Secret societies... what is the secret?

I think it's like the kids forming a club. "No Girls Allowed". No big secrets, but way big on exclusiveness.

Maybe somebody else can direct an answer to the spirituality & religion context.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_World_Order_(conspiracy)

New World Order (Novus Ordo Mundi) refers to a conspiracy theory in which a powerful and secretive group (Illuminati, Freemasons, etc.) has created a secret plan to eventually rule the world via a unitary (as opposed to federal) world government.

Conspiracy theorists allege that the most powerful figures of the conspiracy are the owners of the world's largest banks, partnered with others who are among the world's wealthiest people. Beneath this level are supposed to be the people in the highest levels of various governments, military and intelligence bureaus, and the major media.


Reverse side of the Great Seal of the United StatesThe belief may stem ?- at least partly ?- from the political phrase "New World Order", which has been used in politics for much of the twentieth century. The phrase New World Order has its roots in the Latin phrases Annuit Cœptis, meaning "He has approved our beginnings," and Novus Ordo Seclorum meaning "A New Order of the Ages."

Alternate names for the New World Order are Illuminati Bankers, High Cabal, Fourth Reich, Synarchist International, the Cryptocracy and the Power elite.

I can't tell you. They are secret societies. If I told you, they wouldn't be a secret societies any more.

Secret society
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A secret society is a social organization that requires its members to conceal certain activities?-such as rites of initiation or club ceremonies?-from outsiders. Members may be required to conceal or deny their membership, and are often sworn to hold the society's secrets by an oath. The term "secret society" is often used to describe fraternal organizations (e.g. Freemasonry) that may have secret ceremonies, but is also commonly applied to organizations ranging from the common and innocuous (collegiate fraternities) to mythical organizations described in conspiracy theories as immensely powerful, with self-serving financial or political agendas, global reach, and often satanic beliefs.

Like the most successful forgeries, it is conceivable that the most effective secret societies are unknown beyond their adherents.

Historically, secret societies are often the subject of suspicion and speculation from non-members; and as such have aroused nervousness from outsiders since the time of the ancient Greeks, when meetings were held "sub rosa" (Latin, "under the rose") to signify the secrecy and silence of the Hellenistic god Harpocrates.

For this reason, secret societies are illegal in several countries. In the European Union, Poland has made the ban a part of its constitution. Article 13 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland states:

"Political parties and other organizations whose programmes are based upon totalitarian methods and the modes of activity of nazism, fascism and communism, as well as those whose programmes or activities sanction racial or national hatred, the application of violence for the purpose of obtaining power or to influence the State policy, or provide for the secrecy of their own structure or membership, shall be prohibited."
Some secret organizations exploit secrecy as a means to further political or criminal agendas, including such historical examples as the Know Nothing party in the United States, and the Mafia, respectively.

Many student societies established on university campuses [1] have been considered secret societies. Some collegiate secret societies are the Flat Hat Club (1750) and Phi Beta Kappa (1776), both founded at William & Mary. The most famous member of the FHC was Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States. In correspondence, Jefferson noted that the Flat Hat Club served "no useful object." Others are the Order of the Bull's Blood (1834) at Rutgers University, and the Bishop James Madison Society (1812) at The College of William & Mary. The most famous collegiate secret society is the Skull and Bones (1832) at Yale University.




Contents
1 List of secret societies
1.1 Business, international or non-governmental organizations
1.2 Student societies
1.3 Fraternal organizations
1.3.1 Masonic
1.3.2 Rosicrucian
1.3.3 Other
1.4 Criminal organizations
1.5 Historical secret societies
1.6 Revolutionary or underground organizations
1.7 Alleged secret societies
2 See also
3 External links



List of secret societies

Business, international or non-governmental organizations
While not self-styled as secret societies, these groups are often discussed in that context.

Bilderberg Group
Club of Rome
Council on Foreign Relations
Rhodes-Milner Round Table Groups
Royal Institute of International Affairs (also known as Chatham House)
Trilateral Commission

Student societies
Anak Society (1908) at Georgia Institute of Technology
Berzelius (1848) at Yale University
Bishop James Madison Society (1812) at the College of William and Mary
Book and Snake (1863) at Yale University
Cambridge Apostles (1820) at the University of Cambridge
Cloak and Dagger (society) (1892) at Georgetown University
DERU (1895) at Northwestern University
Episkopon at the University of Trinity College
Elihu at Yale University
The Eyes of Texas at the University of Texas at Austin
Flat Hat Club (1750) at the College of William and Mary
IMP Society (1902) at University of Virginia
The Machine (1914) at the University of Alabama
Michigamua (1902) at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Mystical 7 (1837) at Wesleyan University
The NoZe Brotherhood (1924) at Baylor University
Order of the Acropolis at University of Georgia
Order of the Bull's Blood (1834) at Rutgers University
Order of Gimghoul (1889) at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Order of the Greek Horsemen (1955) at University of Georgia
Owl Society at the University of Pennsylvania
Pachacamac at the University of Kansas [2]; Began in the early 1900s, appearing without names every year in the Jayhawker yearbook in black cloaks and hoods, it was formally abolished and banned by the University in 1992.
Phi Beta Kappa (1776) at the College of William and Mary, began as a secret society, but eliminated secrecy in 1831 and is now national
Quill and Dagger (1893) at Cornell University
Scroll and Key (1842) at Yale University
Seven Society (1905) at the University of Virginia
Shifters (1932) at Wittenberg University
Skull and Bones (1832) at Yale University
Sphinx Head Society (1890) at Cornell University
Sphinx senior society (1886) at Dartmouth College
Sword and Serpent (1870) at Rutgers University
The Vitruvian Society at the University of Hartford
Wolf's Head (1883) at Yale University
Z Society (1892) at University of Virginia

Fraternal organizations

Masonic
Freemasonry (also known as Free & Accepted Masons)
FUDOFSI
FUDOSI
Order of DeMolay
Order of the Eastern Star

Rosicrucian
AMORC (Ancient Mystical Order Rosae Crucis)
Confraternity of the Rose Cross
Rosicrucians
Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia (SRIA)

Other
Bohemian Club
Knights of Columbus
Order Militia Crucifera Evangelica
Order of the Solar Temple
Ordo Templi Orientis
P2
Order of the Arrow
The Veiled Prophet Organization in St. Louis, Missouri. [3]

Criminal organizations
Bloods
Camorra
Crips
Mafia (also known as La Cosa Nostra)
MS-13
Thuggee
Tong
Triad
Yakuza

Historical secret societies
Beati paoli
Illuminati
Knights of the Golden Circle
Know-Nothings
Krypteia
Ku Klux Klan (exists at present with very small membership)
Gladio
Society of the Elect
SPK
Thule Society
Tiandihui
Wide Awakes

Revolutionary or underground organizations
Black Hand
Carbonari
Fenian Brotherhood
Germanenorden
Katipunan
Mau Mau
Muslim Brotherhood
Narodnik
Righteous Harmony Society
Sons of Liberty
Tongmenghui
Vihan Veljet
Walhalla-orden
White Rose Society
Communist League (US)

Alleged secret societies
Either the existence of these, or their status, is subject to significant doubt. See also Secret societies in popular culture

Angelic Society
Majestic 12
Priory of Sion
The Elders of Zion
Vril Society

See also
List of Masonic organizations
List of Japanese nationalist movements and parties
Secret societies in Singapore


External links
How the Secret Societies Got That Way
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_society"


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_society

I guess my question would be "why does it have to be secret?"

They must be doing something they are ashamed of... or maybe it is a surprise!

Exactly what I was thinking, Rex. If you can't do it in the open you probably shouldn't be doing it at all I always say. :wink:

Is there a small minority of the people who know what is best for the majority?

Is this why there are so many secrets?

Christianity was once a secret society, before the cross became a necklace pendant and that fish symbol thingee a bumper sticker.

Yeah Yeah, That's It!

It's gonna be a BIG SURPRISE!

I can hardly wait....I hope there'll be ice cream involved.

Maybe Judaism was once a secret society but I do not think you can call the same for christianity...

Maybe you are confusing the secrecy that early Christians displayed because they were being persecuted and needed to keep their beliefs secret from those who would do them harm but as you can see... the secret got out.

"Good news" doesn't always seem by nature to be secretive but sometimes people just prefer bad news...

From the very inception of Christianity it's claim is that the hidden secrets of our spirituality are now revealed through Christ jesus...

1Co 2:10
But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God

1Pe 1:12
Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into

Eph 3:5
Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit;

When I was a teenager, I lost my virginity to this girl who was a member of an organization called the "Rainbow". I understood it was ateen chicky branch of the Masons. They wouldnt talk about what they did, but they must have been taking contraction lessons cuz I wasnt right for years after getting it from her. I still look back in wonder how lucky I was.

Haha

Yea, ice cream and cool aid.

Do you attribute your affection for her more because of her secrets or because she was attractive physically?

Who controls the British crown?
Who keeps the metric system down?
We do, we do

"Who keeps Atlantis off the maps?
Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
We do, we do!

Who holds back the electric car?
Who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?
We do, we do!

Who robs gamefish of their site?
Who rigs every Oscar night?
We do, we do!!!"

I was laying on a couch with my eyes closed. There was a voice calm and soothing. I could feel the couch under me until suddenly the atoms in the couch seemed to let me pass right through them. I still had my eyes closed I could no longer feel myself aging, yet I was still falling.

The world passed through me, history passed through me and the earth passed through me until even the sun had passed through me. I saw the sun then before me and it brought me to a terrifying fear. I knew now how isolated and solitary this sun was. I became so frightened that everything turned to white as if the sun had engulfed my reason and reality...

I was completely and seemingly mute. Life had died and been replaced by the hum of an electric motor. I was the God of the snakes... It was then that I saw the golden tablets hewn by the hand of the dividers and the tablets were falling from the sky with me. I could read through the words and they made me even fear more for what was unseen.

All of the energy of the cosmos passed through me then until it had faded and the last bit of energy had been consumed. Then there was darkness and a void of total emptiness. I had died yet I still was falling.

I had lost all sense of where I was, I had forgotten myself. I heard my own heart stop and it seemed like a drum, dry and distant. Everything was gone, an empty shell and only I existed in this alternate state between lost worlds that were both illusions. No one will cry or touch again. I then landed upon something very soft that caught me. It seemed to envelope me and I realized I was now an embryo within the womb.

Then I saw a crisscross pattern. I saw people lined up in rows and columns with microchips in their foreheads and laser beams for all seeing eyes. Yet they had the same fear because they had read the golden tablets too.

The tablets made them begin to war within themselves. They could not contain their fury and so they spilled their war out on to the earth and the earth began to burn with murder and hell fire. I saw twelve kings bow down before the executioner and tell of their bloody deeds.

This vision then laid down still and flat upon a vast ocean and I followed the voice back through the various patterns and symbols to consciousness.

This brings up a serious topic. The allegation of secret societies is at the core of anti-semitism.

A now infamous book, "The protocols of the Elders of Zion", was at the core of European anti-semitism in the early 1900s. The Elders of Zion were an supposed secret society of Jews who were plotting to take over the world.

This, of course, is a reason for the hateful anti-Semitism of the period and was the core of the Nazi philosophy (and helped their rise to power).

Most of todays conspiracy theories are very similar. They allege there is a secret society that is plotting to control the world and causing harm.

Some of my family peddles this dangerous idiocy and I have seen the propaganda.

A main target is the masons... but there is a surprising point in the rhetoric. The secret "symbols" that they use as evidence of sinisters plots are Jewish symbols--- includind the star of David.If you watch, it is clear that they think the masons are controlled by "Zionists" (i.e. the Jews).

They claim (right on the box of the CD) not to be anti-Semetic, yet they are alleging that the world is menaced by the "Zionists" and "show" how Israel is at the core of all kinds of evil. How do they manage this contradictions?

One of the CDs a family member showed me explains. They love the "true" Jews. They explained how the star of David is not a Jewish symbol and that it is the "fake" Jews who are part of the conspiracy.

Then one statement explained it all.... The "true Jews" are the ones that converted to Christianity.

That people still swallow this crap scares me.

Have you ever looked at the zodiac and the constellations and wondered if the view that we see when we look out at the universe may be very unique in all the universe...

That this pictorial circle of animals, messiahs, virgins impregnated with light, twins, bulls, the scales of judgment, sea monsters and dragons etc... Is this possibly the only "key" to understanding why the universe exists?

Our night sky may be the only place where the picture of the universe becomes clearly, understandable and in focus...

No other earth has the same exact view of the universe that we do. What were the ancients trying to say with the zodiac? That history is written by their position and alignment... Is the earth really again possibly the center of the universe?

RexReed,

Are you into astrology?