Thirty-Three Degrees, and a Name That Is Not About Scotland

The Scottish Rite is one of the two great systems of additional Masonic degrees, and its name is one of the more misleading in the fraternal world.

Not Scottish

The rite took its modern organised form with the founding of a Supreme Council at Charleston, South Carolina, in 1801, drawing on earlier French degree systems, the ecossais or Scottish degrees, whose name it inherited. It is not Scottish in origin and was assembled largely in France and the United States. It offers a graded series of ceremonies beyond the three basic degrees of the craft lodge, reaching to the thirty-third, and membership requires that a man first be a Master Mason.

Degrees as instruction

The degrees are not ranks of authority so much as a sequence of dramatised moral and philosophical instruction, drawn from many traditions and elaborated at length in the writings attached to the rite. Organised under governing Supreme Councils in different countries, it is one of the most widespread Masonic systems in the world, and the thirty-third degree, conferred by invitation, is honorary rather than a step every member takes.