beelzebub tales to his grandson :all and everything

anyone read this book? just picked it up at thrift store for $0.65

 

It's a uniquely interesting and weird book. Read the intro first.

 

Very hard book to enjoy. There is maybe a substantive statement every 200 pages or so. I found the rest to be self serving gibberish under the guise that such gibberish represented a calculated psychological effect in the reader.

 

thanks for the input. only a few pages in and pretty strange so far.

 

Should have said before - it's also extremely hilarious in places. Seems Gurdjieff did have a sense of humour. Many people seem to miss this.

 

although some of it was interesting most of it was a wast of time imo i all most didn't finish because of the rambling on of nonsense when he explains how stuff works. and his version of history is so full of shit. he did make some good points at times.

 

ditto

 

A one-time associate of Gurdjieff called P.D. Ouspensky translated Gurdjieff's books from Gurdjieff-speak into ordinary philosophical language. Through Ouspensky it's easier to identify the useful, the not useful and the nonsensical in Gurdjieff.

Gurdjieff certainly had quite a big scene going in his day. Remnants of Gurdjieff societies still exist worldwide.

 

I bought it over 15 years ago and thought it was impossible to read. I recently picked up a PDF and found it MUCH easier to read. I don't know if it's my age or the easy electronic format, but this book is pretty damn cool. The actual physical book was big, bulky and hard to read. I think half the strain of reading the physical book comes more from the book itself and the way it's printed rather than the actual text. On the pdf version, it's really not that hard to follow or understand. And it's entertaining, like, I don't know, Dr. Seuss or something.

 

That is the point!

The other points you seem to have missed are even better! First of all, the rambling wears out the incessantly conceptual processes of the mind, the bullshit version of history stretches the limits of your credulity. Combined with the more overt points and the overt hilarity, the point is to produce an "Aha!" moment of the "cosmic giggle." He said to achieve the desired effect, a person must read this huge volume three times in a row. Can you imagine reading this, desperately looking for meaning, waiting to be enlightened before it finally dawns on you that the message is: reality is all around you, it's a mysterious illusion that can not be comprehended with the conceptual mind, all and everything you've been told and hold on to as true is essentially a bunch of bullshit when you get down to it.

It doesn't really fit well with our typical way of thinking. Most people think eventually we will figure everything out to some satisfaction and many people think we're already there. The truth is, what we know and what we will ever know for sure is truly impossible to know. This is why in every field, in every corner of the globe, we have people who adamantly believe different things, whether scientific, religious or philosophical. Even the things they agree on can be easily picked apart to find differences in the explanations for these beliefs. For example, it is a huge assumption to believe consciousness arises from the brain. This point is really examined in the Dalai Lama's "The Universe In A Single Atom" book in which he discusses his knowledge and experience with some of the world's leading scientists.

 

muahahaha, good ol' gurdjieff -- he actually would have people read and re-read the book to him and constantly reword things to make it as difficult to discern the meaning as possible; it's a safe-guard. if one opens these doors too soon, it can lead to unfortunate consequences. take your time, we have eternity to play this game...

 

I was planning on finally reading it this year, but my $20 paperback was stolen by an electrician.