Joseph Franz Molitor

In 1812 Molitor became professor of philosophy at the new Lyceum Carolinum in Frankfurt, which Karl Theodor von Dalberg had set up on the French model; after the end of 1814 he drew a permanent pension from there, with which he - in addition to income from private tuition and his work at the philanthropist - could make a living.

After becoming acquainted with Judaism and its own symbolic language, Molitor entered the Frankfurt Freemason's Lodge "Zur Aufstieg Morgenröthe" on May 19, 1808, in which Jews could also be a member; at times he was their chairman.

As the fruit of many years of study, he published the first volume of his Philosophy of History or Tradition in 1824, which gave him the support of scholarships from Christian von Hessen-Darmstadt and (mediated by Schelling) Ludwig I. from Bavaria.

The main starting point of his argumentation was the fight against pantheism, atheism and materialism, based on the assumption that the Kabbalah contains a higher mysticism that could also be inherent in Christianity.

Molitor's Philosophie der Geschichte oder über die Tradition was an influence on Gershom Scholem and Walter Benjamin.