Question
A Brother has written asking WHY do Freemasons refer to themselves as Brothers.????
Answer
From Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary if find the following definition;
Brother;
1. A male who has the same parents as another or one parent in common with another
2. (a) Kinsman (b) one who shares with another a common national or racial origin
3. A fellow member
From Mackey’s Lexicon of Freemasonry;
Brother:
The term Freemasons apply to each other, Freemasons are Brethren, not only by common participation of the human nature, but, as professing the same faith, as being jointly engaged in the same labours, and being unified by a mutual covenant or tie, whence they are also emphatically called “Brethren of the Mystic Tie”.
Personally, I think of Freemasonry as a Fraternal Brotherhood with common ideals and principles and as such I feel privileged to have so many Brothers, in the craft, scattered across the face of the Earth.