Masonic Essay. by Nicolas Laos For The Gnostic Warior

Educational Material for the Members of the
Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry ©
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Copyright © August 2022 by Nicolas Laos

All rights reserved. No part of this essay may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or
transmitted in any form or by any means: electronic, electrostatic, magnetic, tape, mechanical
photocopying, recording or otherwise without the written permission of the Author.
Dr. Nicolas Laos has coined the term “Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry,” he
is the Founder and Grand Master of the Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite
of Symbolic Masonry, and he has written the ritual, the lectures-catechisms, and the
constitution of the Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry (scheduled to appear by Trine Day LLC in 2022).
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“Yesterday was too early, tomorrow it will be too late,” said Lenin
With this essay, I announce that, in the summer of 2022, I began preparing the
publication of a large volume entitled The Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry: A Freemasonic Reformation To the Glory of the Enlightened Humanity
and a Movement for a Humanistic World Order, which I wrote during a period of
almost fourteen years, in the context of international esoteric work and with the help
of dedicated collaborators. The publication of this book will be carried out by the
American publishing company Trine Day LLC (www.trineday.com) later in 2022.
This book presents a blueprint for Masonic reform. In particular, the aforementioned
book under publication will provide:
(i) a system of esoteric and socio-political education, combining esotericism
with historicity;
(ii) a method of understanding the reality of the world and the reality of
consciousness;
(iii) a philosophical approach to Freemasonry and a Freemasonic approach to
philosophy;
(iv) an investigation of the meaning and the history of Freemasonry;
(v) the Ritual of the “Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry”
(M∴P∴R∴S∴M∴), which I have personally composed with a clear vision
and a clear set of goals, which are fully explained in the present book;
(vi) an exact exposition of the ethos, the structure, and the substantive content
of the Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry, of which I am the Founder and Grand Master; and
(vii) an open invitation to a specific Freemasonic and existential path.
I invented the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry (in my mother Greek
language: “Νεωτερικός και Τελεσιουργικός Τύπος του Συμβολικού Τεκτονισμού”),
and I gave it this name, in order to fuse Freemasonry, the spiritual core of modernity,
and a vision of humanity’s perfection into a consistent, secular, scholarly rigorous,
historically aware, politically responsible, humanistic, and rational Order of Symbolic
Masonry.
This is the context in which I find true meaning and purpose in Freemasonry. I
couldn’t care less about any variety of Freemasonry that is captivated by elementary
lessons of Protestant and bourgeois ethics, or by occult delirium, or by techniques of
mutual flattery and fraudulent manipulation, or by the logic of the contemporary
public-relations and marketing industry (or by parastatal projects). Additionally, I
have outgrown all those elementary Masonries which prohibit political and religious
discussion in their Lodges, are organized as single-sex associations, and function like
bourgeois “Sunday schools.” But I am deeply interested in Freemasonry as an
instrument and a method of deep socio-cultural engineering; and, by composing the
Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry, I have created a Freemasonic
institution equipped with a specific socio-cultural and ideological “architectural plan.”
In this attempt, I have been supported in many ways by a large, but most importantly
highly cultured, group of international friends, with whom we have been walking (and
working) on the same spiritual path for more than ten years.
In the spring of 2008, a small group of Freemasons and other distinguished men
and women of the civil society, who were provisionally styled as the “Scholarly and
Political Order of the Ur-Illuminati,” or a “Masonic Society of Illuminists,” met at an
office in Wilton Road, in South West London, accepted me as its chairman, and we
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decided to undertake and accomplish a difficult and bold Project regarding the
reformation of Freemasonry along the lines that I explain in Chapter 1 of this book.
Gradually, many Freemasonic, scientific, and philosophical adepts as well as business
people and technocrats from around the world embarked on this Project. During
2008–21, several well-protected meetings took place and several task forces and
workshops were organized in different European cities in order for this Project to be
accomplished; and, for a long period of time, we had to keep our Project protected
and concealed behind or within other organizations and to apply counterintelligence
methods and techniques (mainly in order to anticipate and preempt disruptions). Thus,
complying with every initiatory formality of the corresponding initiatory system, I
have created various types of Masonic Lodges, esoteric Colleges, and illuminist
associations in order to serve as outer, protective rings of the Modern and Perfecting
Rite of Symbolic Masonry during the latter’s “nascent period” and to help me keep
the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry innocent and undefiled.
As a private exclusive membership organization, in general, and as a fraternity that
educates and empowers a revolutionary elite, in particular, we value privacy; and, as
the English Chartist poet Charles Mackay wrote in his poem No Enemies, “He who
has mingled in the fray / Of duty, that the brave endure, / Must have made foes! If you
have none, / Small is the work that you have done.” For more than ten years, several
select friends of mine, persons of principles, have been helping me to create and
manage a few esoteric groups worldwide in order to promote our socio-cultural
master plan in different ways and to use different filtering processes. Just as a perfect
edifice must have an adequate structure of different rooms, a good lighting system, a
good ventilation system, and, of course, a good sewer system, so a perfect esoteric
edifice must have a sealed institutional core surrounded by a protective network of
compartmentalized organizations and an efficient assessment and filtering system.
The historical West (founded on the classical Greco-Roman civilization and the
European Enlightenment) is the cradle of the most advanced manifestations of
humanism, philosophy, and science. Nonetheless, in the twentieth century and in the
beginning of the twenty-first century, the yoke of capitalism, specifically manifested
through such institutions as the military-industrial complex, the big oligopolies and
monopolies, and financial oligarchies, as well as postmodernism caused several
serious, highly infectious socio-cultural “autoimmune diseases” in the body of the
Western world (see also: Alfred Claassen, “Gamers,” Multiculturalists and the Great
Coming Apart: The United States since 1965, Oregon: Trine Day, 2021). The West
has been attacking the West (and the rest). The historical experience of the twentieth
and the twenty-first centuries has shown that, while Eastern (Asian and Eurasian)
elites fight against the European Enlightenment from the outside, Western capitalist
elites undermine and blatantly contradict the European Enlightenment from the inside.
Western elites have been systematically attacking the Western humanistic,
philosophical, and scientific legacy by invoking emergency situations (such as
terrorism, financial crises, health crises, climate change, etc.); Western postmodern
currents and postmodern grievance groups (often associated with sexuality, radical
ecology, and the New Age movement) have been systematically alienating the
Western world from the Western traditions of rational grand narratives, deep
historical awareness, and scholarly rigorous critical thinking; and Western high-net-
worth mattoids (often associated with high technology and finance) and grand
mobsters have been systematically transforming the traditional Western bourgeois
civilization into a system that reflects the ethos of Hieronymus Bosch’s “Ship of
Fools” and clashes with every aspect of modern humanism.
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Why do I attach so much importance to fighting postmodernism? Postmodernism

seeks the overthrow of virtually all preceding positions of epistemology, and it is
strongly influenced by the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900). Michel
Foucault, one of the most influential post-modern scholars, argues that “nothing in
man―not even his body―is sufficiently stable to serve as the basis for self-
recognition or for understanding other men” (Michel Foucault, Language, Counter-
Memory, Practice, edited by D. F. Bouchard, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press,
1977, p. 153). Therefore, according to Foucault, there is no escape from the
functioning of power and contingency, and struggle is always necessary to avoid
domination.
Is the will to truth a truth, or is it simply another name for the will to power? “What
in us really wants ‘truth’?” Nietzsche’s answer is the will to power. This is Foucault’s
epistemological thesis, too. Moreover, following this Nietzschean epistemological
argument, Jacques Derrida, one of most influential postmodernists, developed the
theory of deconstruction, according to which texts collapse under their own weight
once it is demonstrated that their “truth content” is merely the “mobile army of
metaphors” identified by Nietzsche (see Christopher Norris, Derrida, London:
Fontana, 1987Norris, 1987).
According to Nietzsche’s conception of the will to power, a false judgment can be
seen as an expression of creativity, and, hence, it can be interpreted as a consequence
of a dynamic attitude to life. But if philosophy recognizes untruth as a condition of
life, and, therefore, it moves beyond every distinction between good and evil,
identifying will as such with truth, then it is necessarily indifferent as to whether an
untrue judgment underpins injustice and violence. In other words, Nietzsche
appreciates and respects creativity as such, without any further qualifications and
without any conditions. But, in this way, contrary to the classical Greek philosophers’
approach to the notion of creativity, Nietzsche’s approach to creativity is unable to
provide a solid foundation for the development of life.
Nietzsche argues that philosophers are dishonest because they pretend that their
thoughts represent objective reality, whereas, for Nietzsche, what they actually do is
to reduce their prejudices, their ideas, to “the truth.” In reality, Nietzsche contends,
philosophers defend judgments that are equivalent to advocates’ tricks or their own
hearts’ desires, but they present them in abstract forms and by means of arguments
which they have articulated after (not before) the original conception of their ideas. It
is useful to mention that this Nietzschean argument underpins Richard Rorty’s
postmodern approach to epistemology, according to which philosophers should give
up on the idea that our knowledge “mirrors” nature and instead adopt a pragmatic
theory of truth, which is compatible with Rorty’s self-description as a “postmodern
bourgeois liberal” (Richard Rorty, Objectivity, Relativism and Truth: Philosophical
Papers, vol. I, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 197–202).
However, Nietzsche makes a mistake: the validity of truth does not depend on its
genealogy but on its logic, its consistency, and the logic of truth depends on the fact
that it can harmoniously unite a multitude of data in a specific perspective. Therefore,
philosophers, being epistemologically sensitive, are not as dishonest as Nietzsche
contends.
Holding the sacred torches of reason and modern revolutionary political thought,
the members of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry fight against all
of the aforementioned socio-cultural “autoimmune diseases” of the West and try to
complete the “challenge of modernity,” which, according to the great Italian
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philosopher and politician Antonio Gramsci (1891–1937), consists in living without

illusions and without becoming disillusioned.
In the modern capitalist world, the social establishment, namely, the nexus of the
ruling elites, systematically manipulates and even creates cultural currents, narratives,
and events, including esoteric societies, in order to achieve the following three goals:
(i) to create social decompression valves, specifically, to create outlets for relieving
anxiety and phobias of the masses in ways that are safe for and controlled by the
social establishment; (ii) to contain and manage fringe social groups and movements
within particular channels and frameworks that are safe for and controlled by the
social establishment; and (iii) to conduct propaganda campaigns and perception-
management operations on a massive scale, both at a national and international level.
For instance, in the second half of the twentieth century, which was an era marked
by the acceleration of capitalist globalization, the Cold War, and the collapse of the
Soviet Union (U.S.S.R.), the capitalist establishment, motivated by the
aforementioned three goals, systematically manipulated the following socio-cultural
phenomena:
- the Rock and the Punk subcultures (trying to keep and, thus, control critically
important segments of the youth and forces of social dissidence within
particular channels and frameworks),
- the New Age movement (which is highly malleable and underpins the creation
of numerous “sur-mesure” esoteric “schools” and “new religious
movements”),
- Freemasonry (used by cunning elites as an instrument for the manipulation of
members of the petty and the middle bourgeoisie),
- modern art (e.g., Jackson Pollock was supported by the CIA as an American
response to the Soviet art in the context of the artistic Cold War),
- nihilistic “stand-up comedians” and pseudo-radical showmen and social
influencers (who were agents of controlled opposition and disinformation
agents),
- reality shows (such as the “Big Brother TV reality competition show,” which
promotes people’s acculturation to totalitarian and exploitative regimes and to
degrading treatment),
- radical ethnic and religious organizations (especially Christian, Jewish, and
Muslim ones),
- as well as various fake conspiracy theories and fanciful tales about medieval
knights, Illuminati, UFOs, ancient secrets, Mary Magdalene and Jesus Christ,
the “Holy Grail,” special privileged “bloodlines,” “Ascended Masters,” occult
wars, and apocalyptic geopolitics (thus concealing truthful narratives about
such issues and disorienting the consciousness of the social masses).
Whenever any of the aforementioned types of psychological operations tends to get
out of the social establishment’s control, and whenever the social establishment
realizes that they cannot spin a fake narrative enough to their own favor, specialized
bureaucracies (particularly, those related to intelligence services and domestic
security) intervene in order to contain and restructure the corresponding cultural
community or subculture through different means and methods, which may include
the creation and dissemination of alternative fake narratives and spectacles, fomenting
conflict, and even subversive operations through the spread of drug use and
assassinations (see: Harold Fox, Dark Psychology, Independently Published, 2021;
Henrik Krüger, The Great Heroin Coup, Oregon: Trine Day, 2016; Peter
Pomerantsev, Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the
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New Russia, New York: Public Affairs, 2014; Peter Dale Scott, The American Deep
State, updated edition, Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2017). Furthermore, the
capitalist elites want to control ideological discourse: for instance, the hedge-fund
manager George Soros (the founder of the Open Society Foundation) invests on
liberal and leftist social movements and institutes, and he supports the Democratic
Party in the U.S.A., while the hedge-fund manager Robert Leroy Mercer invests on
conservative and right-wing libertarian social movements and institutes, and he
supports the Republican Party in the U.S.A. (see: Walter L. Adamson, Hegemony and
Revolution, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980).
Gorgias is the first of Plato’s political dialogues in which the authentic art of
politics—which, according to Socrates’s definition, cares for the good—is contrasted
with that which merely imitates it and deals only with the question of enforcement.
Under the capitalist system, for the most part, politics is a counterfeit of the authentic
art of politics, a theatrical event. To explain what I mean by this assertion, I would,
first of all, like to recall that one of the most commonly cited examples of a metaphor
in English literature comes from William Shakespeare’s pastoral comedy As You Like
It (Act II, Scene VII):
All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances.
Inspired by Shakespeare’s aforementioned metaphor, I could synoptically describe

the socio-political reality (“historical incidents”) under capitalism as a series of
theatrical plays in the following way: A theater is a building or an outdoor area in
which dramas are performed. Additionally, every theater has a backstage, which is the
resource for actors, movers and shakers in the performing arts. In my metaphor, the
theater allegorizes the mainstream social and political sphere and the overt historical
becoming.
First of all, the spectators of a theatrical performance have to buy a ticket in order
to enter the theater. After entering the theater, they sit in a seat. In front of them is the
theater stage, where the play will be played. The spectators who sit in the theater are
the popular masses that are acculturated to the established system; hence, they have
bought a “ticket” to the “mainstream,” whereas, the “others” are the “pariahs.” There
are four main forms of drama (namely, states of historical becoming under
capitalism): comedy, tragedy, tragicomedy, and melodrama. For instance, crises and
wars are tragic plays; the consumer society and the welfare state fall under the
category of comedy; petty-bourgeois behaviors fall under the category of
tragicomedy; and the phenomena of social climbing, political contestation, patriotism,
and piety fall under the category of melodrama.
In order for a theatrical performance to be played, first of all, there must be a
scriptwriter, who has written the play. The scriptwriters (of the theatrical plays that
the popular masses see and perceive as historical reality) are the members of the
ruling transnational capitalist elite. Every theatrical performance also needs a stage
director. The stage directors are the state intelligence and national security agencies,
and they have assistant stage directors. The assistant stage directors are the diplomats,
the members of the diplomatic corps of the various nation-states and international
organizations. Furthermore, in order for a theatrical performance to be played, we
need actors, who will take on different roles. The actors who have leading roles are
the politicians. The actors who have supporting roles are the journalists. The
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background actors are the members of the judiciary, the police, and the armed forces,
as well as the establishment’s technocrats. Theatrical productions usually have
sponsors. The sponsors are the businesspeople, specifically, those capitalists who are
hierarchically inferior to the ruling transnational capitalist elite (the scriptwriters).
Finally, theaters have stage managers, who provide technical and organizational
support to the director, the actors, the designers, the stage crew, and the technicians
throughout the production process. The stage managers are the various priests, the
religious leaders, the establishment’s spiritual “gurus,” and the leaders of the
conformist Freemasonries and other fraternities.
By contrast, the Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry advocates stern scholarly integrity and aims to historicize Freemasonry in
order to create Freemasons capable of improving themselves and the world within the
context of history, by becoming polymaths and morally responsible persons. Indeed,
the rituals, the catechisms, and the lectures of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of
Symbolic Masonry are carefully crafted to provide its members with an
interdisciplinary program of intellectual development and with a method for
developing moral consciousness.
In 2022, the aforementioned Project, which started in London in 2008, came to
completion with the publication of this book. By the end of 2021, I had managed to
write the final draft of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry
(M∴P∴R∴S∴M∴), which is included in this book, and it has been approved by my
associates in the context of the aforementioned Project. Thus, in 2022, the
Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry
(A∴O∴M∴P∴R∴S∴M∴) was officially founded and publicly disclosed as a robust,
fully developed, strong, and independent Freemasonic subject. The old group of the
“Scholarly and Political Order of the Ur-Illuminati” has reached its “telos” and, thus,
it has been developed into the “Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite
of Symbolic Masonry,” just as, in the seventeenth century, Dr. John Wilkins’s
“Invisible College” was developed into the “Royal Society.”
History teaches that the decision of many organizations, esoteric or otherwise, to go
the clandestine route tends to severely limit their recruitment policy to less than
suitable candidates. On the other hand, those organizations, esoteric or otherwise, that
seek to operate in the mainstream sphere of their day run the risk of being assimilated
by corrupt or spiritually insignificant agents of the social establishment and
subordinating their declared objectives to the dictates of public relations and
marketing. The Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry (A∴O∴M∴P∴R∴S∴M∴) has managed to overcome the aforementioned
dilemma and the associated risks by consistently implementing an elitist and
ideologically driven policy, requiring the fulfillment of very strict terms and
conditions of admission. In this Order, the practice of Freemasonry is a highly elitist
and highly ideologized activity, in every sense of the terms “elitist” and
“ideologized.”
Although our Masonic Order has its own, distinct ideology, philosophy, and
agenda, the way I organized it is, in terms of methodology, inspired by the following
scholarly institutions:
- the eighteenth-century French group of the “philosophes,” who promoted a
“republic of letters” and composed the famous Encyclopédie;
- the American system of liberal education, which promotes integration of
learning across the curriculum and co-curriculum, interdisciplinary studies,
and a synthesis between academic and experiential learning;
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- various science clubs operating in American and British universities;

- the Institute for Advanced Study, located in Princeton, New Jersey;
- as well as political and economic think-tanks and clubs (such as the Chatham
House, the Business Council for International Understanding, the Davos
World Economic Forum, the China Center for Contemporary World Studies,
the Valdai Discussion Club, etc.).
Moreover, my method of action in the realm of Freemasonry has taken inspiration
from the following esoteric/secret societies:
- Pythagorean and Platonic/Neoplatonic associations or “schools” (as
exemplified, for instance, by: Iamblichus, The Theology of Arithmetic, trans.
R. Waterfield, Michigan: Phanes Press, 1988; John Dillon, The Heirs of Plato:
A Study of the Old Academy, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2003; and Hans
Joachim Krämer, Plato and the Foundations of Metaphysics, ed. and trans. J.
R. Catan, New York: State University of New York Press, 1990);
- the legendary Rosicrucian society whose methodology is described in the
seventeenth-century Rosicrucian manifestos;
- the irregular American Masonic Lodges of the eighteenth century, which
supported the American Revolution of 1776;
- liberal French Freemasonry, which supported the French Revolution of 1789
(one of the French Revolution’s mottos was “Liberty, Equality, and
Fraternity,” and this was also the motto of the Grand Orient de France, which
was founded by French Freemasons in 1773);
- the Jacobin Club (which was the most famous political group of the French
Revolution, and it got this name because it rented for its meetings the refectory
of the Couvent des Jacobins, a Dominican monastery on rue Saint-Honoré, in
Paris);
- the Grand Orient of the Peoples of Russia, which, in the 1910s, politicized
Russian Freemasonry, supported the February Revolution, namely, the first
stage of the Russian Revolution of 1917, and it facilitated the conquest of
power by the Bolsheviks;
- the Italian Carbonari and Giuseppe Mazzini’s Young Italy movement (in his
“General Instructions for the Members of Young Italy,” Mazzini highlighted
“a law of Progress and Duty”);
- Kabbalistic currents (such as the synthesis between Christian mysticism,
Kabbalistic thought, and Neoplatonic philosophy by the Italian Renaissance
scholar Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, who introduced the Kabbalah to the
emerging Renaissance Neoplatonists and presented his seventy-two
Kabbalistic Conclusiones as a way of confirming the Christian religion
starting with the fundamentals of the Hebrew spirituality; and the community
of the nineteenth-century Russian philosopher Vladimir Sergeyevich Soloviev,
who used the Kabbalistic term “Ein Sof,” meaning “without end, infinite,” to
describe the “positive nothingness” of the ground of being, thus articulating an
apophatic theology of the divine essence before creation, while simultaneously
using the Kabbalistic term “Adam Kadmon,” meaning “primordial
man/Adam,” to describe the supernal man, or Logos, who was the
intermediary between the “Ein Sof” and the world);
- the nineteenth-century League of the Just (German: Bund der Gerechten),
which tasked Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels with writing a political
manifesto (and the resulting document was The Communist Manifesto);
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- and the secret societies that were founded by the German tailor, operative
Mason, inventor, communist scholar, and political activist Wilhelm Christian
Weitling (1808–71).
But the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry, which I have composed
and expose in this book, is the master plan, the strategic vision itself, and the
conclusion of my esoteric research.
The two poles of attraction of my personality are Wisdom and War. Like the
ancient Greco-Roman goddess Athena/Minerva, I am a lover of Wisdom and a lover
of War. War is inextricably linked to the dialectic of reality itself, it is an outgrowth of
the contradictions of real life, and it signifies the struggle of a human being or a
human community to produce history. In one way or another, the productive world is
marked by war. Furthermore, we can discern and assess different categories of people
and societies by analyzing the kinds of war that they fight. For instance, there are
wars fought for the sake of capitalist profits, whereas other wars are fought for the
sake of social justice. There are wars fought against knowledge, whereas other wars
are fought in order to defend and expand knowledge. There are wars fought against
humanity’s freedom, whereas other wars are fought for the sake of humanity’s
freedom, etc. From my perspective, “peace” is an alliance between people who fight
the same kinds of war.
Furthermore, paraphrasing Vladimir Lenin’s arguments about “Dogmatism and
‘Freedom of Criticism’” (from his book What Is to Be Done?), I would like to point
out that, since we are convinced that the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry has made a major, strategic progress in the philosophy of Freemasonry, we
do not seek freedom for this new philosophy of Freemasonry to continue side by side
with old, intellectually and socio-politically dilapidated varieties of Freemasonry, but
the substitution of this new variety of Freemasonry for the old, intellectually and
socio-politically dilapidated Freemasonic institutions. This struggle must be
organized, and it is organized, according to all the rules of the Craft, by people who
are experts in the social sciences, in general, and in Freemasonry, in particular.
What is true is NOT what is true for you. What is true is what is true both in itself
and for you, since, as I explain in this book and, particularly, in the Modern and
Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry, truth originates from the contact and interplay
between consciousness and reality, and reality refers to and comprises both the reality
of consciousness and the reality of the world. However, one of the most remarkable
maladies of our times is the fact that many people willfully choose ignorance (thus, I
never stop being amazed by the operation of spiritually insignificant and atavistic
Freemasonries, fake illuminist/Illuminati “Orders,” superstitious religious institutions,
and delusional occult organizations).
Our Order in general and my research work in philosophy in particular follow a
way of thinking whose origin can be traced to Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, and it is
based on “universal definitions.” This way of thinking consists in thinking upon
thinking itself, thus leading contemplation to a level that supersedes mere practical
thinking and spontaneity. For instance, instead of confining himself to practical moral
prescriptions and instead of being content with spontaneous moral judgments arising
from the observation of nature, Plato developed a rigorous and systematic thinking
about moral questions, such as courage (in his dialogue Laches), temperance (in his
dialogue Charmides), justice (in his dialogue Republic), and piety (in his dialogue
Euthyphro), and he sought answers regarding the general idea that underlies these
concepts. This way of thinking, namely, thinking upon thinking itself, makes possible
a serious discussion about the questions of “what” and “why,” rather than being
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limited to the question of “how” and practical micromanagement, and, thus, it opens
the mind to the world of philosophy and genuine strategy. This is the reason why
philosophy and history (understood as an expression of human creativity as opposed
to natural necessity) were originally invented by the ancient Greek civilization.
When my publisher, Kris Millegan, the founder and director of Trine Day LLC,
wrote to me that his “agenda is a better, brighter and bolder future for the world’s
children, and theirs,” I felt that we reconfirmed an alliance of principles and values.
Indeed, I would like to express my gratitude to Kris Millegan, whose work and ethos
both as a publisher and as a published researcher are exemplar. Kris Millegan has
edited such enlightening books as: The Octopus Conspiracy and Other Vignettes of
the Counterculture, from Hippies to High Times to Hip-Hop & Beyond (authored by
Steven Hager) and Expendable Elite: One Soldier’s Journey into Covert Warfare
(authored by Daniel Marvin), published by Trine Day LLC. He is a renowned
researcher in “deep politics,” and his father, Lloyd S. Millegan, was in the Office of
Strategic Services (OSS), the Service of Military Intelligence (G2), and later went to
the CIA, becoming Head of Division, Head of Intelligence Analysis for East Asia. It
gives me great satisfaction and honor that Kris Millegan undertook the publication of
my book.
The Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry is
a Freemasonic Order that is registered to the Western modernity, a synthesis between
rationalism and scientific realism, socialism, and progressivism, and it is founded on
the conceptual triplet
〈𝑑𝑖𝑎𝑙𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑐 𝑜𝑓 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑑𝑦𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑐𝑖𝑡𝑦, 𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑙 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑚, 𝑐𝑦𝑏𝑒𝑟𝑛𝑒𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑠〉
as delineated in this book. Thus, instead of advocating for the dictatorship of the
capital, or for the dictatorship of the proletariat, or for democratic illusions, or for
postmodern grievance groups, we propose a regime based on government by those
whom Plato has called the “epaiontes” (i.e., “those with real understanding,” the
“genuine experts,” “those who perceive things according to their nature”), provided of
course that capitalism is eliminated in the context of a feasible and scientifically
rigorous socialism (since capitalism subjugates expertise to particular capitalist
expediencies). All these controversial concepts are explained in detail and
systematically in this book. Epaiontes of the world unite!
Nicolas Laos, 3ο M∴P∴R∴S∴M∴

Founder and Grand Master of the
Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry ©
Athens, Greece, August 2022

Email: nlaosoffice3@gmail.com
Or
Via the podcast Gnostic Warrior – By Moe Bedard: gnosticwarrior.com
11
Above: Nicolas Laos presiding over a Masonic ceremony that took place in the Bensousan
Han (a pub and inn built by a Jewish merchant called Samuel Bensousan in 1810, in
Thessaloniki, Macedonia, Greece, during the last century of the Ottoman era), Summer
Solstice 2022.
My Freemasonic background has three milestones. The first milestone is my

initiation in Symbolic Masonry and, particularly, my raising to the degree of a Master
Mason. The second milestone is my initiation in the Ancient and Accepted Scottish
Rite and, particularly, my elevation to the 33rd and last degree of this Rite. The third
milestone is my initiation in the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim
and, particularly, my elevation to the 97th and last degree of this Rite.
In 1997, at the age of 23, I was initiated into Freemasonry in London, specifically,
in the “Honor Per Onus” Lodge No. 6586 of the United Grand Lodge of England
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(UGLE), having been “proposed” by the late W. Bro. Theodore Frangos, who was a
Grand Officer of the United Grand Lodge of England, a Grand Elected Knight
Kadosh (under the auspices of the Supreme Council 33 ο for England and Wales), a
prominent member of the Cypriot-British community of London, and an Archon
(honoree) of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople (my “seconder” being the
late W. Bro. Constantine Drakos, PM, Grand Elected Knight Kadosh). Within six
months after my initiation, I was raised to the sublime degree of a Master Mason.
During 1997–99, at Lodge meetings (which were taking place at the Freemasons’
Hall, the headquarters of the United Grand Lodge of England, which has been at 60
Great Queen St, London, since 1775), I had several opportunities of meeting
interesting and well-intended people and of reading many authoritative Masonic
books and historical documents at the Grand Library, where I had the opportunity to
personally interact with two brilliant senior members of the UGLE’s staff, namely,
V.W. Bro. John Hamill (who was the then Grand Librarian of the UGLE) and W. Bro.
Julian Perry (who was the then media relations coordinator of the UGLE). Moreover,
during 1999 and 2000, I had the opportunity to practise the English form of Symbolic
Masonry in the National Grand Lodge of Greece (specifically, in the “Greek-Speaking
Hotel” Lodge No. 67). During that period, I also explored appendant Masonic Orders,
specifically, the Order of the Holy Royal Arch of Jerusalem, the Order of Mark
Masonry, the Order of the Royal and Select Masters, and the Orders of the Knights
Templar and the Knights of Malta, affiliated with the National Grand Lodge of
Greece on the basis of Charters issued to them by the corresponding British Masonic
Bodies. During 2001–03, I accumulated a few more Freemasonic experiences by
participating in the labors of the “Etairia ton Filikon” Lodge No. 116 under the
auspices of the Grand Lodge of Greece. Moreover, during 1999–2003, I investigated
the history of the Greek Masonic schism of 1986, which led to the formation of the
National Grand Lodge of Greece by Lodges that seceded from the Grand Lodge of
Greece in an effort to consolidate Greek Freemasonry, which had been extensively
debased and corrupted by the policy of the Grand Lodge of Greece.
By the middle of the 2000s, I had already forged important friendships in the
United Grand Lodge of England, in the National Grand Lodge of Greece, and in the
Grand Lodge of Greece, but I had also realized that many Freemasonries have lost
their significance, many Freemasons actually sail in the chaos of diverse experiences
that they accumulate without being able to synthesize them into a consistent
existential strategy and world-conception, and several Freemasonic factions operate as
networks of white-collar crime or even as agents of state bureaucracies that are known
as the “deep state.” For instance, a famous case of a “deep state” institution was the
Italian Lodge “Propaganda Due,” better known as “P2,” under the leadership of the
Italian financier and CIA asset Licio Gelli (see: Daniele Ganser, NATO’s Secret
Armies: Operation GLADIO and Terrorism in Western Europe, London: Routledge,
2004). It is important to mention that, as the French Professor of Legal History and
literary critic Jacques de Saint Victor has argued, mafia (specifically, the European
and American transnational system of organized crime) was born in the “décombres”
(ruins) of the feudal regime, and it was developed further as a consequence of the
advent of bourgeois democracy and capitalism from the nineteenth century onwards
(Jacques de Saint Victor, Un Pouvoir Invisible: Les Mafias et la Société
Démocratique (XIXe–XXIe Siècles), Paris: Gallimard, 2012). In fact, the essence of
modern mafia is the result of the merger between a rotten nobility and a criminal
bourgeoisie, and various secret/“esoteric” societies (such as the notorious Italian
13
Masonic Lodge “P2”) and private exclusive membership clubs operate as front
organizations for the mafia, often in collaboration with state bureaucracies.
Several phenomena of counter-initiation, such as the above, occur both in the
countries of the capitalist core and in the countries of the capitalist periphery. In fact,
the Masonic institutions of countries that belong to the capitalist periphery are often
manipulated by the dominant Masonic Orders and Rites of the capitalist core, which
proclaim themselves to be the ultimate authority on “regular” Freemasonry. The
meaning of “counter-initiation” itself has been systematically studied by the French
philosopher and prolific author René Guénon (1886–1951). As a Freemason, as an
avid reader, and as a professional associated with private intelligence companies, I
have created important files containing information about the “front-stage” and the
“back-stage” aspects of Masonic history, and I have systematically studied the
contradiction between the forces of “initiation” and the forces of “counter-initiation”
(see also: Jedediah French and Angel Millar, eds, The Art and Science of Initiation,
London: Lewis Masonic, 2019). Having said the above, I maintain that Freemasonry,
being essentially about “building” minds and societies, can, indeed, exist and operate
as a tool for intellectual development and existential nobility.
True initiatory institutions help and guide people to become conscious of the
contents that press upward from the unconscious, upward from the level of instinct, or
blind nature, and to ascend to the level of reason, thus becoming what Plato has called
a “Philosopher King” over themselves and the world. The essential core of
civilization is nothing else but the transformation of nature into the dominion of
humanity’s reason and will. Thus, there is an on-going contradiction between the
“initiatory secret” and the “profane”: the former leads to the expansion of
consciousness, freedom, and illumination, whereas the latter leads to inner shrinking,
serfdom, and obscurantism.
According to ancient Greek mythology, Orpheus founded the Orphic Mysteries.
The rites of those mysteries were based on the myth of Dionysus Zagreus, the son of
Zeus and Persephone. When Zeus proposed to make Zagreus the ruler of the universe,
the Titans disagreed, and they dismembered the boy and devoured him. Athena saved
Zagreus’s heart and gave it to Zeus, who swallowed the heart, from which was born
the second Dionysus Zagreus. Moreover, Zeus destroyed the Titans with lightning.
From the ashes of the Titans sprang the human race, who were part divine (Dionysus)
and part evil (Titan). This double aspect of human nature, the Dionysian and the
Titanic, plays a key role in Orphism. The Orphics affirmed the divine origin of the
soul, but they believed that the soul could be liberated from its Titanic inheritance and
could achieve eternal bliss through initiation into the Orphic Mysteries (see: William
K. C. Guthrie, Orpheus and Greek Religion: A Study of the Orphic Movement,
Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1993).
Another important friend of mine in the English Masonic Obedience was the late
Fra John Baron Dudley von Sydow von Hoff (1937–2016), who was also a
professional member of the staff of the Grand Secretary’s Office at the Mark Masons’
Hall, in London. The Mark Masons’ Hall is the administrative headquarters of ten
appendant Freemasonic Orders affiliated with the United Grand Lodge of England.
Moreover, Fra John Baron Dudley von Sydow von Hoff was the Master-General of
the United Grand Priories of the Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem, a
British non-Masonic, chivalric and charitable organization based on the legacy of the
medieval Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem. Fra John Baron Dudley
von Sydow von Hoff has shared with me some of his important experiences and
insights regarding the administrative aspects of Freemasonic institutions, and he
14
bestowed upon me the title of a Knight of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem at the 26th
Investiture Ceremony of the Grand Priory of England, Wales, Isle of Man and Chanel
Islands, held on the 27th of September 2008 in the Priory Church of Saint
Bartholomew the Great in the City of London.
In the Middle Ages, the Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem was one of
the four major Crusading Orders (the other three being the Knights Templar, the
Knights of Saint John, and the Teutonic Knights). The history of the Lazarite
Hospitallers in the twentieth century goes back to the 1930s. In fact, in 1929, a
“Council of Officers” of the “Association” of the Lazarite Hospitallers approached the
Duke of Seville, and offered him the “Grand Mastership of the Order.” It was not,
however, until the 12th of December 1935 that he was proclaimed the “44th Grand
Master.” The Grand Priory of England, Wales, Isle of Man and Channel Islands of the
Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem was formed, consecrated, and
established, on the 1st of January 1995 under the leadership of a highly experienced
Lazarite Knight, namely, Fra John Baron Dudley von Sydow von Hoff, and it was
gradually developed into the United Grand Priories of the Hospitaller Order of Saint
Lazarus of Jerusalem, which was formed on the 13th of May 1999, as an independent
British branch of the Lazarite Hospitallers.
Above: Dr. Nicolas Laos (on the left) and Fra John Baron Dudley von Sydow von Hoff (on
the right), wearing their distinctive insignia of the Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of
Jerusalem, at an investiture ceremony of the United Grand Priories of the Hospitaller Order of
Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem that took place in the Anglican Church of St. Paul in Athens,
Greece, in 2008, with the blessings of Canon Malcolm Bradshaw, MBE (second photograph,
on the far right), Chaplain of St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Greater Athens.
The English Freemasonic tradition is founded on Operative Masonry, and, indeed,

this approach to Freemasonry has put an indelible imprint on the way I think about
Freemasonry. However, wishing to expand my Freemasonic horizons and to enrich
my Freemasonic journey with more philosophical elements, I decided to join the
Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. I did so in the context of my participation in a
prestigious and authoritative Italian Masonic Obedience known as the Ordine
Massonico Tradizionale Italiano, in Rome. The Ordine Massonico Tradizionale
Italiano is a “mixed” initiatory Order, in the sense that it admits both men and women
to membership. It has many Lodges throughout Italy as well as in Berlin, Saint
Petersburg, Santo Domingo, Warsaw, and Toronto, it maintains fraternal bonds of
mutual recognition and cooperation with many other Masonic Obediences around the
world, and it practises and exerts sovereign control over Symbolic Masonry, the
Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, the Rectified Scottish Rite, the Egyptian Rite of
Misraim, and the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim (see:
http://www.ordinemassonicotradizionale.it/). From the outset of my participation in
the Ordine Massonico Tradizionale Italiano, I realized that the Brothers and the
15
Sisters of the numerous Lodges that this Order rules in Italy and elsewhere constitute
an authentic Masonic fraternity, not only in a formal sense, but also in a substantive
one. I have forged deep personal and Masonic relations with Sister Pierpaola
Meledandri, who is a very active member of the Ordine Massonico Tradizionale
Italiano and a distinguished lawyer in Rome, as well as with Most Venerable Brother
Luigi Pruneti, who is the Grand Master of the Ordine Massonico Tradizionale
Italiano, a highly experienced and influential Italian Freemason, and a very productive
and inspiring author.
Regarding Br. Luigi Pruneti’s Masonic background and expertise, it is worth
mentioning that, before becoming the Grand Master of the Ordine Massonico
Tradizionale Italiano, he served as the Grand Master of the Grand Loggia d’Italia
degli ALAM (Antichi Liberi Accettati Muratori) from 2007 to 2013, and was elevated
to the 33rd degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite in 1992 in that
Obedience. The Grand Loggia d’Italia degli ALAM was founded in Italy in 1910 as a
mixed Masonic Obedience by a group of Scottish Rite Masons who split from the
Grande Oriente d’Italia in 1908 in order to reform Italian Freemasonry. In 2017, he
was regularly installed as the Founding Grand Master of the Ordine Massonico
Tradizionale Italiano, which is an independent Masonic Obedience. Acting according
to the authorities with which he is vested as the Grand Master of the aforementioned
Order, M.V. Brother Luigi Pruneti put me forward to be elevated to the 33rd and ne
plus ultra degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite and to be admitted to the
Sovereign Italian Sanctuary of the Egyptian Rite of Misraim.
On the 4th of August 2020, the Italian online journal L’Opinione delle Libertà
published an interview of Grand Master Br. Luigi Pruneti (see:
http://opinione.it/societa/2020/08/04/pierpaola-meledandri_luigi-pruneti-gran-
maestro-dell-ordine-massonico-tradizionale-italiano-gran-loggia-d-italia-degli-alam-
gran-commendatore/). In that interview, Grand Master Br. Luigi Pruneti stated the
following regarding Freemasonry:
Masonry is a complex associative phenomenon, therefore it is articulated on

different levels; in other words, it is like a polyhedron showing different faces.
Consequently, it is a spiritual path and an initiatory communion; it is a school of
values and a method of civil and social growth; it is a meeting place where
people of different sexes, social background, and cultural background meet on a
level of absolute equality; it is a way of knowing, where the Socratic motto “I
know that I do not know” functions as a guide; it is an itinerary in stages, along
which those who know how to look within themselves are able to better
understand the other on their own.
The Ordine Massonico Tradizionale Italiano has declared that its esoteric work
aims to improve the human being, and that, by this, it means the following (source:
http://www.ordinemassonicotradizionale.it/1/chi_siamo_1275497.html): (i) Full
realization and defense of such human values as: freedom, equality, fraternity,
tolerance, respect for others, and solidarity. (ii) Refusal of any discrimination. (iii)
Development of the dynamics of listening and dialogue, according to the aphorism of
G. Calogero: “Understand the other as you would like to be done with you.” (iv)
Search for truth through the application of methodological doubt. (v) The promotion
of the autonomy of consciousness and of the decision to combat any desire for
fraudulent manipulation and conditioning. (vi) In-depth study of the initiatory path,
based on the Masonic method, which encompasses explanations of images, narratives,
and symbols. (vii) The ability to create harmony. (viii) The ability to appreciate the
16
growth of others. The aforementioned principles constitute an integral part of the

ethos of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry, which I have
composed and expound in my book entitled The Modern and Perfecting Rite of
Symbolic Masonry: A Freemasonic Reformation To the Glory of the Enlightened
Humanity and a Movement for a Humanistic World Order (Trine Day LLC, 2022).
Above: Dr. Nicolas Laos’s certificate of elevation to the 33rd degree of the Ancient and
Accepted Scottish Rite, issued (on the 27th of July 2020) by the Supremo Consiglio del 33∴
ed Ultimo Grado Rito Scozzese Antico e Accettato Tradizionale d’Italia, which is affiliated
with the Ordine Massonico Tradizionale Italiano.
On the 27th of July 2020, the Supreme Council of the Ancient and Accepted
Scottish Rite that is affiliated with the Ordine Massonico Tradizionale Italiano,
officially known as the Supremo Consiglio del 33∴ ed Ultimo Grado Rito Scozzese
Antico e Accettato Tradizionale d’Italia (under its Sovereign Grand Commander Br.
Giovanni Constantini 33∴ and its Grand Secretary General Br. Nestore Bartoletti
33∴), bestowed upon me the 33rd and ne plus ultra degree of the Ancient and
Accepted Scottish Rite. On the 10th of October 2020, Grand Master Br. Luigi Pruneti,
holding also the degree of an Emperor Grand Conservator (Imperatore Gran
Conservatore) of the Egyptian Rite of Misraim and the Office of the National Grand
Hierophant of the Sovereign Italian Sanctuary of the Egyptian Rite of Misraim,
personally appointed me as an honorary 97th-degree member of the executive
committee of the aforementioned institution of the Egyptian Rite. Meanwhile, as I
shall explain shortly, I had already been elevated to the 97th degree of the Ancient
and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim by an American Masonic Obedience of this
Rite. On the 6th of November 2020, Grand Master Br. Luigi Pruneti, acting in his
official capacity as the Grand Master of the Ordine Massonico Tradizionale Italiano,
issued two Charters (Patent Letters) to me: with the first Charter, he authorized me to
found an independent Body of Lodges of Symbolic Masonry in Greece (working in
the degrees 1ο–3ο), thus investing me with the authorities and powers of a Grand
Master of Symbolic Masonry; and with the second Charter, he authorized me to found
an independent Body of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite in Greece (working
in the degrees 4ο–33ο), thus investing me with the authorities and powers of a
Sovereign Grand Commander of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite.
17
Above: The Charter (Lettera Patente) with which, on the 6th of November 2020, Grand
Master Br. Luigi Pruneti, acting in his official capacity as the Grand Master of the Ordine
Massonico Tradizionale Italiano, authorized Dr. Nicolas Laos to found an independent Body
of Lodges of Symbolic Masonry in Greece (working in the degrees 1 ο–3ο), thus investing Dr.
Laos with the authorities and powers of a Grand Master of Symbolic Masonry.
Above: The Charter (Lettera Patente) with which, on the 6th of November 2020, Grand
Master Br. Luigi Pruneti, acting in his official capacity as the Grand Master of the Ordine
Massonico Tradizionale Italiano, authorized Dr. Nicolas Laos to found an independent Body
of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite in Greece (working in the degrees 4 ο–33ο), thus
investing Dr. Laos with the authorities and powers of a Sovereign Grand Commander of the
Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite.
In the late 2000s, my interests in comparative mythology, cultural psychology, and

psychology of religion ignited my interest in the Ancient and Primitive Rite of
Memphis–Misraim, since this Masonic Rite comprises degrees that are concerned
with several ancient European, Egyptian, and Asian mythologies and systems of
mysticism (such as Norse mythology, ancient Greek and ancient Roman mythologies,
Zoroastrianism, ancient Egyptian mythology, Jewish mysticism and mythology,
Hindu mysticism and mythology, etc.). In general, the term “civilization” refers to a
mode of being, a way of life. Civilization is a structure that consists of institutions and
technologies, and, in broad terms, it includes culture. Culture is the result of
18
humanity’s reflection on human life, and it is historically objectified through artistic

creation, philosophy, religion, and science. Culture is embodied in civilization and
underpins civilization, and civilization underpins the integration of culture into
history. The French cultural anthropologist and ethnologist Claude Lévi-Strauss, in
his book The Raw and the Cooked: Mythologiques (translated by John and Doreen
Weightman, Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1983), pointed out that culture,
corresponding to the notion of spiritual creation, and civilization, corresponding to the
notion of technological construction, are inextricably related to each other, regarding
their essences and their manifestations. In particular, culture is a reflective attitude
towards institutions and an attempt to transcend institutions through myth. Myth’s
complex structure reflects the structure of institutions, and it represents the core of
culture. Additionally, the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung, in his seminal
Psychology of the Unconscious (translated by Beatrice M. Hinkle, New York: Moffat,
Yard and Company, 1916), pointed out that myth translates experienced reality into a
symbolic language, and, in this way, it is conductive to the participation of a society
as a whole in the same experience of reality, since myth integrates all areas of
conscious and unconscious life into a common experience of reality. In view of the
foregoing, the management of social affairs and any meaningful attempt to bring
about changes in an established civilization are inextricably linked to the adequate
management of the mythological contents of people’s collective mind.
I was initiated into the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim by Tau Dr.
Allen Bar Kohenim Greenfield, 33ο-95ο-97ο. Tau Dr. Allen Bar Kohenim Greenfield
is the Founder and Facilitator of the Mother Lodge of the “Sons and Daughters of
Aaron,” in Atlanta, in the State of Georgia, U.S.A., a regular Initiate of the Ancient
and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim by partaking of the initiatory lines of
succession of Michael Paul Bertiaux and the Hermetic Brotherhood of Light, which
derives from the Order of the Golden and Rosy Cross, which, in turn, was founded in
the 1750s by the German Freemason and alchemist Hermann Fictuld. Regarding
Michael Paul Bertiaux (born in 1935), I should mention that he studied philosophy
and history at the Jesuit University in Seattle, received instruction in philosophy at
Tulane University in New Orleans, studied theology at the Anglican Theological
Center in Vancouver, was ordained in the Old Catholic Church by Forest E. Gregory
Barber (whose ecclesiastical lineage goes back to Archbishop Gerardus Gul), and he
was initiated into the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim by the Grand
Hierophant of one of its branches, Hector-François Jean-Maine, the son of Lucien-
François Jean-Maine, in 1964, in Haiti. Lucien-François Jean-Maine was a student of
Gérard Anaclet Vincent Encausse, whose esoteric pseudonym was Papus. Papus was
a renowned occultist, and he succeeded John Yarker, who was the Founding
International Grand Master of the British branch of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of
Memphis–Misraim, in the leadership of this Masonic institution after the latter’s death
in 1913 (moreover, John Yarker was a Master Mason of the Lodge of Integrity No.
189, under the auspices of the United Grand Lodge of England). Tau Dr. Allen Bar
Kohenim Greenfield, 33ο-95ο-97ο, has played an important role in the Ancient and
Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim, and he has written a relevant ritual book entitled
The Compleat Rite of Memphis (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform,
second edition, 2014). On the 10th of October 1992, acting as a regular Grand
Hierophant of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim, Michael Paul
Bertiaux authorized Tau Allen Bar Kohenim Greenfield “to found, gather, rule, and
teach a philosophical and research Lodge of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of
Memphis–Misraim,” specifically, the aforementioned Mother Lodge of the “Sons and
19
Daughters of Aaron” (in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A.), by which I was awarded the 95th
degree of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim. Finally, on the 14th
of June 2015, I was awarded the 97th and ne plus ultra degree of the Ancient and
Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim (namely, the degree of a Grand Hierophant) by
the “Misir” Lodge, in Vršak, Serbia, presided by its Grand Hierophant Tau Neven
Daničić, 33ο-95ο-97ο. The aforementioned Serbian “Misir” Lodge has been
consecrated by and is regularly affiliated with the aforementioned American Mother
Lodge of the “Sons and Daughters of Aaron.”
Above on the left: The Charter with which, on the 10th of October 1992, Michael Paul
Bertiaux authorized Tau Allen Bar Kohenim Greenfield “to found, gather, rule, and teach a
philosophical and research Lodge of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim,”
specifically, the Mother Lodge of the “Sons and Daughters of Aaron” (in Atlanta, Georgia,
U.S.A.). Above on the right: The Masonic Certificate and Charter with which Tau Allen Bar
Kohenim Greenfield, on the 8th of September 2012, bestowed upon Dr. Nicolas Laos the 95th
degree of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim and authorized Dr. Laos to
found and rule a research Lodge of this Masonic Rite (in addition to Tau Allen Bar Kohenim
Greenfield’s signature, this certificate bears the signatures of other senior members of the
Mother Lodge of the “Sons and Daughters of Aaron”).
On the left: A Temple of Dr.

Nicolas Laos’s Mother
Lodge “Misir” of the
Ancient and Primitive Rite
of Memphis–Misraim in the
Zenith of Vršak, Serbia.
20
Above: The Masonic Certificate and Charter with which, on the 14th of June 2015, the
“Misir” Lodge of Serbia of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim (Greenfield–
Bertiaux Lineage) bestowed upon Dr. Nicolas Laos the 97th and ne plus ultra degree of the
Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim (namely, the degree of a Grand Hierophant)
and authorized Dr. Laos to found and rule a sovereign Grand Sanctuary of the Ancient and
Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim.
Tau Dr. Allen Bar Kohenim Greenfield has succinctly explained the significance of
“ritual initiations,” as practised, for instance, by Freemasons, as follows: first, an
initiatory ritual is the product of its composer, who seeks to get the candidate from a
point A to a point B according to a specific process; and second, an initiatory ritual is
a product of action, specifically, of the act of initiation by a trained initiate, charged
with the duty of conducting the candidate through a ceremony in such a way that a
receptive candidate will experience the intended inner alteration and personal growth
(see: http://tallengreenfield.com/index.html).
My Freemasonic career has been indirectly yet significantly reinforced by my
engagement in chivalric institutions and by my study of chivalry. The term “chivalry”
derives from the French word “chevalier,” which means horseman. Medieval
Crusades had their glory and their sense of nobility, since they expressed particular
communities’ dedication to a higher goal and a clear strategic vision, they contributed
to the development of international relations, and they broadened the intellectual
horizons of medieval Western Europe. However, I do not endorse the specific goals of
medieval Crusaders. In fact, I loathe any idea of a religious war. Moreover, I am fully
aware of the deplorable fact that several modern chivalric organizations occasionally
function as shelters for persons imbued with militaristic and far-right views.
In 2011, the Norwegian “neo-Templar” and Freemason Anders Breivik combined
militaristic and far-right views with terrorist action. The Breivik manifesto and video
indicate that Breivik was associated with a larger movement of neo-Templars
crusading in defense of their vision of a “Judeo-Christian” Europe. The Breivik video
is similar to a video that has been released by a neo-Templar group called “Order
777,” whose leader is an East German by the name of Nick Greger (known also as
“Commander Mad Nick” and “madnick 77”), who is an artist, an author, a prolific
producer of videos posted on the Internet, as well as an anti-Muslim terrorist and
bomber. The videos that have been posted on the Internet by the Order 777, like the
21
Breivik video, urge “Judeo-Christian” Europe to unite against the Muslim world and
against globalist multi-culturalism. Furthermore, in their videos, both Nick Greger
and Anders Breivik praise the Serbian paramilitary unit known as Arkan’s Tigers (and
later as Red Berets), which initiated ethnic cleansing in Bosnia; and, in particular, the
Breivik manifesto extols Arkan’s Tigers and their commanders (specifically, Milorad
Ulemek and Ražnatović Arkan) as role models (see: Duncan Gardham, “Violent
Videos of Oslo Killer’s ‘Mentor,’” The Telegraph, 29 July 2011, online:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8671075/Violent-
videos-of-Oslo-killers-mentor.html). In fact, several Euroatlanticist neo-Nazis, often
associated with NATO’s secret intelligence and military networks that were
developed during the Cold War and with the organized crime, have turned into
counter-jihad activists and agitators, such as Nick Greger. Moreover, as the Canadian
diplomat and scholar Peter Dale Scott has pointed out, radicals such as Nick Greger
and Anders Breivik are assets of the following actors simultaneously: U.S. and NATO
intelligence agencies, former Soviet military intelligence officers who have turned
into arms and drug traffickers, the Russian mafia, and corrupt factions of the Russian
military-industrial complex (see: Peter Dale Scott, American War Machine: Deep
Politics, the CIA Global Drug Connection, and the Road to Afghanistan, Lanham:
Rowman & Littlefield, 2014).
Fascism and, generally, the “far right,” known also as the “Alt-right,” have been
traditionally operating as guardian dogs in the service of the capitalist establishment.
For instance, the Nixon administration (1969–1974) supported fascist military
regimes in Greece and Cyprus (see: Andreas G. Papandreou, Democracy at Gunpoint,
London: Andre Deutsch Ltd, 1971), sold jet aircraft to the fascist governments of
South Africa and Portugal, engaged in difficult counter-insurgency campaigns in
Africa, and it violated United Nations sanctions against Rhodesia. In 1970, U.S.
President Richard Nixon and his National Security Adviser, Henry A. Kissinger,
authorized the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to encourage a military coup in
Chile in order to prevent the inauguration of the democratically elected socialist
presidential candidate Salvador Allende, a loyal and lifelong liberal Freemason, but
the plan was not successful (see: Peter Kornbluh, “CIA Acknowledges Ties to
Pinochet’s Repression: Report to Congress Reveals U.S. Accountability in Chile,”
The National Security Archive, September 19, 2000, online:
http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/20000919/). The CIA provided funding for the
mass strikes against Allende’s government in 1972 and 1973 and for extensive black
propaganda in the newspaper El Mercurio (ibid). CIA’s first approach to stop Allende
was called “Track I” approach, and CIA’s second approach, the “Track II” approach,
consisted in the encouragement of a military overthrow (ibid). On 11 September 1973,
Allende died during a military coup d’ état that was launched by Army Commander-
in-Chief Augusto Pinochet, who was a fascist Freemason actively supported by the
CIA (ibid). Augusto Pinochet’s fascist regime, which lasted from 1973 to 1990,
implemented a free-market oriented economic policy under the guidance of the
neoliberal “Chicago Boys” (a group of Chilean economists, most of whom trained at
the Department of Economics of the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman
and Arnold Harberger), and many of Pinochet’s officers were paid contacts of the
CIA or the U.S. military.
In 1976, Henry A. Kissinger, who was Secretary of State under U.S. President
Gerald R. Ford, took a similar line as he had towards Chile when Jorge R. Videla, a
senior commander in the Argentine Army, came to power in a coup d’ état that
overthrew the elected government of Isabel Martínez de Perón. Through a process
22
called the National Reorganization Process, Videla’s fascist military regime

consolidated its power, launching brutal reprisals and “disappearances” against
political opponents (Carlos Osorio, Marcos Novaro, and John Dinges, eds., “On 30th
Anniversary of Argentine Coup: New Declassified Details on Repression and U.S.
Support for Military Dictatorship,” The National Security Archive, March 23, 2006,
online: http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB185/index.htm). The
National Reorganization Process regime lasted from 1976 until 1983. Previously
secret State Department documents, including some published by the Argentine
newspaper Clarín, show that U.S. officials had prior knowledge of Videla’s intentions
and supported him. More than a week before Videla’s coup d’ état, U.S. Ambassador
Robert Hill sent to William Rogers, who was the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for
Latin America, a secret cable reporting that the commander of Argentine Navy,
Admiral Emilio Massera, had requested that the U.S. embassy “indicate to him one or
two reputable public relations firms in the U.S. which might handle the problem for a
future military government” (ibid). While Rogers suggested delaying official
recognition of Videla’s dictatorial government, the U.S. Secretary of State Henry A.
Kissinger ordered full U.S. support to Videla, and among those who implemented this
policy in 1976 were Richard Cheney, who was the White House Chief of Staff, and
Donald Rumsfeld, who was Defense Secretary (ibid). About twenty years later,
Richard Cheney became the U.S. Secretary of Defense under President George H. W.
Bush, and also he became the 46th Vice President of the United States from 2001 to
2009, under President George W. Bush. Donald Rumsfeld served again as Secretary
of Defense from 2001 to 2006, under President George W. Bush.
The moral and philosophical legitimization of fascist regimes by liberal oligarchies
and neoconservatives continued and was rigorously formulated in Jeane Kirkpatrick’s
celebrated Commentary essay “Dictatorships and Double Standards” (Jeane
Kirkpatrick, “Dictatorships and Double Standards,” Commentary 68, 1979, pp. 34–
45). Jeane Kirkpatrick, a Georgetown University political science professor, served on
Ronald Reagan’s Cabinet on the National Security Council, Foreign Intelligence
Advisory Board, and Defense Policy Review Board, and also she served as the 16th
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (1981–85). In her previous celebrated essay,
Kirkpatrick formulated what is known as the “Kirkpatrick doctrine,” according to
which right-wing authoritarian regimes which were allies of the West were distinct
from and better than left-wing “totalitarian” regimes, because pro-U.S. right-wing
authoritarian regimes were putatively susceptible to an incremental transition to
liberal democracy, and their enmity to communism served as the predominant piece
of evidence for their political disposition.
Regarding Ronald Reagan, the fortieth President of the United States, himself, it is
worth mentioning that he is the first U.S. President to have been officially condemned
by the International Court of Justice for unlawful use of force (namely, for
international terrorism) in the U.S. war against Nicaragua. However, this fact did not
stop highly moralistic American Masonic authorities from praising Ronald Reagan in
the most official way. In particular, on 11 February 1988, several Masonic officials
(including Francis S. Paul, who was the then Sovereign Grand Commander of the
Scottish Rite for the Northern Masonic Jurisdiction, and C. Fred Kleinknecht, who
was the then Sovereign Grand Commander of the Scottish Rite for the Southern
Masonic Jurisdiction) officially visited President Ronald Reagan in the Oval Office of
the White House, where they presented him with a “Certificate of Honor” and
awarded him the title of an “Honorary Scottish Rite Mason.”
23
In order to understand the “big picture,” we have to think as follows: The global
capitalist system that prevailed in both the Euroatlantic and the Eurasian geopolitical
spaces after the dissolution of the Soviet Union comprises two major competing
factions, namely, a left-wing faction and a right-wing one. The left-wing faction
defends a model of liberal oligarchy by manipulating liberal and socialist ideas and
values, while simultaneously using postmodernism in order to deconstruct the original
liberal and socialist theories, which were offshoots of the European Enlightenment,
and to substitute them with instrumentalized varieties of “leftism” and
“neoliberalism.” The right-wing faction defends a model of statist oligarchy by
manipulating traditionalist and nationalist ideas and values, while simultaneously
using postmodernism in order to deconstruct the rationalist current of the European
Enlightenment and to cultivate a radical form of subjectivism, which relativizes
values and norms, thus facilitating the psychological operations of authoritarian statist
regimes and various conservatives. The neo-Templarism of Nick Greger and Anders
Breivik represents a criminal asset of the right-wing faction of the global capitalist
establishment, while the advocates of “globalist multiculturalism” who have been
vilified by Nick Greger and Anders Breivik belong to the left-wing faction of the
global capitalist establishment. Neither of the aforementioned factions encourages or
even permits a genuine ideological discourse, because both of these factions use ideas
and values primarily (if not exclusively) as tools for the conduct of psychological
operations, and they are stunningly insensitive to the notion of truth.
Having said the above, I do endorse a symbolic conception of chivalry, according
to which a knight’s horse is a symbol of power, and a knight is a symbol of a person
who controls powers. Thus, the concept of chivalry is inextricably linked to the
concepts of self-regulation and discipline. Moreover, chivalry instills in people a
sense of historical responsibility and a desire for personal growth and historical
action. It goes without saying that many hold a chivalric title in name only, and their
activities as Knights or Dames are limited to attending balls and other gala events,
parading around in regalia, and conducting public relations. On them, chivalry has
been wasted, since it is deprived of inner nobility. As the American historian and
academician Barbara Tuchman (1912–89) has explained, “more than a code of
manners in war and love, chivalry was a moral system, governing the whole of noble
life” (Barbara W. Tuchman, A Distant Mirror, New York: Random House, 2014, p.
62 and, generally, Chapter 3).
I advocate a new, humanistic “Crusade” for the revival of a genuine ideological
discourse and a new type of idea-centered “patriotism” that means devotion to and
vigorous support of an ideology and reason, instead of any particular country itself. I
am a proponent of a peculiar type of patriotism referring to ideas (namely, to an
ideological homeland) rather than nation-states. The term “ideology” was coined by
the French Enlightenment aristocrat and philosopher Destutt de Tracy in 1796 to
designate a systematic critical and therapeutic study of any sensationalist presentation
and source of ideas, and it should never be confused with “ideolepsis,” which implies
obsession (see: George Lichtheim, The Concept of Ideology and Other Essays, New
York: Random House, 1967). My interpretation of Freemasonry is combined with an
esoteric and ideologically driven approach to chivalry. I believe that a Freemason
should be a historically responsible, intellectually vigilant, and politically active
person, and, therefore, I believe that Freemasonry should be enriched with chivalric
enthusiasm for the sake of a humanistic “Crusade” and in order to sincerely and
rigorously defend the spiritual core of the European Enlightenment.
24
Above (from left to right): The Rt Hon the Lord Lingfield (Robert Balchin, Baron Lingfield,
Kt, DL), who is a distinguished British educator, a member of the UK House of Lords, and
the Patron of the Saint Lazarus Hospice Association (namely, the charitable apparatus of the
United Grand Priories of the Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem), Dr. Nicolas
Laos, wearing the chain collar of a Knight of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem, and Lady Lingfield,
in the Church of Saint Bartholomew the Great in the City of London, in 2008, at an
investiture ceremony of the United Grand Priories of the Hospitaller Order of Saint Lazarus
of Jerusalem.
Furthermore, my Freemasonic career in the Ancient and Primitive Rite of

Memphis–Misraim, in particular, has been significantly supported and enriched by the
Ordine Massonico Tradizionale Italiano, whose Founding Grand Master Br. Luigi
Pruneti, as I have already mentioned, has appointed me as an honorary member of the
Sovereign Italian Sanctuary of the Egyptian Rite of Misraim. The origins of
“Egyptian Masonry” can be traced back to the Egyptian Rite of Masonry that was
developed by the Italian mystic Count Alessandro di Cagliostro at the end of the
eighteenth century. Regarding Cagliostro, it should be mentioned that he was an agent
of the Bavarian Illuminati, and, through his “Egyptian Rite,” he attempted to fuse
Scottish Rite Masonry and revolutionary social ideas. Moreover, Cagliostro’s Ritual
was an attempt to fuse Freemasonry and Alchemy (the Hermetic Art) to provide a
humanistic initiatory system (see: Philippa Faulks and Robert L. D. Cooper, The
Masonic Magician: The Life and Death of Count Cagliostro and His Egyptian Rite,
London: Watkins, 2017; Iain McCalman, The Last Alchemist: Count Cagliostro,
Master of Magic in the Age of Reason, New York: Perennial/HarperCollins, 2003).
Napoleon Bonaparte was initiated by Cagliostro into the Egyptian Rite of
Freemasonry and into the Masonic Rites of Memphis, of Misraim, and of Memphis–
Misraim, which came down from it.
A maxim given in Cagliostro’s Rite was the following: “Qui agnoscit martem,
cognoscit artem,” meaning “whoever recognizes Mars, knows art.” Mars was an
ancient Greco-Roman god of war, and, in alchemy, Mars symbolizes separation,
which refers to the isolation of the components of dissolution by filtration and,
subsequently, to the discarding of any ungenuine or unworthy material. The
aforementioned maxim implies the struggle that an initiate must make in one’s quest
to understand the reality of oneself and the reality of the world. As we try to
transmute our primal self into a higher and better self, and as we try to improve our
existential conditions, we must face all our negative qualities and all negative
25
historical forces and win. This is the reason why we need the destructive force of
“Mars.” Additionally, the art of transforming a “Rough Ashlar” into a “Perfect
Ashlar” requires struggle, discipline, and perseverance.
Above: The Certificate of Dr. Nicolas Laos’s appointment as an honorary 97th-degree

member of the Sovereign Italian Sanctuary of the Egyptian Rite of Misraim, issued in Rome,
Italy, on the 10th of October 2020 (signed and sealed by the Imperatore Gran Conservatore
and the Gran Cancelliere of the aforementioned Obedience of the Egyptian Rite of Misraim).
Above on the left: the Emblem of the Sovereign Grand Inspectors General (namely, the
recipients of the 33rd degree) of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim (this
degree is almost identical with the 33rd degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite).
Above on the right: the Emblem of the Grand Conservators (namely, the recipients of the 95th
degree) of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim. These emblems have been
designed and are used by the Mother Lodge “Misir” of Serbia of the Ancient and Primitive
Rite of Memphis–Misraim. The double-headed eagle is the most characteristic symbol of the
Scottish Rite, and it symbolizes spiritual and material powers working together. The winged
egg (which, in ancient Egyptian religious art was known as the “Kneph”) is the most
characteristic symbol of the Egyptian Rite, and it symbolizes universal spirit acting on
primordial matter, and, generally, it represents the productive world.
26
After the late 1780s and especially during the 1790s, modern Egyptology
blossomed, because Napoleon the Great extended the French Empire into Egypt and
brought Egyptian treasures and artifacts to Europe. Moreover, in 1799, the Rosetta
Stone was discovered. The Rosetta Stone is a granodiorite stele inscribed with a
decree issued at Memphis, in Hellenistic Egypt, in 196 B.C. on behalf of King
Ptolemy V. The decree appears in three scripts, precisely, in ancient Egyptian
hieroglyphs, in the demotic Egyptian language, and in ancient Greek. Thus, the
Rosetta Stone provided the key to the modern understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs.
At the end of the eighteenth century and at the beginning of the nineteenth century,
Europe experienced a phase of intense fascination with ancient Egypt. As I have
already mentioned, the origins of “Egyptian Masonry” can be traced back to the
Egyptian Rite of Masonry that was developed by the Italian mystic Count Alessandro
di Cagliostro at the end of the eighteenth century. The first mention of the Misraim
Rite was in Venice in 1788, and it spread rapidly to Milan, Genoa, and Naples.
The Rite of Misraim with its ninety degrees was originally structured and
established in a formal way in Italy in 1804–05. Its degrees were collected from
several Masonic, Hermetic, Neoplatonic, Kabbalistic, Alchemical, and Rosicrucian
sources. In 1813, the Milan “Mother” Lodge of Misraim granted Patents of the 90th
Degree to a few French Masons. From 1814 onwards, under the leadership of brothers
Joseph, Michel, and Marc Bédarride, the Rite of Misraim was quickly developed in
France. Initially, the Grand Orient of France accepted the authority of the Misraim
Rite, but, in December 1817, the Misraim Rite asserted its independence, and, thus,
the Grand Orient of France started treating the Misraim Rite in a rather inimical way.
During the nineteenth century, in France, the Rite of Misraim served as a meeting-
place of opponents to the regime. Moreover, during the nineteenth century, the
Misraim Rite transmitted the required Third Degree to the Carbonari, and the
Carbonari recruited members in Misraim and Memphis Lodges. The Carbonari were
an Italian revolutionary secret society, which, in 1814, attempted to obtain a
constitution for the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies by force, and, in 1820–21, it began
resisting the French occupiers, notably Joachim Murat, the Bonapartist King of
Naples. Thus, finally, the Carbonari became a liberal nationalist secret society
expressing militant opposition to Austria’s regime (precisely, Emperor Francis I of
Austria and Austrian State Chancellor Prince Klemens von Metternich) and to the
Holy Alliance, in general. They were instrumental in organizing revolutions in Italy in
1820–21 and in 1831. In the nineteenth century, nationalism was used by liberal
political forces as a means of fighting against imperialist and authoritarian regimes
(such as those of Napoleon and the Powers of the Holy Alliance) and creating liberal
republics (see: Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution: 1789–1848, New York:
Vintage, 1996).
The Memphis Rite (also known as the Oriental Rite) is a modification of the
Misraim Rite, and it was originally organized in Paris, in 1838–39, by Jacques-
Étienne Marconis de Négre, who had previously been a member of the Rite of
Misraim. The Memphis Rite was composed of ninety working and six honorary
and/or administrative degrees. References to an Egyptian system of Masonry were
made in a pamphlet entitled Master of Masters, which appeared in Paris, in 1815. In
fact, by that time, French Freemasonry had already been established in Egypt by the
armies of Napoleon the Great, and, from thence, mingled with Hermetic and other
local mystical traditions, it was transplanted to Montauban in France, in 1816, by the
French Freemasons Gabriel-Mathieu Marconis de Négre, Baron Dumas, J. Petite, H.
Labrunie, Samuel Honis, etc. Thus, the Rite of Memphis was formed. After an
27
interval of inactivity, this system of Egyptian Masonry was revived in Brussels and
Paris, in 1838–39, by Jacques-Étienne Marconis de Négre, son of Gabriel-Mathieu
Marconis de Négre.
In 1872, John Yarker merged the Rite of Memphis and the Rite of Misraim, and he
founded a Sovereign Grand Sanctuary of the Rite of Memphis and Misraim in his
hometown of Manchester. Additionally, at the end of the nineteenth century, John
Yarker established the “Ancient Universal Pansophic Rite,” in the context of which he
attempted to synthesize all esoteric European lineages of the various “Illuminati”
currents and organizations. Like Papus after him, Yarker wanted to create a universal
initiatory movement by uniting all the rites, the orders, and the currents of the
Western mystery tradition of the Illuminati into one global superstructure. The
traditional English Freemasonry was one of the fiercest opponents of such initiatives
and ideas, and this is one of the reasons why, during the nineteenth and the twentieth
centuries, in the Anglo-Saxon world, the so-called regular Freemasonries consolidated
their policy of considering the Rite of Memphis–Misraim as an “irregular” type of
Masonry.
Another initiatory line of the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Memphis–Misraim was
founded by the Italian general and politician Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807–82), who is
considered, with Camillo Cavour, Victor Emmanuel II, and Giuseppe Mazzini, as one
of Italy’s “fathers of the fatherland.” He played a protagonist role in the Risorgimento
(namely, the political and social movement for the unification of Italy), and he was
appointed general by the provisional government of Milan in 1848, and General of the
Roman Republic in 1849 by the Italian Minister of War. Before Yarker, in 1881,
Giuseppe Garibaldi had already initiated a process of merging the Rite of Memphis
and the Rite of Misraim with the Scottish Rite; Garibaldi’s aforementioned initiative
was accomplished in 1889, and he was proclaimed International Grand Master of the
Rite of Memphis–Misraim.
Finally, I should add a few words about the Illuminati. When we have to talk about
the “Illuminati,” we primarily think of the “Illuminati” of Bavaria (see: Terry
Melanson, Perfectibilists: The 18th Century Bavarian Order of the Illuminati,
Oregon: Trine Day, 2009; Josef Wäges and Reinhard Markner, eds, The Secret School
of Wisdom: The Authentic Rituals and Doctrines of the Illuminati, Surrey: Lewis
Masonic, 2015). That secret society was founded in 1776 by Adam
Weishaupt, Professor of Law at the University of Ingolstadt in Bavaria. Some people
connect the Bavarian Illuminati with the Spanish mystical Christian association of the
“Alumbrados” (“Illuminated”) of the sixteenth century, or the French “Société des
Illuminés d’Avignon” (“Society of the Illuminati of Avignon”), which was founded in
1786 by Dom Antoine-Joseph Pernety and a Polish Count called Tadeusz Leszczyc-
Grabianka. This argument is not correct; only the name was similar, but nothing else.
In fact, there are several varieties of “Illuminati” movements. In addition, it is hard to
prove that all of the ideological assumptions and arguments of the Bavarian Illuminati
were originally formulated and proclaimed by the Czech philosopher, pedagogue, and
theologian Comenius (1592–1670), who addressed the first formal scientists as
“illuminati,” and by other Renaissance scholars and mystics, as some researchers
maintain. The truth is that the secret society that was created by Law Professor Adam
Weishaupt was originally called the “Order of the Perfectibilists,” and it was only
later that it was called the “Order of the Illuminati (of Bavaria).” Initially, it consisted
of students of the University of Ingolstadt; but later it became bigger and stronger
with a structure similar to that of Freemasonry and a vertical and ritualistic system.
They wished to establish a new world order founded on the idea of a European
28
Republic and a type of socialism/communism. However, as I have already mentioned,

there are different varieties of “Illuminati” and different varieties of “illuminist”
narratives.
Very soon after the foundation of the Order of the Illuminati of Bavaria, a fierce
disagreement broke out between Adam Weishaupt, who was the Chairman of the
Illuminati’s “Areopagus” (executive apparatus), and Adolph Freiherr von Knigge,
who was a rich and powerful member of the Illuminati’s “Areopagus.” In 1784, the
clash between Weishaupt and Knigge led to Knigge’s departure from the Order of the
Illuminati, threatening as he left that he would reveal the Illuminati’s secrets. This
internal dissension was one of the main reasons for the demise of Weishaupt’s Order
of the Illuminati. Another important reason for the demise of Weishaupt’s Order of
the Illuminati was the fact that, in 1777, the relatively liberal Prince-Elector of
Bavaria, Maximilian I Joseph, was replaced by Karl Theodor, whose outlook was
more conservative. In 1785, Karl Theodor banned all secret societies, including the
Illuminati. Thus, the Order of the Illuminati was shattered in Bavaria. Weishaupt fled
Bavaria and settled in Gotha. With the cooperation of the Jesuits, who were strong
opponents of Weishaupt’s work, the authoritarian Bavarian political regime that was
established by Karl Theodor conducted a vicious propaganda campaign against Adam
Weishaupt and the Illuminati in Bavaria and throughout Europe. Moreover, many
Freemasons, mainly out of fear of being persecuted by political and religious
authorities, denounced the Illuminati.
Adam Weishaupt’s illuminist movement combined the quest for light and science
with a radical type of romanticism that underpins a primitive type of communism,
which is akin to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s radicalism and the mentality of the hippie
movement of the 1960s. However, the historical Rosicrucians of the seventeenth
century articulated a much more careful illuminist movement, which promotes the
quest for light and science without subscribing to a radical type of romanticism, and,
in the nineteenth century, the Bavarian Illuminati’s primitive type of communism was
replaced by scientifically formulated theories of socialism.
Dismissing every sensational and disoriented reference to the Bavarian Illuminati,
and warning my readers against various cases of pseudo-Illuminati societies, which
have sprung up around the world as means by which devious minds take advantage of
the attractiveness of sensational narratives about the historical Illuminati of Bavaria
and manipulate people’s aspirations, I argue that there are two elements of the
historical Illuminati of Bavaria that are worth preserving: the first element is their
attempt to combine esotericism and politics in an explicit and systematic way, and the
second element is their attempt to create a liberal and humanistic initiatory society.
In 2008, I assumed the presidency of the steering committee of a very discreet
London-based group of Masons and non-Masons (originally incorporated in London)
whose goal was to fuse certain aspects of contemporary English-style Freemasonry
with certain aspects of the eighteenth-century Bavarian Illuminati, especially
regarding the study of liberal arts and sciences and world affairs, and, in 2017, I
founded the Scholarly and Political Order of the Ur-Illuminati (SPOUI) as an
illuminist Masonic think-tank (originally incorporated in Sofia, Bulgaria) with the
support of distinguished Freemasons and conscientious esotericists from the U.S.A.,
Mexico, and Europe.
As I have just explained, I have used the term “Illuminati” in some of my esoteric
initiatives in a very specific way regarding its philosophical content and as a code
name for a series of preparatory actions for the development of the Autonomous
Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry. Apart from that, I
29
should gratefully acknowledge the Italian scholar, Freemasonic leader, and Illuminati
Grand Master Professor Giuliano Di Bernardo as one of my main esoteric mentors. In
2002, Professor Giuliano Di Bernardo, who was the Grand Master of the Grand
Orient of Italy (Grande Oriente d’Italia) during 1990–93 and the founding Grand
Master of the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy (Gran Loggia Regolare d’Italia) during
1993–2001, founded the Academy of the Illuminati (Accademia degli Illuminati),
based in Rome at Piazza di Spagna. Professor Giuliano Di Bernardo has officially
conferred upon me the power and the principles of the Illuminati, and he has officially
conferred upon me the power and the privileges to form in Greece the National
Headquarters of the Illuminati.
Regarding my personal illuminist and Masonic activities and experiences, I should
clarify that all my aforementioned illuminist and Masonic activities and experiences
have been eventually distilled into the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic
Masonry. In other words, with the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry,
I am moving towards the future (while simultaneously managing relevant
international networks, which serve the goals of the Autonomous Order of the
Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry, which embodies and encapsulates
my “master plan” in the realm of esotericism). Every aspect and every element of
Freemasonry and of the Bavarian Illuminati that I find worth preserving are embedded
into the Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry, which ultimately sums up
and elucidates my presence and action in the realm of esotericism in general and
Freemasonry in particular. In accordance with the Rosicrucians’ Confessio
Fraternitatis (1615), the Autonomous Order of the Modern and Perfecting Rite of
Symbolic Masonry tries to contribute to “an influx of truth, light, and grandeur.”
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Modern and Perfecting Rite of Symbolic Masonry ©

Copyright © August 2022 by Nicolas Laos

Why do I attach so much importance to fighting postmodernism? Postmodernism

philosopher and politician Antonio Gramsci (1891–1937), consists in living without

All the world’s a stage,

Inspired by Shakespeare’s aforementioned metaphor, I could synoptically describe

- various science clubs operating in American and British universities;

Nicolas Laos, 3ο M∴P∴R∴S∴M∴

Athens, Greece, August 2022

My Freemasonic background has three milestones. The first milestone is my

The English Freemasonic tradition is founded on Operative Masonry, and, indeed,

Masonry is a complex associative phenomenon, therefore it is articulated on

growth of others. The aforementioned principles constitute an integral part of the

In the late 2000s, my interests in comparative mythology, cultural psychology, and

humanity’s reflection on human life, and it is historically objectified through artistic

On the left: A Temple of Dr.

called the National Reorganization Process, Videla’s fascist military regime

Furthermore, my Freemasonic career in the Ancient and Primitive Rite of

Above: The Certificate of Dr. Nicolas Laos’s appointment as an honorary 97th-degree

Republic and a type of socialism/communism. However, as I have already mentioned,

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