oxford

The Oxford Commencement as the Oldest Degree Ceremonies Extant: A Reprise

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A degree ceremony at the University of Oxford, England

A couple days ago my mind returned to some posts I made back in the infancy of TempleStudy.com in 2008.  These posts were about the commencement exercises at Oxford University.  Now that seems quite odd, doesn’t it?  What would commencement exercises have anything to do with the temple?  Well let me tell you.  The Oxford commencement exercises as practiced today may be the oldest, longest-running, and relatively unaltered degree ceremonies still in existence, and their forms are still quite archaic, yet very familiar.  Yes, even older than Freemasonry.

Oxford University, in Oxford England, is the oldest university in the English-speaking world.  Indeed, its beginnings date back to the 11th century!  That’s old.  Furthermore, they claim that their commencement exercises, also called “degree ceremonies,” have remained unchanged for over 800 years.  That’s a long time.  Therefore, much of what is seen today in the forms of the Oxford commencement are totally unrecognizable to the modern world.  Undoubtedly even the graduates are likely baffled at the performances during the meeting.  No other university does it quite like they do.  On the other hand, much of what happens in the ceremony will be strikingly familiar to the endowed Latter-day Saint.

In 1906 a fellow by the name of Joseph Wells published a study about these ceremonies at Oxford, which I dug into quite a bit, and found quite a treasure trove of interesting parallels to modern LDS temple worship.  Of course, I only point out the Oxford side of the coin.  Why do these ceremonies have such interesting elements?  Perhaps it was when Joseph Smith took his spring vacation to Oxford in early 1842 and witnessed the ceremonies first-hand, and thought there were some good things in there, ripe for borrowing.  Joking aside, the origination of the forms of the Oxford ceremonies is up for investigation.  I only took a passing look into what they are like today.

Here are the links to my original posts in 2008:

Part 1, Introduction – http://www.templestudy.com/2008/06/27/the-degree-ceremonies-of-oxford-university-part-1/
Part 2, Wells study – http://www.templestudy.com/2008/06/29/the-degree-ceremonies-of-oxford-university-part-2/
Part 3, YouTube videos – http://www.templestudy.com/2008/06/30/the-degree-ceremonies-of-oxford-university-part-3/
Part 4, Wells continued – http://www.templestudy.com/2008/07/01/the-degree-ceremonies-of-oxford-university-part-4/

I’m interested in hearing thoughts about where these exercises may have come from.  Please let us know your comments.

P.S.  The matriculation ceremonies at some universities also offer some peculiarities, as seen in this clip with Julia Roberts in the movie Mona Lisa Smile.

Margaret Barker Interview – Part 7b (Temple in the Modern World)

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“We have to try to get through the filter of the later editing… But deep down, there was something there.  I’m mean this [the temple] is a cultural icon, it’s shaped our pictures of the garden of Eden, it’s shaped our pictures of what it is to be a human being.  Because Adam is the great high priest, and everything that happened within that setting, for better or worse, has shaped the Western world’s idea of what it means to be human.  It’s a huge thing to discover…”  —Margaret Barker

Margaret Barker Interview – Part 7a (Location of the Temple)

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“…the building of the Second Temple involved leveling a new site… I mean, as far as I can see, the Zachariah prophesies about the mountain becoming a plain and building all that sort of thing, they are implying that a new mountaintop site is to be used for the rebuilt temple. That suggests to me that the site of the first temple was not the site of the second temple.” —Margaret Barker

Margaret Barker Interview – Part 6 (Seeing the Face of God)

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“The original purpose of the temple pilgrimage, was that you went to the temple to see the face of the Lord. Yea? In the old calendars ‘each of your males will see the face of the Lord’… By the time you’re reading the Masoretic texts as we have now, ‘each of your males will be seen in the presence of the Lord’… it’s been changed. Because the idea that you saw the presence of God was unthinkable, so they said, well, ok, you appear in the presence of God, you present yourself in the temple…”  —Margaret Barker

“So we know that somebody thought it was you are seeing the face of the Lord. Yea. Very interesting, very interesting. So someone has been at work, changing the docs, and we know which way.”  —Margaret Barker

“I think Melchizedek was a theophany of Yahweh. The Jewish interpretation, certainly the next passage, … Yahweh is the great high priest, and he is the one, as you have in the temple, you know, the great high priest is Yahweh, and he is the priest to God Most High. So you’ve got a hierarchy of priests. And I think that is how Genesis 15 was interpreted. Where, in the Apocalypse of Abraham, Abraham sees, mostly clearly, Melchizedek, but he describes him as … the angel Yahweh, and he is dressed as a high priest, with his purple and his… turban thing, and yes, it’s all very very interesting… all the other earlier sources… Melchizedek is the priest of El Elyon, almost certainly Yahweh, part of the great angel hierarchy. I mean, the implications of that for Melchizedek priesthood, is just mind boggling, absolutely mind boggling… So there is a lot of work for people to do, waiting to be done. Oh dear, it would be nice if we didn’t need sleep. We’d get such a lot more done!”  —Margaret Barker

Margaret Barker Interview – Part 5 (Social Implications)

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“… the Old Testament describes idolatry as the work of human hands.  So if you worship the work of human hands, the political system, economics, anything like that, that is idolatry.  The consequence of idolatry, according to the commandments, is that the third and fourth generation suffer from their iniquity.”  —Margaret Barker

“A single parent is actually a contradiction in terms.  What you’ve actually got is an abandonment.  But you’re not allowed to say that.  Because it is usually the mum who is bringing up the child.”  —Margaret Barker

“The image of God.  That is what we were created in, isn’t it?  … That is the basis of human dignity.  And if you deny that image in yourself, you are denying the most precious thing.  If you say, I am no more than the skin and bones, … you’d have lost the most important thing of all.  … I don’t know if you have this in America, but in magazines you have all this ‘Let’s give you a new image!’ You know, and you have your hair dyed and plastic surgery, and all the rest of it.  You don’t need a new image!  You know, we’ve got the greatest image already, but most people don’t know that.  You are the image of God… and that defines your rights and your responsibilities.”  —Margaret Barker