Our Life With Mr Gurdjieff

In Gurdjieff and Music Johanna Petsche examines the large and diverse body of piano music produced by Armenian-Greek spiritual teacher G. I. Gurdjieff (c.1866-1949) in collaboration with his devoted pupil Thomas de Hartmann (1885-1956). Petsche draws on a range of unpublished materials and data from original field research to critically situate and assess this music within its socio-cultural and unique religio-spiritual

Gurdjieff was wrong but his teaching works...is the story of one man's remarkable journey of self-discovery which dispels the Gurdjieffian premise that man is not born with an immortal soul. With his own quest, Orest Stocco illustrates that we are all born with a spark of divine consciousness; but not until we take evolution into our own hands, which Gurdjieff's teaching helped him to do, will we realize our true self.

Western Sufism is sometimes dismissed as a relatively recent "new age" phenomenon, but in this book Mark Sedgwick argues that it has deep roots, both in the Muslim world and in the West. In fact, although the first significant Western Sufi organization was not established until 1915, the first Western discussion of Sufism was printed in 1480, and Western interest in Sufi thought goes back to the thirteenth century. Sedgwick starts with the earliest origins of Western Sufism in late antique Neoplatonism and early Arab philosophy, and traces later origins in repeated intercultural transfers from the Muslim world to the West, in the thought of the European Renaissance and Enlightenment, and in the intellectual and religious ferment of the nineteenth century. He then follows the development of organized Sufism in the West from 1915 until 1968, the year in which the first Western Sufi order based on purely Islamic models was founded. Western Sufism shows the influence of these origins, of thought both familiar and less familiar: Neoplatonic emanationism, perennialism, pantheism, universalism, and esotericism. Western Sufism is the product not of the new age but of Islam, the ancient world, and centuries of Western religious and intellectual history. Using sources from antiquity to the internet, Sedgwick demonstrates that the phenomenon of Western Sufism draws on centuries of intercultural transfers and is part of a long-established relationship between Western thought and Islam.

This book demonstrates that the most forceful contribution to George Gurdjieff's world-view is Sufism, understood as the tradition of seeking truth wherever it can be found, especially at the meeting place of the world religions. Gurdjieff's masterpiece, Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson, is philosophically analyzed in its use of literary devices to jolt the reader into radical transformation.

This text explores the major new or unconventional religions and spiritual movements in America that exist outside the Judeo-Christian tradition.

Beyond Meetings with Remarkable Men into the truth behind the self-crafted mythology of Gurdjieff’s life • Reveals evidence that Gurdjieff was a secret Freemason, relying on hypnotism, psychic research and spiritualism • Explores the profound influence of the Yezidis, esoteric Christianity, and the “gnostics” of Islam, the Sufis, on Gurdjieff’s Fourth Way teachings and the “Work” • Uncovers the truth behind Gurdjieff’s relations with Aleister Crowley • Accurately dates Gurdjieff’s real activities, particularly his enigmatic early life In November 1949, architect Frank Lloyd Wright announced the death of “the greatest man in the world,” yet few knew who he was talking about. Enigmatic, misunderstood, declared a charlatan, and recently dubbed “the Rasputin who inspired Mary Poppins,” Gurdjieff’s life has become a legend. But who really was George Ivanovich Gurdjieff? Employing the latest research and discoveries, including previously unpublished reminiscences of the real man, Tobias Churton investigates the truth beneath the self-crafted mythology of Gurdjieff’s life recounted in Meetings with Remarkable Men. He examines his controversial birthdate, his father’s background, and his relationship with his private tutor Dean Borshch, revealing a perilous childhood in a Pontic Greek family, persecuted by Turks, forced to migrate to Georgia and Armenia, only to grow up amid more war, persecution, genocide, and revolt. Placing Gurdjieff in the true context of his times, Churton explores Gurdjieff’s roles in esoteric movements taking root in the Russian Empire and in epic imperial construction projects in the Kars Oblast, Transcaucasia, and central Asia. He reveals Gurdjieff’s sources for his transformative philosophy, his early interest in hypnosis, magic, Theosophy, and spiritualism, and the profound influence of the Yezidis and the Sufis, the “gnostics” of Islam, on Gurdjieff’s Fourth Way teachings and the “Work.” Churton also explores Gurdjieff’s ties to Freemasonry and his relationships with other spiritual teachers and philosophers of the age, such as Madame Blavatsky, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Aleister Crowley, dispelling the myth that Gurdjieff forcibly expelled the “Great Beast” from his Institute. Showing how Gurdjieff deliberately re-shaped elements of his life as parables of his system, Churton explains how he didn’t want people to follow his footsteps but to find their own, to wake up from the hypnosis that drives us blindly through life. Offering a vital understanding of the man who asked “How many of you are really alive?” the author reveals the continuing importance of Gurdjieff’s philosophy for the awakening of man.

This volume fills a lacuna in the academic assessment of new religions by investigating their cultural products (such as music, architecture, food et cetera). Contributions explore the manifold ways in which new religions have contributed to humanity’s creative output.

Offers information and stories about Gurdjieff, setting him within the cultural and social contexts of America between 1924 and 1935.

The saddest people in the world are those that have been brought as far as life can take them in the evolution of their individuality, because the longing in their soul for wholeness and singleness of self cannot be satisfied by life and one does not know what to do to fill the hollow in their soul and be the person they are destined to be, like my high school hero Ernest Hemingway. No matter how much life he experienced, he never seemed to get enough of it; like marlin fishing in the Gulf Stream, which so tested his manhood that he had to prove himself over, and over, and over again, and in the process winning trophies and adulation that fed his massive ego which in turn demanded more attention, a never-ending cycle that drove the great author to despair and suicide.

A literate introduction to the life and teachings of one of the world's most influential spiritual teachers offers a close-up portrait of G. I. Gurdjieff and his influence on such students as Frank Lloyd Wright, Katharine Mansfield, and P. D. Ouspensky, among others. Original. 15,000 first printing.

P. D. Ouspensky's classic work In Search of the Miraculous was the first to disseminate the ideas of G. I. Gurdjieff, the mysterious master of esoteric thought in the early twentieth century who still commands a following today. Gurdjieff's mystique has long eclipsed Ouspensky, once described by Gurdjieff as "nice to drink vodka with, but a weak man." Yet Ouspensky was a brilliant, accomplished philosopher in his own right, and some consider his meeting with the charismatic "Mr. G." the catastrophe of his life. Indeed, in subsequent years Ouspensky tried hard, with limited success, to break away. This book moves Ouspensky's own story center stage, against the backdrop of the Russian Revolution, the dervishes of Constantinople, and a cosmopolitan Europe entre deux guerres. The archetypal encounter it describes echoes that of Don Juan and Castaneda, or perhaps Mephistopheles and Faust. One of the great mystical adventures of our time, it will fascinate everyone interested in the farthest reaches of what it means to be human. The paperback edition includes a new chapter on Gary Lachman's own former work in Gurdjieff's psychology.

Explores the roots of modern transpersonal psychology and spirituality through psychobiography.

This book explores the life and ideas of the enigmatic twentieth century philosopher, mystic, and teacher of esoteric dances George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff, performing a hermeneutic textual analysis of all his writings to illuminate the place of hypnosis in his teaching. Foreword by J. Walter Driscoll.