Talk:Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry

message: I note that an editor requested a translation of the motto Deus MeUmque Jus... a direct translation would be "God and my Right", but this really does not tell us anything.  Do we really need to provide a translation?
I think that it would be better to just cut mention of the motto all together... or, at least, cut it from the picture caption.  If the motto is important (which I am not at all sure about), we should discuss it in the main text.  A picture caption should simply tell the reader what they are looking at... in this case, the cover art from an old edition of M&D. What the motto says or means is essentially irrelevant to explaining the picture. Blueboar (talk) 14:31, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Motto in picture caption 

message: I think we need to take a very close look at how we deal with this book's treatment and understanding of the first three degrees, and we need to not apply only our own interpretation of what the current organisational structure of the AASR in the USA is, but also how the system was seen by Pike (as witness his book Esoterika about the first three degrees in the Scottish Rite Ritual), and how it is practiced in places other than the US.  From the University of Bradford's page about the Scottish Rite: While the degrees of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish rite commence with the Entered Apprentice, FellowCraft or Companion, and Master Mason, all authority over these degrees by the Supreme Councils is waived, and they are exclusively administered by the Blue or Symbolic Lodges, working under the jurisdiction of Grand Lodges and the representative system. In some countries, the first three degrees are given in Lodges of Perfection. Pike himself says in the preface to the book "THE following work has been prepared by authority of the Supreme Council of the Thirty-third Degree, for the Southern Jurisdiction of the United States, by the Grand Commander, and is now published by its direction. It contains the Lectures of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite in that jurisdiction, and is specially intended to be read and studied by the Brethren of that obedience, in connection with the Rituals of the Degrees."  The lectures contained in that book include the lectures of the first three degrees, which are part of the Scottish Rite; in fact, he comments on the differences between the Scottish Rite First Degree and the York Rite first degree here.  Jorge Soto points out that the Scottish Rite's first three degrees are currently the only or most extensively used system in more than 25 countries and by at least 75 Grand Lodges. ("The Forgotten Three," Haboneh Hahofshi, Vol. LIX, No. 2, 1994, pp. 18-21).  Pike knew there were 33 degrees in the Scottish Rite, and wrote about those first 32 (M&D does not deal with the 33rd).  To keep the wording The book is composed of Pike's ruminations and essays on the three Craft Degrees of Freemasonry (1st, 2nd and 3rd degrees) and each the Degrees of the Scottish Rite, from the 4th to the 32nd implies, from that specific wording, that the first three degrees are not part of the Scottish Rite (with which a number of reliable sources disagree), and and could be interpreted to imply that the Scottish Rite doesn't include the 33rd.--Vidkun (talk) 15:20, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think we can fairly distinguish between what Pike envisioned for his system of degrees (as explained in M&D), and what ended up occurring in the US.  As for what occurs in other countries... we have to be careful, because not all "Scottish Rites" are the same... some followed Pike's vision... others ignored it.  The topic is tricky. Blueboar (talk) 15:16, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  First Three Degrees 

message: Are we supposed to know what 'G∴C∴' stands for? (Last line of the first paragraph).  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2607:FA48:6D16:A4F0:6129:8109:C86B:397B (talk) 19:52, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: That abbreviation is used in several places, and at other places (including in the indented quote shortly after the instance you mention) the phrase Grand Commander is written out in full. After reading the text, it seems to me that the one is short for the other. My native language is French, and the head of a French-speaking Supreme Council is called le Très Puissant Souverain Grand Commandeur, usually shown in writing as « le T∴P∴S∴G∴C∴ »; AFAICT this French expression is just a verbose variant of the one used in this English-language article. — Tonymec (talk) 18:49, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Obscure abbreviation 

message: Direct quote from Heimbichner & Parfrey (2012, page 72):
"Pike's soaring mind embraced large and spacious regions. It seemed untroubled by the need to properly attribute text that he borrowed or lifted. This tendency to absorb the writings of others and reproduce them as his own found a peak point  in his magnum opus, Morals and Dogma (1871), a 900-plus-page behemoth that became a cornerstone of the Scottish Rite. In it, Pike plagiarized from the French occultist Eliphas Lévi (Alphonse Louis Constant, 1810–1875), including infamous passages about Lucifer."
I do not see a NPOV problem adding this to the article. Virtuus (talk) 17:43, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: The plagiarism was noticed in the 1920s. René Guénon wrote in Theosophy: History of a Pseudo-Religion (page 20): "Since we have the opportunity to do so, let us add that Albert Pike’s reputation as a Masonic writer was quite overrated: a considerable part of his major work Morals and Dogma of Freemasonry is clearly plagiarized from Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie by the French occultist Eliphas Levi." Link to text --Virtuus (talk) 18:48, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Hodapp writes in Freemasons for Dummies: "Whole passages of Levi's book made into Pike's". The article currently cites this as a source for the statement "Pike frequently quotes passages of Lévi's work". What do we make of "made into"? Legitimate quoting or plagiarism? --Virtuus (talk) 18:53, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

text: A concern I have is that putting accusations of plagiarism in the lead of article (supported by citations or not) may promote a particular POV that is not neutral. Pepe Oats (talk) 16:08, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Plagiarism