Eugene Jeffrey Gold is an American Jew in his mid-fifties who grew up in New York City. His father was Horace L. Gold, the late founder/editor of Galaxy magazine, and the young Gold�s imagination and religious sensibilities were nourished by his father�s involvement in an esoteric spiritual group composed of science fiction writers, which included Asimov, Heinlein, Philip Jose Farmer, L. Ron Hubbard, and Robert Silverberg.(1) This group met every Sunday in a large water storage tank in Manhattan that had been converted by one of the writers into a self-regulating tropical forest—complete with plant, insect and bird life and with waterfalls. Horace Gold brought his son to these meetings which were a forum for philosophical speculations and scientific extrapolations, where oriental meditation techniques and ESP training were tried out. Gold left home to attend the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles where, in 1970, he helped create the original Earth Day. Since the early 60s Gold has since been active in the West Coast Consciousness movement and has directed many Gestalt therapy groups and spiritual training workshops. He has made recordings of experimental music and, in recent years, has dedicated himself to his vocation as an artist, sculptor and painter.

E. J. Gold is deceptively conventional in his appearance. He is well-fleshed, middle aged, of middle height, but likes to wear scratchy woolen long-johns (with stripes, thereby suggesting the outlaw or jailbird) and keeps his head and eyebrows clean-shaven (the latter contributing to the bald intensity of his gaze). Disciples have reported conflicting first impressions: "He scared the shit out of me!"; "He was the greatest comedian I�d ever seen"; "He had the kindest, wisest eyes." He might be mistaken for a truck driver, a construction worker or possibly a Hell�s Angel. The stories of his conversion triumphs are testimonials to the power of his native charisma, which (reputedly) needs no props or "transcendence mechanisms" (Kanter 1972). A flyer distributed in the Chronic workshop in 1984 relates the tale of how Gold intercepted a stockbroker rushing to work one morning, and simply asked, "Do you have the time?" That stockbroker never reached his office, nor even glanced at his watch, for he recognized the call to participate in the "Work," and followed his master to California. Gold�s former wife, Cybele, offers a similar account of her first meeting with her future master while browsing through a perfume stall in a "hippie" crafts market. She had barely observed his disheveled appearance when he gazed into her eyes and said, "Well, ready to work this time round?" Her immediate reaction was, "Boy, am I ever! "(Autobiography of a Sufi, 1977:vii).

Feuerstein (1991) describes the radical style of initiation into spiritual values of "crazy-wise" adepts who seek to jolt their apprentices out of their cognitive boundaries by using trickery, clowning, obscenity or threats, and frequently employ the breaking of taboos associated with drugs, sex, and nudity. A uniquely American and secularized version of "holy madness" seems to surface among Orrin Klapp�s five different kind of American heroes. Klapp (1962) identifies the "Winner" (or smooth operator), the "Splendid Performer" (which would correspond to the "crazy wise" characteristics of Trickster and Clown). Stone, in his study of Werner Erhard�s image, adds the "Versatile Entrepreneur" (one who is successful at a wide field of endeavor) to Klapp�s list of heroes. As the examples below demonstrate, Gold embodies these characteristics of the American folk hero, as does Werner Erhard, and other "exemplary prophets" (Weber, 1946) arising out of the Human Potential Movement.

Stone (1982) notes the appeal of the American mythic hero, the snake oil salesman, the brash and outrageous huckster whose behavior assaults the norms of genteel respectability. The 1960�s witnessed a revival of interest in cynical heroes like the "con artist" the "smoothie" and "sharpie," according to Orrin Klapp (1964). Stone (1982) argues that contemporary Americans are inclined to trust the con artist hero, once he has been identified as such, if only because they can predict that his behavior will always be based on self interest. Like Werner Erhard (Stone, 1982), Gold�s "bad act" has turned away some potential followers but it has intrigued others. One Montreal core group leader claimed it was exactly this quality that initially drew him to Gold:

A friend of mine was telling people he�d met a real teacher. I decided to check it out. Then I got the whole truckload dumped on my head. �Interesting!� I thought. �It�s either true or else this guy al-Washi has the most phenomenal way of dealing with people, or else he�s the most incredible con man going.� My initial reaction was either this is right on and there is nothing else to do, or else I�m being totally conned, and either way this is a good place to hang out because if I�m being conned I want to find out how, so it won�t happen again, and if not there is nowhere else to be.

The theme of fakery and chicanery is rife in IDHHB literature. One poster, for example, blatantly advertised "Fake Sufi Dancing/ Snake Fufi Dancing." The Shakti Handbook (1974) features a photograph of Gold and his wife posing in white robes and turbans at the entrance to a Disneyland cardboard mosque. The cover of Autobiography of a Sufi displays Gold sporting an obviously false wig and beard. In The Seven Bodies of Man (1989:iv) Gold tells us how he was engaged in a dinner conversation with a wealthy dowager who was about to write out a generous donation to the IDHHB. Gold, at that moment, impulsively bends forward, leering and drooling into her plate, and begins spouting nonsense—causing his would-be benefactor to close her bank book and retreat in disgust. Paradoxically, this strategy is often successful as a "double bluff," attracting experienced seekers who have learned to be wary of the hustle of "fake" or incompetent gurus on the North American spiritual scene.

Gold plays the role of charlatan or quick-change artist in his public appearances. When this researcher attended an IDHHB "sufi dance," Gold bounded into the room, clad only in a loose dhoti and a turban decorated with a sequined dollar sign. When Gold visited the Montreal Shakti center in August 1973, he appeared for his lecture in an orange sari, his eyes ringed with kohl and spoke for several minutes on samadhi with a thick Indian accent. Then he turned around, whipped off the sari, wiped his face clean, and donned a fez and moustache. Suddenly he was Mr. Gurdjiev, talking to the sophisticated Moscovites in his rustic Russian accent. Next, he proceeded to mime a Kentucky farmer humping his mule while declaring in a southern drawl that any activity could become a path to spiritual awakening. He concluded this performance by asking his audience what criteria they would use to distinguish between a "real" and a "fake" master?

Gold once described himself as "a master of the anticlimactic punch line." A brilliant comic (his students claim he once worked professionally as a stand-up comedian in Hollywood nightclubs) he will eloquently build a suspenseful narrative only to conclude with a feeble, meaningless punch line. The puzzled silence which ensues is explained as "equivalent to a Zen koan." He maintains, however, that the purpose of his humour is to administer shocks to "wake up the machine." When a woman in the Chronic workshop complained, "I love your sense of humour, but when are you going to tell us something useful?" he explosively denounced her "ignorance" and reduced her to tears—but then kindly explained that through telling jokes he could "convey information more quickly."

At the "Chronic" workshop in 1984, Gold told us the tale of how he went out and got his first job at fourteen. He walked into a large New York City department store and asked to speak to the manager, who assumed he was offering his services as a delivery boy. "I�m not applying for a specific job," Gold said. "What I want is your permission to hang around for three days and observe how this store operates. Then, when I find a job that needs to be created I will apply for it." Sure enough, the young Gold drew up a proposal for a high level managerial post and the manager, impressed by his initiative, awarded it to him. For "Chronic" participants, the moral of the tale was, "I�m not offering you a job, I�m encouraging you to create your own."

One of the most baffling features of Gold�s leadership is his sudden, shocking aberrations in behavior which are referred to as "turn offs" and "gross outs" by his disciples. Gold�s teaching method is rationalized by core group leaders as a test of loyalty:

The sufi way of malamah... which means the real master offers the student an excuse to leave, so he does something to destroy his own credentials, so that only the serious, discerning student will remain....

Feuerstein offers an alternative explanation; that the "crazy wisdom" method of administering shocks is to awaken the disciples. Cybele Gold provides a striking example of this pedagogical method during her birthday party in the mid-sixties:

Mr. Gold smilingly and gracefully cut a piece of cake for me, and suddenly smushed it in my face, inviting me afterward to do the same to him.... Pretty soon everyone was laughing and throwing cake around the room. �Remember this is food and food is sacred!� he shouted.... I said, �Hey, I need to go and shower.� So I went upstairs and turned on the water but before I could close the door or take off my clothes, Mr. Gold and a few of the older students ran in and grabbed me.... There we stood in our party clothes... in this very small shower stall with melted wet cake running down our socks and over our toes (My Life with Mr. Gold, Part III, by Cybele Gold: no pagination).

A well-known spiritual therapist and colleague of Gold, Claudio Naranjo, describes a particularly outrageous terror tactic perpetrated by Gold on his unsuspecting followers:

Let me tell, as an instance, how after a certain night of snowing, E. J. managed to convince everybody that they were not only snowed in, but (through simulated radio news to the effect that the orientation of the North Pole was rapidly changing) created a confusion to the effect that a new glaciation age was upon us. After some time of illusionism those present were convinced that they would never be able to get out of the house and that the best they could do was to prepare for death by lying down on the floor and listening to readings of the American Book of the Dead. And so they did, for days, I was told (The Seven Bodies of Man, by E. J. Gold, 1989:xv).

A similar event occurred at the "Christmas party" held at the Crestline California headquarters in 1973. Visitors arriving were greeted by a "guard" dressed in Nazi uniform carrying a toy machine gun who informed them that they were entering a Nazi concentration camp. Several students balked at this prospect and turned back home, but the 300-odd members who remained spent three days living in a crowded room, ate only lentils, peanut butter and water, were deprived of adequate sleep and were issued passes to go to the outhouses, escorted by the "guards." At the end of the third day, "Herr Commandant" Gold descended the spiral staircase to the bottom landing with his fellow "officers" (all wearing Nazi uniforms) and proceeded to perform a slapstick comedy which "broke up" the prisoners-until Gold announced it was their turn. Everyone had to stand up and entertain the company for five minutes. Then one hundred single dollar bills came floating down the staircase, and Gold announced it was time for a "beer bash," which reputedly turned into a "drunken orgy" (Palmer, 1976:17-19).

Paradoxically, Gold�s students appear to derive a sense of security from the surrendering to the insecurity of their relationship with Gold. One woman who had lived in the Grass Valley community for five years commented:

Sometimes he will ask you to do something that is stupid, pointless and then he will yell at you for being stupid enough to obey him. He�ll say, �Don�t listen to me! What the Hell makes you think that I know what I�m doing!�

Throughout its ephemeral experiments, the Institute for the Development of the Harmonious Human Being has retained its name and only changed its location once: from Crestline to Grass Valley, California in the early eighties. Its membership is composed of four levels: at the top of the pyramid is the founder E. J. Gold, but he sometimes shares his pedestal with colleagues. Between 1974 and 1980 he formed a charismatic duo with his (now estranged) wife, Cybele, with whom he coauthored two books (Gold & Gold, 1976; 1977). The editorial page of the Shakti! magazine, for example, lists "Babaji al-Washi and Mataji Kalinanda" as "founders." Other spiritual teachers—distinguished mime artists, Rabbis, sufi masters, and HPM therapists—collaborate on occasion with Gold, and float in and out of his schools to lecture or conduct workshops. Former Gold disciples (Gestalt therapist, "Sheikh Yassun Dede" of Vancouver, and mime artist/puppeteer "Bob" in Winnipeg, for example) still consider Gold to be their "master," but pursue independent careers, creating and directing their own spiritual schools. One noteworthy "crazy wise" graduate is "Rex" of the Hell�s Angels, who met Gold in the early 70�s:

Rex was sitting in one of those all-night bikers bars in L. A., when E. J. walked in, sat down and started talking, got the gang�s attention, and talked all night. The next morning a bunch of bikers rode up to Crestline to participate in the Work. Most of them dropped out, but [Rex]... well, he�s greasy, fat and obscene, and we think he�s pretty obnoxious... but E. J. considers him now a master in his own right.(2)

Rex was a writer for Penthouse magazine and after meeting Gold continued to write the fake erotic testimonials for the Forum column, but began to inject his pornographic stories with hidden "teachings" and "spiritual clues," in response to the advice of Gold who claimed that Penthouse readers are really looking for spiritual, not sexual highs—but they don�t know it yet, because sex is the closest they�ve come to the "waking state." Rex works exclusively within biker gangs, seeking to transform them into "secret mystery schools."

The second level is formed by "Core Group," the circle of 50-odd long-term disciples, family and friends who live on or near the Gold estate in Grass Valley, California. Core Group members report that living with Gold involves intense spiritual training. These disciples compose, edit and print IDHHB literature, rehearse the traveling puppet shows and plan the ongoing experimental "schools." Annual workshops are held at the IDHHB (most recently the "Bardo Boot Camp"), and many of the Core Group leaders are beginning to form small spiritual groups of their own.

The third layer of the hierarchy is represented by local "Study Circle Leaders"—who originally joined a local "school," survived its "debriefing," and accepted Gold�s invitation to join in the "Work." Study circle leaders often move into the centers and live communally following their sudden promotion to full-blown teachers and proselytizers in Gold�s latest "school" where they are "put on the spot" and must learn to take risks in what turns into a crash course in "crazy wisdom." They must invent ordeals for their students, and draw upon their own, innate source of "holy madness." Many of these Study Circle Leaders join the Grass Valley community on a temporary or permanent basis.

The bulk of membership is provided by the lowest stratum—the ephemeral "students" who sign up for one of the schools, become "sufis," "puppeteers" or "thanatologists," but rarely survive the "debriefings," the "gross outs" or the organization�s subsequent metamorphosis into a new NRM. Intending to explore dimensions of sufism, sci fi, mime, shamanism, gestalt, etc., these students are puzzled by the scientific flavor and Gnostic underpinnings of the literature. They are likely to be "turned off� by Gold�s weird sense of humour and by the flimsy, "phony" quality of the institutions. When the "school" is debriefed after a few months or weeks, they are invited to join in the "Work." If they ask "What is the Work?" they are told, "When you are ready for the Work, you will know what the Work is." Very few respond to this challenge.

The attrition rate at this level is very high. In Montreal, for example, between 1973-1974, around 300 young people drifted through the Shakti! training but not one of them signed up for the freshly-concocted Wud Sha Lo, (Palmer, 1976). Very little effort is made to retain these lower level members, for they are viewed as unwitting and expendable "guinea pigs," recruited for the benefit of Core Group and Study Circle leaders who need practise in honing their "crazy wisdom" teaching skills.

Gordon Melton�s Encyclopedia of American Religion (1984) cites the IDHHB�s 1988 membership figures, which claim 250 members in the 20 U.S. centers, and 50 members in 5 Canadian centers. These figures fluctuate according to how successful the most recent "spiritual school" has been in its recruiting efforts. While no random membership survey has been conducted on the IDHHB, on the basis of participant-observation in the 1973 Shakti! "white room training," and the 1984 "Chronic" workshop in New York City, a rough sketch of Gold�s following might be attempted, as follows: Around 80% are U.S. citizens, and the rest Canadians and Europeans, and perhaps 40% of Gold disciples are Jews. Their ages range from 25 to 40 with a few older, Jewish couples in their sixties.

The Core Group and Study Circle leaders might be described as experienced spiritual seekers; people who, by their own account, were disillusioned with the more "world-rejecting" NRMs (Wallis, 1984) like the Divine Light Mission, or dissatisfied with the commercialized, unwieldy institutions of more "world affirming" NRMs like Scientology and Arica. While they appreciated the spiritual training offered in "world rejecting" groups, they were too sophisticated to imbibe their totalistic world views, and too individualistic to tolerate their authority patterns. As for the "world affirming" groups, they found their teachings watered down, popularized and their clientele overcrowded and undiscriminating. IDHHB leaders tend to be well-versed before encountering Gold�s ideas in some of the more sophisticated and intellectual mystical literature available in the counter-culture: with authors like Carlos Castaneda, Idries Shah, Herman Hesse, Sufi Sam, P.D. Ouspensky, and sacred texts like the Way of the Pilgrim, the Philokalia, the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Already familiar with the "crazy wisdom" aesthetic, they were attracted on first encountering the IDHHB by its aura of romance, mystery, adventure which Gold and his Core Group exude so potently.

One of the most puzzling aspects of Gold�s operation is the apparent reckless wastage of human resources and money. Much of their advertising is ineffective; for their posters are so subtle it is highly unlikely the public would recognize these as invitations to spiritual work. For those few who do respond, it can be very difficult to locate the centers, or get permission to attend meetings. Once inside the door, the aspiring initiate is often put through daunting tests. One study circle leader described her initiation as follows:

I first wandered into a second hand Science Fiction store called Cowachin, and I noticed the clerk was acting strange like a robot, repeating the phrases of his customers and moving in a jerky, mechanical fashion. My friend and I were amused, but as we left, he handed us a flyer advertising a "Sacred Dance" demonstration. We decided we had stumbled upon a secret Gurdjiev group after seeing the dance, which was like the Sacred Gymnastics. So, we called the bookstore several times, but they put us off for weeks. When Gary went to visit Cowachin, the young man behind the counter denied that there was anything spiritual going on. Meanwhile we saw all these cryptic posters showing a fat lady from the back sitting at a soda counter, labeled "Objective Thinking" with no explanation, just the phone number of the bookstore. Finally, after several weeks, they phoned and invited us to an evening meeting.

It appears obvious that the group�s inaccessibility at certain phases, and the obscure references used in their advertising would limit their appeal to a fairly sophisticated clientele. Only those who were familiar with In Search of the Miraculous, Castaneda�s books, or the Nasruddin stories would be likely to persist. One member, steeped in the lore of Gurdjiev and Hesse, described herself as "mad with spiritual desire" when she first encountered Gold�s movement:

[I] felt very lost... I was reading a lot of Gurdjiev, but it made me feel a sort of calling to something inside me. I would meditate every morning before I went to work, but when I got back in the evening everything seemed meaningless and unreal. I would feel a pain in my chest as if something were tugging at me, and would get into my car and drive and drive. I was hoping to meet someone or see a sign, but all I saw were shopping centers, Howard Johnsons, parking lots...

This state of mind evidently rendered her receptive to the mystification and baffling ordeals presented by the IDHHB.

Wallis argues that the sect, previously defined as a splinter movement from a church, can also evolve out of a cult-type of religious organization. According to his redefinition of a sect, the latter is understood by its members to be uniquely legitimate as a means of access to truth or salvation, as opposed to the cult which, like the denomination, is conceived by its members to be pluralistically legitimate—that is but one of a variety of paths to salvation (Wallis, 1975). The IDHHB, in a paradoxical fashion, appears to combine certain features of a cult with certain characteristics of a sect and might be analyzed as composed of constantly shifting, concentric layers of "cult-like" and "sect-like" communities. Gold appears to trigger these transformations and separate or combine these layers through what Weber (1936) termed charismatic displays. Some of his displays (like his millenarian/ survivalist prophecies) enhance his authority and intimidate students into withdrawing into the womb-like world of the sect. Other displays (like his "debriefings," "turn offs" and "gross outs") appear to be deliberate attempts to diminish his authority and send students away.

The IDHHB is "cult-like" in that it has developed an eclectic synthesis of ideas and practices which are available in the prevailing "cultic milieu." It is "loosely organized, with no clear distinction between members, non-members, tolerant of other groups and beliefs, and often transitory" (Wallis, 1975:41). Gold appears to be on good terms with other religious leaders emerging out of the Human Potential Movement—leaders like Oscar Ichazo, Jose Silva, Claudio Naranjo, Werner Erhard and Pir Vilayat Khan—and freely draws upon their techniques and ideas. Gold�s "schools" share many of the characteristics of weekend intensive therapies in the HPM, noted by Stone (1976), including multiple participation, eclecticism and no expectation of organizational loyalty. Above all, Gold�s organization, like the ideal-typical "cult," grants its members the freedom to determine what constitutes acceptable doctrine—that is, it operates on the basis of "epistemological individualism."

A deeper examination of the authority patterns and ideology of the IDDHB, however, suggests that it is really a sect masquerading, or posing as a cult. First, the ideology only seems to change or fluctuate. Gold is actually expressing the same basic ideas over and over again in different languages. Underlying his eclectic forays into sufism, Tibetan Buddhism, Gurdjiev "ideas" and Christian/Jewish mysticism is the same concern. This concern might be characterized as a neo-Gnostic quest for knowledge, a search for the shaman�s power of flight and control over the soul�s destiny. Gold�s cathartic ordeals to "awaken the machine" are not so very unlike Scientology�s "process" of "erasing engrams" and ultimately unveiling the omniscient, omnipotent, immortal being Hubbard identified as the "thetan." Gold�s eschatology is expressed in its purest and most comprehensible form in the "Grapefruit Rap" audio tape, which is often played for students shortly before their school is "debriefed." In this lecture, Gold uses the metaphor of the grapefruit to explain how one can feed and strengthen the Essential Self through engaging in irritating work to "wake up the machine."

The IDHHB�s highly controlled leap-frogging between religious traditions, each language highlighting a new facet of Gold�s revealed Truth, serves to underscore the inadequacy of traditional attempts to encapsulate the sacred. For Gold students, these deceptive departures into ecumenism demonstrate the ineffable nature of spiritual life and the urgent necessity for first hand experience. When Gold spreads the fan of his dazzling doctrinal kaleidoscope, rather than implying a message of epistemological pluralism, he is convincing his students that religious traditions offer no more than distorted glimpses of partial truths, and that only a living enlightened master can provide the necessary stimulus for real spiritual growth. While Gold savors the wisdom of other traditions, he also pokes fun at their rules and taboos, and he mimics or mocks their holy men. This establishes his own credentials as a "real master." While Gold�s illusory openness, pluralism, and cynicism is what might initially appeal to experienced and jaded seekers who have learned to be wary of authoritarianism—in the end, they must turn to him as the final repository of revealed Truth and submit to the extraordinary rigors of the "Work"—or leave. The conviction members cherish—that they are part of an elite "mystery school"—reoccurs in the interviews and published testimonials of members. Cybele reports her experience of dancing in a circle with the IDHHB Core Group and suddenly feeling dizzy—then receiving an hallucination of Gold, his features transforming into those of Gurdjiev, the great Russian mystic—and realizing the true identity of the IDHHB dancers as Gurdjiev�s reincarnated community at Fontainebleau ("My Life with Mr. Gold," Part I—no date).

Gold reveals his own sectarian stance in a dialogue with Claudio Naranjo concerning "the internal conflicts that have so far kept the human potential movement from realizing its own potential." Whereas Naranjo describes the HPM as "the democratization of psychotherapy," Gold insists that "for every one individual who goes through transformation, there are a thousand who just go through the motions ... if you have the intensity, you don�t need the belief system" (Magical Blend magazine, Vol. 29, January, 1991:25). Thus, he upholds the notion of the elite, the elect or chosen few, characteristic of a sect (Wallis, 1975:42-43). In response to Naranjo�s assertion that the "global predicament" requires that salvation should become the destiny of a greater number of human souls, Gold cuts in:

Gold: Don�t say it; the numbers are the same.

Naranjo: There has to be a larger number for the....

Gold: No, it�s the same number, and it always will be.

Wallis argues one of the main distinctions between a cult and a sect is that, as a result of its individualistic nature, the former maintains weak boundaries between its own ideology and competing ideologies in the cultic milieu. Hence, "members typically move between groups and belief systems" (Wallis, 1975:42). This does appear to be the case for the short-term students involved in the 11 "schools." A careful scrutiny, however, of the long-term members� careers suggests that the IDHHB might, in fact, be described as a self-contained replication of the surrounding "cultic milieu." Gold�s close disciples, experienced "seekers" and avid readers of the wide range of occult and mystical literature available to participants in the counter-culture, have evidently found within the IDHHB a playing field for spiritual experimentation and innovation. They can sample California�s abundant "spiritual supermarket" (Greenfield, 1973) without even venturing outside the boundaries of the IDHHB. Their "conversion careers" are speeded up as they dress up as sufis one year, Hassidic dancers or Christian angels the next. Their energies are absorbed in role playing as they assume the doctrinal certainty of a "sufi" or "Franciscan" and set up new centers and proselytize. While superficially maintaining these public roles and sectarian stances, they are inwardly cultivating a detachment from all "religious trips," and are relativizing these competing authoritative claims. One Shakti! leader noted:

I had just come out of the Divine Light Mission where we used to stand on the street and hand out literature. Now, after Shakti! came out, I found myself back on the street, wearing white robes and a turban, handing out this weird literature I didn�t understand myself. A friend saw me and got really worried. He used to play bridge with my old husband. I tried to tell him it was a game, that I was only playing at being the brainwashed religious nut—I was now watching myself in this role—but he didn�t understand. He kept saying, �I�m worried about you, L—, let�s go for coffee and talk about it!�

The unusual features of the IDHHB resemble some of the "major puzzles" that Wallis (1982: 106) confronted when studying the Children of God:

... the rapidity and extent of change, the willingness continually to ... break down the institutional structures so laboriously created, and the frequent turnover in leadership; the constant ambiguity and contradiction as to approved belief and practice; the perpetual movement; the tensions between open and closed attitudes to membership ... and between freedom and control, and finally, the relative indifference to prophetic failure ....

Wallis� variation (1984) on Weber�s theory of charisma suggests a promising framework for interpreting Gold�s career. Wallis sees the deviations in Moses David�s career, his abrupt volte faces, his series of failed "world�s ends" his doctrinal improvisations, as explicable strategic responses to the perennial problem every charismatic leader confronts: that of "creeping institutionalization." By pruning his followers so that only the most loyal remain, by overturning the institutions leaders have set up, and depriving them of "tenure of office," Mo is able to keep his creativity unbridled, and to remain the sole direct access to truth.

At the August 1984 Chronic workshop, Gold delivered a speech asserting that his aim was not to build a large corporation, but to "keep the family business running"—to show his friends how to "operate the corner store." His dearest wish, he claimed was to "retire from the business," to "hand over the keys—both sets of keys." It became clear as a participant observer in Shakti!, that the purpose of Gold�s enterprise was not to build a large membership, nor to make money. I was puzzled by what appeared to be his reckless inefficiency when I observed over the summer of 1973 how the core group managed to collect a group of 20-odd students to enroll in the Wednesday night "White Room Training," and how these students eagerly anticipated the visit of "Pir al-Washi," and how they responded to one of Gold�s abusive tantrums in which he dismissed them as a "high school debating club"—a ritual "turn-off" which drove all but three students away. One leader noted in retrospect that this experience was for her "... a real lesson. We worked hard to find those people—we had a nice little group going and he had to come long and ruin it! I really resented it, but now I appreciate that E. J. was giving me the opportunity to learn." This and other accounts seem to support my argument that the purpose of these experimental schools was to provide a challenging learning environment for young spiritual teachers. Indeed, it appears that the most outrageous antics perpetrated by circle study leaders on their unsuspecting students received the greatest approval from headquarters:

All of a sudden we found ourselves distributing this weird Shakti literature. I hardly had time to study it myself before we were teaching it. I couldn�t believe anyone would respond to this stuff. We�d put up posters announcing sufi storytelling evenings with the words "Objective thinking" and nothing but our address. No one would call, then suddenly a bunch of people would arrive out the blue and we�d have to scramble to set up a class. We kept calling Core Group and asking "what do we do next?" and they�d just say "Use your initiative, keep them working. You guys have no imagination." It seemed the more ridiculous things you could make people do, the more approval you got.

One ex-member described her first workshop as follows:

I was shown into a room and told to sit there until my guru told me what to do. I kept waiting for someone to come and give me instructions. After a while I noticed all these lollipops—hanging from the plants, under the cushions, the curtains... I figured this was some kind of test, so I began to collect them and ate one—but I never found out if I�d passed the test or not. Next we were told to put on diapers, bonnets and knitted booties, and we played all afternoon in a huge playpen, saying "goo" and "gah," and building block castles, and drinking out of oversize baby bottles. Later, when I got to know Lucille she told me she was in a panic because she�d received no instructions about this workshop, so she invented these exercises at the last minute.

Another informant recalled how she received a phone call at 4:00 a.m. inviting her to a cocktail party commencing in half an hour, and how she scrambled to dress appropriately and found herself sipping cocktails and listening to jazz at the Shakti center by 5:00 a.m.

If the divagations in Gold�s career are to be explained as another instance of "resistance" (Wallis, 1982)—a strategy to avoid the rigidity, compartmentalization and complacence that tend to "settle in" once a movement becomes large, successful, and institutionalized, surely the extraordinary degree and refinement of the IDHHB�s planned instability is unnecessary and overdone. Gold�s postmodernism, his sophisticated and self-conscious conceptual artistry, closer to the tradition of John Cage than to America�s great new religious founders like Mary Baker Eddy and Joseph Smith—"makes sense" as conceptual art and also as a new pedagogy; the endeavor to provide a stimulating learning environment, an exclusive academy for talented "interns" in the "crazy wisdom" tradition.

The phoenix-like quality of Gold�s schools, each one born out of the ashes of the last might be perceived as a dramatization of Gold�s eschatology, in which death and rebirth play a prominent part. Disciples must get used to living "between lives" in the "transit state," so that their anonymous passage from mask to mask, their shamanic ability to transform into sufis, robots or Japanese puppets, is understood as practice for future conscious rebirths. From a sociological perspective, the participation of IDHHB members in role-playing exercises and in creating and destroying institutions might be seen as a means of cultivating skills and attitudes to cope more efficiently with the pressures and precariousness of modern life, identified by neologisms like "role overload" (Glendon, 1985), "future shock" (Toffler, 1974) and "facework" (Goffman, 1976). In this respect, Gold�s movement accommodates our pluralistic, fragmented and rapidly changing society.

But Gold moves far beyond encouraging accommodating attitudes towards "mainstream culture," and the docile indifference this stance implies. Pervading IDHHB literature is an euphoric celebration of the American Way, a vision of U.S. urban life in its bustling, incongruous vulgarity, as a glamorous frontier and playground for spiritual hustlers and adventurers. Its patriotic message might be compared to the Book of Mormon which informs us that the Lost Jews of the Old Testament are alive and well in the Americas, and that Jesus appeared to us over here. Gold�s books, particularly The Avatar�s Handbook and The American Book of the Dead, preach a similar message of spiritual nativism, and promise endless "Journeys to the east" in suburban malls. They tell us you don�t have to cross the Caucasus with Gurdjiev�s White Russian refugees to find mystery and adventure: you don�t need to travel to Turkey or to Persia to find secret sufi masters; that you can stumble over them in Alex�s Borscht Bowl in Manhattan, in Disneyland, or in small town laundromats. Failing that, you can create your own postmodernist "mystery school" out of brash commercial symbols and American folk motifs.

Zarestky and Leone (1974) see NRMs as providing an important outlet for individual needs, community services, and free enterprise that is part of the American heritage, but is stifled by the large corporations and the universalistic norms of today�s society. They see "cult conversion" as "a folk answer to a system that is over-diploma-ed, over-certified, too specialized ... it is the last voice for decentralization and the free enterprise system" (1974:xxxvi). The IDHHB stands out as an extreme expression of this entrepreneurial spirit.∆

—Susan Palmer, Department of Religious Studies, Dawson College, Montreal, Quebec.

Campbell, Colin (1972) "The cult, the cultic milieu, and secularization" A Sociological Yearbook of Religion in Britain 5:119-36.

Ellwood, R. S. (1973) Religious and Spiritual Groups in Modern America. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.

Feuerstein, Georg (1991) Holy Madness: The Shock Tactics of Crazy-Wise Adepts, Holy Fools, and Rascal Gurus. New York: Paragon House.

Gold, E. J. (1973) Shakti: The Gestalt of Zap. Crestline, CA: Core Group Publication.

Gold, E. J. (1974) The Butterfly of Retribution. Core Group Publications.

Gold, E. J. (1974) You Look Somehow Familiar Forever. Core Group.

Gold, E. J. (1975) American Book of the Dead. San Francisco: AND/OR Press.

Gold, E. J. (1975) The Joy of Sacrifice: Secrets of the Sufi Way. And/Or Press.

Cybele & E. J. Gold (1976) Beyond Sex. Crestline, CA: And/Or Press.

Cybele and E. J. Gold Joyous Childbirth: The Conscious Birth. Crestline, CA: And/Or Press.

Gold, E. J. (1978) Autobiography of a Sufi. Nevada City, CA: And/Or Press.

Gold, E. J. Applying the Science of Conscious Death, Rebirth, and Awakening: As Taught By E. J. Gold. (1977 pamphlet).

Gold, E. (1977) Secret Talks with Mr. G. (1979) Vols. 1 & 2. IDHHB inc. Nevada City, CA.

Gold, E. J.(1990) Pure Gesture: Macrodimensional Glimpses of Other Realities. Nevada City, CA: Gateways Fine Art Series.

Kanter, Rosabeth Moss (1972) Commitment and Community: Communes and Utopias in Sociological Perspective. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Klapp, Orrin (1962) Heroes, Villains and Fools: The Changing American Character. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Stone, Donald (1976) "The Human Potential Movement," pp. 93-115 in The New Religious Consciousness, Robert Bellah and Charles Glock, eds. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Stone, Donald (1982) "The Charismatic Authority of Werner Erhard," pp. 141-175, in Millennialism and Charisma by Roy Wallis (ed.) Belfast: The Queens University.

Wallis, Roy (1975) "The Cult and its Transformation" in Sectarianism. Great Britain: Peter Owen Limited.

Weber, Max (1946) Essays in Sociology by H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills, eds. New York: Oxford University Press.

(1) Gold related this biographical account on the occasion of his visit to Montreal in August, 1973.