Our Gods Wear Spandex (6 page)

Horrified by widespread poverty and economic inequality in Europe, socialists called for the redistribution of wealth and the abolition of private property. From this movement came “Scientific Socialism,” better known as communism, which regarded socialism as a transitional phase—a mere prelude to communism, which would scientifically reorder society and abolish poverty, oligarchy, and wealth. This new order, established by a revolutionary vanguard, would eventually give way to a dictatorship of the proletariat (the working classes). Needless to say, it never worked quite that way in practice.

Anarchism, a system calling for the abolition of all central government, is not taken seriously today. In its time, however, it posed a threat to the established order, particularly in Europe. One of the earliest anarchist thinkers was English philosopher William Godwin (1756–1836), father of Mary Shelley (
Frankenstein
), who preached a brand of anarchism he called utilitarianism. Other important 19th-century anarchist thinkers include the Frenchman Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, and the Russians Mikhail Bakunin and Prince Peter Kropotkin, who advocated a strange admixture of communism and anarchism.

In the early 20th century, a group of Italian immigrants called the Galleanists (named after anarchist leader Luigi Galleani) spearheaded a bombing campaign
in cities across America. One Galleanist, Mario Buda, bombed Wall Street on September 16, 1920 to protest the indictment of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, two anarchists blamed for a deadly robbery in Braintree, Massachusetts. The Galleanists provoked a massive crackdown against a host of radical groups in the early 1920s that came to be known as the Palmer Raids.

Along with this political activism, came movements promoting sexual freedom. The Oneida Community, founded in 1848 by John Humphrey Noyes, practiced an early form of communism called Communalism. The Oneidans included among their teachings the doctrine of “Complex Marriage,” under which every man was essentially married to every woman and monogamy actually forbidden. A less religiously based notion of sexual freedom was advocated by Victoria Woodhull (1838–1927), who also fought for women's suffrage and became the first woman to run for president in 1872. Woodhull also worked as a traveling faith-healer and later allied herself with the Spiritualist movement.

Another pioneer in spirtuality and personal freedoms was Pascal Beverly Randolph (1825–1875), who founded the first established Rosicrucian Temple in Boston in 1858, and another in San Francisco in 1861. Randolph advocated the practice of sex magic and may have had an influence on Theodor Reuss, who founded the Ordo Templi Orientalis, and Aleister Crowley, who succeeded Reuss as the OTO's leader.
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Clearly, by the middle of the 19th century, America was ready for a new revolution, though not necessarily one of a political nature.

When Spiritualism burst on the Western world, it shook the Christian world-view to its core. The movement had an inauspicious start, however. In 1848, a trio of sisters—Kate, Leah, and Margaret Fox—reported a series of “spirit rappings” in their home in New York. The sounds seemed to have no earthly cause, and soon they were said to respond to questions posed to these “spirits.” Later, two of the sisters admitted they faked the rappings by cracking their knee
joints. Still later, at least one of the sisters recanted this confession.
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Whatever the case, the Fox sisters sparked a wildfire that burned across the dry spiritual kindling of America. Already prone to cyclical religious revivals known as “Great Awakenings,” the country responded enthusiastically to the sisters' claims, with seemingly little concern for their authenticity.

As soon as the story of the Fox sisters hit the press, both sides of the Atlantic were flooded with mediums, clairvoyants, and other assorted spiritualists. If you wanted to speak to your dear, departed Aunt Matilda, you had only to make a small “donation” to a medium, who would be more than willing to put you two in touch. The Spiritualist movement became even more widespread after the grief and carnage of the Civil War made widows and orphans desperate to contact their lost husbands and fathers.

The success of Spiritualism depended on more than the credulity of a grieving public, however. It tapped into the greater discontent aroused by industrialization and its attendant social woes. If spirits could now speak to us without the aid of priestcraft, a whole host of cultural, political, and religious assumptions could also be brought into question. By piercing the eternal veil, Spiritualism opened minds to a whole host of Bohemian, radical, and freethinking movements that changed traditional society forever. At the same time Charles Darwin had kicked lose assumptions that dated to the Book of Genesis with his treatise on evolution
The Origin of Species
. Darwin's theories had unwittingly planted the question in inquiring minds: After humanity, what next?

Spiritualism also sparked a renewed interest in stage magic. Using the latest in technology, magicians wowed audiences with their illusions, convincing many that their elaborate tricks were evidence of true supernatural powers. And stage magic, in turn, provided Spiritualist mediums with a whole new bag of tricks and gimmicks with which to convince their clients that they really could contact the etheric realms. As if all that were not enough, colonial expansion brought with it Eastern occultism and mysticism, particularly the varieties developed in India and China. All of these factors worked together to prepare the public for the explosion of occultism and alternative spirituality in the Victorian Era.

Victorian occultism synthesized Spiritualism, stage magic, Eastern mysticism, and Freemasonry. In the ferment of the moment, when science and technology were blossoming at unparalleled rates, London became the nexus of a host of secret societies and cults. The goal of these new occultists was to transform the human mind, body, and soul, just as steam engines and mechanical inventions were transforming industry and agriculture. Surrounded by super-powerful machines that threatened to overwhelm Humanity, these occultists conjured up a race of super-powerful humans to meet the challenge. They found ample precedent in ancient mythology and religion to justify and inspire their yearnings for a “New Man.” The occultists turned to Renaissance individualism, alchemy, and the Hermetics to imagine a new race of god-men that could transcend the weaknesses, sins, and corruption of the society they saw around them.

This intellectual and spiritual ferment provided fertile ground for the growth of new religious and philosophical movements. These newborn occult and secret societies all found their ritual roots in the ancient mysteries and hermetic traditions of the past.

One of the most obscure and least understood of these occult movements is Rosicrucianism. No one is exactly sure how the Rosicrucian Order started, who belonged to it, or exactly what they believed. For a group so shrouded in mystery, however, the Rosicrucians have had an incalculable influence. The professed aim of this enlightened mystical brotherhood was, as Michael Howard writes in his landmark work,
The Occult Conspiracy
, “the evolution of humanity from materialism to spiritual perfection.”
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The earliest mention of a Brotherhood of the Rosy Cross occurs in 1604 in a manuscript called
The Restoration of the Decayed Temple of Pallas
. In 1614, the
Fama Fraternitatis
appeared, which purported to be a history of the order. This was followed by the
Confessio Fraternitatis
in 1615 and
The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz
in 1616. The
Chymical Wedding
referred to the work of the alchemists, who sought to marry the masculine and feminine properties of creation and produce the Royal Hermaphrodite, which some historians have linked to Harpocrates, or “Horus the Child,” in the ancient mysteries. In fact, one of the first texts that can be called a comic book was the
Mutus Liber
, a 17th-century wordless alchemical text that told the story of the
Chemical Wedding of Sun and Moon
in sequential picture form.

The Rosicrucian order allegedly traced its origins to a German pilgrim named Christian Rosenkreuz who traveled to the Middle East to study the occult arts. He returned to Germany and founded the Order, whose goal was to bring about a “universal reformation of mankind.” Shortly after the publication of the texts mentioned above, several Rosicrucian Orders arose, all claiming to be the true inheritors of Rosenkreuz's mantle.

It is significant that, at the time of Rosenkreuz's reported founding of the Order, Germany was in the midst of a religious war between the Established Church and the Protestant Princes of the Empire, whom the Rosicrucians were said to favor. Martin Luther's personal seal was, in fact, a cross placed in a rose, leading some to speculate that the Reformation itself grew out of Rosicrucianism. Whatever the case, the combination of ancient occultism and alchemy that found its expression in Rosicrucianism had a powerful influence on the development of Freemasonry, a largely Protestant movement coming to prominence at the time in Great Britain.

Some historians who believe that Rosicrucianism predates 1604 claim that the Order was active in the court of Queen Elizabeth I, and that occultists like John Dee, Francis Bacon, and Edward Kelley had extensive contact with them. Many speculate that the Rosicrucians were, in fact, an outgrowth of the Knights Templar.
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It is true, nonetheless, that, as the Masons became more powerful and militant, the Rosicrucians diminished in prominence, and may even have been absorbed by Freemasonry.

The advent of Theosophy in the 19th century brought on attempts to resurrect Rosicrucianism. Theosophists Annie Besant, Marie Russak, and James Wedgwood established an Order of the Temple of the Rosy Cross in 1912 that, predictably, fell into disarray. Russak then joined forces with H. Spencer Lewis, who had established the Ancient and Mystical Order Rosae Crucis (AMORC) in New York in 1915, but then moved the Order to San Francisco. AMORC enjoyed some prominence in the early 20th century, and Lewis eventually built a Rosicrucian temple in San Jose, California. The Order advertised extensively in newspapers and magazines, especially the pulp magazines. They offered correspondence courses in the mystical arts to readers with come-ons like: “Have You Lived Before This Life?”

Shortly after the emergence of Rosicrucianism, another secret society arose that exerted a monumental impact on Europe's social and political landscape. Many people now believe that this group, the Order of Free and Accepted Masons, is the direct descendant of the medieval Knights Templar, a monastic order ostensibly
founded to ensure safe passage to Christians traveling to Jerusalem during the Crusades. The Templars instituted a complex banking system while safeguarding the treasure of European pilgrims, and are responsible for the invention of the credit system and branch banking. King Philip IV of France coveted the Templars' vast wealth to finance his dreams of conquest and used his puppet, Pope Clement V, to declare them heretics. Clement ordered their arrest and the confiscation of their vast holdings throughout Christendom. Legend has it that, although Templar Grand Master Jacques De Molay died at the stake, several knights escaped with the bulk of the Order's treasure. It is commonly believed that Scottish King Robert the Bruce offered them safe haven.
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