title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard taught a form of black exceptionalism and self-pride to poor Southern blacks during the Great Northward Migration at a time when old ideas of scientific racism were prevalent. He advocated community members to establish and own their own businesses, eat healthy, raise families, and refrain from drugs and alcohol. He influenced his successor Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X and many other Black Nationalist thinkers. Both during and after his life, some charged that Fard was a con man who used mystery and charisma to swindle poor blacks by selling them new Muslim names and stirring up racial animosity by copying selected elements of other Muslim religious sects and ideologies that would fit his racial supremacist narrative.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: In 1938, sociologist Erdmann Doane Beynon published in the "American Journal of Sociology" a firsthand account of several interviews he conducted with followers of Fard in Michigan. From those interviews, Beynon wrote that Fard lived and taught in Detroit from 1930 to 1934. He came to the homes of black families who had recently migrated to Detroit from the rural South. He began by selling silks door to door, telling his listeners that the silks came from their ancestral homeland. At his suggestion, he came back to teach the residents, along with guests.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: In the early stage of his ministry, Fard "used the Bible as his textbook, since it was the only religious book with which the majority of his hearers were familiar. With growing prestige over a constantly increasing group, [Fard] became bolder in his denunciation of white people and began to attack the teachings of the Bible in such a way as to shock his hearers and bring them to an emotional crisis."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Beynon's interviewees told him that reports of Fard's message spread throughout the black community. Attendance at the house meetings grew until the listeners were divided into groups and taught in shifts. Finally, the community contributed money and rented a hall to serve as a temple where meetings were conducted. The Quran was soon introduced as the most authoritative of all texts for the study of the faith. Fard prepared texts that served as authoritative manuals of the faith and were memorized verbatim by his followers.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Beynon described disputes and tension that arose between the new community and the police over the group's refusal to send their children to public schools. One member of the group, later declared mentally insane, allegedly participated in "human sacrifice" in 1932 in an effort to follow lessons regarding the sacrifice of devils. These incidents drew police attention, according to Beynon, and contributed to persecutions and schisms.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard named his community the "Nation of Islam". Following the rapid increase in membership, he instituted a formal organizational structure. He established the University of Islam, where school-age children were taught, rather than in the public schools. He established the Moslem Girls' Training and General Civilization Class, where women were taught how to keep their houses, clean and cook. The men of the organization were drilled by captains and referred to as the Fruit of Islam. The entire movement was placed under a Minister of Islam.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: According to Beynon, Fard's followers grew to approximately eight thousand. "Within three years the prophet not only began the movement but organized it so well that he himself was able to recede into the background, appearing almost never to his followers during the final months of his residence in Detroit."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: From interviews with approximately 200 families who followed Fard, Beynon concluded:"Although the prophet lived in Detroit from July 4, 1930 until June 30, 1934, virtually nothing is known about him, save that he 'came from the East' and that he 'called' the Negroes of North America to enter the Nation of Islam. His very name is uncertain. He was known usually as Mr. Wali Farrad or Mr. W. D. Fard, though he used also the following names: Professor Ford, Mr. Farrad Mohammed, Mr. F. Mohammed Ali. One of the few survivors who heard his first addresses states that he himself said: 'My name is W. D. Fard and I came from the Holy City of Mecca. More about myself I will not tell you yet, for the time has not yet come. I am your brother. You have not yet seen me in my royal robes.' Legends soon sprang up about this mysterious personality."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard used the name "W. F. Muhammad" on several lessons written in 1933 and 1934. In 1933, he began signing his name "W. F. Muhammad", which stands for "Wallace Fard Muhammad".


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: On November 20, 1932, James J. Smith, a black man, was killed by Robert Harris, who was his roommate and a member of the Nation of Islam, on a makeshift altar in what was described as a human sacrifice. Harris attended meetings of the Detroit chapter of the Nation of Islam, then also called the Order of Islam, and Allah Temple of Islam, where he was given the name of Robert Karriem. He claimed he was influenced by the group. Consequently, Fard and another leader, Ugan Ali, were arrested and questioned. "The society cannot be blamed for anything he did," Ali was quoted in the "Detroit News", Nov. 23, 1932. "Harris had no standing in the order and was not regarded as a leader. Many people avoided him because of the wild things he sometimes said." Harris was later declared mentally unbalanced, pleaded guilty and was imprisoned, while Fard and Ali were released.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Efforts to trace the origins and life story of Fard have been extensive but have yielded only fragmentary results and not even his date of death is known; further complicating any efforts is the fact that only 5 pictures of Fard are known to exist, 4 being mugshots taken after various arrests and one being the official portrait by the Nation of Islam; most observers agreed they all belong to the same person which was confirmed via facial recognition analysis. Additionally, Fard is alleged to have used up to 58 different aliases during his life.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Karl Evanzz of "The Washington Post" submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to the FBI in 1978 requesting its file on Fard. Evanzz based his account of Fard's life on the declassified portion of the FBI file that he received about a decade after his request. Evanzz detailed the experience of several other authors who also based their accounts of Fard's life on the FBI file.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: From the FBI's response to the Freedom of Information Act request, Evanzz claimed that Fard, using the name Fred Dodd, married Pearl Allen in Multnomah County, Oregon, on May 9, 1914, with their first child, a son, born the next year.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Dodd left his family in 1916 and moved to Los Angeles, using the name Wallie Dodd Ford. A World War I draft registration card for Wallie Dodd Fard from 1917 indicated he was living in Los Angeles, unmarried, as a restaurant owner, and reported that he was born in Shinka, Afghanistan on February 26, 1893. He further reported that he was a resident alien and citizen of Afghanistan. He was described as of medium height and build with brown eyes and black hair. On the draft card, "Ford" is written in parentheses in a different hand. At the bottom of the card, he signed his name as "Wallie Dodd Ford".


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: As of 1920, Ford was still living in Los Angeles as 26-year-old Wallie D. Ford, with his 25-year-old wife, Hazel E. Ford. In the 1920 United States Census, his race was reported as white, his occupation as a proprietor of a restaurant, and his place of birth as New Zealand. He provided no known place of birth for his parents nor his date of immigration.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: A marriage certificate dated June 5, 1924, was issued to Wallie Dodd Ford and Carmen Trevino (or Treviño) in Santa Ana, California. Ford reported that he was a cook, age 26, born in Oregon and living in Los Angeles. Trevino was a 22-year-old native of Mexico also living in Los Angeles. Both provided their race as "Spanish"; Ford claimed that his parents, "Zaradodd" and "Babbjie", were natives of Madrid, Spain.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: A declassified Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) memorandum dated May 16, 1957 states: "From a review of instant file it does not appear that there has been a concerted effort to locate and fully identify W. D. Fard. In as much as Elijah Muhammad recognizes W.D. Fard as being Allah (God) and claims that Fard is the source of all of his teachings, it is suggested that an exhaustive effort be made to fully identify and locate W. D. Fard and/or members of his family." The FBI took note of the article written by Erdmann Doane Beynon, and it conducted a search for Fard using various aliases including the name "Ford".


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: The search produced two Fords of interest, one of whom was Wallace Ford, a prominent movie actor. The other was Wallie D. Ford of California, arrested by Los Angeles police on November 17, 1918 on a charge of assault with a deadly weapon.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: On October 17, 1957, the FBI located and interviewed Hazel Barton-Ford, Wallie Ford's common-law wife, with whom he had a son named Wallace Dodd Ford, born on September 1, 1920. Barton-Ford gave a description of Wallie Ford, and described him as a Caucasian New Zealander. The FBI's search for Fard was officially closed the following year on April 15, 1958. Immigration records did not match any of his aliases. His true identity remains unknown, but there is strong evidence that the Nation of Islam founder Wallace D. Fard was the same man as Wallace Dodd Ford, an inmate in San Quentin Prison. According to Patrick D. Bowen, a PhD candidate at the University of Denver's Iliff School of Theology, fingerprints and photographs taken from San Quentin Prison matched those of Fard taken during the 1930s in Detroit; furthermore, in San Quentin he almost certainly came in contact with African American Muslim preachers and converts also incarcerated there.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard was arrested again on January 20, 1926, for violation of the California Woolwine Possession Act, and on February 15, 1926, for violation of the State Poison Act, for which he was sentenced to six months to six years at San Quentin State Prison on June 12, 1926. According to San Quentin records, Wallie D. Ford was born in Portland, Oregon on February 25, 1891, the white son of Zared and Beatrice Ford, who were both born in Hawaii.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: On August 15, 1959, the FBI sent a story to the Chicago "New Crusader" newspaper, stating that Fard was a "Turkish-born Nazi agent who worked for Hitler in World War II". According to the FBI story, Fard was a "Muslim from Turkey who had come to the United States in the early 1900s. He had met Muhammad in prison … where the two men plotted a confidence game in which followers were charged a fee to become Muslims." After the story was published, Elijah Muhammad and Malcolm X subsequently charged black media outlets, which reprinted the accusation in large numbers, with running the story without requesting a response from the Nation of Islam.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: A February 19, 1963, FBI memorandum states: "In connection with efforts to disrupt and curb growth of the NOI, extensive research has been conducted into various files maintained by this office. Among the files reviewed was that of Wallace Dodd Ford." Five months later, in July 1963, the FBI told the "Los Angeles Evening Herald-Examiner" that Fard was actually Wallace Dodd Ford. The paper published the story in an article titled "Black Muslim Founder Exposed As White." An FBI memorandum dated August 1963 states that the FBI had not been able to verify his birthdate or birthplace, and "he was last heard from in 1934."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: The Nation of Islam refutes the claim that Fard and Ford are one and the same in an article posted on the NOI website by Dr. Wesley Muhammad.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Karl Evanzz, in his book "The Messenger", postulates that Fard was the son of a Pakistani Muslim, then known as East Indians. He bases this theory on several indications:


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: The 2019 book "Finding W.D. Fard: Unveiling the Identity of the Founder of the Nation of Islam" by Dr. John Andrew Morrow investigates theories of Fard's origin. "The people who actually met him, and the scholars who have studied him, have suggested that he was variously an African American, an Arab from Syria, Lebanon, Algeria, Morocco or Saudi Arabia... a Turk, an Afghan, an Indo-Pakistani... a Greek..." Morrow writes. "In an attempt to determine the origins of W.D. Fard, most scholars have relied on his teachings as passed down, and perhaps modified, by Elijah Muhammad. Some have suggested that he was a member of the Moorish Science Temple of America or the Ahmadiyyah Movement. Others have suggested that he was a Druze or a Shiite."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: "Chameleon: The True Story of W.D. Fard" by A. K. Arian studies the origin of the Nation of Islam founder. One theory postulated is that Fard was of Afghan heritage.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: In addition to his assertion that Fard was Ford, Evanzz also said that Fard was once a member of the Moorish Science Temple of America, citing as a primary source the 1945 publication by Arna Bontemps and Jack Conroy titled "They Seek A City". Authors have also cited E. U. Essien-Udom for this proposition as well. In his 1962 book "Black Nationalism: The Search for an Identity", Essien-Udom wrote:


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: "Noble Drew Ali was shot and stabbed in his offices at the Unity Club in Chicago on the night of March 15, 1929 … He was eventually released on bond, but a few weeks later, he died under mysterious circumstances. Some people claim that he died from injuries inflicted by the police while he was in jail. Others, however, suggest that he was killed by [Sheik Claude] Greene's partisans. For some time, one W. D. Fard assumed leadership of the Moorish movement. According to Bontemps and Conroy, Fard claimed that he was the reincarnation of Noble Drew Ali. By 1930 a permanent split developed in the movement. One faction, the Moors, remains faithful to Noble Drew Ali, and the other, which is now led by Elijah Muhammad, remains faithful to Prophet Fard (Master Wallace Fard Muhammad). However, Minister Malcolm X and other leaders of the Nation of Islam have emphatically denied any past connection whatsoever of Elijah Muhammad, Master Wallace Fard Muhammad, or their movement with Nobel Drew Ali's Moorish American Science Temple."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: On the question of a connection between the Nation of Islam and the Moorish Science Temple of America, Beynon wrote:


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: "Awakened already to a consciousness of race discrimination, these migrants from the South came into contact with militant movements among northern Negroes. Practically none of them had been in the North prior to the collapse of the Marcus Garvey movement. A few of them had come under the influence of the Moorish-American cult which succeeded it. The effect of both these movements upon the future members of the Nation of Islam was largely indirect. Garvey taught the Negroes that their homeland was Ethiopia. The Noble Drew Ali, the prophet of the Moorish-Americans, proclaimed that these people were 'descendants of Morrocans [Moroccans]'."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Beynon also wrote: "The prophet’s message was characterized by his ability to utilize to the fullest measure the environment of his followers. Their physical and economic difficulties alike were used to illustrate the new teaching. Similarly, biblical prophecies and the teachings of Marcus Garvey and Noble Drew Ali were cited as foretelling the coming of the new prophet".


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: With regard to Elijah Muhammad, Beynon's article stated: "From among the larger group of Muslims there has sprung recently an even more militant branch than the Nation of Islam itself. This new movement, known as the Temple People, identifies the prophet, Mr. W. D. Fard, with the God, Allah. To Mr. Fard alone do they offer prayer and sacrifice. Since Mr. Fard has been deified, the Temple People raise to the rank of prophet the former Minister of Islam, Elijah Mohammed, now a resident of Chicago. He is always referred to reverently as the 'Prophet Elijah in Chicago.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Elijah Muhammad, who led the Nation of Islam from 1934 to 1975, heard Fard teach for the first time in 1931. Elijah Muhammad stated that he and Fard became inseparable between 1931 and 1934, where he felt "jailed almost" due to the amount of time that they spent together with Fard teaching him day and night.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: A handwritten lesson written by Fard states:"Twelve Leaders of Islam from all over the Planet have conferred in the Root of Civilization concerning the Lost-Found Nation of Islam – must return to their original Land. One of the Conference Members by the name of Mr. Osman Sharrieff said to the Eleven Members of the Conference: 'The Lost-Found Nation of Islam will not return to their original Land unless they, first, have a thorough Knowledge of their own.' So they sent a Messenger to them of their own. Now, the Messenger and his Laborers worked day and night for the last three and one-half years, and their accomplishments are approximately twenty-five thousand..."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: In this lesson, Fard places the number of converts obtained in Detroit at 25,000, and he describes a "Messenger" sent to the "Lost-Found Nation of Islam" who is "of their own". Nation of Islam theology states that this "Messenger" is Elijah Muhammad.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard wrote, in his instructions to the leaders of his community, that they should "copy the Answers of Lesson of Minister Elijah Muhammad." He went on to state: "Why is Stress made to the Muslims to Copy, the Minister, Elijah Muhammad's Answers? The past History shows that the ALMIGHTY ALLAH sends Prophets and Apostles for the people's Guide and Example, and through them HIS Mystery was Revealed. And those who follow the Apostle would see the Light."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard wrote several lessons which are read and committed to memory by members of the Nation of Islam. Some of the lessons are in the form of questions asked by Fard to Elijah Muhammad. One such lesson concludes with the text: "This Lesson No. 2 was given by our Prophet, W.D. Fard, which contains 40 questions answered by Elijah Muhammad, one of the lost found in the wilderness of North America February 20th, 1934."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Beynon described the substance of Fard's teaching as follows:"The black men in North America are not Negroes, but members of the lost tribe of Shabazz, stolen by traders from the Holy City of Mecca 379 years ago. The prophet came to America to find and to bring back to life his long lost brethren, from whom the Caucasians had taken away their language, their nation and their religion. Here in America they were living other than themselves. They must learn that they are the original people, noblest of the nations of the earth. The Caucasians are the colored people, since they have lost their original color. The original people must regain their religion, which is Islam, their language, which is Arabic, and their culture, which is astronomy and higher mathematics, especially calculus. They must live according to the law of Allah, avoiding all meat of 'poison animals', hogs, ducks, geese, possums and catfish. They must give up completely the use of stimulants, especially liquor. They must clean themselves up – both their bodies and their houses. If in this way they obeyed Allah, he would take them back to the Paradise from which they had been stolen – the Holy City of Mecca."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Modern Nation of Islam theology is based upon the belief that Fard's teaching of Elijah Muhammad was fulfillment of scripture regarding God's teaching of an Apostle, where Fard is described as "God in Person", the "Messiah", and the "Mahdi". Fard wrote the following for his followers:"[T]he LESSONS that OUR SAVIOUR (ALLAH) gave us to Study and Learn is the Fulfillment of the Prophecies of All the Former Prophets concerning the Beginning of the Devils, and the Ending of the Civilization, and of our Enslavement by the Devils, and Present Time of our Delivery from the Devils by OUR SAVIOUR (ALLAH). PRAISE HIS HOLY NAME! There is No God but ALLAH. How that ALLAH would separate us from the Devils and, then destroy them; and Change us into a New and Perfect People; and Fill the Earth with FREEDOM, JUSTICE and EQUALITY as it was filled with wickedness; and Making we, the Poor Lost-Founds, the Perfect RULERS."


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: In his 1965 book "Message to the Blackman in America", which is a compilation of articles written by Elijah Muhammad for newspapers throughout the early part of his Ministry, he summarized what Fard taught him as follows:"He began teaching us the knowledge of ourselves, of God and the devil, of the measurement of the earth, of other planets, and of the civilization of some of the planets other than earth. ... He measured and weighed the earth and its water; the history of the moon; the history of the two nations, black and white, that dominate the earth. He gave the exact birth of the white race; the name of their God who made them and how; and the end of their time, the judgment, how it will begin and end. ... He taught us the truth of how we were made 'slaves' and how we are kept in slavery by the 'slave-masters children. He declared the doom of America, for her evils to us was past due. And that she is number one to be destroyed. Her judgment could not take place until we hear the truth. ...


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: He declared that we were without the knowledge of self or anyone else. How we had been made blind, deaf and dumb by this white race of people and how we must return to our people, our God and His religion of peace (Islam), the religion of the prophets. We must give up the slave names of our slave-masters and accept the name of Allah (God) or one of His divine attributes. He also taught us to give up all evil doings and practices and do righteousness or be destroyed from the face of the earth. He taught us that the slave-masters had taught us to eat the wrong food and that this is the cause of our sickness and short span of life. He declared that he would heal us and set us in heaven at once, if we would submit to Him. Otherwise he would chastise us with a severe chastisement until we did submit. And that He was able to force the whole world into submission to his will. He said that he loved us (the so-called Negroes), his lost and found, so well that he would eat rattlesnakes to free us if necessary, for he has power over all things." Wallace Fard Muhammad loved the black people of the United States of America. Part of Fard's teaching also involved admiration for Japan. He was linked to the Pacific Movement of the Eastern World and Japanese agitators such as Satokata Takahashi, and Ashima Takis. The FBI charged that Takahashi had been an influential presence in the Nation of Islam. He spoke as a guest at the NOI temples in Detroit and Chicago.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard appears in the novel "Middlesex", by Jeffrey Eugenides, in which Fard's Detroit Temple No. 1 is the location setting for several scenes in the book.


title: Wallace Fard Muhammad

text: Fard and his teachings are also referenced in many hip-hop songs. Artists who have made references within their music include Jay-Z ("I'm going to chase the Yacub back in the cave"), Jay Electronica ("Lost tribe of Shabazz stylin' on the record", "The son of W.D., who hung around in the D, Who ran around in the three, The trap gods raised me, Face all on the Sphinx, Story all in the wall of the pyramids, Niggas know the Black God saved me"), Brand Nubian ("This Asiatic black man is a dog spelled backwards, The maker, the owner, the cream of the planet earth, Father of civilization, God of the universe, Manifestin thought with my infinite styles, Making sure this travels twenty-three million miles, The other six I set the crucifix, Because the heart of the problem is this..."), and Ras Kass in the song "Riiiot" ("Now I got niggas claiming they saw God unfortunately, he wasn't in the person of Master Fard Muhammad").


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The Gāyatrī Mantra, also known as the Sāvitri Mantra, is a highly revered mantra from the "Rig Veda" (Mandala 3.62.10), dedicated to the Vedic deity Savitr. is the name of the Goddess of the Vedic meter in which the verse is composed. Its recitation is traditionally preceded by ' and the formula ', known as the "", or "great (mystical) utterance". The Gayatri mantra is cited widely in Hindu texts, such as the mantra listings of the Śrauta liturgy, and classical Hindu texts such as the "Bhagavad Gita", "Harivamsa", and "Manusmṛti". The mantra and its associated metric form was known by the Buddha.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The mantra is an important part of the upanayana ceremony. Modern Hindu reform movements spread the practice of the mantra to everyone and its use is now very widespread.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The main mantra appears in the hymn RV 3.62.10. During its recitation, the hymn is preceded by ' () and the formula ' (). This prefixing of the mantra is properly described in the Taittiriya Aranyaka (2.11.1-8), which states that it should be chanted with the syllable ', followed by the three Vyahrtis and the Gayatri verse. Whereas in principle the "gāyatrī" mantra specifies three "pāda"s of eight syllables each, the text of the verse as preserved in the Samhita is one short, seven instead of eight. Metrical restoration would emend the attested tri-syllabic ' with a tetra-syllabic "".


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The "Gāyatrī" mantra is dedicated to Savitṛ, a Sun deity. The mantra is attributed to the much revered sage Vishwamitra, who is also considered the author of Mandala 3 of Rig Veda. Many monotheistic sects of Hinduism such as Arya Samaj hold that the Gayatri mantra is in praise of One Supreme Creator known by the name AUM (ओउ्म् ) as mentioned in the "Yajur Veda", 40:17.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: Gayatri meter, called "Gayatri Chandas" in Sanskrit, is twenty-four syllables comprising three lines (Sk. "padas", literally "feet") of eight syllables each. The Gayatri mantra as received is short one syllable in the first line: "".


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: Being only twenty-three syllables the Gayatri mantra is "Nichruth Gayatri Chandas" ("Gayatri meter short by one syllable"). A reconstruction of ' to a proposed historical ' restores the first line to eight syllables. In practise, people reciting the mantra may retain seven syllables and simply prolong the length of time they pronounce the "m", they may append an extra syllable of "mmm" (approximately va-ren-yam-mmm), or they may use the reconstructed "".


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The Gayatri mantra is cited widely in Hindu texts, such as the mantra listings of the Śrauta liturgy, and cited several times in the Brahmanams and the Srauta-sutras. It is also cited in a number of grhyasutras, mostly in connection with the upanayana ceremony in which it has a significant role.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The Gayatri mantra is the subject of esoteric treatment and explanation in some major Upanishads, including Mukhya Upanishads such as the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, the Shvetashvatara Upanishad and the Maitrayaniya Upanishad; as well as other well-known works such as the Jaiminiya Upanishad Brahmana. The text also appears in minor Upanishads, such as the Surya Upanishad.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The Gayatri mantra is the apparent inspiration for derivative "gāyatrī" stanzas dedicated to other deities. Those derivations are patterned on the formula , and have been interpolated into some recensions of the Shatarudriya litany. Gāyatrīs of this form are also found in the Mahanarayana Upanishad.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The Gayatri mantra is also repeated and cited widely in Hindu texts such as the "Bhagavad Gita", "Harivamsa", and "Manusmṛti".


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: In Majjhima Nikaya 92, the Buddha refers to the Sāvitri (Pali: "sāvittī") mantra as the foremost meter, in the same sense as the king is foremost among humans, or the sun is foremost among lights:


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: In Sutta Nipata 3.4, the Buddha uses the Sāvitri mantra as a paradigmatic indicator of Brahmanic knowledge:


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: Imparting the Gayatri mantra to young Hindu men is an important part of the traditional upanayana ceremony, which marks the beginning of study of the Vedas. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan described this as the essence of the ceremony, which is sometimes called ""Gayatri diksha"", i.e. initiation into the Gayatri mantra. However, traditionally, the stanza RV.3.62.10 is imparted only to Brahmana. Other Gayatri verses are used in the upanayana ceremony are: RV.1.35.2, in the tristubh meter, for a kshatriya and either RV.1.35.9 or RV.4.40.5 in the jagati meter for a Vaishya.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: Gayatri japa is used as a method of prāyaścitta (atonement). It is believed by practitioners that reciting the mantra bestows wisdom and enlightenment, through the vehicle of the Sun (Savitr), who represents the source and inspiration of the universe.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: In 1827 Ram Mohan Roy published a dissertation on the Gayatri mantra that analysed it in the context of various Upanishads. Roy prescribed a Brahmin to always pronounce "om" at the beginning and end of the Gayatri mantra. From 1830, the Gayatri mantra was used for private devotion of Brahmos. In 1843, the First Covenant of Brahmo Samaj required the Gayatri mantra for Divine Worship. From 1848-1850 with the rejection of Vedas, the Adi Dharma Brahmins use the Gayatri mantra in their private devotions.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: In the later 19th century, Hindu reform movements spread the chanting of the Gayatri mantra. In 1898 for example, Swami Vivekananda claimed that, according to the Vedas and the "Bhagavad Gita", a person became Brahmana through learning from his Guru, and not because of birth. He administered the sacred thread ceremony and the Gayatri mantra to non-Brahmins in Ramakrishna Mission. This Hindu mantra has been popularized to the masses, pendants, audio recordings and mock scrolls. Various Gayatri yajñas organised by All World Gayatri Pariwar at small and large scales in late twentieth century also helped spread Gayatri mantra to the mass.


title: Gayatri Mantra

text: The Gayatri Mantra forms the first of seven sections of the Trisandhyā Puja (Sanskrit for "three divisions"), a prayer used by the Balinese Hindus and many Hindus in Indonesia. It is uttered three times each day: 6 am at morning, noon, and 6 pm at evening.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Forest Green Rovers Football Club are a professional football club based in Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, England. The team compete in , the third tier of the English football league system, and have played their home games at The New Lawn since 2006, when they moved from their original home at The Lawn Ground.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Formed in October 1889, the club became founder members of the Mid Gloucestershire League five years later. Competing in various local league competitions for much of the 20th century, they won a multitude of league titles: the Dursley & District League (1902–03), the Stroud and District Football League (1911–12 and 1920–21), the Stroud Premier League (1934–35, 1935–36 and 1936–37), the North Gloucestershire League (1920–21 and 1921–22), and the Gloucestershire Northern Senior League (1937–38, 1949–50 and 1950–51). They became founder members of the Gloucestershire County League in 1968, before they were moved up to the Premier Division of the Hellenic League seven years later.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Forest Green won the Hellenic League in the 1981–82 season and lifted the FA Vase after beating Rainworth Miners Welfare in the final at Wembley. They spent the next 13 years in the Midland Division of the Southern League, and briefly competed under the name Stroud F.C. Reverting to the name Forest Green Rovers, the club won successive Southern League Southern Division and Premier Division titles in 1996–97 and 1997–98, winning promotion into the Conference. Reaching the 1999 FA Trophy Final, which they lost, they became the first club to reach the finals of both the FA Vase and FA Trophy. They also reached the 2001 FA Trophy Final, which again they lost. Twice reprieved from relegation from the Conference National due to the demotion of other clubs, the club was transformed following investment from green energy industrialist Dale Vince in 2010.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Under Vince's chairmanship Forest Green became the world's first vegan football club in 2015, and the New Lawn was installed with numerous eco-friendly innovations. Investment in the playing squad saw the club compete for promotion into the English Football League, which they achieved with victory in the 2017 National League play-offs, having been beaten in the semi-finals in 2015 and in the 2016 final. Forest Green were then promoted to League One in 2022 for the first time in their history, following a EFL League Two title win.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The club was established in 1889 by Rev. E.J.H. Peach, representing the Forest Green area of Nailsworth. The name Rovers was adopted in 1893, and the following year the club were founder members of the Mid-Gloucestershire League. Their first home league match on 6 October was a 1–1 draw with Brimscombe, and the club went on to finish the 1894–95 season in third place. Nailsworth had become an urban district in 1894 and there was an effort to ensure the town was represented by a football team. As a result, the club was renamed Nailsworth Association Football Club and many members of the original team were replaced by players from Nailsworth, although they continued to play at the original Lawn Ground in Forest Green. However, the club withdrew from the league during the 1896–97 season.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The club was re-established in 1898 under the Forest Green Rovers name, and absorbed Nailsworth Thursday shortly afterwards. They joined both Division One of the Mid-Gloucestershire League and also the Dursley & District League for the 1899–1900 season. The Mid-Gloucestershire League folded in 1901, with Forest Green left playing in the Dursley & District League. In 1902–03 they joined the new Stroud & District League, also continuing in the Dursley & District League. In the Stroud & District League they finished as runners-up to Brimscombe, whilst in the Dursley & District League they finished joint top of the table with Stonehouse after being awarded the points from an unplayed match against Chalford. As a result, a play-off match was held to decide the championship, with over 1,000 spectators watching Forest Green win 2–1 in extra time. In 1906–07 they finished bottom of the Stroud & District League with zero points (although they had won one game, they had two points deducted for fielding an ineligible player). They withdrew from the Dursley & District League in 1908.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In 1911 Forest Green merged with Nailsworth to form Nailsworth & Forest Green United, continuing to play at the Lawn Ground and in the Stroud & District League; the new club won the league, losing only one match all season. They entered a team into the Dursley & District League in 1912–13, but withdrew from the Stroud & District League after only four matches. After World War I the club rejoined the league and the 1919–20 season saw them finish joint top of the table with Chalford and Stonehouse. The league subsequently held a draw to decide the championship, with Forest Green drawn against Stonehouse in a semi-final, with the winner to play Chalford for the title. However, Stonehouse beat Forest Green 3–2 in the semi-final match. In 1920 the club also entered a team into the North Gloucestershire League and went on to win both leagues, as well as the Northern Junior Cup. They repeated the double league championship the following season. They were founder members of the Gloucestershire Northern Senior League in 1922, but left the league at the end of the 1922–23 season to return to the Stroud & District League.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Forest Green finished as runners-up in 1924–25 and 1925–26, before rejoining the Gloucestershire Northern Senior League in 1926. They went on to finish as runners-up in 1926–27 before leaving the league again to play in the new Stroud Premier League. After finishing fourth in the league, the club returned to the Northern Senior League at the end of the season, although they also kept a team in the Stroud Premier League. The club withdrew from the Stroud Premier League in 1930, the league for a third time in 1934, rejoining the Stroud Premier League. They were Stroud Premier League champions for three successive seasons in 1934–35, 1935–36 and 1936–37, before re-entering the Northern Senior League in 1937. They went on to win the league title in 1937–38. After finishing as runners-up in 1948–49, they won successive league titles in 1949–50 and 1950–51. Although the club finished as runners-up in 1952–53, they were relegated to Division Two at the end of the 1954–55 season. However, they were Division Two champions the following season, and were promoted back to Division One. Forest Green were amongst the founders of the Gloucestershire County League in 1968, where they played until moving up to the Premier Division of the Hellenic League in 1975 under the management of Peter Goring.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Forest Green's first season in the Hellenic League Premier Division saw them finish fourth. Although they then spent two seasons in lower mid-table, a third-place finish in 1978–79 was the start of a successful four years, culminating in the 1981–82 season, in which they won the Hellenic League and reached the final of the FA Vase. At Wembley they defeated Rainworth Miners Welfare 3–0 to win the trophy. At the end of the season the club were promoted to the Midland Division of the Southern League. Although they finished third in their first season in the new league, the next six seasons were spent in mid-table.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In 1989, the club was renamed Stroud Football Club. Another season in mid-table was followed by two in which they finished in the bottom five. They also participated in the Welsh Cup for four seasons, reaching the quarter finals in 1990-91 where they were defeated by the eventual runners-up Wrexham. After reverting to their original name, the club continued to struggle in the league until they were transferred to the Southern Division in 1995. After finishing eighth under Frank Gregan in 1995–96, they won the division the following season, earning promotion to the Premier Division of the Southern League. The 1997–98 season saw them win the Southern League Premier Division, securing a second successive promotion and entry to the Football Conference.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In Forest Green's first season in the Conference they finished twelfth, as well as reaching the final of the FA Trophy, becoming the first team to play in the final of both the FA Vase and the FA Trophy. However, they lost 1–0 to Kingstonian. The following season saw another first as the club reached the first round of the FA Cup for the first time; after beating Guiseley 6–0 in the first round, they lost 3–0 at home to Torquay United in the second. In November 2000 Gregan was replaced as manager by former England international Nigel Spink; the club reached the FA Trophy final again at the end of the season, losing 1–0 to Canvey Island.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In 2004–05 Forest Green finished in the relegation zone, but were reprieved after Northwich Victoria were demoted due to issues with their stadium. In 2007–08 the club defeated Football League opposition in the FA Cup for the first time, beating Rotherham United 3–0 in a first round replay, before losing 3–2 at Swindon Town. The following season saw them reach the third round of the Cup for the first time, beating Team Bath and then Rochdale to set a third round tie at home to Derby County which they lost 4–3 in front of a record crowd of 4,836. Another third round appearance in 2009–10 ended with a 2–1 defeat at Notts County.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The 2009–10 season saw Forest Green finish in the relegation zone, but another reprieve from relegation was won when Salisbury City were expelled for breaking financial rules. The club was then taken over by Ecotricity founder Dale Vince; Vince set out plans to make the club more eco-friendly, including removing red meat from players' diets, stopping selling meat products in the ground and treating the pitch with organic fertiliser.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Forest Green finished fifth in the Conference in 2014–15, qualifying for the promotion play-offs; they went on to lose 3–0 on aggregate to Bristol Rovers in the semi-finals. The following season saw them finish as runners-up in the renamed National League, their highest-ever league position; in the subsequent play-offs they defeated Dover Athletic 2–1 in the semi-finals, before losing 3–1 to Grimsby Town in the final at Wembley. A third consecutive play-off campaign was secured with a third-place finish in 2016–17. After beating Dagenham & Redbridge 3–1 in the semi-finals, the club defeated Tranmere Rovers by the same scoreline in the final at Wembley, earning promotion to League Two. This made Nailsworth the smallest town ever to host a Football League club.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In 2018 Forest Green Rovers became the first football club in the world to be certified carbon neutral under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) initiative Climate Neutral Now. The 2018–19 season saw them finish fifth in League Two. They went on to lose 2–1 to Tranmere Rovers in the play-off semi-finals. Another play-off campaign in 2020–21 saw them lose 5–4 on aggregate to Newport County.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In 2021–22 they secured an automatic promotion spot to League One after a draw against Bristol Rovers, and clinched the title following a 2–2 draw away at Mansfield Town. They won their first League One game, defeating Bristol Rovers 2–1 away thanks to a late goal.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The United Nations has recognised Forest Green Rovers as the world’s first carbon-neutral football club and it was described by FIFA as the “greenest team in the world”.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In September 2020, Arsenal fullback Héctor Bellerín became the second-largest shareholder in the club.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: On 2 August 2021, Forest Green Rovers announced a new partnership with clean energy and electric vehicle YouTube channel, Fully Charged and named their pitch accordingly to The Fully Charged New Lawn.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The previous club badge was very similar to the FC Barcelona badge. The flag of St. George appeared on both badges, showing his links to England as well as Catalonia. Rovers' home kit for many years was a black and white striped shirt with black shorts.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In May 2011, the club released a consultation for supporters inviting opinions on the club's decision to change its badge. The new badge was used from the beginning of the 2011–2012 season.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: On 2 July 2012, it was announced that the club would change its home strip from its traditional black and white stripes to a lime green shirt with black shorts and socks. The decision to move away from the traditional black and white stripes proved controversial with many supporters. The away strip was also changed to an all-white kit with the dates '1899–2012' near the neckline of the kit to indicate the years when the club first played in an all-white kit and the decision to bring it back in 2012.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In the summer of 2014 the home strip was changed to lime green and black stripes on the front, with a plain green back, green shorts and black and green striped socks in order to align with sponsor Ecotricity's marketing colours. On 19 August 2014, the new away strip was announced, which would be a modern version of the traditional home strip of black and white striped shirt, black shorts and red socks.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In 2021, the team became the first in the world to play in a football kit made from a composite material consisting of recycled plastic and coffee grounds.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: Gloucestershire rivals Cheltenham Town are seen as the club's main rivals. Fixtures between the two sides are humorously named "El Glosico", a play-on-words of the famous "El Clásico" fixture.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: During the club's years in the non-league pyramid, the club maintained local rivalries with Gloucester City, and Bath City. However, following Rovers' promotion to the EFL in 2017, these rivalries are no longer competed.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The club initially played at a ground 'at the top of the hill' in Forest Green known as the Lawn Ground. They moved to a ground in Nailsworth in 1924, but returned to the Lawn in 1927 after it was upgraded with a boundary wall and entrance gates. At the start of the 2006–07 season the club moved to the New Lawn.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: The Sustainability in Sport terrace is at the north end of the ground. This terrace was the location for away fans and had previously housed home supporters which it has reverted to. A decision by the club at the end of the 2012–13 season saw the areas in which home and away fans were housed at the ground switched with home fans reverting to the EESI Stand at the opposite end of the ground which was converted from seating to a standing terrace. Subsequently away fans have been accommodated in the West side of the ground. The East Stand is the largest-capacity stand at the ground and is a seated stand that contains seven boxes, the 'Green Man' public house, gym, dance studio and conference and leisure facilities. The western side of the ground is an open terrace now the area for away fans with a small covered seating area. Although the stadium can hold 5,147 fans, the highest league attendance recorded at the venue so far was 3,781 in a Conference Premier fixture against Bristol Rovers. However, the highest all-time attendance was 4,836 for an FA Cup third round tie at home to Championship side Derby County. The usual attendance was between 1,300 and 1,800 for National League fixtures.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In June 2011, the club began work on making the stadium environmentally friendly following the arrival of new owner and green energy entrepreneur Dale Vince. This included developing an entirely organic pitch. In December 2011, 180 solar panels were installed on the roof of the EESI stand, helping the club generate 10% of the electricity needed to run the stadium. In April 2012, Forest Green introduced the first robot lawn mower to be used by a British football club on to its playing surface. This followed a previous robot mower that had been in service at the club's former ground. The Etesia robot mower – known as a 'mow bot' – uses GPS technology to guide it round the pitch without the need for human intervention and gathers power from the solar panels at the stadium. In December 2012, the club beat 200 other nominees to first prize in the Institute of Groundsmanship awards in the sustainability and environmental category for its organic pitch and the environmental aspects at The New Lawn.


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: On 3 November 2016, the club announced the winning design for a proposed 5,000 seat new stadium to be built within the Eco Park complex beside Junction 13 of the M5 in Gloucestershire, 1.5 miles west of the town of Stonehouse (and 8.5 miles northwest of their spiritual home of Nailsworth). The design is for a stadium made almost entirely of wood, including the roof cantilevers. It will be able to be increased in size to 10,000 capacity depending on the club's success. The plans were initially rejected by the planning authorities in June 2019 but revised plans were approved later that year. The English Football League gave their consent to the stadium in February 2021. It is intended that the new stadium will have the lowest carbon footprint of any stadium in the world. Vince hoped that the club would be able to play games at the stadium within "three or four years".


title: Forest Green Rovers F.C.

text: In November 2022, former Forest Green Rovers players, Kieffer Moore and Robert Sánchez were named in the Wales and Spain squads respectively for the 2022 World Cup. They are the first and only former Rovers players to play in a World Cup.


title: AllMusic

text: AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the database was first made available on the Internet in 1994. AllMusic is owned by RhythmOne.


title: AllMusic

text: AllMusic was launched as "All Music Guide" by Michael Erlewine, a "compulsive archivist, noted astrologer, Buddhist scholar and musician". He became interested in using computers for his astrological work in the mid-1970s and founded a software company, Matrix, in 1977. In the early 1990s, as CDs replaced LPs as the dominant format for recorded music, Erlewine purchased what he thought was a CD of early recordings by Little Richard. After buying it he discovered it was a "flaccid latter-day rehash". Frustrated with the labeling, he researched using metadata to create a music guide. In 1990, in Big Rapids, Michigan, he founded "All Music Guide" with a goal to create an open-access database that included every recording "since Enrico Caruso gave the industry its first big boost".


title: AllMusic

text: The first "All Music Guide", published in 1992, was a 1,200-page reference book, packaged with a CD-ROM, titled "All Music Guide: The Best CDs, Albums & Tapes: The Expert's Guide to the Best Releases from Thousands of Artists in All Types of Music". Its first online version, in 1994, was a text-based Gopher site. It moved to the World Wide Web as web browsers became more user-friendly.


title: AllMusic

text: Erlewine hired a database engineer, Vladimir Bogdanov, to design the "All Music Guide" framework, and recruited his nephew, writer Stephen Thomas Erlewine, to develop editorial content. In 1993, Chris Woodstra joined the staff as an engineer. A "record geek" who had written for alternative weeklies and fanzines, his main qualification was an "encyclopedic knowledge of music". 1,400 subgenres of music were created, a feature which became central to the site's utility. In a 2016 article in "Tedium", Ernie Smith wrote: "AllMusic may have been one of most ambitious sites of the early-internet era—and it’s one that is fundamental to our understanding of pop culture. Because, the thing is, it doesn’t just track reviews or albums. It tracks styles, genres, and subgenres, along with the tone of the music and the platforms on which the music is sold. It then connects that data together, in a way that can intelligently tell you about an entire type of music, whether a massive genre like classical, or a tiny one like sadcore."


title: AllMusic

text: In 1996, seeking to further develop its web-based businesses, Alliance Entertainment Corp. bought All Music from Erlewine for a reported $3.5 million. He left the company after its sale. Alliance filed for bankruptcy in 1999, and its assets were acquired by Ron Burkle's Yucaipa Equity Fund.


title: AllMusic

text: In 1999, All Music relocated from Big Rapids to Ann Arbor, where the staff expanded from 12 to 100 people.


title: AllMusic

text: By February of that year, 350,000 albums and two million tracks had been cataloged. All Music had published biographies of 30,000 artists, 120,000 record reviews and 300 essays written by "a hybrid of historians, critics and passionate collectors".


title: AllMusic

text: In late 2007, AllMusic was purchased for $72 million by TiVo Corporation (known as Macrovision at the time of the sale, and as Rovi from 2009 until 2016).


title: AllMusic

text: The All Media Network produced the "All Music Guide: The Definitive Guide" (at first released as "The Experts' Guide"), which includes a series of publications about various music genres. It was followed by "Required Listening" series, and Annual guides. Vladimir Bogdanov is the president and the main editor of the series.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The Order of Nine Angles (ONA or O9A) is a Satanic and left-hand path occultist group which is based in the United Kingdom, and associated groups are based in other parts of the world. Claiming to have been established in the 1960s, it rose to public recognition in the early 1980s, attracting attention for its neo-Nazi ideology and activism. Describing its approach as "Traditional Satanism", it has also been identified as exhibiting Hermetic and modern Pagan elements in its beliefs by academic researchers.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: According to the Order's own claims, it was established in the Welsh Marches of Western England during the late 1960s by a woman who had previously been involved in a secretive pre-Christian sect which survived in the region. This account also states that in 1973 a man named "Anton Long" was initiated into the group, subsequently becoming its grand master. Several academic commentators to have studied the ONA express the view that the name "Anton Long" is probably the pseudonym of the British neo-Nazi activist David Myatt, although Myatt has denied that this is the case. From the late 1970s onward, Long authored books and articles which propagated the Order's ideas, and in 1988 it began publishing its own journal, "Fenrir". Through these ventures it established links with other neo-Nazi Satanist groups around the world, furthering its cause through embracing the Internet in the 2000s.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA promotes the idea that human history can be divided into a series of aeons, each of which contains a corresponding human civilization. It expresses the view that the current aeonic civilization is that of the Western world, but it claims that the evolution of this society is threatened by the "Magian/Nazarene" influence of the Judeo-Christian religion, which the Order seeks to combat in order to establish a militaristic new social order, which it calls the "Imperium". According to Order teachings, this is necessary in order for a galactic civilization to form, in which "Aryan" society will colonise the Milky Way. It advocates a spiritual path in which practitioners are required to break societal taboos by isolating themselves from society, committing crimes, embracing political extremism and violence, and carrying out acts of human sacrifice. ONA members practice magic, believing that they are able to do it by channeling energies into their own "causal" realm from an "acausal" realm where the laws of physics do not apply, and these magical actions are designed to help them achieve their ultimate goal of establishing the imperium.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA eschews any central authority or structure; instead, it operates as a broad network of associates – termed the "kollective" – who are inspired by the texts which were originally authored by Long and other members of the "inner ONA". The group is composed largely of clandestine cells, which are called "nexions". Some academic estimates suggest that the number of individuals who are broadly associated with the Order falls in the low thousands. Various rapes, killings and acts of terrorism have been perpetrated by far-right individuals influenced by the ONA, with various British politicians and activists calling for the ONA to be proscribed as a terrorist group.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Academics have found it difficult to ascertain "exact and verifiable information" about the ONA's origins given the high level of secrecy which it engages in, in order to shield itself. As with many other occult organisations, the Order shrouds its history in "mystery and legend", creating a "mythical narrative" for its origins and development. The ONA claims to be the descendant of pre-Christian pagan traditions which survived the Christianisation of Britain and which were passed down from the Middle Ages onward in small groups or "temples" based in the Welsh Marches – a border area between England and Wales – which were each led by a grand master or grand mistress. According to the Order, in the late 1960s a grand mistress of one such group united three of these temples – Camlad, the Temple of the Sun, and the Noctulians – to form the ONA, before welcoming outsiders into the tradition.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: According to the Order's account, one of those whom the grand mistress initiated into the group was "Anton Long", an individual who described himself as a British citizen who had spent much of his youth visiting Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. Long claimed that prior to his involvement in the ONA he had been interested in occultism for several years, having contacted a coven based in Fenland in 1968, before moving to London and joining groups that practiced ceremonial magic in the style of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and Aleister Crowley. He also claimed a brief involvement in a Satanic group based in Manchester, the Orthodox Temple of the Prince run by Ray Bogart, during which time he encountered the ONA Grand Mistress. According to the Order's account, Long joined the ONA in 1973 – the first to have done so in five years – and became the grand mistress' heir. He later recalled that at that time the group held rituals at henges and stone circles around the solstices and equinoxes.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: This account further states that when the Order's Grand Mistress migrated to Australia, Long took over as the group's new grand master. The group claimed that Long "implemented the next stage of Sinister Strategy – to make the teachings known on a large scale". From the late 1970s onward, Long encouraged the establishment of new ONA groups, which were known as "temples", and from 1976 onward he authored an array of texts for the tradition, codifying and extending its teachings, mythos, and structure. These texts are typically written in English, although they include passages of Classical Greek as well as terms from Sanskrit and Arabic, reflecting Long's fluency in such languages. After examining these texts, the historian Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke stated that in them, Long "evokes a world of witches, outlaw peasant sorcerers, orgies and blood sacrifices at lonely cottages in the woods and valleys of this area <nowiki>[</nowiki>Shropshire and Herefordshire<nowiki>]</nowiki> where he has lived since the early 1980s".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The real identity of "Anton Long" remains unknown for both members of the Order and to academics who have studied it. However, in a 1998 issue of the anti-fascist magazine "Searchlight", it was claimed that "Anton Long" was a pseudonym of David Myatt, a prominent figure in the British neo-Nazi movement. Born in the early 1950s, Myatt had been involved in various neo-Nazi groups, initially serving as a bodyguard for Colin Jordan of the British Movement before joining the Combat 18 militia and becoming a founding member and leader of the National Socialist Movement. His text on "A Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution", in which he advocated violent militancy in aid of the neo-Nazi cause, was cited as an influence on the nail bomber David Copeland. In 1998, Myatt converted to Islam and remained a practicing Muslim for eight years, in which time he encouraged violent jihad against Zionism and Israel's Western allies. In 2010, he announced that he had renounced Islam and was practicing an esoteric tradition that he termed the "Numinous Way".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Goodrick-Clarke supported the idea that Myatt was Long, with the religious studies scholar Jacob C. Senholt adding that "the role of David Myatt [is] paramount to the whole creation and existence of the ONA". Senholt presented additional evidence that he believed confirmed Myatt's identity as Long, writing that Myatt's embrace of neo-Nazism and radical Islamism represented "insight roles" which Myatt had adopted as part of the ONA's "sinister strategy" to undermine Western society, a view endorsed by scholar of Satanism Per Faxneld. In 2015, an ONA member known as R. Parker argued in favour of the idea that Myatt was Long. As a result of Page's publication, the sociologist of religion Massimo Introvigne stated that the ONA has "more or less acknowledged" that Myatt and Long are the same person.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Myatt himself has repeatedly denied allegations that he has any involvement with the ONA. and that he has used the pseudonym "Anton Long", Religious studies scholar George Sieg expressed concern with this association, stating that he found it to be "implausible and untenable based on the extent of variance in writing style, personality, and tone" between Myatt and Long. Jeffrey Kaplan, an academic specialist in the far right, has also suggested that Myatt and Long are separate people, while the religious studies scholar Connell R. Monette posited the possibility that "Anton Long" was not a singular individual but rather a pseudonym used by several different people.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA arose to public attention in the early 1980s. During the 1980s and 1990s it spread its message through articles in magazines. In 1988, it began publication of its own in-house journal, titled "Fenrir". Among material it has issued for public consumption have been philosophical tracts, ritual instruction, letters, poetry, and gothic fiction. Its core ritual text is titled the "Black Book of Satan". It has also issued its own music, painted tarot set known as the Sinister Tarot, and a three-dimensional board game known as the Star Game. The ONA established links with other neo-Nazi Satanist groups: its international distributor was New Zealander Kerry Bolton, the founder of the Black Order, who is described as an ONA adept in the group's published letter-correspondence, and it has access to a private library of occult and far right material owned by the Order of the Jarls of Bælder. According to Monette, the group now have associates, and groups, in the United States, Europe, Brazil, Egypt, Australia, and Russia. One of these associate groups is the U.S.-based Tempel ov Blood, which has published a number of texts through Ixaxaar Press, while another is the California-based White Star Acception, which has been designated as the ONA's "Flagship Nexion" in the United States despite diverting from mainstream ONA teachings on a number of issues.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: During the early 1990s, the Order stated that it was entering the second stage of its development, in which it would leave behind its prior focus on recruitment and public outreach within the occult community and that it would instead focus on refining its teachings; its resulting quietness led some occultists to erroneously speculate that the ONA had become defunct.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In 2000, the ONA established a presence on the Internet, using it as a medium to communicate with others and to distribute its writings.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In 2008, the ONA announced that it was entering the third phase in its history, in which it would once again focus heavily on promotion, utilising such social media as online blogs, forums, Facebook, and YouTube to spread its message. In 2011, the "Old Guard", a group of longstanding members of the Order, stated that they would withdraw from active, public work with the group. In March 2012, Long announced that he would be withdrawing from public activity, although he appears to have remained active in the Order.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Monette described the ONA as "a fascinating blend of both Hermeticism and Traditional Satanism, with some pagan elements".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Faxneld described the ONA as "a dangerous and extreme form of Satanism" and as "one of the most extreme Satanist groups in the world." Jeffrey Kaplan and Leonard Weinberg characterised it as a "National Socialist-oriented Satanist group", while Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke similarly deemed it to be a "Satanic Nazi cult" which "combine[d] paganism with praise for Hitler". He added that the ONA "celebrated the dark, destructive side of life through anti-Christian, elitist and Social Darwinist doctrines." Considering the manner in which the ONA had syncretized both Satanism and Heathenry, the historian of religion Mattias Gardell described its spiritual perspective as "a heathen satanic path". The scholar George Sieg however argued that the ONA should be categorised as "post-Satanic" because it has "surpassed (without fully abandoning) identification with its original satanic paradigm".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA describe their occultism both as "Traditional Satanism", Since the establishment of the ONA, the term "Traditional Satanism" has also been adopted by Theistic Satanist groups like the Brotherhood of Satan. Faxneld suggested that the Order's adoption of the word "traditional" possibly reflected a "conscious strategy to built legitimacy" by harking back to "arcane ancient wisdom" in a manner deliberately distinct from the way in which Anton LaVey sought to gain legitimacy for his Church of Satan by appealing to rationality, science, and his own personal charisma. Elsewhere Faxneld suggested that the ONA's use of "Traditional Satanism" to differentiate themselves from the dominant forms of Satanism had comparisons with how those who describe themselves as practitioners of "traditional witchcraft" do so to distinguish their magico-religious practices from the dominant form of modern witchcraft, Wicca.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: According to Jesper Aagaard Petersen, an academic specialist of Satanism, the Order present "a recognizable new interpretation of Satanism and the left-hand path", and for those involved in the group, Satanism is not simply a religion but a way of life.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The Order postulates Satanism as an arduous individual achievement of self-mastery and Nietzschean self-overcoming, with an emphasis on individual growth through practical acts of risk, prowess and endurance. Therefore, "[t]he goal of the Satanism of the ONA is to create a new individual through direct experience, practice and self-development [with] the grades of the ONA system being highly individual, based on the initiates' own practical and real-life acts, instead of merely performing certain ceremonial rituals". Thus Satanism, the ONA assert, requires venturing into the realm of the forbidden and illegal in order to shake the practitioner loose of cultural and political conditioning. Intentionally transgressive, the Order has been characterised as providing "an aggressive and elitist spirituality". Religious studies scholar Graham Harvey wrote that the ONA fit the stereotype of the Satanist "better than other groups", something which he thought was deliberately achieved by embracing "deeply shocking" and illegal acts.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA are strongly critical of larger Satanic groups like the Church of Satan and the Temple of Set, whom they deem to be "sham-Satanic" because they embrace the "glamour associated with Satanism" but are "afraid to experience its realness within and external to them". In turn, the Church of Satan has criticised what they alleged was the Order's "paranoic insistence that they are the only upholders of Satanic tradition", with Kaplan stating that these comments reflect "the intramural tensions" that are common within "the world of Satanism".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Although conceiving of itself as having pre-Christian origins and describing Satanism as "militant paganism", the ONA does not advocate the re-establishment of pre-Christian belief systems, with one ONA tract stating that "all past gods of the various Western Traditions are rendered obsolete by the forces which Satanism alone is unleashing". However, Goodrick-Clarke noted that the group's "ideas and rituals" draw upon "a native tradition", with references to the pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon concept of "wyrd", an emphasis on ceremonies performed at equinoxes, and the construction of incense using indigenous trees, thus suggesting the idea of "rootedness in English nature". Practitioners undergo "black pilgrimages" to prehistoric ceremonial sites in the area around Shropshire and Herefordshire in the English Midlands.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Furthermore, Monette writes that "a critical examination of the ONA's key texts suggests that the satanic overtones could be cosmetic, and that its core mythos and cosmology are genuinely hermetic, with pagan influences."


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA states that cosmic evolution is guided by a "sinister dialectics" of alternating Aeonic energies. It divides human history into a series of Aeons, believing that each Aeon was dominated by a human civilization that emerged, evolved, and then died. It states that each Aeon lasts for approximately 2000 years, with its respective dominating human civilization developing within the latter 1500 years of that period. It holds that after 800 years of growth, each civilization faces problems, resulting in a "Time of Troubles" that lasts from between 398 and 400 years. In each civilization's final stage is a period that lasts for approximately 390 years, in which it is controlled by a strong military and imperial regime, after which the civilization falls. The ONA claims that humanity has lived through five such Aeons, each with an associated civilization: the Primal, Hyperborean, Sumerian, Hellenic, and Western. Both Goodrick-Clarke and Senholt have stated that this system of Aeons is inspired by the works of Arnold J. Toynbee, with Senholt suggesting that it might also have been influenced by Crowley's ideas regarding Thelemic Aeons.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA claims that current Western civilization has a Faustian ethos and it has recently undergone its Time of Troubles, with its final stage, an "Imperium" of militaristic governance, due to commence at some point in 1990–2011 and last until 2390. This will be followed by a period of chaos from which will be established a sixth Aeon, the Aeon of Fire, which will be represented by the Galactic civilization in which an Aryan society shall colonize the Milky Way galaxy. However, the Order holds that unlike previous Aeonic civilizations, Western civilization has been infected with the "Magian/Nazarene" distorion, which they associate with the Judeo-Christian religion. The group's writings state that while Western civilization had once been "a pioneering entity, imbued with elitist values and exalting the way of the warrior", under the impact of the Magian/Nazarene ethos it has become "essentially neurotic, inward-looking and obsessed", embracing humanism, capitalism, communism, as well as "the sham of democracy" and "the dogma of racial equality." They believe that these Magian/Nazarene forces represent a counter-evolutionary trend which threatens to prevent the emergence of the Western Imperium and thus the evolution of humanity, opining that this cosmic enemy must be overcome through the force of will. Both Goodrick-Clarke and Sieg note that these ideas regarding the "Magian soul" and "cultural distortion" brought about by Jews were derived from the works of Oswald Spengler and Francis Parker Yockey.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA praises Nazi Germany as "a practical expression of the Satanic spirit ... a burst of Luciferian light – of zest and power – in an otherwise Nazarene, pacified, and boring world." Embracing Holocaust denial, it claims that the Holocaust was a myth which was constructed by the Magian/Nazarene establishment in order to denigrate the Nazi administration after the Second World War and erase its achievements from "the psyche of the West". The group believes that a neo-Nazi revolution is necessary in order to overthrow the Magian-Nazarene domination of Western society and establish the Imperium, ultimately allowing humanity to enter the Galactic civilization of the future.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Accordingly, positive references to Nazism and neo-Nazism can be found within the group's written material, and it evokes the Nazi leader Adolf Hitler as a positive force in its text for the performance of a Black Mass, also known as The Mass of Heresy. However, some ONA texts state that members should embrace neo-Nazism and racism not out of a genuine belief in Nazi ideology, but as part of a "sinister strategy" to advance Aeonic evolution. A version of the Black Mass-produced by an Australian ONA group, The Temple of THEM, replaces praise of Hitler with praise of the Islamist militant Osama bin Laden, while the writings of Chloe Ortega and Kayla DiGiovanni, key publicists for the U.S.-based White Star Acception, express what Sieg termed a "left-anarchist" platform which lacked the condemnation of Zionism and the endorsement of Aryan racialism which is found in Long's writings. The Order is thus far more overtly politically extreme in its aims than other Satanic and left-hand path organisations are, seeking to infiltrate and destabilise modern society through magical and practical means.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA's core system is known as the "Seven Fold Way" or "Hebdomadry", and is outlined in one of the Order's primary texts, "Naos". The sevenfold system is reflected in the group's symbolic cosmology, the "Tree of Wyrd", on which seven celestial bodies – the Moon, Venus, Mercury, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn – are located. The term "wyrd" was adopted from Old English, where it referred to fate or destiny. Monette identified this as a "hermetic system", highlighting that the use of seven planetary bodies had been influenced by the Medieval Arabic texts "Ghāyat al-Ḥakīm" and "Shams I-Maarif".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The Seven Fold Way is also reflected in the group's initiatory system, which has seven grades through which the member can gradually progress. These are: (1) Neophyte, (2) Initiate, (3) External Adept, (4) Internal Adept, (5) Master/Mistress, (6) Grand Master/Mousa and (7) Immortal. The group has revealed that very few of its members raise to the fifth and sixth degrees, and in a 1989 article the ONA stated that at that point there were only four individuals who had reached the stage of Master.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA does not initiate members into the group itself, but rather expects an individual to initiate themselves. It requires that initiates be in a good physical condition, and recommends a training regimen for prospective members to follow. Newcomers are expected to take on a magical partner of the opposite sex. Thenceforth, the practitioner must undertake personal and increasingly difficult challenges in order to move through the different grades. Most of the ordeals that allow the initiate to proceed to the next stage are publicly revealed by the Order in its introductory material, as it is believed that the true initiatory element lies in the experience itself and can only be attained through performing them. For instance, part of the ritual to become an External Adept involves an ordeal in which the prospective member is to find a lonely spot and to lie there, still, for an entire night without moving or sleeping. The initiatory process for the role of Internal Adept entails the practitioner withdrawing from human society for three months, from an equinox to a solstice, or (more usually) for six months, during which time they must live in the wild without modern conveniences or contact with civilisation. The next stage – the Ritual of the Abyss – involves the candidate living alone in a dark isolated cavern for a lunar month. According to Jeffrey Kaplan, an academic specialist of the far right, these physically and mentally challenging initiatory tasks reflect "the ONA's conception of itself as a vanguard organization composed of a tiny coterie of Nietzschean elites."


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Within the initiatory system of the ONA, there is an emphasis on practitioners adopting "insight roles" in which they work undercover among a politically extreme group for a period of six to eighteen months, thus gaining experience in something different from their normal life. Among the ideological trends that the ONA suggests its members adopt "insight roles" within are anarchism, neo-Nazism, and Islamism, stating that aside from the personal benefits of such an involvement, membership of these groups has the benefit of undermining the Magian-Nazarene socio-political system of the West and thus helping to bring about the instability from which a new order, the Imperium, can emerge. However, Monette noted a potential shift in the insight roles recommended by the group over the decades; he highlighted that while the ONA recommended criminal or military activities during the 1980s and early 1990s, by the late 1990s and 2000s they were instead recommending Buddhist monasticism as an insight role for practitioners to adopt.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Through the practice of "insight roles", the order advocates continuous transgression of established norms, roles, and comfort zones in the development of the initiate ... This extreme application of ideas further amplifies the ambiguity of Satanic and left-hand path practices of antinomianism, making it almost impossible to penetrate the layers of subversion, play and counter-dichotomy inherent in the sinister dialectics." Senholt suggested that Myatt's involvement with both neo-Nazism and Islamism represent such "insight roles" in his own life.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA believe that humans live within the "causal" realm, which obeys the laws of cause and effect. However, they also believe in an "acausal" realm, in which the laws of physics do not apply, further promoting the idea that numinous energies from the acausal realm can be drawn into the causal, allowing for the performance of magic. The ONA distinguish between external, internal, and aeonic magick. External magic itself is divided into two categories: ceremonial magick, which is performed by more than two people to achieve a specific goal and hermetic magick, which is performed either solitarily or in a pair and which is often sexual in nature. Internal magick is designed to produce an altered state of consciousness in the participant, in order to result in a process of "individuation" which bestows adepthood. The most advanced form of magick in the ONA system is aeonic magick, the practice of which is restricted to those who are already perceived to have mastered external and internal magick and attained the grade of master. The purpose of aeonic magick is to influence large numbers of people over a lengthy period of time, thus affecting the development of future aeons. In particular it is employed with the intent of disrupting the current socio-political system of the Western world, which the ONA believe has been corrupted by Judeo-Christian religion.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA utilises two methods in its performance of aeonic magick. The first entails rites and chants with the intent of opening a gateway – known as a "nexion" – to the "acausal realm" in order to manifest energies in the "causal realm" that will influence the existing aeon in the practitioner's desired direction. The second method involves playing an advanced form of a board game known as the Star Game; the game was devised by the group, with the game pieces representing different aeons. The group believes that when an initiate plays the game they can become a "living nexion" and thus a channel for acausal energies to enter the causal realm and effect aeonic change. An advanced form of the game is used as part of the training for the grade of Internal Adept.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The Order promotes the idea that "Dark Gods" exist within the acausal realm, although it is accepted that some members will interpret them not as real entities but as facets of the human subconscious. These entities are perceived as dangerous, with the ONA advising caution when interacting with them. Among those Dark Gods whose identities have been discussed in the Order's publicly available material are a goddess named Baphomet who is depicted as a mature woman carrying a severed head. In addition, there are entities whose names, according to Monette, are borrowed from or influenced by figures from Classical sources and astronomy, such as Kthunae, Nemicu, and Atazoth.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Another of these acausal figures is termed Vindex, after the Latin word for "avenger". The ONA believe that Vindex will eventually incarnate as a human – although the gender and ethnicity of this individual is unknown – through the successful "presencing" of acausal energies within the causal realm, and that they will act as a messianic figure by overthrowing the Magian forces and leading the ONA to prominence in the establishment of a new society. Sieg drew comparisons between this belief in Vindex and the ideas of Savitri Devi, the prominent Esoteric Hitlerist, regarding the arrival of Kalki, an avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu, to Earth. The ONA also propagate the idea that it is possible for the practitioner to secure an afterlife within the acausal realm through their spiritual activities. It is for this reason that the final stage of the Seven Fold Way is known as the "Immortal", constituting those initiates who have been able to advance to the stage of dwelling in the acausal realm.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA outlines their guidelines for human sacrifice in a number of documents: "A Gift for the Prince – A Guide to Human Sacrifice", "Culling – A Guide to Sacrifice II", "Victims – A Sinister Exposé", and "Guidelines for the Testing of Opfers". According to the ONA's beliefs, the killer must allow their victims to "self-select" themselves; this is achieved through testing victims to see whether they expose perceived character faults. If this proves to be the case, victims are believed to have shown that they are worthy of death, and the sacrifice can commence. Those deemed ideal for sacrifice by the group include individuals perceived as being of low character, members of what they deem "sham-Satanic groups" like the Church of Satan and Temple of Set, as well as "zealous, interfering Nazarenes", and journalists, business figures and political activists who disrupt the group's operations. The ONA explains that because of the need for such "self-selection", children must never be victims of sacrifice.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The sacrifice is then carried out through either physical or magical means, at which point the killer is believed to absorb power from the body and spirit of the victim, thus entering a new level of "sinister" consciousness. As well as strengthening the character of killers by heightening their connection with the acausal forces of death and destruction, such sacrifices are also viewed as having wider benefits by the ONA, because they remove from society individuals whom the group deems to be worthless human beings. Monette noted that no ONA nexion cells publicly admitted to carrying out a sacrifice in a ritual manner, but that members had joined the police and military groups in order to engage in legal violence and killing.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA believe that there are historical precedents to their practice of human sacrifice, expressing belief in a prehistoric tradition in which humans were sacrificed to a goddess named Baphomet at the spring equinox and to the Arcturus star in the autumn. However, the ONA's advocacy of human sacrifice has drawn strong criticism from other Satanist groups like the Temple of Set, who deem it to be detrimental to their own attempts to make Satanism more socially acceptable within Western nations.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Although occult scholars attribute the concept of Nine Angles to The Church of Satan, in its essays and other writings the ONA offers differing explanations as to the meaning of the term "Nine Angles". One explanation is that it pertains to the seven planets of the group's cosmology (the seven angles), added to the system as a whole (the eighth angle), and the mystic themselves (the ninth angle). A second explanation is that it refers to seven "normal" alchemical stages, with an additional two processes. A third is that it pertains to the nine emanations of the divine, a concept originally found in Medieval texts produced within the Islamic mystical tradition of Sufism. Monette further suggested that it was a reference to a classical Indian tradition which divided the Solar System into nine planets.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The ONA is a secretive organization. It lacks any central administration, instead operating as a network of allied Satanic practitioners, which it terms the "kollective". Thus, Monette stated that the Order "is not a structured lodge or temple, but rather a movement, a subculture or perhaps metaculture that its adherents choose to embody or identify with". Monette also suggested that this absence of a centralised structure would aid the Order's survival, because its fate would not be invested solely in one particular leader. The ONA dislikes the term "member", instead favouring the word "associate". In 2012, Long stated that those affiliated with the Order fell into six different categories: associates of traditional nexions, Niners, Balobians, gang and tribe members, followers of the Rounwytha tradition, and those involved with ONA-inspired groups.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The group largely consists of autonomous cells known as "nexions". The original cell, based in Shropshire, is known as "Nexion Zero", with the majority of subsequent groups having been established in Britain, Ireland, and Germany, however nexions and other associated groups have also been established in the United States, Australia, Brazil, Egypt, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Serbia, Russia and South Africa. The Greek wing of the ONA goes by the name Mirós tou Zeús. Some of these groups, such as the U.S.-based Tempel ov Blood, describe themselves as being distinct from the ONA while both having been greatly influenced by it and having connections to it.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In the ONA's terminology, the terms Drecc and Niner refer to folk-based or gang-based culture or individuals who support the Order's aims by practical (including criminal) means rather than esoteric ones. One such group is the White Star Acception, who claim to have perpetrated rapes, assaults, and robberies in order to advance the group's power; Sieg noted that the reality of these actions has not been verified.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: A Balobian is an artist or musician who contributes to the group through their production of fine art. The Rounwytha is a tradition of folk-mystics deemed to exhibit gifted psychic powers reflecting their embodiment of the "sinister feminine archetype". Although a minority are men, most Rounwytha are female, and they often live reclusively as part of small and often lesbian groups.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Several academic commentators have highlighted the existence of a position within the ONA called an "Outer Representative", who serves as an official spokesperson for the group to the outer world. The first to publicly claim to be the group's "Outer Representative" was Richard Moult, an artist and composer from Shropshire who used the pseudonym of "Christos Beest". Moult was followed as "Outer Representative" by "Vilnius Thornian", who held the position from 1996 to 2002, and who has been identified by ONA insiders as the left-hand path ideologue Michael Ford. Subsequently, on the blog of the White Star Acception, the claim was made that the group's member Chloe Ortega was the ONA's Outer Representative, also this blog later became defunct by 2013. In 2013, a female American Rounwytha using the name of "Jall" appeared claiming to be the Order's "Outer Representative".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The existence of the position of Outer Representative and the extent of its functions have been disputed however. According to Senholt the ONA "does not award titles", with Monette writing that "there is no central authority within the ONA." Also disputed is the existence of an O9A "Old Guard". Members of this Old Guard included Christos Beest, Sinister Moon, Dark Logos, and Pointy Hat, although in 2011 they stated that they would withdraw from the public sphere.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: Several academics have written about ONA membership. In a 1995 overview of British Satanist groups, Harvey suggested that the ONA consisted of less than ten members, "and perhaps fewer than five." In 1998, Jeffrey Kaplan and Leonard Weinberg stated that the ONA's membership was "infinitesmally small", with the group acting primarily as a "mail-order ministry".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In 2013, Senholt observed that because the group has no official membership, it is "difficult, if not impossible, to estimate the number of ONA members". Senholt suggested that a "rough estimate" of the "total number" of individuals involved with the ONA in some capacity from 1980 to 2009 was "a few thousand"; he had come to this conclusion from an examination of the number of magazines and journals about the subject circulated and the number of members of online discussion groups devoted to the ONA. At the same time he thought that the number of "longtime adherents is much smaller." Also in 2013, Monette estimated that there were over two thousand ONA associates, broadly defined. He believed that the gender balance was roughly equal, although with regional variation and differences among particular nexions. Introvigne observed that if Monette's estimate was correct, it would mean that the ONA is "easily... the largest Satanist organization in the world".


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: According to a survey in 2015, the ONA has more female supporters than either the Church of Satan or the Temple of Set; more women with children; more older supporters; more supporters who are better established in socio-economic terms; and more who politically are further to the Right.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: According to a report by the civil rights group the Southern Poverty Law Center the ONA "holds an important position in the niche, international nexus of occult, esoteric, and/or satanic neo-Nazi groups." Several newspapers have reported that the O9A is linked to a number of high-profile figures from the far right and that the group is affiliated and shares members with neo-Nazi terrorist groups such as Atomwaffen Division and proscribed National Action, Sonnenkrieg Division, Combat 18 and Nordic Resistance Movement (NRM).


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In the summer of 1997 two members of the Swedish O9A group called Misanthropic Luciferian Order perpetrated the so-called Keillers Park murder, an alleged ritual sacrifice of an Algerian man. The men were eventually convicted of a hate crime.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: On 23 September 2019, Specialist Jarrett William Smith, 24, of Fort Riley, Kansas, was charged with distributing information related to explosives and weapons of mass destruction. Assistant US Attorney Anthony Mattivi alleged in federal court that Smith distributed explosives information and was planning on assassinating federal agents with three other people "for the glory of his Satanist religion". On 10 February 2020, Smith pleaded guilty to two counts of distributing information related to explosives, destructive devices and weapons of mass destruction and was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: A US paratrooper named Ethan Melzer in the 173rd Airborne Brigade's Sky Soldiers, who was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment, in Vicenza, Italy, in 2019 until 2020, plotted an ambush on his unit, "to result in the deaths of as many of his fellow service members as possible." He was charged in June 2020 with conspiring and attempting to murder military service members, and providing and attempting to provide material support to terrorists. The paratrooper was charged with leaking classified information (including the unit's location and security) to his co-conspirators in the RapeWaffen nexion and the Order of the Nine Angles (O9A). In June 2022 he pled guilty to three charges and is scheduled for sentencing in January 2023.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: After Melzer was exposed, several other active members of the US military were also discovered to be members of the O9A. Corwyn Storm Carver was found to be another member in communication with the group and in possession of O9A paraphernalia and literature while stationed in Kuwait. Shandon Simpson, member of the Ohio Army National Guard sent to quell the George Floyd protests in Washington, D.C. openly espoused neo-nazi views and was also found to be in the RapeWaffen. Simpson told that he was planning to shoot the protesters as part of "racial holy war" and was intercepted by the FBI but only after he had already been deployed.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In January 2020, O9A follower Luke Austin Lane and two accomplices were arrested for allegedly stockpiling weapons and plotting to kill an antifascist couple and their young children. In preparation Lane along with dozen other people had engaged in paramilitary training and sacrificed a ram, drank its blood and consumed psychedelic drugs in an occult ritual on his property.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: The British political advocacy group Hope not Hate reported in March 2020 that there were six cases of neo-nazis connected to O9A being prosecuted for terrorist offenses during the year alone. A 2019 article in "The Times" newspaper stated that "a "Times" reporter went undercover on the gaming platform Discord to infiltrate an invitation-only Satanist neo-Nazi group called The Order of Nine Angles (O9A). The group openly encouraged acts of terrorism and celebrated what was described as esoteric Hitlerism."


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: In March 2020, Hope not Hate began a campaign to have the Order of Nine banned, proscribed, as a terrorist group, a campaign supported by several British members of Parliament including the Labour Party's Yvette Cooper, Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: On 18 September 2020, Toronto Police arrested 34-year-old Guilherme “William” Von Neutegem and charged him with the murder of Mohamed-Aslim Zafis. Zafis was the caretaker of a local mosque who was found dead with his throat cut. The Toronto Police Service said the killing is possibly connected to the stabbing murder of Rampreet Singh a few days prior a short distance from the spot where Zafis' murder took place. Von Neutegem is a member of the O9A and social media accounts established as to belonging to him promote the group and included recordings of Von Neutegem performing satanic chants. In his home there was also an altar with the symbol of the O9A adorning a monolith. According to Evan Balgord of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network, they are aware of more O9A members in Canada, and their affiliated organization Northern Order. CAHN reported previously of the Northern Order when a member in Canadian Armed Forces was caught selling firearms and explosives to other neo-nazis.


title: Order of Nine Angles

text: On 11 December 2020, the UK based BitChute removed all O9A material for violating the site's anti-terror policy, citing O9A's "close connections with other proscribed organisations". The same month Yahoo News acquired a report by the US National Counterterrorism Center, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security circulated to U.S intelligence agencies, assessing that the O9A poses a violent threat and that it plays an influential role among right-wing terror groups. The report however added that the O9A was rejected by certain groups for inciting its members to commit rape and pedophilia. In January 2021, after the 2021 storming of the United States Capitol, discussion about proscribing far-right groups was renewed by the Public Safety Minister Bill Blair, and the O9A was named by experts as one of the most dangerous groups in Canada whose proscription is a priority. In April 2021, Democratic Representative Elissa Slotkin pressed Joe Biden's administration to designate O9A as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation (FTO) in a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The Sonnenkrieg Division was officially proscribed in Australia on March 22, 2021, with its adherence to "violent white-supremacist ideology inspired by the Nazi Party and the Satanic ‘Order of Nine Angles’ movement" cited as the reason.