The great lodge of Hamburg

Hamburg was the place where, on December 6, 1737, the oldest Masonic lodge in Germany, the Absalom to the Three Nettle, was founded. Already in 1733, the then English great master, Earl Strathmore and " eleven German gentlemen " in London, received from the Great Lodge of England patent No. 124 for the establishment of the first lodge in Hamburg. However, this event related to the " 11 gentlemen in Hamburg " is not documented anywhere. The earliest documented foundation of the lodge dates back to December 6, 1737 and is written in French, announcing the creation of the so-called Loge d'Hambourg under the leadership of Charles Surrey (Dutch lieutenant), who by that time was already mentioned in the Masonic documents as deputy great master of Prussia and Brandenburg. The first master of the chair was Baron Georg Ludwig von Oberg, who in 1738 played a decisive role in the accession of Crown Prince Frederick (from 1740 Frederick II the Great ) to Freemasonry ^[3] .

In 1740, the Great Lodge of England founded the Provincial Great Lodge of Hamburg and Lower Saxony, the great master of which was installed the master chair of the lodge "Hamburg" Luttmann (also: Lutmann). His box was registered under the distinctive title Bunch of Grapes, Bakker Street, Hamburg . In 1743 the lodge adopted a new distinctive title - “Absalom”. On January 3, 1765, the great master of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Hamburg, Gottfried Jacob Janisch, broke off all ties with London, dismissed all the lodges and left the post of the great master. After that, he adopted the Masonic system of strict compliance . For this purpose, the maternal lodge “Absalom to three nettles” was restored from the lodge “St. George to the green spruce. However, the strict compliance system was poorly accepted by the Freemasons and the work of the lodges almost completely ceased from 1767 to 1773. After the abolition of strict observance at the convention in Wilhelmsbad in 1782, the original ritual of Freemasonry was returned to Hamburg. Soon, the British province of Hamburg was reactivated under the leadership of the new great master Graf ^[4] .

Lodges "Absalom to the three nettles" and "St. George to the Green Spruce "were founded before 1811 the following lodges:" Emmanuel to the lily of the valley "(1774)," Ferdinand Caroline to three stars "(1776) and" Ferdinand to the rock "(1787). The next step in development was the new ritual of Friedrich Ludwig Schroeder , who until 1800 completely reworked the ritual of the “Ancients” and also revised the constitution of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Hamburg. In 1808, in the lodges of the UPLG, a proposal to withdraw from the direct subordination of the English Grand Lodge ripened. This idea was inspired by the French occupation of Hamburg. To prevent insinuations connected with the Great East of France , on February 4, 1811, the creation of the Grand Lodge of Hamburg was announced. The first great master of the VLG became Joch. Phil. Beckmann, and after him Friedrich Ludwig Schröder (1814–1816) ^{[4] [5]} .

Since 1795, the Masonic Hospital (Kleiner Schäferkamp in Schanzenviertel) has been operating in Hamburg, which was built according to the plans of the Danish architect Axel Bundsen. In 1893, Schröder and other masons prepared a plan for the creation of this first private hospital in Hamburg. Initially, the building was used to house female servants, then it was expanded by building a second house for male servants, and finally it gained its purpose — a hospital for sick people of all classes. The financing involved not only five Hamburg lodges, but also received generous donations from citizens and the admiralty. In 1892, a new building was built that met modern hygienic requirements. In all German wars, beginning in 1813, the Masonic Hospital was used as a military hospital.

After the end of the Second World War, the Senate Chancellery, as the successor of the historic Grand Lodge of Hamburg, was given permission to dissolve the Grand Lodge of Hamburg (1962). The decision to dissolve was necessary for the Hamburg Senate, based on current legislation, although, in fact, the Great Lodge of Hamburg no longer existed by that time. The Union of Five (a union of 5 of the oldest lodges in Hamburg) managed to regain their property rights to the building on Welkestraße 8, as well as the Masonic hospital.

The premises of the Great Lodge of Hamburg were destroyed by the Nazis in 1935, as revenge for the missing documents of the Great Lodge of Hamburg. After the war, this place was used by the post office as a parking lot. Since 1971, the premises belonging to the lodges under the general title "Combining 5 Hamburg Lodges" reappears.

On the first floor of the building there are 17 lodges, and on the upper floors there are faculties of economics and social sciences of the University of Hamburg, which rent these premises ^{[4] [5]} .

• Rolf Appel: Schröders Erbe. 200 Jahre Vereinigte fünf Hamburgische Logen . Hamburg-Barsbüttel 2000, ISBN 3-00-004644-5 .
• John Lane: Masonic Records 1717-1885. Lists of all the laws of the Constitution etc. London 1895 (Bestand Deutsches Freimaurermuseum, Bayreuth)
• Eugen Lennhoff, Oskar Posner: Internationales Freimaurer-Lexikon . Almathea-Verlag, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-85002-038-X . (Reprint von 1932)
• Hans Schröder: Geschichte der Provinzialloge von Niedersachsen zu Hamburg für die Jahre 1927-1952 , Hamburg 1952
• Helmut Neuberger: Winkelmaß und Hakenkreuz: Die Freimaurer und das Dritte Reich . Herbig Verlag, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-7766-2222-9 .
• Ferdinand Runkel: Geschichte der Freimaurerei . 3 Bände. Hobbing, Berlin 1931/1932. (Nachdruck: Edition Lempertz, Bonn 2006, ISBN 3-933070-96-1 )

• United Great Lodges of Germany
• Great Lodge of the ancient freemen and accepted masons of Germany

• Absalom zu den drei Nesseln, in: Freimaurer-WIKI
• Gründungsdokumente der sog. 'Loge d'Hambourg'
• 'St. Georg zum Kaiserhof ', die erste Tochterloge von' Absalom '