One of the principal symbols of The Fourth Way is a circle whose circumference is divided into nine parts that are joined within the circle to a triangle and an irregular six-sided figure, the enneagram.

According to Gurdjieff, the enneagram is "the fundamental hieroglyph of a universal language." Gurdjieff's use of the word hieroglyph, of course, points to Egypt. In this context, it is interesting to consider the nine deities established at Heliopolis in the Early Dynastic Period as part of the cosmogonic or creation myths. These cosmogonic tenets are given in the Pyramid Texts of the Old Kingdom.

The frontispiece of the Arithmologia by the Jesuit Athanasius Kircher(16011680), published in 1665, shows a figure not identical but somewhat similar to the enneagram. Kircher was a man of the Renaissance in pursuit of origins. His studies in magnetics, acoustics and medicine led him to attempt to decode Egyptian hieroglyphics. According to one source, Kircher regarded the ancient Egyptian religion "as the source not only of Greek and Roman religion but of the beliefs of the later Hebrews, Chaldaeans and even the inhabitants of India, China, Japan and the Americas, colonized in turn by Ham's progeny. Therefore, he believed that by studying these later and better recorded beliefs one could extrapolate the earliest religion of mankind, that of ancient Egypt."

Like The Fourth Way itself, the enneagram has not been known up to the present time. "The enneagram," said Gurdjieff, "has for a very long time been preserved in secret and if it now is, so to speak, made available to all, it is only in an incomplete and theoretical form." This, and the fact that it is a part of a teaching, has not deterred those who have sought to market the enneagram, divested of its deeper meaning and application, as a psychological tool. See William Patrick Patterson's Taking With the Left Hand.

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The Enneagram - Gurdjieff Legacy

Self-Remembering

Self-remembering is the bridge between knowledge and wisdom. It is an effort to be aware of oneself in the present, to break away from whatever imaginary world one may have delved in a moment ago and return to reality. It is an instantaneous internal reorganization: pushing ones mechanical thoughts and emotions to the background while bringing ones Higher Self to the forefront remembering ones Self.

Gurdjieff introduced self-remembering in one of his early talks with his Russian students, inviting them to share what they had seen by observing themsveles. None had noticed the most important fact: that they didnt remember themselves. Ouspensky, who narrates this discussion, begins experimenting with self-remembering and subsequently realizes its key role in the work towards consciousness.Here, as before, Gurdjieff borrows and translates an old practice. The Upanishads were an extensive treatise on the Self, on the need to remember it and bring it to the forefront. Sufism speaks of Remembrance of God in terms very similar to Gurdjieffs later expression. But the term God had lost its meaning by the twentieth century, associated too deeply with religions connotations that prevented people from relating to it practically. Gurdjieff was translating older systems into language palatable to modern western man.

Hence the difference between the system and the Fourth Way: while the system is Gurdjieffs twentieth-century expression, the Fourth Way is the sum of all past and present expressions of this way the long body of tradition that appeared and disappeared on the stage of mankind.

Earlier expressions of the Fourth Way would not have called themselves Fourth Way. Gurdjieff called his presentation Fourth Way to distinguish it as one of four possible ways to awakening. All four lead to the same end: awakening of consciousness, becoming real, being able to Be. The spiritual paths that lead to that same goal, however, may differ in character, like different roads leading to a similardestination.

We will not expound on the three ways to avoid straying from our main focus. These are well described in In Search of the Miraculous. What isnt clearly emphasized there, however, is that, while Gurdjieff presents three archetypes of ways based on human types, this is true only in theory. In practice, any way will prove a blend of all three ways with a center of gravity on one. The Fourth Way differs from these in that it strives to blend all three ways harmoniously.We say strive, for that is the idea. Normally, though, a teaching will begin as Fourth Way and evolve to place emphasis on one aspect over the others. It may gradually assume an emotional, religions hue; or it may gradually assume an intellectual, academic hue. This seems to have happened in both Gurdjieff and Ouspenskys teachings, where each began at a similar place but gradually gravitated towards an emphasis closer to his own natural tendency; for Gurdjieff it was physical movement, for Ouspensky it was intellectual discussion.

A fundamental aspect of the Fourth Way, absent in most modern practices of spirituality, is that the spiritual evolution of man has to be linked to a scale greater than man. Man does not evolve solely for his own benefit. He is generally not meant to evolve spiritually, but serves organic purposes, for which his normal undeveloped condition is sufficient. Evolution is a rare exception, a going against the stream, an escape from the general law.

The reason spiritual evolution is, at all, possible, is because its benefit to a higher cosmos. Parallel to the downward movement of universal growth of the endless physical expansion of the universe there exists an upwards movement towards consciousness, for which a minority of conscious individuals is indispensable. These are the broad and narrow ways mentioned in the Gospels and likened by Gurdjieff to acorns in a field. Of the billions of acorns produced each year, how many will mature into trees?

The Fourth Way is, therefore, exclusive by definition. It is not for all. It flatters none. Neither is it a path that can be traveled half-heartedly. It is a last resort, a way for those disappointed with everything else, who have sought yet havent found. It is a way for disillusioned people who know too much who know they have nothing to lose.

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Gurdjieff and Hypnosis: A Hermeneutic StudyAuthor: Mohammad H Tamdgidi

Foreword: J. Walter Driscoll

Gurdjieff and Hypnosis: A Hermeneutic Study explores the life and ideas of the enigmatic twentieth century philosopher, mystic, and teacher of esoteric dances George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff (1872?-1949), performing a hermeneutic textual analysis of all his published writings to illuminate the place of hypnosis in his teaching.Human enlightenment and liberation, mystics have long advised, require spiritual awakening from the hypnotic sleep of everyday life. This book explores the life and ideas of the enigmatic twentieth century philosopher, mystic, and teacher of esoteric dances George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff (1872?-1949), performing a hermeneutic textual analysis of all his published writings to illuminate the place of hypnosis in his teaching. The hermeneutic approach captures both the aim for an in-depth textual analysis, and the notion that the intent is to interpret the text using its own symbolic and meaning structures.

Systematically explored for the first time is Gurdjieffs objective art of literary hypnotism intended as a major conduit for the transmission of his teachings on the philosophy, theory, and practice of personal self-knowledge and harmonious human development. In the process, the nature and function of the mystical shell hiding the rational kernel of Gurdjieffs teaching are explainedshedding new light on why his mysticism is mystical, and Gurdjieff so enigmatic, in the first place.

Mohammad Tamdgidi is the Founding Director of OKCIR: The Omar Khayyam Center for Integrative Research in Utopia, Mysticism, and Science (Utopystics). He has been an Associate Professor of Sociology teaching social theory at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

The book includes a Foreword by J. Walter Driscoll, a major bibliographer and scholar of Gurdjieff studies.

Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan (New York, London)5-1/2 x 8-1/2 inches, 288 pages, 15 figures, indexPublication Dates: hc 2009/pb 2012 (rel. 10/2/12)hc: ISBN: 978-0-230-61507-6, ISBN10: 0-230-61507-4pb: ISBN: 978-1-137-28243-9, ISBN10: 1-137-28243-6eb:ISBN 978-0-230-10202-6

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The various editions of this book are also available for ordering from Palgrave/Macmillan and all major online bookstores worldwide.

Tamdgidi sets a benchmark for Gurdjieff Studies in relation to two recognized but insufficiently explored areas, his writings as a unified field and his exploitation of hypnosis in its broadest sense. His compact interpretation of Gurdjieff emphasizesfor the first timea search for meaning based on recognizable keys within about 1,800 pages of Gurdjieffs four texts as a single body of work, with particular focus on subliminal and subconscious dimensions of impact and interpretation, an approach which might be termed the Hermeneutics of Gurdjieff. Thus, Tamdgidis work is an important original contribution to the constructive, independent, and critical study of Gurdjieffs four books. Anyone who has seriously attempted to read Beelzebubs Tales or Meetings with Remarkable Men can vouch for their intentionally beguiling or hypnotic effect. These readers will appreciate Tamdgidis interpretive virtuosity and focushe keeps each tree and the entire forest in sight throughout.From the Foreword by J. Walter Driscoll, independent scholar and bibliographer; editor and contributing author, Gurdjieff: A Reading Guide, 3rd Ed. (2004); contributing editor, Gurdjieff International Review (1997-2001); co-author, Gurdjieff: An Annotated Bibliography (1985).

A wondrous odyssey and extraordinary argumentation! Nothing in the corpus of writings on Gurdjieffs works goes near to matching this masterful reading. Each time one looks back into the text, one finds more gold, no dross.Paul Beekman Taylor, Professor Emeritus at the University of Geneva, and author of G. I. Gurdjieff: A New Life; Gurdjieffs Invention of America; The Philosophy of G. I. Gurdjieff; Gurdjieff & Orage: Brothers in Elysium; and Shadows of Heaven: Gurdjieff and Toomer

In the ocean of literature on Gurdjieff, the brilliant book of Mohammad Tamdgidi has a very special place. It is the first serious academic attempt at a hermeneutics of Gurdjieffs texts, taking as key the core of Gurdjieffs teachingthe enneagram. Of course, Gurdjieffs teaching cannot be understood apart from its practice. But it is also true that this teaching cannot be understood without a rigorous study of the writings of Gurdjieff himself.Basarab Nicolescu, author of Manifesto of Transdisciplinarity

viiiList of FiguresviiiList of AbbreviationsixForeword by J. Walter DriscollxvPrologue1Introduction: Gurdjieff, Hypnosis, and Hermeneutics28Chapter One: Philosophy: Ontology of the Harmonious Universe52Chapter Two: Philosophy: Psychology of a Tetartocosmos70Chapter Three: Philosophy: Epistemology of Three-Brained Beings88Chapter Four: The Organ Kundabuffer Theory of Human Disharmonization113Chapter Five: The Practice of Harmonious Development of Man137Chapter Sex: Life is Real Only Then, When I AM Not Hypnotized177Chapter Seven: Meetings with the Remarkable Hypnotist207Chapter Eight: Beelzebubs Hypnotic Tales to His Grandson224Conclusion: Gurdjieffs Roundabout Yezidi Circle237Appendix: Textual Chronology of Gurdjieffs Life253Bibliography259Index

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George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff13 January 1866? - 29 Oct. 1949

Gurdjieff was a True Spiritual Master and Mystic of the 20th century, an extraordinary man whose teachings deal with the most important existential questions about the meaning and purpose of human life. He lived during a period of political and social unrest and could realize that most of humanity had long stopped functioning in a harmonious way due to difficult social conditions.After many years of personal search and spiritual practice, Gurdjieff managed to enter the essence of ancient traditions, and find the lost answers that preexisted all known religions and systems of faith. He presented them in such a way as to make them understandable and more easily accessible to the modern man of the West.

Gurdjieff's spiritual method of self-awareness was called by his student P.D. Ouspensky "The Fourth Way," because in it, Gurdjieff incorporated the intellectual, emotional and physical aspects of self-development, instead of separately working on each one of them. In order to achieve this, he not only used lecturing and writing, which appeal to the mind, but also music to wake up emotions, along with dance and movement to stimulate the body. But Gurdjieff was not a theorist. As Dr Kenneth Walker said "Gurdjieff was a living example of the outcome of his own teaching, which he summed up in the words 'the harmonious development of man.'"

His students and followers thought of Gurdjieff as an enlightened man, and when, in his lectures, he referred to Jesus, his students could only think of Gurdjieff, himself as a messenger from God, too. For his students, Gurdjieff was their Jesus, and they felt they were his apostles, who had to spread his teachings all over the world.

George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff was born in Alexandropol, modern-day Gyumri, in Armenia, Russian Empire, on January 13th, most probably in 1866, but 1872 and 1877 have also been mentioned as the years of his birth. His father, Georgios Georgiadis, who was a carpenter, was of Greek origin and his mother was Armenian. Gurdjieff grew up in the town of Kars and from an early age, he showed a keen interest in the ancient scripts and in the paranormal.

Most of the facts about his first adolescent and adult years come from Gurdjieff's own accounts in his book Meetings with Remarkable Men, which is the second volume of his trilogy All and Everything. The book cannot be considered as purely autobiographical, and Gurdjieff prefers to concentrate on events rather than dates. However, after 1912, when Gurdjieff arrived in Moscow, dates concerning his life are regarded as accurate.

As a young man, he took part in several pilgrimages to holy places, monasteries and saints' tombs hoping to find answers to his questions about human existence, and with the money he earned from working at the railway station of Tiflis, he bought a large number of old Armenian books searching for ancient mysteries. After that, he travelled to Egypt, the Middle East and Central Asia, reaching as far as The Gobi Desert and Tibet, trying to find the hidden knowledge of the ancient sages.

He started teaching in Moscow in 1913, and attracted several students who were interested in his ideas on human nature and his system for spiritual development. Because of the political upheaval of the time, and the Bolshevik Revolution, Gurdjieff had to change several cities in Russia, and in 1920, Gurdjieff, his student Uspensky, and the composer Thomas de Hartmann, moved to Istanbul, Turkey, where they paid frequent visits to the monastery of the Mevlevi Order of Sufis to attend the ceremony of The Whirling Dervishes. From Istanbul, Gurdjieff travelled to various European cities, lecturing and presenting his work, before establishing the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man in Paris, in 1922.

In 1924 and 1925 Gurdjieff travelled to North America, and large audiences were attracted to his lectures. After the death of his wife in 1926, Gurdjieff stayed in Paris and wrote his trilogy All and Everything. During the Second World War, he remained in Paris and in spite of the hard times, he never stopped teaching and inspiring his students. He died on October 29th, 1949 and was buried at the Fontainebleau-Avon cemetery. His doctor, William Welch said: "I have seen many men die. He died like a king."

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Gurdjieff's ideas cover many different fields of knowledge. He was a mystic, a philosopher, and a psychologist who went deep into the human psyche, and came up with the realization that our apparent limitations are the result of our unwillingness to act and change in such a way as to be able to use the full range of our natural and divine endowment.

Cover design for the prospectus of the Institute for the Harmonious Development of ManDrawn by Alexander De Salzmann

Gurdjieff saw man under the light of his possible evolution. While psychology examines the man in his current state of existence, and tries to heal his weaknesses, Gurdjieff's aim was to help him develop his potentialities, become aware of his real nature, and "wake up from his sleep," by applying the proper spiritual practices which he called "The Work."

Gurdjieff believed that humans, in their normal, everyday state, are extremely mechanized with almost no degree of freedom, and that human activity is mostly reactive to environmental stimuli, thus leaving little margin for originality in actions, thoughts and feelings. He taught that humans who desire to escape this slumbering state, must first become aware of their mechanized nature and then gradually, replace mechanized thinking with true and potent levels of awareness.

According to his teachings humans consist of four different bodies. The first is the physical body which is the one that the fakirs work on, the second is the emotional body which monks use in their search for God, the third is the spiritual body through which yogis try to alter the nature of their consciousness, and the fourth body which is the "Master" or the real "I," is the ultimate goal of Gurdjieff's System, and it is the state of being that will liberate man from mechanization.

His "Work," which was an elaborately designed teaching methodology, included prayers, music and sacred dances, which he learned during his stay as a pupil in a "Sarmoung" monastery in Turkestan, and which he used to make his students increase their attention, fight laziness and daydreaming, and reach higher levels of consciousness. Gurdjieff considered those movements as a very important part of his method and sometimes he referred to himself as a "teacher of dancing." He had also choreographed a ballet called "Struggle of the Magicians," whose music and gestures came from the Tibetan monasteries.

One of the symbols Gurjieff used in his method for harmonious development was the enneagram, whose name comes from the Greek words ennea-nine and grammi-line, and which he believed to be "the fundamental hieroglyph of a universal language." Gurdjieff said that all knowledge and all the universal laws can be included in the enneagram, which is now believed to have its origins in the ancient Egyptian religion of the nine deities, as they were presented in the Egyptian cosmogony.

With the use of visual symbols such as the enneagram, the use of music and dance, Gurdjieff wanted to make his students understand that words were not the only means of conveying ideas, and that the concept of man and his place in the universe went beyond the use of language. He applied an esoteric teaching which explained how to restore the lost knowledge and whatever was distorted in religion, and which could help men to develop their essence and get rid of the fake, artificial personality of an automaton, which is just a part of a machine.

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Gurdjieff knew that as long as man is treated "in the mass," world harmony is not possible to be attained. Since the world is a reflection, or an enlargement of the individual world, if individuals do not develop, the world will not be able to live in peace and harmony. Gurdjieff gave humanity his esoteric teaching of The Fourth Way, through which individuals follow the sacred, inner path of self-transformation that will eventually lead to a collective, new awakening.

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G. I. Gurdjieff Famous Mystics Great People

George Ivanovich Gurdjieff was one of the most influential spiritual teachers of the twentieth century. In his early years, he participated in expeditions that went in search of ancient teachings, partly documented in his book Meetings with Remarkable Men. His quest led him to a secret brotherhood, from which he seemed to have returned in possession of a unique system.

In 1910, Gurdjieff imported that system to Russia. He translated his eastern knowledge and experience into a language palatable to twentieth century western man. He called hisdisciplinethe Fourth Way, a blend of the three traditional ways of the Fakir, the Monk and the Yogi (read more about the Fourth Way). However, the Bolshevik Revolutionand the first World War forced Gurdjieff to migrate and eventually end up in France, where he opened his Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man. Gurdjieffs influence extended throughout Europe and as far as America, but the declining social order and World War II prevented him from further formalizing his organization. He was forced to close the institute and spent the latter part of his life writing books:Life Is Real Only Then, When I Am, All and Everything, Meetings With Remarkable Men and Beelzebubs Tales to his Grandson.He died in France on October 29, 1949.

Angkor Wat Temple

Gurdjieff was discreet about the origins of his teaching. He felt no need to reveal his footsteps. For one, he claimed that the wars had obliterated any traces of the schools with which he had come in contact. Moreover,his teaching specifically called, not for academical study, but for turning knowledge into practice. Gurdjieff himself had labored to acquire his teaching and had earned, so to speak, the rights over it. Such rights had to be earned anew by anyone meeting his work for the first time. While knowledge could be given, wisdom had to be earned. Hence, Gurdjieff, who had sacrificed much to obtain his wisdom, was reluctant to hand it over to others except at the price of labor. Once earned by any individual, the knowledge would become his own; he himself would become those ancient truths Gurdjieff allegedly dug up, a reiteration of ancient wisdom, a contemporary expression of a timeless truth.

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Evagrius give us 3 trinitarian interpretations:

a) practice of the virtues, contemplation of the divine in nature, and spiritual knowledge of God

b) faith, hope and love

c) gold, silver, and precious stones

II. Is the Enneagram ancient wisdom?Evagrius expresses the purpose of his spiritual practice in Verse 51 of Chapters on Prayer:

We seek after virtues for the sake of attaining to the inner meaning of created things. We pursue these latter, that is to say the inner meanings of what is created, for the sake of attaining to the Lord who has created them. It is in the state of prayer that he is accustomed to manifest himself.

This verse on the purpose of prayer expresses a spiritual method and goal unfamiliar to most modern Western notions of religion, which, as Alfred North Whitehead states, is tending to degenerate into a decent formula wherewith to embellish a comfortable life. (Science in the Modern World, Lowell Lectures, 1925, p. 223).

Why do phrases such as seek after virtue and attain to the inner meaning of created things seem strange to us? To partially answer this question, a look at the history of Evagrius teachings is helpful.

Evagrius wrote these texts in the fourth century, a critical period in the development of the Christian Church. In 324 AD, Constantine declared Christianity the Roman state religion and as Rome was Christianized, Christianity was Romanized. In a twist of history, as the Pagans had persecuted the Christians, now the Roman Christians were persecuting the Pagans and many heretical Christians as well. To Christians motivated to solidify the temporal power of the early church, the danger of contamination of the faith by Pagan ideas was of paramount concern (for a historical account of the political forces that shaped Christianity see Elaine Pagels The Gnostic Gospels).

Evagrius was considered by his disciples to have attained a rare degree of harmony in his personality through his ascetic practice and through his pure prayer. (Bamberger, J.E., The Praktikos, p. XXV) Yet in 399 AD, the same year as his death, his followers were persecuted as heretics and forced into exile. Evagrius was condemned at the Fifth Ecumenical Council in 553 and also by the following 3 Councils. Fortunately, Evagrius followers managed to take some of his works with them into exile, into areas outside the Roman Empire including the Arabic world where he influenced the Persian Sufis and Armenia where his works exerted a great influence on Byzantine theologians.

However great the efforts of the early Christian church were to cleanse itself of Hellenistic influence, a residue remained. As George Sarton states, (the Greeks) created theological instruments that were needed for the development of the three dogmatic religions of the WestJudaism, Christianity, and Islam. In each of these religions there is a woof of scripture and tradition, but the warp in Greek (Ancient Science Through the Golden Age of Greece, p. 198). The symbolic use and interpretation of number was a prevalent element in the fabric of Hellenistic philosophy and is evident in the theology of the early Christian theologians. Two of Evagrius contemporaries, St. Jerome (died 420) and St. Augustine (354-430), have also interpreted the number of fishes in Simon Peters net.

Perhaps it was St. Jerome who provided the right solution to the meaning of the 153 fish of great size when he observed that, according to the opinion of Oppianus of Cilicia, there are 153 species of fishthus the passage refers symbolically to the universality of the Church. (Bamberger, Chapters on Prayer, footnote 11, page 54). Here the symbolism is concrete, single, correct, and is quantity rather than quality.

St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, interprets the meaning of the 153 fishes in Simon Peters net in his Letters (Letter LV to Januarius, Chap. XVII 31):

Hence also, in the number of the large fishes which our Lord after His resurrection, showing this new life, commanded to be taken on the right side of the ship, there is found the number 50 three times multiplied, with the addition of three more [the symbol of the Trinity] to make the holy mystery more apparent; Then [in this new life] man, made perfect and at rest, purified in body and soul by the pure words of God, which are like silver purged from its dross, seven times refined, shall receive his reward, the denarius; so that with that reward the numbers 10 and 7 meet in him. For in this number [17] there is found, as in other numbers representing a combination of symbols, a wonderful mystery. Nor is it without good reason that the seventeenth Psalm is the only one which is given complete in the book of Kings, because it signifies that kingdom in which we shall have no enemy. .... And when shall this His body be finally delivered from enemies? Is it not when the last enemy, Death, shall be destroyed? It is to that time that the number of the 153 fishes pertains. For if the number 17 itself be the side of an arithmetical trianglethe whole sum of these units is 153.

St. Augustine gives us 2 interpretations of 153. One is Trinitarian and is similar to that of Evagrius.

Like St. Jerome and St. Augustine, there were most likely many early theologians who found symbolic significance in the numbers of the Scriptures. This interest in symbolic number was pervasive at the time of the early Christian Church and was rooted in pre-Christian thought at least since the time of Pythagoras and probably even earlier.

Today, of course, we tend to look upon number symbolism as a confused, pre-scientific form of thought. Numbers in the Bible may mean nothing, just selected at random to indicate quantity or comparison; or they may have had some superstitious or self-referent meaning for the authors of the Scriptures. Another possibility, however, is that some Biblical numbers and possibly the structure of some of the Scriptures encoded information or indicated other sources of knowledge (c.f. legomonism, Anthony Blake, The Intelligent Enneagram of Gurdjieff, Shambhala 1996, in press).

That symbolic number and sacred geometry were indicative of the divine structure of the universe was self-evident to many early philosophers and theologians. Although this qualitative understanding of number which had its roots in Hellenistic philosophy was almost entirely purged from Christianity during its early development, it appears to have left its trace in the Scriptures whose authors, as educated people of their day, were probably versed in the sacred science of number and proportion. Most of the symbolic meaning of this sacred canon of number is lost to us but this may not be irrevocably so as interest in ancient more holistic forms of thought is growing as the limitations of our fragmented, technological rationality become ever more apparent. There is reason to believe that the enneagram may be a fragment of an early sacred cosmology.

3. Did Evagrius Ponticus combine the evil thoughts with the enneagram?In John Bambergers double text (The Praktikos, Chapters on Prayer, Cistercian Publications, 1970) we see that Evagrius knew both a psychology based on 8 evil thoughts and a cosmology symbolized by a hexagon plus triad. Can we therefore conclude that the Enneagram of Fixations originated in the Egyptian desert in the 4th century AD?

For several reasons, I think the answer to this question is No. One reason lies in the structure of the text. Although we find both systems in a single text in Bambergers translation, this text is comprised of two books which were written at different times for different purposes. The first book, Praktikos, describes the evil thoughts. The enneagram-like symbol is described in an introductory letter to the the second book, Chapters on Prayer. As the purification and codification of Christian thought was in progress during Evagrius entire lifetime, he was no doubt aware of the heretical nature of Pythagorean philosophy and was, therefore, prudent to restrict his number symbolism to an introductory dedication. The proto-enneagram and the evil thoughts are not combined in his work.

A second reason to conclude Evagrius considered his psychology separate from the symbolic cosmology is that in his 3 interpretations of the number 153, none include the number 8, his number of evil thoughts. In other words, the two systems dont coincide numerically. His hexagon plus triad would be a 3, 6 or 9-term system and he does not adjust the number of his evil thoughts to fit.

A third reason to believe that to Evagrius these 2 systems were disparate is that as a contemplative, Evagrius would understand the passions to be obstacles to gnosis of the divine. That is, the passions would not participate in or in any sense determine the logos or sacred order of the cosmos but would be obstacles to its perception. The purpose of the contemplative life is to purify or eliminate obscurations to gnosis.

4. Was Gurdjieff influenced by Evagrius Ponticus?Gurdjieff, a Greek Armenian, was raised in the border area between Armenia and Georgia where, to this day, Evagrius, a Greek native of Georgia, is accorded great honor. The teachings of Evagrius and the Desert Fathers were an intrinsic part of the Eastern Orthodox culture and would have certainly influenced Gurdjieff during his childhood and early intellectual development.

Gurdjieff, who described himself as a Pythagorean Greek and Gnostic Christian, is infamous for having gone to great lengths not to divulge the sources of his teachings to even his closest pupils. This has given rise to much speculation about the sources of Gurdjieffs teachings. J.G. Bennett recounts Gurdjieffs ongoing rewriting of his magnum opus, All and Everything, each time with increasing obscurity. Gurdjieff explained this as burying the dog deeper. Bennett recounts, When people corrected him and said that he surely meant bury the bone deeper, he would turn on them and say it is not bones but the dog that you have to find. (J.G. Bennett, Making a New World, p. 274)

Yet, in the teaching of the Desert Fathers of the 4th century students of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky will recognize a root source for many of the inner exercises of the Fourth Way. Mt. Athos, a Russian Orthodox monastery in Greece where the esoteric Christian tradition of the Desert Fathers was practiced in the early twentieth century is cited by Ouspensky in In Search of the Miraculous. Gerald Palmer who translated The Philokalia was a student of Ouspensky. E. Kadloubovsky, who also translated writings of the Desert Fathers, was Ouspenskys secretary from the mid-1930s until Ouspenskys death in 1947. Both J.G. Bennett and P.D. Ouspensky used The Philokalia as a primary spiritual text in their work with students. The teaching of Evagrius Ponticus and the Desert Fathers must be considered as a major source of the Gurdjieff Work, which Gurdjieff himself called esoteric Christianity.

ConclusionIn the 4th century writing of Evagrius Ponticus we find a highly developed contemplative psychology which has become all but extinct in the West. We also find a Pythagorean interpretation of an important Biblical symbolic number. Fragments of both the psychology and symbolism are found in the teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. As these ideas were part of the Hellenistic warp of the fabric of Christian and Islamic religions, we find striking similarities between early Christian thought and the later Sufi spirituality and cosmology.

In our search for ancient wisdom it is important to keep in mind our natural tendency to reinterpret what we find through our own preconceptions, according to our own cultural and historic context. In this way, symbols of other cultures and contexts become invested with our own meaning and in the process become a mirror which reflects our own contemporary interests. The writings of Evagrius and the Desert Fathers, now 1600 years old, are an inspiration to seekers in a technologically bright but spiritually dark age, to open our hearts and minds to the greater possibilities that lie in each of us. __________Lynn Quirolo is a 1972 graduate of J.G. Bennetts International Academy for Continuous Education at Sherborne, England. Since 1976 she has occasionally taught the Enneagram. __________ Enneagram Monthly, Issue 14 & 15, April & May 1996

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GurdjieffFolk Art Guild

The work of Gurdjieff has many aspects. But through whatever form he expresses himself, his voice is heard as a call. He calls because he suffers from the inner chaos in which we live. He calls us to open our eyes. He asks us why we are here, what we wish for, what forces we obey. He asks us, above all, if we understand what we are. He wants us to bring everything back into question. And because he insists and his insistence compels us to answer, a relationship is created between him and ourselves which is an integral part of his work. (- Jeanne de Salzmann)

Near the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century, G.I.Gurdjieff, sensing the ongoing disintegration of world culture, went in search of a powerful ancient stream of true knowledge of being at the root of the worlds great traditions. (-Views From the Real World)

Gurdjieffs rich legacy of writings, movements or sacred dances, and music can be studied at the Rochester Folk Art Guild.

His teaching engages the intelligence of body and heart as well as mind. As one Guild potter said, To make a beautiful pot, one needs to participate in a universal process of awakening the intelligence of the body and the hands. The forces that shape a pot are the same forces that shape a persons life. With the effort to attend to what one is doing in every moment,simple acts come to have inner meaning. At the Guild, all share in community tasks such as cooking, cleaning, gardening, taking care of animals, building maintenance and general upkeep. These daily chores, the discipline of the crafts, and practice of the music and movements not only provide a field for the study of attention, but also offer a model for transformation of materials, inner and outer.

The message Gurdjieff brings is one of hope, that there is the real possibility of evolution and discovering what it means to truly be a human being.

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Gurdjieff - The Rochester Folk Art Guild

FROM DEATH PSYCHOLOGY TO DEEP ECOLOGY AND EASE: KATHERINE MANSFIELDS FINAL DAYS IN FRANCE In 1922, at a time when death was closing on her, Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) could forget the solemnity of her state by adopting a holistic... moreFROM DEATH PSYCHOLOGY TODEEP ECOLOGY AND EASE:KATHERINE MANSFIELDS FINAL DAYS IN FRANCE

In 1922, at a time when death was closing on her, Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) could forget the solemnity of her state by adopting a holistic approach to the world, which, in 1973, Norwegian philosopher Arne Nss (1912-2009) would theorise about and term deep ecology. At the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man at Fontainebleau-Avon, on the threshold of her permanent end, deep in her psyche Mansfield found happiness in the feeling of kinship with and compassion for life forms other than her own. There she also saw the physical representation of the philosophy of deep ecology in Russian mystic George Ivanovich Gurdjieffs (1866?-1949) Movements, a symbolic dance deemed sacred and traceable to Sufism which, with its stress on the unity within the universe, had centuries ago foreshadowed deep ecology. Furthermore, at Fontainebleau, where the paths of people of different nationalities and creeds intersected, Mansfield felt affiliated with humans, thereby calling Gurdjieffs disciples my people, and contemplated in unison with them mans symbiotic relation to the universe. This paper, focused on the last stage of Mansfields life which she spent in France with references to her letters and other relevant writings, proposes to discuss that in the said period and setting, the writer acquired a sense of oneness with both human and nonhuman nature, or nature in its totality, which ultimately, like alchemy, transformed the painful period she had to endure into a rewarding one.

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Gurdjieff Research Papers - Academia.edu

GurdjieffBorn(1866-01-13)January 13, 1866Alexandropol, Russian EmpireDiedOctober 29, 1949(1949-10-29) (aged83)Neuilly-sur-Seine, FranceEra20th-centurySchool"Fourth Way"

Main interests

George Ivanovich Gurdjieff (13 January 1866 29 October 1949), usually known as Gurdjieff, was an Armenian guru and writer. He was an influential spiritual teacher of the first half of the 20th century. He himself was influenced by Sufi, Zen and Yoga mystics he met on his early travels.[1][2]

Gurdjieff taught that most people live their entire lives in a state of hypnotic "waking sleep":

Gurdjieff developed a method for working towards a higher state of consciousness and achieving full human potential. He called this "The Work" or "The Method".[2][4]

Gurdjieff's method for awakening one's consciousness is different from that of the fakir, monk or yogi, so his discipline was called originally the "Fourth Way".[5]

At different times in his life, Gurdjieff formed and closed various schools around the world to teach the work. He claimed that the teachings he brought to the West came from his own experiences and early travels. The teachings expressed the truth found in ancient religions. They were wisdom teachings relating to self-awareness in people's daily lives, and humanity's place in the universe.[2]

There is a 1979 British film, Meetings with Remarkable Men, directed by Peter Brook. It is based on the book of the same name by Gurdjieff. It was shot on location in Afghanistan (except for dance sequences, which were filmed in England). It starred Terence Stamp as Prince Lubovedsky, and Dragan Maksimovic as the adult Gurdjieff. The film was entered into the 29th Berlin International Film Festival and nominated for the Golden Bear prize.

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Gurdjieff - Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

October 2008

Remember yourself always and everywhere.

Gurdjieff

Gurdjieff taught self-remembering as a fierce warrior fights in battle. He warred against sleep, and the system that he taught presented human beings as sleeping machines and the radical approach that was needed to awaken. He was a pioneer of self-remembering in the West, while he kept the origin of his teaching mysterious. Yet although his system included a cosmology of universal laws, he rated them below the practical effort of self-remembering. Even during his fascinating, idiosyncratic discussions with his students on man the machine and the earth as a pain factory, Gurdjieff would always remind his students that the Work was for awakening. In one meeting with his students, he pointed out that they had all missed something in their efforts at self-observation. When they could not discover what he meant, he told them, You did not remember yourselves.

Self-remembering is the central idea of the Fourth Way. In Gurdjieffs cosmology, the birthright of a human being is to be awake but the psychological condition of sleep prevents it. Because of this condition, humanity is uninterested in awakening, and if a human-being discovers they are asleep, they will find an excuse to forget or deny it. So Gurdjieff taught self-remembering as an experiment to demonstrate its value and as a way of life. He taught his students the difference between being asleep and being awake. He taught self-remembering as a continual, practical effort, bringing ones attention to ones Self at the same time as the activity that one is engaged in.

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Gurdjieff: Life is real only then, when 'I am' - Being ...