Ordo Templi Orientis PhenomenonAlphonse Wallen, Theodor Reuss, Carl William Hansen, Ben Kadosh, Hermetic Brotherhood of Light, Joanny Bricaud, Eduardo Frosini, Grunddal Sjallung, Ordo Templi Orientis, Aleister Crowley, Marc Lully, Theosophical Society, Pelle Bull, Per Jorgensen, Eugen Grosche, Heinz Bolke, Swiss Abbey of Thelema, H.J. Metzger, Caliphate
by P.R. Koenig
|
|
Carl William Hansen was born on 11 October 1872 in Copenhagen. By profession he worked as a dairyman. In 1898 he was initiated into the Order of the Martinists by the Baron Alphonse Wallen. The 'Wiener Freimaurerzeitung' ["Vienna Freemasonic Newspaper"] issue 2 and 7/8 from 1929 reported that Hansen
received the 32° sometime in 1906.
In the same year, 1906, he published "Den Ny Morgens Gry, Lucifer-Hiram, Verdensbygmesterens Genkomst".
In 1917 Hansen had advanced to become the Danish representative and chief of the Martinists for Denmark. On the 3 September 1921 Theodor Reuss made Carl William Hansen (Ben Kadosh = Hebrew for "the Holy Son") the X° of the O.T.O. for Denmark. | 
|
|
Hansen became also a Gnostic Primate, a member of Memphis-Misraim and the Hermetic Brotherhood of Light.
Hansen obtained the 30° from Joanny Bricaud of the Order of the Martinists in the summer of the same year. Because Reuss did not have a structure nor issue rituals for the upper O.T.O. degrees, Hansen was made up directly to the IX°. In 1923 C.W. Hansen activated his authority as Delegate of the Order of the Martinists from the charter he had received from Joanny Bricaud to found the "Grand Orient de la vraie et haute Maçonnerie esoterique et gnostique du Danmark". He founded the lodge "Sphinxen" which only worked for one year, it was here where he met his future successor, Grunddal Sjallung (1895-1976). Hansen dissolved the lodge in the summer of 1924 he received a 33° charter from the "Grande Oriente Italiano degli Antichi ed Accetati Muratori, Zenith di Roma", via Eduardo Frosini who had been a member of Reuss' MM in Italy. Frosini was a collaborator of Arturo Reghini who exchanged charters of a "Ritus Philosophicus Italicus" with Aleister Crowley in 1913. 
It was Frosini who sent the Reuss-rituals to Hansen. Frosini also sent MM and a "Order of Illuminati" charter to Hansen. Hansen went on and founded a new Grand Orient, called "Den Danske Stor-Orient af gamle og antagne frie Murere" (The Danish Grand Orient of Ancient and Accepted Free Masons). Soon after the formation Hansen made Sjallung a Magus Cancellarius 33°, 95°, IX°. The Order worked according to Reuss' constitution. After some time the members were becoming more and more puzzled by the "irregularity" of the masonic body of the Order they were in and the Grand Treasurer General at the time made things much more complex having made off with the financial takings in 1928. A meeting was held on 14 April 1929 and a new Order was constituted. The newly formed Grand Lodge called itself a "Frimurerlauget" and stated that it would regularize itself. In 1930 Hansen became unpopular in the Lodge, he resigned only a few days before he was going to be thrown out. He moved his O.T.O. and his various other Orders to elsewhere, founding his 12th creation: the lodge "The Three Points". Carl William Hansen died on 3 August 1936 from a heart-attack. Grunddal Sjallung continued his work. When he took over Hansen's O.T.O. he also took the title of Rex Supremus corresponding with Aleister Crowley (in August 1938) and re-writing the initiation rituals. Nevertheless, Sjallung's version of the O.T.O. was never of the Crowleyan type. Crowley remarked in his diary: "'Strangers, indeed!" Because some members wanted to focus on the masonic aspect only, Grunddal Sjallung and a number of members decided to depart in 1946, founding the "Sovereign Saint John of Jerusalem Order of Hospitalors" in Denmark. In 1955 the Order bought an ancient abbey, making it a humanitarian home for the poor. From 1971 until his death in 1976 he lived in an asylum, suffering from dementia. Sjallungs successor was a certain Johannsen who seemingly corresponded with Marc Lully of the O.T.O.A. and President of a Chicago Theosophical Society lodge. When Johannsen died in 1977, Pelle Bull (Per Jorgensen) who corresponded with the son-in-law of Eugen Grosche, Heinz Bolke continued the Danish branch of the O.T.O. Later in 1976 Pelle, his wife and two children visited the Swiss Abbey of Thelema under H.J. Metzger. But Metzger's O.T.O. which only accepted regular Masons, did not recognize Pelle's Danish O.T.O. In 1994 Pelle complained that the "Caliphate" had threatened him because he used the O.T.O. insignia. |
| Eric Ericson used a combination of fact and fiction on Carl William Hansen in his novel "Master of the Temple" (London 1983). | 
|
|
This is an outline from the German "Das OTO-Phaenomen" (1994) and the English "O.T.O. Rituals and Sexmagick". (1999)
Tradução portuguesa: Carl Willian Hansen — Dinamarca. To the main page of Photographs and Documents To the other chapters of the English online version of "The O.T.O. Phenomenon" book O.T.O. Phenomenon navigation page | main page | mail
|
