Spear of Destiny

A legendary Christian relic, the Spear of Longinus, identified in folklore with the spear that pierced the side of Christ (John 19:34) nearly two thousand years ago. Occult legend states that whoever claims this spear and understands its occult significance holds the destiny of the world in his hands. According to Houston Stewart Chamberlain, British-born propagandist for anti-Semitism and the German philosophy of an Aryan master race, this spear was claimed by Constantine the Great, Justinian, Charles Martel, Charlemagne, and various German emperors, all men of destiny.

Before World War II, the Spear of Destiny (more properly known as the Maurice Spear) was exhibited in the Hofburg Museum in Vienna. It attracted the attention of the young Adolf Hitler, who linked it with legends of the Holy Grail and made his own plans to be a man of destiny. The spear held a special fascination for Hitler and his associates in the hothouse atmosphere of occultism and evil philosophies that gave rise to the Nazi plan for world domination. In 1935, Heinrich Himmler had a replica of the spear made and kept it in his private room. Three years later, Hitler led his troops into Austria, the first stage of his plan for world conquest. One of his first acts was to remove the Spear of Destiny from the Hofburg Museum.

The spear was buried beneath the Nuremberg Fortress, where it was discovered on the day that Hitler shot himself in the Berlin bunker on April 30, 1945. It was recovered together with other treasures of the Imperial collection. On January 6, 1946, these treasures were returned to the authorities at Vienna, and the spear was reinstated in the Hofburg Museum.

Trevor Ravenscroft has compiled an exhaustive account of the story of the spear. The manner in which it influenced Hitler was integral to the occult philosophy that permeated the upper echelons of the Nazi movement and effected the actual events of World War II. Ravenscroft drew much of his unique research information from Walter Johannes Stein (1891-1957) who knew Hitler as a young man and saw Hitler's books concerned with occultism and Grail legends, with copious manuscript notes by Hitler himself indicating the beginnings of his Nazi philosophy.

Sources:

Ravenscroft, Trevor. The Spear of Destiny. London: Spear-man, 1972. Reprint, New York: Putnam, 1973.