Förvandlande ögonblick. Gudsuppenbarelser i vår tid

In English This study is based on questionnaires, letters, and short biographies written by 92 ordinary Swedish citizens. Most of them had visions of Jesus or of angels and "divine light". The questionnaires focus on changes concerning religious activity, attitude towards the Bible, concept of God and religious orientation. The author has chosen to describe 35 cases in the form of short biographies (4-6 pages), integrating both quantitative and qualitative data. Since more than 90% of all informants mentioned a crisis prior to the religious vision, the author focuses his study on the relationship between life-crisis and religious vision. The author presents a model of personality, based on ego-psychology, according to which religious visions can be regarded as autosymbolic representations of intrapsychic conflicts. Visions of Jesus, angels, or the divine light, are symbolic representations of order, as against chaos. In almost all cases the vision brings an end to the life-crisis, end chaos, and establishes order.