Founders: Joseph Di Mambro (b. 1924; d. 1994) and Luc Jouret (b. 1947; d. 1994)
Like other New Religious Movements or NRMs (see New Religious Movement) that draw on the western esoteric tradition (see Esoteric Movements, the Rosicrucian Order, Cretona Fellowship and AMORC: Ancient and Mystic Order of the Rosy Cross) the Order of the Solar Temple emphasized the link between itself and a much older tradition dating back to medieval times. The inspiration behind the founding of the Solar Temple movement, Joseph Di Mambro (1924—94) was born in France and was once a member of AMORC (1956—69), whose ideas continued to exercise a strong influence on him even after he left that movement. He also had links with the esoteric renewal movement, the Arginy movement, founded by the French writer Jacques Breyer (1922—96).
In difficulties with the French authorities over allegations of fraud Di Mambro left France for Switzerland where he established himself as a teacher and spiritual master and founded (1976) the Centre for Preparing the New Age. His followers who had purchased a house in France near Geneva lived a communal life and performed esoteric rituals. In 1978 Di Mambro started the Golden Way Foundation in Geneva, an organization that was to remain the centre of his esoteric interests for some years. In the 1980s he met Luc Jouret, also an esotericist and at first member and then Grand Master of the Renewed Order of the Temple, a movement that was based on Templar (see Ordo Templi Orientis) and Rosicrucian ideas. In 1982 Jouret joined Di Mambro’s group and was to provide the charismatic leadership that it had been lacking. Both men founded the Order of the Solar Temple in 1984 with Jouret assuming the more prominent public role as the movement’s principal spokesperson and theorist.
There were several levels of membership beginning with the Amanta group, which consisted of those who attended public lectures and seminars. The next level had direct involvement in the esoteric Achedia Clubs and the top tier consisted of the initiated who were members of the International Chivalric Organization of the Solar Tradition.
Discontent and disillusionment began to surface among members in the early 1990s and accusations were made of fraud and quackery on the part of the leadership, and the among critics was Di Mambro’s own ‘cosmic child’ Emmanuelle, whose origins lay it was claimed in a mystical act of intercourse between Di Mambro’s mistress and a discarnate Master. Emmanuelle and others became seriously disillusioned with Di Mambro’s leadership when they discovered that what he claimed to be visible manifestations of Masters of the Temple were in fact the product of electronic and other devices installed by the leadership. It was this discovery in particular that led Emmanuelle and some fifteen members to leave the movement. Di Mambro and Jouret were also encountering problems both from members and with the police in Canada. In 1993 their small group of followers led by Jouret had been investigated concerning allegations that they were stockpiling semi-automatic weapons. Jouret and two members who had been arrested briefly were fined. There were also police investigations of financial irregularities in France and Australia following money transfers by Di Mambro, which never reached any conclusion.
Disposed to interpreting misfortune in apocalyptic terms, and suffering from various illnesses, Di Mambro began composing Tracts on the subject of the Transit’ in 1993. Police investigations and internal discontent and disaffection would seem to have fostered in him the conviction that the End of Time was imminent. With Jouret with whom he also seems to have been in frequent disagreement, Di Mambro began preparing his remaining followers for ‘transit’ to another world. The sense the movement had of being persecuted by external enemies heightened when the French police refused to renew Di Mambro’s wife’s visa in 1994.
That the time had come for ‘transit’ was confirmed by messages from discarnate beings channelled by Di Mambro and the prominent Swiss businessman Camille Pilet (1926-94) who had joined the OTS in 1987. Tragedy soon followed. In the towns of Cheiry and Granges-surSalvan in Switzerland on the night of 4 October 1994 fires broke out as part of a planned suicide mission by the leadership of which most of the others who died were unaware. The latter were possibly expecting to be conveyed by supernatural means—perhaps by means of a space ship—to another planet (see Heaven’s Gate). Some days previously in Quebec two Swiss members had executed the Dutoit family for being untrustworthy. Their principal ‘crime’ was to have been unprepared to remain silent about the electronic devices used to produce manifestations of the Masters. Their executioners committed suicide two days before the Swiss tragedy in which an estimated forty-eight members died. Of those who died at Cheiry some were classified as traitors and most did so after consuming a sleep-inducing drug before being shot, while most of those at Salvan—the majority of whom were part of the leadership and core membership—were poisoned. Some appear to have perished directly in the flames. By no means all of the membership, therefore, had opted for suicide and certainly not the children who were simply murdered. The tragedy did not end there. On 23 December 1995 sixteen members of OTS including children were found dead in the mountains of Vercours near Grenoble and on 21 March 1997 five members of the OTS committed suicide in St Casimir, Quebec, their children in this case being allowed to choose whether to ‘transit’ with their parents or to decide not to take part.
