08-21-2016, 02:48 PM
An Overview of the Gurdjieff Books for Law of One Students:
Beelzebub’s Tales to his Grandson or, An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man,
This series was written after a serious car accident which prevented Gurdjieff from teaching in the way he had planned using more physically based exercises. It was translated by many of his students, read aloud in groups, and many parts were re-written before it published at the time of his death in 1949.
Readers today should take into account several things before beginning with this one. Much of this tome was put together in the late twenties, a period where the attention of elite intellectuals was paramount to being heard in the discussion of spiritual awakening. These were people whose ideas were rarely put into question, and whose willpower had been weakened by the economic boom of the early twentieth century. Snarkyness and sarcasm were all-the-rage… people were ready to hear something shocking; if they did not, the book would have flopped.
Gurdjieff, prepared for this, also wanted to write it in such a way as to make the mind focus longer than is usual to communicate a single thought with a sentence. In this way the reader would improve his or her ability to hold attention. The allegory tells of an ancient rich history of our solar system and our planet, with many detailed chapters on subjects such as art, war, and our lasting conscience. It is for those who have a good intellect, who can appreciate the exercise of the attention span and the humor of the wanderer whose compassion for the hapless three-brained-beings of planet earth at times could use a belly laugh. It may be read just casually at first and if the desire surfaces to look deeper, then read again for clarity of the exquisite metaphor.
Meetings With Remarkable Men
This is simply a loose autobiographical series. It is much easier to read. Many people suggest reading this book first to see if you are really interested in devoting the time that it takes to read the first series.
Life Is Real Only Then, When 'I Am"
This series is for the reader of today with no particular interest in the above considerations. It gets to the heart of The Work and gives actual exercises and advice to the fellow seeker. In this series we finally see a little bit of the humility of Gurdjieff, and we feel that a genuine connection has been made with the source of the material which has been brought to us through the long sacrifice and dedication of those in the spiritual work before the time of the author and his books.
There are an inordinate number of books ABOUT Georges Gurdjieff, including the most popularized In Search of the Miraculous, by P.D. Ouspensky, who based his entire career on studying Gurdjieff’s ideas.
The books which actually flesh out the life and ideas of G. in an elegant and impeccable way were written by John Bennett.
Bennett was a mathematician, chemist, and a brilliant speaker of many languages who also studied various cultures and spiritual traditions. His magnum opus is The Dramatic Universe. It is an unparalleled mathematical proof of the existence of a divine creator and extraterrestrial intelligence, with an explanation of how we can verify and actualize the information for ourselves. (There are two versions of book 1, a short one and a long one - I read the short one first).
The beauty of the Bennett work is that all of his lectures were recorded and are available in many formats. Some of them make the most comforting companions as books, as Bennett was an incredibly eloquent speaker and his comedic timing is outstanding.
The Ouspensky books convey a hopelessness about our spiritual development that is entirely dependent on working in a “fourth way school”. It is difficult to see through his despair, but if your spirit is in joy, there is something to be learned there about the mechanism of the moving-emotional-intellectual centers and their chemistry.
Any others are no better than the gossip magazines of today - which may be of interest in the waiting room or hair salon- but not elsewhere.
Beelzebub’s Tales to his Grandson or, An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man,
This series was written after a serious car accident which prevented Gurdjieff from teaching in the way he had planned using more physically based exercises. It was translated by many of his students, read aloud in groups, and many parts were re-written before it published at the time of his death in 1949.
Readers today should take into account several things before beginning with this one. Much of this tome was put together in the late twenties, a period where the attention of elite intellectuals was paramount to being heard in the discussion of spiritual awakening. These were people whose ideas were rarely put into question, and whose willpower had been weakened by the economic boom of the early twentieth century. Snarkyness and sarcasm were all-the-rage… people were ready to hear something shocking; if they did not, the book would have flopped.
Gurdjieff, prepared for this, also wanted to write it in such a way as to make the mind focus longer than is usual to communicate a single thought with a sentence. In this way the reader would improve his or her ability to hold attention. The allegory tells of an ancient rich history of our solar system and our planet, with many detailed chapters on subjects such as art, war, and our lasting conscience. It is for those who have a good intellect, who can appreciate the exercise of the attention span and the humor of the wanderer whose compassion for the hapless three-brained-beings of planet earth at times could use a belly laugh. It may be read just casually at first and if the desire surfaces to look deeper, then read again for clarity of the exquisite metaphor.
Meetings With Remarkable Men
This is simply a loose autobiographical series. It is much easier to read. Many people suggest reading this book first to see if you are really interested in devoting the time that it takes to read the first series.
Life Is Real Only Then, When 'I Am"
This series is for the reader of today with no particular interest in the above considerations. It gets to the heart of The Work and gives actual exercises and advice to the fellow seeker. In this series we finally see a little bit of the humility of Gurdjieff, and we feel that a genuine connection has been made with the source of the material which has been brought to us through the long sacrifice and dedication of those in the spiritual work before the time of the author and his books.
There are an inordinate number of books ABOUT Georges Gurdjieff, including the most popularized In Search of the Miraculous, by P.D. Ouspensky, who based his entire career on studying Gurdjieff’s ideas.
The books which actually flesh out the life and ideas of G. in an elegant and impeccable way were written by John Bennett.
Bennett was a mathematician, chemist, and a brilliant speaker of many languages who also studied various cultures and spiritual traditions. His magnum opus is The Dramatic Universe. It is an unparalleled mathematical proof of the existence of a divine creator and extraterrestrial intelligence, with an explanation of how we can verify and actualize the information for ourselves. (There are two versions of book 1, a short one and a long one - I read the short one first).
The beauty of the Bennett work is that all of his lectures were recorded and are available in many formats. Some of them make the most comforting companions as books, as Bennett was an incredibly eloquent speaker and his comedic timing is outstanding.
The Ouspensky books convey a hopelessness about our spiritual development that is entirely dependent on working in a “fourth way school”. It is difficult to see through his despair, but if your spirit is in joy, there is something to be learned there about the mechanism of the moving-emotional-intellectual centers and their chemistry.
Any others are no better than the gossip magazines of today - which may be of interest in the waiting room or hair salon- but not elsewhere.