Scientology, Church of

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Scientology, Church of

In 1950 writer L. Ron Hubbard announced the discovery of Dianetics as a new system of mental health. Several years later he announced the further development of Dianetics into a comprehensive system of spiritual philosophy and religion, which he termed Scientology. Both Dianetics and Scientology now form the teachings and practice of the Church of Scientology.

Dianetics

Developed in part in reaction to the dominance of behavioral approaches to psychology and then-current psychotherapeutic practices such as electric shock therapy, Dianetics is based upon the idea that the human is identified with the soul (termed the Thetan), and Dianetics identifies what the soul does to the body through the mind. It was first exposed to the public in the article "Dianetics … An Introduction to a New Science" in the pages of Astounding Science Fiction (May 1950), a magazine published by one of Hubbard's friends who had become enthusiastic about the possibilities of the new approach. Several weeks later Hubbard's book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health was published, on May 9, 1950, and became an overnight best-seller.

Hubbard suggested that the goal of life was what he termed "infinite survival." Pain, disappointment, and failure are the results of actions that do not promote survival, he said. The mind operates to solve the problems relating to survival. From the information it receives, stored in mental pictures, it directs the individual in actions geared toward surviving. Such mental images are three dimensional—they have energy and mass, they exist in space, and they tend to appear when someone thinks of them, Hubbard said. They are strung together in a consecutive record accumulated over a lifetime Hubbard called a "time track."

The theory of Dianetics is a variation on preexisting concepts of conscious and unconscious mind, using the terms analytic and reactive mind. The analytic mind, according to Hubbard, records the mental image pictures derived from our experiences. However, pictures of experience which contain pain or painful emotions are recorded in the reactive mind. Also, experiences that occur when a person is unconscious (on the operating table, for example) or partially conscious (when inebriated) are recorded by the reactive mind and are not available to the analytic mind, he said.

The problem with the reactive mind is that it stores particular types of mental images called "engrams" (a term borrowed from psychologist Richard Semon to denote a memory trace), creating a complete record of unpleasant or unconscious experiences. It also thinks in identities, equating the various elements of a painful experiences. In the future, when one experiences several elements in the engram, all of the pain and emotion of past experiences will flood back into the present. Over a lifetime, the cumulative effect of engrams can be a set of unwanted and little-understood negative conditions, including, but not limited to, pains, emotional blocks, and even physical illnesses, according to Hubbard. Armed with Hubbard's book, any ordinary individual was considered competent to practice a simple system of psychotherapy superior to those involving specialized training.

Having discovered the nature of the human psyche, Hubbard set out to discover the means of addressing psychological disorders. His techniques are supposed to erase the contents of the reactive mind, rendering them useless in further affecting the person without his/her conscious knowledge.

The aim of the techniques is the production of a "clear," a person whose reactive mind has been cleared, who has no engrams. The primary technique is called "auditing," a one-onone counseling process that uses an instrument called an "Emeter," a modified whetstone bridge that measures the level of electrical resistance in the human body. It is the belief that such resistance is directly related to the focus upon an engram. The process of becoming a clear occurs in a series of classes and personal counseling sessions. Participants record the state of clear in degrees.

Hubbard founded the Hubbard Dianetic Research Foundation in June 1950. He spent the rest of the year traveling and lecturing and the following year opened the Hubbard College in Wichita, Kansas. By this time Hubbard had speculated that human beings are basically spiritual, and that once cleared, have great potential. These insights led to what would be termed "Scientology." The Hubbard Association Scientology International was founded in 1952, and the first Church of Scientology opened two years later. Dianetics became the method of entering the church and discovering its teachings.

Scientology

Hubbard proposed the existence of engrams—painful impressions from past experiences, extending back into innumerable previous incarnations. According to his book The History of Man (1952), the human body houses two entities—a genetic entity (for carrying on the evolutionary line), and a Thetan, or consciousness, like an individual soul, that has the capacity to separate from body and mind. In man's long evolutionary development the Thetan has been trapped by the engrams formed at various stages of embodiment, Hubbard says.

As soon became obvious in Dianetics, clears were not the fully liberated individuals it had been hoped they would be. The idea of engrams from past lives explained the problem, thus a new concept appeared in Scientology—the "MEST-Clear" (MEST = Matter-Energy-Space-Time). Much of Hubbard's thinking resonates with the concepts of reincarnation and transmigration of souls found in Eastern religions. The goal of Scientology training thus became the final clearing of the individual of all engrams and the creation of what is termed an "Operating Thetan." Among the abilities of the operating Thetan is the soul's capacity to leave and operate apart from the body.

The exact content of the teachings of the Church of Scientology are imparted in the classes attended by church members and are not revealed to the public. Such is especially true of the highest classes (OT-4-7 levels), though jumbled accounts have been presented in books by former members, several of whom left the church with the confidential materials used in the classes and who tried to hurt the church by making these materials available to the general public. As in Dianetics, one progresses through the OT levels on a degree basis, the mastering of one level being a prerequisite to the next.

Scientology's Controversy

Almost from its beginning, Scientology has been a controversial religion. Soon after his announcement of the discovery of Dianetics, Hubbard encountered opposition by the American Medical Association, and in 1958 a two-decade battle with the Food and Drug Administration began. The initiation of these continuing battles had immense consequences, and critics of the church used the actions in one country as a basis for initiating actions elsewhere. Also, government files, not checked for accuracy, were passed to other government agencies and to other countries. Suddenly, in the 1960s, Scientology found itself under attack from a variety of quarters and has spent 30 years in the courts in the attempt to vindicate its existence and program.

Through the 1970s and 1980s, the church fought battles with the Internal Revenue Service in the United States (finally resolved in the early 1990s) and with several former members and anticult organizations who accused it of brainwashing church members. The church itself initiated legal action against publications that it believed libeled the organization and its founder. Important international cases were fought and won in Australia, Canada, and Great Britain, and ongoing cases are pending in Germany, among the most conservative of Western countries concerning religious freedom issues.

In the midst of its fight with the U.S. government, and continually blocked in its attempt to gather documentation of covert government actions against the church, in the mid-1970s several high officials conspired to infiltrate targeted agencies and obtain copies of files on the church. The FBI, CIA, and IRS were especially high on their list. When the plan was discovered, it resulted in a massive raid on the church's headquarters. Several church officials were arrested and convicted of theft of government property.

As of the 1990s, with the solving of its problems with the U.S. government, the church has moved to gain its rights as a viable religion in Germany and to oppose the actions of the Cult Awareness Network—which it believes is simply an antireligious organization—and similar groups internationally.

The Church of Scientology reports members in 129 countries and the words of L. Ron Hubbard have been translated into over 30 languages. They also maintain social reform and community activities among services such as the World Institute of Scientology Enterprises (WISE), that provide professional groups with strategies to find harmony in the workplace.

For an authoritative account of Dianetics and Scientology, see current editions of L. Ron Hubbard's books Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health and History of Man, both published by the Church of Scientology, Los Angeles, and available at local Scientology organizations. Address: US IAS Members Trust, 1311 N. New Hampshire Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90027. Website: http://www.scientology.com/.