Jean-François Lavère

Jean-François Lavère in 2017

A chemical engineer by profession, Jean-François Lavère has studied the work of Maria Valtorta for more than 30 years. Convinced that the historicity of Maria Valtorta's work could be demonstrated or found to be flawed by the numerous details contained within it, he undertook a systematic study of all the details provided by the work. Over several years, he methodically cataloged the data from the work in various fields (arts, astronomy, fauna and flora, ethnology, geography, geology, history and geopolitics, techniques, metrology, religions, social sciences, …).

Bruno Perrinet, founding president of the Maria Valtorta association and longtime friend, presents him as follows in the traveling lectures he gives:

"In 2003, Jean-François Lavère tried to convince his wife that Maria Valtorta's work was not authentic but rather invented by a woman with a great imagination. Maria Valtorta was, after all, paralyzed, bedridden; how could she have specified thousands of details other than by personal invention? Jean-François Lavère thus set out to systematically demonstrate the deception of the descriptions. To his great surprise, the more he searched, the more he realized that the details were not only perfectly precise but corresponded to reality.

He methodically cataloged, over the years, the data from the work in fields as varied as arts, astronomy, fauna and flora, ethnology, geography, geology, history and geopolitics, techniques, metrology, religions, social sciences, …

His studies today contribute to confirming the supernatural nature of the work, attesting to the authenticity of the visions."

Encounter with the Work of Maria Valtorta

In the booklet that recounts his encounter with Mgr René Laurentin, the latter questions him about the circumstances of this encounter:

"R.L.: When did you start reading Maria Valtorta?

J-F.L: In 1982 or 1983, on the advice of a priest friend. He strongly recommended this reading to my wife and me. Having already read the work three times, and holding a doctorate in theology, he was able to confirm its doctrinal orthodoxy. Then, he suggested that I take a scientific look at this work, as he had already proposed to historian Jean Aulagnier.

R.L.: But that was a time when you still had a job?

J-F.L: I was indeed still active at that time. As an engineer, I was a project manager for turnkey plant construction. Later I realized that this multidisciplinary activity would be very useful to approach Maria Valtorta's work in the most objective and methodical way possible.

R.L.: And is it since your retirement that you began making these systematic classifications and verifications of Maria Valtorta?

J-F.L: I started a little before retirement but in a non-systematic way. Since 2004, I devote four to five hours daily to study.

R.L.: What is the focus of your research?

J-F.L: To systematically test the truthfulness of all the material details contained in this work."

A little further, Jean-François Lavère explains his working method illustrated with a few examples:

"R.L.: Besides chronology, what are your other research focuses?

J-F.L.: My goal was to verify in the work all material data that could be verified. So my research is truly multidisciplinary. For example, if a village or a monument is described, I try to find its historical mention, or its location if any traces remain today. When Maria Valtorta describes the synagogue of Corozaïn, and says it is black, we can verify today both the existence of this synagogue and that the archaeological remains of the site are basalt, but that was still unknown in 1944!

So, everything that could be verified, I systematically enter it into a database. I seek the location of all the geographical sites described (there are about 450 in the work); I try to find historical traces of some 750 to 800 characters; I verify fauna, flora, craft techniques, Jewish or Roman customs, the plausibility of the characters' movements, currencies, units of measurement, even sociocultural evocations... I aim to verify everything except what is totally outside my field of expertise, like exegesis or medicine."

[...]

R.L.: According to what criteria do you classify all the studied data?

J-F.L.: Depending on the result of the analysis, I assign them a qualifier selected from a list of eight possibilities: Exact; Coherent; Decisive; Possible; Improbable; Illogical; False; Unresolved."

[...]

R.L.: And during your verifications, have you found errors in this work?

J-F.L.: After verifying more than 8,000 pieces of information, I found very few. But being a work written by a human hand, it naturally includes some imperfections inherent to human nature. It is easy to distinguish between Jesus' words, always exact, and the impressions of the author Valtorta, which sometimes prove imprecise or inaccurate. Like when she says "on a beautiful winter day," while chronology clearly shows the scene takes place in autumn. Incidentally, Maria Valtorta is aware of her own limits. For example, estimating the width of the Jordan at 20 meters, she adds, "Do not take my figures as gospel truth"… Or believing she sees a screwdriver, which would be anachronistic, she immediately adds "as it seems to me."

R.L.: Are there other scientific fields where you made findings we have not yet discussed?

J-F.L.: Of course, many other fields! I could mention knowledge of ancient architecture, or that of Roman and Hebrew calendars. In the work, the delicate subject of embolismic years, those 13-month years that allowed realigning the lunar cycle with the solar cycle of the seasons, is mentioned and perfectly taken into account.

We should also mention information related to Jewish customs, like the presence of ten witnesses (the minyan), during the age of majority examination…

[...]

R.L.: So continue your daily studies on the historicity of Maria Valtorta and publish them as I suggest, in annotated notes on every chronological, archaeological, historical detail... that you continue to find daily."

Works and Publications

Articles

• 2010 - series of articles published in "Chrétiens magazine" on the remarkable knowledge of Maria Valtorta. Examples: The flight into Egypt (Matharaea) - Investigation in Phoenicia (Alexandroscene) - Did Maria Valtorta go to Antioch in Syria … at the time of Jesus? - A surprising panorama (Judea) in the center of Judea - The ascent of Adomin - The parable of the mustard seed - The Nazirite vow - etc.
• 2018 - he wrote 80 short articles for the website Valtorta.fr, justifying the remarkable knowledge of Maria Valtorta.

Publications

• 2010 - The Valtorta Enigma, Volume 1. Scientific and historical approach to some major questions, RSI ed., reissued in 2017. Translated into Italian and English.
• 2012 - Dictionary of Gospel Characters according to Maria Valtorta, in collaboration with René Laurentin and François-Michel Debroise, Salvator ed. Biographical and historical entries of more than 700 characters mentioned by Maria Valtorta.
• 2014 - The Valtorta Enigma, Volume 2, RSI ed., 2014. Scientific and historical approach to The Gospel as It Was Revealed to Me.
• 2017 - Geographical Dictionary of the Gospel according to Maria Valtorta, RSI ed. Descriptive entries of places, monuments, and peoples mentioned in the Work.
• 2017 - Investigation on the Events Concomitant to the Resurrection of Jesus, two-part study on the coherence of the four gospel accounts of the morning of the Resurrection. Freely downloadable: 1) Investigation on the Events Concomitant to the Resurrection of Jesus (PDF) - 2) Timed analysis of movements (PowerPoint).
• 2021 - Investigation on the Dating of the Life of Jesus. Illuminated by the study of the gospels and the writings of Maria Valtorta, CEV ed. Summary booklet of the author's work on the subject.

Works

• 2014 - He is the author of the reconstruction of the Face of the suffering Christ based on that of the Shroud of Turin and that of Veronica’s veil (Holy Face by Domenico Fetti). Only three points of overlap sufficed for him to obtain this portrait.

• Ongoing: Jean-François Lavère has been working for several years with a team of researchers (theologians, exegetes, specialists of the work) on the annotated translation of The Gospel as It Was Revealed to Me and the related dictionary integrating the 24,000 remarkable data collected to date. Expected edition date: 2030.

Conferences

Jean-François Lavère has given only one public conference.

2018 - Tours
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In a Christian sense, study concerning God and divine things in the light of Revelation.

Analysis of the historical, cultural, and literary context of Biblical texts to better understand what they meant at the time they were written and how they can be interpreted today.

People who analyze the historical, cultural, and literary context of Biblical texts to better understand what they meant at the time they were written and how they can be interpreted today.