A candidate is said to be exalted, when he receives the Degree of Holy Royal Arch, the seventh in American Masonry. Exalted means elevated or lifted up, and is applicable both to a peculiar ceremony of the degree, and to the fact that this degree, in the Rite in which it is practiced, constitutes the summit of ancient Masonry.
The rising of the sun of spring from his wintry sleep into the glory of the vernal equinox was called by the old sun-worshipers his "exaltation"; and the Fathers of the Church afterward applied the same term to the resurrection of Christ. St. Athanasius says that by the expression, "God hath exalted him," St. Paul meant the resurrection. Exaltation, therefore, technically means a rising from a lower to a higher sphere, and in Royal Arch Masonry may be supposed to refer to the being lifted up out of the first temple of this life into the second temple of the future life. The candidate is raised in the Master's Degree, he is exalted in the Royal Arch. In both the symbolic idea is the same.
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This page is adapted from the Glossary at Phoenixmasonry — Used with permission.
