# Secret Handshakes?! Is there such a thing? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 3, 2003, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090 "2003-07-03T18:42:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crankyasanoldman/32/11670_2.png) [@CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrankyAsAnOldMan)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2003, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/21 "2003-07-05T04:44:05Z")
Fretful, I can’t remember it either. Then again, the cabal hasn’t invited me to any world-domination meetings around here, so it hasn’t come up. ---
**Author:** ![biqu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7feea3/32.png) [@biqu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/biqu)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2003, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/22 "2003-07-05T05:15:42Z")
I was inducted into phi beta kappa just over a month ago, so I remember the “secret handshake” better than **CrankyAsAnOldMan**. A search on [Google Images](http://images.google.com/) led to [this picture](http://rhendess.home.mindspring.com/pbk/images/handshake.gif) of the handshake, which is shown on [this page](http://rhendess.home.mindspring.com/pbk/handshake.htm) along with a fairly accurate description. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2003, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/23 "2003-07-05T16:25:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Fretful Porpentine \* > \*\*… And somebody who wasn’t a PBK showed me what it was on the day before my initiation, so it’s not all _that_ secret. > \*\* You know, I’m not sure we’re even expected to keep it a secret. IIRC, the only thing we were sworn to keep secret was the whole selection-of-initiates process, and I was never let in on that anyway. Maybe it will come up at some point. > [@](#): > > \*\* > (Meanwhile, I _am_ a PBK and I can’t for the life of me remember what it was, but I’m pretty sure my election was a clerical error anyway.) \*\* Or it’s for some big _secret_ reason that you are not privy too…oooooooh… ---
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2003, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/24 "2003-07-05T16:43:55Z")
I met a girl in a bar, the other week who showed me what she said was the secret handshake of the freemasons, I told her she couldn’t know becasue the freemasons don’t let women in! ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/25 "2003-07-06T03:17:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by DougC \* > \*\*- - - Well I checked my Big Secrets books and can’t find anything on the Masons’ secret handshake. I thought something was there. I seem to remember reading it as being one or two fingers extended into the palm of the other person. The Knights of Columbus handshake it does describe: the handshake is conventional, but the first person squezes twice in rapid succession, and the second answers by squeezing once. > ~ \*\* I am a Knight of Columbus. I have attained the Fourth Degree, the highest degree of the Order. I am a Past Grand Knight of my council, a Former District Deputy in my jurisdiction, and a Past Faithful Navigator of my Assembly. The Knights do not have a secret handshake. There are secret rituals, but there is no handshake as described above. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/26 "2003-07-06T08:14:06Z")
Slight hijack… is the KoC a fraternal order? I’d always thought it was sort of a retired gent’s club, which is perhaps the same thing…(no offense intended Bricker) My college fraternity has a secret handshake… and 11811 I’m assuming your reasons for deactivating involved some kind of unpleasantness, but its a little unfair to the members of your organization who came before you to be showing off something they considered a secret. ---
**Author:** ![Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angel_of_the_lord/32/2949_2.png) [@Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angel_of_the_Lord)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/27 "2003-07-06T17:05:34Z")
Alpha Phi Omega, which is a coed service fraternity, has a secret handshake. Which, of course, I have to ask how to do every time initiation comes around. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/28 "2003-07-06T17:11:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by dutchboy208 \* > **… is the KoC a fraternal order? I’d always thought it was sort of a retired gent’s club, which is perhaps the same thing…(no offense intended Bricker)** It’s a Roman Catholic fraternal organization, founded because Catholics were not allowed to become Freemasons. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/29 "2003-07-06T17:50:20Z")
> [@](#): > > Swordfish? Every password was swordfish! Whenever anyone tried to think of a word that no one would ever guess, they always chose swordfish. It was just one of those strange quirks of the human mind. Terry Pratchett - Night Watch 😃 ---
**Author:** ![NeutronJack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/neutronjack/32/4134_2.png) [@NeutronJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NeutronJack)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/30 "2003-07-06T21:18:54Z")
[Cecil states:](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4_138.html) > [@](#): > > In shaking hands, for example, a Master Mason will press his thumb between the other guy’s second and third knuckles, thereby identifying himself to initiates while leaving others clueless. This leave it open whether non-Master Masons have a different handshake, or none at all. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2003, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/31 "2003-07-06T21:30:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by dutchboy208 \* > \*\*Slight hijack… is the KoC a fraternal order? I’d always thought it was sort of a retired gent’s club, which is perhaps the same thing…(no offense intended Bricker) None taken… although I’m about forty years away from retirement, I think! The Knights of Columbus are a Catholic, family, fraternal, service organization. - Rick ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2003, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/32 "2003-07-07T06:30:35Z")
Okay, so Catholics aren’t allowed to become Freemasons… yet they trace the origins of their organization/order/cult/insert your term of choice here to the Knights Templar, (or Hospitaler, I can’t quite remember) which would have been a pre-Reformation group and thus Catholic… ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2003, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090/33 "2003-07-07T13:30:10Z")
I don’t know enough about the Freemasons to endorse or reject your statement that their origins lie with the Knights Templar. I had always heard that they began in 1717 in London with a “Grand Lodge” of Freemasonry which then spread itself to other “lodges” throughout Britian and the rest of the world. But I can tell you that for a long period of time, the Catholic Church believed that the organization was anti-clerical, and execommunicated a Catholic who joined the Masonic order. In 1983, the penalty of excommunication seems to have been lifted. However, the Church still forbids Catholics from enrolling in masonic associations, stating that those who are “…are involved in serious sin and may not approach Holy Communion…” - Rick [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secret-handshakes-is-there-such-a-thing/186090.md?page=1)