Through casuistry, rational argument is used to reach conclusions that are dubious, illusive, or self-serving and are mostly related to moral issues. In other words, he learned the art of propaganda. One critical lesson that he learned was that reason does not tell someone to be merciful; instead, it tells them to leave no witnesses.
Watch it now, on Wondrium. Weishaupt was neither Jewish nor a Jesuit, nor was he involved in any kind of other religion, although he studied and worked in a Jesuit-run university. The Jesuits were a secret society within the Catholic Church. They did whatever it took to protect the church against its enemies, even if it required political conspiracy and assassination.
Like the Knights Templar, they got wealthy and powerful and were accused of blasphemy and heresy. In , they were disbanded by Pope Clement XIV, which presented Weishaupt with an opportunity to be promoted as a deacon of canon law.
This is why some people believe that he was a Jesuit at heart and secretly followed their instructions. He believed that the most effective means of leadership was through secrecy.
These secrets could be real or imaginary. It was the best way to manipulate people. He believed that his order had to be covered under other societies or occupations. So he looked for a secret society to conceal his order under it. The best choice was Freemasonry. It had many benefits: it was widely known to the public, it did not attract attention, and their lodges were the best means of recruiting. He also admired the secrecy that united the Masonic lodges. To this end, he was initiated into a Masonic lodge in and asked the members of Illuminati to do the same.
Jesuit College of Ingolstadt. Gotha-Parkallee CTH. Age of Enlightenment. Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie. Weishaupt, Adam. Obalky knih. Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary. Commons gallery. Commons category.
Category:Adam Weishaupt. International Standard Name Identifier. GND ID. Library of Congress authority ID. Virtual International Authority File. Nationale Thesaurus voor Auteurs ID.
IdRef ID. WorldCat Identities ID. Europeana entity. FactGrid item ID. Freebase ID. Weishaupt was not the only one who believed that the monarchy and the church were repressing freedom of thought. Freemasonry was steadily expanding throughout Europe in this period, offering attractive alternatives to freethinkers. Weishaupt initially thought of joining a lodge. Weishaupt was not, he said, against religion itself, but rather the way in which it was practiced and imposed.
On the night of May 1, , the first Illuminati met to found the order in a forest near Ingolstadt. Bathed in torchlight, there were five men. There they established the rules that were to govern the order. They included important people in Bavarian public life, such as Baron Adolph von Knigge. By the end of , the Illuminati had 2, to 3, members. As a former Freemason, he was in favor of adopting rites similar to theirs.
The membership levels also became a more complex hierarchy. There were a total of 13 degrees of initiation, divided into three classes.
The first culminated in the degree of illuminatus minor, the second illuminatus dirigens, and the third, that of king. After the French Revolution began in , the Illuminati were accused of desiring a similar revolt against the Bavarian regime. Some even claimed that Weishaupt had met the French revolutionary leader Robespierre.
In reality, Weishaupt was more of a reformer than a firebrand revolutionary. Weishaupt and Knigge increasingly fought over the aims and procedures of the order, a conflict that, in the end, forced Knigge to leave the society.
At the same time, another ex-member, Joseph Utzschneider, wrote a letter to the Grand Duchess of Bavaria, supposedly lifting the lid on this most secret of societies. The revelations were a mix of truth and lies.
According to Utzschneider, the Illuminati believed that suicide was legitimate, that its enemies should be poisoned, and that religion was an absurdity. He also suggested that the Illuminati were conspiring against Bavaria on behalf of Austria. Having been warned by his wife, the Duke-Elector of Bavaria issued an edict in June banning the creation of any kind of society not previously authorized by law. The Illuminati initially thought that this general prohibition would not directly affect them.
But just under a year later, in March , the Bavarian sovereign passed a second edict, which expressly banned the order. In the course of carrying out arrests of members, Bavarian police found highly compromising documents, including a defense of suicide and atheism, a plan to create a female branch of the order, invisible ink recipes, and medical instructions for carrying out abortions. The evidence was used as the basis for accusing the order of conspiring against religion and the state.
In August , the duke-elector issued a third edict in which he confirmed that the order was prohibited, and imposed the death penalty for membership. Weishaupt lost his post at the University of Ingolstadt and was banished. The Bavarian state considered the Illuminati dismantled. Their legacy, however, has endured and fuels many conspiracy theories. Weishaupt was accused—falsely—of helping to plot the French Revolution.
The Illuminati have been fingered in recent events, such as the assassination of John F. First Class Each novice was initiated in humanitarian philosophy until he became a minerval. Second Class The various degrees in this class were inspired by Freemasonry.
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