Gnostic Esoteric Study & Work Aids: Quotes from Gurdjieff’s Book “Beelzebub’s Tales to his Grandson”

Introduction

In this post as promised I have provided certain excerpts from Gurdjief’s book “Belzzebub’s Tales to his Grandson” that in order explain the esoteric cause of war.

There has Always Been War and so a Solution was Sought

Gurdjief relates that in the history of humankind wars have been constant. He continues saying that about 600 to 700 years ago a special society of wise men in a city called Mosulopolis searched for a solution to this problem. They did come up with a solution and it did work for a long while, until a particular philosopher named Atarnakh came about and introduced another solution which for a while was effective but then when it stopped being implemented grave consequences unfolded, namely world war one.

An Ancient Society of Wise Men Dedicated to Stop War

“Well, now, my boy, after this digression which I have made for your practical benefit, let us return again to the serious question touched upon; I shall begin with the history promised you about how the society of terrestrial beings which had as its motto ‘The-Earth-Is-Equally-Free-for-All arose and fell, because the information about this will give you the possibility to understand well just about that first and chief cause why there on your planet this terrible process of periodic reciprocal destruction by these unfortunate three-brained beings of our Great Megalocosmos must already almost inevitably proceed.

“And likewise you will learn how the, so to say, local Nature—when something unforeseen hinders its correct functioning for the purposes of the common-cosmic Trogoautoegocrat—adapts itself so that its results should correspondingly blend with the harmony of this most great cosmic law.

“The said society of terrestrial beings-men arose, as I have already told you, six or seven centuries ago on the continent Asia in a town then existing under the name of Mosulopolis.

“And it arose from the following cause:

“Just at that period, the processes I have mentioned were flowing particularly frequently on just that same continent.

“These processes occurred partly between different communities and partly within the limits of these communities themselves; and these latter processes afterwards came to be called ‘civil wars.’

“One of the chief causes of these terrible processes which became frequent both between and within communities on the continent Asia was, at that period, a religion, then only just formed, which had been fantastically founded on the teaching of a genuine messenger of our ENDLESSNESS—Saint Mohammed.”

A Solution was Proposed to Stop these Civil Wars

A member of that of that society of wise men, namely Atarnakh proposed that animals be sacrificed on purpose to satisfy the theory that nature demands that a certain number of deaths take place on the planet, and so if more animals die the number of human beings that need to die in order to satisfy this quota will be much less if nothing.

The Solution of a Certain Kurdish Philosopher Atarnakh

‘“Now listen to what we must do to attain this aim.

The results of all my researches clearly prove that Nature requires that at certain periods a certain number of deaths should take place on the Earth; and at the same time I have succeeded in making clear that for the needs of Nature it is indifferent which deaths these are, whether deaths of people themselves or deaths of the lives of other forms of beings.

‘“From this it follows that if the number of deaths required by Nature is made up by the deaths of other forms of lives of the Earth, then obviously the need for the number of deaths of men themselves will thus be of itself correspondingly reduced.

“‘And it will be quite possible to attain to this if all the members of our society continue to work with the same intensity, only not with the aim of realizing our former program, but of reviving upon the Earth on a larger scale than before the ancient custom among men of offering sacrifices to their gods and saints by destroying the lives of other forms.’

What Actually Happened

So animal sacrifices were introduced and that practice continued on a large scale. However a certain Dervish Assadulla Ibrahim Ogly came along after several hundred years and began a campaign to abolish this practice of animal sacrifice.

Animal Sacrifices Began

“Some days later, the members of that society now under the new motto, ‘The-Earth-Only-for-Men,’ dispersed from the city Mosulopolis to their native countries where, under the general instructions issuing from the philosopher Atarnakh, they so acted that among the populations of the continent Asia the idea should be strengthened and again take root of ‘making themselves agreeable’ to their gods and idols by killing beings of different forms.

“And indeed, afterward, when they began to actualize in practice this new program of theirs, there very soon began to be re-established among the beings all over the continent Asia the custom of offering sacrifices to their fancied ‘saints’ by the destruction of the existence of various weak and stupid one-brained and two-brained beings there.”

Animal Sacrifices were Stopped

“And thanks to preachings of this kind about the ‘other world’ by dervishes, considered great authorities on such questions, the beings of Asia did indeed year by year diminish their sacrificial offerings.”

“In short, the result of all the activity of this ‘good’ Persian dervish was precisely the latest great process of reciprocal destruction, or, as your favorites call it, ‘The Great World War.’

A Mistake in the Solution of Animal Sacrifices and also in Stopping the Animal Sacrifices

It so appears that the animal sacrifices did diminish many wars however, it was not exactly what nature needed or required. It turns out that what nature really requires is in simple terms is for human beings to transmute, that is some other than the energy that is released from us when we die. Anyhow because the animal sacrifices stopped, nature just was not receiving what she needed and plus because human beings by then had stopped transmuting nature was very in need of nourishment so she had to adapt and obtain that nourishment another way which was through death or war, and a great war as nature was very impoverished at that stage.

The Mistake – It is Quality that Nature Requires not Quantity

“And so, my boy, although the hypothesis put forward in the theory of that uncommon learned Kurd Atarnakh very nearly, as I have already told you, approximated to reality, yet nevertheless he failed to understand what was most important, namely, that the vibrations required by Nature, which have to be formed from the radiations issuing from beings both during their existence as well as from the process of their Rascooarno, have no significance quantitatively, but only qualitatively.

“It is possible that the Kurd Atarnakh, being an unusual terrestrial being, would have understood this also if he had known the details of the results that had been obtained after those conditions of being-existence had been already more or less established on this planet, which were especially created for the three-brained beings arising there by the Most Saintly Labors of the ‘essence-loving’ Very Saintly Ashiata Shiemash.

“During that said period, not only did their rate of ’mortality’ begin to decline, but what they call their birth rate also began to decline.

“Their birth rate declined because, when the three brained beings there were already existing more or less as is becoming to three-centered beings and when the radiations issuing from them were yielding vibrations more akin to the vibrations required from them by Nature both for the Most Great common-cosmic Trogoautoegocrat in general and for the maintenance of the Moon and Anulios in particular, then Great Nature did not fail to adapt herself to the diminishing of their birth rate, the more so as in recent times the need for the said vibrations for the maintenance of the existence of the planet Moon had to be diminished.

“The aspect of this fundamental question regarding the significance of the sense and aim of the existence of your favorites is so important for the understanding of a great deal that proceeds there on the Earth, and by the way also of the question touching the causes of war, that I consider it necessary to refer to it once more.

“I first learned that the destiny of beings arising on this planet of yours is chiefly to elaborate—by means of the process of their existence—the vibrations required by Nature for the maintenance of those former parts of the planet now called Moon and Anulios, when, do you remember, I became worthy personally to converse for the second time with His Conformity the then still Angel, but now Archangel, Looisos.

“His Conformity then told me that although the movements of both former parts of the planet Earth were now already finally regulated with the general harmony of movement and that every kind of apprehension of some or other surprise in the near future had absolutely vanished, yet to avoid and possible complications in the distant future it had been explicitly decided by the Most High, Most Sacred Individuals to actualize the ‘corresponding’ on the planet for the formation of what is called the Sacred Askokin so that this sacred cosmic substance, required for the maintenance of that planet’s former parts, might continuously issue from that planet.”

The Cause and the Result

The real food that nature requires is our transmutation and when nature can not acquire it she must look to other means and one of these is the death of human beings and war is a vehicle for this.

No Askokin from Human Beings Caused Nature to Adapt

“And so, my dear Hassein, when it appeared that the instinctive need for conscious labor and intentional suffering in order to be able to take in and transmute in themselves the sacred substances Abrustdonis and Helkdonis and thereby to liberate the sacred Askokin for the maintenance of the Moon and Anulios had finally disappeared from the psyche of your favorites, then Great Nature Herself was constrained to adapt Herself to extract this sacred substance by other means, one of which is precisely that periodic terrifying process there of reciprocal destruction.

Nature Adapts

Nature always adapts herself to fit into harmony with everything, namely the cosmos. Because of the large losses of life during the two previous world wars nature has according to Gurdjief increased the birth rate.

How Nature Adapts Increasing the Birth Rate

“In order that you may represent to yourself and understand well in what way unfortunate Nature there so adapts Herself that there should be attained what is called the ‘equilibrium of vibrations,’ required from this planet for the common-cosmic harmony, I shall explain to you only about one fact which is just now being actualized there, that is to say, subsequent to that process of theirs which they called the ‘World War.’

“It was plainly owing to the fact that during the said process what is called ‘poison gas’ was invented by beings called ‘Germans,’ and what are called special ‘rapid-fire machine guns’ by beings called ‘Englishmen,’ that the amount of Rascooarnos or deaths unforeseen by Nature took place on this occasion and in a far greater quantity than was then required by Her, or, as the candidates for Hasnamuss there, namely, the commercial businessmen, would say, ‘overproduction’ occurred in respect of the deaths of the three-brained beings required there.

“In consequence, Nature there had again to begin from that moment to ‘puff and blow,’ and, as is said there, ‘jump out of Her skin’ in order to correct this unforeseeingness and adapt Herself once again in a corresponding manner.

“This time, from what I myself learned for certain during my last stay there, and also from the intimation communicated to me by etherogram, Great Nature there is evidently about to increase, for future times, the birth rate of other forms of beings there.

“I noticed in the cities Petrograd and Tiflis situated in the large community Russia, of which community more beings perished than of any other during that World War of theirs, that that kind of quadruped being which as a rule never appeared there, namely, the quadruped beings which hate people and which are called ‘wolves,’ were already prowling in the streets.

“In the information communicated to me by etherogram it was said, among other things, that in the same large community Russia the birth rate of beings of the kinds of rodents called ‘mice’ and ‘rats’ had increased to such an unprecedented extent that at the present time they are beginning to devour most of the stored provisions of the beings of the said community.”