The Irlmaier prophecies, Part 1: The seer

Quoted from: Stephan Berndt, Alois Irlmaier – Ein Mann sagt, was er sieht. If you feel the first half of this post emphasises the Catholic side of things, you’d be right. As I mentioned, those interested in Catholic prophecy have discovered Irlmaier, but there are only limited translations available in English.
I left out Irlmaier’s work for the police or the trial against him (he was acquitted) as this blog series is about his prophecies. If you’re interested in those other things, let me know; and I’m sure there’s also plenty of information available on the internet.

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Alois Irlmaier was born on 8 June 1894 in Oberscharam near Siegsdorf south of Lake Chiemsee in Bavaria as the son of a farmer. In 1920 Irlmaier married his wife Maria and took over his father’s farm. Six years later, the farm burned to the ground. And with this misfortune began for Irlmaier and his family – he was the father of four children – a long period of economic hardship, until the Second World War. Partly as a result of this hardship, Irlmaier’s family moved to Siegsdorf, about 30 kilometres east of the Austrian border, at the end of 1928. There Irlmaier became known as a clairvoyant, and there he died on 26 July 1959.

If one believes the printed matter of the time and contemporary witnesses who are still alive today, Alois Irlmaier had a whole range of supernatural abilities. First of all, there was his ability to detect water veins with his bare hands and with such high reliability that he was later able to base his economic existence on the search for water. In the course of his life, he is said to have found thousands of water veins and springs and dug hundreds of wells. […] As a result of this activity, he travelled through many areas of his Bavarian homeland and beyond, and thus came into contact with many people in different regions. His activity as a dowser was thus an important prerequisite for him to become known in a larger area. In addition, for a long time he was also quite communicative about his other psychic abilities. So whoever called Irlmaier the water seeker got Irlmaier the seer at the same time.
It is less well known that Irlmaier could also sense illnesses and even long healed injuries. These two abilities – the water sensitivity and his sense for health problems – could still somehow be explained by a certain physical sensitivity. He crossed the border to the actual seer with his ability to „see“ the past, the present in a different place and above all the future.

Irlmaier stated in several interviews about the origin or first appearance of his seer-like ability that he had his first vision without any recognisable external cause in 1928, when he was staying with a client in the Salzburger Land. The Bayerische Landeszeitung wrote in 1949:

He related that in 1928 he was working as a well builder in Salzburg [in Kuchl, east of Berchtesgaden, note B.] and at that time he came to the home of his client. He was alone in the room and was looking at an old picture of Our Lady surrounded by 12 saints. And suddenly it happened! Suddenly he saw this painted Madonna smiling, the saints moving, and was scared to death. He thought he had fallen ill and had not spoken of this experience for a long time. But from that hour on, he was haunted by visions of images. He saw these supernatural images on the clouds, on the walls of houses and rooms and finally also in the open air, in front of which a wall of smoke appeared at the moment of the apparition. From year to year these visions became stronger and more frequent, and they occurred involuntarily and at random. This means that he can also „command“ his visions.

The Altbayerische Heimatpost wrote in 1949 on Irlmaier:

In the farmhouse parlour he saw a picture of the Virgin Mary which he liked from the first moment he saw it. „And as I look at it, Our Lady comes out of the frame and walks towards me and looks at me very sweetly, and then she goes back into the frame. Ever since then it’s been like that with me. – „By the way,“ he speaks softly, as if he’s telling a great secret, „by the way, only I know where the image is. When I realise that I’m done, I’ll have a chapel built around the image. And when it’s finished, I’ll die. I know that for sure.“

Altbayerische Heimatpost, 13 November 1949, p. 3

„I stood there like a block of wood,“ Irlmaier continues, „but since then I’ve been seeing this and that. Sometimes it’s deceased people in veil-like robes, sometimes it’s the Lord God on the cross and all kinds of holy things, without my wanting them.“

Münchner Merkur, 22/23 October 1949, p. 9

It is said in the literature that Irlmaier repeatedly called for prayer for the deceased. He did not simply „see“ the dead, but also perceived their state of mind and even – it is said – mediated between the living and the dead. In one case it is said that Irlmaier reconciled a living son with his dead father.

He lives in a wooden barrack near the railway station [Freilassing, note B.]. A wire fence gate, from which dangles a small sign reading: „Alois Irlmaier, well construction and installation“, leads into a courtyard surrounded by warehouses and covered with construction equipment, where a shaggy mutt jumps around barking viciously. Through a low, narrow door in one of the sheds, one enters Irlmaier’s „office“, a sleeper-cabin-like cabin that can squeeze three people in at best. A dusty ray of sunlight falls through a half-blind peephole. Otherwise the room is dark. But there is not the talmi-like, spooky atmosphere of a fortune-teller’s or „soothsayers‘ parlour“; instead, one feels as if one were in a modest farmhouse parlour.
Irlmaier sits bolt upright on a wooden chair and invites the visitor to take a seat on the rickety sofa opposite. He is a medium-sized, sturdy, simply rurally dressed man of 55, resembling a farmer or shepherd.

Münchner Merkur, 22/23 October 1949, p. 9

Apart from the fact that Irlmaier did not „live“ in the barracks as claimed above, but only received those seeking advice there, this description also corresponds to other sources […].
The most impressive proof of many people’s belief in Irlmaier’s abilities is the queue of people seeking advice that (with interruptions) stood in front of his property from the summer of 1945 until the spring of 1950 and not infrequently grew to 100 people or more. However, this number was only reached at weekends. There was also a time between 1946 and 1947 when there were no people waiting, as Irlmaier was forbidden to speak. […]
Of course, it is more effective for the public if well-known personalities are also mentioned by name. This happened in the case of General Clay’s sister. General Lucius D. Clay was military governor of the US occupation zone in Germany from 1947 to 1949 and initiator of the Berlin Airlift in 1948/1949. The Altbayerische Heimatpost wrote in November 1949:

One day, General Clay’s sister appeared at his house, in a grandly beautiful car, accompanied by her chauffeur and an American pressman – „a very fat one.“ [Irlmaier’s words, note B.] The lady from the USA was most astonished when Irlmeier described her house across the great water to her in all its details and told her various events from her life that were certainly not known to anyone else but her.
„She said I should travel around America, I could earn a lot of money there. But I’m staying here. I’m not leaving home. And I’m not so keen on money; you can believe me, I could already have earned a lot if I wanted to make a business out of it.“

Already during the war, as a result of word of mouth, Irlmaier was known as a seer not only in the Rupertiwinkel (the German region around his home in Freilassing), in the Salzkammergut (the part of Austria bordering Freilassing) and in the Chiemgau, but also in more distant German-speaking areas. This was mainly based on Irlmaier’s information about the fate of missing soldiers. In the final weeks of the war, another reason was added:
While south-eastern Bavaria was reasonably spared from major bombing until 1944, on 18 April 1945 – less than three weeks before the end of the war – Rosenheim came under particularly heavy attack. In the early afternoon, 200 bombers attacked the city’s railway station and completely destroyed it. A few hundred metres northeast of the station, under the Salin-Garten, a small city park, there was a larger air raid shelter (tunnel). Numerous witnesses later testified that Irlmaier had warned against being in the middle of the bunker at Salin-Garten.
Here is a corresponding report from the Altbayerische Heimatpost of November 1949:

A few days before the heavy bombing raid on Rosenheim, Irlmaier stayed in the town on the river Inn. On this occasion he described the coming disaster with pinpoint accuracy. Referring to the large bunker erected in the Salin Garden, he prophesied: „Those who are in the middle will get it; those who stay at the entrance will not get it.“ Word got around. When the aircraft roared over Rosenheim and the bombs fell, the people in the bunker actually moved away to the entrance tunnels, i.e. to where it was actually most dangerous. Only a few soldiers, mocking Irlmeier, stayed in the middle of the bunker. And it was there that a bomb fell and tore the soldiers apart; nothing happened to the other people.

Altbayerische Heimatpost, 6 November 1949, p. 8

In the report of the local air raid warden of 24 April 1945, which can still be viewed today in the Rosenheim municipal archives, 53 people were killed and 36 wounded in the attack of 18 April. Although the bunker is not explicitly listed under the heading „Buildings and Property Damage“, heavy bomb hits are noted on Kufsteiner Straße and Hindenburgstraße, which bordered Salin-Garten to the north and east and met at what was then the Staatsbank […]. Of the 53 dead, six are listed as members of the Wehrmacht. These six could have been „a few soldiers“ above.

Irlmaier had saved many people during the war by predicting which houses in Freilassing would fall victim to the bombs: „Everything will be blown away except the cellar! And yours will only have the windows smashed!“ The people of Freilassing laughed, but heeded his warnings and found out afterwards that the well builder had been right.

Alois Irlmaier, 1990, p. 61

Opinions of some priests about Irlmaier

While a young chaplain … only hesitantly revealed his divided opinion and finally referred to the rejectionist attitude of the Church in most cases of clairvoyance, a parish priest of a small village in the Chiemgau was much more open-minded and expressed his conviction that Irlmaier’s visions were to be judged as a gift from God, but should not be emphasised too much in the press and distorted with thickly applied paint. „Our good Irlmaier,“ he concluded, „is not a miracle man for the general public, but a believing Christian who wants to live righteously and be left in peace. The fact that our Lord God has given him a sharp inner eye must not be allowed to become a curse on him by elevating his person to the status of an idol of the superstitious people.“
[…]
We found less acceptable the opinion of a Capuchin monk interviewed on the street, who sees Irlmaier as a blasphemer, because he ascribes to himself qualities that are only given to a few, known gifted people. We had to refute him when he said that Irlmaier earned his money very easily with these „tricks“. „Do you know Irlmaier personally, that you can so easily pronounce the sentence on him and judge him as a rogue?“ – „No, I don’t know him, but what I read about the man in the press is quite enough for me.“
[…]
A dean of the Roman Catholic Church […]: „If we priests were given as much interest and faith as this Irlmaier … our pastoral work would truly be child’s play. Every good Catholic must give serious thought to the fact that believers themselves fail to obey the Church when they … hear about a person who is supposedly endowed with supernatural powers. … Of course, Irlmaier is not an atheist, he does not spread false doctrine, but, as I hear, he proves himself a good Catholic. […]“

A known, parapsychologically knowledgeable priest who has commented on Alois Irlmaier is the aforementioned Father Dr. Norbert Backmund (1907-1987) from the Windberg monastery in the Bavarian Forest. […]

Among Irlmaier’s prophecies are some that also invites our opposition. The cross in the sky visible to all, the three days of darkness … that a beautiful time will come afterwards, that figs and lemons will grow in our country, that people will all become pious and virtuous afterwards and that faith will regain its honour – I cannot quite believe all that. Alois, aren’t you mistaken? Haven’t you guessed wrong once again?

Hellseher schauen in die Zukunft, 1961, p. 46

„Guessing“ sounds like gambling or tossing a coin, „guessed wrong again“ like a 50% success rate. … „I can’t quite believe all this“ – well, that may be so. … But the three days of darkness and the subsequent religious renaissance in particular are also predicted by a number of other sources […]. So this is not about any special and strange predictions from the mouth of Alois Irlmaier.
The real kicker is that Norbert Backmund must have known that Irlmaier is not alone with these predictions – and that Norbert Backmund himself basically provides the proof. For in the list of sources in his book he himself lists several books from which it is quite clear that Irlmaier – especially about the three days of darkness and the religious renaissance – is by no means an exception in Christian-European prophecy with these predictions.

We now begin with one of the earliest publications of Irlmaier’s prophecies. It comes from the Altbayerische Heimatpost of 20 November 1949.

„I have already said that it is not very nice. There is still a lot of hardship coming on our country, but not just that, on our whole world. A third great war is quite certain, but I do not know when it will come; but one thing is quite certain, that it will not last long – I see a three … it may be only three days, it may be three weeks, it may be three months. But it certainly doesn’t last longer. And that’s the good thing, that it goes by so quickly.“

In later years Irlmaier seems to have been absolutely certain that a „third world war“ was coming. When he speaks here of a third great war being fairly certain, this can be said to be his expression at an earlier stage (here ten years before his death). Irlmaier thus openly admits that he does not know when the war will come. This honesty is typical of him. It happens again and again that Irlmaier describes certain visions or „visions“ and immediately remarks that he does not know what it means. Irlmaier repeatedly mentions the short duration of the war over the years. In general, he is very constant over the years in what he describes. No real change or significant modification in the description of his scenario is evident from the documents. And this concerns the period from at least 1949 until his death in 1959.

What does that mean: knowing something for sure? he asked back. – Whether that would be true or not, whether the war would come or not, he didn’t know that either. But he „sees it.“ And since he had already seen so much that later proved to be true, it was probably true. „Of course, one can also be mistaken. I can also be wrong. – I am only human.“ …
Finally, the man from Freilassing told us that „in the happy time“ there will be a temperature in Bavaria, especially in the southern part, that is like in Italy. „We will be able to harvest wine and even figs in the Oberland, and the industrious farmers will have two harvests. The people will all get along well and you will hardly hear an angry word.“

Altbayerische Heimatpost, 20 November 1949, p. 8

„I just say it the way I see it. Our Lord God can’t be messed with. But maybe he’ll allow me to take a look into his workshop. Whether everything will turn out as I tell you, I don’t know. If people don’t want to believe it, then they should simply leave it alone.“

Tatsachenberichte um Alois Irlmaier, 1952, p. 22

I do not know of a single quote in which Alois Irlmaier predicts a man like Mikhail Gorbachev – or German reunification. Only one statement by Irlmaier that I know of […] can be interpreted in the direction of the upheaval in Eastern Europe. However, in this case one can hardly speak of an „interpretation“. Irlmaier said:

„Over in the East there will come a great turnaround. […] It won’t happen so quickly, and there will be all kinds of fights beforehand, but it’s coming. He who no longer respects the cross has lost. And Stalin wants nothing to do with the cross. That’s exactly how it was with us in Germany, how the ‚higher-ups‘ left our Lord God, and that’s when the disaster happened.“

Altbayerische Heimatpost, 20 November 1949, p. 8

This quote from November 1949 sounds very much like the disintegration of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact. Don’t you think so? What else could it be? „won’t happen so quickly, and there will be all kinds of fights beforehand“ – that’s exactly what happened in the former Eastern Bloc. There was not one big war, but many smaller fights. Unrest, civil wars, overthrows and terrorism in many former Eastern Bloc countries, even an attempted coup in Moscow itself… You – dear reader – are now speculating that the „great turnaround in the East“ could be a scenario that will only take place sometime in the distant future? – Perhaps sometime after the „third world war“? Wrong! Irlmaier mentions a bloody but short (!) civil war in Russia immediately after the „third world war“. This can be clearly distinguished from the above „turnaround“ on the basis of the details described. This would result in the following chronological sequence:

1. turnaround in Russia – 2. Russia’s attack – 3. civil war in Russia.

For comparison, Irlmaier’s description of the civil war in Russia after the „third world war“:

But in the East a gruesome killing breaks out, the people clash among themselves. Then the Cross comes to honour again.

Ein Blick in die Zukunft, 1955, p. 94

And in Russia? A revolution breaks out there and a civil war. There are so many corpses that they can no longer be removed from the streets.

The Russian people believe in Christ again and the cross is coming back to glory. The great among the party leaders kill themselves and in the blood the long guilt is washed away. I see a red mass mixed with yellow faces, there is a general uproar and gruesome killing. Then they sing the Easter song and burn candles in front of black images of the Virgin Mary.

The bloodbath in Russia is, so to speak, the conclusion of a self-destructive process that the rulers in the Kremlin have initiated through the war. The bloodbath is then followed by a religious renaissance. All this is never, ever to be confused with what came with Gorbachev and after the „great turnaround“.

„They talk on the phone with the Zuban box. They also play with it. I don’t know what it is, but I see it very clearly.“

Zuban box? … Never heard of it! What is that? The lady’s answer: „Yes, just a cigar box.“ I thought to myself: „A bit too big for a mobile phone – but okay.“ Later I went on the internet: The German-Bavarian dictionary didn’t know any Zuban either. Shortly afterwards it turned out:
Zuban is the name of a Bavarian cigarette factory that was bought up by a competitor in 1928. But Zuban cigarettes continued to be sold until the 1950s. So the people Irlmaier „saw“ were using a cigarette pack to make phone calls. That makes sense – and is likely to be a mobile phone.
To get to the bottom of the matter, I looked on the internet to see what Zuban’s packaging looked like at the time. The first thing I found was a photo of a 50-gram tin box for tobacco, which in terms of shape roughly corresponds to some mobile phone models that came onto the market a few years before smartphones. […] On further searching, I then discovered a picture of a Zuban cigarillo box, brand „Hofparkett“. It leaves you gobsmacked. It really looks like a smartphone […].
A few months after the interview in the Allgäu, I discovered the following prediction in a book from 1959 that I had borrowed from the Bavarian State Library, which is attributed to a Sibyl of Prague from the 17th century (died 1658). This seer is said to have said about the people – so one reads in 1959:

I see them holding a small angular thing in their hands, which gives them information about everything they want to know.

Marcus Varena, Gesammelte Prophezeiungen, 1959, (source from 1951), p. 165

It is basically pointless to discuss now whether this statement originates from the 17th century or was only foisted on this source in the 1950s. Even in the 1950s there were no personal computers, no LCD displays, no mobile phones – not to mention the internet. […]

According to said lady, Alois Irlmaier also predicted tablet PCs:

With a black board they write, like with a typewriter.

[…] Irlmaier is also said to have foreseen credit cards:

You can pay (in later times) with a cardboard lid. You slide that into a little box. Then it works.

First it comes with the money. Nations go bankrupt because they don’t have any more money. … They never get themselves together… This leads to total poverty. It spills over from country to country. We will get total poverty, too. We won’t be spared.

Continuing from the lady’s notes:

There is a murderous tumult on the other side of the boot country (Italy). The desert countries are seeing a lot of unrest. People are shooting each other. The governments are being deposed and killed. The unrest goes from country to country.

As an aside, Irlmaier occasionally got the time wrong. The lady in the interview:

He also spoke of the open border (EU). … My father said – when I was in the first or second grade – my father was so far-thinking that he said: „The girl will have to learn French and other languages later anyway“;. Then Irlmaier said, „That’s quite good, because then there won’t be any more borders anyway. When I reach the age where you learn languages, there are no more borders… that is, at that time. … But that wasn’t true, that came later.

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Part 2: The signs
Part 3: The Third World War
Part 4: The yellow line and the three days of darkness
Part 5: The aftermath
Part 6: The Kurier text