The Masonic ritual defines Freemasonry as “a peculiar system of morality, veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols”.
Freemasonry’s Inner Circle and The Blue Lodge degrees
The Legend of the Craft in the Old Constitutions refers to Nimrod as one of the founders Of Freemasonry. Thus in the York Manuscript. No. 1, we read: 'At ye makeing of ye Toure of Babell there was Masonrie first much esteemed of, and the King of Babilon yt was called Nimrod was A Mason himself and loved well Masons." And the Cooke Manuscript thus repeats the story: 'And this same Nembroth began the towre of babilon and he taught to his werkemen the craft of Masonrie, and he had with him many Masons more than forty thousand. And he loved and cherished them well" (see line 343). The idea no doubt sprang out of the Scriptural teaching that Nimrod was the architect of many cities; a statement not so well expressed in the authorized version, as it is in the improved one of Bochart, which says: "From that land Nimrod went forth to Asshur, and builded Nineveh, and Rehoboth city, and Calah and Resen between Nineveh and Calah, that is the great city." - Albert G. Mackey - Encyclopedia of Freemasonry
"The claim that Freemasonry took its origin at the building of the Temple is without any historical authority. The Legend of the Craft, upon which, to be consistent, all Masonic rituals should be founded, assigns its oigin equally to two other periods ‑ to that of the building of the Tower of Babel, when Nimrod was Grand Master, and to Egypt under the geometrician Euclid. Why the Temple of Solomon was exclusively selected by the modern Masons as the incunabulum of their Order can be only conjecturally accounted for." - The History Of Freemasonry By Albert G. Mackey 33°
