Up to 1881, the Rites of Memphis and Mizraim went the same parallel and harmonious way in the same very particular climate; indeed these Rites began to gather together in two appurtenances the Masons of the Grand-Orient of France and those of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite who were interested in studies bearing on Esotericism and Symbolic Masonry, Gnosticism, Kabala, even Occultism and Hermeticism. These two Rites were the inheritors and the Trustees of old initiatic Obediences of the XVIIIth Century: the Philalethes, Philadelphs, the Hermetic Rite, the Primitive Rite, etc. And all this represented to Mizraim: 90 various degrees, and to Memphis, 95.
The problem was how to administer and utilise such an incongruous collection. When Garibaldi was appointed first Grand Master-General for life, for the entire world (because to a foreigner, the brothers abroad had not known political persecutions as they had in France) the decision was to set up a kind of classification by no means hierarchic in origin, but which rapidly became so. Indeed the 95 degrees of the Rite of Memphis-Mizraim must be considered as a pathway, wherein lie old Masonic degree's which were no longer practised and which were not a scale of values either.
The agreements of 1863 with the Grand-Orient of France and in 1896 with the Grand Symbolic Scottish Lodge, future Grand Lodge of France did not concern the normal 33 degrees (Rite of Perfection following the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite). The Superior Workshops of Memphis-Mizraim obligatorily practice the: 4th degree (Secret Master), 9th degree (Elect of the Nine), 13th degree (Royal Arch), 14th degree (Grand Elect of the Sacred Vault and Sublime Mason), 18th degree (Knight R+C), 20th Degree (Knight of the Temple), 28th degree (Knight of the Sun). The 30th degree, (Knight Kadosh) 31th degree (Grand Inspector), 32nd degree (Sublime Prince of the Royal Secret), 33rd degree (Sov.'. G.'. Inspector General. The 66th degree (Grand Consecrator) 87th, 88th, 89th and 90th degree called the (ARCANA ARCANORUM).
The Superior degrees that is all degrees above the 33rd degree are conferred as an honourary title upon Masons in recompense for their valour and fidelity to the Rite.
The 20th Degree confers the Ancient Strict Observance Templar degrees, of Baron Von Hundt, and the succession of Jean Baptiste Villermoz, the C.B.C.S., Chevaliers Bienfaisants de Cité‚ Sainte.
