It enabled him to become the ruler of eighty million people - and in the space of twelve short years to leave his ineradicable mark on history.
Walther Friedrich Schellenberg
INTRODUCTION
Many books have been written about Hitler, many reasons suggested to account for him.
It is said that Germany in the 1930's was economically and spiritually bankrupt, that Hitler and his associates were simple opportunists or petty bureaucrats.
But one explanation tends to contradict another, and when they are combined, they merge into a solution so general that nothing is explained.
Understandably, then, many people are still not satisfied that the unique events of the Third Reich have been adequately dealt with by the historians.
In all this complicated story, there is one question which cries out for an answer:
How is it that the theorists have missed a vital element, even when they themselves provide important clues ? That element is the occult.
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| Hitlerjugend © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| SS Emblem © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
The Schutzstaffel - translated to Protection Squadron or defence corps, abbreviated SS with stylized "Armanen" sig runes) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP). It began at the end of 1920 as a small, permanent guard unit known as the "Saal-Schutz" (Hall-Protection) made up of NSDAP volunteers to provide security for Nazi Party meetings in Munich. Later in 1925, Heinrich Himmler joined the unit which had by then been reformed and renamed the "Schutz-Staffel". Under Himmler's leadership (1929–45), it grew from a small paramilitary formation to one of the largest and most powerful organizations in the Third Reich
The Hitlerjugend (abbreviated HJ) was a paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party. It existed from 1922 to 1945. The HJ was the second oldest paramilitary Nazi group, founded one year after its adult counterpart, the Sturmabteilung (SA). It was made up of: the Hitlerjugend proper, for male youth aged 14 to 18; the younger boys' section, Deutsches Jungvolk (German Youth), for those aged 10 to 14; and the girls' section, the Bund Deutscher Mädel (the League of German Girls).
It now seems puzzling that they should not also have given as much consideration to the underlying
basis for these odd phenomena as they gave to economic and social factors.
But this has led, inevitably, to selective blindness.
In order not to be accused of giving credence to irrational beliefs, they have failed to see those beliefs in their proper historical perspective.
Since early studies always influence later ones, the interpretation of Nazi origins has tended to remain pretty much the same for the past two decades.
All the same, people do seem to have a subliminal awareness that the National Socialism was involved in occultism.
The current occult revival has placed us in a better position to examine the National Socialism from a different perspective, and gives ample ground for believing that occult beliefs and practices played a major part in the history of the Third Reich.
Some scholars may have been thrown off the scent because Hitler went to great pains to eradicate occultism from Germany almost as soon as he came to power, and on that account, is mistakenly identified as an enemy of irrational faith.
On the contrary.
As will be borne out in later chapters, the occult was purged, not because it was abhorrent, but because Hitler took it seriously - so seriously, indeed, that it posed a potential threat.
The astrologer Wilhelm Wulff, who was put to work by the SS casting horoscopes of nations, groups, and movements, describes, in 'Zodiac and Swastika', Heinrich Himmler's confession of his own interest in and practice of occultism and his explanation of the purge:
'For us politics means ... the elimination of all forces except those serving the one constructive idea. . .
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| Wilhelm Theodor H. Wulff - Horoscope |
Wilhelm Theodor H. Wulff (27 March 1892 - 9 June 1979) was an German-Austrian astrologer and writer. He is best known for the 1973 book 'Zodiac und Hakenkreuz'. The book tells about his time as an astrologer in Nazi Germany near the end of World War II. He was Heinrich Himmler's astrologer.
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| Berghof - Berchtesgaden |
That Hitler was fascinated by the occult is proven: the Berchtesgaden library at the Berghof, discovered in a mine after the war, contained many volumes on occultism and cults.
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| Madame Blavatsky |
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| George Gurdjieff, |
Cults, from those connected with George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff, Madame Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, and Rudolf Steiner to their present reincarnations, shared certain features: an authoritarian obedience to a charismatic and Messianic leader; secrecy; loyalty to the group above all other ties; a belief in supernatural possibilities open to the members only; initiation into superhuman sources of power; literal acceptance of the existence of supermen who handed down an oral tradition to a chosen people and who were guiding us now.
Гео́ргий Ива́нович Гурджи́ев; (George Ivanovich Gurdjieff January 13, 1866 – October 29, 1949) was an influential spiritual teacher of the early to mid-20th century who taught that most humans live their lives in a state of hypnotic "waking sleep", but that it is possible to transcend to a higher state of consciousness and achieve full human potential. Gurdjieff developed a method for doing so, calling his discipline "The Work"(connoting "work on oneself") or "the Method". According to his principles and instructions, Gurdjieff's method for awakening one's consciousness is different from that of the fakir, monk or yogi, so his discipline is also called (originally) the "Fourth Way".
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| Seal of the Theosophical Society |
In 1875, Blavatsky and Henry Steel Olcott established a research and publishing institute called the Theosophical Society. Blavatsky defined Theosophy as "the archaic Wisdom-Religion, the esoteric doctrine once known in every ancient country having claims to civilization." Blavatsky saw herself as a missionary of this ancient knowledge.
Here was the missing link in our understanding of those who proclaimed themselves gods.
Other historians have corroborated that Germany between the two world wars was particularly ripe for these states of mind.
It was a time of alienation and impotence.
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| click here for The First World War © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| click here for The Causes of the Great War © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Apart from the physical devastations, the three bugbears of taxation, inflation, and confiscation sapped the strength of the middle class.
The war itself was but a symptom of growing inner turbulence in Europe.
The trouble had, of course, begun much earlier.
In Germany particularly, the gap between an advancing technology and an outmoded social order was great.
In the years preceding World War I, the German Jews were in an especially vulnerable position.
The full emancipation of the German Jews, which had come in 1871, brought large numbers of Eastern European Jews to Germany.
They settled in the cities, taking a prominent part in commercial, cultural, and political life.
Likewise, the period from 1857 to 1910 saw a rise in the Jewish population of Vienna of more than 400 percent.
Because of the high value the Jews placed on learning, a disproportionately large number went into the medical and legal professions, trying in that way to gain a modicum of social acceptance.
Some Germans, of course, mistook these professionals for the average Jew.
Slowly, a new religion evolved for those Germans who felt somehow cheated - a cult of race, based on the supremacy of the Aryans and the vilification of the Jews.
It was called the völkisch or Pan-German movement, and it enjoyed great popular appeal.
It began a virulent campaign against the 'foreign element.'
A racial theory of history was developed, and it heralded the coming of a new 'Messiah'.
A racial theory of history was developed, and it heralded the coming of a new 'Messiah'.
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| Guido von List |
The mystical concepts of Reich and Volk went along with an awakening interest in occultism.
Secret cults sprang up, - anti-Semitic and nationalistic
Two Austrian occultists, Jorg Lanz von Liebenfels and Guido von List, presented an occult anthropological package which attracted a number of wealthy backers.
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| von Liebenfels |
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| Ostara |
Hitler's collection of books obtained as a student contained works on mythology and a collection of von Liebenfels's racist-occult magazine, Ostara (see left), and he even visited with the Templar Master (as seen in Chapter Two).
Friends of his from the early days recall long conversations on occult themes - everything from reincarnation to yoga to paganism and magic - and his later biographers, such as Sir Allan Bullock, record Hitler's familiarity with occult topics in the days prior to the Second World War.
While Hitler appreciated the "scholarship" he discovered in the occult magazines and books he devoured, he never took a particular liking to the type of people who composed occult lodges.
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| Dietrich Eckart |
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| Rudolf Heß |
The occultists who were members of his inner circle - such as Heß, Rosenberg, Gutberlet, and Eckart - lived on the periphery of the Thule and Germanenorden lodges; while Eckart and Rosenberg were members of the Thule, it is clear that they would have been exploiting that membership for their own, hidden, agenda.
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| Rudolf Sebottendorff |
The leadership and influence of men like Sebottendorff was strong, and it is doubtful whether Hitler would have willingly accepted a role subservient to an occult (or political) master.
History has shown that no occult order can survive two masters.
Hitler was an activist.
Almost any action was better than sitting around a room in a robe and meditating on Thor.
Hitler was a pacer. He couldn't sit still for long.
And he was a demagogue, almost from the beginning. He had to lead; and if he couldn't lead, he would absent himself from the action and the conversation altogether.
But was Hitler a ritualistic cultist ? As a black-robed, ritual-performing, invocation-chanting priest of Satan ? Probably not.
The basic details of Hitler's life story are so well known, and so well documented in other sources, that to repeat them here would cheat the reader who is, after all, looking for the occult aspect to the mystery of the Third Reich.
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| Alfred Rosenberg |
Let us concentrate then on those aspects of Hitler's life that reveal occult interests and involvements, all the while remembering what has been said here before: that there is no evidence that Hitler ever actually joined an occult society per se, but that the evidence for his fascination with occult themes and subjects is extensive and that a great portion of the program of the Third Reich concerning race, Jews, Freemasons, genetic engineering, etc., was the veritable platform of the völkisch and Pan-German occult lodges carried out in actual practice, a platform Hitler inherited from Liebenfels, Rosenberg, and Eckart during his early days in Vienna and Munich.
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| Aleister Crowley |
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| Mathers |
Indeed, his major argument with the occult lodges was only that they had been unable to carry out their programs in the real world.
Hitler, in a sense, had 'mastered' himself, and the 'real world' to an extent that men like Mathers and even Crowley had not, but wished to.
That is - not satisfied with phony titles and the accumulation of pedigrees and initiations that typified the 'fin de siecle' occultist - he was able to take his occult beliefs and enact them on the world stage to a degree undreamed of by mainstream occult philosophers.
In that sense, then, he was a tool of the occultists.
More, he was their Creature.
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| Braunau-am-Inn |
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| Dorfwappen Braunau-am-Inn © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Hitler was born on April 20, 1889, to an Austrian civil servant in the town of Braunau-am-Inn, a locale said to be famous at the time for its large proportion of native mediums.
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| Rudi and Willy Schneider |
It is even claimed that Hitler shared the same wet nurse as two famous 'channelers' of the day: Rudi and Willy Schneider.
That Hitler himself might have been a medium was a contention made by a great many of his personal friends and other observers, who described the Fuhrer in terms ranging from "hypnotic" to "demoniacally possessed".
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| Stift Lambach Chorschule |
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| Stift Lambach - Österreich |
So, we will begin with Hitler's childhood schooling at Lambach Monastery, from 1897 to 1899, under the guidance of Catholic monks.
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| Wappen von Bischof Hagen |
It is so indicative of the atmosphere in which the NSDAP would later take root in Germany and Austria that, as mentioned earlier, the coat of arms of this monastery is a swastika before which Hitler would pass every school day and which even now adorns the chapel where Hitler would attend choir practice, and in several other places, and which was even visible from his apartment window.
Hitler (like Heinrich Himmler, Joseph Goebbels, and so many other prominent Nazis) was born and reared a Roman Catholic (see left), a fact that is often forgotten.
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| Alois Hitler |
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| Klara Hitler |
His mother was devout, his father rather less so; and it is important to recognize that Hitler never got along well with his father, although he said that he respected him, but idolized his mother.
Like all good Catholic children of a certain age, Hitler was confirmed in the Church.
The Roman Catholic Confirmation ceremony is one in which young Catholics reaffirm the sacrament of Baptism: that is, with their own voice they confirm their acceptance of the vows made for them by their godparents when they were infants.
They officially reject "Satan, and all his pomps, and all his works," in a ceremony which evidently left the young Hitler either totally unimpressed or strangely tense, for he was distracted and restless that whole afternoon until some neighbourhood children came by and invited him to a game of cowboys and Indians, which he joined with unbridled enthusiasm.
We may wonder at what point Hitler lost his interest in the Church or, indeed, if he ever had any interest to lose.
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| Catholic Bishops Supporting the NSDAP |
Many Christian organizations enthusiastically supported Hitler in the early years of his dictatorship, choosing not to believe that the virulently anti-Christian stance of his neo-pagan NSDAP was sincere.
They were accompanied in this by many Jewish people and organizations which could not accept that the anti-Semitism of the Party was anything more than a cheap political ploy.
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| Wappen Heiliges Römisches Reich © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Martin Luther |
Germany, of course, was the birthplace of the Lutheran Reformation, the last stronghold of the Heiliges Römisches Reich (Holy Roman Empire) and a country of Christians of whatever persuasion.
Germany was also the country of Walpurgisnacht, that famous pagan festival celebrated on April 30 every year, traditionally at the top of Mount Brocken in the Harz Mountains, where the Witches' Sabbath supposedly takes place.
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| Rudolf Bultmann |
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| Hermann Samuel Reimarus |
Eventually, German scholarship would prove that the Gospels were written much later than anyone had previously realized, a position represented by no less than the esteemed Biblical commentator and professor of the University of Marburg, Rudolf Bultmann who, in his 'Jesus and the Word' - published before Hitler came to power - came to the conclusion that the life of Jesus was virtually unknowable.
Thus we have a land where scientific research and religious fervor meet; a country that will occasionally engage in an almost masochistic turning-inward upon itself and its cherished ideals, devouring its own children in the process.
We have a nation where fierce religious beliefs live cheek by jowl with fierce religious dissent; a land where Lutherans and Catholics, Christians and pagans, each lay claim to the country's psyche.
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| The Holy Inquisition © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Rosicrucian Emblem © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Rudolf Steiner |
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| Adam Weishaupt |
And Germany became the country where the Anthroposophical Society of Rudolf Steiner was founded less than 150 years later, an organization that was banned and persecuted by the Third Reich, resulting in Steiner's own untimely death in 1925.
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| Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
It also comes as no surprise that the ultimate British secret occult society of that era - the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn - originated, not on that "blessed isle," but in Germany itself with the "cypher manuscript" of Fraulein A. Sprengel in Stuttgart.
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| Dr. William Wynn Westcott |
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| Dr. William R. Woodman |
It was somehow important to the Chiefs of the Golden Dawn - Dr. William Wynn Westcott, MacGregor Mathers, and Dr. William R. Woodman - to demonstrate a German origin for their Society.
And why was the German origin fof the Golden Dawn so important ?
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| Paracelsus |
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| Deutschritterorden © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Aleister Crowley |
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| Ordo Templi Orientis © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
And it was from Germany, after all, that Aleister Crowley's most famous import originated, one still in existence today: the Ordo Templi Orientis, or OTO.
We have noted how Hitler was influenced by the writings of völkisch occultists like Liebenfels.
This had happened at a time in his life when everything around him was falling apart.
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| Dr Eduard Bloch |
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| Weihnachtsbaum |
In 1907, his beloved mother died in an excruciating manner: diagnosed with breast cancer, by the family Doctor, strangely enough a Jew by the name of Eduard Bloch - she submitted to the painful application of iodoform to her chest.
This was a method by which - it was believed - the acid-like characteristics of iodoform would literally burn out the cancerous cells.
She succumbed, however, on December 21, dying in the light of a Christmas tree near her bed.
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| Liebenfels; Swastika © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Burg Werfenstein |
(Four days later, unknown to young Adolf) Lanz von Liebenfels would raise his swastika flag over Burg Werfenstein, not far from the Hitler home in Upper Austria.)
That this experience would have figuratively burned itself into her son and thereby affect his psyche in profound and disturbing ways - particularly in relation to women, for there is evidence that his mother's gruesome death may have affected his sex life.
It has been said that Hitler's problem in terms of art was his inability to draw the human body; - perhaps a result of his inability to purge himself of the trauma of watching his mother die in such a horrible fashion on the eve of the winter solstice.
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| Academy of Fine Arts - Vienna |
In another age, or another country, Hitler might have blamed his gross misfortunes on a plague of evil spirits, and sought the assistance of an exorcist or witch doctor.
Instead, the ideas he found in Liebenfel's 'Ostara' provided him with another - equally occult and nefarious - enemy: an evil race whose very blood, and cells, and genes were slowly possessing and dispossessing the entire German people.
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| Kunde von den Sodoms-Äfflingen und dem Götter-Elektron |
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| Lanz von Liebenfels |
In 1905, Liebenfels published his book 'Theozoölogie oder die Kunde von den Sodoms-Äfflingen und dem Götter-Elektron' (Theozoology, or the Science of the Sodomite-Apelings and the Electron of the Gods) in which he advocated sterilization of the sick and the 'lower races', as well as forced labour for castrated 'chandals' (lower races), and glorified the 'Aryan race' as 'Gottmenschen' (god-men). Lanz justified his esoteric racial ideology by attempting to give it a Biblical foundation; according to him, Eve, whom he described as initially being divine, involved herself with a demon and gave birth to the 'lower races' in the process. Furthermore, he claimed that this led to blonde women being attracted primarily to 'dark men', something that only could be stopped by 'racial demixing' (racial hygiene) so that the 'Aryan master humans' could 'once again rule the dark-skinned beastmen' and ultimately achieve divinity. A copy of this book was sent to Swedish poet August Strindberg, from whom Lanz received an enthusiastic reply in which he was described as a "prophetic voice".
Hitler was not completely credulous: that is, he did not surrender his entire life to a blind acceptance of occult beliefs; otherwise, he would have spent his remaining years sitting around seance tables and invoking spirit guides like many of his contemporaries, in Europe and America.
Instead, Hitler was nothing if not pragmatic, and not easily fooled by fake mediums and other occult charlatans.
He sought real-world solutions to the problems posed by mystics such as Liebenfels.
That is, he agreed with occult theory, and seemed to take much of it as accepted fact; it was occult practice - particularly the occult practices taking place in his own environment of self-deluded, albeit self-proclaimed, magi and bishops and seers - that he couldn't stomach, although he loved to read about occultism, and to discuss it with those of his friends who had done some of the same reading.
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| Karl's Church in Winter - Adolf Hitler |
He eventually had his own space at a men's dormitory where he was given a small, clean room of his own, and managed to buy some watercolors.
He would paint scenes of churches and local landmarks, and a friend would hawk them on the streets for a cut of the proceeds.
It was in Vienna and during these tough times that Hitler made the personal acquaintance of Lanz von Liebenfels at the latter's office, sometime in 1909.
Liebenfels remembered that Hitler appeared so distraught and so impoverished that the 'New Templar' himself gave Hitler free copies of Ostara, and the bus fare back home.
Liebenfels remembered that Hitler appeared so distraught and so impoverished that the 'New Templar' himself gave Hitler free copies of Ostara, and the bus fare back home.
It would be von Liebenfels who would greet the ascension of Hitler to Germany's throne with tremendous enthusiasm, as a sign of the great occult power that was sweeping through the world under the sign of the swastika.
The four operas that compose the famous 'Ring Cycle' were a favourite, of course, and 'Parsifal', 'Lohengrin' ... virtually all of Wagner's mythological and mystical work.
One Wagnerian opera that stands out as an early favourite of Hitler's is a lesser-known and infrequently performed work called 'Rienzi'.
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| Lord Bulwer-Lytton |
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| August Kubizek |
They had to stand during the performance since they could not afford seat tickets.
It is an intriguing footnote to the story of the occult Reich that 'Rienzi's' libretto was based on an historical novel of medieval Rome by the celebrated English occultist and best-selling author Lord Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873).
'Rienzi' was a patriot who attempted to reform the Roman government, but who eventually failed and went to his death.
'Rienzi' - whose real name was Niccolo Gabrini - was often called "the last of the Romans."
'Rienzi' - whose real name was Niccolo Gabrini - was often called "the last of the Romans."
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| 'Vril - The Coming Race' |
As for Bulwer-Lytton, who is probably best known for his 'The Last Days of Pompei', he was the author of the popular occult novels Zanoni and 'Vril - The Coming Race', the latter having inspired the creation of a German secret society by the same name.
(Bulwer-Lytton's name would also be lumped together with those of Byron, Moore, Shelley, Rousseau, George Sand, and Victor Hugo as a member of the "Satanic School" of literature: a trend of certain Romantic poets towards the anti-Christian, unconventional, and occasionally obscene in literature.)
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| 'Parsifal' - Richard Wagner |
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| Friedrich Nietzsche |
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| Thule-Gesellschaft © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Groups such as the Thule Society, the Edda Society, the List Society, the Germanenorden, and the Order of New Templars would include nobles, military officers, college professors, and wealthy industrialists among their ranks.
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| The Pagan Grail © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Blond-haired Aryan Hero |
It was also the influence of Wagner to which we can attribute that fascination for orders of knighthood, the quest for the pagan Grail, Teutonic gods, and blond-haired Aryan heroes that would eventually dominate the 'weltanschauung' of one of Hitler's most ardent supporters, Heinrich Himmler.
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| Heinrich Himmler |
About the year 1911 Hitler made the acquaintance of one Josef Greiner (see right)- another resident of the men's hostel, an unemployed lamplighter - and they would spend hours discussing such arcane lore as astrology, religion, and the occult sciences.
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| Josef Greiner |
Josef Greiner (Styria, 1886—Unknown (after 1947)) was an Austrian writer
Josef Greiner was born in Styria in 1886. He moved to Vienna around 1908 and earned his living through various jobs, including as a sign painter, and as a lamplighter for a cabaret.
He lived in the Meldemannstraße dormitory from January to April 1910; it was during this period that he first became acquainted with Adolf Hitler, who moved into the dormitory in February 1910 and stayed until 1913. According to an essay by Reinhold Hanisch, during this period Greiner and Hitler at one point worked together.
In 1938, Greiner published a memoir entitled 'Schrift Sein Kampf und Sieg. Eine Erinnerung an Adolf Hitler' (His Struggle and Victory: A Memoir of Adolf Hitler). In it, he told of knowing Hitler during his time in the Meldemannstraße dormitory. He praised Hitler, calling him "Lord of the Ostmark", a "genius", and a "messiah".
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| Munich |
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| Sven Hedin |
But in 1913, defeated in his dream of becoming an artist and thereby redesigning the great public buildings of Vienna, Linz, and other Austrian cities, Hitler finally left his homeland for Germany, crossing over the border from Austria-Hungary on May 24 and arriving in Munich the next day.
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| Assassination in Sarajevo |
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| Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand |
In July 1914, Austria will declare war on Serbia.
Three days later, on August 1, Germany will mobilize against Czarist Russia; on August 3, she will declare war against France; on August 16, Hitler will enlist with the 1st Bavarian Infantry Regiment.
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| Hitler Embraces the War |
If there is still any doubt about Hitler's enthusiasm for occult and völkisch themes, the following should put all objections to rest.
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| Iron Cross © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Adolf Hitler is twenty-six years old; by the time the war ends in 1918, he will have been awarded the Iron Cross, First and Second Classes, and will have proven himself an exceptionally brave combat soldier.
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| Gas Attack |
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| Pasewalk |
The doctors, not familiar with this type of condition, believe it to be psychosomatic.
While they may be wrong, he does eventually regain his sight, only to lose it again as word of Germany's surrender reaches his ears on Martin Luther's birthday: November 9, 1918.
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| Mystical Enlightenment © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Yet it is during Hitler's blindness that he receives a kind of mystical enlightenment, like that experienced by Guido von List many years before during his own temporary blindness (or like that of Saul, blinded on the way to Damascus) for, from that point on, Adolf Hitler has changed.
He has been illumined, perhaps.
He been in contact - as the Golden Dawn would have said - with his 'Holy Guardian Angel', his higher Self – the 'True Will'.
The 'True Will' is the very essence of the occult understanding of the universe.
There is a part of man which is of a singular nature, although the mind is unable to perceive it as such.
This 'True Will' does not spring from conscious intent, but from the interplay between the deepest Self and the πλήρωμα - for the 'True Will', un-assuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of result, is in every way perfect.
The 'True Will' cannot be experienced directly, because it is the basis of consciousness (or experience), and it has no fixed qualities on to which the mind can latch.
The 'True Will' is the consciousness, it is the elusive "I" which confers self-awareness but does not seem to consist of anything itself.
The 'True Will' can sometimes be felt as ecstasy or inspiration.
The 'True Will' is the very essence of the occult understanding of the universe.
There is a part of man which is of a singular nature, although the mind is unable to perceive it as such.
This 'True Will' does not spring from conscious intent, but from the interplay between the deepest Self and the πλήρωμα - for the 'True Will', un-assuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of result, is in every way perfect.
The 'True Will' cannot be experienced directly, because it is the basis of consciousness (or experience), and it has no fixed qualities on to which the mind can latch.
The 'True Will' is the consciousness, it is the elusive "I" which confers self-awareness but does not seem to consist of anything itself.
The 'True Will' can sometimes be felt as ecstasy or inspiration.
click below for more information about
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| © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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| Wappen des Deutschen Reiches |
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| Kaiser Wilhelm II |
Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albrecht von Preußen; 27 January 1859 – 4 June 1941) was the last German Emperor (Kaiser) and King of Prussia, ruling the German Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia from 15 June 1888 to 9 November 1918.
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| Bayerische Räterepublik |
The Bavarian Soviet Republic, also known as the Bayerische Räterepublik or Münchner Räterepublik was, as part of the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the short-lived attempt to establish a Jewish socialist state in the form of a 'workers' council republic in the Free State of Bavaria. It sought independence from the also recently proclaimed Weimar Republic. Its capital was Munich.
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| Anton Drexler |
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| Vier-Jahreszeiten-Hotel - Munich |
From this Circle will be spawned the German Workers' Party with rail worker and locksmith Anton Drexler at its head.
Anton Drexler (13 June 1884 – 24 February 1942) was a German far-right political leader of the 1920s, instrumental in the formation of the anti-communist German Workers' Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei - DAP), the antecedent of the NSDAP (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei).
Drexler served as mentor to Adolf Hitler during his early days in politics.
Born in Munich, Drexler was a machine-fitter before becoming a railway locksmith in Berlin in 1902. He joined the Fatherland Party during World War I. He was a poet and a member of the völkisch agitators who, together with journalist Karl Harrer, founded the Deutsch Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party - DAP), in Munich with Gottfried Feder and Dietrich Eckart on 5 January 1919.
Anton Drexler (13 June 1884 – 24 February 1942) was a German far-right political leader of the 1920s, instrumental in the formation of the anti-communist German Workers' Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei - DAP), the antecedent of the NSDAP (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei).
Drexler served as mentor to Adolf Hitler during his early days in politics.
Born in Munich, Drexler was a machine-fitter before becoming a railway locksmith in Berlin in 1902. He joined the Fatherland Party during World War I. He was a poet and a member of the völkisch agitators who, together with journalist Karl Harrer, founded the Deutsch Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party - DAP), in Munich with Gottfried Feder and Dietrich Eckart on 5 January 1919.
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| Deutsch Arbeiterpartei © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
It is this Party that Hitler will infiltrate - on the orders of a Captain Mayr, who reports to a clique of wealthy industrialists and officers operating, coincidentally, out of the Four Seasons Hotel - in September of 1919.
Captain Karl Mayr (5 January 1883 in Mindelheim – 9 February 1945) was a General Staff officer and Adolf Hitler's immediate superior in an army Intelligence Division in the Reichswehr, 1919-1920. Mayr was particularly known as the man who introduced Hitler to politics. In 1919, Mayr directed Hitler to write the Gemlich letter, in which Hitler first expressed his anti-semitic views in writing.
Captain Karl Mayr (5 January 1883 in Mindelheim – 9 February 1945) was a General Staff officer and Adolf Hitler's immediate superior in an army Intelligence Division in the Reichswehr, 1919-1920. Mayr was particularly known as the man who introduced Hitler to politics. In 1919, Mayr directed Hitler to write the Gemlich letter, in which Hitler first expressed his anti-semitic views in writing.
Drexler will give him a small pamphlet that he has authored containing explosive phrases like "National Socialism" and "New World Order."
Hitler is captivated by these concepts, and decides that his spying days are over.
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| German Workers' Party member 555 |
Adolf Hitler becomes Deutsch Arbeiterpartei member 555.
Later, perhaps for superstitious reasons, Hitler will annoy the Old Guard by claiming that he was member number 7; this will be proven wrong when it is revealed that the Party began its numbering system at 500 in order to appear larger than it really was.
(Hitler was actually member number 7 of the executive committee of the Party, formed later.)
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| 'Necronomicon' |
Lovecraft was also an anti-Semite and an ethnophobe, as many of his writings and letters attest.
During the years that Nazism rose to total power in Germany, Lovecraft (see right) was writing stories about an un-namable evil that could be conjured using the formulas of the 'Necronomicon', and along the way introduced yet another "black book," the 'Unaussprechlichen Kulten' ("Unspeakable Cults") of the German anthropologist Friedrich Wilhelm von Junzt.
'Unaussprechliche Kulte' was written by Friedrich Wilhelm von Junzt. The first edition of the German text appeared in 1839 in Düsseldorf. The English edition was issued by Bridewall in London in 1845, but contained numerous misprints and was badly translated. A heavily expurgated edition was later issued in New York by Golden Goblin Press in 1909.
'Unaussprechliche Kulte' was written by Friedrich Wilhelm von Junzt. The first edition of the German text appeared in 1839 in Düsseldorf. The English edition was issued by Bridewall in London in 1845, but contained numerous misprints and was badly translated. A heavily expurgated edition was later issued in New York by Golden Goblin Press in 1909.
He wrote about the mysterious and abhorred practices of Asians and Arabs in his short story "The Horror of Red Hook" among other tales and - save for the rather high literary quality of his stories when compared to the articles of a von Liebenfels - their racist nature could have easily promised him publication in select copies of 'Ostara'.
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| Aleister Crowley |
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| Nazionalsocialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei NSDAP © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Gradually, Hitler - carrying out his own, mysterious agenda which began at the sanitorium in Pasewalk - begins to assume total control of the German Workers' Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or DAP).
He changes its name to National Socialist German Workers' Party or Nazionalsocialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP.
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| Ahnenerbe © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
Still broke, Hitler lives in a tiny rented room in Munich.
His bookcase has a few, well-thumbed volumes, including the memoirs of a famous Swedish explorer, Sven Hedin, (already mentioned) whose principal destination has always been Asia with an emphasis on Tibet.
Sven Hedin will later become deeply involved with the infamous Ahnenerbe: a research organization within Himmler's SS.
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| Dietrich Eckart |
Eckart, encouraged by his friends in the Thule, went to hear him speak at DAP meetings and, like so many people after him, became entranced by the hypnotic, mesmerizing Austrian fanatic.
He takes Hitler under his wing and introduces him to the elite of Munich society.
Dietrich Eckart was an author and playwright who owned his own newspaper.
Famous for his translation into German of 'Peer Gynt', Eckart was one of Munich's coffee-house darlings, as well known for his biting wit and sarcasm as for his felicitous use of the German language in poetry and plays.
With a circulation of some thirty thousand, his newspaper - Auf Gut Deutsch ("In Good German") - ranked with the 'Volkischer Beobachter' and 'Ostara' as an influential anti-Semetic publication. |
| 'Der Mythus des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts' |
His protege was none other than Alfred Rosenberg, the Baltic- born anti-Semite who is later to become one of the architects of the official pagan policies of the Third Reich.
He was the author of the seminal work 'Der Mythus des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts' - (The Myth of the Twentieth Century) - which provided a possible philosophical basis for National Socialism.
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| Alfred Rosenberg |
Eckart, Rosenberg, and, later, Rudolf Hess become Hitler's closest companions and co-conspirators in the first years of the 1920s in Munich.
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| Dietrich Eckart |
It was Eckart who, on his deathbed after the failed Beer Hall Putsch of November 8-9, 1923, was widely quoted as saying:
"Hitler will dance, but it is I who plays the tune.... Do not mourn for me, for I will have influenced history more than any other German."
Eckart - it will be no shock to learn - was an occultist.
An intimate of the Thule Society, he was as well versed in its beliefs (and, hence, of those of the Germanenorden) as any other member.
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| Hanns Horbiger |
Hanns Hörbiger (29 November 1860, in Atzgersdorf – 11 October 1931, in Mauer) was an Austrian engineer from Vienna with roots in Tyrol. He took part in the construction of the Budapest subway and in 1894 invented a new type of valve essential for compressors still in widespread use today.
He is also remembered today for his Welteislehre ("World Ice Theory") - which he first put forward in the 1913 book, 'Glazial Kosmologie', written in collaboration with astronomer Philipp Fauth. Hörbiger's theories were later popularized by H.S. Bellamy, and influenced Hans Robert Scultetus, head of the Pflegestätte für Wetterkunde (Meteorology Section) of the SS-Ahnene
Eckart's close relationship with both Rosenberg and Hess would have provided fertile ground for any number of wide-reaching discussions on mystical subjects.
It has even been claimed that Eckart and Hitler attended seances in which ghostly ectoplasmic forms were seen.
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| Rudolf Steiner |
There is also evidence that Eckart was approached by the occultist Rudolf Steiner.
Steiner was interested in forming an alliance with Eckart as the latter was known to be a mystic and Steiner had his own politico-mystical agenda.
During the "troubles" of the spring of 1919, Steiner sought out Eckart in an attempt to get coverage for his "Threefold Commonwealth" idea in the pages of Eckart's 'Auf gut Deutsch' (see above), an attempt that was doomed to failure.
During the "troubles" of the spring of 1919, Steiner sought out Eckart in an attempt to get coverage for his "Threefold Commonwealth" idea in the pages of Eckart's 'Auf gut Deutsch' (see above), an attempt that was doomed to failure.
According to Eckart, Steiner was a crazed sex magician and a member of the Jewish-Masonic conspiracy.
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| Arthur Schopenhauer |
This is extremely relevant, for it shows that Eckart believed in the idea of Cosmic Consciousness (Atman) and in the concept that the visible, tangible world is illusion (Maya).
The term "atman" has also been used, and abused, by a variety of occultists to mean a higher Self and to refer to the next stage in human evolution, which was, of course, virtually a strategic goal of the Occult Reich, and a tenet of their basic beliefs.
As for Eckart himself, most histories give him very little print space (click here for the full story).
His influence over Hitler is downplayed.
His influence over Hitler is downplayed.
Yet, for the last three years of his life, Eckart was Hitler's constant companion, and the man who helped propel him into the public spotlight.
It was Eckart who first introduced Hitler to all the right people, to the wealthy and powerful movers and shakers of Bavaria.
Eckart clearly groomed Hitler for the role he was later to play and spent those three years orchestrating his rise to power.
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| Hitler (with dog) at Coburg |
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| Henry Ford |
And it was Eckart who, along with Rosenberg, accompanied Hitler to Upper Bavaria with fifteen hundred Storm Troopers to "liberate" the town of Coburg from the Reds, in what was arguably Hitler's first real military victory.
Hitler's popularity and influence in Germany was growing at a speed that must have amazed Hitler himself, considering that only a few years earlier he had been practically unknown.
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| Hofbrauhaus |
The old guard - those members of Germany's defeated army that came home to find their nation unrecognisable, in shreds from the hundreds of wars taking place between dozens of private armies and political parties, and in absolute economic chaos - drank in Hitler's speeches like cool steins of draft in the very beer cellars where the NSDAP met.
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Post Great War Germany
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| Hofbrauhaus - Festsaal |
That the Germans were enslaved by punitive interest payments.
That swift and violent action was needed if Germany was to be snatched from the jaws of a satanic conspiracy.
The speech was welcomed by thunderous applause from the approximately two thousand listeners, and the die of the Occult Reich was cast.
At this time the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion' (see left) was being widely disseminated, and raising alarms about a grand conspiracy of Jews and Freemasons bent on destroying Germany as they were at that moment destroying Russia.
If Hitler were in power, his listeners believed, he would throw out all these undesirable elements - by force of arms, if necessary - and the country would be right again.
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EINE ARTE MENSCHENOPFER - (A Kind of Human Sacrifice)
As Hitler was travelling around Germany, raising consciousness and gathering recruits, a secret organization within the Ehrhardt Freikorps Brigade was itching for revolution.
They eventually carried out (on June 24, 1922) the most famous assassination of the era, one that is still remembered today by those who lived through it, as Americans remember where they were when Kennedy was killed.
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| Ernst von Salomon |
Organization Konsul was a terrorist cell within the Brigade Ehrhardt, dedicated to carrying out bombings and assassinations against leftist targets and "Versailles" politicians, i.e., the "November criminals" who were believed to have sold Germany down the river at the Armistice and later at the Versailles Peace Conference.
While the Freikorps marched openly and provocatively through the streets, their brothers in Organization Consul stuck to the alleys.
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| Walther Rathenau |
Rathenau's father had founded what later became AEG, Germany's version of General Electric, by purchasing Edison's patents on the electric light bulb. Rathenau himself, a sensitive, artistic soul who became enmeshed in high finance, industry, and politics almost against his will (he was a lover of poetry and music who had written volumes of aphorisms under a pseudonym) was Jewish.
But that was not his only crime.
He was also wealthy, admired, powerful, and a man with far-ranging vision.
He had virtually single-handedly ensured that Germany would be able to wage a continuous war under the Kaiser by arranging to bring all of Germany's raw materials under centralized control in 1914.
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| Treaty of Rapallo |
He had written books describing the political and cultural situation in Germany with insight and wit.
In short, he was a man of many accomplishments and, what is more, a sympathetic and elegant figure whom even the conspirators admitted "unites in himself everything in this age that is of value in thought, in honour, and in spirituality."
We might not be discussing Rathenau at this point were it not for a peculiar phenomenon surrounding his death that is referred to by historian Norman Cohn.
Of course, the Freikorps (and particularly the Ehrhardt Brigade (see left), as we have seen) was heavily influenced by völkisch and other Pan-German occultism.
And it was the Ehrhardt Brigade, that marched into Munich that May Day in 1919 wearing the swastika as their symbol and singing the hakenkreuz hymn.
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| Ehrhardt Brigade |
But Rathenau was identified with the most legendary conspiracy of all time, and was numbered among its members in the crazed imaginations of desperate men.
Walther Rathenau, they believed, was one of the actual Elders of Zion.
His assassination would be a blow against the international Jewish/Masonic/Communist/Capitalist cabal to dominate the world.
He did unite in himself all those qualities and values recognized by the Organization Consul itself, and thereby symbolized the success of the Zionist conspiracy.
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| Ernst Röhm |
The murder was timed to coincide with the summer solstice; and when the news was published, young Germans gathered on hilltops to celebrate simultaneously the turning of the year and the destruction of one who symbolized the powers of darkness.
In later years, Ernst Röhm would deliver a eulogy at the graves of two of the assassins, saying that their spirit "is the spirit of the SS, Himmler's black soldiers."
The human sacrifice of Walther Rathenau - timed to occur on a pagan holiday or "sabbath" that was observed by Nazi cultists throughout Germany - was the signal that the new Aryan faith was increasing in strength.
It certainly must have seemed that way to Hitler.
THE LIBERATION OF COBURG
With Eckart and now Rosenberg at his side, Hitler strode all over Germany like an avenging angel on a budget, seeking out targets of opportunity.
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| NSDAP Swastika |
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| Sturmabteilung Badge © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
The unifying symbol of the SA, of course, was the swastika, which they wore as armbands, and which they flew as black-red-white flags after a design approved by Hitler.
They were also accompanied by a brass band that played rousing marches at every public meeting of the Nazi Party.
The Sturmabteilung (SA) ( Storm Detachment or Assault Division, or Brownshirts) functioned as the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. It played a key role in Adolf Hitler's rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s. Their main assignments were providing protection for Nazi rallies and assemblies, disrupting the meetings of the opposing parties, and fighting against the paramilitary units of the opposing parties (esp. the Rotfrontkämpferbund).
The Sturmabteilung (SA) ( Storm Detachment or Assault Division, or Brownshirts) functioned as the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. It played a key role in Adolf Hitler's rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s. Their main assignments were providing protection for Nazi rallies and assemblies, disrupting the meetings of the opposing parties, and fighting against the paramilitary units of the opposing parties (esp. the Rotfrontkämpferbund).
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| 'Mit Hitler in Coburg' |
This time, they were met with opposition in the form of a crowd of opponents of various persuasions who began by jeering and shouting epithets, calling Hitler's followers murderers and criminals, and who proceeded very shortly to throw rocks at the marching Storm Troopers.
Hitler gave a signal with his whip, and the Troopers fell upon the crowd with reckless abandon.
The hostile crowd was forced back, and the march continued, but the talk on the street was that the Communists had only fallen back to regroup and that a major confrontation would take place in twenty-four hours.
The following day, in spite of a call to all leftists to throw out the SA, Hitler - who anticipated a full-scale battle with an opposition numbering close to ten thousand, and whose own SA contingent (swollen with newly arriving members and converts) now numbered only fifteen hundred - found himself greeted instead with wild approval by the people of Coburg, and surprisingly the rest of the day passed without conflict.
Hitler - his friends, the poet-mystic Eckart, and the architect-mystic Rosenberg in tow - had actually liberated the town of Coburg.
And now they were ready for the rest of Germany.
THE COMBINATION OF STELLAR INFLUENCES
In a letter written to Hitler by a female admirer in Munich a little over a month before the famous Beer Hall Putsch of November 1923, the future leader of Germany was advised of certain astrological predictions made by Frau Elsbeth Ebertin, the 'dowager empress' of an impressive line of German astrologers whose innovative techniques are still employed today in Europe and America.
Elsbeth Ebertin (* May 14 1880 in Görlitz , † November 28th 1944 in Freiburg im Breisgau ) was a Germanastrologer , graphologist and writer. She also wrote under the pseudonym Elsa Gorlizia .
Elsbeth Ebertin (* May 14 1880 in Görlitz , † November 28th 1944 in Freiburg im Breisgau ) was a Germanastrologer , graphologist and writer. She also wrote under the pseudonym Elsa Gorlizia .
MUNICH, 30 SEPTEMBER 1923
Highly honored Mr. Hitler,
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| Frau Elsbeth Ebertin |
The following is an excerpt of the article in question.
No name is given in the article, but it can only be your esteemed person who is referred to therein (Ebertin, p. 54).
No name is given in the article, but it can only be your esteemed person who is referred to therein (Ebertin, p. 54).
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| Adolf Hitler - Horoscope |
"A fighter born on April 20, 1889, at whose birth the sun stood at 29°of Aries, might, by his all too daring actions, place himself in danger and possibly soon contribute to the impetus which will start the stone rolling.
"According to the stellar constellations the man must definitely be taken seriously and is destined for the role of a leader in future struggles.
"It almost seems as if he whom I have in mind has been chosen by fate, under this strong influence of Aries, to sacrifice himself for the German people and to bear everything courageously and bravely; even if it should be a matter of life and death; but at the least to give the impetus to a German liberation movement, which then will erupt quite suddenly in an elementary way.
"However, I don't want to preempt fate. Time will tell, but as things are going at the time of my writing they cannot continue!
"The German people can only come to itself again in the political and religious field through some spiritual leaders sent by God, namely by the agency of individuals who believe in God and have a cosmological sensitivity, and who are above party politics, several of whom I have discovered among April natives (that is to say only if the star constellations are favorable).
"Once the right point in time will have come, i.e., once the Versailles peace treaty will have proved to be impossible to fulfill and will have been overturned, then the stars -- which are now still shining in hidden places -- will beautifully appear as shining meteors, similar to the heavenly bodies which are now newly discovered or become visible ..." etc. etc.
You must forgive me if I could not help but inform you of the foregoing.
Most respectfully,
Heil und Sig!
Most devotedly,
Maria Heiden, Munich
It is felt it worthwhile to quote the entire text as it illustrates both the self-professed "fanatical" devotion of the letter writer as well as the political sentiments of Frau Ebertin at this time.
Frau Heiden quoted the comments from Ebertin's own book of predictions, 'Ein Blick in die Zukunft' (A Glimpse into the Future) for the year 1924, which was published in July of 1923.
It was brought to Hitler's attention by a number of other admirers as well, and Frau Ebertin herself sent a copy of her book to the Volkischer Beobachter ... but according to Ebertin her predictions only served to irritate Hitler.
Hilter was not one who was willing to believe that his fate was out of his hands and written in the stars, at least not when he felt he had the future - and Germany's - in his grasp, as he did that September of 1923.
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| Munich Putsch of November 1923 |
An ill-planned and poorly executed attempt to take over the Bavarian government by force resulted in a major setback for the Party.
Hitler was arrested; Hess - who had escaped to Austria - was being sought by the authorities and would eventually surrender himself; and Dietrich Eckart - Hitler's mentor and protector - died in Berchtesgaden, on December 26 of that year, his protege in prison but his optimism unbounded.
Eckart knew where Hitler was headed, because it was he who had pushed him in the right direction.
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| Eckart's Death Mask Berghof |
Hitler owed a great deal to Eckart, and the evidence left behind shows that he knew and understood that; after all, the final words of 'Mein Kampf' show that
Hitler's famous memoir was dedicated to him.
Hitler's famous memoir was dedicated to him.
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| 'The International Jew' |
Another contribution of Eckart, and one that is frequently missed even by occult historians, is his connection with Henry Ford.
Eckart was approached by agents of the American automobile manufacturer as early as 1920-1921.
Ford was a notorious anti-Semite, and had actually written a book - 'The International Jew' - which was enormously popular in Germany where a German-language version was a best-seller.
Hitler had read it before writing 'Mein Kampf'.
Hitler even had a picture of Ford hanging in his office at Party headquarters (the Brown House).
It is worthwhile to note that the German publisher of 'The International Jew' (as well as of an early German edition of the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion') was none other than Theodor Fritsch, the man who founded the Germanenorden in 1912 for which the Thule Society served as a front.
The support of Henry Ford was vital to the survival of the Nazi Party in the early days, and one of Hitler's proudest achievements.
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| Großkreuz des Supreme Auftrag der deutschen Adler |
He was the first American and only the fourth person to be given the award.
Even Baldur von Schirach would credit Henry Ford's writings for having converted him to anti-Semitism.
An earlier recipient of the award was Benito Mussolini that same year.
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| Erik Jan Hanussen |
Thus it was Eckart who handled some of these early financial contributions from Henry Ford, and Eckart who, among others, dealt directly with the Ford representatives in Germany.
After Eckart, perhaps no single other human would come to exert that type of influence over Hitler until Erik Jan Hanussen, the psychic and astrologer who honed Hitler's public-speaking skills ... and who performed occult rituals on Hitler's behalf.
As Eckart's ghost continued to inspire Hitler from beyond the grave, Hitler would indeed dance; and in that 'danse macabre' Hanussen would lead.
HANUSSEN
In the last days of 1932, Hitler was contemplating suicide.
Released from prison in 1924 after the Beer Hall Putsch got him a light sentence for what was, after all, high treason, his 'Mein Kampf 'a best-seller, and his Party back and stronger than ever, he nonetheless was losing ground in the Reichstag.
Hindenberg - the much-respected and very popular president of the Republic - was not pleased with the rough-and-tumble crowd that seemed to compose Hitler's voting bloc, and various ministers were conspiring against Hitler to keep him out of government altogether.
Hindenberg - the much-respected and very popular president of the Republic - was not pleased with the rough-and-tumble crowd that seemed to compose Hitler's voting bloc, and various ministers were conspiring against Hitler to keep him out of government altogether.
In 1932, they were succeeding. Hitler was facing a crucial election.
Members of the NSDAP were in danger of defecting to other political organizations.
His own trusted disciples were dividing the Party into warring factions that could not be controlled.
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| Eva Braun |
Although Eva survived what the doctors would later characterize as a serious suicide attempt, Hitler himself knew he was politically dead.
It appeared as if he had lost the will to fight, and he began to speak more and more of his own death.
He entered the political campaign a distracted, depressed leader who seemed unable to hold his fractious Party together.
They lost heavily in the Reichstag five days later - losing seats to the hated Communists - and the press began publishing the Party's obituary.
At this nadir of his career, he turned to an old friend whom he had met years earlier, in 1926, in Berlin.
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| Erik Jan Hanussen |
The Viennese Hanussen - whose real name was Herschel Steinschneider, the son of an Austrian vaudeville performer - began his career doing odd jobs in a travelling circus, until he began his own newspaper.
He soon became interested in hypnosis and medium-ship, and published several books on the subject, eventually becoming the darling of the international socialite set, a man who never failed to entertain at parties but who also provided more serious assistance to those of his hosts who needed a horoscope drawn up or a spell cast.
He dyed his hair blond to fit his new persona as a Danish aristocrat, and dived into the frantic, heady atmosphere of early 1930s Berlin competing with astrologers, clairvoyants, and mediums of every description.
Although he had never cast Hitler's astrological chart before, now in the late days of 1932 with Hitler morose and on the verge of doing himself damage, Hanussen erected his natal and probably a transit or progressed chart and appeared before Hitler with an eerie prognosis.
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| Erik Jan Hanussen |
The implication was oddly surreal.
The "obstacles" were not actual people or circumstances.
Instead, Hanussen claimed, Hitler was the victim of some sort of occult plot.
History has not recorded who might have been responsible for this, and it is possible that all Hanussen knew - or claimed - was that "evil occult influences" were around Hitler, causing him to lose his edge.
We may fantasize about a lodge of German magicians, summoning forces to thwart the attempts of Hitler to gain power in Germany.
We may wonder if a witch or sorcerer - operating alone in some mountain fastness in the Obersalzberg, perhaps - was casting a spell against Hitler for something as relatively trivial as a broken promise or unrequited love, and thereby altering the course of European history forever.
We will certainly never know the actual dimensions of this baneful influence around the Fuhrer, but the outcome of Hanussen's meditations was nothing short of spectacular.
In order to rid himself of this evil spell, he said, one would have to go to Hitler's home-town - at the time of the full moon - at midnight - in a butcher's backyard - and remove a mandrake from the ground.
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| Mandrake |
According to some traditions, one had to stop one's ears with cloth or cotton before pulling the root from the earth, as it would emit a piercing scream that would shatter the eardrums.
A dog was sometimes used to pull the root from the earth as the magician kept his hands clasped around his own ears.
The resulting shriek - it is said - normally killed the dog.
The mandrake is also known for its powers as an aphrodisiac, and as an amulet of protection.
We must assume that Hanussen was thinking of this last property in connection with Hitler.
Also, the significance of the butcher's yard should not be ignored: such a place would have given the surrounding earth the peculiar quality of a veritable Teutonic orgy of blood, dismemberment, death, and pain, which would have been mystically absorbed by the root itself.
Hanussen decided to perform the necessary rituals himself, and set off for Hitler's birthplace in Austria, returning on New Year's Day 1933 with the amuletic root, and with a prediction: that Hitler's return to power would begin on January 30, a date roughly equivalent to the pagan Sabbath of Oimelc: one of the four "cross-quarter" days of the witches' calendar.
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| Hanussen's Palace of Occultism |
Hanussen's impossibly optimistic prediction came true to the day.
That was not the end of Hanussen's ability to predict the future, however, for on February 26 of that same year - during a seance held that evening at his own lavishly furnished "Palace of Occultism" on Lietzenburger Strasse, and attended by Berlin's movers and shakers - he predicted that the Communists in Germany would attempt a revolution, signalled by the destruction by fire of an important government building.
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| Reichstag Fire - 1933 |
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| Reichstag Fire - 1933 'Völkischer Beobachter' |
European history had been changed forever, and once more the society seer was right on target.
But, six weeks later in April of 1933, Hanussen would be dead; murdered in a forest outside Berlin by agent or agents unknown.
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| Karl Ernst |
In fairness, however, no amount of dirty tricks could have explained Hanussen's accurate prediction of Hitler's enormous success in January.
Another version had it that Hanussen's murder enraged the Fuhrer, and that he ordered the death sentence for its perpetrator, Karl Ernst, who was executed during the Röhm purge with a bewildered 'Heil Hitler' on his lips.
Another version had it that Hanussen's murder enraged the Fuhrer, and that he ordered the death sentence for its perpetrator, Karl Ernst, who was executed during the Röhm purge with a bewildered 'Heil Hitler' on his lips.
Unfortunately, we will never know what happened, for Hanussen died as he had lived: the Count St. Germain of Weimar Germany, a complete and compelling mystery.
THE MASTER OF THE PENDULUM
Another occultist in Hitler's inner circle was the Thulist, astrologer, and pendulum expert Wilhelm Gutberlet (born 1870).
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| 'Völkischer Beobachter' |
Franz Eher Verlag was a publishing company that Sebottendorff purchased in 1918 for about five thousand Reichsmarks (RM).
It consisted of a newspaper, the 'Munchener Beobachter', that had ceased publication with the death of its founder in June.
Sebottendorff picked it up and moved its offices to the Thule meeting rooms at the 'Four Seasons Hotel' (see above), turning it into an anti-Semitic organ that was eventually taken over - after a series of intervening ownerships by other parties - by the German Workers' Party after Sebottendorff left Munich.
In 1920, Wilhelm Gutberlet owned shares worth 10,000 RM, or about 8.5 percent of the total value of the paper.
It was renamed the 'Völkischer Beobachter', and as such became the propaganda machine of the NSDAP.
Gutberlet was a Thulist. He was also one of Hitler's earliest followers.
A medical doctor, he was present at the first meeting of the German Workers' Party that Hitler attended and had remained a close friend and confidant since then. In other words, since 1919.
Gutberlet virtually disappears from most official accounts of the NSAP until he reappears in Schellenberg's memoirs.
Walter Schellenberg was chief of the Foreign Intelligence section of the SD (Sicherheitsdienst or Security Service), and survived the war to write about his experiences as spymaster in Europe.
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| Walter Schellenberg |
'Hitler's racial concern was one of his characteristic features. I discussed this several times with Dr. Gutberlet, a Munich physician who belonged to the intimate circle around Hitler.
Gutberlet believed in the "sidereal pendulum," an astrological contraption, and claimed that this had given him the power to sense at once the presence of any Jews or persons of partial Jewish ancestry, and to pick them out in any group of people.
Hitler availed himself of Gutbarlett's mystic power, and had many discussions with him on racial questions.'
Thus, in Gutberlet, we have an occultist, a Thulist, an astrologer, a racist, a pendulum expert, and a confidant of Hitler, all wrapped into one.
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| Sidereal Pendulum |
And it is revealing to know that Gutberlet, the astrologer and mystic, was consulted by Hitler on racial matters as well as on mystical subjects, thus providing additional evidence that Hitler's racism was motivated by his occultism.
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| Karl Haushofer |
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| Heinrich Himmler |
To complete the story, we have to investigate Haushofer, Hess, Himmler and many others for - as the Reich consolidated and became more powerful - other occult lodges in Germany were active and were seen to pose a threat to the new regime.
While drawing upon some of the same traditions as the Order of New Templars, the Germanenorden, and the Thule Society - Eastern religions, rituals associated with astrology and mythology, sexual formulas for becoming powerful and casting spells - they had other associations which made them suspect.
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| © Copyright Peter Crawford 2013 |
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