The Nature of Scientology

Scientology is an applied religious philosophy containing procedures intended to assist an individual to become more himself and enhance his personal well-being.

The truth is that in Scientology we are studying an extension of the work of Gautama Siddhartha (Buddha), begun about 2500 years ago. He sought to end the endless cycle of birth and death and birth, and this led to an effort to show Man that he was a spirit and did not have to be a body and did not have to go on being clay.

The Nature of Scientology

Scientology (from Latin scio knowing in the fullest sense of the word, and Greek logosto study) is an applied religious philosophy containing procedures intended to assist an individual to become more himself and enhance his personal well-being.

Scientology encompasses a broader scope than any Eastern or Western philosophy ever has, but it should be realized that a great deal of what we know, with an added exactness of understanding, was already known and lost thousands of years ago. So we are not dealing with something new in Scientology.

What we are doing with this data is new, and the technology for bringing about a new state in Man as it appears today in Scientology, is thousands of years old. When we call Scientology a philosophy we are calling it a religion out of a much deeper well than the last two thousand years.

The truth is that in Scientology we are studying an extension of the work of Gautama Siddhartha (Buddha), begun about 2500 years ago. 

He sought to end the endless cycle of birth and death and birth, and this led to an effort to show Man that he was a spirit and did not have to be a body and did not have to go on being clay.

Gautama Siddhartha found out how to move the spirit out of the body. The trouble he had with his work was how to stably do this or continue somebody in this exterior condition (the state of the individual himself, when it is outside his body, from lat. Exterus= outside). He did not know how to do this.

Lamaism which began in Tibet after the time of Gautama Siddhartha, was actually developed by Gautama Siddhartha who went to Tibet and worked there to develop what is called Lamaism in an effort to produce a methodology to reach the basis of the mind and permit an individual to be spiritually free. Now that work, too, was relatively unsuccessful. We were more successful than that in Scientology. We can show an individual that he is a human spirit more easily than has been done before. And, of course, today we have been totally successful in achieving for the individual, his own awareness of his spiritual nature and abilities. Yet the work of Gautama Siddhartha, although looked upon as a failure, produced a sufficiency of wisdom on this planet to bring civilization to three-quarters of Asia.

People poured out of China for centuries over tortuous and dangerous mountains and snow-filled passes to drop down into India, just to come closer to the area where Gautama Buddha had taught that there is hope and that the endless cycle of life and death does not have to continue. that an individual can be free even from this. The ignorant deified him and made idols of him but Gautama Siddhartha never pretended to be anything but a man. And due to him a great deal of this work was handed on and an enormous amount of what we call religion in this Western Hemisphere today was given to us directly by Gautama Siddhartha.

Buddhism is the oldest and most numerous religion on this planet at this moment and predates Christianity by 500 years. Probably the shreds of Buddhism coming into the Middle East with the silk and spice merchants sparked a religious revival and a considerable amount of messianic activity in the Middle East. The spice and silk merchants of India and China now, after the contact of Alexander in about 333 BC, found out there was a Europe, followed on the trail of his retreating conquest and made a trade contact with Europe. From there on, Asia supplied Europe with spices and silks and other goods on an overland route. Along with them undoubtedly came Buddhism.

“Love thy neighbor” was one of the first lessons taught by Gautama Siddhartha and it is that lesson which we have received from the Middle East, though it is probably more popularly known as a Christian lesson.

There is even a tradition that Christ studied in India and at the age of thirty came into the West bringing wisdom and hope. This was the beginning of a further spread of religion through Christianity. The early monks of Christianity brought this religion into the greater parts of Europe. These people, then, handed on the torch of wisdom, of information, generation to generation. And right on down to this time we are indebted to them.

Scientology can demonstrate that it can attain the goals set for Man by Christ, which are: wisdom, good health and immortality. Now, regardless of any truths or prophecies or prophets or anything else that happened as an independent endeavor, all this was sparked off by Buddhism. Gautama Siddhartha Buddha predicted that in 2500 years the entire job would be finished in the West. This is stated in the Pali Canons.

Well, we finished it. Scientology is an applied religious philosophy, a direct extension of the work of Gautama Siddhartha Buddha.

Everyone, anyone, of any race, color or creed, could be a member of the Buddhist Church. It was not limited to one caste or class or race or nationality. It was the first international religious movement, but although it has carried forward until today it actually has not moved its technology one inch further than it was pushed in Tibet until the advent of Scientology.

The spirituality of Man is the basis of religion and it is the one thing that all religions have in common. They have different creators, different gods, different alters of worship, but in one thing they hold a common truth and that is that Man is a spiritual being. Only in Buddhism was this ever proven and it is proven now again in Scientology.

This proof and the inherent potential ability of the spirit of Man you will find for yourself as you walk the well-marked road that is Scientology today.

Scientology is an applied religious philosophy by its basic tenets, practice, historical background and by the definition of the word “philosophy” itself. The following will help clarify the philosophical and practical aspects of religion.

Religious practice implies ritual, faith-in, doctrine based on a catechism and a creed. Religious philosophy implies study of spiritual manifestations; research on the nature of the spirit and study on the relationship of the spirit to the body; exercises devoted to the rehabilitation of abilities in a spirit.

Scientology is an applied religious philosophy in the actual meaning of the word and gives Man truth and real knowledge about himself, and frees the being of the load that limits his consciousness to the only physical aspects of life.

Auditor means “one who listens”. He or she is a highly trained person well versed in an understanding of the spirit. Auditing is a term used to mean the application of Scientology processes (Process: a series of questions asked to a person by an auditor to help her find out things about herself or life) and procedures to someone by a trained auditor.

Auditors have since the beginning of Scientology, been the only individuals on this planet, in this universe, capable of freeing Man. At times, some forget or choose to ignore the fact that the Auditor is not just another fellow or a guy who works in Scientology. An auditor is a highly trained specialist, no matter what level of training. He or she is the only one who can give Man the truth that Man knows.

The Auditor audits the spiritual beingness of the individual, increasing the individual’s understanding, enabling him or her to discard aberrations (Aberration: deviation from rational thinking or behavior) and to be more effective in all aspects of life and livingness.

The Auditor is handling the reactive mind of the individual. The reactive mind is a portion of a person’s mind which works on a totally stimulus-response basis which is not under his volitional control and which exerts force and the power of command over his awareness, purpose, thoughts, body and actions and is the single source of human aberration and psychosomatic ills.

It had managed to bury itself from view so thoroughly that only inductive philosophy, traveling from effect back to cause, served to uncover it.

If you really want to know more about the reactive mind you should study “Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health” thoroughly. It’s enough here to say it still exists and still accounts for all one’s “unaccountable” actions.

Since the perfection of the technology in Scientology to handle this reactive mind, freedom from mental torment is now a certain, attainable state and has been achieved by thousands of Scientologists.

We can demonstrate to human beings that they are spiritual beings and that is the essence of religion. Man is a spiritual being. Where he came from and how and why and where he is going, are questions developed in religion.

Auditing is directly concerned with increasing the ability to survive, with increasing the sanity or ability to reason, the physical ability, and the general enjoyment of life.

The higher a person can rise on this scale, the righter he is in terms of reason, in terms of survival, and in terms of general well-being. The higher he is, the happier. The lower he is, the sadder.

Happiness is important. The ability to arrange life and the environment so that living can be better enjoyed, the ability to tolerate the foibles of one’s fellow humans, the ability to see the true factors in a situation and resolve problems of living with accuracy, the ability to accept and execute responsibility, these things are important. Life is not much worth living if it cannot be enjoyed. The ability to live well and fully and to enjoy that living is the gift of a Scientologist.

The Auditor might liken his job to removing the rocks and shoals from the hidden depths of a turbulent river and making of it a smooth-flowing and powerful stream. The Auditor is not changing the preclear (a person who finds out more about self and life through Scientology Auditing) by evaluation and suggestions. He is simply making it easier for the mind to do what the basic personality – the individual naturally wants the mind to do. This might be said to be the end goal of auditing.

A fact which has been forgotten in this time of war and spiritual pestilence is that there have been times in Man’s history and prehistory when he has succeeded. It has not all been gloom and hopelessness. Else we would not be here today – even as poorly as we are. Men have lived to conquer all other forms of life, from the mastodon to the microbe. Men have lived to build walls and roads and pyramids which have defied the elements for thousands of years. Men have lived to write music which has pleased the gods and lines which have made the angels sigh and the devil weep.

This is a time for Man to succeed again. Here is the word, the technology, the goal. The job is cut out and its name is Survive!

– L. Ron Hubbard – 1965