Church of Scientology e-mails hacked - link inside!

[Myshkin]

Don't you think that cults are generally assumed to have people in charge who don't really believe in the doctrine, whereas Dr Rowan Williams probably does love his neighbour and that?

That's what modern usage of the word implies, yeah. It hasn't always been that way though; certainly wasn't in antiquity.

Like I said, Hubbard basically superimposed a sci-fi aesthetic (and duly warped) bits of Zoroastrianism, Manicheanism, Thelema and other influences he picked up on his own spiritual quest.

There's every chance in the world that he genuinely believed in the kernel of what he was teaching. Just because the mythology was obviously the invention of one man doesn't mean that he didn't strongly believe in the message behind that mythology. Relatively few Christian scholars (and clerics) take the Bible as literal truth, for example.

 

[knock]

What is the message behind Scientology mythology? Give us your money you impressionable fool?

 

[Myshkin]

That's pretty much the 'exoteric message'.

Nah, behind all the hogwash it's essentially about spiritual development in order to transcend human limitations - the old gnostic / Hermetic schtick, albeit twisted into the service of a somewhat sinister and authoritarian orgnisation.

 

[Treacle]

Hubbard reckoned he could time travel, which is how he saw all the alien stuff. He was a sci-fi writer. He had a good imagination, and was quoted saying something like 'the easiest way to become rich is to start your own religion'. I've heard he was actually quoting someone else, but it still rings pretty true, in his case. It's the harassment of ex-members which annoys me, so much. People are stalked, and the wife of the leader has been missing for years - with no apparent concern from the authorities. Anyone who doesn't know much, just read up on it and watch the documentaries already mentioned. It's unbelievable what people will believe, and what sort of things they will do, in order to protect it.