Bert Hellinger's controversial therapy by Herman Nimis, September 2005

[The following is a summary of 2 articles which originally appeared in the Dutch antifascist magazine Alert!, issues 1-2005 & 2-2005, see http://afa.home.xs4all.nl/alert/. The English translation of German booktitles- in brackets and italics- is unofficial since hitherto, all books mentioned in this article have appeared in German only.]

Bert Hellinger's so-called systemic constellations, which he commends as a therapy for problems within families and organizations, are now being offered in more than 25 countries all over the world; they are especially popular within esoteric and new age circles. Over half a million of his books and videos based on this sort of therapy, which is supposed to constitute a revolution in the field of psycho-therapeutics, have as yet been sold in these countries. Since a couple of years, Hellinger's own reactionary ideas have been under severe attack in his native country Germany, whereas hardly any criticism exists in other countries. German critics point out that Hellinger is not only attempting to set the clock back for decades or even centuries on achievements in contemporary society, but habitually also adopts a most humiliating attitude towards those who come to him for help. Worse still, he displays sympathy and compassion towards dictatorships such as Adolf Hitler's regime and his national-socialist movement. Most of Hellinger's co-written books and teachings dealing on these issues are available in German only. This critical article on H. - probably the first to have ever appeared in English - offers a brief review of his mode of therapy as well as a survey of critical reactions to his therapeutic methods.

A guild of would-be practitioners
Bavaria-resident Bert [= short for Suitbert] Hellinger is already 79 years old, yet still shows a remarkable activitity for his age. Furthermore, he does not deny his religious past. As a Roman-Catholic friar, he went to South Africa in 1953 and taught at missionary schools in the province of Natal. He also studied Zulu-rituals and group-dynamics. It has been said that he copied material from the late U.S. family-therapist Virginia Satyr, who displayed a more serious approach in her work. In the early 1970's, Hellinger left the order and resettled in Austria and Germany, where he set up a practice as a psychotherapist without the appropriate qualifications. In many European countries, psychotherapy is not officially recognized, causing a situation that furthers uncontrolled growth of indistinct legal status of the profession. H's followers-cum-practitioners present themselves as qualified, but might actually be would-be as they might have read only one of his books or seen only one of his videotapes and besides, Hellinger's readings do not match with regular concepts of psychotherapy at all.

Hellinger's methods formula to the solution of your problem may read as follows. Suppose you are suffering from a serious ailment or struggling with servere mental problems within your family or a relationship. Regular [psycho]therapeutic treatment has proved ineffective, and then you happen to hear about Bert Hellinger and his family constellations which, within a mere half hour or even shorter, will allegedly solve your problem for approx. 300,- Euros. During these sessions, a practitioner, not necessarily appointed by the official International Bert Hellinger Institut (1) [in Germany, the number of practitioners is estimated to exceed 2000, in Holland around 150], picks out -in agreement with the patient- a representative for each of his family members from an eager audience, occasionally amounting to more than 500 people. Following his instructions, these representatives perform a short role-play on stage, treating the problematical issue in form of a family constellation, whereupon something miraculous seems to happen: within a very short period, a 'solution' emerges which supposedly does away with all mutual intrigues and emotional disturbances. Hellinger bases this phenomenon on a so-called 'conscious field', an apparently imperceptible collective conscience of the entire family pattern. Hellinger's sympathizers claim an obvious link with the morphogenic fields of British biologist Rupert Sheldrake, whose theories however have met with considerable scepticism from other scientists. In order to add scientific flavour to Hellinger's doctrine, Sheldrake's questionable views have been adopted by the Hellinger-scene.

Patriarchism all over
Over the last 4 years, Hellinger's controversial ideas have confronted him with lots of criticsm in German-speaking countries, and this is gradually spreading to the Netherlands. Critics report that the Hellinger-like practitioners -in contrast to regular psychotherapists- generally lack solid training and consequently their therapies show a very amateuristic set-up. Intake interviews merely consist of a few sentences, and there is hardly any aftercare. Besides this, Hellinger displays in his therapies an authoritative approach and reverts to extremely old-fashioned moral standards, leaving hardly any freedom to his clients. One of the keystones in H.'s doctrine consists of the hierarchical structure within a family: a father is considered the irrefutable head, and his wife and children are at all times answerable to him and must under all circumstances obediently submit to his will, while the first-born child takes precendence over the younger ones. This hierarchy also applies to inhabitants of a country towards the head of state, and the summit of Hellinger's hierarchical ranks is fate: human beings should be aware that fate actually controls their lives and they have to submit to it.

From Hellinger's highly patriarchal viewpoint, family constellations dealing with matrimonial problems usually tend to conclude that the spouse has been disobedient to her husband, and that she was actually the one who had caused the problem. Obviously, feministic circles, after having achieved a liberal, self-determinative standard for women over the past decades, are far from happy with Hellinger's doctrine. Regarding homosexuality, Hellinger points out that within a family, a homosexual is generally regarded as an outcast and suffers from a very heavy fate. Proudly, Hellinger claimed that he had cured at least one person from this 'disease', who - after having participated in a family constellation - married a few months later and is now the happy father of a child.

A highly unprofessional scene

Incest isn't bad at all

An obscure form of mysticism
By the same token, Hellinger explicitly and invariably sides with the role of offenders during therapeutic sessions which centre around the latter and their victims. He goes even further on this issue, claiming that those who commit crimes - including war-criminals - are unable to act in any other manner since they are under orders of an authority 'from-on-high' that lies entirely beyond their influence. Basing himself on indeterminate cosmic laws and obscure mysticism, Hellinger proclaims that this authority makes use of human beings whose actions are inescapably determined by their destiny. Consequently, war criminals were unable to defy their duties as this authority was in complete control of them. Sixty years after the end of W.W.2, Germany is still suffering from feelings of guilt, which prompts Hellinger to induce the victims of the first and subsequent post-war generations to be grateful to their offenders instead of dealing with post-traumatical problems for years on end. In keeping with his habitual family constellations and incest-therapies, victims are told to perform a ritual of a similar kind: they must kneel down before those representing their malefactors and express their gratitude. Obviously, Hellinger met with strong criticism from German authorities, all the more so since the idea to end all discussions on war culpability is one of the main issues within the N.P.D., a German political party with outspoken leanings towards the extreme right, which over the last years has gained increasing public interest.

Winning the hearts and minds of managers
Meanwhile, pretentious expressions such as 'systemic constellations for organizations' serve to introduce H.'s therapies on a large scale into - mostly German - enterprises and institutions. Managers and business people in general are considered prone to therapy in order to weather the present economic incertitudes. Unfortunately, they are frequently oblivious of authentic scientific methods and instead are receptive to pseudo-therapies with alluring claims. Unable to tone this down to its real proportions, they tend to become impressed and overwhelmed by the current terminology on the H.-scene such as systemic ranks, morphogenetic fields, resonance, and chaos-theory.

Allegiance to resistance fighters is uncalled for
According to Hellinger, opposition against those so-called authorities-on-high is entirely futile, and resistance workers during W.W. II ought to have been aware that nothing could be undertaken against the desastrous phenomena within Hitler's Third Reich. In fact, they should have realized their failing beforehand. Only last year, Hellinger told a German audience, whilst guiding one of his family constellations: "In this country, a broad public opinion still exists that these nazi criminals were personally responsable for their acts and took decisions of their own free will and that they are therefore to be blamed for those crimes. But that is wrong, because at the time a stupendous force had enveloped them." Hellinger also proclaims that allegiance to resistance fighters against national-socialism - or any other dictatorial government such as the former Pinochet regime in Chile - is useless, wrong and actually based on ego-inflating self-deceit. One may well wonder why H. does not apply his own logic to these opponents of tyranny, considering that the latter may also be carrying out orders-from-on-high, albeit of a very different quality. [It would seem that in H.'s line of thinking, the powers of evil have supremacy over the powers of good, in so far as he willing to accept the existence of the latter]. According to H., the names of resistance fighters such as young Scholl and his sister who were murdered by the nazis should no longer be remembered and be scrapped from history books, since he supposes them to have also had lethal intentions. To top it all, Hellinger goes so far as to accuse these courageous people of lack of compassion towards their compatriots! (B) ! H. himself served as a soldier on the eastern front during W.W.II and admires the acts of his fellow-soldiers, considering them to be heroes as they also acted within the scope of a high and mighty authority. Following his line of reasoning, Hellinger shows deep admiration for the type of man who acts like a warrior and is prepared to serve as an implement of war. In his view, a martial attitude is a quality of true manhood, and 'soft sentiments' are entirely out of place in a male.

Hitler's mystic spot

How one of Hellinger's closest friends quitted

A dubious therapy
In the Netherlands, many of the new age and pychotherapeutic circles that apply Hellinger's formula prefer to ignore serious criticism from colleagues as well as vigilant authorities in Germany, whom they believe to have constituted a counter-movement as a reaction to the initial success of H.'s family constellations. Some even deny the facts, claiming that the H.-therapy deserves credit for its positive effects. Moreover, Hellinger's ideas seem to be catching on within regular psychotherapy. The following example illustrates this. In the Netherlands, incorrect public behaviour during the German occupation in W.W.II is still a current issue. Children and/or grandchildren of people who collaborated with the enemy are known to suffer under this knowledge. Consequently, a therapeutic institution was founded in an attempt to alleviate these people's problems. Yet it will come as a surprise that this institution also makes use of Hellinger's formula. Claiming that Hellinger's therapy grants his clients lots of freedom - which is contradicted by evidence - this institution named Herkenning [lit.: Recognition], relentlessly brushes aside all forms of criticism.

Whitewashing the incongruities
Yet another example shows how the Hellinger-elite tends to soft-pedal its own fallacies. In different interviews and during family constellations, Hellinger has made various anti-Semitic remarks. On one occasion, he ordered a woman of Jewish descent to confess to her husband, with whom she had matrimonial problems: "I am very glad that you married me in spite of me being Jewish." In his book Mit der Seele gehen [Conversing with the soul] (B) Hellinger quotes a Jewish teacher who deserted his faith: "Not until each and every Jew has remembered Adolf Hitler in his prayers, will the Jewish people come to terms with themselves." Another H.-quote is: "Europe would not have reached its present level if national-socialism had not occurred." In order to tone down some of H.'s anti-Semitic utterances, the H.-elite brought professor Haim Dasberg, chairman of the Israeli Center for Psychosocial Support of Holocaust Survivors and Second Generation, around to write a praising introduction to H.'s book Rachel weint um ihre Kinder [Rachel weeps for her children], published in 2004. To top it all, Dasberg was invited to speak as an eminent guest before the 5th International [Hellinger] Congress for System Constellations, named Pantha Rei [Everything flows], held at Cologne in May 2005 (8). Its programme revealed that Dasberg's lectures focussed on the German-Jewish past. Last year already, the FKP published an open letter (9), advising Dasberg to withdraw his participation in this congress. In spite of their warning, Dasberg went, thereby displaying unreliability and compromising the centre he is allied with.

Junkyard
Hellinger doubtlessly shows similarities with the new pope Joseph Ratzinger/ Benedictus XVI: his age, his faith, his region of descent [Bavaria] and some of his conservative attitudes, although the pope demonstrated during his visit to Cologne in August 2005 that he vehemently condemned anti-Semitism. This year, Hellinger will turn 80, bus this does not mean that his lifework will not be continued after his death. Among his elite are followers who profile themselves as extremely hard-core. It is to be hoped that the accumulating criticism will set these die-hards thinking, and that the latter will eventually face the facts and bear the consequences. According to the FKP, the H.-elite is wavering and is making fruitless attempts to press their issue through court proceedings. The present state of affairs undeniably shows that in the end, Hellinger's forms of therapy will land where they belong, namely on the junkyard of psychotherapy.