Johann Joseph Gassner

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Johann Joseph Gaßner on an engraving by Franz Xaver Jungwirth . Text: Do you want to see Mr. Gaßner / Drawn right to life / Look here! d 'Lander can of course give him to you.

Johann Joseph Gaßner (born August 22, 1727 in Braz / Klostertal near Bludenz in Vorarlberg , † April 4, 1779 in Pondorf (now part of Kirchroth , Lower Bavaria) near Regensburg ) was an Austrian - German Roman Catholic clergyman, theologian, exorcist and Faith healer .

Life

He studied theology with the Jesuits in Innsbruck and Prague, was ordained a priest in 1750, in 1751 the office of early messenger in Dalaas and in 1758 the parish in Klösterle am Arlberg. Most diseases attributing the influence of evil spirits, he moved here to hell incantations by blessing jurisdictions and prayers and made for the purpose with the permission of the bishop of Constance even travel to Constance, where this however convinced of Gassner charlatanism and dismissed him to his parish . In 1774 Gaßner had found refuge with Honorius Roth von Schreckenstein in the prince abbey of Kempten / Allgäu and wrote there at the time of the last witch trial in Germany against Anna Maria Schwegelin his programmatic text "Useful lessons against the devil". In 1774, however, he was called by Bishop Anton Ignaz von Fugger-Glött of Regensburg to Ellwangen and later to Regensburg and there was an indescribable influx from Bohemia , Austria , Bavaria , Swabia , Franconia , and even from the Lower Rhine provinces.

The healing of both the "missed", i.e. H. Those plagued by illness, as the “possessed”, ie the otherwise healthy, he carried out by means of exorcism until Emperor Joseph II intervened in 1777 and ordered Gassner to leave Regensburg. The bishop, who had appointed him his court chaplain with the title of a spiritual councilor, referred him to the parish of Pondorf as compensation, where Johann Joseph Gaßner spent his old age as dean and died unnoticed.

Peter Lenk's Gaßner figure in Meersburg

reception

The writings published about him form the content of the magic library (Augsburg 1776). His cures were defended by Eschenmeyer in Kieser's magazine for animal magnetism . Even Johann Kaspar Lavater had found worthy of the greatest attention. In any case, Gassner proceeded unselfishly and probably believed in his cures himself.

Peter Lenk set a monument to Johann Joseph Gaßner with a figure from his Magic Column in Meersburg . Gaßner had performed miraculous healings in Meersburg in the summer of 1774. B. got a lame chaplain running. The sculpture shows Gaßner standing on four feet on a pedestal, surrounded by gawking citizens, how he drives out the evil spirits - little devil figures - in the form of bowel winds. The figure next to Gaßner, who looks up to the sky with a raised crucifix, represents Bishop Franz Konrad von Rodt , who resides in Meersburg and who, like Franz Anton Mesmer , was not very pleased with the spectacle.

literature

Web links

Wikisource: Johann Joseph Gaßner  - Sources and full texts
Commons : Johann Joseph Gaßner  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Behringer, Wolfgang :: The "Bavarian witch war". The debate at the end of the witch trials in Germany (in: The end of the witch persecution. Stuttgart 1995, pp. 287-313) . S. 310 .
  2. ↑ Werner E. Gerabek : Gaßner, Johann Joseph. In: Werner E. Gerabek, Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 460.
personal data
SURNAME Gassner, Johann Joseph
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian-German Roman Catholic clergyman, exorcist and faith healer
DATE OF BIRTH August 22, 1727
PLACE OF BIRTH Braz near Bludenz , Vorarlberg
DATE OF DEATH April 4, 1779
Place of death Pondorf (today part of Kirchroth , Lower Bavaria)