1 The Vril: from Dystopian Satire to Esoteric Neo-Nazism
This chapter traces the dazzling reception of the fictional occult force called vril, invented by one of the most influential Victorian authors, Edward Bulwer- Lytton (1803–1873), in his successful 1871 novel The Coming Race. The English lord wrote down his ideas at a time when the emerging modern natural sciences were struggling with currents such as mesmerism and spiritualism for the interpretive hegemony of phenomena such as electricity, magnetism, and a growing number of newly discovered forms of radiation. Unknown, powerful forces seemed to permeate the entire world and be a possible explanation for magic and miracles. Bulwer-Lytton played a central role in this discourse not least because of his pronounced ‘esoteric’ interests. With his Rosicrucian-themed novel Zanoni (1842), he had captivated a large number of enthusiastic readers who believed the author to be the bearer of Rosicrucian secret knowledge (Strube 2013, 13–32). In this and other works, Bulwer-Lytton explored the phenomena of occult natural forces, which he presented as an explanation of magic, the understanding of which could mean not only deciphering but mastering nature (ibid., 21–32). It was in this context that The Coming Race elaborated ideas of universal, all-pervading elemental forces, which Bulwer-Lytton summarized under the name of vril. The work, one of the first science fiction novels ever written, was received with enthusiasm by the public and especially within esoteric circles (Roukema 2021). This success was due in no small part to the social critique underlying the narrative: the story can be read as a dystopian satire, a commentary on contemporary scientific, religious, and social developments (Strube 2013, 35–52).
Theosophists and occultists, however, who had long identified Bulwer- Lytton as an ‘initiate,’ were mostly captivated by The Coming Race because of its discussion of occult forces, futuristic technology based on them, and the spiritual-biological evolution of the human race. The vril was reinterpreted by authors such as Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1831–1891), the leading figure of the Theosophical Society, and Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925), the founder of Anthroposophy, who regarded it as a powerful elemental force that had enabled the inhabitants of Atlantis to build—and destroy—their superior civilization (Strube 2013, 65–79). In fin-de-siècle Germany, the vril was vividly discussed in esoteric and alternative milieus and was to be used in the interwar period to develop utopian visions of a society that used the primal power of vril to ultimately ascend to the level of omnipotent divinity. This combination of esoteric, biological, and technological discourse was typical of contemporary occultism and lent itself to radical political interpretations (Treitel 2004; Owen 2004; Noakes 2019). These included an enthusiastic reception by the adherents of Ariosophy, a blend of völkisch and esoteric ideas that was decidedly fascistic, racist, antisemitic, and misogynistic (Goodrick-Clarke 1985; Paape 2020; Baier 2021). The leading Ariosophist Adolf Joseph Lanz, who called himself Jörg Lanz von Liebenfels (1874–1954), was among the propagators of the supposed transformative powers of vril, as interpreted by its occultist reception.
This politically tinged reception would continue after World War II, leading to a bewildering spread in popular culture, esoteric circles, and right-wing extremism (Strube 2012; 2013, 126–89). In bestsellers such as Louis Pauwels and Jacque Bergier’s Morning of the Magicians (1960), the vril was associated with a mysterious ‘Vril Society,’ which was portrayed as the dark force behind the ‘Third Reich,’ and the SS in particular (John-Stucke and Siepe 2021). As early as the 1950s, it also played a central role in the development of an esoteric neo- Nazism that revolved around the notion of the ‘Black Sun,’ a symbol now widely used in right-wing extremist circles around the world. The vril, already considered by Bulwer-Lytton and his esoteric recipients to be the driving force behind futuristic flying machines, was explained in this context as the technological basis for alleged Nazi secret weapons, with the help of which the Nazi élites would have retreated to secret German bases in South America and under the two poles. Since then, these followers of the ‘Midnight Mountain’ (a metaphysical representation of ‘the North,’ Thule, Atlantis, or Hyperborea) have waged a spiritual struggle against the materialistic forces of the ‘demiurge’ Yahweh and his followers from ‘Mount Sinai’—a thinly veiled antisemitic conspiracy narrative.
These developments significantly shaped the image of vril that prevails today. Whereas the adherents of esoteric neo-Nazism operated in the political underground, the understanding of vril they constructed exerted a great fascination on a broad audience and continues to be received in an unmanageable mass of publications as well as on the internet. Indeed, a direct reception can be traced from the beginnings of esoteric neo-Nazism to still existing circles that are more active—and effective—than ever in spreading their ideas (Pöhlmann 2021, 123–36). This includes the omnipresent topoi of Nazi flying saucers, secret technology powered by vril, secret societies struggling for world dominance, the supposed origin of ‘the Aryans’ in the star system of Aldebaran, preoccupations with Atlantis and Thule, as well as völkisch fantasies about ‘the East.’ This shows how the occultist desire for a new stage in human evolution, following the development or rediscovery of a superior science, was prone to a combination with racial ideas and elitist ideologies. In what follows, this development will be traced and illustrated in the light of little-studied sources from the decades around 1900.
2 The Theosophical Transfiguration of Vril and Its Author
Even before Blavatsky helped Bulwer-Lytton to further prominence in Theosophical circles in Isis Unveiled in 1877, English Rosicrucians had claimed to have recognized an initiate in him and unceremoniously declared him a member of their order (Strube 2013, 55–64). Given the esoteric contents of Zanoni, it is not surprising that the novel had a great attraction for Rosicrucians—or people who thought they were. A year after the publication of The Coming Race, and shortly before his death, Bulwer-Lytton learned by accident, so to speak, of his membership in a Rosicrucian order. The fact that he died without the matter really being cleared up is probably the main reason why rumors about his possible membership in secret societies and orders of various kinds persist vigorously to this day. Without these allegations, which began to spread in the 1870s, the vril might have never been charged with the importance that has been attached to it over time.
The story of The Coming Race deftly played with some of the most prominent discourses of the nineteenth century, revolving around issues of science, technology, social reform, religion, and Orientalism. A young and wealthy American, together with a mining engineer friend, descends into a cave to search for mineral resources. The two men come across a long and apparently not naturally formed shaft, which is illuminated by mysterious light sources. As they continue their descent, the engineer is killed by a fall, but the protagonist is able to descend unharmed (Bulwer-Lytton 1871, 1–11). Left to his own devices, he soon encounters the subterranean race of the Vril-ya, whose monumental architecture immediately suggests their high level of development and is likened to that of ancient Egypt and ‘the Orient’ (15).
The civilization of the Vril-ya, which the narrator comes to know in the course of the novel, is characterized by its absolute technical superiority over the human upper world. Countless ‘automata’ relieve the Vril-ya of much of their work, and the ‘oriental’-looking city they inhabit is thoroughly luxurious, beautiful, and orderly. This superior civilization would not have been possible without the force that had assumed such prominence that the race named itself after it. All life is governed by vril. Practically the entire culture of the Vril-ya is based on the application of this almost omnipotent force, which can be used for constructive and healing as well as for destructive purposes. It is likened by the protagonists to electricity and Michael Faraday’s (1791–1867) “atmospheric magnetism,” akin to “mesmerism, electro-biology, odic force, &c., but applied scientifically through vril conductors.” Thus, the Vril-ya “can exercise influence over minds, and bodies animal and vegetable, to an extent not surpassed in the romances of our mystics. To all such agencies they give the common name of vril” (Bulwer-Lytton 1871, 47). The Vril-ya have even evolved biologically to conduct vril, having developed a special nerve that connects to engineered ‘vril staffs.’ The vril thus represents a symbiosis of technology, religion, and nature, as the Vril-ya were not only spiritually capable of handling such a tremendous force, but they also physically evolved to operate their impressive devices and vehicles. The latter include flying ships powered by vril, which especially arouse the narrator’s curiosity (182–83).
Considering Bulwer-Lytton’s reputation as an adept, it is not surprising that it did not take long before his mélange of occult forces, subterranean civilizations linked to ancient Egypt, and futuristic technology would attract the attention of occultist authors. A major admirer was Blavatsky, whose writings were significantly influenced by Bulwer-Lytton. His novels The Last Days of Pompeii, Zanoni, A Strange Story, and The Coming Race served Blavatsky not only as sources of inspiration but also for numerous quotations (Liljegren 1957; see also Coleman 1895). This can be seen in Isis Unveiled, which displays extraordinary admiration for the English author:
No author in the world of literature ever gave a more truthful or more poetical description of these beings than Sir E. Bulwer-Lytton, the author of Zanoni. Now, himself “a thing not of matter” but an “Idea of joy and light,” his words sound more like the faithful echo of memory than the exuberant outflow of mere imagination. (Blavatsky 1877, 285)
Here, Blavatsky referred to the author as almost superhuman, thus giving his books a prophetic, divine character (Liljegren 1957, 13–14). In an article in The Theosophist, she later wrote that Bulwer-Lytton was “one who is still claimed by the mysterious brotherhood in India as a member of their own body” (Blavatsky 1884, 17). This special place of Bulwer-Lytton in Blavatsky’s work led numerous Theosophical authors to elevate him to one of the most prominent initiates. The resulting extensive body of writing in Theosophical journals and monographs helped to further propagate the claims about Bulwer-Lytton’s secret knowledge or his initiation by ‘the Masters’ (Stewart 1927). That Bulwer-Lytton’s descriptions of a coming race held a great fascination for Theosophists is not surprising. The coming race could be readily harmonized with the Theosophical teaching of the ‘root races,’ whose next stage of development was already predicted in the near future.
The first time Blavatsky referred to vril was to describe an all-pervading life force that, in her view, flows through the universe. In a long list, she enumerated the various names that have been used for it in human history: Chaos, the Zoroastrian fire, the torch of Apollo, the Egyptian Phtha or Ra, the burning thorn bush, the vapors of the Oracle of Delphi, the sidereal light of the Rosicrucians, the Akasha of the Hindus, the astral light of Eliphas Lévi (1810–1875), the aura and the fluid of the Mesmerists, the Od of Karl von Reichenbach (1788–1869), atmospheric magnetism, galvanism, electricity, the Archeus (a Paracelsian term), and a number of other terms (Blavatsky 1877, 125). She continues:
Sir E. Bulwer-Lytton, in his Coming Race, describes it as the VRIL, used by the subterranean populations, and allowed his readers to take it for a fiction. […] Absurd and unscientific as may appear our comparison of a fictitious vril invented by the great novelist, and the primal force of the equally great experimentalist, with the cabalistic astral light, it is nevertheless the true definition of this force. Discoveries are constantly being made to corroborate the statement thus boldly put forth. (Blavatsky 1877, 125–26)
The identification of vril with these terms was especially easy because Bulwer-Lytton himself had made such comparisons in his writings. Blavatsky went on to explain that behind both all so-called miracles and magic there is nothing but the mastery of natural laws. “The phenomena of natural magic,” according to Blavatsky, have nothing to do with sleight of hand, but are based on the skillful control of natural forces by the willpower of the practitioner (Blavatsky 1877, 128–29). She viewed Mesmer and his followers in the tradition of the “thaumaturgists of all periods, schools, and countries” and concluded that Mesmerism is the most important branch of magic; its phenomena were the effects of the universal agent which underlay all magic and had produced at all ages the so-called miracles (129).
Clearly, vril was a term suitable for Blavatsky to collect a multitude of other terms from the entire history of humankind, and this especially under the aspect of contemporary scientific discoveries and theories. In doing so, as time went on, she interpreted the vril less and less as a fictional literary notion and more as a veiled reference to a real, existing force. At the end of 1883, she wrote in a letter: “The vril is not altogether a fiction, as some chelas [disciples] and even ‘lay’ chelas know” (Blavatsky 1985, 143). When Blavatsky’s Secret Doctrine appeared in 1888, she had already formulated this idea. It is remarkable that she referred to the vril in connection with the experiments of the American inventor John Ernst Worrell Keely (1827–1898). According to Blavatsky, Keely had unconsciously discovered a tremendous force during his experiments.
[It] is the terrible sidereal force, known to, and named by the Atlanteans Mash-mak, and by the Âryan Rishis in their Astra Vidyâ by a name that we do not like to give. It is the Vril of Bulwer Lytton’s Coming Race, and of the coming Races of our mankind. The name Vril may be a fiction; the Force itself is a fact, as little doubted in India as is the existence of the Rishis, since it is mentioned in all the secret books. (Blavatsky 1893 [1888], 614)
Keely had claimed the discovery of an etheric force that enabled him to operate an engine by means of vibrations using only water and air. He had not been able to convince the experts with his experiments and fell into public disrepute. However, Keely had attracted much attention with his experiments only a few years before the publication of The Secret Doctrine and was much discussed in occultist circles. That Blavatsky combines in one breath Atlantis, Indian teachings, the claims of an American inventor, and a Victorian novel is characteristic of her approach. Since Indian teachings in The Secret Doctrine occupy a much larger space in Blavatsky’s thinking than they did in the times of Isis Unveiled, the vril now appears not in the company of the ancient Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, but of the Indian Rishis. The presence of the Atlantis motif, highly popular at the time, can be explained by Bulwer-Lytton’s descriptions of the Vril-ya as heirs to a sunken civilization (Strube 2013, 35–44).
In The Story of Atlantis, published in 1896, the Theosophist William Scott- Elliot (1849–1919) dealt with the location and heritage of the sunken continent and, on the basis of clairvoyant visions, described it in minute detail in the second part of his book (cf. contemporary writings, such as Donnelly 1882, 214–36). Scott-Elliot even included four geographical maps of Atlantis and described the social conditions of its inhabitants, members of that “principal or root race which preceded our present fifth or Aryan” (1903, 10). In a chapter on education, Scott-Elliot described the teaching of the young Atlanteans, which was devoted primarily to “the development of the psychic faculties and the opening of the pupils’ understanding of the hidden forces in nature” (62–63).
The development of the vril supposedly enabled the Atlanteans to employ advanced technological inventions. Among these were impressive aerial warships that had powerful “destroyer engines” and could accommodate fifty to a hundred fighting men (Scott-Elliot 1903, 70). Just as in The Coming Race, these airships are described as powered by a machine that works with vril (cf. Bulwer-Lytton 1871, 182–83). At one point, Scott-Elliot discussed the mastery of “personal vril,” implying that the Atlanteans first controlled their flying ships by an individually applied vril, but later designed machines that harnessed a different force (Scott-Elliot 1896, 53). He also referred to Keely and the English inventor Hiram Stevens Maxim (1840–1916), addressing, like Blavatsky, current developments in scientific discourse and suggesting that contemporary humans could tap into occult forces even if they are less spiritually developed. Consequently, in Scott-Elliot’s work, the vril takes on the features of a primordial elemental force which the Atlanteans were able to avail themselves of due to their superior spiritual abilities. By the invention of a machine which used an alternative force, however, the vril was no longer necessary for the control of the airships. The individually applied vril is thus contrasted with a machine-set force. In this way, Scott-Elliot formulated his great confidence in the technical progress of humankind: the unspeakable powers of the vril from The Coming Race, unattainable by humankind on spiritual and biological levels, could still be tapped by human ingenuity. In the following years, the Theosophically transformed notion of vril was thus further related to all kinds of ideas about occult forces and technology to harness them, leading to a new step in human evolution.
3 Contested Science and the German Enthusiasm for Vril
This increasing preoccupation with occult forces and technology must be viewed against the background of the scientific discoveries at the turn of the century, which left a great impression on German occultists and would decisively shape the face of occultism. Rapid advances in the fields of electronics and radiology transformed public life and ushered in the age of the atom. The invisible forces and rays that had been the subject of learned speculation and debate for centuries became scientifically tangible and technologically exploitable (Noakes 2019). Cathode rays had already been discovered in the 1860s and 1870s, and from 1886 to 1888 Heinrich Hertz discovered radio waves, which were successfully transmitted by Nikola Tesla in 1891 and by Oliver Lodge in 1894. In 1895, Wilhelm Röntgen had discovered x-rays, for which he received the first Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901. This was followed in 1896 by the discovery and study of radioactivity by Henri Becquerel (Noakes 2008, 323–34; Kragh 2002, 27–43). How deep radiation research was still in its infancy, despite all progress, is shown by the supposed discovery of n-rays by René Blondlot, which caused fierce debates in scientific circles and finally led to a refutation by the American physicist Robert Wood (Nye 1980, 125–56). It is therefore important to bear in mind that the pioneering work of radiation research was by no means uncontroversial, and its subject matter often appeared diffuse not only outside but also within academic discourse.
In the eyes of many occultists, all this seemed to prove at last the old doctrines of invisible, all-pervading forces. In numerous publications, as well as in literally all occultist journals, well-known topics such as magnetism, hypnotism, electricity, and Od-rays were discussed more vividly than ever before in light of the new scientific discoveries. Hitherto ridiculed things, such as the human aura, control over mind and matter, or telepathy, now appeared scientifically provable and feasible in the eyes of occultists. An excellent example from the history of technology is telegraphy, which, after its development in the mid-nineteenth century, was considered by many to be an “occult art” (Noakes 1999). Through new technical achievements it would even be possible for humankind to reach a new evolutionary stage. With disgrace, however, the occultists had to realize that science was still generally dismissive of their teachings (Noakes 2008, 329–31). They wanted to oppose the despised “materialism” of the “established sciences” with a science that was dedicated to humankind in its totality and its relation to nature and cosmos, without disregarding the latest scientific findings. More than ever, the “occult sciences” became a counter-science (Treitel 2004, 16, 34–55).
In 1886, the first issue of the journal Sphinx was published by the Leipzig publishing house Th. Griebens Verlag, bearing the subtitle Monthly Journal for the Historical and Experimental Substantiation of the Psychic [übersinnlich] Worldview on a Monistic Basis (Treitel 2004, 40–55). The editor of the journal, Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (1846–1916), was president of the German branch of the Theosophical Society, founded in 1884 (Zander 2007, 75–432; Howe 1995, 111). The Sphinx occupied a central position among German publications and counted among its contributors notable authors as Carl Kiesewetter (1854–1895) and Carl du Prel (1839–1899). Modern science, we read in the “Appeal and Preface” of the first volume, has not come any closer to understanding humankind and its relationship to nature and the universe. The scientists of the century had made the mistake of investigating humankind “on a predominantly materialistic basis” and had lost sight of what was essential. By founding “transcendental psychology,” the editors wanted to establish a science dedicated to the exploration of the psychic (übersinnlich). Especially the “mystical” and “magical” phenomena of the “life of the soul” were to become the subject of research, because a science that renounced these aspects could hardly come closer to its goal (Anonymous 1886, I–II). It is further said:
But as modern science was born out of misunderstood knowledge of nature and even partly out of superstition, so also the beginning of this science of the psychic is shrouded in doubtful darkness, and all the more so because the control and guidance of this study has been neglected so far by official science. […] Passionless, impartial and impersonal, as all science as such is, we strive for the goal of a scientific, i.e., monistic, uniform explanation of all sensual and psychic facts, which we feel compelled to recognize as real. (Anonymous 1886, II–III; emphasis in the original)
This criticism of ‘official science’ defined the character of ‘counter-science’ and at the same time formulated a claim to superiority of the latter which did not close itself off to important aspects of human existence but wanted to explore it in his entirety. It was in this environment that Bulwer-Lytton’s vril made its entry into the circles of German occultists. This was possible due to the fact that Bulwer-Lytton already had the reputation of being an ‘initiate,’ which is why his works were used as source material in occult publications (Strube 2013, 55–79).
In the second and third volumes of the Sphinx, Bulwer-Lytton’s ghost short story, The Haunter and the Haunted, was printed under the title “A Kind of So-Called Ghosts: An Own Experience and its Explanation” and annotated by Hübbe-Schleiden and Kiesewetter (Bulwer-Lytton 1886/1887). Remarkably, Bulwer-Lytton’s ghost story is treated as a “study” rather than a work of fiction. The commentaries of Hübbe-Schleiden and Kiesewetter speak of Bulwer’s “experiences,” which were considered to be of great importance because of their “explanations of such facts” (Bulwer-Lytton 1886/1887, 399/56). This shows that Bulwer-Lytton was no longer perceived by Hübbe-Schleiden and Kiesewetter as a novelist but as an investigator of occult phenomena. The successful ghost story was thus transformed into a ‘scientific’ article.
The literary work of Bulwer-Lytton was also referred to in the fifth volume in an article on “Hypnotism and Electricity in Ancient Egypt” by the Munich- based painter Franz Lambert, a member of the Psychologische Gesellschaft (Psychological Society), co-founded by Du Prel and Albert von Schrenck- Notzing (1862–1929). Hübbe-Schleiden referred in a footnote as a matter of course to “Bulwer’s vril-power (coming-race)” in connection with “electrifying machines” possibly used by the Egyptians (Lambert 1888, 3). To what extent Hübbe-Schleiden became aware of The Coming Race can only be conjectured. It is likely, however, that he was well aware of the great esteem in which Blavatsky held the book. In any case, this reference in 1888 seems to have been the first—albeit casual—mention of vril in German occult or theosophical circles.
There are also several references to Bulwer-Lytton in the Zentralblatt für Okkultismus, published since 1908. The Zentralblatt (Central Gazette) was initially edited by the well-known astrologer Karl Brandler-Pracht (1864–1939) and was published by the Leipzig publishing house Max Altmann (Howe 1995, 113–15; for more on the Leipzig milieu, which was central to German occultism, see Bigalke 2016; Schuster 2018). Its declared goal was “researching the entirety of the secret sciences,” while its editors emphasized their claim to “Scientific Occultism” with an article of the same name in the first volume. An article on “The Prophecies of the Conquest of the Air” by one Ch. Thomassin dealt with past achievements in aircraft construction and recounted the prophecy of a Berlin somnambulist. The short article ends with the following passage:
When the prophecy will have been fulfilled and the conquest of the air will have succeeded, we will still not be as far as the race of the Vrilya, which Bulwer has described to us in his interesting novel “The Coming Race” (“Das Geschlecht der Zukunft”), which has been published in German translation by Max Altmann in Leipzig. According to the poet’s visions, these lucky Vrilya have already harnessed a power that is even more effective than electricity, that unites all natural forces, the old magnetic fluid of the occultists, which they can use for various purposes due to their advanced constitution. This power, the vril, serves them for their larger air vehicles, as for moving the wings they use for air travel. (Thomassin 1909, 470)
As in the writings of Scott-Elliot, the vril is mentioned in connection with the operation of flying machines and the wisdom of Atlantis, yet with direct reference to the German translation of The Coming Race. The fact that the novel was published by Max Altmann automatically brought it closer to readers interested in theosophy and the occult. For example, Franz Hartmann also mentioned The Coming Race in an article on “The Hollow Earth” in the fourth volume of the Zentralblatt.
4 Bulwer-Lytton’s Reception among German Occultists
The enthusiasm with which Bulwer-Lytton’s novels were received is made clear by an article by one ‘Sindbad’ on “The Elixir of Life in Bulwer’s Novels and in the Writings of Real Adepts,” which appeared in several parts in the Zentralblatt in 1918. Behind the pseudonym Sindbad hid the astrologer Friedrich Schwickert (1857–1930). He was supérieur inconnu of the Martinist Order, member of the Ariosophical List Society (Goodrick-Clarke 2004, 36–48) and, as Frater Gonsalvo, a member of Lanz’ Ariosophical Ordo Novi Templi (Howe 1995, 130; Goodrick-Clarke 2004, 53, 108; Hieronimus 1996; Paape 2020). Schwickert’s article was additionally published in the same year as an independent print, with a laudatory preface by the well-known occultist and great Bulwer-Lytton admirer G. W. Surya, whose civil name was Demeter Georgievitz-Weitzer (1873–1949). He had been editor of the Zentralblatt after Brandler-Pracht, before Max Altmann took over this position. Surya was a great admirer of Bulwer-Lytton especially because of Zanoni—in Surya’s writings, including his best-known book, Moderne Rosenkreuzer (1930), there are numerous favorable references to Bulwer-Lytton (e.g., Surya 1923, 240). Schwickert, in turn, took up the well-known allegations that Bulwer-Lytton was a Rosicrucian initiate who transported veiled secret knowledge in his novels:
Among the works soaring with eagle wings above the knowledge of the scholastic wisdom of our time are Bulver’s [sic] “Zanoni,” “A Strange History,” and “The Coming Race,” which in a certain sense may also be regarded as true initiatory writings of a Hermetic connoisseur and expert who was probably a genuine Rosicrucian and therefore knew much more than he was allowed to communicate to the general public. (Schwickert 1918, 10)
Schwickert tried to prove not only Bulwer-Lytton’s secret knowledge but also his abilities as a magician and referred to the account of a man who had allegedly visited Bulwer-Lytton to ask for “initiation into practical magic.” On the third night, Bulwer-Lytton is said to have replied to the aspirant that he would visit him. Indeed, the master appeared in the man’s room on the said evening:
He rose to shake hands with those who had arrived, but when he had almost come close to touching the figure, it disappeared. The initiate, who had never before perceived such a phenomenon, stood there for a while in amazement, wondering what to do next. Then a voice whispered, so close to his ear that he thought he could feel the warm breath of it: “Come!” He turned quickly in the direction from which the voice had sounded, but saw nothing. (Schwickert 1918, 11)
The astonished magician-to-be then decided to seek out Bulwer-Lytton at his hotel. On the way there, however, the whispering voice guided him to a completely different place, where he would have never suspected to find Bulwer-Lytton:
When he entered the room, he found Bulwer standing in the middle of a pentagram drawn on the floor with red chalk, holding a staff pointed at him. The magician asked the initiate whether he had considered his decision carefully and was now ready to carry it out. On the affirmative answer the apprentice had to take the oath of obedience and secrecy of a neophyte of the Hermetic Lodge of Alexandria. (Schwickert 1918, 11)
This curious passage has been quoted at length to illustrate the extent of the transfiguration of Bulwer-Lytton into a supposed ‘initiate.’ The fact that the well-known authors Schwickert and Surya published such a story through an important publishing house and in an influential periodical cemented Bulwer- Lytton’s reputation as an occult master. How much this influenced the reception of Bulwer-Lytton’s books in the relevant circles is obvious. Schwickert speculated that Bulwer-Lytton, “the great pioneer of occultism,” had chosen the form of a novel for his “revelations […] in order to make the hermetic teachings and warnings that can be communicated at all accessible with the greatest clarity to the widest circles of those thirsting for knowledge,” without time revealing too much (Schwickert 1918, 12). The Coming Race and the occult force of vril were received not as literary inventions but as veiled ‘Rosicrucian’ knowledge. This reception of Bulwer-Lytton was not limited to Germany, for translations of his works also appeared in esoteric circles in France. A Strange Story was published as a feuilleton in Le Théosophe in 1911 and later, from July 1920, in Le Voile d’Isis; the popularity of vril, however, was incomparably greater among Germans.
5 The Writings of Peryt Shou
Of great importance for the reception of vril in German occultism are the obscure writings of the esotericist Peryt Shou (né Albert Christian Georg Schultz; 1873–1953). Despite his considerable influence and a revival of attention in recent years, Shou’s work remains largely unexplored (see, however, Lenz 2004; Krumm-Heller 1919; Fritsche 1954). Shou’s numerous small independent publications, as well as his essays in well-known esoteric journals such as Prana and Hag-All, attest his multifaceted esoteric interests, which were reflected in a synthesis of predominantly Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Egyptian, and Germanic neopagan motifs. In the 1920s they took on an increasingly Ariosophical character. The vril first appears in Shou’s 1921 publication Kwa-non-she: Die Weltreligion des Neu-Buddhismus und die abendländischen Geistesstömungen (Kwa-non-she: The World-Religion of New Buddhism and the Occidental Currents of Thought). As “Kwa-non-she” Shou described the coming “world savior” of what he called the “New Buddhists.” He signified “the completion of the present, the ‘Aryan’ root race and brings back the splendor that was lost to it in the beginning.” The New Buddhist teachings, wrote Shou, are ultimately to be traced back to “ancient Aryan” roots, which is why corresponding teachings and prophecies are also found in Zoroastrianism as well as in the Bible. These “elements of a world religion” would lead to a “fulfillment of all religions,” to be realized by the coming of the Avatar (Shou 1921, 3–10). By this, Shou understood the return to an “Aryan faith” that had been lost to the West because the Church had distanced itself from the “Aryan idea of original Christianity” (22). Through the arrival of the Kwa-non-seh, the “bringer of Shamballah,” a “new humanity” would arise. Shamballah was called by Shou the “Aryan future land,” the “light-land of the Aryans” (33–35). In his somewhat garbled language, Shou explained:
But nevertheless an event is waiting to be realized. “Shamballah,” the city of the masters of the present Aryan race, the city of the celestial “Manasaputras,” whose threads go not only over the earth but through the universe, will appear at the same time in the West, as the Tibetans also teach. Namely, it will rise from the north, from the light of the north, which is eternal in the north, by which is meant a radiation effect of the upper air layers or light spheres, from which the “northern light” is said to come. (Shou 1921, 40; emphasis in the original)
Shou’s remarkable Shamballah symbolism stands for the source of an “Aryan faith in knowledge that comes neither from thought nor feeling alone, but rather from blood!” (Shou 1921, 42; emphasis in the original). While in the Occident “Christianity lay fallow,” Buddhism flowed through whole Asia—the “strong religious longing of the Occidental” had to be directed for this reason to the East. This allegory reflects the idea of an “Aryan religion of the blood,” which would have been preserved in its original form in the East and would have to be rediscovered by the special religious disposition of the “Nordic man” and would have to arise anew “from the light of the North” (ibid.).
The appearance of the Kwa-non-seh would cause the “overflowing” of a so far unknown cosmic primeval force whose positive pole is called “Aldebaran” (or “Al Dwar-an”) and whose negative pole is called “Anthares” (or “An-dwar”) (Shou 1921, 36). Aldebaran and Anthares were also described by Shou as the “guardians of Shamballah,” with Aldebaran standing for the “god-man” and Anthares for the “man-animal” (56–57). These bewildering ideas demand attention because the vril was similarly associated with both Shamballah and the star system Aldebaran, as the supposed home of “the Germans,” within the context of esoteric neo-Nazism in the decades following World War II (Strube 2012; 2015). Indeed, these motifs can be discerned for the first time in Shou’s Kwa-non-seh, demonstrating continuities up to the present day.
Shou devoted a separate chapter to vril at the end of Kwa-non-seh, entitled “‘Vril,’ the New Power. Epilogue!” (Shou 1921, 153–55). There he presented the vril as a real force which “Lytton Bulwer” would have described in “his ‘Coming Race’ and in ‘Zanoni.’” It will “bury, indeed destroy, the present Europe, as the maritime volcanoes buried Atlantis.” In the form of a “mountain-crystal” it is in the hand of a “Jm-Lama of the East” and lies in a bowl which is also called the “Grail”:
[A]round him gathers that silent community of the East, which dwells behind high mountains, by which the power of that Vril is guarded and exercised. Bulwer describes them bound to a staff, which is in possession of those “Vril-ja,” the “Easterners.” He reaches them in the form of a poetic disguise through a dream that leads him through the tunnel of a high mountain to that land. (Shou 1921, 153; emphasis in the original)
Bulwer, Shou continued, would have described it as a “primordial force” which “underlies the various manifestations of energy, such as magnetism, heat, electricity, light.” He also associated it with telepathy on the basis of the “communications of Bulwer, Blawatsky, Surya and others,” and saw it as a future force that would pave the way to the “new race.” It is applicable only by the hand of a “pure and noble” man, and for this reason is safe from abuse by “black magicians,” since the “members of the Eastern Order” watch over it (Shou 1921, 154). Vril was the “crown of all natural forces, their union to a highest synthesis, also at the same time the power which will rule the future Europe!” (155; emphasis in the original). The sources Shou cites—Bulwer-Lytton, Blavatsky, and Surya—reveal a line of reception from German occultism to Theosophy to the fantastic ideas of Bulwer-Lytton’s ‘secret knowledge.’ Unlike his occultist contemporaries, however, Shou associated the vril not only with Atlantis but also with ‘Eastern’ secret orders, an allusion that had already been found in a vaguer form in Blavatsky (Strube 2013, 65–69).
Further information about Shou’s sources is given in a manuscript which he had presented in 1930 to the Fraternitas Saturni, a magical lodge founded in 1928 by Eugen Grosche (known as Gregor A. Gregorius; 1888–1964) and which was published in 1951 in the Blätter für angewandte okkultistische Lebenskunst (Pages for Applied Occultist Art of Living) edited by Gregorius (Lechler 2015). In this essay, titled “The Spiritual Return of Atlantis,” Shou again made reference to the Atlantis motif and cited specific sources:
Rudolf Steiner, Hans Much and Mereschkowski were precursors. Hermann [sic] Wirth made wide circles sit up and take notice in his ingenious work “Der Aufgang der Menschheit.” Eugen Georg deepened in his fundamental book “Verschollene Kulturen” (Lost Cultures) the only rudimentary previous knowledge about Atlantis. […] Today’s atomic physics and quantum theory point again to the mysterious elementary power of the Atlanteans, which Bulwer-Lytton called the Vril. This mysterious radiation power was certainly still partly known to the old Egyptian priesthood, because Egypt was an Atlantean colony at that time. (Shou 1951, 15)
With Rudolf Steiner we encounter once more the connection of Atlantis and vril, mediated via Scott-Elliot, which had spread among the German occultists. Hans Much (1880–1931) and Dmitri Sergejewitsch Mereschkowski (1865–1941), both of whom were widely received in occultist circles, had also dealt with these popular Atlantis theories. Shou probably referred to Mereschkowski’s Das Geheimnis des Westens (The Secret of the West) from 1929, which had appeared in German translation in 1929. Notably, Mereschkowski had attended a lecture by Rudolf Steiner in Paris in 1906 and had become acquainted with him there (Webb 2008, 205). Herman Wirth (1885–1981), especially emphasized by Shou, was one of the most important personalities in Atlantis research (Löw 2009; Wiwjorra 1995; 2012). One of the most influential ideologues of an ‘Aryan Atlantis,’ Wirth had described in his book Der Aufgang der Menschheit (The Rise of Humankind; 1928) the matriarchal culture of the “Nordic-Atlantean race,” which had had to leave their homeland Atlantis more than 50,000 years ago (Wirth 1928, 27–29). In 1935, Wirth was involved in the founding of the pseudo-scientific research institution, the Ahnenerbe of the SS, but soon fell out of favor due to his overly embarrassingly unscientific way of working and was forced out in 1938 (also see Kater 2006, 11–16, 41–43, 58–65; Heinrich 2002, 58–59).
Less known today, but quite influential in its time, was Eugen Georg’s Verschollene Kulturen (Lost Cultures), published in 1930 by R. Voigtländer in Leipzig. Therein Georg combined the common Atlantis theories of authors like Steiner, Scott-Elliot, Hermann Wieland (1922), and Wirth with Ariosophical race theories, which he took mainly from the writings of Lanz and List. In addition, he relied on the so-called ‘World Ice Theory’ of the Austrian Hanns Hörbiger (1860–1931), who had explained the sinking of Atlantis with the falling of a moon onto the earth (Wessely 2006; Kurlander 2017). Georg referred to the vril in connection with Atlantean airships, whose description he adopted almost unchanged from Scott-Elliot. We learn that, at first, the airships had been operated with a kind of “astral fluid,” “which is described as a magnetic-odic force personally inherent in the Atlantean man. Later, however, by Vril: the seed fuel of an ethereal nature ‘distilled’ from plant germs.” The vril, Georg explained, was described “accurately” by Theosophical clairvoyants, evidently a reference to Scott-Elliot’s clairvoyant description of Atlantis (Georg 1930, 86–87).
All of the sources mentioned by Shou that address the vril can be traced back to Scott-Elliot, which once again shows the great influence the ‘Atlantean Vril’ of the Theosophical author has exerted. It is interesting to note that beyond these undoubtedly un- or ‘pseudo’-scientific sources, Shou also referred to the latest scientific findings, namely, atomic physics and quantum theory. Being always anxious about the ‘scientific’ foundation of his statements, he saw in the new discoveries both a confirmation of “ancient knowledge” and a possibility for human development. According to Shou, the recent research of one man had come especially close to this possibility: “The Austrian Schappeller,” he wrote, “claims to have rediscovered in Aurols-Münster this primal force, the VRIL, in its vacuum force” (Shou 1951, 17).
6 Karl Schappeller’s Raumkraft
The inventor Karl Schappeller (1875–1947) had claimed to be able to use a cosmic elemental force, which he called Raumkraft (space force or spatial force), with the help of machines he had engineered. To this end, he had conducted research and constructed apparatuses in the castle he had acquired in the small town of Aurolzmünster in Upper Austria. The few publications on Schappeller depict him as either charlatan or genius (Freund 2000, 167–82; Bahn and Gehring 1997, 112–33; also see Kalmar 1932). It is a fact that Schappeller’s work made a great impression on many contemporaries and that he was able to gather numerous followers and supporters—among them even the former Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859–1941), to whom Schappeller owed a large part of his financing. Schappeller’s theses also attracted much attention in occultist circles.
A prominent admirer of Schappeller was Lanz, who called the inventor “a titan in the technical-physical field” (Lanz von Liebenfels 1930) and mentioned him in several of his publications. In his Bibliomystikon, Lanz wrote that the research of Schappeller helped to give back to man his old “electrozoic powers” (Lanz von Liebenfels 1931, 44). In the same breath, Lanz also referred to the Ariosophist Frenzolf Schmid, a “former professor of the Academy” who later became an SS Obersturmbannführer with connections to Heinrich Himmler’s Ariosophical protégé Karl Maria Wiligut (1866–1946), and who was apparently involved in the famous SS expedition to Tibet (Wegener 2013, 98; 2016, 60; Miliopoulos 2007, 163). Lanz was interested in Schmid because he wrote about the properties of still unexplored rays in connection with healing procedures. In 1931, he published the alleged text of an Attalantean Ur-Bible according to “Attalantean traditions and ancient Indian records.” The prophet Moses, Schmid claimed, had merely copied these original texts (Schmid 1931, 5). Herbert Reichstein (1892–1944), the influential Ariosophical publisher, also wrote about Schmid’s and Schappeller’s researches (Reichstein 1930, 201–6; see also Goodrick-Clarke 2004, 145–54; 1985).
It is not surprising, then, that Schappeller’s theses enjoyed a high reputation in Ariosophical circles and must have been known to anyone who followed the Ariosophical publications of that time. Even though Schappeller’s records are lost, a large part of his theses and experiments are preserved through the writings of his followers (Wetzel et al. 1928; X. X. 1929; Talus 1929). A booklet on Raumkraft published in 1928 was edited by Franz Wetzel and Louis Gföllner. The former had made a name for himself as a dowsing expert and ran the Munich-Solln-based Herold-Verlag, which printed, among other things, the journal Natur und Kultur. Wetzel’s publishing house also printed a Guide to the Use of the Terrella Magnetic Globe, which Gföllner had written together with other authors. The term ‘Terrella’ derives from the experiments conducted in 1600 by William Gilbert (1544–1603), the personal physician of Queen Elizabeth I, which suggested that the earth itself was to be regarded as a large magnet.
A much more comprehensive account of Schappeller’s theories can be found in a book published in 1955 by the Briton Cyril W. Davson (1881–1969). According to the author, he had already written the book in 1942, after having spent three to four years with Schappeller. Since he was separated from his companion by the war, he was forced to write it by himself (Davson 1955, 9, 21). Davson’s book should be taken with a grain of salt, if only because of its hagiographic character: “When the right motives are there, the New Age will dawn, and the new instrument with which to construct a new and better world will at last be recognized and gratefully accepted” (27). Although forgotten today, Schappeller’s Raumkraft had a considerable influence at the time, as evidenced by the former Kaiser’s support of the Austrian inventor.
In his Verschollene Kulturen, Eugen Georg also referred to Schappeller’s apparatuses and saw in them a possible future source of energy. He emphasized that “the fate of the human race” would be decided by “technical-scientific and spiritual-moral progress” (Georg 1930, 282). Technical progress would give the individual the means to become a “magician” and ultimately even a god. “Once, in Atlantean early periods, mankind seems already to have experienced a great technical, probably even a metatechnical-magical culture.” After this development had been interrupted, humankind was again
on the way to a metatechnique and magiotechnique. The goal lies in not assessable distance. One day man will be able to intervene into the innermost essence of matter and life with an energetic technique which is unimaginable today. Then he will “conjure” in exactly the same way as nature has been “conjuring” for millions of years—in a way that is still inimitable at the moment. (Georg 1930, 255–56)
The understanding of science of many occultists becomes abundantly clear in these lines. “The realm of phenomenal science is over,” Georg proclaimed. “The realm of occult and magical physics and biology begins” (1930, 256). By mastering these advanced new technologies, man could become master of nature: “That makes him the energetic master of the world! That makes him the renewer of the creation! To the Second Demiurge: to the Homo demiurgos and Imitator Dei!” (258). This way of thinking is reflected in numerous contemporary publications that play an outstanding role for the later reception of vril. These publications express the longing to ascend to the nature-controlling god-man in a time of perceived decline, by mastering the all-pervading elemental force—the vril.
7 Conclusion and Outlook: Postwar Continuities
We have seen how, since the publication of The Coming Race in 1871, ideas about esoteric teachings, occult forces of nature, and superior ancient civilizations were combined with contemporary scientific discourse and attempts to develop revolutionary technological devices that would solve society’s problems and elevate humanity to a new evolutionary stage. In the interwar period, these desires took on an increasingly political character, reflecting cultural anxieties, especially in German-speaking Europe, where currents such as Ariosophy were an expression of the skyrocketing success of völkisch and other nationalist and racist ideologies, including National Socialism. The constant emphasis on the spiritual, biological, and civilizational superiority of the Vril-ya lent itself to far-right fantasies of racial superiority, the Atlantean origins of the ‘Aryan race,’ and world domination following the mastery of occult forces. From the 1930s onward, these ideas were crucial for authors such as Julius Evola (1898–1974), Savitri Devi (1905–1982), or Miguel Serrano (1917–2009). This discourse produced a range of elements that are at the center of present-day far-right esoteric narratives, including the idea of ‘the North’ and the star system of Aldebaran as well as futuristic technical devices, especially flying machines powered by vril.
Rather than a relic of Victorian fantasy and a bygone interwar radicalism, these ideas are rapidly growing in importance, particularly within far-right networks spanning from the United States, Europe, and Russia to Australia and New Zealand. The symbol of the ‘Black Sun,’ for instance, which is inherently linked to the notion of vril since the 1950s (Strube 2012; Pfeiffer 2021), was prominently displayed in 2017 at the white nationalist Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, VA, during the 2019 terrorist attack on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, during the 2019 attack on a synagogue in the German city of Halle, during the Buffalo, NY, attack in 2022, among Russian radical nationalists and neo-Nazis, and as part of the former official insignia of the Ukrainian Azov Battalion. Although these are obviously no marginal developments, their historical sources remain largely under-studied. This chapter has only been able to shine a spotlight on them, which will hopefully serve to highlight the importance of further investigation into esoteric networks of the decades around 1900 and their continuities since the end of World War II.
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