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Period: 2500 BCE to
Primitive Adonism
Adonism is an ancient esoteric doctrine that was transmitted through the Chaldeans, Phoenicians, Persians, Egyptians and Greeks, today it still receives an echo in the East among the Kurdish Yézidis. -
Period: 2500 BCE to
About Adonism
Adonism is a polytheistic religion that revolves around the belief that there are five main gods: Belus, Biltis, Adonis, Dido and Molchos. Adonis is the most prominent in the group's theology, being a benevolent figure that Sättler equates with the Christian figure of Satan. In contrast to Adonis, Adonists believe that Molchos is malevolent and responsible for the enslavement of humanity through monotheistic religions such as Judaism, Christianity and Islam. -
Paganism
Paganism is a generic religious concept used by Christians since the 6th century, in the Roman Empire, to designate the set of beliefs that belonged neither to Christianity nor to Judaism. -
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About Paganism
Early Christians used the term to refer to the diversity of cults that surrounded them as a single group, either for reasons of convenience or rhetoric.While paganism generally implies polytheism, the main distinction between classical pagans and Christians was not the number of deities, since not all pagans were "strictly" polytheistic. -
Birth of Franz Sättler
Franz Sättler was born in Most, a town in northern Bohemia, a Czech region that was then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. -
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About Franz Sättler
Franz was a linguist, traveled much of Europe and was imprisoned by the French during World War I, where he became acquainted with theosophy and the occult, subjects that interested him greatly. After briefly serving as an intelligence agent for the Czechoslovakian government, he was again arrested and imprisoned, this time in Germany, where he began to formulate some of his esoteric ideas and write books on the subject. -
Neopaganism
In 1919 a new concept was created: neo-paganism, but we will not recognize it under this name until the 1990s. This is due to the fact that members of the Thule Society, a völkisch occultist group, founded the German Workers' Party. Their ideology, known as Blut und Boden - 'Blood and Soil' - was rooted in Germanic paganism and exalted the relationship between the earth and the biological purity of the German people. -
Creation of the adonist society - Adonism.
Founded in Vienna, Austria. Adonists believe that Adonis, the creator and benefactor of mankind, was demonized as figures such as Satan, Ahriman and Iblis. Through the dominance of these monotheistic religions, Adonists believe that Molchos maintained control of the world, but that in 2000 CE, Adonis will face Molchos in a final battle, defeating him and ushering in a Golden Age, which will last until the universe is once again subsumed under Chaos. -
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(Plus)
Adonism also holds a strong belief in tolerance towards other human beings, with Sättler stating that "The Adonist's most important virtue is tolerance and the scope in which he can practice it is unlimited", and also upholding a personal maxim: "Understanding everything means forgiving everything." -
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Problems with the Law
The police came across a list of the eighty German members of the Adonist Society, which provoked a new scandal in the press, which found it shocking that so many members of "high society" were involved with such a secretive occult group accused of committing sexual orgies. Sättler continued with the Society, this time based in Greece. Finding it difficult to get new members (who would provide the dues and donations he needed to survive), Sättler dissolved the Hekate Lodge. -
The Orion Alliance
The group had major problems within Germany itself, as it faced opposition from the Nazi Party, which had recently taken control of the government, and some regime figures claimed that the group was part of a Judeo-Masonic conspiracy. With the dissolution of the Hekate Lodge, the Society was renamed the Orion Alliance (Orion Bund in German). -
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The end of the Adonism?
In the early 1940s, the Nazis ordered the invasion of much of the rest of Europe, leading to World War II, and it was during this period that all historical traces of Sättler disappeared. How he died is unknown, although it has been claimed that it was either in a prison in Vienna or in the Mauthausen concentration camp, although neither is proven. -
The Failed New Adonism
First attempt to recreate the Adonist Society by Walter Koblizek. He lived in Rosenheim near Munich in West Germany, and published a brochure announcing the re-creation of the group, but nothing more appeared of it, and Koblizek died in 1967. -
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Investigations and promises
Professor Adolf Hemberge, collected Sättler's rare works, making copies of them through mimeographing or photocopying them and distributing them among his friends and members of his magical study groups. In the 1970s, Hemberger had plans of reviving the Adonist Society, but these never came to fruition. -
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New Investigations
Professor Helmut Möller of the University of Göttingen, published a German-language essay on Sättler in a 1990 festschrift in honor of Ellic Howe, a scholar specializing in the study of ceremonial magical groups. His work was expanded by Hans Thomas Hakl, an Austrian scholar, who also conducted a German-language examination of Sättler, which was followed by the publication of an edited English-language version: The International Journal of Pagan Studies (2010).