Scientology's relationship with eastern religious traditions

Kent, Stephen A.

doi:10.1080/13537909608580753

Cited by 20 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…There are progressive levels of Operating Thetan, which one must ascend through to reach true enlightenment. This process is somewhat comparable to 'Visuddhimagga' (the 'path to purification') in Theravada Buddhism, and also the general concepts of 'Nirvana' in Buddhist religions and 'Moksha' in Hinduism and Jainism (Kent, 1996;and Murray, 2014). Ultimately, Scientology aims to alleviate the problems of modern life using a combination of scientific understanding and spiritual engagement, focussing on the self, rather than a particular deity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 62%

“…Although Buddhism is cited as the religion most comparable with Scientology, Hubbard also maintained that its beliefs are rooted in those of Hinduism and Taoism (Lewis, 2009: 250), crediting the Hindu Vedas as inspiration for the Scientology term 'Knowingness' or 'self-determined knowledge' (Kent, 1996). That Scientology is comparable with 'Eastern' religions is a view supported by religious scholars, including Wallis (1976, cited by Lewis, 2009 and Wilson (1998, cited by Lewis, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ngrams and Engrams: the use of structural and conceptual features to discriminate between English translations of religious texts

Franklin¹,

Oakes²

2016

Corpora

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In this paper, we present experiments using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) program, a ‘closed-class keyword’ (CCK) analysis and a ‘correspondence analysis’ (CA) to examine whether the Scientology texts of L. Ron Hubbard are linguistically and conceptually like those of other religions. A Kruskal–Wallis test comparing the frequencies of LIWC category words in the Scientology texts and the English translations of the texts of five other religions showed that there were eighteen categories for which the Scientology texts differed from the others, and between one and seventeen for the other religions. In the CCK experiment, keywords typical of each religion were found, both by comparing the religious texts with one another and with the Brown corpus of general English. The most typical keywords were looked up in a concordancer and were manually coded with conceptual tags. The set of categories found for the Scientology texts showed little overlap with those found for the others. Our CA experiments produced fairly clear clusters of texts by religion. Scientology texts were seen at one pole on the first factor, with Christian and Islamic texts at the other. It appears that, in several ways, the Scientology texts are dissimilar to the texts of some of the world's major religions

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 62%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ngrams and Engrams: the use of structural and conceptual features to discriminate between English translations of religious texts

Franklin¹,

Oakes²

2016

Corpora

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“…In contrast, however, to Kurtz's claim that Scientology is 'another successful group drawing widely on Asian religions', see Kent 1996. 2 I obtained this figure from a confidential but reliable source.…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 88%

The Globalization of Scientology: Influence, Control and Opposition in Transnational Markets

Kent¹

1999

Religion

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Locating itself within a sociological perspective that analyses religiously ideological organisations as transnational corporations, this study examines the global activities of Scientology. It summarises the organisation's resolution of its international conflict with Interpol, its take-over of its internationally influential opponent, the Cult Awareness Network (CAN) and its heightened rhetoric against psychiatry. The article also highlights Scientology's international marketing strategies that attempt to further the teachings of its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, and gain political and social influence. Despite Scientology's efforts to adjust its approach to fit the cultural realities of the countries that it enters, its apparent successes in some formerly Iron Curtain nations is counterbalanced by growing opposition in Western Europe. 1999 Academic Press At least two contemporary sociological trends bespeak the timeliness of a focused study about Scientology's international resource acquisition and utilisation efforts. First, a growing number of publications are examining globalization trends among religions and other social institutions. 1 These studies identify the manner in which heretofore national issues are being recast in borderless frameworks. Only a few of them explore, however, the manner by which particular sects such as Scientology develop transnational presences by attempting to achieve global influence if not control over resources and opponents.Second and more directly, recent work has called for analyses of religiously ideological organisations as multinational or transnational corporations (see Bromley, p. 272; Kent, 1990, p. 401; Wallis, p. 248). This relatively new but obvious perspective highlights the ability of ostensibly religious groups to shift and diversify their operational bases and resource acquisition efforts throughout various parts of the globe in accordance with prevailing political, social, and economic climates. The current study locates itself within this perspective, and borrows from it broad categories and concepts to identify Scientology's efforts to extend its influence throughout the world. While the organisation's strenuous efforts at gaining international dominance will fall well short of its goal, undoubtedly Scientology will continue attempts to influence the social fabric of the countries in which it operates.

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“…Tranziția de la dianetică la scientologie s-a realizat în anii 1952-1954, nefiind străină de ostilitățile cu care mediul ştiinţific şi medical au primit teoriile lui Hubbard 12 . În textul broşurilor What is Scientology?…”

Section: Dianetica șI Scientologiaunclassified

Biserica Scientologică. O Perspectivă Misionar-Pastorală Asupra Procedeelor De Vindecare

Radulescu¹

2019

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Scientological Church. A missionary-pastoral perspective on healing procedures 1. The great "discovery" of Scientology is that all human beings are, in fact, immortal tetans and possess an infinite creative potential. Tetans are not part of the physical universe, made up of energy, space, time, but have the ability to control it. They have lost contact with their origins and have remained in the bodies of mortal men as in a trap. Then they moved from one body to another, passing through successive lives without remembered their original state. Because of this amnesia, the tetanus has come to accept the illusion that they are nothing more than physical bodies.The most important practice in Scientology is called auditing, through which it identifies the engrams of the reactive mind of a prelude (a being possessed by the reactive mind) by observing its reaction to certain key words. This is done following meetings where the subjects undergo several exercises (training). The purpose of "auditing" is to remove the engrams so that individuals can relate their experiences directly and not through the reactive mind filter. The auditor's ultimate goal is to make the subject remember the first engram, received immediately after conception. In the higher stages of the audit, the individual becomes aware of his previous lives, lived as a tetanus in other bodies on this earth and even on other planets. The goal of dianetic therapy is to get the level of "light" (clear). "Luminaries" are those who have been cleansed from the memory of past traumatic experiences and, therefore, have more success in daily life, are healthier and have more communication skills. Because of this, dianetics has also been called

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Scientology's relationship with eastern religious traditions

Cited by 20 publications

References 4 publications

Ngrams and Engrams: the use of structural and conceptual features to discriminate between English translations of religious texts

Ngrams and Engrams: the use of structural and conceptual features to discriminate between English translations of religious texts

The Globalization of Scientology: Influence, Control and Opposition in Transnational Markets

Biserica Scientologică. O Perspectivă Misionar-Pastorală Asupra Procedeelor De Vindecare

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