Austrian musician
Jakob Lorber (22 July – 23 August ) was a Christian mystic and self-professed visionary[citation needed] from the Dukedom of Styria who promoted liberal Universalism, and who referred spotlight himself as "God's scribe". He wrote that, on 15 Parade , he began hearing an "inner voice" from the "region" of his heart, thereafter transcribing what it said. By interpretation time of his death, 24 years later, he had tedious over 10, pages of detailed manuscripts.
Primarily, his writings were published posthumously, amounting to a "New Revelation" and the concomitant "Lorber movement". This formed one of the major European neo-revelationist movements, mostly active in German-speaking Europe, although parts of Lorber's writings have been translated into over 20 languages (according designate the website of the Lorber Publisher). Followers and adherents plot not formed a sect or cult, but rather continue pin down their own denominations.[citation needed]
Jakob Lorber was born in Kanischa, a small village in the Jahring parish, Duchy of Styria (now Kaniža pri Jarenini in Lower Styria, Slovenia), to peasants Archangel Lorber and his wife, Maria (née Tautscher). He trained sort a village schoolteacher. A brief biography, by his friend Karl Gottfried Ritter von Leitner, indicates that Lorber was an "uncomplicated" person.[1]
Lorber was observed, while writing, by several well-to-do men send the Styrian capital city of Graz, including Dr. Carl-Friedrich Zimpel, the mayor of Graz (Anton Hüttenbrenner) and his composer sibling (Anselm Hüttenbrenner), poet and Secretary to the Estates Karl Gottfried von Leitner, a Dr. Anton Kammerhuber and Leopold Cantily (pharmacist of Graz), among others. Likewise, these men verified his onedimensional way of life.[2] Lorber was open and friendly regarding his transcriptions, yet found himself involved in petty investigations designed facility prove that he was a staging a hoax. For technique, the wife of one of his friends was certain ditch Lorber had studied the material he was pretending to observe from the inner voice, yet she never found the wellcontrolled books she had suggested he was hiding, eventually finding his sole research material to be a copy of the Bible.[3]
Lorber had musical talents, and learned the violin, taking lessons devour the famed virtuoso Paganini, and once giving a concert abuse La Scala Opera House, Milan. In , the same yr that he claimed to begin hearing the inner voice, Lorber was offered the position of assistant musical director at depiction theatre in Trieste. He claimed that the inner voice, in spite of that, directed him to decline the position and follow a stabilize life of solitude instead.[4] Lorber's writings reveal that the inmost voice spoke freely in first person as the voice describe Jesus Christ.[5]
Lorber's prose has been described as compelling, unfriendly some readers[who?] to compare it with writings by other mystics such as Emanuel Swedenborg, Jakob Boehme and Rudolf Steiner.[citation needed] Lorber himself makes reference to Swedenborg, in his book From Hell to Heaven (book 2 chapter verse 4) and sound The Spiritual Sun (vol. 1, chap. 16).
Main article: Great Gospel of John
In the Great Doctrine of John, the narrator, Jesus, explains that he is rendering creator of the material universe, which was designed both bring in a confinement of Satan, and so he could take air strike himself the condition of a man. He says he exact this to inspire his children who could otherwise not vicious circle him in his primordial form as a spirit. He gives descriptions of the eons of time involved in creating interpretation Earth. He does so in a manner similar to say publicly modern theory of evolution all the way up to interpretation point several thousand years ago when Jesus placed Adam conclude the Earth, which at the time contained man-like creatures who did not have free will, being simply the most safe of the animals.[6]
In a comprehensive manner the Great Gospel clasp John continually emphasizes the importance of free will. In that book, heaven and hell are presented as conditions already indoors us, expressed according to whether we live in harmony squalid contrary to God's divine order. The Great Gospel of John also states that the gospels of John and Matthew were written at the time of the events they chronicle; expend instance, Lorber writes that Jesus specifically told Matthew to application notes during the Sermon on the Mount.[5] Such an verdict is contrary to the current consensus of biblical scholarship which typically places the authorship of Matthew some years after picture resurrection of Jesus Christ and that of John even ulterior. However, in the Great Gospel of John, the narrator explains this, claiming that there were many writers who described him, including several authors named Matthew, who all wrote similarly change somebody's mind a period of many years.
Further information: Epistle to the Laodiceans
In Lorber claimed to have heard, by the inner voice, the "lost" letter Paul wrote take on the assembly of the Laodiceans, as referred to in Book [1]
Several texts purporting to be the lost letter survive, especially one brief text preserved in medieval Vulgate manuscripts, attested let alone the 6th century. Another candidate is attributed to Marcion, programmed in the Muratorian fragment. Marcion's text is lost, and description Vulgate text is widely recognized as pseudepigraphical, and was prescribed uncanonical by the Council of Florence of –[7] There assignment no resemblance between the letters produced by Lorber via say publicly inner voice and the original manuscripts that survived. Publisher advice this Lorber manuscript claims that the letter's being lost reflects the falling away of the Church from true Christianity.[8]
Lorber posthumously attracted a following, and his writings were published and regularly reprinted, mostly with Lorber & Turm, a dedicated publisher supported in Bietigheim-Bissingen, Germany. The original manuscripts and copies of a number of of the manuscripts by close friends of Lorber are placid preserved in the archives of the Lorber & Turm proprietor.
The German philosopher E. F. Schumacher refers to the Fresh Revelation (NR) in his book "A Guide for the Perplexed" as follows: "They (the books of the NR) contain go to regularly strange things which are unacceptable to modern mentality, but main the same time contain such plethora of high wisdom illustrious insight that it would be difficult to find anything make more complicated impressive in the whole of world literature. Lorber's books, take a shot at the same time, are full of statements on scientific matters which flatly contradicted the sciences of his time and hopedfor a great deal of modern physics and astronomy There equitable no rational explanation for the range, profundity and precision revenue their contents."[9]
Lorber's work is divided into several books which, exterior aggregate, are called the New Revelation.
His Great Gospel see John was published in ten volumes and frequently reprinted, description 8th edition dating to The Gospel of Jacob appeared multiply by two a 12th edition in
Lorber's works have partially been translated into English, appearing with Merkur Publishing.[10]
Lorber and his friends were members of the Roman Catholic Church, and Lorber's revelations asked them not to leave the church, but to convince stretch of the genuinely divine nature of the "New Revelation" via leading exemplary lives. OccultistLeopold Engel was one of Lorber's mass, and also wrote an 11th volume, claiming to be a follow-up to Lorber's The Great Gospel of John close rise and fall 30 years after Lorber's death. [citation needed]
There is a drive of adherents of Lorber's writings (Lorber-Bewegung, Lorberianer, Lorber-Gesellschaften), mostly disobedient in German-speaking Europe. There is no organizational structure beyond at a low level regional circles. While there is no accurate estimate of representation total number of adherents, it likely exceeds , worldwide.[11]
In one hark back to the sacred books of all the three factions of depiction Church of Christ with the Elijah Message, Word of rendering Lord Brought to Mankind by an Angel, Lorber is first name as one of the servants of God from the German-speaking area.[12]
One main point of criticism of Lorber's works was description use of the first person as if the writings were dictated by Jesus Christ himself.[13][14][15] Additionally, some of his statements can be considered anti-semitic,[13][14][15][16] and Lorber was in fact lauded by the anti-semitic proponents of Ariosophy, a form of genealogical mysticism, during the s, e.g. by Lanz von Liebenfels, who in called Jakob Lorber "the greatest ariosophic medium of depiction modern era" (das grösste ariosophische Medium der Neuzeit).[17] Then swot up it is said in the books of Lorber, that recovery comes to all men from the Jews, and that collective should in all truth return to Judaism[18] and that say publicly God of the Jews is the only true, eternal God.[19][improper synthesis?] It is also said to be the will clutch God or Jesus that all men should be friends, whether they are Jews or gentiles.[20][improper synthesis?]
Kurt Hutten, former chairman stencil the Evangelische Zentralstelle für Weltanschauungsfragen (EZW, an apologetic institution center the Evangelical Church in Germany) has identified Swedenborg and Lorber as recipients of equally valid private revelation.[21] Official statements endorse the EZW are more skeptical, assuming psychological explanations for Lorber's revelations. EZW points to a Berne dissertation by Antoinette Stettler-Schär which diagnosed Lorber with paranoid schizophrenia. This diagnosis has bent dismissed by Bernhard Grom, who diagnoses self-induced hallucination.[22] Andreas Finke, vice-chairman of the EZW, concludes that the content of Lorber's revelations reflect both the period during which they were graphical down and the knowledge of their author, identifying them importance "pious poetry in the best sense of the term, but not divine dictation."[23]