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Hermann Wilhelm Johannes
Viktor Kritzinger, later known as Hans-Hermann
Kritzinger, a son of a preacher, was born on June 10, 1887, in
Boitzenburg.
In the beginning, Kritzinger was a meteorologist and astronomer. For
some time, he was the head of the Astronomical observatory in Bothkamp in
Sleswich-Holstein. In 1911, he got his doctor's degree in astronomy. His
dissertation was entitled Über die Bewegung des Roten Fleckes auf
dem Planeten Jupiter (Berlin) .In 1912, his book Errungenschaften
der Astronomie - nach den Originalarbeiten der führenden Forscher
was published. In 1917, Kritzinger founded the DARGESO, the Deutsche
Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Sonnenbeobachtung. In 1927 the book Spaziergänge
durch den Weltraum - eine Astronomie für jedermann was published.
One of the topics of this book were comets.
From 1934 to 1945, Kritzinger was in charge of the Flugabwehr-Artillerieschule
für Ballistik of the German War Department. He wrote a couple of books about
ballistics, such as Artillerie und Ballistik in
Stichworten (1939, together with F. Stuhlmann) and Primärfunktionen (Nuremberg, 1943).
His book Schuß und Schall in Wetter und Wind -
Ballistisch-meteorologische Einführung in das Tageseinflußwesen beim
Schießen der Artillerie (Leipzig), dates from 1918.
After World War II, Kritzinger had various professions.
Kritzinger
was the first German astronomer who turned himself to astrology. In
1911, Der Stern der Weisen - astronomisch-kritische Studie was published, an astrological book,
written by Kritzinger, dealing with the Star of Bethlehem. The preface
was written by dr. Wilhelm Faber, from whom in 1922 a revised edition
was published of the translation of the Centuries, made by Eduard
Roesch in 1850.
Kritzinger was a member of the Deutsche Okkultistischen
Gesellschaft and editor of the monthly magazine Psychische
Studien - Monatliche Zeitschrift vorzüglich der Untersuchung der wenig
gekannten Phänomene des Seelenlebens gewidmet. In 1922, he also was
the publisher of the astronomic monthly Sirius.
He held many
lectures about paranormal phenomena and wrote at least four books,
dealing with this theme. In three of them, among which Mysterien
von Sonne und Seele (Berlin, 1922), he comprehensively discussed
the Centuries. From Mysterien von Sonne und Seele it
becomes clear that he had vivid discussions with Carl Loog, the author
of Die Weissagungen des Nostradamus (Pfullingen in Württemberg,
DE, 1921) about Loogs ideas regarding Nostradamus' methods. Despite his
huge interest in the Centuries and his possession of a copy of
the 1668-Amsterdam-edition, Kritzinger never wrote an entire
book about them.
In
the course of the years, Kritzinger had different attitudes towards the Centuries. In
World War I, he wrote a flyer for the German army, in which he
discussed quatrain 10-51.[1]
In 1922, in Mysterien von Sonne und Seele, he followed the path
which one year before was set by Loog in Die Weissagungen des
Nostradamus and compared Loog's theories and time structures with
his own time structures regarding the world's future in general and
especially England's future. In 1929, in Todesstrahlen und Wünschelrute,
Kritzinger was more reluctant regarding Loog's theories and took up
various cycle theories, described in 1926 by Wöllner in Das
Mysterium des Nostradamus, under a discussion of the meaning of the
Great Conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn, described in various books in
the past. This discussion has no political purpose.
In December 1939, Kritzinger became involved in the production of
national-socialist propaganda material, based upon the Centuries.
There are strong indications that in December 1939, Goebbels ordered him
to find a Nostradamus-expert who could edit the Centuries in
order to use them for psychological warfare. Kritzinger approached Carl
Loog, the author of Die Weissagungen des
Nostradamus, who refused, and later suggested to approach the Swiss
astrologer Karl Ernst Krafft, one of his friends, which actually
happened.[2] The
contact between Krafft and Kritzinger dated from most lately 1925 and
continued until most certain the summer of 1940. After Krafft's
settlement in Berlin in January 1940, they met each other frequently and
discussed many quatrains from a propagandistic point of view. Kritzinger
thought that Krafft's comments many times were too drastic, whereas
Krafft accused Kritzinger of having filched material.
In a letter, dated on May 27, 1940, adressed to dr. Rahn, deputy
chief of Information IV of the German Foreign Office, dr. Werner
Wilmanns wrote that according to Karl Ernst Krafft, one dr. Seifert,
working at the Ministry of Propaganda, was occupied with a
Nostradamusbrochure, which Kritzinger was supposed to write. I have no
information about the title of this brochure
In Der Seher von Salon, volume 38 in the series Informations-Schriften,
a series of propaganda brochures, produced by the German Foreign Office,
Kritzinger included fragments which originate from Mysterien von Sonne und
Seele. To these fragments, he added elements which in one way
or another plead for "the German cause". The question is if
Kritzinger adjusted his 1922-comments on the Centuries because of
propaganda reasons or if he wrote Der Seher von Salon because he
was convinced that Nostradamus had predicted the German break of the
Versailles Treaty, the beginning of World
War II, the air raids
on England and England's fall by 1941. Due to the interest he had in
1922 in the fate of England and his speculations about the year England
would fall, it is possible that by 1941 Kritzinger really was convinced
that the course of the events in the Interbellum and the beginning of World
War II was predicted by Nostradamus. On the other hand,
propaganda-elements such as the depicting of Napoleon as England's
greatest enemy and the forging of the text of quatrain 05-94 mean that,
from an exegetic point of view, Der Seher
von Salon is a contaminated publication.[3]
In
1941, Kritzinger was arrested as a result of the Aktion-Heß, a
mupping-up operation in Germany among astrologers and occultists in June
1941, after the flee in of Rudolf Heß to England in May 1941.[4]
In the forum Der Tierkreis von Dendera, it is mentioned that at
the end of 1941, in a secret
military pendulum institute, in the V.d.Heydt-Straße in the
South
Tiergarten district of Berlin, a group called SP (Sidereal Pendulum) tried to locate hostile submarines by means of a pendulum.
According to one of the contributions in this forum, the members of this
group were the astrologers Wilhelm Hartmann, H.H. Kritzinger, F. Quade,
K. Schuppe, Walther, countess Wassilko-Serecki and Wilhelm Wulff.[5]
It is said that Hitler granted to Kritzinger the title of professor
because of his outstanding contributions to the war at sea.
After
World War II, Kritzinger remained active in the paranormal
field. In 1949, the magazine Astrologische Monatshefte -
Fachzeitschrift für theoretische und angewandte Astrologie published
an article by Kritzinger, entitled Ein transplutonischer Planet? In
1954, Kritzinger held a lecture for a "geopathy"-group,
founded in 1951, whose members occupied themselves with possible
connections between earth rays and diseases, entitled Vorschläge und Gedanken zu
zukünftiger produktiver Forschungsarbeit im Rahmen des Arbeitskreises.
After World War II, Kritzinger, as far as I know, did not
publish anything about Nostradamus. The books he wrote in the twenties
and thirties, were not reprinted. I don't know whether or not he was
persecuted because of his national-socialist activities or that he
temporarily was not allowed to write or to have his books published.
Back in 1961-'62, when he had contact with Howe, Kritzinger did not give a
correct description of his part in the production of national-socialist
propaganda, based upon the Centuries. Perhaps the 73-year old
professor rather wanted this chapter in his life to remain closed.[6]
Kritzinger died on December 2, 1968 because of a short, severe
disease. In a short necrology, published in Hamburger Heften #34,
1969/2, Ludwig Rudolph presented him as an astronomer and gave the titles
of some of his contributions, published in Hamburger Heften.
De
Meern, the Netherlands, July 1, 2006
T.W.M. van Berkel
actualized on June 14, 2007
Kritzinger-1922 (1921) |
Kritzinger-1941
(1940) |
Notes
-
Howe,
p.168. [text]
-
Van
Berkel: The 1939-fortune of Mysterien
von Sonne und Seele (dr. H.-H. Kritzinger, DE, 1961). [text]
-
Van
Berkel: Der
Seher von Salon (Informations-Schriften
#38, dr. H.H.- Kritzinger, DE, 1941). [text]
-
Maichle: Die
Nostradamus-Propanganda der Nazis 1939-1942. [text]
-
Boardy-de:
Der Tierkreis von Dendera. [text]
-
Van
Berkel: The 1939-fortune of Mysterien
von Sonne und Seele (dr. H.-H. Kritzinger, DE, 1961). [text]
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