Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare

by Michael A. Hoffman II

From 007 to 2001, from Dealey Plaza to the Apollo Moon Flight, from the barrel of a Bulldog .44 to the corridors of the pyramids of Sirius; from the secret symbolism of Jack the Ripper to the public symbolism of the first atomic bomb blast, this work illuminates the crimes and command ideology of the masonic Cryptocracy, where ground zero meets the zero hour in a bestial crucible of ritual murder, human alchemy and demonic invasion. Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare takes the reader to the core of a cosmic cryptogram, a dark Oz where the ancient fables become modern memes for the psychological contagion and devastation of humanity, and where the stratagem the author terms 'Revelation of the Method'; becomes the key to the finale of the mysteries of the ages.

Genres: Nonfiction, Conspiracy Theories, Politics, History, Psychology, Philosophy, Occult

215 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1992

About the author

Michael A. Hoffman II is an independent scholar, a former reporter for the New York bureau of the Associated Press, and the author of ten books of radical history, journalism and literature.
He studied political science and history under Faiz Abu-Jaber at the State University of New York at Oswego.
He investigates political and occult crime by decoding what he calls twilight language.

Reviews

[Russell Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won't try to pretend that Michael Hoffman is a great writer because he's not. He is an important writer however and a peerless researcher. The world is filled with societies that have secrets. We know that, but we don't give it much thought.

When two presidential candidates belong to the same secret society we simply smile and say that boys will be boys. On the other hand, we seem to accept that perhaps brethren within any organization might favor each other in various ways and, if pushed, would probably admit that societies, like others, have secrets for a reason.

Hoffman has been on the forefront of writing about these issues and this book is considered a classic in its field. Not available on Kindle, it is still worth finding. Mercifully, it is relatively short, not allowing Mr. Hoffman time to rant and endlessly recapitulate...

[Ellie · Rating 3 out of 5]

With each passing day I become more schizophrenic

[Chrissie · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you ever wondered why things never change, this book may be a nice, rude awakening. Empowering like you wouldn't believe. Fascinating, charged, controversial, and scarily ominous.

[Jacob Aitken · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michael Hoffman analyses both how shadow governments use psychological warfare and why it works on late American man. Along the way we get a brilliant analysis of occult symbolism. Hoffman suggests that moden American man suffers from three things: amnesia, abulia, and apathy (Hoffman 9). This is important for his next thesis: the shadow government (or Cryptocracy or Regime or New World Order, call it what you will) can “pull these stunts” largely because a) the people are apathetic and so b) won’t resist.

Hermeticism and Alchemy

Alchemy is not simply transmuting lead into gold. It is transmuting society as well. It is turn to lead (traditional Christian man) into gold (Enlightenment project). Fabled alchemy had at least three goals to accomplish before the total decay of matter, the total breakdown we are witnessing all around us today, was fulfilled--at least for American culture-- and these are:

1.The Creation and Destruction of Primordial Matter (the atom was split at Trinity Site, NM, which runs along the 33rd degree north latitude)

2. The Killing of the Divine King. (JFK was killed at the 33rd degree of north parallel latitude between the Trinity River and the Triple Underpass at Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas. Dealey Plaza was the site of the first masonic temple in Dallas. This was also a televised slaughter in a sense). And for the record, the above analysis stands no matter one’s views on the Official Government Story of Spanky the Magic Bullet. For the record, I believe in the Magic Bullet. The above argument hinges on topography and synchronicity, not on who the shooter was.

3.The Bringing of Prima Materia to Prima Terra (91).

a.The "Phoenix" lunar landing module, after its return to the orbiting mother ship piloted by Michael Collins, was jettisoned directly into the sun in fulfillment of one of the most persistent themes of alchemical lore and Rosicrucian poetry: the "sexual marriage" of the sun and the moon (98).

These alchemical goals have been accomplished. The question remains: what is the affect/effect upon modern society? Hoffman notes, “We are mocked, disoriented and demoralized. Occult prestige and potency is heightened. This is what simplistic researchers miss: the function of macabre arrogance thumbing its nose at us while we do nothing except spread the tale of their immunity and invincibility further. That is the game plan operant here” (89).

The message is subtler than that. By common law and moral law those who are aware of crimes are also guilty. The Regime’s after-the-fact revelations is designed to further our guilt, knowing we won’t do anything about it. It is social engineering at its finest. Hoffman continues,

“As I've pointed out, secrets like this were rarely revealed in the past because traditional people had not yet completed the alchemical processing. To make such perverse, modern revelations to an unprocessed, healthy and vigorous population possessed of will, memory, adherence to their deepest inner intuition and intense interest in their own salvation, would not have been a good thing for the cryptocracy. It would have proved fatal to them.

But to reveal these after-the-act secrets in our modern time, to a people who have no memory, no will-power and no interest in their own fate except in so far as it may serve as momentary
titillation and entertainment actually strengthens the enslavement of such a people (89)”.

Analysis

The book’s weakness is its brevity. Too many explosive issues were only barely touched upon. One wishes that he would have better documented some Freemasonic references. I understand his interest in the Son of Sam murders, but it appears he overdeveloped that point. Aside from these criticisms, the book is pure gold.

[Rinstinkt · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Almost all people of all eras are hypnotics. Their beliefs are induced beliefs. The proper authorities saw to it that the proper belief should be induced, and people believed properly." -- Charles Fort

Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare by Michael A. Hoffman II explores occult symbolism, ritual murder, and mass mind control from the most original angle I have seen.

Among the several different topics, the most important was the concept of "Revelation of the Method" to the masses, which is a purposeful exposure strategy of the elite, in order to create a sense of helplessness and despair, in other words a show of strength.

Some of the works mentioned by the author are:
- Jack the Ripper: The Final Solution;
- Dr. Faustus;
- Edgar Allan Poe;
- The Silence of the Lambs;
- The Gutenberg Elegies: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age.

Some quotes from the book:

The acid test of a human being's freedom and will to protect the quality of his life, lies in a person's attitude toward his oppressor. What is modem man's attitude toward Wall Street and the bankers, toward Dan Rather and the ignorance-bestowing media and advertising man, toward Lincoln and Truman, FDR and Reagan, George Bush and Johnny Carson, Exxon and Monsanto?
As one writer has observed, "The most amazing thing about the American people is that they are constantly defending their worst betrayers." Who then is the modern man? He is a mindbombed patsy who gets his marching orders from "twilight language" key words sprinkled throughout "his" news and current events. Even as he dances to the tune of the elite managers of human behavior, he scoffs with great derision at the idea of the existence and operation of a technology of mass mind control emanating from the media and government. Modem man is much too smart to believe anything as superstitious as that!
Modern man is the ideal hypnotic subject: puffed up on the idea that he is the crown of creation, he vehemently denies the power of the hypnotist's control over him, even as his head bobs up and down on a string.

-

Why then does he revere them? Because they flatter him. This is the first secret of mass mind control and can be observed as the foundation stone of virtually every false religion, party, cult, philosophy, system and training. How can modern man free himself when he is told that he is already a demi-god, that the problem lies only in finding a pure enough economic or political system worthy of his high-minded brilliance?

-

Many of Judeo-Churchianity’s “Satan-hunters" and "Satan fighters" are part of the problem, not the solution. They have blind faith in the police, the military and the government. They have no concept of the fact that Freemasonry and Satanism are sometimes controlled and staffed by elements within the police and the government.
They see the world through the eyes of the rulers of the System. They remind me of the story St. Augustine told of a pirate who was confronted by that mighty conqueror, Alexander the Great. "How dare you molest the sea?" Alexander angrily asked the pirate.
"How dare you molest the whole world?" the pirate replied. "Because I do it with only a little ship, I am called a thief. You doing it with a great navy are called an emperor."
Many "Satan-hunters" and "occult investigators" repeatedly ignore or minimize the influence of Yale University’s Skull and Bones Society on initiates George Bush and son George W. Bush and of the hold Freemasonry has over some of the very policemen who lecture at schools about the occult.

-

A majority of those who call themselves "Christians" are just as much Satanists as any heavy metal rock band. In fact, the morality of the heavy metalists may be a bit higher since they admit what they are, whereas the so-called “Judeo-Christians” pose behind just the sort of pious, hypocritical front Jesus Christ excoriated.
Millions of Churchmen promote the worship of the doctrines of Central Government because their church receives tax exempt status only so long as these "preachers for hire" advocate idolatry of the State. But Christ taught the opposite (Matthew 20:25-28; Mark 10: 40-45).
Most churches allow "Christians" to adore multimillion dollar sports-team players and franchises which hold gigantic football and baseball contests in huge, Roman-style coliseums broadcast to hundreds of millions on television, to the greater glory of money, the waste of time and the promulgation of mass idolatry.

-

The Catholic Church also subscribes to this "saved by race" lie. Dr. Eugene Fisher, director of Catholic-Jewish relations for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops stated: "The path of dialogue is first the elimination from Christian teaching of all the vestiges of the ancient Christian polemic against Judaism. The notion that one can define Christianity as good by saying it's better than Judaism, is a fundamental heresy. One needs to understand that God chose the Jewish people irrevocably and eternally as Scripture says very clearly."37
This is Master Race propaganda put forward by “angels of light” who claim to be horrified by the Nazis, but who today worship “Jews” as a race possessed of an “irrevocable” divine status. If that is the case, why did Jesus even bother to preach, if the Jews of His time were already saved by their Herrenvolk status? And if “Scripture says” this “very clearly,” why the vociferous calls of late for the censorship of certain “problematic” passages in the New Testament?
The Document of the Vatican Commission for Religious Relations with Judaism, (section 4) states: "We propose, in the future, to remove from the Gospel of St. John the term, 'the Jews' where it is used in a negative sense, and to translate it, 'the enemies of Christ."

-

Was it by some sort of "television" that Satan tempted Christ? "The devil … showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time…All these will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me" (Luke 4:5; Matthew 4: 8-9; emphasis supplied).

-

... to whom are we directing the exposure, anyway? Who do we imagine comprise the audience that will respond and take effective action? Faith in the power of exposing crimes and their perpetrators to the light of day presupposes an audience of human beings who will intuit, fight, resist, remember.

-

There is and has been since this nation’s inception, a secret society that practices what the ancients termed sorcery, but which is nothing more than a kind of mind control. Their members are found in the FBI, the Secret Service, the Dept, of Justice, the halls of Congress and the corridors of finance, industry and the media of news and entertainment. These forces have combined to condition Americans into the breaking of millennia-old moral and racial taboos as a means of tearing them from their roots and their heritage, causing them to deride even the most basic survival instincts and natural law.

[Thomas Widrich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many of the conspiracies Hoffman exposes can be found in other books. Hoffman’s merit is to answer the question why cryptocracy does so little to hide their crimes. The answer is that they are used to get away with everything they do, and whenever something is exposed with impunity, they feel reassured. And “consent fuels their control like no other form of energy.”

Consent is also crucial to establish mind-control:

“The alchemical principle of the Revelation of the Method has as its chief component, a clown-like, grinning mockery of the victim(s) as a show of power and macabre arrogance. When this is performed in a veiled manner accompanied by certain occult signs and symbolical words and elicits no meaningful response of opposition or resistance from the target(s), it is one of the most efficacious techniques of psychological warfare and mind-rape.”

All in all, an excellent read during the COVID-19 scamdemic.

[Andrew Gillsmith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michael Hoffman is a novelist trapped in a conspiracy researcher's body.

I am at times awed by the beauty--the poetic perfection--of his language. No writer in the field of conspiracy theories today has a firmer grasp on the occult dimension of "modern history" than Hoffman. Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare is a classic in the genre.

[Mr. Bookworm · Rating 4 out of 5]

ok, i read this back in 2013. just finished the Da Vinci Code, which reminded me of this. boy, this book was a trip. the author makes us aware of the hidden symbols that we see in everyday life, and never give a second thought to. it covers everything, from JFK to the masons ( i mean the “real” masons, not the fake smokescreen ones that your grandfather belongs to). this book is the only thing thats ever scared me. i was working overnights during this time, and i was afraid to walk to my car at 3am in the morning. it ties things like the Jack the Ripper killings, to a bigger conspiracy involving the Queen and royalty and secret, murderous cults. however, just when he starts to reel you in, and you begin to think he might be on to something, he claims something really outlandish, like his belief the Moon Landings were connected to the Manson Murders. all in all, this was a really great book. i’m going to read it again, but this time i’ll probably enlist a buddy to keep me from going off the rails and ranting about conspiracies to my family, friends and any stranger on the street that looks like they have an ear and a minute to spare.

[Grips · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pairs well with Codex Magica by Texe Mars.

Coincidence is a force of nature. It may sound absurd to one fully steeped in the material modernist conception of the world but that is the inescapable conclusion of the thorough student of the transmundane:

“There is a dark poetry to ritual murder, to twilight language, to the fantastic convergences known as coincidence. Most “conspiracy researchers” miss these. The best investigator--of the occult or of almost anything else--has a child-like sense of curiosity and wonder about seemingly mundane things. [...] The preservation into adulthood of childhood’s inherent appreciation of the true “magic,” which may be found in what is generally dismissed as the “ordinary, everyday world,” was expressed with childlike glee by the born-again Christian mystic Thomas Traherne in the 17th century:
“Your enjoyment of this world is never right ‘till every morning you wake in heaven; see yourself in your father’s palace and look upon the skies, the earth and the air as Celestial Joys: having such a reverend esteem for all, as if you were among the angels…’till the sea itself floweth in your veins, ‘till you are clothed with the heavens and crowned with the stars…infinitely beloved of almighty God.”

The Hermetic Academy has made an artform of harnessing Coincidence for their ignoble ends, but theirs is a losing struggle. For they oppose the very medium through which they work, they antagonize God–reality itself. That, however, is no reason to rest easy, for in their mad rebellion they wreak havoc and disaster. God may win in the end, but man may not. Unless we fight back. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?

Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare is a rhetorical tour de force into canon of the Hermetic Academy aimed at intermediates and above, written in compelling prose. A beginner will not get much out of this book because he will become lost in the myriad of unexplained references. You are expected to already have all the puzzle pieces. The book will show you how they fit together and help you connect them. It will take you on an engaging journey from the bottom to the top of the whole rotten system, and back down again.

Names are important, pay attention. Stay Vigilant and always keep both eyes open.

—----------

Favorite quotes. I have so many it’s hard to pick and choose so enjoy the spam. Actually, you should go read the entire book because it is overflowing with love for the human heritage
Quotes:

There is no escaping fallen human nature. Those who claim to have the key, have oiled the skids to Plutonia, not Paradise, to the 'hunimal' and the 'golem,' not humanity, much less the "higher man." To know our limits is not a limitation. It only signifies that rather than perpetually trying to surpass our Creator, we cultivate our sensitivity to the incomparably beautiful vision He has bequeathed us as our birthright, and drink everyday with joyous appreciation at the fountain of miraculous glory that is His natural creation.
-
The following is a statement which comes from within the British-intelligence wing of the Cryptocracy:
“This demonstrates one of our simpler methods. Realizing that our activities will sooner or later come to light, we structure our activities so that as conspiracy researchers unravel them, they will release information into the public consciousness in such a way that it mirrors our initiatory procedure. In this way, the more we are investigated, the more masses of people are psychologically processed by the very people who seek to expose us. The meme that constitutes our essential structure is then successfully mimicked within the consciousness of those who investigate us. Success can then be measured precisely to the extent that our work is “exposed.”
-
The Injuns that are still out in the woods and have been there for the past 1500 years don't need computers and machines to keep the universe going. In fact, they say just the opposite of what McKenna says, that playing god and believing in the progressions of "hip" scientists and hackers is just going to lead to more destruction.

It's really like a war between two forces: the machine versus nature. The machine side is very slick, it presents itself as being on the side of nature. You know the line: "By shopping at Wal-Mart and buying a load of polluting garbage, you're helping to save the Rain Forest because Wal-Mart will donate five cents to the Save the Earth Fund for every dollar you spend keeping our worthless junk distribution network in business."

McKenna and the other leaders of the supposedly beneficial marriage between machines and pagan nature consciousness agree with conformist unanimity that the number one enemy on this planet is the human baby. "Stop the babies. Cut the birth rate. Sterilize, abort, shut down the channel of fertility." That's the message of these electronic "pagans."
-
Hermes, patron saint of the alchemists, gnostics and Freemasons, was above all, (or below all), a salesman. We're sold on the pitch that a One World, raceless, computer-utopia run by machines piloted by real hip, New Age jerks is where it's going to be happening. I doubt it. I think what they're paving the way for, either deliberately or as useful idiots, is a digitalized police state.
-
The cultivation of powers of discrimination and discernment are seldom the focus of the information-mongers. Yet if we acknowledge a war against the mind's capacity for independent thinking, then the acquisition of wisdom and not data is what we ought to recognize as paramount. A blizzard of data alone, without an aptitude for detecting fraud, is more a curse than a boon. Indeed when “expansion of the mind” is substituted for the traditional vocation of cultivation of the mind, we find ourselves not on a “superhighway” (a typically empty modem boast), but in Rene Guenon's cul-de-sac, where quantity reigns over quality. The substitution of the one for the other is itself a product of the conspiracy against original thinking and hence we are brought full circle with the cognition that, taken as a phenomenon, conspiracy research itself, is sometimes a part of the conspiracy against the mind.
[...]
I have said it before but it is worth restating: the hidden wisdom of this age lies not in what we invent but in what we avoid. The assault on our spirit and mind by the multi-tracked stimuli of the modern electronic world is toxic at nearly any level. The sheer accumulation of millions of images swelling like a tide through the circuits is of itself desensitizing.
[...]
The imploding data hive that he seeks to wire my offspring to, without doubt, coarsens their soul and dulls their spirit. The highest attribute we can cultivate in children, or recover in adults, is innocence. William Blake defined the “auguries of innocence” in his poem of the same name, where he wrote that the innocent are able to “…see the universe in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower; hold infinity in the palm of their hand and eternity in an hour.”

This timeless, pristine condition is extirpated by electricity. Those who have spent many hundreds or even thousands of hours of their lives in front of a television screen or a computer monitor, for the good intention of education or the sordid pursuit of depraved amusement, are both like the cadaver of Frankenstein, they must have ever greater electric shocks administered to them in order that they might come alive.
[...]
“…while circuit and screen are ideal conduits for certain kinds of data-figures, images, cross-referenced information of all sorts…they are antithetical to inwardness…inward experience, including all aesthetic experience, unfolds in one kind of time; electronic communications, of their very nature, depend upon-indeed create-another. The time of the self is deep time, duration time…All circuit-driven communications, by contrast, are predicated upon instantaneousness. To use them, to interact with them, requires that we enter a virtual now-the perpetual present tense of the impulse, of the beep, the flickering cursor.
-
Ritual murder is mind control. It's not always earth compensation for sacrilegious tampering. It can be ceremonial, possessing a liturgy that uses twilight language to imprint the Group Mind, the entity that is formed psychically when large numbers of people are intently focused on the same object, image or symbol. [...]
Symbolism embedded within terrorism and achieved with seeming invincible accomplishment by "invisible" principals, is a great way to control and process people.

In America, [REDACTED] was also a victim of masonic assassination. Three gunmen, three 'unworthy assassins' (the 3 hoboes); the Triple Underpass, the Trinity River, the 33rd degree of north latitude; Dealey Plaza, site of the first masonic lodge in Texas; a hidden government that got away with it; all this combined to leave the American people in the psychic condition of a rape victim; like a masonic initiate stripped of his clothes, lying in a coffin, terrorized by intimations of death and ready to be re-made in the image and likeness of his overseers.
-
We can't endure anything that is too profound. It must first be predigested and packaged in segments and dispensed through computers and videos in bright, pulsating dollops. One does not acquire learning by such means, but rather the illusion of learning. Part of the deadly intoxication of the modem era is the dance it does along the rim of the ever-present now. This pathetic modern infatuation is not a philosophy but a mimic of the five-and-dime marketing strategy of planned-obsolescence capitalism.

Modernists are obsessed with a thread of time molded by electrical circuits and soon, "biochips" (computers based within living cells, rather than silicon). But against this brief sneeze in the continuum of history, stands thousands of years, an entire respository of wisdom, which has, of late, been suppressed or discounted. There is something inherently totalitarian in the summary dismissal of so vast a body of folklore and classical learning, just because it is old and traditional.
-
Although the FBI catalogues all terrorist acts involving politically-motivated threats and violence, its SLATT operation (State/Local Anti-Terrorism Training), enacted after the Oklahoma City bombing in 1996, was created to furnish police only with information on the “Far Right.” The enabling directive alludes to “individuals adhering to ‘patriot’ extremist or other domestic terrorist philosophies.” It denotes as “extremists” those who “identify with one or more of the following philosophies: anti-tax, anti-federal government, anti-state government, anti-authority, anti-world alliances, pro-racial purity, pro-white supremacy, anti-Semitic and fear of loss of Constitutional rights…with equal fear of a one world order.” Persons so designated are targeted by the FBI’s National Security Division. Each month across the nation, police officers are trained by the FBI under SLATT, to spy upon and arrest those who fall into these categories. This government program is so Orwellian that to protest it makes one a potential target of it!

[Victor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Medieval man was literate in occultism. He understood the nefarious meanings of it’s symbols not because he was an initiate, but because Christianity, which permeated all aspects of his society, had taught him its dangers and to recoil in its face. Shielded by his Christian training and faith, pagan rituals and symbols could not influence his life. The occult remained largely secret and fringe.

Modern man, on the other hand, is illiterate in occultism. He lives in a mostly secular society where only 37 percent of Americans attend church on a regular basis, according to the Pew Research Center. He has eschewed religion and faith for “scientism”, which Hoffman describes as “black magic.” The dearth of religion and spirituality in the lives of Americans have made them vulnerable to the power of the occult, Hoffman claims.

Today, the occult is mainstream. It has emerged from the underworld and into the light of day to become the “Cryptocracy” that openly rules the mass mind of America through entertainment media, commercialism, and government. Though we do not recognize it, occult symbolism is everywhere, and according to Hoffman, we have become the initiates of the occult without being aware of it. “The masses at large in the 21st century,” writes Hoffman, “have had as many occult experiences and absorbed as many occult cues as most of the old Lodge brothers.”

I found some of Hoffman’s claims farfetched and confusing because he often employs a sort of frenzied, esoteric, abstract jargon that is as cryptic as the subject of his book (“Wouldn’t you, shouldn’t you love to be like them in the interstices of the alchemical Nigredo phase of transmutation, in the Silentium post clamores (silence after noise) of their operating room and dissection chamber, where dead matter becomes the focus of humanity’s quest?”).

Given the language, Hoffman’s audience appears to be the self-aware initiates and students of the occult, which would make his arguments moot; since, he would be preaching to the choir. But if his purpose is to awaken Americans to their indoctrination by dark cabalistic forces, he might have written the book in more accessible language.

Nevertheless, Hoffman’s take on “trinity sites” and high profile crimes and criminals in history were eye opening. His analysis of President Kennedy’s death as a “Killing of the King” ritual murder, for example, adds another layer to the intriguing, dark conspiracy behind his assassination. Hoffman reveals that Dealey Plaza, which is “located approximately ten miles south of the 33rd degree north parallel latitude between the Trinity River and the Triple Underpass” was also “the site of the first masonic temple in Dallas.” If there is truth to Oliver Stone’s film, “JFK”, Hoffman might have added that Kennedy was not killed by Lee Harvey Oswald, but by three teams of assassins who set up a “triangulation crossfire” in a plaza whose name means “goddess rule”.

Hoffman makes a similar occult analysis of the Trinity nuclear test site in New Mexico, of Jack the Ripper, of Ted Kaczynski the Unabomber, of David Berkowitz the Son of Sam serial killer, and even of Dr. John Whiteside Parsons, the scientist and co-founder of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Parson's story was especially unsettling; it creeped me out like the gimp scene in Quentin Tarantino's film, "Pulp Fiction."

Hoffman's book would make a great documentary because the occult symbols and stories that he shares are visual. A documentary could also improve upon the book, which is not well written.

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is for those with a PhD. in conspiracy theory, yet I only have a bachelors with 15 graduate credit hours. Lots going on in the text and it all speaks to a level marginally outside of my focus, but is directly related. Author, Michael A Hoffman, isn't interested in teaching to the beginner, he's writing with the assumption you already have prior knowledge. While I do have prior knowledge, it's not as vast as his and I like my memory jogged.

Crash Collusion magazine out of Berkeley wrote this:
Michael A Hoffman II is one of today's more original conspiracy researchers. Rather than bogging himself down with unprovable minutiae and untraceable connections, he instead plots general trends visible to all, with a startling new viewpoint.

The startling new viewpoint refers to Freemasonry and other secret societies' grip on civilization's function and goings-on. Freemasonry, especially after the 32nd degree, is satan's device and means of controlling this planet. He has many, to be sure, but the Freemasons have stood the test of time. While I'm fine being aware of the Freemasons and their power, I don't need to dive too deeply. If you enjoy knowing all the connections, symbology, coincidences, and hidden references of the Masons, this book is for you.

Take-aways that enrich my actual focus and give me more to explore are:

1. William Morgan, Freemason whistleblower

2. Christopher Marlowe, another whistleblower

3. Rosemary's Baby

4. Page 124 - interview with Crash Collusion

5. Page 88 - the "Lone Nut" theory sold by police and media after serial murders. Working under an evidentially strong conclusion that there were more than one Son of Sam killer, only David Berkowitz, Richard Falco, took the fall for all of them. But really, he was part of a satanic cult much like Charles Manson. On page 55 in The Ultimate Evil, Berkowitz said, "I, David Berkowitz, have been chosen since birth to be one of the executioners for the cult."

6. Page 88 again - wealthy Manhattan heir in the Sam cult kept young children in a townhouse and cult members called it "The Nursery."

7. On page 128 Hoffman discusses ritual murder and pontificates where its necessity comes from.

I can appreciate Hoffman's depth of knowledge and jokingly say he has his PhD in conspiracy theory, but what I really want him to acknowledging is how satanism ties all these conspiracies together. Satanism is the foundation that gives structure to all of this evil. There is intelligent evil and it sends gunmen into elementary schools, crashes planes into populated high rise buildings, financially destroys economies, and kidnaps 22,000 children worldwide each day - over 8 million a year. I really want him to tie it all together for us, which maybe he does in later books?

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

“When you start to see the pattern of coincidence and it becomes a language for you, you have to become either an initiate or a schizophrenic, take your pick, because you lose the protection of materialism - - our protection against the disordering of the arrangement we’ve given to the world to make it manageable” (pg. 130).

Hoffman II gives the reader so much to look into further. Looking forward to reading his sequel book, “The Twilight Language”.

[LittleFlowerEnjoyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I don't agree with every take that the author has on certain events, I found the book profoundly illuminating into the sheer influence of the occult and so-called "twilight language" on modern media and culture.

[Ryan Furtado · Rating 5 out of 5]

Scary, there are large forces at play that most are not aware of. We are headed on a dark path.

[Chandler Kelley · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books on culture/politics/history I've ever read. Not for the faint of heart, and, as with any occult research (not to be confused with the practice of occultism), much of the subject matter is info-hazardous. In short, Hoffman's thesis is that the modern world is dominated by occultists and secret societies pushing narratives associated with gnosticism/transhumanism, through veiled symbolism (a.k.a. twilight language) and predictive programming. He convincingly shows that we are in a "Revelation of the Method" era, when the elites (he calls the cryptocracy) are now openly revealing their centuries- and decade-long works to a society which has largely given implicit consent over time, which they believes absolves them from guilt.

This is an immensely important and prophetic work of "revisionist" history. The book's final edition was printed just months before 9/11, and I noted dozens of times where Hoffman is almost predicting such an event to occur as part of the elites' plan(s). For that reason, I'm looking forward to reading his 2020 follow-up, "Twilight Language," part of which is a reflection on whathe wrote here.

I can't give a blanket recommendation of this book to all readers, but this is certainly a great starting place for understanding parapolitics and conspiracies. Plus, Hoffman writes from a solid Christian perspective unlike most conspiracy theory writers (e.g., written by pagan/gnostic New Agers or heterodox Christians obsessed with ungrounded end times beliefs).

[Sir Badgerly · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW, Sh*t, WOW! Read it and understand the mass deception that has been going on way too long. I'm trying not to conclude that there is no hope politically and that all we can do is save our souls, but it's not really going with the facts these days. Unless a couple million people read this and a start talking about it. Just don't end up like Christopher Marlowe, whose eyes were gouged out for "seeing too much."

'The plan' is way more advanced than I thought. The end is nigh? Without an act of Divine Providence, it seems like it. That or a really dark age that will make "1984" look like Utopia. God save us!

[Celeste · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to believe the perspective advanced in this book, that there is a shadowy elite, a cryptocracy, with nefarious objectives to be ludicrous conspiracy theories but given the dystopian times we are living through, that perspective has changed. The answers might not be in this book but much of its perspective is true. I've come to see that people are not foolish to believe in conspiracy theories, even if inaccurate, because at least they know better than to believe what they are told. For, its not coincidental and for no reason that the elite congregate in secrecy at Bilderberg and Bohemian Grove. Then we see the so-called world leaders move in unison on key and controversial objectives. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, Dorothy? One of the many gifts my father gave to me was a mind that questioned what it was told by authority, that understood TV was mind rot best avoided and that the ruling elite have plans for the future and we are not a part of it. So much of what my father railed against came true but even he would be surprised by some of the darkness descending upon us now.

Some of what I found fascinating in this read was the use of spectacle as rituals on a mass level to communicate and normalize their world view and to get our complicity in it by watching it. Watching it is a form of consent and is not as passive as it seems. At the end of her life, my mom wouldn't watch anything Satanic on TV, and there was lots of it out there. That's a far cry from mom in the 70s who went through her phase of being curious about witchcraft, reading about it and dredging up all kinds of bad stuff before dropping it. When you peer into the darkness, it peers into you.

"The massive cryptocracy over humanity has been accomplished under the cover of victimhood. The world's most rigid and fascist hierarchy has successfully enveloped its occult discipline in the patina of persecution and hounding by the "uptight, the blind, the superstitious and the ignorant."

Sounds a lot like ID politics and the manufactured culture wars 'raging' today, no?

"Which is more dangerous a threat to individual rights and the natural order: the old time princes and prelates who loudly announce their aspiration for glory, authority, pomp and ceremony, or those other princes and tyrants who advance their dominion under the mask of freethought, victimhood, equality and a man-made heaven on earth?"

It is fashionable to rail against the monarchy as colonial repressors but what if the new princes of today are actually a lot worse?

"The key rocket fuel scientist who laid the crucial technical groundwork for the eventual rocket propulsion used in the Apollo flights was Dr. John Whiteside Parsons of the California Institute of Technology. Dr. Parsons was a descendant of one of the founders of the Satanic "Hell-Fire Club" in Britain. He himself was the leader of the California branch of Aleister Crowley's Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO). In his honor, NASA named a crater on the moon after Parsons."

Why are key leaders like this one enmeshed in such dark sh*t?

From a movie where they expose some of their agenda through mass entertainments, this is from David Cronenberg's Videodrome:

"We are entering savage new times....The battle for the mind of North America will be fought in the video arena, the videodrome....You reality is already half-hallucination. If you're not careful it will be come total hallucination....Massive doses of videodrome signal will ultimately create a new outgrowth of the human brain which will produce and control hallucination to the point that it will change human reality.....In the dialog of the Videodrome film, the helmet wearer asks his captor, "Will it hurt you?" To which is captor replies, "It won't hurt you. You might catch yourself sliding in and out of the hallucinatory state after this is all over. If you do, just relax and enjoy it. It will soon go away. But for now, I think you'll find a little sado-masochism will be necessary to trigger off a good healthy series of hallucinations. That is why our Videodrome game is so strange-something to do with the effects of the exposure of violence on the nervous system. It opens up receptors in the brain and spine that allows the Videodrome signal to sink in."

The use of entertainments as mind control is rampant. You can see it in most crass form in popular music today in the music, the messages, the videos and the performances on awards shows like MTV and Grammies.

"If we consider the hours in a day most Americans spend in front of a TV and add to that the hours children spend immersed in the digital world of video games and add to that their forthcoming immersion in computer-simulated worlds of supposed "history" and "travel" in their schools, and we see the creation of dwellers-in-perpetual-illusion. Couple this with the increasing very rapid destruction of wild nature and our ability to access it, and modern humanity becomes almost totally cut-off from the voice of God, emerging as enslaved drone-bees: wired, processed, helmeted and programmed; a processing that has been the goal of secret societies since Adam Weishaupt's Beenan Orden ("Order of the Bees.). Outside the murders rage, the invasion tides swell, the blood is polluted, the control is tightening, the asphalt is pouring, the landmarks and the wilderness are vanishing, the heritage is dying and memory itself is dwindling."

Sounds like a good description of today, no?

[Valiant Thor · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting perspective on secret societies and the occult undertones of many world events. I wouldn't recommend this as an *introductory* book to the subject, but it's worth reading. As an introduction, I'd recommend Jim Marrs' book, "Rule by Secrecy".

[Dennis Fernandes · Rating 4 out of 5]

"America has become a pathological culture of monetary and career success at all costs."
page 158, Michael Hoffman II

[Swhirsch · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting insights, unfortunately the author is a virulent racist

[Zab · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hoffman argues that certain events are mixed in with a symbolic logic rooted in occult traditions, especially those emphasizing transformation through trauma. When people are subjected to shocking, disorienting public episodes, they become malleable. The spectacle becomes a ritual designed to break down old social norms and implant new, more compliant ones. Even disbelief or cynicism plays into the hands of these operators. When people stop trusting their own perception and shrug off manipulation as “just the way the world is,” they surrender their psychological autonomy. Shocking events, contradictory media narratives, and gaslighting serve to dissolve a cultures sense of meaning. Once society is spiritually weakened, it becomes easier to push new realities, along with norms, fears, and forms of obedience.

He mentions the symbolism embedded in political theater, architecture, assassinations, and geographic locations. He interprets certain public events (especially those involving violence or national trauma) as ritual enactments with coded elements such as numerology, archetypes, mythic echoes, and references to occult traditions.

The main idea is not that every detail is part of a literal conspiracy, but that modern power structures understand how symbols shape the human psyche. By embedding their messages in imagery, repeated narratives, and psychologically charged myths, they develop a population accustomed to manipulation. Media outlets serve as both amplifiers and ritual participants, reporting events and shaping emotional reactions through selective framing.

He describes "revelation of the method" as a technique in which elites slowly reveal the nature of their manipulations, not to warn the public, but to deepen their control. When people see evidence of corruption, deception, or ritualistic manipulation but choose to ignore it or feel powerless to act, they psychologically internalize their own subordination. The revelation becomes part of the ritual, producing resignation instead of rebellion. He views this as one of the most advanced forms of psychological control: domination achieved through transparency, irony, and the public’s own inaction. This psychological manipulation relies not on absolute secrecy, but on a paradoxical transparency. The symbols, clues, and ritual patterns are placed in plain sight, but buried beneath layers of irony, noise, and public apathy. The ruling groups power grows from the very fact that the public can see the manipulation but feels unable or unwilling to resist it.

Another theme is the deliberate erosion of traditional sources of moral and symbolic meaning. He argues that secret society thinking thrives in a world where people are spiritually confused. When language, truth, and morality become fluid, individuals can be guided by external forces that promise a sense of coherence or direction. The growth of propaganda, mass entertainment, and ideological extremes is not accidental. It's part of a controlled environment where confusion becomes a tool of governance.

The ultimate goal of this psychological warfare is not simply political domination, but a deeper transformation of human consciousness itself. He raises the idea that the orchestrators of these symbolic manipulations are engaged in a long term project to reshape humanity, a remake of mankind. The end result is a population that accepts surveillance, manipulation, and ritualized control as natural parts of life, and even participates in its own transformation.

[Brad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Someone I've known for a long time suggested this book to me and offered to lend it, so I said sure and agreed to offer up my opinion after reading it. I set the book aside and didn't think about it until I finally got around to reading it several days ago.

This book reads like an independently published book from over 20 years ago, which it is. It also reads like a 214 page excerpt from a much longer work, which it's not. It's sort of hard to explain, but the book certainly wasn't quite what I expected, but it was still good.

If you're looking for a richly detailed story of the history behind different secret societies in the United States, or globally, you won't find that here. What you'll find here is a detailed but somewhat disjointed explanation of events in history and how they correlate to mostly one or two secret societies. The books uses terms like "Cryptocracy" and "masonic" but I generally accepted the primary subject of the book to be the Freemasons. Other times he specifically mentions the Ordo Templi Orientis.

Much of this book covers events in history (Jack the Ripper, Columbine, Son of Sam etc.,) and ritual murder/sacrifice. It's certainly disturbing material. Also, there's a good deal about the media, and films, The Wicker Man and Rosemary's Baby being two in particular.

The author has certainly done TONS of research and provides great detail in this 214 page book. In terms of "conspiracy theory" books, this is certainly more of a "niche" book, for lack of a better word, and dated at this point, but anyone looking for books on these topics (see title of the book) this would be a must-read for sure.

[Máté · Rating 1 out of 5]

this book is incredibly bias, written from a viewpoint of a blindly Christian man who has clearly lost faith in all except the institution of the church. even though he is arrogant towards all other views but his, he himself fails to realise the hypocricy of the church and how it really turns everything upside down, while seeking nothing but control over the souls of its believers while claiming to save them. if one fails to make this connection and read between the lines of the Book, then all other effort to look behind the curtain is destined to fail… sees things in black and white and unable to see the bigger picture behind it all. not well researched, horribly written, very superficial. not worth your time

[Dan Zarfati · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has some fun moments, specially when it examines fortean events and cultish groups. Well turns out in the book that the author reveals himself as a Christian fundamentalist of the inquisition type, a proper nut who is living outside a mental institution. For him any none Christian that does not follow Jesus paths is a degenerate and must be damned. Well too bad you have not study how the gospels were altered and played with, you are advocating for a theocratic dictatorship, a old way of control.Add to that the incredible discourse against science, in probably in favour or cave man. No thanks sir.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare by Michael A. Hoffman II is the best book out there on the subject of conspiracy/mind control/media/technology. Hoffman's writing style and intellect is also superior to other authors in the similar genres, as he is able to describe exactly how his Cryptocracy is able to manipulate us so well.
Hoffman is able through his use of language to blur the lines between "modern science" and "primitive magic," better than even Marshall McLuhan could.

[Malik · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book with great substance but underwhelming presentation. I think it's effective in adding plots and history for people who are already engaged in this topic but alienating to people who may be new to it.

[Palacios · Rating 4 out of 5]

So much information! I read this slowly but much time would be required to research and verify the dense body of information the author presented.
I will hang onto this and revisiting some time in the future.

[Fatima Sarder · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some of the conspiracy theories in the book feel a little out there. There is a lot of important messages weaved within the text but the writing is quite bad, which makes it difficult to read and comprehend.

I love a good conspiracy theory, but this book isn't for me.

[PHIL Harrington · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is probably one of my number one or number two favorite books especially in esoteric knowledge a lot to do also with some predictions of 9/11 in this book and a lot of gems.I give it five stars Plus

[Adam Marasco · Rating 2 out of 5]

The church started fighting the occult before sucumbing to its evil charm..good read