Cosmic Suicide is the definitive study of the Heaven's Gate cult. Consisting of neither tabloid trash nor New Age pabulum, it details the group from its origin in the early 1970's to the sensational mass suicide in 1997. By providing perspective and insight into the cult's attitudes and beliefs, Cosmic Suicide places Heaven's Gate within a historical context of millenarian movements. The book gives intimate details about the cult's doomsday philosophy, including the influence of Christianity, UFOs, and conspiracy theories. These factors prompted the androgynous believers to think that the passing of the Hale-Bopp comet would usher the UFO Crew into the Next Level of human evolution. Bizarre facts are revealed about the cult's lifestyle, including the odd monastic rituals designed to indoctrinate new members. In fact, the text features a rare transcription from a recruitment meeting held in Dallas in early 1994. It also contains extensive appendices, which include leader Marshall Applewhite's autopsy report and numerous documents of otherworldly propaganda. Cosmic Suicide is an indispensable reference for anyone interested in learning the real truth behind this strange End Times religion.
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Cosmic Suicide gives more than a glimse into a bizarre realm of alien messiahs, their doomsday prophecies, and their starry-eyed eunuchs. By distinguishing between media disinformation and the grisly truth, the authors thoroughly examine the weird belief system and the transcendent demise of Heaven's Gate. Supplemented by the group's Internet propaganda and Marshall Applewhite's autopsy report, Cosmic Suicide also unveils the dark secrets of apocalyptic groups while it explains humanity's ongoing obsession with the end of the world.
About the Author
Rodney Perkins and Forrest Jackson wrote this book for presentation at the Center for Study on New Religions (Cesnur) in Amsterdam, NL in 1997.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
All Hail Hale-Bopp,
By charles (The Peach State) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cosmic Suicide: The Tragedy and Transcendence of Heaven's Gate (Paperback)
Suicide cults! Apple sauce! Sexless androgenoids! Sure there are satanic cults, drug cults, Ufo cults, Christ cults, Hip hop cults, beenie-baby cults, Ebay cults, and even tupperware cults, but none come close to the inspired zaniness of Doe's Heaven's Gate cult. I've been an observer of cults for most of my adult life and I must admit that I've got a soft-spot in me for all of them. Many books are written in the aftermaths of these cults and most are a boring lethargic read. Victims families are trotted out for the dog & pony show and stoic lawmen denounce the "crimes". NOT IN THIS BOOK! Here, Forrest Jackson and Rodney Perkins become entrenched in the genesis of the Heaven's Gate cult as well as interpreting the parallels with other cults and pull back the veil on our own cult dominated society, exposing our fetishes for some cults and our poison hatred of others. Not only is this book a fun read because of the scalpel-altered DOE and his suicide-prone squad of comet pilots, but this book takes it's subject matter seriously, and never in a Bugliosi tone of superiority. The closest equivalent that I can think of to this book in terms of cult research is MESSENGERS OF DECEPTION by Dr. Jacques Vallee. COSMIC SUICIDE is one of the best books written about the Heaven's Gate cult, hands down and it's written from the desk of someone who did the leg work and circumvented all the idiot editorializing that this book would have been subjected to had it been published by a major publishing house. To put it simply... if cults are your thing... especially the Heaven's Gate cult.... then BUY THIS BOOK!
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Infomative, interesting, unbiased, a must read,
By A Customer
This review is from: Cosmic Suicide: The Tragedy and Transcendence of Heaven's Gate (Paperback)
This is one of those rare gems that is both informative, and interesting. It covers a lot more ground then just the history of the heavens gate cult. There are Ideas on why our society is causing a rise in such splinter groups. Most books about cults tend to be either biased, or boring; this is neither. First rate journalism, unpretentius writing, concise and to the point style, make this an enjoyable must read for any one who desires to be socialy aware.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A quite humane approach,
By
This review is from: Cosmic Suicide: The Tragedy and Transcendence of Heaven's Gate (Paperback)
The reasoning and worldview of religious minorities are often difficult, impossible even, to understand for an outsider. What he or she sees as completely bizarre and incomprehensible is for the believer quite normal and natural. Not rarely is there a major clash when the two worldviews meet, and history is thus filled with conflicts between dominating religious beliefs and exotic and strange groups.
The "UFO-cult" known as Heaven's Gate is one of the most notorious new religious movements in modern times, with the media going into a genuine frenzy after their well-known mass suicide in San Diego in 1997 where close to forty members lost their lives. They were convinced that an extraterrestrial spacecraft was hidden behind the comet Hale-Bopp, an idea planted in them by their leader Marshall Applewhite. However, the fact that such (in)famous UFO people as radio host Art Bell and author/abductee Whitley Strieber were positive to this idea was definitely not an obstacle in the strengthening of the beliefs of the soon-to-be victims. The pictures of the alleged spacecraft were proven to be hoaxes, and mainstream science declared the comet to be just that: a very ordinary comet. Still, that did nothing to quench the suicidal ideas. Perkins' and Jackson's book is a thin little thing with a little more than 100 pages. However, the small scale doesn't mean the quality is low. It was originally published in 1997, the same year the tragedy took place, and is filled to the brim with interesting facts about Heaven's Gate, its history, and worldview. A worldview that, when it comes down to it, wasn't really that different from other, more established religions. Using a comparative approach the authors show how different parts of the ideas can be found in other religions and/or in earlier eras. The language is easy to understand, so you don't have to be a scholar of religion to benefit from the reading. The text is furthermore filled with miscellaneous little stories and details that many other essays and studies about the group have left out or ignored. These stories and details might not provide a better comprehensive picture of the group, but they sure make the reading more fascinating. Still, the fact that the book was published in 1997 makes the section about the internet, quite understandably, feel somewhat outdated, and I must say that the conclusion that Applewhite founded the movement as a result of his homosexuality and the negative response from the Christian church is very weak indeed. But it's nonetheless a book worth reading, primarily due to the understanding it offers. Alternative religious movements are often hard to grasp, but by reading this book one will gain a somewhat thorough understanding of why the members did what they did, how they viewed their bodies more as "containers" than bodies, and how they as a result of this regarded their actions not as suicides per se. They simply moved on to a different level. The greatest insight offered by the book, however, is that readers will learn about other "normal" people, who chose to do something radically different and incomprehensible while at the same time being able to rationalize it completely, at least according to their view of the world.
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