Medieval Mystery Plays, Masonry,and Mormonism

[_Mary]

Just a question. I've been delving into some books about the Medieval Guilds of England, with particular interest in the Masons Guild, which apparently was known for being a little more mysterious in terms of its initiation rights and the such like.

This led me on to looking at the Medieval Mystery Plays.

Has anyone from within Mormonism ever done a study of the possible linkage between the Plays, Masonry and then Mormonism, specifically in terms of the temple ceremony?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystery_play

However, it should not be inferred that there was no speculative component in the work carried out in the lodges of operative free masons, because they had developed their own rich tradition and ceremonials, some of which were similar in presentation to the Passion Plays of the Middle Ages. As all medieval guilds were highly secretive in respect of the private proceedings of their fraternities, information concerning their ceremonials is somewhat sketchy.

My bold....

From: http://www.themasonictrowel.com/books/f ... pter_6.htm

http://www.english.cam.ac.uk/medieval/mystery_plays.php

http://www.english.cam.ac.uk/medieval/m ... iption.php

[_moksha]

The LDS Church has at least two plays of that nature: The Hill Cumorah Pageant and the Manti Miracle Pageant. For the Manti Miracle Pageant, there was even a doxology of sorts, a couple of lines the audience would recite at crucial times in the play. Unfortunately, those lines came into disuse and have long since been forgotten. Even my memory seems fuzzy on this point, but I bet Blixa would know the exact answers.

The audience lines I seem to remember are:

1. "Is there no hope for the Widow's son?"

2. "So who cares what the gefilte fish thinks, we're going to eat the fish already!"

[_Tobin]

I'm waiting for Book of Mormon the Musical to debut at the Hill Cumorah. That would be awesome-sauce.

[_Yoda]

I'm waiting for Book of Mormon the Musical to debut at the Hill Cumorah. That would be awesome-sauce.

LOL!

I don't see that happening. It is too critical of Mormonism.

However, from what I understand it is one VERY FUNNY musical! My little brother saw it about six months ago.

[_Blixa]

That takes me back, Mary. I did a lot of Medieval lit and art study at one point as an undergrad. I wish I still had all my texts from those days. My off the cuff reaction would be that some of the temple rites do draw on a tradition of biblical reenactment via Masonry's use of it. Beyond that, I don't see any direct parallels or connections, but it is kind of interesting to put that aspect of Mormon temple ritual in that tradition, or perhaps in juxtaposition to that tradition.

[_Mary]

That takes me back, Mary. I did a lot of Medieval lit and art study at one point as an undergrad. I wish I still had all my texts from those days. My off the cuff reaction would be that some of the temple rites do draw on a tradition of biblical reenactment via Masonry's use of it. Beyond that, I don't see any direct parallels or connections, but it is kind of interesting to put that aspect of Mormon temple ritual in that tradition, or perhaps in juxtaposition to that tradition.

I'm afraid my access to resources isn't that good right now. Bit frustrating. I would love to know what the specific words were for the Creation Play. It seems each guild took a different part of the biblical/gospel narrative to dramatize, and did so until the plays were banned in the 1500's.

I don't know what type of Masonry Joseph was initiated into. Does anyone know the exact form of the ceremonies? I've seen comparisons of Modern Masonry and the Mormon Endowment Ceremony on the net, but these aren't useful if Joseph wasn't initiated into a Modern form of Masonry??

I've done some digging, and found a book by Frank C Higgins on 'Ancient Freemasonry - An introduction to Masonic Archaelogy' which has some excerpts on the alleged use in some forms of ancient masonry (according to the older texts that he could access) of the usage of Adam and Eve as symbolic of male and female and of the masonic use of aprons, which represented the fig leaves Adam and Eve clothed themselves with in the garden of Eden. (P310 onwards)

http://books.google.co.uk/books

I may be 'barking' up the wrong tree, but it does seem interesting...



Found this link which suggests that the plays are having something of a revival.

http://www.yorkguildofbuilding.org/html ... _play.html