Early Years of Max Heindel

Max Heindel, Rosicrucian Initiate
and founder of The Rosicrucian Fellowship, was born on July 23, 1865. His father
was Francois L. Von Grasshoff, of a noble family connected with the German Court
during the time of Prince Bismarck. After emigrating to Copenhagen, Denmark, he
met and married a Danish woman, three children being born to them. The oldest of
these was Carl Louis Von Grasshoff, who later adopted the pen name of Max
Heindel.

At the age of sixteen Max Heindel entered the shipyards
of Glasgow, Scotland, where he learned engineering. As Chief Engineer of a
trading steamer he took trips into many lands, thus gaining a wide knowledge of
the world and its people. For a number of years he was Chief Engineer on a large
Cunard Line passenger ship plying between America and Europe.

Between the years 1895 and 1901, he was a consulting
engineer in New York City. During this time he married, the marriage being
terminated by the death of his wife in 1905. A son and two daughters were born
of this marriage.

After going to Los Angeles, California, in 1903, Max
Heindel became interested in the study of metaphysics, joining the local branch
of the Theosophical Society and serving as its vice-president from 1904-1905.
During this time there began to grow within him an increasingly intense desire
to understand the cause of the sorrows and sufferings of humanity and to help
alleviate them. He began the study of astrology, which he found to his delight
gave him the key by means of which he found he could unlock the mysteries of
man’s inner nature.

The events in Max Heindel’s life immediately subsequent
to 1905 are given in the following account of the birth of the Rosicrucian
Fellowship. Until his transition on January 6, 1919, he was active in doing the
pioneer work of launching the Fellowship, including the acquisition of land for
the establishment of International Headquarters in Oceanside, California, the
building of necessary buildings, publishing of books, etc.

The Birth of the Rosicrucian Fellowship

In order to make the
origin of the Fellowship clear to our readers we will give a history of how and
when Max Heindel met the Elder Brothers of the Rosicrucian Order. We will,
moreover, use his own words at times to make the matter more clear.

During the summer of 1905, through overwork on account
of his extreme desire for spiritual knowledge, Max Heindel was taken seriously
ill in Los Angeles with heart trouble, so ill that for months his life was
despaired of. Much of the time during this illness he spent out of the body,
consciously working and seeking for the truth as he might find it on the
invisible planes. He was undaunted by sickness, however, and as soon as health
permitted, he went on the lecture platform to spread his occult knowledge.

In May, 1906, this work was cut short in San Francisco
be the great earthquake, and his lecture tour led him to Seattle and the
northern part of the country. After a course of lectures in that city he was
again forced to spend some time in a hospital with valvular heart trouble. Still
undaunted, he once more took up his work of lecturing in the northwestern part
of the United States.

In the fall of 1907 during a most successful period in
Minnesota, there came to Mr. Heindel a friend who had for months been begging
him to go to Berlin to meet a man whom she claimed to be a most wonderful
lecturer and teacher. Failing by correspondence to induce him to leave his work
in America, she had come to Minnesota for the express purpose of personally
urging him to go. She was successful at last in persuading him to make the trip.

After reaching Germany he attended lectures and had
several interviews with this teacher. But in a short time he found that this man
had little to give him, and that what he gave out was not new to him. In
disappointment he was ready to go back to America. As he sat in his room in
great dejection, feeling that he had given up a big work in America to take this
trip, a being, who he later learned was an Elder Brother of the Rosicrucian
Order and who afterward became his Teacher, appeared, clothed in his vital body,
and offered to help him on certain occult points. The information which the
Teacher gave him was concise and logical and beyond anything Mr. Heindel was
capable of writing. On a later visit the Teacher offered to impart to him the
teachings which he desired, provided that he keep them secret. Max Heindel had
for several years searched and prayed that he might find something wherewith to
appease the soul hunger of the world. Having suffered and known the longings of
his own heart, he could not give the promise to the Elder Brother, and refused
to accept anything that he could not be permitted to pass on to his soul-hungry
brothers. The Teacher left him.

Can you imagine the feeling that would naturally come
over a starving man who had been denied food for some time to have some one
offer him a piece of bread but before he could taste of it to have it snatched
away? The last condition would be more wretched than the first. So it was with
Max Heindel. About a month later, however, the Teacher appeared in his room
again and told him that he, Max Heindel, has stood his test. He stated that if
he had accepted the offer, namely, to keep the teachings a secret from the
world, he, the Elder Brother, would not have returned. He was told of the
candidate whom they had at first chosen, who had failed to pass his test in
1905; also that he, Max Heindel, had been under the observation of the Elder
Brothers for a number of years as the most fit candidate should the first one
fail. In addition he was told that the teachings must be given out to the public
before the close of the first decade of the century, which would be the end of
December, 1909.

At this last interview with the Teacher he was given
instructions as to how to reach the Temple of the Rose Cross, which was near the
border between Bohemia and Germany. At this Temple Max Heindel spent a little
over one month in direct communication with and under the personal instructions
of the Elder Brothers, who imparted to him the greater part of the teachings
contained in The Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception. The first draft of
this book, which was made while he was in the Temple, the Teacher told him was
but an outline. The heavy psychic atmosphere of Germany was particularly adapted
to the communication of mystical thought to the consciousness of the candidate,
but he was told that the three hundred and fifty pages of manuscript which he
had written would not satisfy him when he reached the electric atmosphere of
America, and that he would then wish to rewrite the entire book. In his great
enthusiasm he at first doubted this. He felt that he had received a wonderfully
complete message. But the Elder Brother’s predictions were true. After Mr.
Heindel had spent a few weeks in New York City, what the Elder brothers had told
him proved to be a fact. The style in which the manuscript was written did not
then please him, and he set about the work of rewriting.

He rented a cheap hall bedroom on the seventh floor of a
rooming house, and during the hottest summer months of 1908 he sat in this hot
room typing from 7 A.M. until 9 and sometimes 10 P. M., when he would go out for
his dinner. After a walk through the hot streets of New York he would again
resume his work on the manuscript, continuing until after midnight. The heat
becoming too intense, he moved to Buffalo, New York, where he finished the
manuscript about September, 1908.

The next problem which faced him was how to get the book
published and where he was to procure the means for its publication. On account
of the heat of that season of the year he was unfortunate in starting lectures
and classes in Buffalo. But later he found a good field for his work in
Columbus, Ohio, where Mrs. Rath-Merrill and her daughter assisted him in the
drawing of diagrams. In this city he spent a number of successful months in
lecturing and teaching, and then formed the first Rosicrucian Center, November
14, 1908. After each lecture he distributed free mimeographed copies of the
twenty lectures of the Christianity Series. Starting with Lecture No. 1,
The Riddle of Life and Death, he gave to each one present a copy to
take home to study. These copies he ran off on his mimeograph machine at night
after the lecture. With a small hammer, a packet of tacks in his pocket, and his
advertising cards under his arm, he walked miles each day to place these cards
where they would reach the eyes of the public. He wrote his own newspaper
articles and placed them in the hands of the editors, who were sometimes very
prejudiced against the new teachings. Mr. Heindel, however, with his pleasing
personality, could usually win them over, sometimes getting a full column
write-up which brought a goodly crowd.

After delivering twenty lectures in Columbus, his path
led him to Seattle, Washington, where he had made many friends in 1906. He hoped
to interest some friend there in assisting him to print his book. This friend
proved to be William M. Patterson, who not only assisted him to get the book
into the hands of the publisher but, being a printer and editor himself, was
able to give him much valuable advice as to the publishing. Mrs. Bessie Brewster
and Kingsmill Commander were also most helpful in assisting him in the editing
of the manuscript. Following this, and accompanied by William M. Patterson, he
took the manuscript of the Cosmo-Conception and the twenty lectures
to Chicago, where they were later published.

We will give here a few of Max Heindel’s own words
descriptive of his work in Chicago: “The Rosicrucian
Cosmo-Conception was published in November, 1909, about five weeks before
the end of the first decade of the century. Friends had edited the original
manuscripts and had done splendid work, but I had of course to revise it before
giving it to the printer; then I read the printer’s proof, corrected and
returned it, and reread it after mistakes had been rectified. I read it again
after the type had been divided into pages, and gave instructions to the
engravers about the drawings and to the printer about placing them in the book,
etc. I was up at 6 A. M. and toiled until 12, 1, 2, or 3 in the night during all
those weeks, amid endless confusion, with tradesmen and the roar of Chicago
about my ears, sometimes almost to the limit of nervous endurance. Still I kept
my faculties together and wrote many new points into the Cosmo. Had
it not been for the support of the Elder Brothers, I must have gone under. It
was their work, however, and they saw me through. Yet I was almost a wreck when
the strain was past.”

While in Chicago the entire edition of the
Cosmo-Conception, with the exception of a few hundred copies which
were taken to Seattle, was stored with a woman who conducted a publishing house.
Being in debt this woman used the Cosmo-Conception stored with her
to pay her indebtedness to other publishers. When the request was later made
from Seattle for more books, it was found that the first edition of two thousand
copies was exhausted. This necessitated the ordering of the second edition. A
sixty-page index was then added.

While it might seem that the loss of two thirds of the
copies of the Cosmo-Conception must have been a calamity to one of
limited means, it was far from it. It proved to be a godsend, for the woman had
been associated with New Thought, Theosophy, and various other advanced thought
movements for a number of years and had furnished them with books she procured
from large publishing houses. She induced them to accept the
Cosmo-Conception, which up to that time had been comparatively
unknown. Thereby she created a demand which was one means of spreading the
Rosicrucian teachings to many parts of the world. it was a cloud which truly had
a silver lining.

After having established Fellowship Centers in Columbus,
Seattle, North Yakima, and Portland, Mr. Heindel returned to Los Angeles in
November, 1909, to start work in that city.

To continue with this story it is now necessary that the
writer bring in her own associations. Previous to Max Heindel’s leaving Los
Angeles and between the years of 1898 and 1906 the writer, who was then Augusta
Foss, and Mr. Heindel had been close friends, spending much time together in the
study of occultism, astrology, and kindred subjects. When he returned to Los
Angeles in 1909 with the Rosicrucian Teachings, the writer found in the
Cosmo-Conception that which she had been seeking for a number of
years. It satisfied the inner longing. It was the food for which her soul had
hungered. She at once threw herself heart and soul into the work, and assisted
Mr. Heindel with his lectures and classes.

Between November 29, 1909 and March 17, 1910, he
conducted classes and gave lectures in Los Angeles. Giving three public lectures
a week, he filled a hall holding one thousand full to the door each night. By
March his health would not permit him to go on. Shortly afterward he was taken
ill with the usual heart trouble, and while in the hospital at the very point of
death he had a most remarkable experience. We will append his description of it
in his own words:

“On the night of the 9th of April, 1910, when the New
Moon was in Aries, my Teacher appeared in my room and told me that a new decade
had commenced that night, and that in the coming ten years it would be my
privilege to give to the world a science of healing such as later described. The
Fellowship would furnish helpers in the great work.

“This was the first intimation I had had that such work
was contemplated. The night before, my work with the newly formed Los Angeles
Fellowship Center had terminated. I had traveled and lectured six out of seven
nights, and several afternoons a week besides, since my Chicago publishing
experience. I was sick and withdrawing from public work to recuperate. I knew it
was very dangerous to leave the body consciously when ill, for the etheric body
is then unusually attenuated, and the silver cord breaks easily. Death under
such conditions would cause the same sufferings as suicide, so the Invisible
Helper is always cautioned to stay in his body when it is suffering. But at my
Teacher’s request I was ready for the soul flight to the Temple, and a guard was
left to watch the sick body.

“As we have stated previously in our literature there
are nine degrees in the Lesser Mysteries of whatever country, and the
Rosicrucian Order is no exception. The first of these corresponds to the Saturn
Period, and the exercises having to do with it are held on Saturn’s day at
midnight. The second degree corresponds to the Sun Period, and that particular
rite is celebrated at midnight on Sunday. The third degree, corresponding to the
Moon Period, is held on Monday at midnight; and so on with the remainder of the
first seven degrees; each corresponds to a Period and is held on the day
appropriate thereto. The eighth degree is celebrated at the New Moon and the
full; the ninth degree at the summer and winter solstices.

“When a disciple first becomes a lay brother or sister,
he or she is introduced to the rite held on Saturday nights. The next Initiation
entitles him also to attend the midnight services at the Temple on Sunday
nights, and so on. It is to be noted, however, that while all lay brothers and
sisters have free access in their spiritual bodies to the Temple during all
days, they are barred from the midnight services of the degrees which they have
not yet taken. Nor is it a visible guard who stands at the door and demands a
password of each as he desires to enter, but a wall is around the Temple,
invisible yet impenetrable to those who have not received the ‘Open Sesame.’
Every night it is differently constituted, so that should a pupil by mistake or
through forgetfulness seek to enter the Temple when the exercises are above his
status, he would learn that it is possible to bump one’s head against a
spiritual wall and that the experience is by no means pleasant.

“As already said, the eighth degree meets at the new and
full moon, and all who have not attained to it are debarred from that midnight
service, the writer among them; for these degrees are no mere mummeries to be
obtained by the payment of a few paltry coins, but require a measure of
spirituality far beyond my present attainment, a stage to which I may not attain
in several lives though not wanting in effort or aspiration. You will therefore
understand that on the night of the New Moon in Aries, 1910, when the Teacher
came for me, it was not to take me into that exalted gathering of the eighth
degree but to another session of a different nature.

“Besides, though this session was held in the night as
it occurs in California, the time being different in Europe the exercises of the
New Moon had been held in Germany hours before, so that when I arrived at the
Temple with my Teacher, the sun was already high in the German heavens.

“When we entered the Temple, some time was devoted to an
interview with my Teacher alone, and in it he outlined the work of the
Fellowship as the Brothers would wish to have it carried out.

“After the interview we entered the Temple, where the
twelve Brothers were present. It was arranged differently from what I had seen
it before, but lack of space forbids a detailed description. I shall only
mention three spheres, suspended above one another in the center of the Temple,
the middle sphere being about half way between floor and ceiling; also it was
much larger than the two others, which hung above and below it.

“The various modes of vision above the physical are:
etheric or X-ray, color vision, which opens up the Desire World; and tonal
vision, which discloses the Region of Concrete Thought, as explained very fully
in The Rosicrucian Mysteries. My development of the latter phase of
spiritual sight had been most indifferent up to the time mentioned, for it is a
fact that the more robust our health, the closer we are enmeshed in the physical
and the less able to contact spiritual realms. People who can say, ‘I never had
a day’s sickness in my life,’ at the same time reveal the fact that they are
perfectly attuned to the physical world and totally incapable of contacting the
spiritual realm. This was nearly my case up to 1905, though I had suffered
excruciating pain all my life, the effects of a surgical operation on the left
limb in childhood. The wound never healed until I changed to a meatless diet;
then the pain also ceased. But my endurance during all the previous years was
such that it never showed by a line on the face, and in every other respect I
had perfect health. It was noticeable, however, that when blood flowed as a
result of an accidental cut, it would not coagulate, and a great quantity was
always lost; whereas after two years on a clean diet the accidental loss of an
entire nail in the morning resulted in the loss of only a few drops of blood; I
was able to use the typewriter the same afternoon; there was no festering as the
new nail grew.

“Upbuilding of the spiritual side of the nature,
however, brought disharmony to the physical body; it became more sensitive to
conditions around; the result was a breakdown. This was all the more complete
because of the before mentioned endurance that kept me on my feet for months
after I should have given in, with the result that I came very close to death’s
door.73

“Out of this precarious condition, however, has come an
increasing ability to function in the spiritual world. While, as said, my tonal
vision and the ability to function in the Region of Concrete Thought here
related were indifferent and chiefly confined to the lowest subdivision thereof,
a little assistance from the Brothers that night enabled me to contact the
fourth division, where the archetypes are found, and to receive there
the teaching and understanding of that which is contemplated as the highest
ideal and mission of the Rosicrucian Fellowship.

“I saw our Headquarters and a string of people coming
from all quarters of the world to receive the teaching. I saw them issuing
thence to bring balm to afflicted ones near and far. While here in this world it
is necessary to investigate in order to find out about anything, there the voice
of each archetype brings with it as it strikes the spiritual consciousness a
knowledge of what that archetype represents. Thus there came to me that night an
understanding which is far beyond my words to express, for the world in which we
live is based upon the principle of time, but in the high realm of the
archetypes all is an eternal Now.”

You will note in the above article that Max Heindel was
able by the help of the Teacher to function in the fourth division of the Region
of Concrete Thought, where the archetypes of physical form are found. This can
only be accomplished after passing through the fourth Initiation, or fourth
degree, which corresponds to the first half of the Earth Period. Only after
passing through the third stratum of the earth can a man function in the fourth
division of the Region of Concrete Thought.

At the time of this Initiation into the deeper Mysteries
the Brothers imparted to him the knowledge that an Ecclesia or Temple was to be
built on Mt. Ecclesia, where a Panacea was to be prepared. The spiritual
outpouring obtained in such a place by the use of a certain formula given to Mr.
Heindel on that memorable night in the Temple will be combined with a suitable
physical substance to facilitate transmission. This Panacea cannot be prepared
until the right conditions are made for it in the Ecclesia by the Probationers.

Our Temple was erected and dedicated on December 25,
1920, before the second decade of the century had closed. This Temple, the
Ecclesia, was erected for the purpose of affording more powerful means for the
healing of disease. Healing meetings are held in this holy place at a regular
time each day by the Probationers who have consecrated their lives to this work.
Assistance is rendered by the Elder Brothers, who are using Headquarters as a
focusing point. Added to this is the work of the Invisible Helpers, who are
Probationers located in many parts of the world. The healing power generated in
the Ecclesia has increased the efficiency of the work of the Invisible Helpers
so that the cures effected are frequently quite miraculous, and our work of
healing is spreading over the entire globe.

The Rosicrucian Fellowship teaches that the wonderful
organism called the human body is governed by immutable natural laws. All
disease results from willful or ignorant violation of Nature’s laws. People are
ill because in this life or in a previous one they have disregarded the
fundamental principles on which the health of the body depends. If they wish to
regain and to retain health, they must learn to understand these principles and
regulate their daily habits in conformity with them.

The Rosicrucian Order

The Rosicrucian Order, founded in the
13th century, is one of the schools of the Lesser Mysteries. The other Lesser
Mystery schools are variously graded to meet the spiritual requirements of the
most precocious among the earlier races of the eastern and southern people with
whom they work. Christian Rosenkreuz is the 13th member of the Rosicrucian
Order. Only the Brothers of the Order have the right to speak of themselves as
“Rosicrucians.”

Seven of the Brothers of the Rosicrucian Order go out
into the world whenever occasion requires, appearing as men among other men, or
working in their invisible vehicles with or upon others as needed. But it must
be strictly kept in mind that they never influence any one against his will or
contrary to his desires, but only strengthen good wherever found. When any of
the seven Brothers are working in the world, they have and use material bodies
just as other people do, and they live in a house which people in general might
consider the house of some well-to-do but not ostentatious person. They hold
offices or positions of distinction in the community where they live, but it is
only to give a reason for their presence and not create any question as to what
they are, or who they are, or as to there being anything out of the ordinary in
them. Outside of the house in which they live and in that house and through that
house there is what may be called the Temple. This is etheric and is different
from our ordinary buildings. it might be likened to the auric atmosphere that is
around the Pro-Ecclesia at Headquarters. This is much larger than the material
building and is etheric. Manson’s word picture of a spiritual church gives an
idea of what such structures are. They are around and through buildings and
churches where people are devoted to spiritual things, and of course they differ
in color. The Rosicrucian Temple is extraordinary and not to be compared with
any other structure. It surrounds and interpenetrates the house in which the
Elder Brothers live. This house is so permeated with spirituality that most
people would not feel very comfortable or at ease there.

Five of the Brothers of the Rose Cross never leave the
Temple, and although they possess physical bodies, all their work is done from
the inner worlds. Though the Elder Brothers are human, they are vastly exalted
above our own status.

A considerable period of intensely zealous life as a
visible helper must be lived by the aspirant before he has
evolved his soul body to such a degree of luminosity that it attracts the
Teacher. (Note: At the same time the pupil is building his soul body, he is also
accumulating a power within in like proportion.) No listless, easy-going study
or dreamy contemplation will bring the Teacher. He is himself a servant
in the highest sense of the word, and no one who is not serving with all his
soul need expect to meet him. When he does come, he will need no credentials,
for the very first sentence spoken by him will carry conviction, and so will
every other word he ever speaks to the pupil, for being endowed with the
consciousness which we shall all possess in the Jupiter Period (a self-conscious
picture consciousness) each sentence will bring before the listener a series of
pictures which will accurately illustrate his meaning. For instance, if he
undertakes to explain the process of death, the pupil sees inwardly the passing
Spirit leaving the body; he may note the uncoiling of the silver cord; he sees
the rupture of the seed atom in the heart and how its forces leave the body and
cling to the Spirit. The Elder Brother is able to accomplish this with his pupil
in the following manner:

First, he, the Elder Brother, fixes his attention upon
certain facts which he wishes to convey to the mind of his pupil. The pupil, who
has become fitted for Initiation by evolving within himself certain powers
(which are still latent, however), is like a tuning fork tuned to a pitch
identical with that of the vibrations of the ideas sent out by the Elder Brother
in the pictures. Therefore, the pupil not only sees the pictures, but he is able
to respond to their vibration. Thus vibrating to the ideal presented by the
Elder Brother, the latent power within the pupil is converted into dynamic
energy, and his consciousness is lifted to the level required for the Initiation
which he is being given. This is the reason why the secrets of true Initiation
cannot be revealed. It is not an outward ceremonial but an inward
experience. This description is the nearest to what Initiation really is
that can possibly be given to one who has not experienced it himself. There is
no secret about the pictures in the sense that one would not tell it, but they
are secret because no earthly words are coined which could adequately describe
such a spiritual experience. It is true that the Initiation takes place in the
Temple particularly suited to the needs of a certain group of individuals who
vibrate within a certain octave, and that there are others present. But it is
not what they do or say which constitutes Initiation, for Initiation is an
inward experience whereby the latent powers that have been ripened within are
changed to dynamic energy, which Initiation teaches the pupil to use.

The Rosicrucian Fellowship –
Its Relation to Other Rosicrucian
Societies

The Rosicrucian Fellowship, founded by Max Heindel under
the direct guidance of the Elder Brothers of the Order, is the authorized
representative for the present period of the ancient Rosicrucian Order, of which
Christian Rose Cross, or Christian Rosenkreuz is the Head. This Order is not a
mundane organization, but has its Temple and headquarters on the etheric plane.
It authorized the formation of the Fellowship by Max Heindel for the purpose of
carrying the Western Wisdom Teachings to the Western people. In earlier ages the
Order carried on its work through various secret societies in Europe and
elsewhere; but the growth and advancement of the people of the United States
have in recent years reached such a point that the Order deemed it advisable to
establish an exoteric center here for the extension of its work. The Rosicrucian
Fellowship is its latest manifestation in physical form, putting out the most
up-to-date version of the Rosicrucian Teachings, in twentieth-century scientific
terms, which are at the same time simple and devoid of technical abstractions.

The particular work of the Fellowship, now (1966) being
governed by a Board of seven Directors elected from among its Probationers by
the voting members (Mrs. Heindel passed on in May of 1949), is to disseminate
the esoteric doctrines of the Christian religion, since the Rosicrucian
Philosophy is an esoteric Christian philosophy. It is destined to become the
universal religion of the world, because the Christ is to have charge of human
evolution during the present Great Sidereal Year of approximately 25,000 years.
Anyone who is willing to conform to the regulations of the Fellowship, the
Preparatory School for the Rosicrucian order, and who is not a hypnotist, or
professionally engaged as a medium, palmist, or astrologer, is eligible to
enroll and study its Teachings by correspondence. There is no fixed price on any
of the lessons. The work is carried on by means of freewill offerings and the
income from the sale of books.

Other Rosicrucian societies in the United States claim,
we believe lineal descent from earlier branches of the ancient Rosicrucian Order
in England, France, Egypt, or other countries. The Rosicrucian Fellowship has no
lineal connection with these organizations, but represents a renaissance of the
Order in the Western World.