NOSTRADAMUS, ASTROLOGY AND THE BIBLE
substudY "WORLD WAR ii"
Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse (Aufsätze zur Parapsychologie II)
(Hans Bender, Munich, 1983)
- T.W.M. van Berkel -

General information
In this article, Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse - Aufsätze zur Parapsychologie II is discussed, volume 246 in the Serie Piper, published in 1983 by R. Piper & Co Verlag in Munich. Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse is written by the German parapsychologist Hans Bender. Bender, born in Freiburg in Breisgau on February 5, 1907, and died in Freiburg on May 7, 1991, was the most prominent person in parapsychology in Germany. After World War II, he founded in Freiburg in Breisgau the Forschungsgemeinschaft für psychologische Grenzgebiete. Under his direction, this lead in 1950 to the foundation of the Institut für Grenzgebiete der Psychologie und Psychohygiene (IGPP), which occupies itself with interdisciplinary investigation of anomalies such as extrasensory perception, psychokinesis and changed states of consciousness.[1]  

In Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse, Bender described a series of extrasensory perceptions such as the Centuries, the appearances of the Holy Virgin in Fatima and La Salette, the predictions of Malachy and Mühlhiasel, near-death-experiences and war predictions by a prophetic gifted Frenchman, described by Andreas Rill, a German soldier, in letters to his family in August 1914.
In the first chapter of Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse, entitled Zukunftsschau aus wissenschaftlicher Perspektive, Bender described the parapsychological investigation of extrasensory perceptions. In this investigation, stories about spontaneous phenomena such as visions, dreams and appearances are investigated. Further, by means of standard procedures, probe-persons are tested or persons who claim to have extraordinary parapsychological gifts. Finally, there are investigations of most notably psychics such as Bender's investigation in 1950, together with his Dutch colleague dr. Wilhelm Heinrich Carl Tenhaeff, of the gift of the Dutch psychic Gerard Croiset, about which Bender reports in Zukunftsschau aus wissenschaftlicher Perspektive.
Bender distinguishes three forms of extrasensory perception: telepathy (direct informative contact between two living organisms), clairvoyance (extrasensory perception of an event about which nothing is known to anyone) and prophecy or precognition (knowing in advance of an event, for which happening there is no reason and which happening is not the result of precognition).
In Zukunftsschau aus wissenschaftlicher Perspektive, Bende also discussed questions which raised because of the parapsychological investigation of extrasensory perceptions. One of these questions was if and to what extent there is free will when events can be known before they happen. He also discussed critical notes to parapsychological findings in connection with precognition, such as the note that statements, based upon precognition, can only be verified after the occurrence of the described events, and can not be verified before.

Bender on Centurio, Krafft and Kritzinger
In Der Nostradamus-Boom, the second chapter of Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse, Bender gave attention to the fortune in 1939 of the Swiss astrologer/statistician Karl Ernst Krafft, the part of the German astronomer dr. Hans-Hermann Kritzinger in the production of national-socialist propaganda, based upon the Centuries and the comment in 1949 upon quatrain 05-94 by the German Century-scholar Alexander Centurio. In the next paragraphs, Bender's information about Centurio, Krafft and Kritzinger is compared with the sources he consulted and with what meanwhile has been published about them on this website.

In Nostradamus - Prophetische Weltgeschichte (Bietigheim, 1971) Centurio, whose real name, according to Bender, was Zentgraf, had written that he explained in 1949 in a Berlin newspaper that the word Coloigne in the fourth line of quatrain 05-94 should be read as Cölln, an old name for Berlin. According to him, the third and fourth line of quatrain 05-94 meant that Stalin in vain would try to get power over Vienna and Berlin. Centurio wrote that in 1949, many citizens in Berlin felt themselves encouraged by his comment.[2]
The title of Centurio's article which in 1949 was published, is not listed in either the text of Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse or the bibliography on page 50 of consulted publicatins about Nostradamus and the Centuries. Bender supposed without further investigation that in Nostradamus - Prophetische Weltgeschichte, Centurio correctly summarized the comment upon quatrain 05-94 which he gave in a Berlin newspaper in 1949. This, however, was not the case. In the article, entitled Nostradamus und Berlin - und andere Weissagungen, published in the edition of July 10, 1949 in the Berlin Kurier, Centurio, using his real name "dr. A. Centgraf", wrote nothing about the failing of Stalin's attempts to get power over Vienna and Berlin. According to his comment upon quatrain 05-94 in Nostradamus und Berlin - und andere Weissagungen, Nostradamus had predicted that in 1945, the Red Army would march to Berlin.[3]
Bender also has not known that Centgraf, like Krafft (and Kritzinger) wrote a national-socialist, propagandistic brochure, based upon the Centuries. The Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin owns a copy of the Dutch translation of this brochure. This translation, entitled Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn... (Arnhem, 1941), carries the name of A. de Tombre. On the title page of this copy, it is noted that dr. Alexander Centgraf, Berlin W30, Hohenstauffenstr 35, was the author of this brochure. The backpage shows that Centgraf himself gave this copy to the then Preussische Staatsbibliothek. Archive research in the late eighties by the German Century-scholar Ulrich Maichle showed that after World War II, Centgraf continued to publish on Nostradamus and the Centuries, using the pseudonym Dr. N. Alexander Centurio. The German source text of Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn... dates from the period between the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. In that period, Centgraf voluntarilly worked for the Antikomintern. In Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn..., he told his readers that Nostradamus predicted the fall in 1944 of communism, the expulsion of Jews from Europe and Germany´s final victory. As a token of esteem for this, he was decorated in the beginning of 1945 with the Kriegsverdienstkreuz II. Klasse ohne Schwerter.[4]
Centgraf´s post-war Century-comments contain elements which are present in Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn..., such as the explanation that the word Hadrie in a.o. quatrain 01-08 contains the initials of Adolf Hitler and the word Adrie, which would refer to the northern and southern pole of the axis Germany-Italy.[5] His post-war comments are characterized by an anti-communist conviction. According to those comments, the world peace will be restored in the first half of the 21st century by Heinrich der Glückliche, king of the United States of Europe, a scenario which with slightly different timing is also described by Jean-Charles de Fontbrune in Nostradamus - Historien et prophète (Monaco, 1980), a book which Bender in Der Nostradamus-Boom discusses extensively, without mentioning or discussing the fact that both De Fontbrune and Centgraf suppose that Heinrich der Glückliche would be the new leader of the world.
Counting from 1941, Centgraf's comment upon quatrain 05-94 changed as follows:

• 1941 (Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn..., p.28-29): 
  Coloigne = Cologne; the words La tresve fainte (the faked armistice) deal with the Molotov - Von Ribbentrop pact; Nostradamus predicted that Stalin would violate that pact;

• 1949 (Nostradamus und Berlin - und andere Weissagungen): 
  Coloigne = Berlin; the words La tresve fainte deal with the armistice in Compiègne in June 1940; Nostradamus predicted that in 1945, the Red Army would march to Berlin;

• 1953 (Nostradamus - der Prophet der Weltgeschichte, p.127-129): 
  Coloigne = Berlin; the words La tresve fainte deal with the Potsdam conference which did not result in peace agreements; Nostradamus had predicted that Stalin's post-war blockade of Vienne and Berlin would fail'; no reference to the article, written in 1949;

• 1959 (Nostradamus und das jüngste Weltgeschehen, p.402):
  Coloigne = Berlin; Centgraf wrote that in 1949 he already wrote that Nostradamus had predicted that Stalin's post-war blockade of Berlin would fail.

The information about Centgraf/Centurio which Maichle found in his later investigations, and the studies of his comments, published on this website, confirm to some extent Bender's finding that there is a correspondence between comments upon quatrains in connection with the present and the future and the attitude of the scholar, but put Centgraf in another perspective. In World War II, Centgraf was a national-socialist, propagandist and anti-communist. In Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn..., a brochure with which he tried to intimidate people, his political conviction can be traced back. In the case of Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn..., Centgraf is in one line with Krafft and Kritzinger. In his post-war publications, Centgraf, like Jean-Charles de Fontbrune, projected his anti-communist convictions upon the Centuries. The changes in his comments upon quatrain 05-94 in the course of the years are a history in itself, about which Bender had no knowledge.
 

Krafft and Kritzinger in 1939/40

On page 47 in Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse, Bender wrote that he copied the information about what happened to Krafft in 1939 after he predicted that in November 1939 there would be an attempt on Hitler,  is taken, from Uranias Children - The strange world of the astrologers (Ellic Howe, London, 1967). He completed this information with a couple of personal memories to Krafft, with whom he corresponded and who he helped in 1937 to find a house in Germany.[6]
In the study upon which this article is based, Bender's description of what happened to Krafft in 1939, was compared with Uranias Kinder - Die seltsame Welt der Astrologen und das Dritte Reich (Weinheim, 1995), the German translation of the second, revised edition of Uranias Children... and with what became clear during the research upon which the articles are founded, published in the section substudy "World War II" on this website. This comparison showed a.o. that Bender's description of the events, prior and after the attempt on Hitler, differs from the description in Uranias Kinder... According to Bender, it was in the summer of 1939 that Krafft in a letter warned the Reichskanzlei that there would be an attempt on Hitler in the beginning of November 1939. It was not clear to Bender if Krafft based this upon astrological knowledge, a vision or a combination of astrology and extrasensory perception. Since the Reichskanzlei did not react, Krafft sended a reminding telegram shortly before the critical period. According to Howe, who based himself upon a.o. memories of the astrologer/educationalist F.W. Goerner and Georg Lucht, who in 1940 assisted Krafft in the writing of the manuscript of the Einführung..., Krafft wrote in October 1939 in a "column", written by order of Amt VII-B1 of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt, that in the beginning of November 1939 there would be an attempt on Hitler by means of explosives. Right after the failed attempt, Krafft would have sended a telegram to Rudolf Heß in the Reichskanzlei with the warning that the coming days would still be dangerous for Hitler.[7] 
After the failed attempt, according to Bender, some high SD-officials came from Berlin to interrogate Krafft, who they suspected of being involved. When this turned out not to be the case, they ordered him to go to Berlin. Krafft accepted this invitation and ignored Bender's advice not to go. In Berlin, behind the scenes, Krafft made astrological analyses about the character and the future of prominent statesmen and generals in countries, hostile to Germany. This all differs from Howe's description in Uranias Kinder... that Krafft, after being interrogated in Freiburg, was transfered to Berlin for further investigation, that he successfully argued that he had nothing to do with the attempt and was released with a declaration that he was not involved. Howe, referring to Bender, wrote in Uranias Kinder... that when Krafft after his release arrived in Freiburg, the Gestapo wanted to arrest him again.[8]
Bender's description that the SD-officers who interrogated Krafft in Freiburg, ordered him to go to Berlin, is not confirmed by the information in Uranias Kinder... According to Howe, who based himself upon information, provided by Kritzinger, it was after Krafft's return from Berlin that he was summoned to go to Berlin because Kritzinger told employees of the Propaganda Ministry that Krafft was the Nostradamus-expert they looked for to produce propaganda, based upon the Centuries.[9]
Compared with the information in Uranias Kinder..., Bender's remark on page 48 in Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse that in Berlin, Krafft, behind the scenes, made astrological analyses of prominent statesmen and generals in countries, hostile to Germany, and was ordered by Goebbels (who was advised by Kritzinger) to produce a couple of hundred of copies of an 1568-edition of the Centuries and to write propagandistic quatrain comments, meant for the French-speaking occupied regions, looks as an incorrect contraction of facts. Not once in Uranias Kinder... is mentioned that Kritzinger advised Goebbels about the production of national-socialist propaganda writings. It looks as if Bender situated Kritzinger's role in the life of Krafft in 1939, in 1940. 
Bender'statement that Goebbels ordered to produce propagandistic quatrain comments, meant for the French-speaking occupied regions, also looks like an incorrect contraction of facts. The available documents do not contain the slightest allusion that Krafft got such a kind of order in the period in which he worked at Amt VII-B1 of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt. In that period (January-April 1940), he was occupied with the production of a copy of a 1568-edition of the Centuries and the writing of an introduction to it. Quite peculiar is Bender's phrasing the French-speaking occupied regions. It was only in May 1940 that Belgium, France and Luxembourg were attacked by Germany. At that time, Krafft was working at the Deutsche Nachrichtenbüro. As far as I can see, Bender had Comment Nostradamus a-t-il entrevu l'avenir de l'Europe? in mind when he wrote about propagandistic quatrain interpretations, meant for the French-speaking occupied regions. Comment Nostradamus a-t-il entrevu l'avenir de l'Europe? is Krafft's French translation of his manuscript Nostradamus sieht die Zukunft Europas, which dates from May-June 1940 and was written by order of the Information IV section of the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Krafft finished its translation into French in October 1940; it was printed in Brussels in April 1941 and from there spread in the French-speaking regions.[10]

Bender versus Tenhaeff

Oorlogsvoorspellingen...

In his research upon extrasensory perception, among which war predictions, in order to establish if there were yes/no cases of precognition, Bender discussed the Centuries, i.e. the Nostradamus-boom in France in the summer of 1981, due to interviews in July and August 1981 in which Jean-Charles de Fontbrune, the author of Nostradamus - Historien et prophète, talked about a number of catastrophes which would occur before the millennium change, such as a fatal attempt in Lyon in December 1981 on pope John Paul II, the outbreak of World War III and the destruction of Paris in the course of 1983.
In Bender's eyes, the Centuries are an uttering of prophecy and therefore a kind of extrasensory perception. The prophetic nature of the Centuries is enforced by the "orphic gloominess", as he calls the mysterious language in which the Centuries are written. Bender however notes that it is only by looking backwards that one can observe correspondences between events and predictions, made in the Centuries, sometimes more striking than other times. Precognition, obtained from the Centuries, has no practical value. Further, Bender observes a coherence between the explanation of quatrains for the present and the future and the political and social situation and the attitude of the scholar. In order to demonstrate this coherence, he discusses the comments upon quatrain 05-94, made by Centurio in 1949, De Fontbrune in 1980, Hildenbrand in 1932 and Krafft in 1940. According to Centurio, it was predicted that Berlin would stand the Cold War; De Fontbrune wrote that in the course of the eighties, the Red Army would invade the Federal German Republic; Hildenbrand thought that on a certain moment there would be a "Great-Germany", but could not explain the meaning of the third and fourth line of quatrain 05-94 and Krafft supposed that Hitler was described in this quatrain, who annexed the Rhineland, Austria and whose armies invaded France and Belgium. Facing this diversity of comments upon one and the same text, Bender told that there was no reason to worry about what De Fontbrune had written in Nostradamus - Historien et prophète.
Right after World War II, Bender's colleague Tenhaeff investigated war predictions on precognition (the experience or observation of future evens by means of extrasensory perception) and discussed the Centuries and a number of Century-comments, among which the national-socialist brochures Hoe zal deze oorlog eindigen? and Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn... Tenhaeff's findings can be read in Oorlogsvoorspellingen - een onderzoek met betrekking tot proscopie in verband met het wereldgebeuren (The Hague, 1948, written in 1947).[11] Tenhaeff's opinion about the parapsychological value of the Centuries is diametrically opposed to Bender's. Writing about the gloominess of the Centuries, he concludes that the gloominess is the cause of the countless ways in which they are explained. He considers it an irresponsible loss of time if those who do scientific research on paranormal phenomena occupy themselves with the writings of Nostradamus and his commentators. In contrast with Bender, Tenhaeff made no distinction between comments, related to past events and comments, related to the actual situation or the future.
In Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse, Bender did not compare his findings about the Centuries with what Tenhaeff had written about them.

The nature of the research
As far as I can see, Tenhaeff's investigation of the Centuries was far more extensive than Bender's investigation. The text of Tenhaeff's "Voorspellingen" en propaganda and its bibliography show that he studied Century-comments and -articles by De Fontbrune (1937), Kemmerich (1925), Kiesewetter (1887), Kniepf (1909); Le Pelletier (1867), Pierson, Price, Torné-Chavigny (1860) and Du Vignois (1910), and also the Dutch translation of the Centuries, published in 1941 by Servire publishers, The Hague. A close study of the contents of Bender's Der Nostradamus-Boom shows that the major part can be traced back to the article Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen! - Der Katastrophen-Hellseher Nostradamus und das Geschäft mit der Panik, published in the edition of December 28, 1981 of the German weekly Der Spiegel on the pages 91-97.[12] On page 44 in Zukunftsvisionen Kriegsprophezeiungen Sterbeerlebnisse, Bender mentioned Der Spiegel as the source of listing of Nostradamus-publications in Germany in 1981. However, his information about what happened in France in the summer of 1981 as a result of interviews with De Fontbrune about his book Nostradamus - Historien et prophète as well as a part of his general information about Nostradamus and the Centuries, including the critic of Carl Ludwig Friedrich Otto Graf von Klinckowstroem in Rund um Nostradamus (1927), can be found in Der Spiegel. In other words: the article Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen! appears to have been Bender's main source on Nostradamus and the Centuries.
In his description of what happened in France in the summer of 1981, Bender made similar mistakes as in his description of what happened to Krafft in 1939. In the summer of 1981, according to Bender, the number of sold copies of Nostradamus - Historien et prophète grew from 6.000 to almost 600.000. According to Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen!, the number of 6.000 copies is the number of copies, sold between Christmas 1980 and May 10, 1981, the day on which the French president elections were hold; the number of 600.000 copies is the number of copies, sold between the publishing in October 1980 of the first edition of Nostradamus - Historien et prophète and the writing of Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen! in December 1981, as I suppose. About the book by De Fontbrune's father, of which neither in Der Nostradamus-Boom, nor in Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen! its title Les Prophéties de Maistre Michel Nostradamus - Expliquées et commentées is mentioned, Bender, following Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen!, wrote that it originated from 1938 and was banned and burned in 1940 by the Vichy police because of anti-German comments. Bender suggests that the re-edition dates from the summer of 1981, in other words: that the book of De Fontbrune's father was banned in 1940, only to be published again in 1981 as a result of the Nostradamus-boom, and that this new edition contained a letter on Nostradamus by the American author Henry Miller. In Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen! is written about this book that it dates from 1976. In Weg mit euch, ihr Astrologen! it is not described that the 1976-edition was a revised edition of the twelfth edition of Les Prophéties de Maistre Michel Nostradamus - Expliquées et commentées (Aix-en-Provence, 1975), carrying the name of De Fontbrune's father, but silently revised by his son, who also added a biography of his father, who deceased in 1959, one year after the publication of the eleventh edition. The twelfth edition did not contain the letter by Miller.

Propagandistic Century-comments
Both Bender and Tenhaeff used propagandistic Century-comments in their investigation of the parapsychological value of the Centuries. Bender discussed Krafft's propagandistic comment upon quatrain 05-94; Tenhaeff discussed propagandistic comments in the brochures Hoe zal deze oorlog eindigen? en Voorspellingen die uitgekomen zijn.... 
In contrast with true Century-scholars, the work of propagandists is based upon a military/political order and aimed towards the reaching of a military/political result: the intimidation of the enemy. In order to do a proper job, they deliberately pervert Century-texts or include propagandistic elements in what they present as a genuine translation of Century-texts in modern-French, their own language or the language of the countries and regions in which their brochures are spread. As far as I am concerned, propagandistic Century-comments have a different, perverted nature, compared with the comments by true Century-scholars and therefore are not suited for investigation of the parapsychological value of the Centuries.

Fulfillment data
Neither Bender, nor Tenhaeff discussed the absence of fulfillment data in almost all of the predictions in the Centuries. In my eyes, the gloominess of the Centuries, combined with the absence of fulfillment data, is the cause of the fact that these predictions can be applied to countless situations, as is shown elsewhere on this website in the list of comments which in the course of the years were given upon quatrain 03-57.[13] 

De Meern, the Netherlands, April 3, 2009
T.W.M. van Berkel
updated on May 21, 2010