stint as a salvific act for Mormons.
Prophetic Eclecticism
From this picture emerge probing historico-theological questions. If the temple ceremony were ancient and Masonry degenerated priesthood, pre-1800 Masonry should resemble Smith's temple rite more than post-1800 Masonry. Yet the opposite is the case: pre-1800 Masonry is gradationally more dissimilar to the Mormon ritual.
Hugh Nibley's examples of Egyptian embraces pale in comparison to the identical congruity between the Masonic and LDS embrace. Nibley's ritual verisimilitude also suffers from the lack of a coherent theory of ritual interdependence. Smith's Points clearly owe their genealogy to 19th-century Masonry, not some antediluvian tradition.
Thoughtful examination of Masonic ritual yields a fascinating glimpse into Smith's eclectic use of his environment in Restoration rites.
(hAcKed & rEndeReD by bReNt LeE mEtcALfe! Copyright © 2000–2003 Brent Lee Metcalfe for Mormon Scripture Studies: An E-Journal of Critical Thought. All rights reserved.)
[Bio] Brent Lee Metcalfe is managing editor and Web engineer/designer for Mormon Scripture Studies: An E-Journal of Critical Thought, and is founder and owner of im@go w3 design—a Web technologies consulting venue. He is also a technical editor in the gaming industry. Brent is editor of the provocative tome New Approaches to the Book of Mormon: Explorations in Critical Methodology (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1993), and co-editor with Dan Vogel of American Apocrypha: Essays on the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002). His musings on Web design are published on EarthWeb's developer.com and on c|net's builder.com here and there.
John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, ed. Peter H. Nidditch (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975), 689.
- 01.01.02—Added to hypernote 3 modern rendition of the ERH Ms.; removed Figure 1 hypernote, renumbering hypernotes accordingly; added to hypernote 14 (formerly hypernote 15) additional paragraph.
- 08.27.00—Added quotation to hypernote 4 of Brigham Young's uncritical acceptance of the Hiram Abif myth; added brief critique to hypernote 12 (currently hypernote 11) of Matthew B. Brown's apologetics.
- 02.07.00—Original posting.
William J. Hamblin, Daniel C. Peterson, and George L. Mitton, "Mormon in the Fiery Furnace[:] Or, Loftes Tryk Goes to Cambridge" (review of John L. Brooke, The Refiner's Fire: The Making of Mormon Cosmology, 1644-1844 [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994]), Review of Books on the Book of Mormon 6 (1994), 2:54; D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, 2nd ed. (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 227. See also Hugh W. Nibley, "Looking Backward," The Temple in Antiquity: Ancient Records and Modern Perspectives, ed. Truman G. Madsen (Provo, UT: BYU Religious Studies Center, 1984), 51.
Heber C. Kimball to Parley P. Pratt, 17 June 1842, LDS archives (cited in David John Buerger, The Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship [Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1994], 40). See also Larry E. Dahl and Donald Q. Cannon, eds., Encyclopedia of Joseph Smith's Teachings (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2000), 414 (Dahl and Cannon omit the phrase "but menny things are perfect"); Stanley B. Kimball, Heber C. Kimball: Mormon Patriarch and Pioneer (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1981), 85; Hugh W. Nibley, "On the Sacred and the Symbolic," Temples of the Ancient World: Ritual and Symbolism, ed. Donald W. Parry (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book and Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS], 1994), 576-77. For an incisive overview of the historical complexities see Michael W. Homer, "'Similarity of Priesthood in Masonry': The Relationship between Freemasonry and Mormonism," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 27 (Fall 1994): 67-75.
Edinburgh Register House Ms., 1696, p. 1. See also J. Mason Allan, "The Edinburgh Register House Ms.," Ars Quatuor Coronatorum XLIII (January 1930): 153-55; Douglas Knoop, G. P. Jones, and Douglas Hamer, The Early Masonic Catechisms, ed. Harry Carr, 2nd ed. reprint (Kila, MT: Kessinger Publishing Company, 1963), 31-34; David Stevenson, The Origins of Freemasonry: Scotland's Century, 1590-1710 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 143. Rendered into modern standardized English the ERH Ms. reads thus:
Question 2. How many points of the fellowship are there?
Answer. Five—namely foot to foot, knee to knee, heart to heart, hand to hand, and ear to ear. Then make the sign of fellowship and shake hands, and you will be acknowledged a true Mason. The words are in 1 Kings chapter 7, verse 21, and in 2 Chronicles chapter 3, last verse [v. 17].
Two other manuscripts independently replicate the ERH Ms. five Points: Chetwode-Crawley Ms., ca. 1700 (Knoop, Jones, and Hamer [1963], 38); Kevan Ms., ca. 1714-1720 (Knoop, Jones, and Hamer [1963], 44). The Kevan Ms. appends "... Last Varse the wholl / Varse but especially the words Jachin & Boaz" (Knoop, Jones, and Hamer [1963], 44).
Catechisms belonging to the ERH Ms. family almost certainly preserve an even earlier bigradal (Entered Apprentice and Fellow-Craft/Master) version of the Mason Word. Pre-1700 initiations probably included ritual explanations, though Masonic scholars concur that the grisly Hiramic and Noachian legends were later inventions. In the absence of documentary evidence, some Masonic historians have speculated that the biblical story of Elisha resuscitating a corpse (2 Kings 4:34-35) may have provided an impetus for the Points.
The Sloane Ms. 3329 (ca. 1700) offers an early descriptive—not prescriptive—view of the Points:
Another [salutation] they haue called the masters word and is Mahabyn which is allways divided into two words and Standing close With their Breasts to each other the inside of Each others right Ancle Joynts the masters grip by their right hands and the top of their Left hand fingers thrust close on ye small of each others Backbone and in that posture they Stand till they whisper in each others eares ye one Maha- the other repleys Byn [Knoop, Jones, and Hamer (1963), 48; Stevenson (1988, 144) renders the text with slight variations].
In 1725 "Hand to Back" was listed among "the five Points of Free Masons fellowship" alongside mention of "Marrow in the Bone" and enigmatic references to "Hierome [who built] ... the House of the Lord" and "the primitive Word" (The Whole Institutions of Free-Masons Opened, broadsheet [Dublin: 1725], in Douglas Knoop, G. P. Jones, and Douglas Hamer, The Early Masonic Catechisms, ed. Harry Carr, 2nd ed. reprint [Kila, MT: Kessinger Publishing Company, 1963], 88).
Stories of Hiram Abif's murder were circulating by ca. 1726 (e.g., "the whole History of the Widow's Son killed by the Blow of a Beetle, afterwards found three Foot East, three Foot West, and three Foot perpendicular, and the necessity there is for a Master to well understand the Rule of Three" [Antediluvian Masonry, ca. 1726, in Douglas Knoop, G. P. Jones, and Douglas Hamer, Early Masonic Pamphlets (London: Q. C. Correspondence Circle Ltd. and Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076, 1978), 193-94]). During that period the Graham Ms. (1726) documented an early necromantic legend involving Noah:
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... we have it by tradition and still some referance to scripture cause shem ham and Japeth ffor to go to their father noahs grave for to try if they could find anything about him ffor to Lead them to the vertuable secret which this famieous preacher had for I hop all will allow that all things needfull for the new world was in the ark with noah Now these 3 men had allready agreed that if they did not ffind the verything it self that the first thing that they found was to be to them as a secret they not Doubting but did most ffirmly beLeive that God was able and would allso prove willing through their faith prayer and obediance for to cause what they did find for to prove as vertuable to them as if they had received the secret at first from God himself at its head spring so came to the Grave ffinding nothing save the dead body all most consumed away takeing a greip at a ffinger it came away so from Joynt to Joynt so to the wrest so to the Elbow so they RReared up the dead body and suported it setting ffoot to ffoot knee to knee Breast to breast cheek to cheek and hand to back and cryed out help o ffather as if they had said o father of heaven help us now for our Earthly ffather cannot so Laid down the dead body again and not knowing what to do—so one said here is yet marow in this bone and the second said but a dry bone and the third said it stinketh so they agreed ffor to give it a name as is known to free masonry to this day so went to their undertakings and afterwards works stood:yet it is to be beleived and allso understood that the vertue did not proceed from what they ffound or how it was called but ffrom ffaith and prayer so thus it Contenued the will pass for the deed [Graham Ms., 1726, p. 2 (upper and lower half). See also H. Poole, "The Graham Manuscript," Ars Quatuor Coronatorum L (January 1937): 5-17 (also 18-28); Knoop, Jones, and Hamer (1963), 89-96]. |
Unlike the similar Hiramic myth, there is little evidence that the Noachian tale was recited widely in 18th-century lodges, and even less evidence that it figured in the ritual presentation of the Points. By 1730 the "Five Points of Fellowship" associated with Hiram Abif's slaying were
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Hand to Hand1, Foot to Foot2, Cheek to Cheek3, Knee to Knee4, and Hand in Back5 [Samuel Prichard, Masonry Dissected: Being a Universal and Genuine Description of All Its Branches from the Original to This Present Time (London: J. Wilford, 1730), 28. See also Knoop, Jones, and Hamer (1963), 169]. |
Evidently both "hand to hand" and "hand over back" are retained in some British lodges (see James Dewar, The Unlocked Secret: Freemasonry Examined [Guildford, England: William Kimber and Co. Limited, 1966], 171).
Like others in his social milieu, Brigham Young naïvely embraced the historicity of the Hiramic tale:
It is true that Solomon built a Temple for the purpose of giving endowments, but from what we can learn of the history of that time they gave very few if any endowments, and one of the high priests was murdered by wicked and corrupt men, who had already begun to apostatize, because he would not reveal those things appertaining to the Priesthood that were forbidden him to reveal until he came to the proper place [1 January 1877, Journal of Discourses (Liverpool, England: Joseph F. Smith, 1877) 18:303].
William Morgan, Illustrations of Masonry by One of the Fraternity Who has Devoted Thirty Years to the Subject (Batavia, NY: David C. Miller, 1827), 84-85.
Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Evolution of the Mormon Temple Ceremony: 1842-1990 (Salt Lake City: Utah Lighthouse Ministry, 1990), 96. As Heber C. Kimball documented in 1845, "[the man and the woman] are then left to prove themselves faithful, after which they are admitted into the terrestrial kingdom, where at the alter they receive an additional charge and the second token of the Melchizedek Priesthood and also the key word on the five points of fellowship" (Heber C. Kimball[/William Clayton], Journal, 11 December 1845, An Intimate Chronicle: The Journals of William Clayton, ed. George D. Smith [Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1991], 201). See also Edward H. Ashment, "The LDS Temple Ceremony: Historical Origins and Religious Value," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 27 (Fall 1994): 289-98.
Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Evolution of the Mormon Temple Ceremony: 1842-1990 (Salt Lake City: Utah Lighthouse Ministry, 1990), 103.
"Marrow in the Bone" is attested to as early as 1725 as a metaphor for concealing the secret of Freemasonry—i.e., as marrow is hidden in the bone, so also should the fellowship of Masonry be hidden within the Mason (The Whole Institutions of Free-Masons Opened, broadsheet [Dublin: 1725], in Douglas Knoop, G. P. Jones, and Douglas Hamer, The Early Masonic Catechisms, ed. Harry Carr, 2nd ed. reprint [Kila, MT: Kessinger Publishing Company, 1963], 88).
I explore this issue further in my forthcoming "Joseph Smith's Paradigm of Antiquity," in Brent Lee Metcalfe, Revisioning the Book of Mormon: Criticism Beyond Apologetics and Polemics.
"Health in the navel, marrow in the bones, strength in the loins and in the sinews, power in the Priesthood be upon me, and upon my posterity through all generations of time, and throughout all eternity" (Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Evolution of the Mormon Temple Ceremony: 1842-1990 [Salt Lake City: Utah Lighthouse Ministry, 1990], 103).
The Masonic phrase "marrow in the bones" was retained in the post-April 1990 Endowment.
This observation undermines the apologetics of Barry Robert Bickmore (Restoring the Ancient Church: Joseph Smith and Early Christianity [Ben Lomond, CA: Foundation for Apologetic Information & Research (FAIR), 1999], 349-50), Kenneth W. Godfrey ("Freemasonry and the Temple," Encyclopedia of Mormonism, ed. Daniel H. Ludlow [New York: Macmillan, 1992], 2:528-29), Michael T. Griffith (A Ready Reply: Answering Challenging Questions about the Gospel [Bountiful, UT: Horizon Publishers, 1994], 13-21), Joseph Fielding McConkie (Answers: Straightforward Answers to Tough Gospel Questions [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1998], 48-49), and Eugene Seaich (Ancient Texts and Mormonism [Sandy, Utah: Mormon Miscellaneous, 1983], 75) who seem unaware that Smith's Masonic borrowings—such as the FPoF—were products of gradual evolution through Masonry, not pristine descendants of ancient ritual. To their credit, each author acknowledges some degree of Smith's indebtedness to Freemasonry.
Pointing to biblical prophets who were influenced by pagans confuses the matter (e.g., Griffith [1994], 14-16). The question isn't whether Smith in borrowing from Masonry behaved as his biblical counterparts who sponged their environments; rather, did Smith restore authentic ritual of ancient priesthood? In the case of the FPoF, he did not.
FARMS reviewer Matthew B. Brown scolds David Buerger et al. for misrepresenting—even fabricating—evidence surrounding Mormon/Masonic ritual origins. He summarizes: "After several years of examining the available evidence, I am thoroughly convinced not only that the LDS Temple endowment is genuinely ancient, but also that it's main elements can be clearly seen within biblical texts" (Brown, "Of Your Own Selves Shall Men Arise," [review of David John Buerger, The Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1994)] FARMS Review of Books 10 [1998]: 118. See also Brown, The Gate of Heaven: Insights on the Doctrines and Symbols of the Temple [American Fork, UT: Covenant Communications, Inc., 1999], 299-318). Brown's testimonial is nugatory given that Smith's Masonic borrowings reflect a late (post-1800) stratum in Masonry's ritual evolution. Moreover, his hypercritical zeal to indict critics leads to fallacious reductionism. For example, Brown's core contention that Smith got the "ancient" LDS rite from God and not from Masonry (Brown [1998], 122ff) entails that Smith restored via revelation an ancient ritual—an apologetic that cannot account for the modern (post-1800) FPoF in Smith's Endowment.
E. Ceil McGavin's study (Mormonism and Masonry [Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1956]) relies so heavily on obsolete Masonic scholarship as to render it irrelevant.
Hugh Nibley, The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri: An Egyptian Endowment (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1975), 241-53 (see especially the illustrations on 242, 251). See also Todd M. Compton, "The Handclasp and Embrace as Tokens of Recognition," By Study and also by Faith: Essays in Honor of Hugh W. Nibley, eds. John M. Lundquist and Stephen D. Ricks (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book and FARMS, 1990), 1:623-31; Eugene Seaich, Ancient Texts and Mormonism (Sandy, Utah: Mormon Miscellaneous, 1983), 74-75.
Exacerbating Nibley's predicament, why would God inspire Smith to restore a purported ancient embrace as the culminating temple gesture between God and humankind, only to inspire subsequent prophets to remove it?
Positing that differences between Smith and 19th-century sources nullifies Smith's potential dependency on such sources is methodologically absurd. For instance, some FARMS pundits who disingenuously dub Masonic and Mormon relationships "alleged parallels" contend that
[no] environmentalist explanation has ever attempted to account for the vast number of striking differences between Mormon ideas and symbolism and those of the Masons. ... If Joseph really borrowed his ideas from Masonry, why are the similarities limited to only a few items, many of which have known parallels to more ancient mysteries? ... An adequate explanation of the relationship between Mormonism and Masonry must explain not only the alleged parallels, but also the very significant differences between the two traditions [William J. Hamblin, Daniel C. Peterson, and George L. Mitton, "Mormon in the Fiery Furnace[:] Or, Loftes Tryk Goes to Cambridge" (review of John L. Brooke, The Refiner's Fire: The Making of Mormon Cosmology, 1644-1844 [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994]), Review of Books on the Book of Mormon 6 (1994), 2:54-55, 57].
Contra Hamblin, Peterson, and Mitton, dependency is evaluated by quality of similarities, not negated by quantity of differences. Smith copied his FPoF from early-19th-century Masonry—citing ritual differences does not alter this fact. The onus to prove otherwise rests on those who categorize Smith's point-for-point (no pun intended) Masonic borrowings as "superficial similarities." No scholar of Mormonism is arguing that the LDS Endowment is the Masonic ritual; rather that Smith recast key Masonic ritual elements to fit his unique purposes.
By Hamblin, Peterson, and Mitton's odd logic William D. Mahan (author of the Archko Volume) did not borrow from Lew Wallace's Ben-Hur, Ellen G. White never plagiarized anyone but God, LDS Church History editors only relied on Joseph Smith's journals, and Joseph Smith made no use of the KJV in dictating the BoMor—assertions scholars categorically reject—merely because later authors failed to follow their sources in every detail.