Tuesday, October 28, 2014

A New Book on the French Rite!

Una mirada sobre los usos de los "Modernos" y los rituales del Rito Francés.
Edited by Victor Guerra García.
Published by Masonica.es
2014

This new addition is a  continuation inspired by an earlier title,  Rito Francés. Historia, Reflexiones y Desarrollo (The French Rite: History, Reflections and Development). In this first text the historical context and reflective stages of the French Rite and developments were discussed and analyzed from the distinct personal perspectives of various Masonic authors including Charles Porset,  J-Ch. Nerh, Roger Dachez, JG Plumet, Ludovic Marcos, Daniel Ligou, JP. Lefevre, Joaquim Villalta and Victor Guerra García who, in addition to including articles, coordinated the subject with the intention that a Spanish-speaking readership had access to a plethora of interesting items that seemed important to be made known as the Masonic literature on such ritual is virtually nonexistent. 

Una mirada sobre los usos de los "Modernos" y los rituales del Rito Francés (The Modern Rite:  A look from the XXI century) takes a more personal approach, that differs from the examination of the French Rite, understood as the result of ritual practices of the GODF to direct the gaze a step further back, from the perspective of the history behind the rite established as the Modern Rite, and as such, several themes are raised throughout the book, trying to situate the reader in the historical setting of these developments, analyzing in turn the unique nature of a ritual practices that had its development in seventeenth-century Insular Europe but which evolved in eighteenth-century France. 

Victor Guerra García
The second part of the book is set in a more contemporary context, addressing the conceptual differences between the Modern and the French Rite and providing materials for the background of related aspects essential to understanding how the Congress of the French Rite of Lisbon and the Modern Rite in Barcelona, and the birth of the Universal Masonic Union of the Modern Rite (UMURM) or establishment in Spain of the General Grand Chapter of Spain (GODF-GLSE) came to pass. 

The book closes with an impressive piece by Jean van Win that describes the false basis of support of certain ritual developments within the Orders of Wisdom in France, and finally a final reflection on what the Modern Rite's future may look like in the twenty-first century. 

The text also contains several reflections by way of introduction and epilogue from various current Masonic scholars including Joan Francesc Pont, Sovereign Commander of the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite of Spain; Eoghan Ballard, Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of the Modern Rite of North America and the Caribbean; and José María Bonachi Batalla, the Supreme Council of the Modern Rite of Brazil and President of the UMURM. 

The book may be purchased in either hard copy or electronic format from Masonica.es:

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