Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
A global history of the world's most famous secret society, encompassing kings and presidents, writers and legislators, composers and entertainers, generals and entrepreneurs. During the Scottish Reformation, when kings, princes, and popes were being toppled from their thrones, a new and secretive society was formed. The Freemasonry's fixed rules, suggesting a connection to an ancient wisdom and known only to its initiates, attracted many antagonists, including the Roman Catholic Church, but also attracted a diverse range of members, from tradesman, merchants, actors, lawyers, Jews, and even people of color.
The Craft is a vibrant, revelatory history of the Freemasons, their core ideas, and its members, including revolutionaries (Giuseppe Garibaldi, Sim n Bol var, Motilal Nehru, and George Washington), rulers (five of England and no fewer than fourteen U.S. Presidents), and luminaries (Arthur Conan Doyle, Goethe, Mozart, Shaquille O'Neal, Harry Houdini, Henry Ford, Buzz Aldrin, and Walt Disney; the Duke of Wellington, Duke Ellington, and more). John Dickie captures the mystique of Masonic secrecy, and shows why its history is too important and too compelling to be the exclusive property of the initiated as Freemasonry has had a role in shaping the world for all of us.
Synopsis
Insiders call it the Craft. Discover the fascinating true story of one of the most influential and misunderstood secret brotherhoods in modern society.
Founded in London in 1717 as a way of binding men in fellowship, Freemasonry proved so addictive that within two decades it had spread across the globe. Masonic influence became pervasive. Under George Washington, the Craft became a creed for the new American nation. Masonic networks held the British empire together. Under Napoleon, the Craft became a tool of authoritarianism and then a cover for revolutionary conspiracy. Both the Mormon Church and the Sicilian mafia owe their origins to Freemasonry.
Yet the Masons were as feared as they were influential. In the eyes of the Catholic Church, Freemasonry has always been a den of devil-worshippers. For Hitler, Mussolini and Franco, the Lodges spread the diseases of pacifism, socialism and Jewish influence, so had to be crushed.
Freemasonry's story yokes together Winston Churchill and Walt Disney; Wolfgang Mozart and Shaquille O'Neal; Benjamin Franklin and Buzz Aldrin; Rudyard Kipling and 'Buffalo Bill' Cody; Duke Ellington and the Duke of Wellington.
John Dickie's The Craft is an enthralling exploration of a the world's most famous and misunderstood secret brotherhood, a movement that not only helped to forge modern society, but has substantial contemporary influence, with 400,000 members in Britain, over a million in the USA, and around six million across the world.