Bernard Martinez - Ordo ab Chao - 1979-1995

Ordo ab Chao. Review of the Supreme Council of France, Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, under the publication direction of Bernard Martinez

34 issues, from no. 2 (winter 1979-1980) to no. 31 (first half 1995) (no. 11 is in 4 copies, missing nos. 12, 13, 23). Some issues also include a fascicle on the "Activities of the Jurisdiction" and there is a separate index of subjects and authors for issues 1 to 30.

Ordo ab Chao — the Latin motto of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite meaning “the Order is born from Chaos” — is the official magazine of the Supreme Council of France. The magazine is devoted to the doctrine, history, and practice of higher Masonic degrees within the framework of the AASR, of which it constitutes the organ of reflection and transmission intended exclusively for members of the obedience. The BnF notice, drafted after no. 24 (2nd half of 1991), notes that the magazine is non-communicable within a fifty-year reserve period, which confirms its character restricted to an initiated readership.

The Supreme Council of France was founded in Paris on 20 October 1804 by Alexandre-François-Auguste, Count de Grasse-Tilly, a member of the Supreme Council of Charleston, the second Supreme Council in the world after the one founded in 1801 in South Carolina. The Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite is a Masonic rite founded in 1801 in Charleston, based on the Grand Constitutions of 1786 attributed to Frederick II of Prussia; it comprises 33 degrees and is practiced within two complementary bodies: a Masonic obedience that brings together lodges of the first three degrees, and a jurisdiction of the higher degrees led by a Supreme Council, which groups lodges from the 4th to the 33rd degree. The Supreme Council of France, whose headquarters were located on rue de Puteaux in Paris at the time these issues were published, is the sovereign Masonic authority of the AASR in France, responsible for the transmission and interpretation of the rituals of the higher degrees. Bernard Martinez, the publication director mentioned in the BnF notice, was one of the leading figures of the obedience during the period covered by this collection.

The magazine presents itself with a soft cover in in-8° format of 21 cm, stapled, with pagination varying according to issues and themes treated; some double or thematic issues reach one hundred pages. The cover, sober and without illustration other than the title and the emblem of the AASR’s two-headed eagle, reflects the discretion characteristic of internal publications of Masonic obediences, designed to circulate among members without attracting the attention of a non-initiated public. The complete set of 34 issues gathered here constitutes a collection of exceptional coherence and completeness, covering almost the entire production of the magazine during the first two decades of its existence.