Bert Hellinger is a German psychologist, psychotherapist, educator, theologian, and philosopher.

Hellinger was born in 1925 (birth name Anton Hellinger) in Germany to a Catholic family. At the age of five, B. Hellinger decided that he wanted to become a priest, and when he turned ten, his parents sent him to study at the Catholic monastic school of the Marianhill Order.

  1. In 1918, the boarding school was closed due to the prevailing political regime. Bert moved back in with his parents and went to a regular school. Bert Hellinger was seven years old when Adolf Hitler came to power. Due to his religious beliefs, National Socialism was not well received in the family circle, and the sixteen-year-old Bert joined a small Catholic youth association, which was banned at the time. He was declared an enemy of the state because of one statement he made during a job interview.
  2. In 1944, Bert Hellinger was mobilized into a Wehrmacht construction battalion. He survived the invasion of France and was taken prisoner by the Americans in Belgium in late 1944. However, he managed to escape from the prison camp a year later.

After returning to Germany, Hellinger reconnected with the Marianhill Order, entered the Würzburg Seminary, studied philosophy and theology, and became a priest. A year later, he was sent to South Africa as a missionary. At the same time, he continued his studies at the local university in English and pedagogy, and after graduation, worked as a teacher in the Zulu tribe, as the director of a missionary school. Eventually, he was appointed to lead all one hundred and fifty schools in the congregation.

Hellinger lived in South Africa for sixteen years. He learned to communicate in Zulu, participated in rituals, and gained local recognition. In his work, he constantly saw conflicts based on racial and religious differences. The Anglican Church sent psychologists and group dynamics specialists to the area to solve the problems. In these works, B. Hellinger first became acquainted with group psychotherapy methods, mastered them, and then led local seminars. In the mirror of representatives of other countries and religions, B. Hellinger saw his own isolation from the world. The question of one of the instructors turned out to be a turning point in his thinking and life: “What is more important to you — people or ideals? Which one and for what would you sacrifice yourself?” Hellinger realized that he had lost sight of people, and after the training, he changed his working style.

  1. In 1911, B. Hellinger was invited back from St. Marienthal to Würzburg, where he supervised psychotherapy groups as a supervisor at the pastor's seminary. After some time, he found that his knowledge in the field of psychotherapy was still insufficient and began studying psychoanalysis. After that, he decided to leave the clergy.

In the following years, he studied at the Vienna Association for Depth Psychology (Wiener Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Tiefenpsychologie/Viennese Association for Depth Psychology) with psychoanalysts R. Schindler and J. Shaked. The aforementioned association became the predecessor of the later Austrian Psychoanalytic Society (Vienna Psychoanalytic Society). B. Hellinger completed his studies in Munich (Münchner Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Psychoanalyse/Munich Psychoanalytic Training Institute). After graduation, he was accepted as an active member of the professional association.

Hellinger developed an interest in Gestalt therapy under Ruth Cohen and Hilarion Petzold. At this time, he also met Fanita English, who introduced him to the work of Eric Berne. With his first wife, Herta, he integrated Gestalt therapy, primal therapy with group dynamics and psychoanalysis, and life scenario theory. Also important was Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy's book Invisible Bonds, recognizing hidden loyalties, and the need to balance give and take in families.

Hellinger studied family therapy with Ruth McClendon and Leslie Kadis, where he first encountered family constellations.

Reading Jay Haley's article "The Perverse Triangle" led to the discovery of the importance of family hierarchy. This was followed by further work in family therapy with Thea Schonfelder and training in Milton Erickson's hypnotherapy and neurolinguistic programming (NLP). Frank Farelly's provocative therapy has also been a significant influence, as has Irena Precop's retention therapy. The most important element that Hellinger took from NLP was the emphasis on working with resources, not problems.

Hellinger's contribution is his unique integration of different elements. He does not claim to have discovered anything new, but there is no doubt that he has created a new integration.

Hellinger has said in an interview with Norbert Linz: “I am not convinced that constellations always reveal the objective historical truth about a family, but they reliably point to constructive changes.” In addition, Hellinger’s method allows for a greater “vision” that goes beyond the visible surface of reality, showing what is happening in its full context and full meaning.