Eckankar

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Eckankar.

Eckankar is a new religious movement that focuses on spiritual exercises enabling practitioners to experience what its followers call "the Light and Sound of God."

According to the Eckankar glossary, the term Eckankar means "Co-Worker with God". ^[1] It is likely drawn from the Sikh term, Ik Onkar. Since 1985 Eckankar is described as “The Religion of the Light and Sound of God”. Prior to 1985 Eckankar changed the descriptor following its name several times.

Eckankar headquarters are in Chanhassen, Minnesota (southwest of Minneapolis). At this site there are the Eckankar Temple, an outdoor chapel, an administrative building, and the ECK Spiritual Campus.

1 History
2 Teachings
3 Origins
4 Beliefs
5 Current status
6 Ceremonies and Rites
7 ECK masters
8 Related groups
9 Legal Disputes
10 Accusations of plagiarism
11 Criticism
12 See also
13 References
14 External links
- 14.1 Plagiarism discussion

[edit] History

Founded by Paul Twitchell in 1965, Eckankar was carried by its spiritual leader, Darwin Gross, from 1971 until 1981. From 1981 to 1983 the leadership of Eckankar was co-shared by both Darwin Gross and Harold Klemp. In 1983 Harold Klemp became exclusive spiritual leader of Eckankar. Today, Harold Klemp is revered, but not worshiped, and is considered "the Living Eck Master" by followers of Eckankar.

[edit] Teachings

One of the basic tenets is that soul (awareness or consciousness) can leave the body in full consciousness and travel freely in other planes of reality. Eckankar emphasizes personal spiritual experiences as the most natural way back to God. ^[2] These are attained via "soul travel", shifting the awareness from the body to the inner planes of existence.

Certain mantras are used to facilitate spiritual growth. One important spiritual exercise of Eckankar is the singing or chanting of hu. The Hu has been used in the Sufi and other traditions, and is viewed as a “love song to God.” It is pronounced like the word “Hue” in a long drawn out breath and is sung for about 20 minutes. Eckists sing it alone or in groups for spiritual upliftment. This practice is claimed to allow the student to step back from the overwhelming input of the physical senses and emotions and regain soul’s spiritual viewpoint.

Dreams are regarded as an important teaching tool and members often keep a dream journal to facilitate study. ^[3] According to followers of Eckankar, dream travel often serves as the gateway to soul travel^[4] or the shifting of one’s consciousness to ever-higher states of being.

Eckankar teaches that "spiritual liberation" in one’s lifetime is available to all and that it is possible to achieve self-realization (the realization of oneself as soul) and God-realization (the realization of oneself as a spark of God) in one’s lifetime. The membership card for Eckankar states: “The aim and purpose of Eckankar has always been to take soul by its own path back to its divine source.”

The emphasis has shifted in current times away from out of body experiences to expansion of awareness through experiencing God’s love in everyday matters. The final spiritual goal of all Eckists is to become conscious co-workers with God.

[edit] Origins

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Please see the discussion on the talk page.(May 2008)
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Paul Twitchell founded Eckankar in 1965, although the religion claims that the basis for the Eckankar teachings date back to the beginning of human life and that an early Eckankar teacher is Gakko from Venus.^[5]

According to Doug Marman, Paul Twitchell sourced many modern and ancient religious teachings in his creation of the Eckankar Teaching, but the main sources appear to be Sufism and a little known teaching in India called “The Parent Faith.” (This is where other light and sound teachings such as Sant Mat also derived their roots.)^[6]

Eckankar headquarters were originally in Las Vegas, Nevada. Under the leadership of Darwin Gross, the organization was moved to Menlo Park, California in 1971. In 1986 Harold Klemp moved the base of operations to Minnesota where it remains today.^[7]

Eckankar was founded in 1965 as a business; however, the Panel of Administrators urged Twitchell to conform to usual standards, and the teaching was later registered as a non-profit organization. Eighteen years later, in 1983, Harold Klemp changed it to a recognized religious institution. Currently Eckankar is accepted as a religion by the US Army, Boy Scouts, and many other public institutions.

[edit] Beliefs

Primary to the teaching is the belief that human consciousness can leave the body at will (soul travel) and explore the inner planes of creation. Also, the doctrines of karma and reincarnation are strongly supported.

Soul is seen as the true self, and it wears a mind, emotions and the physical body in the same way as we might put on layers of clothes. Soul can thus leave the body and return at will, once it learns how. Dreams are seen as very important, with books such as The Art of Spiritual Dreaming forming part of the essential reading for all Eckankar students (Chelas).

The beliefs that individuals are responsible for their own destiny and that their decisions determine their future are core principles of the religion. Eckankar students meet in satsang ("spiritual meeting") to discuss books and discourses. Questioning of the stated beliefs is not opposed, and indeed is recommended for new students. In this respect Eckankar is quite different from other teachings.

Many people report that they are drawn to this belief because it confirms to them the validity of experiences they had prior to even hearing about the group. These experiences are generally with either the light or sound, or some of the Eck Masters. A common example is when an adult recalls meeting one of the Eckankar teachers as a child and recalls this when finding a picture of that Master on the wall of an Eckankar center, or at friend's home, or in one of the group's publications. Many of these stories are recorded in the numerous books and magazines published by the organization.

Eckankar does not proselytize, and it seems to attract membership from those who find confirmation of personal experiences and understandings after reading the books, meeting with a member, or seeing one of the many videos available to the public.

After membership, adherents claim that the techniques given in the discourses and books of Eckankar provide individuals with the means by which to have direct and clear inner and outer experiences of the Light and Sound and with the Eck Masters. Members commonly speak of how a dream of inner experience has helped them resolve some issue in their life. Some claim to have learned the art of reading their own past lives and garnering healing or understanding from this. Most report a gradual growth in consciousness that they have experienced through the teachings and initiations. There is a 20-25 year program of discourses provided by the group to members.

According to the US Department of State (International Religious Freedom Report for Cote d'Ivoire 2008), the current Nigerian branch of Eckankar describes their beliefs as "a syncretistic religion founded in 1965 in Nigeria that sees human passion as an obstacle to uniting a person's divine qualities".^[8]

[edit] Current status

Eckankar claims an active membership base in over one hundred countries throughout the world, including the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia and Africa.^[9]^[10] 26,000 American Eckists were estimated in 2001 and 36,700 in 2004.^[11] Estimates from varying authors ^[12] varies from 500,000, in 1972^[13] to 50,000 or less in more recent years. Eckankar does not publish membership figures.

Eckankar’s 50,000-square-foot main "Temple of ECK"^[14] was dedicated in Chanhassen, Minnesota on October 22, 1990. As of late 2007, the largest capacity Eckankar Temple was in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria, Africa, with a total capacity of 10,000.

Eckankar has produced dozens of books, videos, CDs, and tapes on a variety of spiritual topics. Members receive discourses, and they are invited to study at home or in the company of other members in Eckankar Satsang classes. Eckankar does not attempt to convert individuals. They do, however, advertise their presence and distribute literature to interested persons.

The Eckankar “EK” symbol appears on the list of Available Emblems of Belief for Placement on Government Headstones and Markers by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs.^[15]

[edit] Ceremonies and Rites

There are few personal requirements to be an Eckist; however, certain spiritual practices are recommended. Chief among these is daily practice of the "spiritual exercises" of ECK for 15-20 minutes a day. The most basic ECK spiritual exercise is singing the word hu, an ancient name for God (also known and practiced in Sufism), for upliftment and spiritual experiences. A wide variety of spiritual exercises are offered, and members are encouraged to create their own. There are no dietary requirements, sexual taboos, or enforced ascetic practices. Eckankar does not require potential members to leave their current faith to join.

There are a number of rituals an Eckist can experience as part of the teaching:

ECK Consecration Ceremony : Celebrating the entrance of the young and infant into Eckankar, and new life in the light and sound of God.
ECK Rite of Passage : Celebrating the passage from youth into adulthood, usually around thirteen.
ECK Wedding Ceremony : Celebrating the marriage bond as two Eckists commit their lives to one another before God.
ECK Memorial Service : Honors the journey of soul and welcomes it into the worlds beyond the physical.

Eckists celebrate a spiritual new year on October 22. There is no celebration of personal anniversaries such as birthdays of the leaders.

[edit] ECK masters

Main article: ECK master

The neutrality and factual accuracy of this section are disputed.
Please see the relevant discussion on the talk page. (May 2008)

ECKists believe contact with Divine Spirit, which they call the ECK, ^[16] can be made via the spiritual exercises of ECK and the guidance of the living ECK master. It is held that the ECK masters are here to serve all life irrespective of religious belief.

The following masters are among the better known:^[17]

Kata Daki : An ECK Master in the Ancient Order of Vairagi Adepts. She helps people get back on their feet during hardship.
Gopal Das : The Mahanta, the Living ECK Master in Egypt, 3000 B.C., who founded the mystery cults of Osiris and Isis; the guardian of the fourth section of the Shariyat-Ki-Sugmad on the Astral Plane; he teaches at the Temple of Golden Wisdom there. Gopal Das is said to be youthful but mature in appearance, fair-skinned, clean-shaven, and with longish light-colored hair.
Rebazar Tarzs : The officially-designated “torchbearer” of Eckankar in the lower worlds; the spiritual teacher of many ECK masters including Peddar Zaskq, or Paul Twitchell, to whom he handed the Rod of ECK Power in 1965. Said to be over five hundred years old, Rebazar Tarzs was Tibetan by birth and lives in a hut in the Hindu Kush mountains. He is said to be about 5 feet 10 inches tall, with an athletic physique, dark skin, closely-cropped black hair and beard, and piercing black eyes.
Rami Nuri : The ECK Master who is the guardian of the holy book, the Shariyat-Ki-Sugmad, on the Pinda Lok (the physical world) at the House of Moksha, Temple of Golden Wisdom in the spiritual city of Retz on the planet Venus. The letter M appears on his forehead. He also once served as the Mahanta, the Living ECK Master.

[edit] Related groups

Some groups, such as ATOM, started by a former Living ECK Master, Darwin Gross (now deceased) and John Roger’s Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness, appear to have split from the main body of the Eckankar. Gross made this public, while Roger denies any connection to Eckankar beyond having once been a student of Paul Twitchell.

More recently, former Eckist Ford Johnson formed a spiritual organization based on the idea that one does not need a master or spiritual guru to achieve spiritual enlightenment.^[18] ^[19] Other groups created by former Eckists, like Michael Owens’ The Way of Truth^[20] and Gary Olsen’s MasterPath^[21] recruit members to apparently Eckankar-like organizations.

The current leader of Eckankar has stated that members should feel free to leave Eckankar unbounded by guilt or fear. But critics contend that, while Eckankar promotes itself as a path to ending karma and reincarnation, Eckankar writings also speak of karma and reincarnation returning to members who leave Eckankar.^[22]

[edit] Legal Disputes

In 1983 Sri Darwin Gross was asked to completely step down from all leadership roles and association with Eckankar by Sri Harold Klemp under controversial circumstances involving charges against Gross of misappropriation of Eckankar corporate funds.^[23] As Klemp took an exclusive leadership role, the corporate structure of Eckankar changed in California giving Klemp much more authority as the only voting member of the corporation.^[24]^[25] This change, considered by Gross as a "hostile takeover" of the corporation, was formally filed in the State of California on June 20, 1985. The policies giving Klemp exclusive powers were changed in a similar vein in Eckankar's Minnesota corporate papers on January 30, 1987 and were also changed in the Eckankar Nevada corporate papers on December 21, 1987.^[26]

[edit] Accusations of plagiarism

After Twitchell’s death in 1971 David C. Lane, then a member of the Sant Mat derivative Radha Soami Satsang Beas, charged Eckankar was a Sant Mat derivative, and that many Twitchell books used some passages of other groups’ books without crediting their authors. Twitchell’s The Far Country was said to contain the most plagiarism (of Julian Johnson’s Paths of the Masters).

Though there is overwhelming evidence that Twitchell plagiarized several authors when writing his Eck books and discourses,^[27] Eckankar has never admitted that Twitchell ever used plagiarized material. The official Eckankar website goes as far to say that “Paul had taken it [the ECKANKAR teachings] and built upon it from many different areas, and he then moved it more than a step further.” ^[28]

A defence for Twitchell's plagiarism was published in 2007 by a long standing Eckankar High Initiate, Doug Marman ^[29] in The Whole Truth, a biography of Paul Twitchell. Marman lists several books that he feels Twitchell used as uncredited sources, even of the words of "eck masters" from whom Twitchell claimed to have taken dictation.^[30] In relation to this book Twitchell’s widow (Gail) has written "... finally, someone got the whole thing right... Paul's work [put in] in the proper perspective."^[31]^{[unreliable source?]} Twitchell biographer Brad Steiger has also written and commended this work as the most researched and authoritative to date on Paul Twitchell.^{[unreliable source?]} Go To: The Whole Truth

Professor David C. Lane has written a commentary to the Doug Marman book, reaffirming his view that Twitchell did try to cover up his past associations, did plagiarize several authors, and generally had a history of being free with the truth. ^[32]

[edit] Criticism

Internet communities of ex-members and critics, such as the Usenet newsgroup alt.religion.eckankar, include criticisms dating back over ten years. Eckankar has been labeled a cult by some critics, including both former members and Christian writers.^[33]

In the introductory level Eckankar states that spiritual truth is not the possession of a single person or group, and that the many paths all lead to the same goal. However, Eckankar states it is the most direct path to the highest heaven. The Shariyat-Ki-Sugmad, Eckankar’s “Bible,” unambiguously states that Eckankar is the most direct path to God.

Some outspoken ex-Eckists believe that Eckankar is unethical and less than honest in how it presents itself and its history. ^[34] Accordingly, some former Eckankar initiates feel an obligation to "wake up" current Eckankar initiates to what they claim they are not being told, and some critics cite former leader Twitchell's claimed plagiarism as a reason to leave Eckankar.