posted on Jul, 29 2003 @ 12:12 AM
MaskedAvatar, you stated that the Mark MM is the 4th degree, this is "true" to an extent...I suppose I could be wrong, but I don't think so.
The 4th is the Mark, 5th is Past, 6th Most Excellent, and then 7th of the York Rite would be the Royal Arch.
What I was meaning by "4th" is the antient degree, taught officially by the Grand Lodge of Ireland, in fact one of the reasons the GLoI was
established, was because the newly established GLoE did not have the "4th degree".
This Degree is now as I've been told encompassed in the whole of the Royal Arch section, but it's worth further research.
This fourth degree was essentially the "Secret Master", not to be confused with the Scottish Rite's 4th Degree, which while called such, is NOT the
actual 4th degree of the Craft.
As we all know there are now just 3 degrees of the Craft, the 4th is as I've so far found out, encompassed in the whole of the Royal Arch, just as
the Templar Degree is basically claimed by the 32nd of the Scottish Rite as well, though not officially...
But so yah...as I'm not a Royal Arch mason I really know nothing else about the 4th Degree of Masonry, just a few hear-says, and what I had read
about the old Division between Antient Craft and Craft Masonry, which is now reunited as I have read, by the establishment of the 4th into the Royal
Arch, and thus now there is a Unified Grand Lodge of England, again, all worth further research to clarify and verify.