The term Illuminati, is the plural of the Latin, Illuminatus, meaning "one who is illuminated." Thus, it means a person who has received the full extent of the initiation that is available through Freemasonry.

Technically, an Illuminatus is a Master Mason who has received all the "light" Masonry can bestow. He is beyond 32^° and even beyond 33^°! Such people are known as the Masters of Masters of the Temple, and collectively are known by several names other than the Illuminati.

· Great White Brotherhood

· Argentium Astrum (Silver Star)

· Order of One

· Torch-bearers

· Invisible College

· Custodians of the Plan

· The Lords of Compassion

· Guardians of the Grail

· Society of Illumined Minds

· World Mind

· Council of Masters

· Hesychasts

· Order of the Perfectibilists

· The Council of All Beings

· Wisemen

· Invisible Order

· Secret Brotherhood

· The Brain Trust

· Crusaders of the Green Cross

· Seekers on the Threshold

· Masters of Wisdom

· The Hierarchy

· Council of Nine

· Fraternitas Saturni

· Hermetic Brotherhood of Light

• International Money Center Banks
• Central Banks
• International Monetary Fund
• World Bank
• International Bank of Settlements
• World Conservation Bank
• Multinational Corporations
• Foundations

• Freemasonry
• Skull & Bones
• Grand Orient Lodge
• Grand Alpina Lodge
• Knights Templar
• Royal Order of the Garter
• Priory De Sion
• Rosicrucians

• National Government Leaders
• United Nations
• Bilderbergers
• Trilateral Commission
• Council on Foreign Relations
• Club of Rome
• Aspen Institute
• Bohemian Grove
• Regional Federations (NATO, EEC, etc.)
• International Labor Unions

• CIA
• KGB
• British Intelligence
• Mafia/Organized Crime
• Drug Cartels
• Interpol
• Communist Party

• World Council of Churches
• National Council of Churches
• World Parliament of Religions
• Vatican, The Sovereign Military Order of Malta (SMOM)
• New Age Cults/Groups
• Liberal Protestant Denominations
• Unity Church
• Unitarian / Universalist Church Baha'i
• Temple of Understanding

• UNESCO
• World Peace Groups
• Planetary Congress
• World Constitution and Parliamentary Assoc.
• Environmental Groups
• Lucis Trust
• World Goodwill
• World Union
• Esalen Institute
• Media Establishment

"There has not been and there will not be a place for the unfit. The fit will lead, and if the unfit are not coming along there is no place for them....In the Age of Enlightenment there is no place for ignorant people. Nature will not allow ignorance to prevail." - Transcendental Meditation guru Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

Most of the elite were born elite. Their upbringing is steeped in tradition and is a kind of secret society in of itself. Their father was a Mason, his father was a Mason, his father's father was a Mason. Perhaps while growing up the child heard stories of his father's involvement in other secret groups.

"There exists in the world today, and has existed for thousands of years, a body of enlightened humans united in what might be termed, an Order of the Quest. It is composed of those whose intellectual and spiritual perceptions have revealed to them that civilization has secret destiny . . .

The outcome of this 'secret destiny' is a World Order ruled by a King with supernatural powers.

This King was descended of a divine race; that is, he belonged to the Order of the Illumined for those who come to a state of wisdom then belong to a family of heroes-perfected human beings." - Manly P. Hall 33° Mason, The Secret Destiny of America

This man is certainly in the position to know. He is regarded as the number one Masonic authority on these matters. So here again we see the plan of a new 'World Order', only this time we're told the philosophy behind such a belief. He also informs us of the conspiracy's antiquity.

It goes back to their belief in Atlantis and the subsequent migration of priestly kings after the destruction of the continent. This body of 'enlightened humans' settled in the Nile delta, and passed their knowledge to the Ancient Egyptians. Who in turn, kept these secrets safe, only to be revealed to initiates of the mystery schools. This is why Masonry is so rife with Egyptian symbolism. Freemasonry itself, they teach, was originally practiced in Atlantis. Before the destruction of their civilization (either by their own hands, or punishment from God) these Atlantians were said to have a worldwide culture (ruled by one king), a perfect religion and science.

Michael Howard, an excellent researcher of this ' occult conspiracy,' summed up his own findings this way:

"A very important aspect of the work of the secret societies has always been the ultimate unification of the world religions. This aim was based on the restoration of the pre-Christian Mystery Tradition, which had been persecuted by the early Church and forced to go underground in medieval Europe, and the recognition that all religions had originated in a universal spirituality referred to as the Perennial Philosophy, the Primordial Tradition or the Ancient Wisdom. The mystical beliefs of the secret societies were, and indeed are, based on the Hermetic maxim 'As above-so below' which teaches that the natural world is a material reflection of the spiritual. It forms the esoteric basis for the Ancient Egyptian Mysteries, Gnosticism, Esoteric Christianity, the Cabbala, the Hermetic tradition, alchemy and societies such as the Templars, Freemasons and Rosicrucians. The occult doctrines of geomancy, alchemy, astrology and sexual magic taught by these secret societies were used as symbolic metaphors illustrating the progression of the individual from material darkness to the spiritual light of understanding." - The Occult Conspiracy: Secret Societies - Their Influence and Power in World History (pp. 170-171)

All of these paths eventually leads the initiate into a belief system that he is privileged and chosen to carry on the 'Great Work' or 'The Plan', that he is above the rest of humanity, he has become 'Illumined'. Therefore imposed rule is a 'right'. The ONLY allegiance is to the 'Light'. It is no coincidence that Illuminati, in its literal translation means-'bearers of light'-Lumen, derived from Lucifer, 'angel of light'. That, my friend, is the final secret of the illuminati. One World Government under one World Religion, ruled by one King. It is nothing but an evil imitation, a counterfeit of the Kingdom of God.

In Beyond the Light, William Schnoebelen describes his experiences in witchcraft and Masonry. As he climbed up the ladder in both disciplines, he found himself square in the face of the Illuminati:

"The branch of the Illuminati into which I was inducted was supposedly directly descended from European Chapters of the AIBS....Was I not part of a higher form of humanity? This is what I had been deluded into believing by Illuminism. I was told I was the next step up in the ladder of evolution, and that Illumined Ones were as far above human beings as people were above apes!

From somewhere...Weishaupt produced the 'Law of Fives.' His original inner council was structured around the pentagram (symbol of the Blazing Star, Sirius). According to our teaching, this inner council was made up of five men: Weishaupt's friend, Kollmer, Francis Dashwood (of the Satanic Hellfire Club), Alphonse Donatien DeSade (where we get our word 'sadism'), Meyer Amschel Rothschild (founder of the great banking house) and Weishaupt."

Enforcing secrecy within the Illuminati was done in the same manner as in the Greek Mystery Schools and Super-Masonic Organizations. The candidates were required to confess compromising information about themselves i.e., sexual indiscretions, and previously hidden criminal behaviour as if he were confessing his sins to a Catholic priest. This reminds one of the rites conducted in another secret society of fame, namely, the Order of the Skull and Bones. There's plenty of evidence to suggest the orders are one and the same, or at least the modern version of Weishaupt's order. Moreover, if Weishaupt's Illuminati were to survive it's "supposed" abolishment, besides its obvious survival in higher Masonic degrees, the Order of the Skull and Bones would be a worthy and powerful candidate.

It must be realized, however, that Weishaupt's Ancient and Illuminated Seers of Bavaria (AISB) was only an outward manifestation of the Illuminati. The plans uncovered for the overthrow of all the governments and religions of the world were certainly giving to Weishaupt by that most "august body"; here and there only hinted about. They represent the "new man" of marxism; the race of perfected ones that Hitler – after a face to face meeting – had said were terrifying. The Secret Chiefs; whether human or some form of higher-intelligent beings. The Secret Brotherhood who desire to usher in the Golden Age of totalitarian rule.

"Witchcraft never was extirpated in the whole of western history. Moreover, if we need fix a date for the institutionalization of witchcraft in the Christian West, we should look to 16th century Protestant England where, under Elizabeth I, the sorcerer John Dee achieved state power, founded Freemasonry and built upon the occult edifice of Catholic heretics such as Giordano Bruno and Pico della Mirandola in pursuing a "Christian" kabbalah and an alliance with the black magic practitioner, Rabbi Judah Lowe of Prague."

- Michael A. Hoffman II

"If the facts concerning the Royal Institute of International Affairs and the Council on Foreign Relations be accepted, it will be seen that the proper study of political mankind is the study of power elites, without which nothing that happens can be understood. These elites, preferring to work in private, are rarely found posed for photographers, and their influence upon events has therefore to be deduced from what is known of the agencies they employ."

- A.K Chesterton in The New Unhappy Lords, chapter XXIV

"There does exist and has existed for a generation, an international Anglophile network which operates, to some extent, in the way the radical Right believes the Communists act. In fact, this network, which we may identify as the Round Table groups, has no aversion to cooperating with the Communists, or any other groups, and frequently does so. I know of the operations of this network because I have studied it for 20 years and was permitted for two years, in the early 1960s, to examine its papers and secret record."

- Carroll Quigley, Georgetown University history professor (deceased), in Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, 1966, p.950

"[...] In addition to these pragmatic goals, the powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was the Bank for International Settlements in Basle, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the worlds' central banks which were themselves private corporations. The growth of financial capitalism made possible a centralization of world economic control and use of this power for the direct benefit of financiers and the indirect injury of all other economic groups."

- Tragedy and Hope, p.324

". . . I am now quite sure that Tragedy and Hope was suppressed although I do not know why or by whom . . ."

- Carroll Quigley, in a letter to a friend

"The Trilateral Commission doesn't run the world, the Council on Foreign Relations does that!"

- Winston Lord, Assistant Secretary of State, the U. S. State Department

"The Illuminati have ever led the race forward; the knowers, mystics and saints have ever revealed to us the height of racial and individual possibilities."

- Alice Bailey From Bethlehem to Calvary

"Wise Men, the ancients believe, were a separate race, and to be born into this race it was necessary to develop the mind to a state of enlightened intelligence ... It is this larger and coming race that will someday inherit the earth ... the Golden Age will come again."

- Manly P Hall, The Secret Destiny Of America, p. 45