Who was Adam Weishaupt?

Adam Weishaupt was born February 6, 1748 of Jewish parents but grew up in the Catholic faith. When his father, George Weishaupt, died in 1754, Adam was adopted by a fellow professor named Baron Ickstatt who was curator of the university of Ingolstadt in Bavaria, and was forced into formal indoctrination of Jesuit ideals of Catholic global Luciferianism at the age of seven.

He graduated from the University of Ingolstadt in 1768, and was made a tutor and catechist. In 1772 he was made a professor of Law. He was initiated as a Freemason in 1774 in Germany, but found that no one in his order truly understood the occult significance of the ceremonies. He decided to found his own organization, which he did on the first of May 1776. This organization was first known as "The Order of Perfectibilists" but became famous as the Illuminati for short. Only five people were present at the first meeting of the order, but it grew rapidly and only a few years later it had chapters all over Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Hungaria and Switzerland. Weishaupt and his co-conspirators, notably Baron Knigge and a lawyer named Zwack, had soon established a network of agents around Europe that infiltrated courts and other places of power and reported back useful gossip and information to Weishaupt. The Illuminati's true goals were shrouded in mystery. Because of Weishaupt´s strong anti-clerical and anti-royalist views, some have assumed that the Illuminati were some sort of communistic organization dedicated to bringing about a proletarian revolution. (taken from http://home.swipnet.se/~w-40977/coolpeople/weishaupt.html)

Here is a revealing quote by Weisaupt on the Illuminati: 

"The great strength of our Order lies in it's concealment, let it never appear in any place in it's own name, but always covered by another name, and another occupation.  None is fitter than the three lower degrees of Freemasonry, the public is accustomed to it, expects little from it, and therefore takes little notice of it.  Next to this, the form of a learned or literary society is best suited to our purpose, and had Freemasonry not existed, this cover would have been employed; and it may be much more than a cover, it may be a powerful engine in our hands.  By establishing Reading Societies, and subscription libraries, and taking these under our direction, and supplying them through our labours, we may turn the public mind which way we will."

To further illuminate, a book by Weishaupt, originally published in German in 1804:

Diogenes' Lamp; or, An Examination of Our Present-Day Morality and Enlightenment