Taking With the Left Hand: Enneagram Craze, People of the Bookmark, & The Mouravieff "Phenomenon"

by William Patrick Patterson

A lucid and compelling account of conflict and charlatanism surrounding the Gurdjieff Work, one of the most important alternative spiritual movements of our day. The first book to explore one of the taboo subjects of our time—spiritual theft, distortion and appropriation—Patterson details and documents how a principal symbol of the teaching has been stolen and commercialized by the so-called enneagram community; how Robert Burton, founder of the Fellowship of Friends, distorted the teaching; and how Mouravieff, a Russian esotericist, plagiarized and appropriated it.

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

William Patrick Patterson is the founder/director of The Gurdjieff Studies Program, the author of seven books on The Fourth Way, and the director-writer-narrator of the award-winning documentary video trilogy—The Life and Significance of G.I. Gurdjieff. He is also the founder/editor of "The Gurdjieff Journal" (est. 1992), the first domestic and international Fourth Way journal. He has led groups for many years and annually gives four public seminars on G.I. Gurdjieff's teaching of The Fourth Way. He is the direct and longtime pupil of John Pentland, the remarkable man Mr. Gurdjieff chose to lead the Work in America.

Reviews

[William Patterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lucid and compelling account of conflict and charlatanism surrounding the Gurdjieff Work, one of the most important alternative spiritual movements of our day. The first book to explore one of the taboo subjects of our time—spiritual theft, distortion and appropriation—Patterson details and documents how a principal symbol of the teaching has been stolen and commercialized by the so-called enneagram community; how Robert Burton, founder of the Fellowship of Friends, distorted the teaching; and how Mouravieff, a Russian esotericist, plagiarized and appropriated it.

[Jeff Stevens · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fairly esoteric book on a fairly esoteric subject. There are entertaining but also historically orientated books on Gurdjieff and the movements he left in his wake (Madame Blatavsky's Baboon Comes to Mind Madame Blatavsky's Baboon) -- but this is not one of those. It's probably only of interest to scholars working with weird American religious movements, and those who have run into, around, or afoul of some of the knockoff faux Gurdjieff groups (or know those who have). If none of those descriptions fits you, don't bother. If one does, though, dive in; the information in this book is extremely rare and hard to find.