Adam Weishaupt

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Johann Adam Weishaupt

Adam Weishaupt

Born

6 February 1748 Ingolstadt, Bavaria

Died

18 November 1830 (aged 82) Gotha, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha

Era

18th-century philosophy

Region

Western Philosophy

School

Empiricism

Main interests

Epistemology, Metaphysics,Ethics

Influenced by[show]

Influenced[show]

Johann Adam Weishaupt (6 February 1748 18 November 1830[1][2][3][4]) was a German philosopher and founder of the Order of Illuminati, a secret society with origins in Bavaria.
Contents
[hide]

1 Early life 2 Founder of the Illuminati 3 Activities in exile 4 References in pop culture 5 Works

5.1 Philosophical works

6 Notes 7 External links

Early life[edit]
Adam Weishaupt was born on 6 February 1748 in Ingolstadt[1][5] in the Electorate of Bavaria. Weishaupt's father Johann Georg Weishaupt (17171753) died[5] when Adam was five years old. After his father's death he came under the tutelage of his godfather Johann Adam Freiherr von Ickstatt[6] who, like his father, was a professor of law at the University of Ingolstadt.[7] Ickstatt was a proponent of the philosophy of Christian Wolff and of the Enlightenment,[8] and he influenced the young Weishaupt with his rationalism. Weishaupt began his formal education at age seven[1] at a Jesuit school. He later enrolled at the University of Ingolstadt and graduated in 1768[9] at age 20 with a doctorate of law.[10] In 1772[11] he became a professor of law. The following year he married Afra Sausenhofer[12] of Eichsttt. After Pope Clement XIVs suppression of the Society of Jesus in 1773, Weishaupt became a professor of canon law,[13] a position that was held exclusively by the Jesuits until that time. In 1775 Weishaupt was introduced[14] to the empirical philosophy of Johann Georg Heinrich Feder[15] of the University of Gttingen. Both Feder and Weishaupt would later become opponents of Kantian idealism.[16]

Founder of the Illuminati[edit]

On 1 May 1776 Weishaupt formed the "Order of Perfectibilists". He adopted the name of "Brother Spartacus" within the order. Although the Order was notegalitarian or democratic internally, it sought to promote the doctrines of equality and freedom throughout society.[17]

The actual character of the society was an elaborate network of spies and counter-spies. Each isolated cell of initiates reported to a superior, whom they did not know, a party structure that was effectively adopted by some later groups.[17] Weishaupt was initiated into the Masonic Lodge "Theodor zum guten Rath", at Munich in 1777. His project of "illumination, enlightening the understanding by the sun of reason, which will dispel the clouds of superstition and of prejudice" was an unwelcome reform.[17] Soon however he had developed gnostic mysteries of his own, with the goal of "perfecting human nature" through re-education to achieve a communal state with nature, freed of government and organized religion. He began working towards incorporating his system of Illuminism with that of Freemasonry.[17] Weishaupt's radical rationalism and vocabulary was not likely to succeed. Writings that were intercepted in 1784 were interpreted as seditious, and the Society was banned by the government of Karl Theodor, Elector of Bavaria, in 1784. Weishaupt lost his position at the University of Ingolstadt and fled Bavaria.[17]

Activities in exile[edit]
He received the assistance of Duke Ernest II of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg (17451804), and lived in Gotha writing a series of works on illuminism, including A Complete History of the Persecutions of the Illuminati in Bavaria (1785), A Picture of Illuminism (1786), An Apology for the Illuminati (1786), and An Improved System of Illuminism (1787). Adam Weishaupt died in Gotha on 18 November 1830.[1][2][3][4] He was survived by his second wife, Anna Maria (ne Sausenhofer), and his children Nanette, Charlotte, Ernst, Karl, Eduard, and Alfred.[2] Weishaupt was buried next to his son Wilhelm who preceded him in death in 1802. After Weishaupt's Order of the Illuminati was banned and its members dispersed, it left behind no enduring traces of an influence, not even on its own erstwhile members, who went on in the future to develop in quite different directions.[18]

References in pop culture[edit]

Adam Weishaupt is referred to repeatedly in The Illuminatus! Trilogy, written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, as the founder of the Bavarian Illuminati and as an imposter who killed George Washington and took his place as the first president of the United States. Washington's portrait on the U.S. one-dollar bill is said to actually be Weishaupt's. Another version of Adam Weishaupt appears in the extensive comic book novel Cerebus the Aardvark by Dave Sim, as a combination of Weishaupt and George Washington. He appears primarily in the Cerebus and Church & State I volumes. His motives are republican confederalizing of city-states in Estarcion (a pseudo-Europe) and the accumulation of capital unencumbered by government or church.

Weishaupt's name is one of many references made to the Illuminati and other conspiracies in the 2000 PC game Deus Ex. During JC Denton's escape from Versalife labs in Hong Kong, he recovers a virus engineered with the molecular structure in multiples of 17 and 23. Tracer Tong notes "1723... the birthdate of Adam Weishaupt" even though this reference is actually incorrect: Weishaupt was born in 1748. Adam Weishaupt is also mentioned ("Bush got a ouija to talk to Adam Weishaupt") by the New York rapper Cage in El-P's "Accidents Don't Happen", the ninth track on his album Fantastic Damage(2002).

Works[edit]
Philosophical works[edit]
(1775) De Lapsu Academiarum Commentatio Politica. (1786) ber die Schrecken des Todes eine philosophische Rede.
(French) Discours Philosophique sur les Frayeurs de la

Mort (1788). Gallica (1786) ber Materialismus und Idealismus. Torino (1788) Geschichte der Vervollkommnung des menschlichen Geschlechts . (1788) ber die Grnde und Gewiheit der Menschlichen Erkenntni. (1788) ber die Kantischen Anschauungen und Erscheinungen. (1788) Zweifel ber die Kantischen Begriffe von Zeit und Raum. (1793) ber Wahrheit und sittliche Vollkommenheit. (1794) ber die Lehre von den Grnden und Ursachen aller Dinge. (1794) ber die Selbsterkenntnis, ihre Hindernisse und Vorteile. (1797) ber die Zwecke oder Finalursachen. (1802) ber die Hindernisse der baierischen Industrie und Bevlkerung. (1804) Die Leuchte des Diogenes.
(English) Diogenes Lamp (Tr. Amelia Gill) introduced by Sir Mark

Bruback chosen by the Masonic Book Club to be its published work for 2008. (Ed. Andrew Swanlund). (1817) ber die Staats-Ausgaben und Auflagen. Google Books (1818) ber das Besteuerungs-System.

Notes[edit]
1. ^
a b c d

Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie Vol. 41, p. 539.

2.

a b c

Engel, Leopold. Geschichte des Illuminaten-ordens. Berlin: H.

Bermhler Verlag, 1906. 3. ^

a b

van Dlmen, Richard. Der Geheimbund der Illuminaten. Stuttgart:

Frommann-Holzboog, 1975. 4. ^
a b

Stauffer, Vernon. New England and the Bavarian Illuminati. Columbia

University, 1918. 5. 6. 7. ^
a b

Engel 22.

^ Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie Vol. 13, pp. 740741. ^ Freninger, Franz Xaver, ed. Das Matrikelbuch der Universitaet Ingolstadt-Landshut-Mnchen. Mnchen: A. Eichleiter, 1872. 31.

8.

^ Hartmann, Peter Claus. Bayerns Weg in die Gegenwart. Regensburg: Pustet, 1989. 262. Also, Bauerreiss, Romuald.Kirchengeschichte Bayerns. Vol. 7. St. Ottilien: EOS Verlag, 1970. 405.

9.

^ Freninger 47.

10. ^ Engel 2528. 11. ^ Freninger 32. 12. ^ Engel 31. 13. ^ Engel 33. Also, Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie Vol. 41, p. 540. 14. ^ Engel 6162. 15. ^ Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie Vol. 6, pp. 595597. 16. ^ Beiser, Frederick C. The Fate of Reason. Harvard University Press, 1987. 18688. 17. ^
a b c d e

Catholic Encyclopedia: Illuminati, sourcing Illuminati papers

18. ^ Dr. Eberhard Weis in Die Weimarer Klassik und ihre Geheimbnde, edited by Professor Walter Mller-Seidel and Professor Wolfgang Riedel, Knigshausen und Neumann, 2003, pp. 100-101

External links[edit]
Find more about Adam Weishaupt at Wikipedia's sister projects Media from Commons

Quotations from Wikiquote

(German) Biography in Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie Vol. 41, pp. 539

550 by Daniel Jacoby. A Bavarian Illuminati primer by Trevor W. McKeown. Illuminati entry in The Catholic Encyclopedia, hosted by New Advent.
[show]
V

The Age of Enlightenment

WorldCat

VIAF: 73876044 Authority control LCCN: n84193453

GND: 118766384

Categories: 1748 births 1830 deaths People from Ingolstadt People from the Electorate of Bavaria Illuminati members Enlightenment philosophers German philosophers 18th-century philosophers University of Ingolstadt alumni University of Ingolstadt faculty Freemasons

Navigation menu
Create account Log in

Article Talk

Read Edit Edit source View history

Main page Contents Featured content Current events Random article Donate to Wikipedia Wikimedia Shop Interaction Help About Wikipedia Community portal Recent changes Contact page Toolbox Print/export Languages Azrbaycanca Catal esky Dansk Deutsch Eesti Espaol Esperanto Franais Bahasa Indonesia Italiano Magyar Nederlands Norsk bokml Polski Portugus Romn Shqip Slovenina / srpski

Suomi Svenska Trke Edit links

This page was last modified on 29 July 2013 at 16:51. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.