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  The most important event in modern Egyptology is the discovery of the tomb of the young King Tutankhamun (better known as “King Tut”) in the Valley of the Kings in November 1922. Led by British Egyptologist Howard Carter, the excavation of Tut's untouched burial chamber produced an amazing wealth of artifacts. The discovery of the tomb reignited the Egyptology craze, just in time for the rise of the pulp magazines. The early deaths of Carter's patron, Lord Carnarvon, and others involved in the Tut excavation had a powerful influence on pulp fiction, since it was widely believed to be the result of “the Curse of King Tut's Tomb.” Cursed tombs soon became a staple in pulp and comic-book stories, and figured in the origins of Golden Age superheroes like Hawkman and Doctor Fate.

  The Victorian Era also saw a craze for all things “Oriental.” At the forefront of this movement was Sir Richard Francis Burton (1821–1890), a soldier, mercenary, explorer, writer, translator (he reportedly spoke twenty-nine languages), and diplomat. Not surprisingly, he was also a Freemason. Burton was best known for extensive travels in Asia and Africa, traveling to Mecca in Arab dress and leading an expedition to find the source of the Nile in 1856. He also became famous for his translation of The Arabian Nights. Burton made the Orient seem alluring and intoxicating, and by doing so helped loosen the stranglehold that Puritanism still had on British society. Burton's promise (or implied promise) of high adventure in foreign lands became a major influence on the globe-trotting heroes of popular fiction.

  THE RADICALS

  Adding to the social ferment in late 19th-century America were a number of radical political movements. The Woman's Suffrage movement, led by activists like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and the Civil Rights movement, led by men like Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington, came to prominence at the same time that political movements like anarchism and socialism arrived on the East Coast with waves of immigrants from Europe.

  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.9 Clearly, by the middle of the 19th century, America was ready for a new revolution, though not necessarily one of a political nature.

  SPIRITUALISM

  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.10 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.

  8 Michael G. Hasel, “Israel in the Merneptah Stela,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 296, Nov., 1994, pp. 45–61.

  9 See Catherine Yronwode, “Paschal Beverly Randolph and the Anseiratic Mysteries,” Sacred Sex (luckymojo.com).

  10 See Ann Braude, Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women's Rights in Nineteenth-Century America (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001).

  CHAPTER 6

  SECRET SECTS

  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.

  THE ROSICRUCIANS

  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.”11

  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.12 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?”

  FREEMASONRY

  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.13

  The origins of Freemasonry are murky. Masons claim their order evolved from the stonemason guilds of the Middle Ages. These master craftsmen often traveled far from home to build cathedrals, taking the closely guarded secrets of their trade with them. These trade secrets developed into an elaborate system of rituals and secret codes protected by the Masons as they traveled a network of lodges frequented by other craftsmen. Eventually, the guild itself evolved into “Speculative Masonry,” which focused on the symbolic and spiritual aspects of the craft. This new brotherhood attracted aristocrats and intellectuals from across Europe and ultimately became a force to be reckoned with.

  Masonry was especially powerful in Britain and its colonies. The first established Masonic body was the Grand Lodge of England, which announced itself to the world in 1717. Masonic ritual traveled with colonists to the New World—several of America's Founding Fathers, including George Washington, were Masons. The famous Boston Tea Party was the work of a Masonic lodge, and the Great Seal of the United States is replete with Masonic imagery and numerology.14 Freemasonry helped break the power of the Vatican by supporting the political fervor that sparked both the French and American Revolutions. It became so powerful in America, in fact, that in the early 1800s, an Anti-Mason political party was formed.

  The backlash against Masonic power in the early 1800s sent the movement underground, only to emerge even more powerful in the late Victorian Age. In America, Masons became prominent in business, sports, and politics, and exerted a strong influence on popular culture. Media moguls like Louis B. Mayer (MGM), Darryl Zanuck (20th Century Fox), and Jack Warner (Warner Bros.) were all high-level Masons.15

  Many believe that Freemasonry is nothing but a modern incarnation of the old mystery religions, particularly the Mithraic and Osirian/Dionysian cults. Masonic symbols like the pyramid and the All-Seeing Eye, both of which are identified with Horus, come from ancient sources. Masons, in fact, refer to themselves as the “Widow's Sons,” a reference to Horus, son of the widow Isis.16 The iconic Masonic emblem of the square and compass represents the masculine and feminine aspects of creation. Although the Masonic community is generally thought to be in decline today, it's hard to overestimate its influence on American culture. Masonic ideals are part and parcel of our national creed, as well as our national mythology. When Superman stands for “truth, justice, and the American way,” he is also standing for the Masonic way. It's almost impossible to separate the two in a definitive way.

  OTHER CHRISTS

  The 19th century also saw the rise of major alternative religious movements, particularly in America, and more particularly in New England. Three of the most important of these movements—Christian Science, Transcendentalism, and Mormonism—had important links to Freemasonry.
r />   CHRISTIAN SCIENCE

  Christian Science is based on the doctrines presented by Mary Baker Eddy in 1875 in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. Eddy (1821–1919) taught the virtues of healing through faith, preaching that illness is an illusion. For many, this led to the disavowal of medical science—admittedly a science in name only at the time. Christian Science was essentially a mystical faith that resonated with the rituals of the Masons, who paid tribute to Eddy by erecting an 11-foot pyramid at her New Hampshire birthsite, which the Church's embarrassed directors had destroyed.17

  Christian Science attracted the literary and artistic elite, through whose support an enormous Mother Church was erected in Boston. The faithful also founded the influential newspaper The Christian Science Monitor, as well as several other long-running periodicals. Like Scientology in more recent times, Christian Science was popular in Hollywood, attracting a wide range of adherents active in the media.18