At the Lodge - 8th November 2004

Lodge Lecture | Class

Lodge Lecture

Tonight's lectures brought everyone out in full force. The main lecture entitled Stars and Swastikas was a resounding success. It was presented by Neil Spencer who took the title from a chapter in his book 'True as the Stars Above'. He was ably assisted by Santiago Mantas, who is very well known around the Lodge and has spoken many times.

The talk centred around the myth that Adolph Hitler was interested and guided by an Astrologer. It was in fact two of his top men Heinrich Himmler and Rudolph Hess both had their own astrologers. But in fact Hitler did not. Neil explained about the esoteric revival in southern Germany and how those people involved in this came to eventually form the Nazi party, using many esoteric symbols in their designs, hence the Hindu sign for luck, the swastika. He also went through the history of the rise of the popularity of Astrology in Germany between the wars until Hitler came to power and then promptly closed down all the astrological papers. He went through the chart of Adolph Hitler, which was profiled by Frau Elsbeth Ebertin in her 1923 yearbook. Though not naming him, she predicted 'a man of action' (believing his Sun to be in Aries) , who was 'destined to play a Fuehrer role' and 'to sacrifice himself for the German nation'. But Ebertin also warned of 'imminent personal danger' from 'incautious action' that could 'likely trigger off an uncontrollable crisis'. He also showed the chart for the for first meeting of the Third Reich and the chart of Hess's flight to Scotland, which was supposed to have been elected by an astrologer!

Santiago showed that all the people born in 1891 with the Neptune/Pluto conjunction which happens every 492 years, had an almost 'fatal' connection with each other and the organisation. Then he proceeded to show that all the members of the 'inner circle' were inextricably drawn together within the new order by their ascendants and midpoints.

A fascinating evening.

Class

How lucky we are to have persuaded Bernard Eccles to give a rare series of classes on the subject of Heaven and Earth: Rediscovering the Planets and the Seasons. This week he looked at stars and seasons: the stellar calendar. It was back to basics of an ancient kind. Bernard explained how primitive time keeping was kept by the relationship of the person and the sky, that works backwards. All based on seasonality. The observation point is sundown - 6 deg below the horizon, 6 - 12 deg below is known as the nautical twilight (when you can still see the horizon) and 18 deg below is the astronomical twilight (when everything is dark).

He then went on to explain how ancient man would have arrived at his seasons and weather prediction by checking a particular star as they saw it progress in the sky before the Sun set or after the Sun has risen. i.e. if the star set after the Sun it was Heliacal setting, if it rose before the Sun it was known as Heliacal rising. He also talked of the Accronical rising and the Cosmical setting (when the star rises as the Sun sets. )

More next week.

Lodge Lecture | Class