Ernst Issbernerhaldane

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German-Australian professional astrologer, palmist, yoga teacher and occultist, an advocate of scientific astrology. He was the author of books on astrology and palmistry. His most famous work, which explores hand and nail diagnostics, is still used today. Its German title Wissenschaftliche Handlesekunst (Chirosophie) auf Grund gereinigter alter Quellen und 20jähriger eigener Studien und praktischer Erfahrungen im In- und Auslande translates as "The Scientific Art of Hand-reading (Chirosophy) on the basis of purified old sources and 20 years of studies and practical experiences at home and abroad." First published in Berlin in 1921, the book was republished in 1925, 1932, 1982, and 1986. In 1991, it was republished under the title Die wissenschaftliche Handlesekunst – Chirosophie. Die Weisheitslehre der Hand (The Science of Hand-reading, 'Chirosophie': Learning the wisdom of the hand). Issberner-Haldane lived in Kolberg until he was 18, then moved to his uncle's in Berlin, where he worked in the tobacco trade and was trained as a merchant. In 1910 he emigrated via Suez (Egypt) and Colombo (British Ceylon) to the then British Dominion of Australia. In Ceylon he met Indian prophets, yogis and fakirs whose esoteric practices and ideas inspired him. For two years, Issberner-Haldane worked on various farms in southern Australia and became an Australian citizen. During a trip through South America, he began writing a book on chiromancy. He supposedly made friends in the highlands of Peru with the travelling Persian sage "Devasvara Lama", whose esoteric teachings he recorded. After a renewed stay in Australia, he left in 1914 again, planning to travel via Germany to the United States. At a stopover in Ceylon, he met a yogi who introduced him to teachings on the human aura and reportedly showed him images of his life from earlier incarnations. When Issberner-Haldane arrived in Germany, he was interned because of his Australian citizenship; on 4 August 1914 Australia had entered the First World War against the German Reich and its allies. Until the end of the war in 1918, he stayed in various internment camps. Afterwards he moved to Berlin, where he practised as a palm reader (Chiromant), yoga teacher and graphologist, and wrote on these subjects. The concepts described by him under the titles "Hatha, Rāja, Karma, Bhakti and Jnāna Yoga" were later criticized as a "self-knit" or "self-woven" doctrine that does not tie in with Indian sources. Handpicking from these sources he developed the idea that internal diseases, inclinations and personality traits mapped on the hands, especially the fingernails, could provide medical hand and nail diagnostics, which could be incorporated into alternative medical practice. This became the gist of his standard book on Chirology. Issberner-Haldane co-founded the Berlin occultist group "Svastika-Zirkel" in 1920, which included the astrologer Wilhelm Wulff, who later advised the National Socialist (Nazi) Reich Interior Minister Heinrich Himmler. In 1925 Issberner-Haldane became acquainted with the Ariosophical author and publisher Herbert Reichstein, in whose publishing house he would later specialize in esoteric literature. In 1927 Issberner-Haldane, under the religious name "Fra Yvo," joined the New Order of the Ariosopher Jörg Lanz von Liebenfels, whom he admired as a "genuinely Aryan genius" and whose projects he promoted. In 1933, together with Reinhold Ebertin he founded the Geistige Front ("Spiritual Front"), an association of Characterologists, excluding the "Jews or other racially inferior persons, the physically malformed or crippled (except invalids), charlatans, quacks as well as persons who are to be regarded as unreliable." In 1933, he also joined the NSDAP (Nazi Party). In 1934 he published in the anti-Semitic weekly Der Stürmer. His racist remarks focused on Jews as alleged threats to "Aryan" values. Yoga was classified by him in a racist context, since he urged his followers never to engage in intermarriage with "lower races". In his 1928 book, Yogha-Schulung für westliche Verhältnisse (Yoga training for western conditions), he declared that this work was suitable "only for the Aryan, the light race," and by no means for "Negroes, Mongols and half-Negroes (Jews), and outspoken bastard people of mixed race." He also found an anti-Gypsy "explanation": palmistry had come into the possession of "Gypsies" who, as "born criminals", "parasites" and "charlatans", were unable to discern the "grandeur of this science" which they "abused for their own benefit." Issberner-Haldane also commented on the existence of extraterrestrial and demonic beings, and he developed a cultural-theoretical view of Atlantis. The racial and racist thoughts in his writings did not prevent the National Socialist (Nazi) regime from banning his writings, such as his autobiography Der Chiromant (1925) and the books Menschen und Leute (1927) and Handschriftendeutung ("Manuscript Interpretation," 1928). In 1940, more of his works were prohibited. Furthermore, Issberner-Haldane was arrested in a Nazi raid on leading astrologers and other occultists, becoming one of more than 300 detainees. He then spent four years in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. After the Second World War, new editions were published of Issberner-Haldane's works, with Ariosophical and racist passages removed, although not always completely. After 1945, he published a few new works, attributed at least until 1961 under the title of 'professor honoris causa' at an unknown university. Issberner-Haldane died in 1966 in Frankfurt am Main. His wife, Rita Issberner-Haldane, who survived him, also practised palm reading and graphology and published works on these subjects. Link to Astrowiki (German)