The Grand Lodge of Slovenia

THE MASONIC LODGE "VALENTIN VODNIK" IN LJUBLJANA (1940)

In his dissertation, the Slovenian historian Peter Vodopivec writes that there was much guessing in the last years before the World War II as to how many Masons are there in Slovenia, who are the members of this secret brotherhood, and does a Masonic Lodge in fact exist in Ljubljana (Peter Vodopivec: Masonic Lodge Valentin Vodnik in Ljubljana (1940), Kronika, periodical for Slovenian local history, XL, 1992). The question was very much on the map in 1940, when the first wave of attacks on Masonry swept the country (the former Yugoslavia), and the Grand Lodge in Belgrade, faced with the extreme pressure of the ban on Masonic associating and on Masonic press, had to take the decision of stopping its operation.

The campaign against Masons was started by Dr. Anton Korošec who, in his New Year's address published in the newspaper Slovenec at the end of 1939, threw communists, Jews and Masons into the same pot. He described them all as destructive, subversive and treacherous organizations, in other words as archenemies of the country. Korošec, of course, did not speak as a private person - he was the voice of the "President of the Senate", as the editor of the newspaper pointed out. The government press in Belgrade and, in particular, catholic newspapers in Croatia and Slovenia grabbed his accusations against Masonry, and intensified them further in July and August 1940. They "discovered" Masons among politicians, scientists and artists, as well as in liberal professional, economical and cultural institutions.

But even the most fervent adversaries of Masonry somehow did not mention names or stated them just by way of exception. It seems that Masonic Lodges and their members managed to keep the majority of their secrets for themselves, and to conceal them from authorities and the public.

Thus it is no surprise that the information about the establishment of the Lodge "Valentin Vodnik" in Ljubljana - the only Slovenian Masonic Lodge that was established in the "old" Yugoslavia - as well took three months to reach the ears of the editorial staff of the Slovenec: on 24 August1940 the newspaper published an unsigned article, quoting Croatian sources, which reported that a Masonic circle, called "Valentin Vodnik", was set on foot in spring in Ljubljana. Slovenec never managed to learn more about Masons of Ljubljana, and their "circle". In his booklet Freemasonry (published in Ljubljana in 1941), Dr. Ivan Ahčin, who was Chief Editor of the newspaper for a number of years, just repeats the meagre information about the "Vodnik Circle" and innocently adds that "Slovenian Masons are mostly members of Serbian and Croatian Lodges".

The Lodge "Valentin Vodnik" became independent as late as on 21 May 1940, as Evgen Lovšin states in a short memorandum. Two written sources confirm the date of its solemn installation: a document, issued for the occasion by the Grand Lodge of Yugoslavia, and signed by the Grand Master Andrija Dim. Dinić, and the dedication in the Bible (translation by Karadžič and Daničić) that was bestowed on the newly installed Lodge by the Grand Lodge of Yugoslavia.

Sources, discovered so far, do not mention whose idea it was to call the Lodge "Valentin Vodnik". The choice, however, was obviously based on the speculation by the literary historian and academician France Kidrič who published a paper on the French-Illyrian Lodge "Friends of King of Rome and Napoleon" (literary periodical Slovan, 1914), and mentioned among its members the first Slovenian poet Valentin Vodnik. Vodopivec, however, deems it clear now almost beyond any doubt that Vodnik was never a member of the French-Illyrian Lodge in Ljubljana. This means that this Lodge was named after a profane personality and not after a Brother Mason.

It is not known where, in 1940, the Lodge had its premises respectively its Temple. Evgen Lovšin reports that its members met in private apartments. In most instances their host was the Civil Governor of Slovenia Marušič who lived at the Resljeva Street. According to data, collected after the World War II, they also met in a separate room of the pub "Novi svet" in Ljubljana.

In spite of the small number of its members, the Lodge "Valentin Vodnik" was a true and perfect Masonic Lodge and not just a "circle" of Masonic enthusiasts, as their adversaries in the prewar editorship of Slovenec wanted to know. It, however, operated for just a few months. According to Professor Furlan, its activities decreased soon upon its foundation, not that much because of political pressures and the prohibition of Masonry, imposed in 1940, bur rather because of the lack of enthusiasm of in its own ranks. Nevertheless, it has been actually dissolved only after the fascist and Nazi occupation in 1941, when most members joined the Resistance, as Lovšin reports. The decision that each member should enter separately his nearest organization of the Liberation Front, was taken in a meeting "in a separate room of a pub in the Ljubljana quarter Gradišče".

Catholic circles continued to attack the Slovenian Masons throughout the war. They accused them of being closely linked with bolsheviks and communists, which was already a permanent constituent part of the prewar clerical propaganda and in no connection whatsoever with the reality. Masons who joined the Liberation Front or supported the Resistance in some other way, did not do it because of their liking for the communism, but for purely patriotic reasons, and because they strongly opposed to anything that was connected with both the fascism and Nazism.

Communists themselves were better aware of this than the clerical circles, and submitted Masons to police hearings as soon as they seized power in 1945. In the years after the World War II the Ljubljana administration of the military intelligence service (OZNA, later UDBA) compiled several files on Masonry, Masonic history, Masonic echoes in Slovenia, and prewar members of Masonic Lodges. These files are crowded with unverified, even completely false data, showing that communists were afraid of Masons, as they were afraid of any other opposition. The list of the members of the Ljubljana Lodge and of other Slovenian Masons, put together by the police and their informants, was much longer than their actual number.

The broad public knew nothing about the attention that OZNA and UDBA paid to Masonry after the war. Generally, there was not much talking or writing about Masonry in the entire Yugoslavia till 1984, when Zoran Nenezić first published his book Masons in Yugoslavia (1974-1980).He was the first to offer more accurate data on Slovenian Masons and the Lodge "Valentin Vodnik". His also listed four addition Slovenian Masons who were not members of the Lodge in Ljubljana, but joined other Croatian and Serbian Lodges. These are Dr. Bogumil Vošnjak, Dr. Niko Zupančič, Dr. Gregor Žerjav and Dr. Albert Kramer.

After the book by Nenezić has been printed, it seemed at first that it would not be possible to collect more data on Masonry in Slovenia than the author from Belgrade already did. But - as Vodopivec wisely says in his dissertation - a historian must never give way to despair. In 1989, the president of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts Janez Milčinski handed over to the National Museum in Ljubljana a collection of items, owned by the Masonic Lodge "Valentin Vodnik", which its last surviving member Evgen Lovšin entrusted him with, shortly before he died. This collection comprises some insignia and some documents that - together with files, kept by the Ministry of the Interior - contribute substantially to the picture of the Masons of Ljubljana and their Lodge.

In the prewar Yugoslavia, Masonry was relatively well developed in Serbia and Croatia. In Slovenia, it was limited to individuals. In his book, Nenezić states approximately 2,300 members of a number of prewar Lodges; the Lodge in Ljubljana had 18 or (perhaps) some more. The fear of Masonry in Slovenia that pervaded both the clerical circles and communists, was obviously greatly exaggerated ... Nevertheless, there were some important personalities of the Slovenian cultural and political history among the members of the Lodge "Valentin Vodnik". Because of them, and because of their mission and the role that they played on the political and cultural scene in Slovenia, the short prewar Masonic episode with the Lodge in Ljubljana is worthy of being included into our Masonic history.