[From the Second Lodge of Bengal in the Olden Times by W. K. Firminger and Guy D. Robinson, page 183.]

1840

Mahommedans and Hindoos

Read another letter from the Grand Lodge intimating that it had been unanimously resolved to suspend the admission of Mahomedans and Hindoos into the Order of Masonry pending an investigation and report on the subject, and requesting a report of the opinion of the members of this Lodge for the information of the Grand Lodge. It was decided to call a special Meeting to consider the matter.

At that meeting held in May, it was proposed by the R. W. Master, seconded by Bro. W. Whyte, that the Mussulmans are admissible as Masons on the principle that 'let a man's religion and mode of worship be what it may, he is not excluded from the Order provided he believes in the Great Architect of Heaven and Earth and practice the sacred duties of morality.'

The motion on being put was negatived by a majority.

A similar motion substituting Hindoos for Mussummans was also negatived.

(Note. As Gould points out, 'By-Law of the Provincial Grand Lodge for Bengal, forbidding the entry of Asiatics without the permission of the Provincial Grand Master was in force until May 12, 1871; and there was at least a popular belief in existence so late as 1860, that Hindus were ineligible for initiation: He further informs us that an assistant military medical officer, reported to be a Brahmin, was initiated in the Meridian Lodge, 31st Foot, in 1860. The Masonic press questioned the legality of this initiation. The P.M. of another Lodge defended it, stating 'that the very groundwork of the Brahmin faith is the belief in one Grand Superintending Being.' The candidate, however, set the controversy at re3t by admitting that he was a Christian. (GHOF. IV, 78) Muslim Princes and Sikh Maharajahs were initiated into the mysteries of the Order in 1775, 1842, 1850 and 1861. The Parsees of Western India, the Confucians and the Muslims were initiated in a Bombay Lodge in 1843 and 1844. (Gould, the Concise History of Freemasonry, 398 also Sidelights on Freemasonry, John T. Lawrence 78, and Freemasonry in India, Wor. Bro_ R. V. Aiyar, GLIN., III, 152-154.))

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