Heinrich Geyer

Heinrich Geyer (born March 27, 1818 in Hardegsen ; † October 4, 1896 in Hamburg ) was a German Catholic-Apostolic clergyman, prophet of the Catholic-Apostolic congregations and founded the “General Christian Apostolic Mission” through new apostolic appointments, which later became the New Apostolic Church led.

Heinrich Geyer was born in Hardegsen near Göttingen as the son of a master shoemaker and initially worked as a court clerk and later as a primary school teacher. He was a Protestant and, driven by Christian charity, founded the “Bethesda” home for neglected children in Volpriehausen near Uslar. This was the first in the Kingdom of Hanover.

Catholic Apostolic Period

He came into contact with the Catholic Apostolic Movement by chance around 1848 and quickly put himself in their service. On October 26, 1849 he moved with his family to Berlin, where he was sealed on December 26, 1849 by the Apostle Thomas Carlyle and installed as a subdeacon. Two days later he was called a priest and ordained as such by the apostle on July 25, 1850. Friedrich Wilhelm Schwarz , who later became the head of the Hamburg community, was installed with him . Shortly after the ordination, the apostle Carlyle distinguished Geyer's official character as that of a prophet. Geyer first served in this office on August 6, 1850.

He had a good reputation among the Catholic Apostolic ministers and accompanied the apostle on many journeys. There was a good and objective relationship with him. In the spring he was called an angel (= bishop) by the pillar prophet Taplin in Albury, England, and ordained to this end on September 9, 1852 in Berlin.

Geyer's prophetic work was at the center of his official activities. He is also said to have had the gifts of speaking in tongues and healing the sick. Between 1852 and 1862 he called all priests and angels in northern Germany and some in southern Germany and Switzerland.

After the death of the Apostle Carlyle, the Apostle Francis Valentine Woodhouse took over the work area of ​​Northern Germany.

From 1858 Geyer attended the newly introduced prophetic conferences in Albury. The first apostles had already died by this time, and the apostles had made up their minds not to fill the offices again. It was all the more astonishing that Geyer called two new apostles at the third of these conferences in 1860: Charles Boehm and William Caird. The apostles immediately dissolved the congregation and, after deliberating on it, rejected this calling. Geyer initially bowed to the apostle's decision and continued to serve.

Separation from the Catholic Apostolic Churches

When the apostle Woodhouse was in Königsberg in 1862, accompanied by the prophet Geyer, he called the priest Rosochacky to be an apostle on the evening of October 10th. The Apostle Woodhouse was initially ignorant of this calling.

Although Geyer often acted as a "prophet with the apostle", he was not formally installed in this office. He was still subordinate to the leader of his Berlin community, the angel Rothe. A short time later he confronted him because of a teaching difference. Since Geyer insisted on his dissenting opinion, he was finally temporarily suspended by the angel Rothe. This suspension was confirmed by the Apostle Woodhouse.

In Hamburg, the head of the church was the angel Friedrich Wilhelm Schwarz, who was subordinate to the higher-ranking angel Rothe in Berlin. In December 1862, Geyer informed Schwarz of his suspension and Rosochacky's earlier appointment as an apostle in Königsberg. Schwarz had long sympathized with Geyer's ideas of continuing the apostolic office. He invited Geyer and Rosochacky to Hamburg and recognized him as an apostle on January 4, 1863 in a public service. The vast majority of the Hamburg community supported Schwarz, Geyer and Rosochacky. Engel Rothe could not change its mind on January 7th and suspended all Hamburg officials who followed Geyer.

On January 17, 1863, Rosochacky, having returned to Königsberg, revoked his own apostle call and called it diabolical. As a result, Geyer, Schwarz and the Hamburg community found it difficult to explain.

General Christian Apostolic Mission

On January 26, 1863, the most famous Catholic-apostolic theologian Heinrich Thiersch formulated the indictment as "Shepherd with the Apostle", whereupon Geyer and Schwarz were found guilty, suspended and excommunicated the next day. The Hamburg community now went its own way. They wanted to remain without apostles until the Lord gave them a new one. This took place in the spring of 1863 when, in Geyer's absence, the priest Carl Wilhelm Louis Preuss was appointed apostle. This violated all Catholic apostolic orders. Preuss was recognized, but until his death on July 25, 1878, he was always in the shadow of the more talented Geyer.

On May 25, 1863, Schwarz was called to the Apostle by Geyer and sent to the Netherlands. The Hamburg congregation was looking for a new name and called itself the General Christian Apostolic Mission (AcAM) ". Geyer had other missionary activities and he gave numerous lectures. Congregations in Berlin and in the Harz (Winneburg, Edela, Osterode, Braunschweig and Wolfenbüttel) On October 30, 1864, Geyer called further apostles in Hamburg: Peter Wilhelm Louis Stechmann for Hungary, Johann Christoph Leonhard Hohl for Hesse and Heinrich Ferdinand Hoppe for the USA, and Johann August Ludwig Bösecke for Silesia no more calls.

From the mid-1970s onwards there were tensions in the communities, which led to two “camps”. It was about the relationship between the prophet and the apostle, the need for sealing , the liturgy and discipleship. On March 31, 1878, in the absence of his apostle Preuss in Hamburg, Geyer called Johann Friedrich Güldner to be the apostle for northern Germany and Scandinavia and thus the successor to the seriously ill Prussia. This could not be right for Preuss, because he had his own succession plans and was supported by the elder Fritz Krebs from the Harz communities. On July 25, 1878, Preuss died and the called, but not yet ordained, Apostle Güldner was to take up his office. This resulted in open differences in a church service on August 4, 1878, with Geyer being deposed as head of the AcAM. He and Güldner left the meeting with most of the congregation. A week later they held their own services again. The event on August 4, 1878 is seen by some religious scholars as the hour of birth of the New Apostolic Church , which developed from the rest of the Hamburg congregation, the smaller congregations in the Harz Mountains and the congregations founded by Menkhoff and Schwarz in Germany.

The Geyer / Güldner congregation kept its name as a General Christian Apostolic Mission and was entirely under the influence of Geyer. In the period that followed, however, it could no longer achieve growth. In 1909 Robert Geyer joined the AcAM with most of the members of the Old Apostolic Congregation .

Heinrich Geyer died on October 4, 1896 at the age of 78 in Hamburg.

literature

• Schröter, Johannes Albrecht: The Catholic Apostolic Congregations in Germany and the "Geyer Case". Tectum Verlag, 3rd edition 2004, ISBN 3-89608-814-9
• Obst, Helmut: Apostles and Prophets of Modern Times , Göttingen 2000, ISBN 3-525-55438-9
• Obst, Helmut: New Apostolic Church - the exclusive end-time church? , Neunkirchen-Vluyn 1996, ISBN 3-7615-4945-8

Web links

• Literature by and about Heinrich Geyer in the catalog of the German National Library