Comments on: Eckankar & Scientology

By: Occult Investigator » Eckankar from the Inside

Occult Investigator » Eckankar from the Inside — Tue, 26 Jul 2005 15:36:06 +0000

[...] de

A read named Mark emailed me the following response to my piece comparing Eckankar to Scientology: I have read several of your comments and I would lik [...]

By: Occult Investigator

Occult Investigator — Wed, 29 Jun 2005 01:02:26 +0000

thanks! that’s a great connection

By: hebrides

hebrides — Tue, 28 Jun 2005 20:51:59 +0000

Eckankar is actually more of a plagiarization of a modern, Indian gnostic movement called Radhasoami or Sant Mat, which I’ve been intrigued by and reading about for the past four years or so. The definitive book on that tradition from an social anthropological persepective is “Radhasoami Reality” by Juergensmeyer (don’t quote me on the spelling) and Lane. In regards to Eckankar and Radhasoami, David Lane’s book “The Making of a Spriritual Movement” is the best and it really sticks in the craw of the Eck organization. You can find it on his website: http://elearn.mtsac.edu/dlane/2005index.htm. The Radhasomi guru Twitchell studied with and plagiarized was named Kirpal Singh–but there are tons of professed Radhasoami Masters to this day who tend to try to claim themselves as the one true master, though this isn’t true for all.
Definitely check out Radhasoami for the gnostic connection. They call the Demiurge Kal or Kal Naranjan and I suspect Kal may be related to the Hindu god Kali, though I’ve yet to find anything definitive to say so with certainty. Basically, the movement teaches a method of triggering out of body experiences through meditating on a set mantra of five “holy names” that only initiates receive (but if you read some of the older literature from the group out of Beas, India, you can figure out what the five names are)…if you meditate on these names with enough focus on your third eye you will hear the holy “Nam,” which is the Sound of the true god (Radhasoami) who exists above and beyond all the gods of the various world religions, who they see as tools or manifestations of Kal aimed at keeping you safely bound to the material world. Anyway, you follow this divine sound out of your body and through various higher dimensions until you attain union with the one true god and/or have an internal vision of the Radhasoami Master. On that last point, you can see where having this experience doesn’t necessarily prove anything other than that you’ve attained a very powerful hypnotic trance, especially since Radhasoami’s tend to have pictures of their guru all over the place…(Is it a surprise then that they see this guy in their astral travels?) Big long ramble, but thought it might interest you.

By: tom

tom — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 19:59:45 +0000

any attempt at systemization of occult process always results in this hodge-podge of subjrct-object blurring of planes; and paul twitchell is a fine example of a man’s iconoclatic synthesis and attempted systemization of his discoveries in terms of eck; which in my opinion is where they all go wrong’ l. ron hubbard, theosophy, etc. must of necessity be incomplete as so much depends on the unique constitutions and occult vitalities of their proponents. the truth rests with the adept and is in no way a democratizable phenomena that all can partake of through writings, etc. in the absence of the power bearer. for this reason all that is the successive chain of their particular currents as this or that occult teaching, is by it’s very nature a blind, for the only priority is man’s own self un-doing, or deconstruction for the sake of transformation, initiation, regeneration, enlightenment etc. and for this reason will forever and always be a secret art; a royal art priveledged of few, though desired of all.

By: Occult Investigator » She Seems Happy Enough…

Occult Investigator » She Seems Happy Enough… — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 19:46:43 +0000

[...] chemical Braindamage (excellent blog, by the way) left a rather keen comment earlier on my Eckankar post: I think itâ€™s very telling that the only criteria that seems [...]

By: zacharius

zacharius — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 18:40:40 +0000

Thanks, Tim. Just completed a long post on the subject over here…

goldenbraid.blogspot.com

BAM!

By: Occult Investigator

Occult Investigator — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 18:36:55 +0000

These are all great points. I especially like what Zacharius has said up here about how it seems like we’re only left with “does the person seem happy” as a way of objective criteria to find out the worth of their path. It goes back to an earlier point I made, but I’ll try to rehash them both together in a separate post. Great conversation!

By: Fell

Fell — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 17:18:04 +0000

Yeah, I am on the fence with this, I suppose. How does one exactly go about and claim that it’s a “fake”? I’m not saying I support Eckankar, I have issues with it just from seeing what I had in person, but overall it’s members genuinely seem educated in metaphysics and perform their own trance and meditation works, and generally lead a happy and peaceful life.

My issues was with my friend’s seeming inability to to allow her to explore the entire gamut of human emotion, anger being one of them. However, now I look back and she may have been the wiser of the two of us. We are as we like to program ourselves, and she wasn’t stupid in regards to that in any way, so her embrace of love and forgiveness was her path to exploring her new paradigm and letting those powers emenate from her, in turn affecting her reality.

I’ll never know, she doesn’t speak with me anymore. She was an inspiration to me in beauty and love, though, so regardless of her “system,” she has all the respect in the world from me.

Like David said, there are so many errors and muck-ups in occult translations, and so many new authors spewing this and that, it can be difficult just for someone to get their foothold in it all. I don’t consider the occult a religion at all, it’s a objective approach to working with internal machinations (which can, in turn, affect perceived “outer” machinations, blah, blah, blah). I am not well-educated on Scientology, but I know the Eckists have their methods for exploring their inner-space and working with very similar concepts as seen in popular occultism and dream work.

By: David

David — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 15:40:54 +0000

Then again I’ve heard there are also a lot of “blinds” in many occult books such as the writings of Aleister Crowley, i.e. misinformation intended to make you go through the work and learn things for yourself. Blinds can be useful too.

By: zacharius

zacharius — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 13:26:05 +0000

I’ve met a couple of eckists as well, and they seemed like very nice, if somewhat softheaded people.

the earlier comment points out what i think is the crucial detail. I have no reason to doubt that eck is a benign fraud of a true intitiatory tradition, but it’s still a fraud, and I think it’s very telling that the only criteria that seems to hold up for a ‘worthwhile religion’ these days is whether it makes you a ‘nice person’. not to criticise the person above at all, but it’s a sentiment I’ve come across time and again.

I can only think it’s a symptom of so much nonsense and hokum out there, and paucity of real gnosis.

If I were feeling conspiratorial I’d put eck in the same category with all the psuedo-initiatic bunk that purports to be a path, but really acts to disable and pacify true seekers, and wonder further what might be behind the sheer weight of disinformation out there.

By: Fell

Fell — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 09:27:08 +0000

Interesting you bring this up. I’ve actually met more Eckists (as they refer to themselves) here in Alberta than I have Scientologists. I had a dear and beautiful friend of mine from high school that was raised Eckist, which I lost due to her uncomfortability with my devout interest in the occult and “darker side of things.”

She was quite loyal to the ECK, as her keychain illustrated, and volunteered in camps and other events to guide other children in youth events under the banner of Eckankar. However, cult phobias aside, she actually was a genuinely good, caring individual. She also went on to study diligently at the Calgary College of Traditional Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture and now, I presume, is doing well for herself in said field.

She never tried to turn me, but always preached love, peace, and forgiveness. Her distaste with me was my constant anger towards the atrocities of the worldâ€¦ that wonderful angst that many of us have in our younger years as we begin to open our own eyes, of our own volition.

I picked up a book on Eckankar and it did just come across as a hodge-podge of Eastern thought symbolically crossed with some Kabbalistic structures. Or that’s what I recall, at least.

But in the end, as far as religions go, if it works, who am I to criticise, right?