What is the meaning of the religion Scientology?
A question from a reader: I was doing research on Tom Cruise today and I just found out that he was involved in Scientology. I know basic things about scientology like that its a religion and that it was founded by L. Ron Hubbard, but what does it stand for?
It exists as a way to make money for the founders.
$
It is a Cult!!
money
It is one of L. Ron’s last, best jokes that he perpetrated on gullible folks who were fed up with Christianity and wanted something else to believe in.
On the other hand, L. Ron’s origin of mankind is no more far-fetched than Christianity’s origin of mankind. Just different.
Neither is supportable by scientific evidence.
they want money & scam. they believe there no God and only nature made like bomb become planet, they believe monkey become human stuff like that. it like science & biology.
It stands for taking money from its members. You MUST be extremely rich to become a scientologist.
I think it’s supposed to mean “the study of knowledge.” But that really has little to do with it.
75 million years ago, Prince Xenu…blah blah…blew them up in volcanoes…blah…clusters…found homes in humans…only through costly pseudoscientific process called auditing can you remove engrams and bad feelings and body thetans. Then you buy all these courses and Techs, then you find out that you have another step to go to be free of thetans, then you find out you ARE a thetan, then you clear your meat body and fly away to the planet Venus, where they have freight locomotives.
I couldn’t possibly make this up.
It is a pseudo-religious cult. More like science-fiction and christian science combined.
L.Ron Hubbard was a science-fiction writer before he founded is own cult..
Google, my love, Google.
Scientology = evolution’s official religious answer. Evolutionists know the facts do not line up with their broken theory on how life began on earth, so in order to compensate for the lack of time, probability, material, etc. for life to “evolve” on earth, they have instituted the concept of “panspermia”– in a nutshell, alien beings (scientology/evolution’s “gods”) came to earth and produced the original human lineage and are the actual progenitors of mankind. This does nothing to answer the fundamental question of the “First Cause”. Even IF aliens created human beings, WHO or WHAT created those aliens? All it does is delay recognition of that first cause.
I also looked into Scientology & it is about improving your mind mentally & after going there investigating it, it is defently NOT where I would want to be, but do research on their homepage.
Tom Cruise has been a Scientologist for over 25 years.He was introduced to it by his 1st wife Mimi Rogers.
Here’s the opening paragraph from the article “The Aims of Scientology “ by L.Ron Hubbard which outlines it’s purpose.
(written circa 1965)
“ A civilzation without insanity, without criminals and without war, where the able can prosper and honest beings can have rights, and where Man is free to rise to greater heights, are the aims of Scientology. “
Also here’s a factual description of the Scientology religion for you (From a Scientologist):
Scientology is a new religion. It is an applied religious philosophy. By “applied” is meant that it is for use in life and living. You actually use it in your day to day life to change and improve existing conditions. It is a practical religion.
All religions if you study them have a basic philosophy, but they also have certain dogma, rituals and observances and a certain faith or belief is required. There is nothing wrong with this , but Scientology is not that kind of religion. It acknowledges the principle of God or the Supreme Being but does not try to define or describe this principle, leaving it up to the individual.
It is also not a messianic religion. This means there is no worship of prophets or messiahs or gods. It is not belief or faith based. In Scientology a truth is true for you according to your own observation and experience .
The dictionary definition that applies:
Religion: The spiritual or emotional attitude of one who recognises the existence of superhuman power or powers.
The most basic principle of Scientology is that YOU are your own immortal soul, that this is not a thing you have but what YOU actually are.
Scientology believes or considers that Man is basically good. This is different from many religions that promote that he his natively evil or bad unless “made” good.
The whole purpose of Scientology knowledge application and procedure is to increase an individual’s understanding and awareness of himself as a spiritual being and to rehabilitate his native abilities and potential.
When you do this there sphere and zones of his positive influence increases and moves outward into his life , his family and friends, his groups and Mankind of which he is part .
How this result is achieved is the “technology” of Scientology, which was developed by L Ron Hubbard from discoveries he made after extensive research into the field of the mind and the human spirit.
Some of this knowledge was already existing in the sacred lore of ancient texts like the Veda or Vedic Hymns going back 10,000 years. New and additional discoveries were made about the nature of the human spirit and fully recorded and codified .
Scientology’s closest spiritual ties with any other religion are with Orthodox (Hinayana ) Buddhism with which it shares an historical lineage. But even here the relationship is based mainly on friendship and the recognition of the being as a spirit rather than any organizational ties.
L.Ron Hubbard published 18 basic books from 1950 to 1955 to fully communicate the basic principles of Scientology, the path of his research and the technology that he developed from this.
He completed all his research before his death in 1986 and left all his materials and copyrights to the Church of Scientology’s Religious Technology Centre along with most of his personal estate when he died.
The Church of Scientology is currently established iand operating internationally in over 160 countries world wide. However it is still a new religion, less than 55 years old.
The true story of Scientology as a religion goes like this:
1. A philosopher developes a philosophy about life and death.
2. People find it interesting.
3. People find it works.
4. People pass it along to others.
5. It grows.
This is just an overview.
L.Ron Hubbard explained fully the theology and technologies of Scientology in more than 500,000 pages of writings, including dozens of books and over 3,000 tape recorded public lectures. So it’s not possible to fully answer your question on this forum, but I hope this helps.
Yeah, Tom Cruise is involved with Scientology. It’s a cult, and he’s one of the members.
They believe many things, including the notion that we are all eternally existing souls called “Thetans”, that we can each control matter, energy, space and time by will alone once we reach our true potential, that the concept of a messiah is a mental implant, that our bodies are infested with the murdered souls of aliens from 75 million years ago, that psychiatry is orchestrating a worldwide conspiracy, and that mental illness does not exist. Here’s a more detailed overview:
Scientology, which questionably calls itself a new “religion”, is the brainchild of 1950’s science fiction writer & occult enthusiast L. Ron Hubbard. The organization, by means of Hubbard’s self created psychotherapy technique called “Dianetics”, claims to be able to help rid members of any & all mental constraints including but not limited to emotional scarring (from this & “past” lives) due to “engrams” (past negative experiences stored in our unconscious mind), psychological disorders & chemical imbalances (the solution is to convince members that these things don’t actually exist) & drug dependence (including legally prescribed psychopharmaceuticals which counteract the effects of psychological disorders Scientologists believe to be nonexistent). Their “treatment” of substance abuse includes little more than massive, often dangerous doses of vitamins and unhealthy extended sessions in a sauna.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dianetics#Scientific_evaluation_and_criticisms
Dianetics review: http://dir.salon.com/story/books/review/2005/06/28/dianetics/index.html
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,812852,00.html
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Narconon/detox.htm
http://www.nypress.com/20/22/news&columns/feature.cfm
Scientology is most certainly NOT a religion. In fact, one of the only reasons they enjoy “tax exempt status” on religious ground in the United States is because they bullied the IRS into a “deal” through extremely aggressive barratry (which is the offense of persistently instigating groundless lawsuits) against said government agency & its officials, & arranged to drop all 2,500 frivolous lawsuits only when an “agreement” was reached. In addition, Scientology’s lawyers hired private investigators to dig up any “dirt” on IRS agents which was then used to blackmail or publicly smear all “vulnerable” agents. It was an all-out WAR that Scientology had waged against the IRS, & was even described as such by Scientology’s “CEO”, David Miscavige, in his 1993 speech to the International Association of Scientologists.
http://legalminds.lp.findlaw.com/list/fedtax-l/msg00445.html
http://www.lermanet.com/scientologynews/nytimes/nyt-irs-030997.htm
http://www.factnet.org/headlines/give-away.htm
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Cowen/essays/irs.html
The official Scientology organization is composed of a number of “levels”. One begins as a “preclear” & works their way up. One must purchase virtually every service crucial to advancement directly from the “church” & at staggering prices. “Auditing”, for example, is purchased in 12½ hour blocks, costing anywhere from $200-$750 for introductory sessions to between $8,000 & $9,000 for advanced sessions. Basically, Scientology claims to possess exclusive knowledge of the path to religious redemption & then charges obscene amounts of money for every tiny incremental step towards this end. Visit this link to see how $380,000 is a conservative estimate for the total cost of moving all the way up the Scientology hierarchal ladder:
http://www.xenu.net/archive/prices.html
These are the total costs for auditing alone:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology_as_a_business#Costs
Here’s an explanation of what “auditing” is:
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061224182319AA2nnd6
At level OT III (Operating Thetan Level 3), some very strange & fiercely guarded secrets are imparted upon worthy members who have paid enough money to advance to such a level (and no, this isn’t a joke): The evil alien ruler Xenu killed millions of aliens (Thetans) from around the universe by kidnapping them, bringing them to earth in golden DC-8 “space-planes”, stacking them around volcanoes & blowing them up by dropping “h-bombs” into the volcanoes. Scientologists believe the souls of these aliens (these souls are “Body Thetans”) were captured, brainwashed & released; they then attached themselves to our ancestors (and according to Scientology’s belief in Thetan immortality, they also attached to us during “past lives”) & cause many of our mental & physical ills to this day. Auditing is said to “clear” us of these Body Thetans as well as the “mental implants” they supposedly impose on our minds.
http://www.spaink.net/cos/essays/atack_ot3.html
http://sf.irk.ru/www/ot3/spaink-ot3.html
http://xenu.net/archive/leaflet/Xenu-Letter.pdf
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/OTIII/
Scientology has taken a very hostile stance towards psychiatry & psychiatric drugs irrespective of the fact that some people require medication to remain adequately functional during everyday life. It doesn’t recognize legitimate conditions like autism, epilepsy, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, or ANY neurological disorder / chemical imbalance at all, & the “church” has been known to withhold prescription pharmaceuticals from members (often with harmful & deadly results). The “Church” blames psychiatry for the Holocaust, as well as school shootings & even September 11th. It’s been suggested that Hubbard’s vehement opposition was born of the psychiatric community’s rejection of his “tech” as a valid treatment method, but it’s also possible that Hubbard chose psychiatry as a scapegoat. Organizations like Scientology are notorious for villainizing a specific out-group because their “stand against the enemy” fosters cohesion within said organization, & psychiatry was an effective rallying point considering many people already distrust & oppose the mental health profession.
http://www.anti-scientologie.ch/usa-scientology.htm
http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=3137&IssueNum=136
http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2005/07/01/sci_psy/index_np.html?pn=1
http://perkinstragedy.org
L. Ron Hubbard, the man behind the creation of Scientology, was & still is a controversial figure. Biographies & lists of personal accomplishments differ greatly between Scientology & non-Scientology publications as the “church” tends to exaggerate & outright lie about his early life, his education, his travels, his achievements etc, preferring to paint a distorted, flattering picture. Several books & articles present facts which flatly contradict these church-published accounts (links to free online copies of these books & articles are provided below), showing conclusively that he was NOT the brilliant, accomplished figure revered by Scientologists. During his autopsy, the sedative Vistaril™ was present in his body, which several of his assistants would later attest was only one of many psychiatric & pain medications Hubbard ingested over the years. It had also been said by many who knew Hubbard personally that at the end of his life he was “a psychopathic insane person screaming about BT’s [Body Thetans]…”
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/Bare%20Faced%20Messiah.pdf
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/atack/contents.htm
http://www.clambake.org/archive/books/mom/Messiah_or_Madman.txt
http://lisatrust.bogie.nl/scientology/essays/jeff-hubbard.htm
To be blunt, Scientology is a cult. It employs semi-legitimate psychotherapy & self-help methods to keep people loyal & convinced of its merit while it simultaneously sucks them dry financially & attempts to keep them far away from ANYONE, even friends & family, who would dissuade them from remaining in such a harmful situation. It bullies all known critics, opponents, “enemies”, etc, often through malicious litigation & character assassination. It’s a particularly greedy as well as manipulative & dangerous cult that takes its anti-psychiatry fanaticism to deadly limits.
http://www.solitarytrees.net/racism/harass.htm#start
http://www.factnet.org/Books/SocialControl/scs.html#toc
http://www.garloff.de/kurt/sekten/mind1.html
http://www.sptimes.com/2006/06/24/Tampabay/The_unperson.shtml
http://www.xenu.net/archive/personal_story/funkydonny.html
The Creed of the Church of Scientology was written by L. Ron Hubbard shortly after the Church was formed in Los Angeles on February 18, 1954. After L. Ron Hubbard issued this creed from his office in Phoenix, Arizona, the Church of Scientology adopted it as its creed because it succinctly states what Scientologists believe.
We of the Church believe:
That all men of whatever race, color, or creed were created with equal rights;
That all men have inalienable rights to their own religious practices and their performance;
That all men have inalienable rights to their own lives;
That all men have inalienable rights to their sanity;
That all men have inalienable rights to their own defense;
That all men have inalienable rights to conceive, choose, assist or support their own organizations, churches and governments;
That all men have inalienable rights to think freely, to talk freely, to write freely their own opinions and to counter or utter or write upon the opinions of others;
That all men have inalienable rights to the creation of their own kind;
That the souls of men have the rights of men;
That the study of the mind and the healing of mentally caused ills should not be alienated from religion or condoned in non-religious fields;
And that no agency less than God has the power to suspend or set aside these rights, overtly or covertly.
And we of the Church believe:
That man is basically good;
That he is seeking to survive;
That his survival depends upon himself and upon his fellows and his attainment of brotherhood with the universe.
And we of the Church believe that the laws of God forbid man:
To destroy his own kind;
To destroy the sanity of another;
To destroy or enslave another’s soul;
To destroy or reduce the survival of one’s companions or one’s group.
And we of the Church believe that the spirit can be saved and that the spirit alone may save or heal the body.
Well the word means, study of knowledge. Is it a Religion? Well that would be for you to decide, I suggest you get any pre 1983 book on the subject and read it, see if it makes sense to you and go forward from there or not.