Hitler and prophecies, including Nostradamus, Erik Jan Hanussen, and the roles the occult had in the creation of the Third Reich. Adolf Hitler (German: [ˈadɔlf ˈhɪtlɐ]; 20 April 1889 -- 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the Nazi Party (German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP); National Socialist German Workers Party). He was chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945 and dictator of Nazi Germany (as Führer und Reichskanzler) from 1934 to 1945. Hitler was at the centre of Nazi Germany, World War II in Europe, and the Holocaust. Hitler was a decorated veteran of World War I. He joined the German Workers' Party (precursor of the NSDAP) in 1919, and became leader of the NSDAP in 1921. In 1923, he attempted a coup d'état in Munich, known as the Beer Hall Putsch. The failed coup resulted in Hitler's imprisonment, during which time he wrote his memoir, Mein Kampf (My Struggle). After his release in 1924, Hitler gained popular support by attacking the Treaty of Versailles and promoting Pan-Germanism, antisemitism, and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and Nazi propaganda. After his appointment as chancellor in 1933, he transformed the Weimar Republic into the Third Reich, a single-party dictatorship based on the totalitarian and autocratic ideology of Nazism. Hitler's aim was to establish a New Order of absolute Nazi German hegemony in continental Europe. To this end, his foreign and domestic policies had the aim of seizing Lebensraum ("living space") for the Germanic people. He directed the rearmament of Germany and the invasion of Poland by the Wehrmacht in September 1939, resulting in the outbreak of World War II in Europe. Under Hitler's rule, in 1941 German forces and their European allies occupied most of Europe and North Africa. In 1943, Germany had been forced onto the defensive and suffered a series of escalating defeats. In the final days of the war, during the Battle of Berlin in 1945, Hitler married his long-time partner, Eva Braun. On 30 April 1945, less than two days later, the two committed suicide to avoid capture by the Red Army, and their corpses were burned. Hitler's aggressive foreign policy is considered the main cause of the outbreak of World War II in Europe. His antisemitic policies and racially motivated ideology resulted in the deaths of at least 5.5 million Jews, and millions of other people deemed racially inferior. The Nazi Party reportedly grew out of several occult groups that sprang up in the late 19th century as a reaction to the advanced materialism and technology of the era. These groups spoke of the coming of a new Messiah that would save Germany. Hitler developed the notion that perhaps he was the chosen one to save the German people.[citation needed] The political parties created in the wake of the country's defeat in World War I combined nationalistic sentiment and occultist practices to forge an image of a superior German people. Hitler's imprisonment after the failed 1923 Munich Beer Hall Putsch would make him a national hero for his defense of a strong German state, convincing him that he was the Messiah who could save Germany. Hitler appropriated Christian symbolism, such as the Spear of Destiny and the Holy Grail for his own purposes. He adopted the swastika from the Hindu/Sanskrit symbol for the Sun. The original symbol turns clockwise. The Nazi one turns backwards. The four arms of the original Hindu swastika represented the Four Vedas. Template:Clairfy It decorates most Hindu homes and temples. At the conclusion, author Dusty Sklar points out that Hitler's suicide happened during the night of April 30 -- May 1, known as Walpurgis Night. The narrator continues: "With Hitler gone, it was as if a spell had been broken". Then Joachim von Ribbentrop's infamous statement of his continued subservience to Hitler at the Nuremberg Trials is taken as final evidence of Hitler's "occult power": ("Even with all I know, if in this cell Hitler should come to me and say 'Do this!', I would still do it."). Speculation about Nazism and occultism has become part of popular culture since at least 1959. There are documentaries and books on the topic, most notably The Morning of the Magicians (1960) and The Spear of Destiny (1972). Historian Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke analyzed the topic in The Occult Roots of Nazism. He argued cautiously for some real links between some ideals of Ariosophy and Nazi ideology, but also analyzed the problems of the numerous popular "occult historiography" books written on the topic. He separated empiricism and sociology from the "Modern Mythology of Nazi Occultism" books which "have represented the Nazi phenomenon as the product of arcane and demonic influence". He considered most of these to be "sensational and under-researched"

• published: 11 Dec 2013
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