Lorber's New Revelation study circles

1. Introduction

Version followed: the Austrian-German "New Revelation" (Neuoffenbarung) of Jakob Lorber (1800–1864): his writings as published by the Lorber-Verlag (Bietigheim-Bissingen), promoted by the Lorber-Gesellschaft e.V., and read in the roughly 30 "Lorber circles" (Lorber-Kreise) that a church research centre reported in German-speaking countries in 2008 [source: Pöhlmann 2008, EZW; Hanus 1987, NDB]. The Lorber-Gesellschaft's own account of its aims and circle format is [uncertain: not verified]. Its seat is given as Hausham (EZW 2008), and a current link lists it at Pittenhart [uncertain: secondary, unverified].

What it is. Lorber was a Graz violinist and music teacher. In 1840 he turned down a post as Kapellmeister in Trieste because an "inner voice" (innere Stimme) called him to write down a kind of new revelation [source: Hanus 1987, NDB]. Followers and scholars date the call to 15 March 1840 [source: Introvigne 2021, Bitter Winter]. He experienced the voice near his heart and attributed it to Christ. He called it the "inner word" (inneres Wort) and called himself God's "writing servant" (Schreibknecht Gottes) [source: Pöhlmann 2008]. Over 24 years he wrote about 10,000 pages [source: Introvigne 2021]. They include Die Haushaltung Gottes (God's household, on primeval history), Die Jugend Jesu (the youth of Jesus), the multi-volume Das große Evangelium Johannes (the Great Gospel of John, a diary-like account of Jesus' ministry), and works on the planets and on the afterlife such as Die geistige Sonne (the spiritual sun), Bischof Martin (Bishop Martin) and Von der Hölle bis zum Himmel (from hell to heaven) [source: Hanus 1987; Pöhlmann 2008]. The titles of the afterlife works are [uncertain: secondary, unverified].

The movement. After Lorber's death, "friends' circles" (Lorber-Freundeskreise) formed, published his manuscripts and grew into a loose movement [source: Hanus 1987; German Wikipedia via Austria-Forum, uncertain: secondary, unverified]. Later recipients of the "inner word" wrote in his tradition, among them Gottfried Mayerhofer, Leopold Engel (who wrote an eleventh volume of the Great Gospel), Bertha Dudde and Anita Wolf. Whether they are authentic is disputed among readers [source: Pöhlmann 2008; Introvigne 2021]. Some readers call one another "spiritual siblings" (Geistgeschwister) and treat the texts as quasi-scripture [source: Pöhlmann 2008]. A movement-sympathetic account says the writings reject a priesthood and an organised church and treat church membership as optional [source: "Jakob Lorber und die Lorber-Bewegung", 2017].

Core idea of how change happens (as the texts teach it). According to the texts, creation is a community of spirits that fell away through self-love, Lucifer being one. Earth is the main stage on which they gradually return to God [source: Hanus 1987]. The return unfolds in stages through the double commandment, to love God above all and one's neighbour as oneself [source: Hanus 1987]. In the Great Gospel, this culminates in a "rebirth of the spirit", a "second birth" from love for God (GGJ vol. 1, ch. 2). The texts say the deeper meaning of the Word opens only to those who live by it (GGJ vol. 1, ch. 1 and ch. 11) [source: Great Gospel of John vol. 1, English edition]. In a study circle, change is understood as reading, reflection and the practice of love in daily life, not as ritual.

Evidence status (one line). The claim that the texts were dictated by Christ is a matter of faith. Church research bodies and historians treat them as religious literature of their time [source: Pöhlmann 2008]. There is no empirical test of the claim.

For the psychotherapist. This is a religious reading tradition, not a therapy. This guide describes the practice as its texts and institutions present it. It then sets out the psychotherapist's work with a client who belongs to, is drawn to, has left, or has a family member in a Lorber circle. Cross-refer 098 (mediumship development circles: dissociation and boundaries) and Domain VI 110 (suggestion and false memory in channelled "recovered" material).

2. Framework

The circles have no published phase structure, grades or initiation [uncertain: not verified]. The framework below is for the therapist's work and is [synthesis]. No source gives session counts, so none are stated. The pace is set by the client's goals.

Phase A – Engagement and mapping.

Goal: understand the client's reason for coming and the place of the Lorber writings in their life, in their own words.
Format: ordinary individual sessions.
Move on when: you know which texts and later revealers the client reads, and how involved they are (private reading, a circle, the society, a family tradition).

Phase B – Cultural formulation.

Goal: complete the DSM-5-TR Cultural Formulation Interview (CFI), with its supplementary module on spirituality, religion and moral traditions [uncertain: not verified].
Move on when: the client's explanatory model of the presenting problem is clear, including whether they see it as spiritual, psychological, medical or mixed.

Phase C – Differential assessment (only where indicated).

When indicated: inner-voice experiences, sleep loss, distress, functional decline, health refusals or family alarm.
Goal: assess psychosis, mania, dissociation, OCD/scrupulosity and grief, without treating belief in the inner word as a symptom.
Move on when: a working formulation is agreed and any urgent medical or psychiatric referral has been made.

Phase D – Focused work on the presenting problem.

Content: grief, scrupulosity, family conflict, a crisis of faith, leaving or staying, or health decisions, using the interventions in section 4.
Move on when: the client's goals are met or their focus shifts.

Phase E – Consolidation, referral and ending.

Content: links to medical care, pastoral or community contacts the client chooses, and relapse signs.

3. Guiding principles

[source for the stance: Pöhlmann 2008 for the risks of exclusivity; everything else is [synthesis] unless tagged]

Describe, do not adjudicate. Neither affirm nor dismiss the claim that Christ dictated the texts. Practical meaning: use the client's terms ("inner word", "the Lord", "rebirth") with a short gloss, and say plainly that you work on how the beliefs function in their life.
Client-led meaning. Practical meaning: ask what the writings give the client (comfort, an answer to suffering, community, a hope for the dead) before you ask about problems.
Belief is not a symptom. Reading revelation texts, or believing they come from Christ, is not evidence of psychosis. Practical meaning: assess form, distress, functioning and change over time, not content alone. Note how such experiences have been read: the theologian-psychologist Bernhard Grom described them as "self-induced" revelation experiences rich in content [source: Grom 2003, as quoted in Pöhlmann 2008]. Hold such labels lightly.
Watch for closure, not for conviction. The Protestant research centre EZW warns that an exclusive claim to binding truth can become a "revelation fundamentalism" that draws people into separate worlds and a "spirit of unfreedom" [source: Pöhlmann 2008]. Practical meaning: assess flexibility, contact with outsiders and the freedom to doubt, not the strength of faith.
No role confusion. Practical meaning: the therapist does not interpret the texts with authority, does not test or validate the client's own inner-word messages, and does not act as a spiritual guide [synthesis].
Health decisions stay with clinicians. Practical meaning: the writings contain health and diet teachings (see 4.10). Explore them, never prescribe from them, and route all medical decisions to the client's doctors. Never advise starting, stopping or changing a medicine.
Respect the community the client chooses. Practical meaning: with consent, a circle member or a church adviser on new religious movements can be part of the support network. These are not given automatically and are not imposed.
Competence and ethics. Practical meaning: work within your competence in religious and spiritual issues (Vieten et al. 2013 [uncertain: not verified]). Keep any personal interest in the texts out of the room. Self-disclosure about your own beliefs is rare, brief and for the client's benefit [synthesis]. For the profession's ethics code, see the Sources list.

4. Intervention inventory

Items 4.1–4.3 describe the practice as the texts and institutions present it, so the therapist knows what the client does. Items 4.4–4.14 are the therapist's interventions.

4.1 The study circle: shared reading of the writings (as practised)

Purpose and when to use: know what the client means by "my circle". About 30 circles in German-speaking countries study Lorber's work. Readers treat it as quasi-scripture, and the Lorber-Verlag and Lorber-Gesellschaft distribute and promote the books [source: Pöhlmann 2008]. Groups of this kind range from loose reading circles to firmer communities [source: Pöhlmann 2003, EZW-Texte 169].
Steps (outline): members meet to read the writings, especially the Great Gospel of John, and discuss how they apply to life. Movement sources say there are no priests and no membership requirement [source: "Jakob Lorber und die Lorber-Bewegung", 2017]. Meeting frequency, the use of prayer or music, and any leadership roles vary by circle and are [uncertain: not verified]. Ask the client how their own circle works.
Example language (illustrative): "Tell me what happens at a typical meeting of your circle: who comes, what you read, and what you take home from it."
Watch for: the circle as a source of belonging and support (a strength). Also watch for pressure to accept one set of texts as the only truth, and for shrinking contact with outsiders (see 4.11).

4.2 Living by the double commandment and the "rebirth of the spirit" (as the texts teach it)

Purpose and when to use: understand the client's moral and spiritual goals. In the texts, love of God and neighbour is the basic law of the kingdom (Reichsgrundgesetz) through which redemption happens [source: Hanus 1987]. The Great Gospel describes a second birth of the spirit from love for God, and says the inner meaning of the Word opens to those who live by it [source: GGJ vol. 1, ch. 1, 2, 11].
Steps (outline): readers take passages as guidance for everyday conduct: love of neighbour, humility, and setting aside self-love, which the texts identify as the root of the fall [source: Hanus 1987]. No technique is prescribed beyond reading and conduct [uncertain: not verified].
Example language (illustrative): "When you try to live by love of neighbour, what does that look like in your week, and where does it feel hard?"
Watch for: a value system you can draw on (compassion, service). Also watch for self-condemnation when the client cannot reach the ideal, or self-sacrifice that neglects their own needs (see 4.9).

4.3 Hearing and writing the "inner word" (public outline only)

Purpose and when to use: recognise this when a client reports receiving messages. Lorber described a voice near his heart that he took to be Christ's, and wrote down what it said [source: Pöhlmann 2008; Introvigne 2021]. Later recipients claimed the same gift, and readers dispute which of them are authentic [source: Pöhlmann 2008].
Steps: none are given here. This guide does not describe any method for inducing or receiving messages. It is a form of channelling: see 098 and Domain VI 110 on suggestion and false memory.
Example language (illustrative): "You said you sometimes receive words in the way Lorber did. Can you tell me when that happens, what it is like, and what you do afterwards?"
Watch for: messages that command harm, isolation, giving away money or stopping medical care. Watch for sleep loss, pressured or growing output, distress, and loss of control over when the messages come. These call for 4.7.

4.4 Client-led exploration of meaning

Purpose and when to use: first sessions, and whenever the writings come up. The aim is to understand what the New Revelation means to this client, with consent, before any assessment [synthesis].
Steps:
1. Ask permission to talk about faith, and say you will not judge or try to change it.
2. Ask how the client came to the writings: family, a crisis, a bereavement, or a search.
3. Ask what they give the client: answers, hope for the dead, a picture of God, a community.
4. Ask which books matter most and why. The afterlife and Gospel works serve different needs.
5. Reflect back in the client's own terms, and check that you understood.
6. Ask how they would like faith to be part of therapy, if at all.
Example language (illustrative): "Some people find these books gave them answers nothing else did. What did they give you?" / "Would you like what you read to be part of our work, or kept separate?"
Watch for: it is working when the client speaks freely and uses their own vocabulary. Guardedness may reflect earlier experiences of being mocked or called mad, so name that you are not doing this.

4.5 Cultural Formulation Interview, including the spirituality, religion and moral traditions module

Purpose and when to use: the assessment phase, or when the problem is framed in spiritual terms (e.g. "I fell away from the Lord", "a spirit is troubling me") [uncertain: not verified for the CFI wording].
Steps: follow the core CFI domains in your own words:
1. The cultural definition of the problem.
2. Cultural perceptions of cause, context and support.
3. Cultural factors affecting self-coping and past help-seeking.
4. Current help-seeking. Then add the supplementary module on spirituality, religion and moral traditions: affiliation, practices, role in coping, conflicts, and stress related to faith. Do not reproduce the instrument's items; paraphrase.
Example language (illustrative): "How would people in your circle understand what you are going through?" / "Has reading or the circle helped with this, or made it harder?"
Watch for: whether the client and their circle have different explanations. Note what help the client has already sought (prayer, circle members, a doctor). Where the focus is a spiritual problem without a mental disorder, consider Religious or Spiritual Problem, Z65.8 [source: ICD-10-CM Z65.8 (Unbound Medicine)]; DSM-5-TR wording [uncertain: not verified].

4.6 Mapping involvement

Purpose and when to use: after 4.4, to see how far the writings structure daily life [synthesis].
Steps: gently map the following.
- Time spent reading.
- Whether the client reads Lorber only, or later revealers too.
- Whether they attend a circle or society meetings.
- Money spent on books, travel or donations.
- Whether they themselves receive "inner word" messages.
- The relationships held through the circle.
- Whether family share the belief.
- Whether the texts guide health, money or relationship decisions.
Example language (illustrative): "Let's draw a quick map of where the writings and the circle sit in your week, and who is in your life inside and outside it."
Watch for: balance (faith alongside work, family and friends) versus narrowing. Financial exploitation by Lorber circles: none found in the sources consulted. Ask about money in an ordinary way, as with any community [synthesis].

4.7 Differential assessment of inner-voice and revelation experiences

Purpose and when to use: when the client hears or writes an "inner word", reports visions or contact with the dead, or family members are alarmed. The goal is to tell culturally meaningful experience apart from psychosis, mania, dissociation, OCD or complicated grief without pathologising belief [synthesis; Grom's view of self-induced revelation experiences, as quoted in Pöhlmann 2008].
Steps:
1. Establish the baseline: how long the experiences have gone on, and whether they are new or part of a stable practice.
2. Assess form: are they experienced as inner or outer, controllable or intrusive, welcome or distressing?
3. Ask whether the client's circle recognises the experience as normal for its tradition. Many readers do not claim to receive messages themselves.
4. Screen for mania: reduced need for sleep, pressured writing or speech, grandiosity (e.g. being the chosen successor), spending.
5. Screen for psychosis: commands, fixed beliefs that spread beyond the faith frame, disorganisation, decline in functioning.
6. Screen for dissociation: amnesia for writing episodes, depersonalisation or derealisation, trauma history.
7. Screen for OCD: intrusive, unwanted blasphemous thoughts, or fear that the voice is from the devil, with reassurance-seeking.
8. Assess risk (self, others, medical neglect). Use standard risk assessment and refer urgently when indicated.
Example language (illustrative): "I'm not asking whether the messages are true. That's for you and your faith. I'm asking how they affect your sleep, your mood and your daily life."
Watch for: sudden onset, sleep loss, escalating output, loss of functioning and messages that urge harm all point to a psychiatric evaluation. A stable, chosen, culturally recognised practice without distress needs no treatment.

4.8 Grief work with afterlife teachings

Purpose and when to use: with bereaved clients. Several of Lorber's works describe the realms beyond death in detail [source: Pöhlmann 2008].
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Ask what the client believes about where the dead person is now, and whether that belief comforts or frightens them.
2. Support continuing bonds: letters, rituals and conversations, framed in the client's faith terms.
3. If texts about souls being purified or in darker realms cause fear for the dead person, explore the fear without debating the doctrine. Ask whether a trusted reader or pastor could speak to it.
4. Watch for searching or prolonged grief (DSM-5-TR prolonged grief disorder [uncertain: not verified]), and treat it with standard grief-focused approaches.
5. If the client seeks contact with the dead through mediums, see 098 and 099 on the exploitation of bereaved people.
Example language (illustrative): "What do the books say about your mother now, and how does it feel when you read that?"
Watch for: comfort and a felt connection mean it is working. Rumination over the fate of the dead, or reading compulsively for reassurance, means it is not.

4.9 Scrupulosity, fear of evil and prophecy-related anxiety

Purpose and when to use: when reading produces guilt, fear of self-love as sin, fear of Lucifer or the devil, or anxiety about prophecies of the end times [synthesis]. The texts describe Lucifer and spirits ruled by self-love [source: Hanus 1987]. Some readers reject one volume as coming from the devil [source: Introvigne 2021].
Steps:
1. Separate the doctrine from the anxiety cycle: intrusion, fear, then checking, praying or rereading for reassurance.
2. If OCD is present, use exposure and response prevention (ERP) as clinical sources such as the IOCDF describe it [uncertain: not verified]. Build a graded hierarchy with consent, and include contraindications and safety planning. Agree to reduce reassurance-seeking, including rereading passages to check.
3. With the client's consent, involve a trusted religious figure to say what the faith actually requires, so faith and compulsion are told apart.
Example language (illustrative): "Your faith asks you to love. The OCD asks you to check again and again. Let's work out which voice is which."
Watch for: less time spent checking and returning to reading for its own sake means it is working. If exposure targets feel like attacks on faith, revise them.

4.10 Health and diet teachings (described qualitatively only)

Purpose and when to use: when the client follows health advice from the writings, or delays medical care. A movement-sympathetic account reports the following [source: "Jakob Lorber und die Lorber-Bewegung", 2017]:
- warnings against coffee;
- acceptance of wine in Lorber's circle;
- "sun remedies" (Sonnenheilmittel), described as demanding to prepare, tied to strict diets and carrying a risk of harm;
- attempts by followers, including physicians, to establish these remedies, with little lasting success. The same account warns that bodily healing can conflict with spiritual healing. No preparation, dosage or diet schedule is given here.
Evidence status (one line): no clinical study of these remedies appears in the sources consulted, and their health claims remain the movement's own [synthesis]. No practice from the writings is presented here as treating any physical disease.
Steps:
1. Ask what health guidance the client takes from the writings.
2. Ask whether any illness is being treated by these means instead of by medical care.
3. Ask about restrictive eating.
4. Share concern plainly.
5. With consent, coordinate with the client's GP. Route any medicine, remedy or illness question to medical care, and contact poison control for suspected harm from any preparation.
6. Never advise starting, stopping or changing a medicine [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "I can't advise on remedies. That belongs with your doctor. I'd like to understand what you're using, so we can make sure your doctor knows too."
Watch for: delayed diagnosis, weight loss or restriction, and children's care being affected (see 4.13).

4.11 Exclusivity, dependency and family conflict

Purpose and when to use: when the writings have become the only source of truth and relationships narrow. The EZW warns of a revelation fundamentalism that draws people into separate worlds [source: Pöhlmann 2008].
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Assess the freedom to doubt and to read other things.
2. Assess contact with non-believing family.
3. Assess decision-making: does the client decide, or do the texts or others in the circle decide for them?
4. Work on values-based choices the client owns.
5. With family members, coach curiosity over argument, and avoid ultimatums.
Example language (illustrative): "What would happen if you disagreed with something in the books? Who could you talk to about that?"
Watch for: growing isolation, all decisions referred to texts or messages, and dependence on one circle member's interpretation.

4.12 Doubt, disputes over authenticity, and leaving

Purpose and when to use: when the client is unsettled by contradictions between revelations, disputes over later recipients, or the movement's historical links (e.g. Leopold Engel's later occult activity) [source: Pöhlmann 2008; Introvigne 2021]. Also when the client is leaving.
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Normalise doubt.
2. Explore the grief of losing certainty and community.
3. Assess religious trauma symptoms (shame, fear of damnation).
4. Support a pace the client chooses, with no push to stay or leave.
5. Help rebuild a social network.
Example language (illustrative): "You don't have to decide today what you believe. What would help you live with the question for now?"
Watch for: depression after leaving, loss of support, and fear-based returns.

4.13 Children and safeguarding

Purpose and when to use: when children are raised within strict reading of the texts, or health teachings affect their care [synthesis]. Child-harm cases linked to Lorber circles: none found in the sources consulted.
Steps:
1. Ask about children's medical care, diet and schooling.
2. Ensure faith-based refusal or delay of care is escalated under local child-protection procedures.
3. Support the child's own assent and voice.
Example language (illustrative): "How do you make decisions about the children's health when you and the doctor see things differently?"
Watch for: missed medical care, restrictive diets in growing children, and isolation from peers.

4.14 Referral, liaison and role boundaries

Purpose and when to use: throughout [synthesis].
Steps:
1. Refer to psychiatry for suspected psychosis or mania, and to a GP or specialist for health issues.
2. With consent, contact a pastor, a circle member the client trusts, or a church information service on worldviews (e.g. EZW in Germany).
3. If you have a personal interest in esoteric or revelation literature, keep it out of therapy.
4. Never read, interpret or validate messages for the client.
Example language (illustrative): "Would it help to have someone from your faith community involved, or would you rather keep therapy separate?"
Watch for: the client trying to recruit you into the reading, or asking you to judge whether a message is authentic. Decline gently and explain why.

5. Handling problems

All guidance in this section is [synthesis] unless tagged. The sources describe the movement but not therapy with its members.

The client wants you to read or endorse the books. Thank them and acknowledge the meaning. Say that your role is to understand how the books matter to them, not to judge their truth. You may read a short passage they bring, as their material, without commentary on its origin.
The client tests whether you think they are "mad". Name it directly: belief in revelation is not a symptom. You will ask about sleep, mood and functioning because you would ask anyone. This often lowers guardedness.
The client is stuck in rereading or reassurance. Track the function: comfort, or relief from anxiety? If it relieves anxiety, use the OCD formulation (4.9), and agree small reductions with the client rather than imposing them.
The client is overwhelmed by afterlife or judgement content. Slow down. Ground in the present, and return to the client's chosen sources of comfort, including passages on love that they choose. Do not argue doctrine. Consider a trusted pastor or reader, with consent.
The inner-word experiences escalate. Combined with sleep loss, grandiosity or command content, this calls for same-day risk assessment and psychiatric referral. Frame it to the client as care for body and mind, not a verdict on faith. Involve family with consent, and without consent only where safety law requires.
The client refuses or delays medical treatment for health reasons drawn from the writings. Stay in relationship, state your concern clearly, and document it. Offer to help the client talk to their doctor. Where children or an incapacitated adult are at risk, follow safeguarding procedures (4.13). Do not give medical advice yourself.
Non-adherence to therapy tasks that feel worldly. Reframe the tasks in the client's own value language, for example love of neighbour including oneself. Let the client adapt or drop tasks that clash with faith.
Rupture: the client feels you dismissed their faith. Acknowledge it specifically, take responsibility for your part, and ask what would restore trust. Return to 4.4.
Family members want you to "get them out". Explain that you do not deprogramme or coerce. Offer the family support in keeping the relationship and communicating with curiosity. Refer them to an information service on worldviews if they wish.
Disputes within the circle about later revelations. Help the client clarify their own position and values. Do not side with any reading of the canon (e.g. the disputed eleventh volume) [source for the dispute: Introvigne 2021].
The client leaves and is lonely or afraid. Use religious trauma-informed work: validate the loss, address shame and fear of damnation, rebuild social ties, and screen for depression and suicidality with standard practice.
Therapist's own reactions. Notice fascination, ridicule or rescuing, and take it to supervision. Keep any personal interest in esoteric literature out of the work.

Sources

Web sources:

Books and other works cited:

Hanus, V. (1987). Lorber, Jakob. Neue Deutsche Biographie 15, p. 163.
Pöhlmann, M. (ed.) (2003). EZW-Texte 169, on new revelations (Berlin: EZW). Includes Grom, B. (2003), cited via Pöhlmann 2008.
Lorber, J. Das große Evangelium Johannes (Lorber-Verlag, Bietigheim). Edition [uncertain].
American Psychiatric Association (2022). DSM-5-TR: Cultural Formulation Interview and supplementary modules; prolonged grief disorder [uncertain: not verified].
ICD-10-CM Z65.8, Other specified problems related to psychosocial circumstances (includes 'Religious or spiritual problem'), https://www.unboundmedicine.com/icd/view/ICD-10-CM/945432/all/Z65_8___Other_specified_problems_related_to_psychosocial_circumstances
Vieten, C., et al. (2013). Spiritual and religious competencies for psychologists [uncertain: not verified].
American Psychological Association. Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct, https://www.apa.org/ethics/code [uncertain: not verified].
International OCD Foundation, resources on scrupulosity and ERP [uncertain: not verified].

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