Nazism and Occultism - The Modern Mythology of Nazi Occultism - Claims of Nazi Occultism - Demonic Possession of Hitler

Demonic Possession of Hitler

For a demonic influence on Hitler, Hermann Rauschning's Hitler Speaks is brought forward as source, although most modern scholars do not consider Rauschning reliable. (As Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke summarises, "recent scholarship has almost certainly proved that Rauschning's conversations were mostly invented".) Similarly to Rauschning, August Kubizek, one of Hitler's closest friends since childhood, claims that Hitler—17 years old at the time—once spoke to him of "returning Germany to its former glory"; of this comment August said, "It was as if another being spoke out of his body, and moved him as much as it did me."

That Hitler was possessed by the devil is also believed by some members of the Catholic Church. Father Gabriele Amorth, an exorcist of the Vatican is "convinced that the Nazis were all possessed. All you have to do is think about what Hitler did. Almost certainly they were possessed by the Devil." There even are documents that state that Pope Pius XII tried to perform an exorcism on Hitler at a distance, but failed.

An article "Hitler's Forgotten Library" by Timothy Ryback, published in The Atlantic (May 2003), mentions a book from Hitler's private library authored by Dr. Ernst Schertel. Schertel, whose interests were flagellation, dance, occultism, nudism and BDSM, had also been active as an activist for sexual liberation before 1933. He had been imprisoned in Nazi Germany for seven months and his doctoral degree was revoked. He is supposed to have sent a dedicated copy of his 1923 book Magic: History, Theory and Practice to Hitler some time in the mid-1920s. Hitler is said to have marked extensive passages, including one which reads "He who does not have the demonic seed within himself will never give birth to a magical world." The quote was previously mistranslated as "a new world" in Ryback's article. An English translation of Magic is due June 2009.

Theosophist Alice A. Bailey stated during World War II that Adolf Hitler was possessed by what she called the Dark Forces. Her follower Benjamin Creme has stated that through Hitler (and a group of equally evil men around him in Nazi Germany, together with a group of militarists in Japan and a further group around Mussolini in Italy) was released the energies of the Antichrist, which, according to theosophical teachings is not an individual person but forces of destruction.

According to James Herbert Brennan in his book, Occult Reich, Hitler's mentor, Dietrich Eckhart (whom Hitler dedicates Mein Kampf to), wrote to a friend of his in 1923: "Follow Hitler! He will dance, but it is I who have called the tune. We have given him the 'means of communication' with Them. Do not mourn for me; I shall have influenced history more than any other German."