The Brotherhood by Stephen Knight: Book Review (original) (raw)

The Brotherhood

The Secret World of the Freemasons

Stephen Knight

Purporting to expose the 'evils' of Masonry primarily in the United Kingdom, this book (written in the early 1980s and, as the author states, in a very short time) seeks to further incite the public as a follow-up to his prior work which claimed that Jack the Ripper was a Mason!

Mr. Knight weaves a tale from his imagination using many 'unnamed sources' whom he claims were at the highest levels of Freemasonry. One such example is a "West End Mason". Ironically, that person - whom, like all of his sources, Knight claims needed anonymity, has identified himself online as being James Todd who publishes an online rant aptly called "VOMIT" ('Victims of Masonic Ill-Treatment'). Todd, curiously, was never an English Mason but rather joined in Scotland and was a member there for a short period. He claims that he was forced to join the organization and, clearly, hated it. Suffice it to say, no one is forced to join Freemasonry (particularly in Scotland) and Todd's attitudes and age (not to mention his abiding hatred for politicians and police) are hardly conducive to an honest presentation. You can read all about Mr. Todd's anti-Masonic and anti-Semitic rants right here. Using sources such as this to support his work puts Mr. Knight on a very shaky foundation indeed.

From the Southern Baptist Convention's Study on Freemasonry we learn that Knight rejected the Christian faith, became a Sannyasin (a religious belief we've found precious little about), and changed his name to Swami Puja Deval in 1983. He died of a (proven) brain tumor in 1985 but anti-Masons enjoy hinting that he was somehow murdered to silence him. (The claim of Masonic actions against those who speak against Freemasonry is easily disproven by the continued lives of other anti-Masonic authors - as well as the death of Masonic authors and historians!)

Even today, UK politicians looking for a 'hook' on which to garner favor will use this book as their crutch. Imagined and/or phony characters painted to look their worst so the author could sell yet another book and appeal to people's fears, this one succeeded and now is the false basis for many anti-Masonic rants.

A classic anti-Masonic book which garnered much interest at the time.