Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction
My Rosicrucian Adventure

One The Stars
The Importance of Revelation
The Reformation
The Last Light
Johannes Kepler and the New Stars
A Conjunction on the Pont Neuf, Paris

Two Tübingen and the Universe
The Science
Rays
Abu Ma’shar al-Balki
Röslin versus Kepler
Grebner and Studion

Three A Prince of Utopia
Interrogation
Enter the Genius
The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreuz
The Whirlpool
A Gang of Conspirators

Four The Alchemical Wedding of Johann Valentin Andreae
Who Was behind the Fama Fraternitatis?
Augustus, Prince Elector of Anhalt
Enter the Rosicrucians

Five Fama Fraternitatis, or the Brotherhood of the Most Commendable Order Roseae Crucis
Damcar and the Sabians

Six The Strange Case of Dr. Adam Haslmayr
The Search for the Brotherhood
A House in the Languedoc
The Decameron
Montpellier and Maguelone
François Rabelais and the Rosicrucian Brotherhood

Seven The Reformation of the Whole Wide World
Raphael Eglin
Hesse-Kassel
The Signifying Fish
Alchemical Politics
The Splash
The Second-Known Printed Response to the Manuscript Fama Fraternitatis
The Motive for Publishing the Fama Fraternitatis
Jesuit Conspiracy

Eight The Confession of the Fraternity
John Dee and the More Secret Philosophy

Nine Rosymania I: The Furor and Its Aftermath
Julius Sperber and Aegidius Gutmann
Philip Ziegler, King of the Rosicrucians
Count Michael Maier
Robert Fludd

Ten Rosymania II: Educating the World
Sir Francis Bacon
Bacon’s New Atlantis and the Fama Fraternitatis
René Descartes and the New Mathematics
Descartes and Faulhaber
Joachim Morsius
Abraham von Franckenberg
Comenius and Hartlib

Eleven Andreae CosmoXenus
De Christiani Cosmoxeni genitura iudicium
Chymische Hochzeit: Christiani Rosenkreuz. Anno 1459
Turris Babel sive judiciorum de Fraternitate Rosaceae Crucis chaos
Mythologiae Christianae sive virtutem et vitiorum vitae humanae imaginum libri tres
Institutio pro magica curiosis (Education for those curious about magic)
The Societas Christiana

Twelve The Rose Cross in Britain
Andreae’s Image of the Christian Society in England
Rosicrucians Are Crazy
Fasciculus chemicus
The Philosopher’s Stone Revealed
The Way to Bliss
Poor Robin’s Intelligence
Robert Samber and a Lost Rosicrucian Free Masonry
Conclusion

Thirteen The Revenge of the Curiosi
What Is a Rosicrucian?

Fourteen The Invisible House
The Enlightenment

Fifteen The Age of Reason
Samuel Richter
Hermann Fictuld
Dom Antoine-Joseph Pernety
The Masonic Eighteenth-Degree Rose Croix
Martinès de Pasqually
Baron Karl Gotthelf von Hund
Jean-Baptiste Willermoz
Louis Claude de St.-Martin
Hans Heinrich von Ecker und Eckhoffen and Bernhard Joseph Schleis von Löwenfeld
Alchemy Among the Gold- und Rosenkreuzer
Social Idealism
Nikolay Ivanovich Novikov

Sixteen The Age of Progress
Bernard-Raymond Fabré-Palaprat
Antoine Fabre d’Olivet
Joseph Alexandre Saint-Yves d’Alveydre
Paschal Beverley Randolph
The Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn
Stanislas, Marquis de Guaïta; Joseph-Aimé (Joséphin) Péladan; Gérard-Anaclet-Vincent Encausse, or “Papus”

Seventeen The Age of Insanity
Rudolf Steiner
Le Comte de Saint-Germain
Max Heindel (Carl Louis Fredrik Grashof)
Harvey Spencer Lewis
The Lectorium Rosicrucianum

Eighteen Full Circle

Notes

Bibliography

Index

About the Author

Tobias Churton is a lecturer in Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry at Exeter University, which offers Britain’s only master’s program in Western Esotericism. The author of Gnostic Philosophy, The Magus of Freemasonry, and Freemasonry: The Reality, he lives in England.

Reviews

"There is a tendency today, fostered (in my opinion) by high-speed everything, to want to skim through things to get to the conclusion. This book is NOT amendable to such an attitude. The research behind it is meticulous. It is laid out in exquisite detail. It bears a thorough, close reading. . . . This work is eye-opening and, for those interested in the development of the Rosicrucian beliefs, a valuable resosurce."
*Michael Gleason, reviewer, Oct 2009*

"The mysterious story of Rosicrucianism, told through its dominant characters, reveals much that is significant with regard to all our pasts and much about ourselves, our truly human nature."
*SirReadaLot.org, Nov 2009*

"The Invisible History of the Rosicrucians provides a fine history of secret societies and presents the first definitive, in-depth survey of these societies . . . "
*The Midwest Book Review, Vol. 4, No. 12, Dec 2009*

"Perhaps the growing interest by the pubic in esotericism--and, indeed, Rosicrucianism--in recent years is a reflection of a deep desire to connect with something greater, with divine intelligence itself. Churton's book is both an education and a revelation."
*Nexus New Times Magazine, Vol. 17, No. 2, Feb/Mar 2010*