Josef Dvorak is an Austrian therapist, Catholic

Catholic

The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...

 theologian

Theology

Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

 (scholar of Karl Rahner

Karl Rahner

Karl Rahner, SJ was a German Jesuit and theologian who, alongside Bernard Lonergan and Hans Urs von Balthasar, is considered one of the most influential Roman Catholic theologians of the 20th century...

), author, and co-founder of the Viennese Actionism

Viennese Actionism

The term Viennese Actionism describes a short and violent movement in 20th century art that can be regarded as part of the many independent efforts of the 1960s to develop "action art" . Its main participants were Günter Brus, Otto Mühl, Hermann Nitsch and Rudolf Schwarzkogler. As "actionists",...

.

Work

For several years, Dvorak worked as a journalist for the Viennese

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

 newspapers Kurier

Kurier

The Kurier is an Austrian newspaper based in Vienna....

and Arbeiter-Zeitung

Arbeiter-Zeitung (Vienna)

For the Chicago anarchist newspaper, see Arbeiter-Zeitung The Arbeiter-Zeitung was started as a Socialist newspaper on July 12, 1889 by Victor Adler. The paper was banned in 1934 after the Feb. 13 issue , but reappeared on Aug...

. At least from the beginning of the 1960s, Dvorak worked in Vienna as a therapist. In this time he also got to know Otto Muehl

Otto Muehl

Otto Muehl is an Austrian artist, who is best known as one of the co-founders as well as a main participant of Viennese Actionism. In 1972 he founded the Friedrichshof Commune that existed for several years before falling apart in the 1990s...

, who conducted a conversation analysis

Conversation analysis

Conversation analysis is the study of talk in interaction . CA generally attempts to describe the orderliness, structure and sequential patterns of interaction, whether institutional or in casual conversation.Inspired by ethnomethodology Conversation analysis (commonly abbreviated as CA) is the...

 on Dvorak. At the end of the 1960s, Dvorak was an important intellectual source of inspiration for the left-winged Viennese student scene.

End of the 1970s, Dvorak claimed to have had an encounter with Satan

Satan

Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...

 while under the influence of LSD

LSD

Lysergic acid diethylamide, abbreviated LSD or LSD-25, also known as lysergide and colloquially as acid, is a semisynthetic psychedelic drug of the ergoline family, well known for its psychological effects which can include altered thinking processes, closed and open eye visuals, synaesthesia, an...

. After that, Dvorak retreated into a farmhouse in the Lower Austria

Lower Austria

Lower Austria is the northeasternmost state of the nine states in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria since 1986 is Sankt Pölten, the most recently designated capital town in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria had formerly been Vienna, even though Vienna is not officially part of Lower Austria...

n Waldviertel

Waldviertel

The Waldviertel is the northwestern region of the Austrian state Lower Austria. It is bounded to the south by the Danube, to the southwest by Upper Austria, to the northwest and the north by the Czech Republic and to the east by the Manhartsberg , which is the survey point dividing Waldviertel...

 and began celebrating “Satanic masses with plenty of naked flesh and blood” („Satanische Messen mit viel nacktem Fleisch und Blut“ )

In the 1980s, Dvorak celebrated a modification of English occult

Occult

The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus , referring to "knowledge of the hidden". In the medical sense it is used to refer to a structure or process that is hidden, e.g...

ist Aleister Crowley

Aleister Crowley

Aleister Crowley , born Edward Alexander Crowley, and also known as both Frater Perdurabo and The Great Beast, was an influential English occultist, astrologer, mystic and ceremonial magician, responsible for founding the religious philosophy of Thelema. He was also successful in various other...

’s Missa Phoenix in Burgenland

Burgenland

Burgenland is the easternmost and least populous state or Land of Austria. It consists of two Statutarstädte and seven districts with in total 171 municipalities. It is 166 km long from north to south but much narrower from west to east...

 and in Bremen

Bremen

The City Municipality of Bremen is a Hanseatic city in northwestern Germany. A commercial and industrial city with a major port on the river Weser, Bremen is part of the Bremen-Oldenburg metropolitan area . Bremen is the second most populous city in North Germany and tenth in Germany.Bremen is...

. These happening

Happening

A happening is a performance, event or situation meant to be considered art, usually as performance art. Happenings take place anywhere , are often multi-disciplinary, with a nonlinear narrative and the active participation of the audience...

s have been broadcasted on Austrian television and gained Dvorak the reputation of being close to Satanism himself.

Today, Dvorak calls himself a “Satanologist” and, as a free researcher and publicist, is particularly engaged in the history of psychoanalysis and the occult. In 1989 he wrote a book “Satanismus. Schwarze Rituale, Teufelswahn und Exorzismus, Geschichte und Gegenwart.” (“Satanism. Black rituals, devil obsession and exorcism, history and presence”).

Literature

• Josef Dvorak: Satanismus. Schwarze Rituale, Teufelswahn und Exorzismus, Geschichte und Gegenwart. Heyne, Munich, 1989. ISBN 3-453-17258-2