Asian brothers
Asiatic Brothers is the abbreviation for a high-grade Masonic system that was developed by Hans Heinrich von Ecker and Eckhoffen in 1782 and that was spread through him and his brother Hans Karl, particularly in the Austrian hereditary lands, but also in northern Germany. Its full name is Order of the Knights and Brothers St. John the Evangelist from Asia in Europe . The history of the order is part of the emancipation of the Jews in German-speaking Freemasonry . - The Asiatic Brothers are not to be confused with the degree of Knight St. John of the Evangelist of the still active Freemason and Military Order of the Red Cross Constantine, the Holy Sepulcher and John the Evangelist with completely different ritual contents.
prehistory
As early as 1781, Hans Heinrich von Ecker, as assigned master of the chair of the Masonic Lodge To the Seven Heavens in Vienna, promoted an order of the Knights and Brothers of Light that he had invented , supposedly erected by the "seven wise fathers, heads of the seven churches in Asia", with the purpose of “spreading light and truth, bestowing bliss and peace, and the real secret images of the three degrees of Brr. Unlock the Freemason Knight ”. The system had five degrees ( novice knight from 3rd, 5th and 7th years , Levite and priest ). By including and emphasizing Kabbalistic elements in the ritual, the acceptance of Jews as "ancient, genuine brothers from Asia" should be made possible, who at that time had no access to German Freemasonry and Rosicrucianism . Corresponding to the "seven churches", the order consisted of six provincial and one main chapters. Ecker was chancellor of the order. Because of disputes with the Rosicrucians and due to financial entanglements, he left Vienna and then promoted his "teaching" in Berlin, but the order was canceled by the king.
Origin of the order and systematic structure
Ecker appeared at the Wilhelmsbad Freemasons Convention in 1782 and won Landgrave Karl von Hessen for his project. At his request, he reworked the system. This is how the knights and brothers St. Johannis the Evangelist from Asia in Europe , the Asian Brothers , emerged as a “fraternal association of noble-thinking, pious, learned, experienced and discreet men without regard to religion, birth and class” , endeavoring to “follow the instructions of the Order to explore the secrets of the knowledge of all natural things for the good of mankind ” . Jews, brothers of the so-called "Melchizedek lodges" , were still admitted, but blasphemers, religious mockers and criminals of majesty, that is, those who violate the "holy rights of kings and princes, who are the image of the Eternal on earth, only in the slightest" , entry was denied. The order again had five departments, two trial levels: seekers and sufferers , and three main levels: knights and brothers , wise masters and royal priests or real Rosicrucians (the latter also called Melchizedek Elus ). Ecker was already active in Vienna again in 1782 with this rite. A Count Sinzendorf was a grand master, Prince Karl von Lichtenstein order protector. In his text Dispatch to the unnamed author of the so-called Authentic Message from the Knights and Brothers Initiates from Asia (Hamburg 1788, p. 12), Ecker names the Marburg mathematics and philosophy professor Johann Konrad Spangenberg (* 1711; † 1783) as active member of the order. Members were also the Jewish supplier to the army and later Jacobin Thomas von Schönfeld , who ended up on the guillotine in Paris, the Prussian court factor Isaak Daniel Itzig and the Kabbalist Ephraim Joseph Hirschfeld . The Duke Ferdinand von Braunschweig held the title of General-Obermeister of the order.
Course content
The International Freemason Lexicon (see sources) describes the organization of the order as an imitation of the Rosicrucian. Basically, the Asiatic Brothers are "nothing more than a splintering off of the Rosicrucians, in which the ecclesiastical, even Christian element was almost completely eliminated." The content of the teaching should be the "real secrets and moral-physical information of the hieroglyphs of the order of knights." and Brother Freemasons ” . The number symbolism of Martinism was combined with the cabalistic elements of the Rosicrucians . Spiritual evocation is practiced at the two highest levels of the order.
End of the order
The order in Austria ended with the measures restricting Freemasonry by Joseph II in 1785. The fight of Ignaz von Born and Prince Johann Baptist Karl von Dietrichstein against the Asiatic Brothers contributed significantly to the issuance of the so-called Masonic patent , although in the lists of the Order the names of very many noble families of the Josephine period. In northern Germany (and probably also in Scandinavia) it seems to have lasted for a long time.
swell
- The brothers St. Johannis the Evangelist from Asia in Europe or the only true and genuine Freemasonry together with an appendix of Fessler's critical history of the Masonic Brotherhood and its nullity concerning a high superior. Berlin 1803 with Wilhelm Schmidt. (Digitized [1] )
- Jacob Katz: The Order of the Asiatic Brothers , in: Ders .: Between Messianism and Zionism. On Jewish social history. Frankfurt am Main: Jüdischer Verlag 1993, p. 78f.
- Eugen Lennhoff / Oskar Posner / Dieter A. Binder: Internationales Freemason Lexicon . Revised and exp. Edition Munich: Herbig 2002, p. 89f.
- Karl RH Frick : The enlightened. Gnostic-theosophical and alchemical-Rosicrucian secret societies at the end of the 18th century. Licensed edition, Wiesbaden: Marix Verlag 2005 [bes. Pp. 455-499].
- Klaus S. Davidowicz: The Kabbalah. An introduction to the world of Jewish mysticism and magic. Vienna: Böhlau 2009 [p. 139-148].
- Titus Malms: Carl Bohemann and the fall of the order of the "Asiatic Brothers" in Pyrmont. In: Quatuor-Coronati-Jahrbuch 24 (1988), pp. 71-107.